The atmosphere in the safehouse became awkward and stifled. For all that they were immortal lovers bound at the soul, the pair didn’t tend to touch a lot around company; they didn’t really need to anymore, not when they could have entire conversations with a glance and an expression, not when they could show affection with a gesture.
They’d grown out of the need to touch all the time to know the other was there. They were in the longest relationship in the world and had found that, centuries after the honeymoon period and after the comfortable symbiosis that came even within a normal human lifespan, there came an almost psychic connection.
They knew each other so thoroughly that they almost lived their lives together in a ballet of movement, instinctive and practised. There was always a kind of energy between them, a tension that connected them like a spider’s web, sensitive to movement.
As unspoken and invisible as this connection between them was, it was still like a shout in the dark when there was something wrong. Andy had noticed a subtle tension in Nicky’s shoulders when she’d walked into the kitchen and found him cooking breakfast.
She was sitting eating a bowl of cereal opposite Nile, who was sleepily drinking her coffee at the table, when Joe walked in. He greeted them with a ‘good morning’ and took his own seat at the table and Andy immediately knew that something had disturbed the connection between the two men.
She couldn’t quite make out the shape of the upset between them, a rare occurrence but not unheard of, but shook her head and turned her attention back to her cereal. She knew it was there, but neither of the boys looked injured or unduly distressed; she’d keep an eye out but leave them to it.
Nile, for her part, was preoccupied with trying to wake up. Dreams of Quynh drowning under the sea still made her restless in her sleep, even though they were coming less frequently and for less time now. She didn’t mention them to the others because there was no point; no one could do anything and she didn’t want to torture Andy with the knowledge she already had, that Quynh was suffering on her own.
She sat back when Nicky put a plate of scrambled eggs, toast and bacon down before her, offering him a smile and a ‘thank you’. Nicky gave her one of his subtle half-smiles in return and she might have seen that something was bothering him if she knew the team better, if she wasn’t so tired.
Andy had begged off a cooked breakfast so Nicky put another plate sans bacon down before Joe and sat with his own in the seat beside him.
He watched his beloved as the man pushed the eggs around the plate a little, noticed the way Joe had tensed up when he sat down. He picked up forkful of his own eggs but they seemed clotted and awkward in his mouth.
Joe had taken maybe one or two bites before he put his fork down, pushing back from the table.
“Joe?” Nicky queried softly, immediately, the concern in his voice putting a crack in Joe’s heart.
“Not hungry.” He responded, trying for a reassuring smile but failing utterly. He stepped away from the table. “I’m going to lie down.” He informed, notably not glancing anyone’s way. He didn’t have to say that Nicky’s company wouldn’t be welcomed, Nicky could tell.
He knew that Nicky would be hurt by his exclusion, but he’d rather that than risk telling Nicky what he’d dreamed. What he’d done in the dream, how he’d liked it. He’d rather Nicky hurt a little than hate him a lot, and if that killed him a little more inside well, he could barely tell against what he already felt.
Nile came to Andy in private later that evening to ask about the other two.
“Joe hasn’t come out of the bedroom since breakfast and Nicky isn’t in there with him. What’s going on?”
Andy had shrugged and told her that even partners of 900 years had the occasional spat or problem. She advised that Nile stay out of it and let them get on with it; she never knew the pair to go to bed angry and they’d work it out eventually.
There was a tone in Andy’s voice when she said that which seemed to suggest that she’d intervene if they didn’t and Nile was left uncertain but placated.
It was more usual for Nicky to need time out to decompress – he was more of an introverted soul than Joe’s usual extroversion – but it wasn’t unheard of for Joe to retreat to some quiet place by himself. He usually spent his time drawing or reading or getting lost in the meditative repetition of cleaning his blade; it was stranger for him to just want to lie in bed though, and stranger still that he’d deny Nicky a place beside him.
Nicky hadn’t disturbed him since breakfast and had instead busied himself tidying the kitchen and the living room, cleaning his own weapons and then preparing lunch. He made a list of some things they might need to buy shortly and then spent some time sparring somewhat half-heartedly with Nile. He hadn’t been any less competent than he usually was, but Nile could still tell he was distracted, even after being thrown over his shoulder to the floor.
From time to time Nicky would approach the bedroom he shared with Joe, looking like he wanted to push the door open and leaving each time without doing so.
He was even quieter than usual, but while he’d been busying his hands with different tasks he’d been turning only one subject in his head over and over again. What could have inspired this mood in Joe?
He’d gone over his memory of the day before, trying to find something that might have upset Joe to this extent, examined their night and bedtime ritual to see if there had been anything there that he’d missed. The last week or two had been hard on all of them; trying to not address Andy’s mortality until she felt ready to do so, shuffling the group dynamic with Nile and without Booker.
Joe had been sick with anger at Booker’s betrayal, but Nicky didn’t think that was the cause of Joe’s sudden withdrawal.
They’d gone to bed last night like any other night, showered together, curled up in bed together with Joe behind him as always. They hadn’t had sex that night but Joe had woken Nicky that morning with the familiar feel of his hardness grinding in against the small of Nicky’s back.
It wasn’t unusual for one or both of them to wake up like that, and it was often that Nicky had come awake with Joe’s mouth or hand around him, or that Nicky woke Joe rubbing his bare ass up against Joe’s hard on, ready and willing.
So that had happened this morning and Nicky had reached back at Joe’s dreaming moan, letting Joe grind against him and just providing a little more friction. He’d been quiet, listening to Joe groan in pleasure in his sleep and wondering what it was he was seeing, wishing he could see.
Joe’s orgasm had woken him and, Nicky realised, it had been then that everything had gone sideways. It was unusual for Joe, for any of them really, to get sick, but when they did their bodies usually healed themselves before it got really bad. Okay, they had died a time or two during the various plagues that had hit the world, normally as they tried to serve as healers, but something like food poisoning or a stomach bug should clear out of their bodies within minutes.
That was another thing – if it was food poisoning it would have been from something Nicky cooked, considering that he usually took that job for himself. He liked looking after his family that way, liked providing for them all like that, but if Joe was sick because he’d overlooked the date on the chicken or something similar he’d have to kick himself.
So what could have happened? Joe had eaten something that disagreed with him and it was because Nicky had been negligent while cooking. Or-
Or Joe hadn’t wanted Nicky’s touch on him while he was sleeping. They had standing consent between them for somnophilic acts like that, but maybe it wasn’t wanted this time? Maybe he’d missed something.
Either way, Nicky was at fault, enough that Joe was avoiding him.
Nicky had left Joe lunch in a plate in front of the closed door, knocking to tell him it was there. He had to collect it by the time dinner rolled around and it seemed untouched, like Joe hadn’t eaten at all.
Joe didn’t come out for dinner either, and the mood at the table was awkward and tense. Nicky pushed his food around his plate much like Joe had done with breakfast that morning; Nile, who had been shooting looks at Nicky now and again, made as if to say something but was stopped by a sharp shake of Andy’s head.
If Nicky knew they were having a silent conversation about him, he didn’t say.
“Nile and I will do the dishes.” Andy commented when it looked like Nicky had no intention of eating. “You’ve been cooking all day.” She looked like she wanted to say something about Joe but was holding her tongue about it for the moment.
Nicky understood that Andy was giving him the chance to go speak to Joe and he nodded with a quiet ‘grazie’ as he left the table.
Joe had spent the day curled around his pain on the bed, lying as far away from the place where Nicky had slept as he could. He didn’t want the familiar, comforting smell of his partner near him, not while he could still see himself jerking off to the way Keane had brutalised Nicky, not when he could hear his own voice conducting Nicky’s torture.
He’d gone over the dream again and again in his mind, shocked and disgusted at his actions, punishing himself for every time he refused to save Nicolo, every time he’d directed Keane to do harm to his love.
He’d barely noticed the time passing, ignoring his hunger and the ache that being away from Nicky like this caused. He missed the brief touch of Nicky’s hand in his hair, how he could slip fingers across the soft curl of Nicky’s shoulder in a quiet caress, missed the air between them as they sat on different chairs and read different books. He missed Nicky.
He said nothing now when there was a knock on the door and Nicky said he was coming in. He heard the door open and then close in succession, could feel Nicky’s hesitation before he made his way over to Joe on the bed. Joe wanted Nicky to reach out and touch him. He wanted Nicky to leave the room before Joe could try to put his hands on him.
“Yusuf? Love? How are you feeling?” Nicky asked in Arabic just for him, his voice soft and hushed, the tone of worry and hesitation in there making Joe’s stomach twist.
“I’ll be fine.” He said back shortly, unmoving, wishing Nicky would leave, hoping he’d come closer.
Of course Nicky came to him. He felt the movement of the bed, the mattress dipping under Nicky’s slight weight as he came to join him. He felt the familiar warmth of Nicky behind him and the way Nicky’s hand hovered, unsure like it should never be, above his shoulder.
He flinched when it landed and the breath Nicky took in as he withdrew his hand sounded like he’d been wounded.
“Yusuf.” Nicky implored, but his voice sounded less broken than it had when he’d begged Joe for help in his dream, the way he’d begged and Joe had laughed at him for it. “Please. What’s going on?”
Joe couldn’t respond, couldn’t say anything to that. How could he tell Nicky what he’d seen without losing him?
Silence strained between them, Joe’s breathing hard and steady like he was concentrating on doing so, Nicky’s fluttering with anxiety and the raw pain of uncertainty.
“If this… this is because of this morning, isn’t it?” Nicky asked. Joe lay still and felt cold, like all his blood had rushed out of his body – how could Nicky know? Had he spoken in his sleep?
“I’m sorry.” Nicky said, and Joe couldn’t have been more surprised to hear it. “I just thought, whatever dream you were having, I thought I could help you through it. I didn’t mean to upset you or… I didn’t mean to touch you when you didn’t want it. Yusuf. I’m sorry.”
Joe finally sat up at that, feeling sick again but this time because Nicky thought he’d done something to provoke this, sounding sick at himself the way Joe felt.
“Habibi, no.” He turned and took Nicky’s hand. Nicky couldn’t seem to make eye contact, so Joe curled a finger under his chin, encouraging him to look up. “You haven’t done anything, luce dei miei occhi.”
He hadn’t kissed Nicky in that dream and he couldn’t stop himself from leaning in now to press his lips chastely against Nicky’s temple in soft apology.
“You haven’t done anything.” He said again. “There’s nothing you could do; I’ll always want your touch.” It wasn’t strictly true, but it was in that moment. “I’m just feeling a little under the weather. I’m sorry I’ve been distant today.”
He hadn’t noticed how his strange behaviour had weighed on Nicky until he saw that burden lighten with his words. It made him ache and he reached out to take Nick in his arms and pull him close, seeking for a kiss that was granted.
“Ana bahibik. Ya rouhi.” I love you. You are my soul. He felt desperate for Nicky in that moment, the same kind of desperation that he felt every time Nicky died and took a moment to come back. It felt ridiculous, suddenly, to deny himself any time with Nicky while they still had each other, and he pushed his hand up underneath the well-worn tshirt Nicky was wearing to clutch at the skin and bone underneath.
Nicky made a helpless, shuddering sound into the kiss and Joe was overcome. Nicky’s hands were tugging at his shirt now and he broke apart only to pull it off and then similarly disrobe Nicky before they came back together, their mouths clashing as though magnetised.
“Ana bahibik.”
“Ti amo.”
They gasped declarations of their love for one another against each other’s mouths, Nicky tugging his jeans open and pushing them down to his knees, shifting awkwardly to kick them off without breaking the kiss.
Joe pulled his own sweatpants down but left them around his knees as he kissed Nicky, running the flat of his hand down over Nicky’s chest, over a nipple, down to stroke over his side, to catch hold of his hip.
Nicky took hold of Joe’s hand and brought it to his mouth, pressing a kiss to Joe’s fingertips before he took one into his mouth, his eyes already dark with pleasure and fixed to Joe’s face.
The dream he’d had jolted into the forefront at that gesture, Joe remembering Keane’s thick fingers gagging his beloved, how he’d stopped him only because he was impatient to see Keane fuck Nicky.
His half-hardness softened immediately and he reared back from Nicky, detaching himself entirely until he was standing at the side of the bed. Nicky was still a little breathless, knelt up on the bed with his jeans puddled behind him on the mattress, still half-hard himself and reaching out to Joe.
“I can’t, I’m sorry, I can’t do this.” Joe said, hectic and frenzied, pulling up his sweatpants hurriedly and all but bolting for the door.
“Yusuf!” Nicky cried out behind him, startled and worried at once.
“I’m going out, I’ll be back later.” He threw over his shoulder as he left the bedroom. He stalked straight past the kitchen where Nile and Andy turned to watch as he grabbed a coat from the stand by the door and left abruptly.
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timeasmymeasure
Re: FILL: Nicky/Joe, imaginary Nicky/Keane, noncon, part 2b
Date: 2020-08-13 09:10 pm (UTC)They’d grown out of the need to touch all the time to know the other was there. They were in the longest relationship in the world and had found that, centuries after the honeymoon period and after the comfortable symbiosis that came even within a normal human lifespan, there came an almost psychic connection.
They knew each other so thoroughly that they almost lived their lives together in a ballet of movement, instinctive and practised. There was always a kind of energy between them, a tension that connected them like a spider’s web, sensitive to movement.
As unspoken and invisible as this connection between them was, it was still like a shout in the dark when there was something wrong. Andy had noticed a subtle tension in Nicky’s shoulders when she’d walked into the kitchen and found him cooking breakfast.
She was sitting eating a bowl of cereal opposite Nile, who was sleepily drinking her coffee at the table, when Joe walked in. He greeted them with a ‘good morning’ and took his own seat at the table and Andy immediately knew that something had disturbed the connection between the two men.
She couldn’t quite make out the shape of the upset between them, a rare occurrence but not unheard of, but shook her head and turned her attention back to her cereal. She knew it was there, but neither of the boys looked injured or unduly distressed; she’d keep an eye out but leave them to it.
Nile, for her part, was preoccupied with trying to wake up. Dreams of Quynh drowning under the sea still made her restless in her sleep, even though they were coming less frequently and for less time now. She didn’t mention them to the others because there was no point; no one could do anything and she didn’t want to torture Andy with the knowledge she already had, that Quynh was suffering on her own.
She sat back when Nicky put a plate of scrambled eggs, toast and bacon down before her, offering him a smile and a ‘thank you’. Nicky gave her one of his subtle half-smiles in return and she might have seen that something was bothering him if she knew the team better, if she wasn’t so tired.
Andy had begged off a cooked breakfast so Nicky put another plate sans bacon down before Joe and sat with his own in the seat beside him.
He watched his beloved as the man pushed the eggs around the plate a little, noticed the way Joe had tensed up when he sat down. He picked up forkful of his own eggs but they seemed clotted and awkward in his mouth.
Joe had taken maybe one or two bites before he put his fork down, pushing back from the table.
“Joe?” Nicky queried softly, immediately, the concern in his voice putting a crack in Joe’s heart.
“Not hungry.” He responded, trying for a reassuring smile but failing utterly. He stepped away from the table. “I’m going to lie down.” He informed, notably not glancing anyone’s way. He didn’t have to say that Nicky’s company wouldn’t be welcomed, Nicky could tell.
He knew that Nicky would be hurt by his exclusion, but he’d rather that than risk telling Nicky what he’d dreamed. What he’d done in the dream, how he’d liked it. He’d rather Nicky hurt a little than hate him a lot, and if that killed him a little more inside well, he could barely tell against what he already felt.
Nile came to Andy in private later that evening to ask about the other two.
“Joe hasn’t come out of the bedroom since breakfast and Nicky isn’t in there with him. What’s going on?”
Andy had shrugged and told her that even partners of 900 years had the occasional spat or problem. She advised that Nile stay out of it and let them get on with it; she never knew the pair to go to bed angry and they’d work it out eventually.
There was a tone in Andy’s voice when she said that which seemed to suggest that she’d intervene if they didn’t and Nile was left uncertain but placated.
It was more usual for Nicky to need time out to decompress – he was more of an introverted soul than Joe’s usual extroversion – but it wasn’t unheard of for Joe to retreat to some quiet place by himself. He usually spent his time drawing or reading or getting lost in the meditative repetition of cleaning his blade; it was stranger for him to just want to lie in bed though, and stranger still that he’d deny Nicky a place beside him.
Nicky hadn’t disturbed him since breakfast and had instead busied himself tidying the kitchen and the living room, cleaning his own weapons and then preparing lunch. He made a list of some things they might need to buy shortly and then spent some time sparring somewhat half-heartedly with Nile. He hadn’t been any less competent than he usually was, but Nile could still tell he was distracted, even after being thrown over his shoulder to the floor.
From time to time Nicky would approach the bedroom he shared with Joe, looking like he wanted to push the door open and leaving each time without doing so.
He was even quieter than usual, but while he’d been busying his hands with different tasks he’d been turning only one subject in his head over and over again. What could have inspired this mood in Joe?
He’d gone over his memory of the day before, trying to find something that might have upset Joe to this extent, examined their night and bedtime ritual to see if there had been anything there that he’d missed. The last week or two had been hard on all of them; trying to not address Andy’s mortality until she felt ready to do so, shuffling the group dynamic with Nile and without Booker.
Joe had been sick with anger at Booker’s betrayal, but Nicky didn’t think that was the cause of Joe’s sudden withdrawal.
They’d gone to bed last night like any other night, showered together, curled up in bed together with Joe behind him as always. They hadn’t had sex that night but Joe had woken Nicky that morning with the familiar feel of his hardness grinding in against the small of Nicky’s back.
It wasn’t unusual for one or both of them to wake up like that, and it was often that Nicky had come awake with Joe’s mouth or hand around him, or that Nicky woke Joe rubbing his bare ass up against Joe’s hard on, ready and willing.
So that had happened this morning and Nicky had reached back at Joe’s dreaming moan, letting Joe grind against him and just providing a little more friction. He’d been quiet, listening to Joe groan in pleasure in his sleep and wondering what it was he was seeing, wishing he could see.
Joe’s orgasm had woken him and, Nicky realised, it had been then that everything had gone sideways. It was unusual for Joe, for any of them really, to get sick, but when they did their bodies usually healed themselves before it got really bad. Okay, they had died a time or two during the various plagues that had hit the world, normally as they tried to serve as healers, but something like food poisoning or a stomach bug should clear out of their bodies within minutes.
That was another thing – if it was food poisoning it would have been from something Nicky cooked, considering that he usually took that job for himself. He liked looking after his family that way, liked providing for them all like that, but if Joe was sick because he’d overlooked the date on the chicken or something similar he’d have to kick himself.
So what could have happened? Joe had eaten something that disagreed with him and it was because Nicky had been negligent while cooking. Or-
Or Joe hadn’t wanted Nicky’s touch on him while he was sleeping. They had standing consent between them for somnophilic acts like that, but maybe it wasn’t wanted this time? Maybe he’d missed something.
Either way, Nicky was at fault, enough that Joe was avoiding him.
Nicky had left Joe lunch in a plate in front of the closed door, knocking to tell him it was there. He had to collect it by the time dinner rolled around and it seemed untouched, like Joe hadn’t eaten at all.
Joe didn’t come out for dinner either, and the mood at the table was awkward and tense. Nicky pushed his food around his plate much like Joe had done with breakfast that morning; Nile, who had been shooting looks at Nicky now and again, made as if to say something but was stopped by a sharp shake of Andy’s head.
If Nicky knew they were having a silent conversation about him, he didn’t say.
“Nile and I will do the dishes.” Andy commented when it looked like Nicky had no intention of eating. “You’ve been cooking all day.” She looked like she wanted to say something about Joe but was holding her tongue about it for the moment.
Nicky understood that Andy was giving him the chance to go speak to Joe and he nodded with a quiet ‘grazie’ as he left the table.
Joe had spent the day curled around his pain on the bed, lying as far away from the place where Nicky had slept as he could. He didn’t want the familiar, comforting smell of his partner near him, not while he could still see himself jerking off to the way Keane had brutalised Nicky, not when he could hear his own voice conducting Nicky’s torture.
He’d gone over the dream again and again in his mind, shocked and disgusted at his actions, punishing himself for every time he refused to save Nicolo, every time he’d directed Keane to do harm to his love.
He’d barely noticed the time passing, ignoring his hunger and the ache that being away from Nicky like this caused. He missed the brief touch of Nicky’s hand in his hair, how he could slip fingers across the soft curl of Nicky’s shoulder in a quiet caress, missed the air between them as they sat on different chairs and read different books. He missed Nicky.
He said nothing now when there was a knock on the door and Nicky said he was coming in. He heard the door open and then close in succession, could feel Nicky’s hesitation before he made his way over to Joe on the bed. Joe wanted Nicky to reach out and touch him. He wanted Nicky to leave the room before Joe could try to put his hands on him.
“Yusuf? Love? How are you feeling?” Nicky asked in Arabic just for him, his voice soft and hushed, the tone of worry and hesitation in there making Joe’s stomach twist.
“I’ll be fine.” He said back shortly, unmoving, wishing Nicky would leave, hoping he’d come closer.
Of course Nicky came to him. He felt the movement of the bed, the mattress dipping under Nicky’s slight weight as he came to join him. He felt the familiar warmth of Nicky behind him and the way Nicky’s hand hovered, unsure like it should never be, above his shoulder.
He flinched when it landed and the breath Nicky took in as he withdrew his hand sounded like he’d been wounded.
“Yusuf.” Nicky implored, but his voice sounded less broken than it had when he’d begged Joe for help in his dream, the way he’d begged and Joe had laughed at him for it. “Please. What’s going on?”
Joe couldn’t respond, couldn’t say anything to that. How could he tell Nicky what he’d seen without losing him?
Silence strained between them, Joe’s breathing hard and steady like he was concentrating on doing so, Nicky’s fluttering with anxiety and the raw pain of uncertainty.
“If this… this is because of this morning, isn’t it?” Nicky asked. Joe lay still and felt cold, like all his blood had rushed out of his body – how could Nicky know? Had he spoken in his sleep?
“I’m sorry.” Nicky said, and Joe couldn’t have been more surprised to hear it. “I just thought, whatever dream you were having, I thought I could help you through it. I didn’t mean to upset you or… I didn’t mean to touch you when you didn’t want it. Yusuf. I’m sorry.”
Joe finally sat up at that, feeling sick again but this time because Nicky thought he’d done something to provoke this, sounding sick at himself the way Joe felt.
“Habibi, no.” He turned and took Nicky’s hand. Nicky couldn’t seem to make eye contact, so Joe curled a finger under his chin, encouraging him to look up. “You haven’t done anything, luce dei miei occhi.”
He hadn’t kissed Nicky in that dream and he couldn’t stop himself from leaning in now to press his lips chastely against Nicky’s temple in soft apology.
“You haven’t done anything.” He said again. “There’s nothing you could do; I’ll always want your touch.” It wasn’t strictly true, but it was in that moment. “I’m just feeling a little under the weather. I’m sorry I’ve been distant today.”
He hadn’t noticed how his strange behaviour had weighed on Nicky until he saw that burden lighten with his words. It made him ache and he reached out to take Nick in his arms and pull him close, seeking for a kiss that was granted.
“Ana bahibik. Ya rouhi.” I love you. You are my soul. He felt desperate for Nicky in that moment, the same kind of desperation that he felt every time Nicky died and took a moment to come back. It felt ridiculous, suddenly, to deny himself any time with Nicky while they still had each other, and he pushed his hand up underneath the well-worn tshirt Nicky was wearing to clutch at the skin and bone underneath.
Nicky made a helpless, shuddering sound into the kiss and Joe was overcome. Nicky’s hands were tugging at his shirt now and he broke apart only to pull it off and then similarly disrobe Nicky before they came back together, their mouths clashing as though magnetised.
“Ana bahibik.”
“Ti amo.”
They gasped declarations of their love for one another against each other’s mouths, Nicky tugging his jeans open and pushing them down to his knees, shifting awkwardly to kick them off without breaking the kiss.
Joe pulled his own sweatpants down but left them around his knees as he kissed Nicky, running the flat of his hand down over Nicky’s chest, over a nipple, down to stroke over his side, to catch hold of his hip.
Nicky took hold of Joe’s hand and brought it to his mouth, pressing a kiss to Joe’s fingertips before he took one into his mouth, his eyes already dark with pleasure and fixed to Joe’s face.
The dream he’d had jolted into the forefront at that gesture, Joe remembering Keane’s thick fingers gagging his beloved, how he’d stopped him only because he was impatient to see Keane fuck Nicky.
His half-hardness softened immediately and he reared back from Nicky, detaching himself entirely until he was standing at the side of the bed. Nicky was still a little breathless, knelt up on the bed with his jeans puddled behind him on the mattress, still half-hard himself and reaching out to Joe.
“I can’t, I’m sorry, I can’t do this.” Joe said, hectic and frenzied, pulling up his sweatpants hurriedly and all but bolting for the door.
“Yusuf!” Nicky cried out behind him, startled and worried at once.
“I’m going out, I’ll be back later.” He threw over his shoulder as he left the bedroom. He stalked straight past the kitchen where Nile and Andy turned to watch as he grabbed a coat from the stand by the door and left abruptly.