Read Beneath the Stain - Part 7 for Free Online Page A

giving in to tears.
    “I couldn’t stand it, Kell, if you didn’t want to be my brother anymore. Mackey, I didn’t think anyone could forgive what I did. So I thought I’d die with the way we used to be, all fixed up in my brain, and then you guys would have to deal with the fallout.” The look he gave Mackey was bitter with self-hatred. “You should recognize my methods by now.”
    Mackey swallowed. “I was pissed,” he rasped, “but I didn’t even blame you. You got no idea what it took for me to tell the fucking world. And I was pretty sure my mother loved me.”
    Grant laughed humorlessly. “Mine doesn’t. Not anymore. She’s said so. But that’s okay. See, your mom came in and told me you all were coming, and I realized for once, I didn’t have to take the coward’s way out. For once I could do things aboveboard, like a man. So I came out to my family—about all of it. About you, about Tony—”
    “Tony?” Mackey said, so stunned he didn’t even have a chance to be sick.
    “We were friends,” Grant said quickly. “That’s all. But we were friends because we knew about each other—and I should have known. I’m sorry, Mackey. I should have fucking known, but I kept thinking if I could do it, so could he. I used to think he was real brave, remember?”
    “We both did,” Mackey said numbly, although they’d never talked about it. It had been there in the way Grant had kept Tony off of Kell’s radar, in the way he’d been kind.
    “I guess nobody’s that brave when they think they’re gonna be alone forever,” Grant said, his voice so bleak that Mackey turned his head and dropped a kiss on his blade of a shoulder, poking the fabric of his sweatshirt up in a tent.
    “Yeah,” he rasped. “You got that right.”
    Grant kissed his forehead, and Kell cleared his throat.
    “You guys, uhm….”
    “Let’s get to the barn,” Grant said. “I’ll rest there, and I need to get this out.”
    “Like a swing,” Mackey said, looking at Kell. Kell nodded, and hell, Trav had them working out enough. They linked arms behind Grant and, very carefully, picked him up in the cradle of their clasped hands.
    They didn’t talk much, because even wasted away like he was, he was still a grown man and Mackey was still short, but they got him into the barn without too much huffing and puffing, and that was a relief.
    They set him on a little throne of hay bales and then sat next to him, one on either side.
    He grabbed Mackey’s hand, free and clear, and Mackey let him and stroked the skeletal back of Grant’s hand softly with his thumb. It was something he’d gotten used to with Trav in the past year, just casually touching someone he loved in public. It was something Grant would never have. Kell looped an arm over Grant’s shoulder.
    “Lean on me, brother,” he said softly. “I’m not afraid of you.”
    Grant tilted his head so it was on his brother’s shoulder, and they sat there for a few moments, the darkness and animal warmth inside the barn sort of a welcome relief from the autumn chill and the hard, bright sun.
    “Trav’s inside with my lawyer,” Grant said. “Mackey, I do hope he loves you, because I’m asking something huge from all of you.”
    “Like what?” Mackey asked, afraid of the answer.
    “I want you to look after Katy— not ,” he added quickly, probably responding to the panic and outrage on Mackey’s face, “full-time. Or even most time. But the lawyer is making sure you can take her for up to a month a year. And any time you drop by, my family has to let you see her. Officially, you and Kell are her godfathers, but really….” He pulled in a breath and let it out, and the pause was so long Mackey wondered if he was going to finish. “You’re her salvation,” he said after a moment.
    “I don’t know anything about kids,” Mackey muttered, meeting Kell’s eyes. Kell looked as panicked as he felt, which was reassuring. “God, Grant, I can barely keep a ficus