End of the Line by Nicky James

NINETEEN

Leopold

When I had slipped into unconsciousness, it had been while in Killian’s world, near the train tracks, freedom within my grasp. I’d been full of life. Full of adventure and happiness, despite the crushing weight of the cold I’d caught. When I awoke, I was back in my old world. The one I’d left behind. The one I’d run from. The one I swore I would never be part of again.

And I felt worse than death.

And I was alone.

Most people who were taken away in an ambulance ended up in a hospital, sharing a room with someone they didn’t know who was notably worse off and had character traits that grated on the nerves. I knew this because of the dozens of movies I’d watched over the years.

But when your family was one of the wealthiest in the world, that wasn’t the case.

When I opened my eyes, soft sunlight bled through the sheer curtains that hung over floor-to-ceiling windows on the north side of the room. I didn’t know where I was, but I could guess. The room was expansive with plush carpeting, decorated with elegant white furniture, surrounded by pale-yellow walls. Oil paintings were dispersed throughout, and fresh flowers filled a vase on a small table near the entryway.

I was tucked into a king-size bed with a heavy, down-filled comforter covering me. An IV line ran from my wrist to a machine. A scattering of instruments and medications covered the bedside table. I was weak and profoundly tired but not nearly as delirious as I’d been when I’d jumped from the train earlier then faced a barrage of police officers.

Had that happened? The quality of the memory was spotty and felt more like a dream.

Had that been today? Yesterday? How long had I been asleep?

The double doors across the room opened, and a man I didn’t know came through. He had expressive white eyebrows, a bushy white mustache, and salt-and-pepper hair cut in a tight fade. He was tall and slender and wore a white coat over a crisp dress shirt and light gray slacks. A stethoscope hung from his neck. A pair of reading glasses were folded in the breast pocket of the shirt.

“Ah, you’re awake. Good.” He spoke German, and I knew right away he’d been brought in specifically at my father’s request. The man was likely overqualified to deal with the common cold, but Father wouldn’t have it any other way.

My throat was dry, and my lips stuck together when I tried to speak. “Where’s my father?”

“He’ll be in to see you shortly.” The man removed the glasses from his pocket and fit them on his nose before checking a chart he retrieved from the bedside table. “He’s been waiting for my call to let him know when you’re awake. Let me take your temperature and see how you’re doing.”

I let him fuss, checking my temperature, my blood pressure, and fiddling with the IV bag on the machine as I pieced together the events from earlier. My chest pinched when images of Killian being shoved into a police cruiser flashed through my head. A sob climbed my throat. My eyes flooded, and the room blurred.

What had happened?

In a flash, I was coughing and sobbing, devastated at the turn of events. I still didn’t understand. How had we been found? Why had they arrested Killian? Why not me?

“Take this.” The doctor held a small medicine cup filled with thick red syrup.

I took it. A hint of menthol and bitter cherry coated my throat, and within a few minutes, my coughing fit calmed. My chest still spasmed with my tears, but I tried to wipe them away and find composure.

“Where am I?” I asked, my voice hoarse and broken.

“Still in the city.”

The doctor, who hadn’t bothered introducing himself, changed out my IV bag, explaining he was giving me another dose of antibiotics. I shuffled, trying to pull myself into a sitting position. My arms trembled, and the act alone wore me out. I was in clean underwear and a crisp white T-shirt. A robe hung over a chair beside the bed, and when I considered reaching for it, intent on getting up and finding out what was going on, the doctor tsked.

“You’ll pull your IV out doing that. You need to rest. You’re unwell. Stay in bed. I’ll call your father.”

“I’m fine. Get this thing out of my arm. I want to talk to Father now. I need to leave. I need…” I needed a lot of things. Answers mostly. And Killian. I needed Killian.

The doctor rested a staying hand on my arm. “You won’t be leaving any time soon, I’m afraid.” He glanced at the doorway, and I wondered who was on the other side. “I’ll call Mr. Van Eschen. Leave the IV. You have a severe bronchial infection, and you’re dehydrated.”

With a warning glare, the older man crossed to the doors. He didn’t close them when he left, and I craned my neck, trying to see into the other room, but my view was obstructed. I wondered which hotel my father had accosted this time. Or was it some luxury high-rise apartment?

A rumble of men’s voices came from the other room. I cocked an ear, listening. It was hard to make out what was being said above the raspy rattle in my lungs. The syrup had calmed my cough, for which I was grateful.

A moment passed. The voices went silent, then Stefan appeared at the doorway, his jaw set, his spine stiff. He was tall and broad with dark features and a military haircut. Had father made his life a living hell after I’d run? Had he blamed Stefan and Harlan for what had happened?

Behind Stefan, I caught sight of a man in uniform. A police officer. Maybe I hadn’t escaped trouble.

“May I come in?” Stefan asked in a hushed tone, his deep baritone rumbling with authority.

“Where’s Father?”

“He’s on his way. He had matters to attend to. Should be here shortly.”

I wanted answers, and Stefan had been there earlier when they’d taken Killian away. Maybe he knew what was going on.

“Why did they arrest Killian?”

“Who’s Killian? Is he the boy you were with?”

“Yes. Where is he?”

Stefan wandered into the room and glanced over his shoulder once before he spoke. The officer hung close.

Stefan’s tone was hushed, and I wondered if he was supposed to be talking to me, but the officer hadn’t stopped him. “Your friend made a concerning phone call when you were back in Moose Jaw. We traced it to an area by the train yard, and it was easy to assume you were continuing this way since we lost track of you in Winnipeg. We had a general idea of where you were going and how you were traveling. The most reasonable location for your next stop was here in Calgary, but on the off chance you went farther, we had officials prepared to move in other cities too. Anywhere the train stopped. You’ve been slippery as an eel, Leo.”

His words churned in my brain. They didn’t make sense. “Killian called you? He wouldn’t do that.”

“He called the hotline your father had set up with the authorities. It was unsettling. He made demands for information he should have known nothing about, so we knew it was authentic. But it was the threats he made that put your father over the edge.”

“Threats?”

“He said if we didn’t meet his demands for answers, no one would ever see you again. That is a threat, Leo. Your father took it personally. Your friend is in a lot of trouble.”

“But that’s preposterous. Killian wouldn’t do that. He wouldn’t—”

“I heard the recording myself. He spoke those words. And others. The implication was he was holding you against your will.”

“No!”

Stefan held up a hand. “His phone was recovered in pieces at a warehouse outside Moose Jaw. Video surveillance showed you both together on the street with a few other people who have yet to be apprehended.”

Willow and Tyler. Oh god. Would they be arrested too?

“I don’t understand. Killian didn’t kidnap me. You know that. I wasn’t taken. You chased me after… when… w-when…” My skin blistered with goose bumps. In the muddy waters of fever and Killian’s arrest, I’d almost forgotten about Barrett.

Once again, I couldn’t breathe.

I touched my throat where a lump formed. My skin blistered, and sweat trickled down my temple. “Is… Did…” A soft whine rose beyond the blockage in my throat, and new tears filled my eyes. “Barrett… is he…”

“He lives.” Stefan’s voice was soft. Careful. “He was rushed to the emergency room and underwent surgery. You did a number on him. He spent over a week in intensive care.”

Stefan’s words hit like a truck. The air burst from my lungs in a great gust, and I clung to the sheets, digging my fingernails into the fabric to ground myself. Barrett was alive. It was a huge weight off my shoulders, but at the same time, a tremulous fear bled out of my belly and seeped through my veins.

He was out there.

“Leo.” Stefan’s voice was more tender and gentler than I’d ever heard it. He stepped forward and sat on the edge of the bed.

When I lifted my gaze, his face blurred. Hot tears ran in rivulets down my cheeks. “Why haven’t I been arrested? I stabbed him.” My hands shook, and I felt the sticky slickness of blood on my fingers, under my nails. The copper scent invaded my nose.

I wiped my hands on the bedsheets.

With another glance toward the doorway, Stefan put a finger to his lips, indicating I should speak quietly. “For all intents and purposes, you have been arrested. The police have this room secured and are waiting to question you in regard to the incident in Montreal. You are not a free man right now. Your father asked that they do so quietly and not draw attention to what is happening. He wants it to stay out of the media.”

Of course. No wonder they hadn’t slapped me in cuffs. No wonder I was in a private hotel or apartment somewhere. Father always had his ways.

“Barrett is still in the hospital. He’s weak but recovering. He won’t speak to anyone. The police have tried to question him over and over, but he stays silent. They feel his silence is suspicious enough. Most people who are attacked want justice, but he says nothing. Harlan and I…” He sighed and picked at a loose thread on the covers. “Leo, we suspected… We knew there was something between you both. Something… intimate. We kept our heads turned out of respect, which we both knew went against your father’s orders, but it wasn’t technically happening during our shifts, so we let it go.”

I stayed quiet as Stefan explained. He wet his lips and checked the door again. The officer stood in the archway, arms crossed over a barrel chest, his back to us. I knew he was listening.

“Barrett was always a little abrasive. A mouthpiece with the other men. One of those people who talked shit just to hear himself. He was a cocky sonofabitch. He wasn’t liked. Something about him bothered us. The things he’d say. The way he acted. Harlan and I started keeping tabs on him during our days off. We watched him closely. He has an aggressive edge. Tried to pick fights. We learned about his taste for young men not too long after we started watching him. He took to the clubs several times a week when he wasn’t on duty and would leave with young boys not much older than you. We watched him rough them up in back alleys while he had his way with them. More than once, we almost broke cover and stepped in to help, but the boys he took always seemed to go along with it.”

“He what?” My stomach dropped. “I had no idea.”

“I’m sorry to be the one to tell you this. I assure you, had we known for certain you and he were… Well, we would have stepped in. It crossed our minds that maybe Barrett was taking advantage of his position with you, but you never said anything, no matter how many times we prompted you to speak of it.” Stefan shrugged. “How were we to know if that rough handling wasn’t something you desired?”

I wanted to be sick.

“And you didn’t tell my father what you suspected?”

Stefan cocked a brow. “That the man he hired to ensure his son walked the straight and narrow”—he added air quotes around the word—“was fucking him instead? No. We didn’t think that was a good idea.”

I dropped my chin and stared at my hands, then picked at my nails.

Stefan didn’t speak for several minutes. “There were signs, Leo. We saw them over time because we were watching. Harlan and I were so close to approaching you about it. We wavered too long, and I’m sorry. We thought we’d try asking you after we got back from Canada, especially when Barrett changed the schedule to ensure he was always on with you in the evenings while we were here. When you exploded from the room covered in blood, I knew immediately we’d waited too long.”

The words came out choked, and Stefan cleared his throat. “You were defending yourself. I know that in my heart. It never crossed my mind to think otherwise. Believe me.”

“What does father think happened? The police? What did you tell them? You must have said something. They have to have questioned you.”

“They have, and—”

Stefan didn’t have time to answer. The clearing of a throat at the bedroom door made us both turn our heads. My father wasn’t a big man—he wasn’t small either—but his status and reputation always made him seem larger than life.

“Leave us,” he snapped at Stefan, his eyes like granite. He was dressed impeccably as always. Not a hair or a thread out of place, pants pressed, face cleanly shaven, expensive cologne in a cloud around him. Sunlight reflected off his platinum Rolex and gleamed off the leather loafers he’d bought new for our trip.

Father had a broad chest, a small paunch he couldn’t get rid of that had materialized with middle age, and thick blond hair with threads of silver throughout.

Stefan left without another word, and Father glared at the officer looming in the doorway until he retreated into the other room. Then Father closed the doors, leaving us alone.

I couldn’t read the expression on his face. He was skilled at masking his feelings. After a silent moment of contemplation, he crossed to the window and drew the sheer curtains aside, letting in the light as he stared out at the horizon. Wherever we were, we were high up. The fall sky was all I could see. I followed the lines of my father’s tense shoulders, trying to get a feel for the situation.

“Father—”

He held up a hand, demanding silence. He didn’t turn around. I couldn’t see his face, but the angle gave me a clear impression of his jaw. The muscles worked back and forth like he was grinding his teeth. The pulse in his temple throbbed. Although he appeared relaxed with his hands in the pockets of his trousers, he was anything but.

“The police wish to speak with you.” His voice was quiet. I had to strain to hear. “You have not been formally arrested, but they would like an explanation about what happened in your room in Montreal. I told them my son would never harm a man. He would never willfully try to end the life of another. Not my son. He is incapable of violence.” A long pause followed those few sentences. He hadn’t asked me a direct question, so I knew it was not my turn to speak.

When he found his voice again, it was strained. “Stefan and Harlan came forward and said they believed Barrett might have acted hostile toward you. They claimed they had been suspicious of his actions for a long time. They believe Barrett attacked you, and you were defending yourself. I admit, it’s a far more reasonable theory, but it begs the question if you were being threatened by a man in my employ, then why didn’t you say anything?”

“Father…”

Again, his hand came up, stopping me.

“I overheard your conversation with Stefan just now.” Father turned from the window and faced me for the first time since he’d entered the room. There was pain in his eyes unlike anything I’d ever seen on my father before. “Is it true?”

My chin quivered, and I nodded. I didn’t know what part he’d heard, but it didn’t matter. It was all true.

“And you didn’t tell me a man I hired to protect you was abusing you?”

“I couldn’t. It meant telling you that I’d defied your orders. It meant admitting that the phase wasn’t over. That I was still entertaining the ideas you find so appalling.”

“Leopold, you are a stupid, stupid child.”

It felt like all I’d done in the past twenty-four hours was cry. My father’s words hit like a slap in the face, and rivers ran down my cheeks again. I blubbered apologies over and over as I curled into a ball. I didn’t recognize my own voice. I’d lied. I’d hidden who I was because, for all the world, I never wanted to disappoint my father.

The bed dipped, and a hand landed on my back, stroking and squeezing my neck. Father’s familiar cologne surrounded me. His voice was soft when he shushed me.

“Stop apologizing.”

He encouraged me to lift my head. I was shocked to find his eyes red-rimmed and glistening in the low light of the room. In twenty-three years, I’d never seen my father cry. Not a single tear. I didn’t think he was capable.

“Tell me everything.”

I shook my head, fighting to stop sobbing. “I don’t want to.”

“Why?”

“Because you’re already ashamed of me.”

“Is that what you think?”

“Of course it is. You didn’t want a gay son. I can’t fix it, Father. I can’t be anyone else but me, and it disgusts you.”

“I am ashamed. You’re right, but—”

“I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”

“Shh. Let me speak. I’m ashamed of myself, Leopold. I put my son in a position where he felt he had to lie and hide. Where he couldn’t come to me when he was in danger. What kind of a father am I? You tell me what he did to you right now. I have to know.”

The words I’d held tight to my chest for so long came pouring out. I told him how Barrett and I had had a short relationship. How afterward, he’d used my secret to his advantage. How he’d threatened and bullied me. The way he’d curl his fingers around my throat and hold me against a wall until I submitted. How each day he grew more aggressive and angrier. More demanding. I told him about the bruises he’d left on my body where no one could see. The harsh punishments he’d whisper in my ear when no one was listening. About the stranglehold he held over my entire life and how I’d felt powerless and afraid around him.

I told my father about the night in Montreal. How Barrett had pinned me to the bed and was going to take what I was no longer willing to give because he thought I wanted to go clubbing when I’d only wanted to take a walk and get fresh air.

I told him about the knife I’d pulled from the hidden sheath on his ankle. About the battle that had followed.

In the end, I was blubbering so much my words were unclear.

Father pulled me into his arms and stroked my hair. “Enough. No more, Leopold. Say no more. I can’t bear to hear it.”

It had been a long time since I’d been encased in my father’s arms like this. Maybe since those days in his office when I’d sat on his lap as we’d shared a picture book, my finger following each word as he read.

I felt safe. I felt warm.

I felt…

“I love you,” he whispered. “Never doubt that. I love you with all that I am.”

“I’m gay.”

He kissed the top of my head and squeezed me a little tighter. “I know, and I’ve been a fool. I am so angry with myself, Leopold. I will never forgive myself. When you first told me, I feared for you. I was deathly afraid. I’ve seen so many stories over the years of gay men being brutally beaten and killed in the street. I’ve seen the way society lashes out at homosexuals. The cruelty. The animosity. Our lives are in the public eye. I feared what you might have to face. I didn’t want you to ever know such hostility. I wanted the world to see how amazing you are and not judge you for who you love, but I was a fool because instead of supporting you, I begged you to change. I told you it was nonsense. I told you it was rubbish and a phase. I told you to shed those crazy notions.”

“I can’t.”

“I know. There is no excuse for what I did. I was wrong, and in the end, I hurt you more.”

For a long time, I stayed in the safety of my father’s embrace. When I’d calmed, I sat upright and dabbed at my tears and snot with the tissue he placed in my hand. I was tired and drained. My chest hurt. My throat was raw, and I was ready to fall back in bed and sleep for a hundred years.

But I had to find out about Killian.

“The police took away the man I was with.”

“Indeed. He made threats against you, and he will be taken care of, I assure you.”

I shook my head. “No. Killian wouldn’t do that. Father, he helped me. He’s a good person. He took care of me. They can’t arrest him. He’s done nothing wrong. Please. I must find him. I must see him.”

“You’re ill, and your freedom is not your own right now. The police have many questions, and until they get answers, we won’t know where we sit. You need rest. We can discuss this another time. First, we must deal with the matter at hand. I can’t hold them off any longer. If you’re ready to talk, I will allow them into the room. I’ll remain present. I’ve hired a lawyer to join us and ensure it all plays out smoothly. He is here as well.”

“No. Father. Please, listen to me. I’ll talk to the police. Fine. But I can’t leave Killian in a jail cell. We have to do something. He wasn’t—”

“Leopold—”

“No! You aren’t listening. I don’t care if I’m sick. I don’t care about the questions from the police. I have to know he’s okay.”

“Why does it matter? He’s a homeless bum riding trains illegally across the country. That life was bound to catch up with him eventually. He is of no concern.”

“Father, please. He is.”

I love him, I wanted to say. He would fight for me, and I will fight for him. I can’t abandon him.

But I wasn’t sure my father would understand.

He must have seen something in my eyes. He paused with an assessing look on his face. He didn’t ask, so I didn’t speak the truth.

“One thing at a time. Police first. Then rest. We’ll discuss this later.”

I opened my mouth to retort, but my father gave me a look that said I was not going to win this battle. As it stood, I was in a city I didn’t know, I no longer had a cell phone, I wasn’t sure where my rucksack with my wallet and cash was, and the police were holding me prisoner until they had answers.

My heart ached when I thought about Killian alone in a jail cell. Did he hate me or blame me for his predicament? Would he ever want to see me again?

I nodded, agreeing to my father’s proposal, but if he thought I would let it go, I wouldn’t. I had a battle ahead of me. I wasn’t just looking to get Killian out of jail, but I had to somehow find the words to tell my father I wasn’t going home with him.

I couldn’t go back to Germany and never see Killian again. Even if my father supported me for who I was, it didn’t change the fact that my life back home wasn’t my own. The script that had been written for me since the day I was born needed to change. If I returned to Germany, I’d spend the rest of my days living someone else’s idea of a perfect life.

My freedom would be gone. The noose would slip back around my neck and choke the life out of me.