Page 189 of Whisper

A barstool squeaked next to him. He closed his eyes. Damn it, he didn’t want to deal with anyone, not tonight. Ironic, though; the first time he wanted to be left alone, someone made their move. One day before, and he’d have spun with a smile, investigated the man until he determinedyesorno. To fuck or not to fuck.

“I’m not interested,” he said, not looking up.Take a hint.

A man settled beside him, propping his forearms on the bar top. In the entire length of the bar, not a single other seat was taken. He’d sat right next to Kris. On purpose.

And he wasn’t leaving. Kris felt the hot stare of the stranger’s gaze against the side of his face.

“Look—” Kris grabbed his drink and twisted. God help this man, interrupting his soul searching, his goodbye to David, on this night. He glared, his eyes sharpened to daggers. “I’m not—”

David gazed back serenely.

David blinked. Once. Twice.

The Martini glass hit the floor. Shattered, splintering into a billion fractional pieces, as many pieces as Kris’s heart had broken into, his soul.

Kris’s mouth moved, but nothing came out. His mind wouldn’t work. Memories erupted from behind the locked doors of his brain: an explosion, the ground shaking. A strike team moving through black smoke in a cramped mosque. Finding an open trunk, a car on fire. A body, burned black, turned to ash. David’s smile as he drove Hamid onto the base. David’s headstone in Arlington.

David,dead.

Except, David was sitting six inches from him, close enough Kris could feel the heat of his body. Could smell him, smell the soap and his skin, like moonlight and sundrenched sand and jasmine, something that had been purely David.

David had changed. A decade did that to a person, especially if they were alive. Lines creased his face, around his eyes, deeper than before. He sported a short beard, dark strands streaked with gray and trimmed close to his skin. His hair was longer, curled on the ends. He wore jeans and a long-sleeved shirt, and a simple green canvas jacket.

His eyes, which had always been event horizons for Kris, the edges of David’s soul, rough borders where they merged and became one, glittered. His light was marred, though. Where once galaxies had shone, sorrow tinged his gaze.

Kris’s chest heaved, his breaths coming hard and fast, speeding up until he was gasping, struggling to breathe. Was he imagining this? Had he just lost it, his final grip on reality? His gaze darted left and right, landed on the bartender, heading his way with a frown.

“Everything okay?” The bartender’s gaze went from Kris to David and back. “You two all right?”

Kris bobbed his head, something between anoand ayesand awhat the fuck?

“We’re fine,” David said smoothly. “The glass slipped. We’re sorry.”

The bartender stared for another long moment and then nodded. Strode away.

“David?” Kris hissed.

That washisvoice.David’svoice. But David wasdead. He wasdeadandgoneand Krisknewthat because he’dnevercome back. He’d never reached out for Kris, had never tried to find him. He’d seen David’sbody, for fuck’s sake. He’d seen burned bones, piles of ash. A man didn’t walk away from that. There was a fucking headstone with David’s name on it, just across the river. There were fucking bones beneath the ground. “What thefuck?”

“I didn’t know you were alive,” David breathed. “I didn’t know.”

“You didn’t know—” Kris boggled, almost bit off his tongue. His eyes nearly popped out, and he just barely restrained himself from grabbing David. Shaking him and shaking him, slapping him across the face so hard his palm burned. You couldn’t slap a ghost, right? “What— Where— How—”

The bartender was glaring at them again. Kris’s gaze bounced from David to the bartender, around the bar. People were staring.

David grabbed his arm, pulled him off the barstool. “Come here,” he murmured in Kris’s ear.

God, David’stouch. Kris melted, the very center of him going liquid, just like he had sixteen years ago in the mountains of Afghanistan. David’s hand on his body, the too-close brush of their presences. He followed behind David, powerless to stop. Once, he would have followed David anywhere. Would he follow David’s ghost, too?

David led him into the bathroom, locked the door behind them.

He took his time turning to face Kris, though.

A million questions formed at once, as soon as David pulled away.How? Where? Why?Each clamored to be asked first, demanded to be heard. His breath sped up again. His body trembled.

“I thought you were dead,” David whispered. He leaned against the locked door, his hands behind his back. He stared at Kris, sorrow bleeding from his gaze.

“That’smyline,” Kris hissed. “That’s whatIsay. Because I saw your fucking body! I saw your fucking corpse! And they took you from me and they buried your bones in the fucking ground!” He heard his shouts bounce off the walls, echo in the cramped bathroom. “Youdiedover there! I saw you die!”