Chapter 52: Cullen’s Secret, The Gym, And Seo’s Silent Warning!

Ruaan looked at his eggs for three more seconds. He could lie or make up an excuse. He has no reason to say anything to Cullen, but Cullen was still going to find out anyway.

Besides that, the news was oddly specific about the youngest Caldwell son. He was just glad photos of him weren’t attached to the news. No one knew who he was since he lived a secret life.

Then he put his fork down and looked at Cullen and said, "Yes. That was my father."

Cullen sat back.

He looked at Ruaan the way people looked at something they had already been examining closely and had just discovered had more layers than they thought. His expression moved through several things quickly and settled on something that was almost amused but not quite.

"Caldwell," Cullen said.

"Yes."

"The Caldwell family."

"Yes."

"You’ve been walking around this facility in a grey uniform eating cafeteria food and you’re from the Caldwell family."

"I’m aware of the irony," Ruaan said.

Cullen laughed. Not the performance laugh he used in front of his men. A real one, short and surprised, the kind that happened when something genuinely caught you off guard.

"I didn’t expect that," Cullen said.

"Nobody does."

Cullen looked at him for a moment. "Why are you here? What did someone like you do to end up in Blackmere?"

Ruaan picked his fork back up. "I don’t want to talk about it."

"It must be serious if the Caldwell son is in a facility like this."

"I said I don’t want to talk about it."

Cullen looked at him. He seemed to consider pushing it and then decided not to, which was a version of Cullen that Ruaan was still not entirely used to. He reached for his coffee instead.

The silence that followed was not uncomfortable. Which was strange because most silences with Cullen had an agenda attached to them. This one just sat there being quiet.

Then Cullen said, "I killed my father."

Ruaan looked up.

Cullen was looking at the table. Not at Ruaan. At the wood grain of the tabletop, his finger was tracing a line along it.

"He used to beat my mother," Cullen said. "For years. She tried to leave twice and both times he found her. The third time she didn’t try to leave. She just stopped." He paused. "She died when I was nineteen. After that, I waited two more years and then I made a decision."

He said it the same way he said most things. Even. Unbothered on the surface. But underneath it was something that had weight to it.

Ruaan said nothing.

"I’ve been here four years," Cullen said. "A few months ago, I’ve been at the top. Before that, I was climbing the same way you’re climbing. For years," He finally looked at Ruaan. "I don’t have anywhere to go when I leave. No family. No house that means anything. So I stay."

Ruaan looked at him.

This was not the version of Cullen that had grabbed his hair and introduced his face to the floor. This was not the version that had collected people for his cell and used them and moved on. This was something underneath all of that, sitting quietly at a breakfast table on a Saturday morning.

Ruaan thought about his own father on the news screen saying he deserved it.

"How long do you have left?" Ruaan said.

"Another two years." Cullen smiled. It didn’t reach anywhere. "Maybe I’ll keep extending."

Ruaan looked at his bread.

He didn’t say anything about himself. Not because he was protecting Cullen from it. Because talking about it meant talking about Mara and talking about Mara meant talking about Harolin and that was a whole thing he was not opening at a breakfast table on a Saturday.

He ate his bread.

Cullen watched him.

"You’re not going to tell me," Cullen said.

"Not today," Ruaan said.

Cullen nodded once. Like that was acceptable. Like he had decided somewhere between the coffee and the news segment that Ruaan was someone whose timeline he was willing to work on.

That was a new development.

Ruaan filed it away and finished his breakfast.

.

.

That night, Ruaan could not sleep.

He had tried. He had been in the comfortable bed with the comfortable duvet in the comfortable room for two hours and his brain had refused every single attempt. It kept going back to last night. To the specific sounds and the specific warmth and the specific problem of knowing that he could not look at Harolin tomorrow without wanting to immediately repeat all of it.

He was a simple man with a complicated situation.

At midnight he gave up and put his clothes on and went to the gym.

The prisoner gym was empty at this hour. One row of lights on, the rest dark, equipment sitting in the quiet with the patient energy of things that waited. Ruaan got on the treadmill and set it to something slow that his body could manage at midnight and walked and stared at the wall.

He heard footsteps at the door about twenty minutes in.

He looked up.

Oren stepped inside.

He saw Ruaan and stopped.

They looked at each other.

"You can’t sleep either," Ruaan said.

"I was doing a check," Oren said. His eyes moved around the gym with the automatic assessment he brought everywhere. "You shouldn’t be out of your room at this hour."

"I’m top one. My curfew is flexible."

"That’s not actually what the rules say."

"Is it not?" Ruaan kept walking on the treadmill. "You know, for someone who memorised the entire code of conduct, you spend a lot of time in places you’re not supposed to be at midnight."

Oren walked further into the gym. He stood at the side with his arms folded and said nothing for a moment.

"Why didn’t you go to Harolin?" Oren said. "If you couldn’t sleep."

Ruaan’s feet kept moving on the treadmill.

He thought about last night. About the sound Harolin had made. About what had come after. About the state of his underwear this morning and the very specific reason for that state.

His face went red.

He was very glad the lighting in this gym was not good.

"I just felt like walking," Ruaan said.

Oren looked at his face.

Even in the dim light, apparently, the face was doing something obvious because Oren’s expression shifted and he said, "I’m going to separate you two."

"Excuse me?"

"It’s against the rules. Whatever is happening between you and Officer Crowe. I’m going to put a stop to it."

Ruaan stepped off the treadmill. He turned and looked at Oren with his head tilted. "Are you jealous?"

"I’m doing my job."

"You’re doing your job very personally for someone who is just doing his job."

"I’m not—"

"I know someone who’s interested in you," Ruaan said.

Oren went still.

"Someone in this facility," Ruaan continued. "Who has been going out of his way to get your attention. You’ve probably noticed."

"I haven’t noticed anything."

"The uhm... The field training didn’t get to you?"

Oren’s jaw moved.

"Seo," Ruaan said.

The name landed and Oren’s face did something very small and very controlled but it was there. A flicker. Something clicking into place behind his eyes.

Ruaan watched it happen.

Oren was thinking. Ruaan could see it without knowing the specifics. The particular expression of someone assembling information they had been holding separately and discovering how it connected.

He remembered the file. Oren is delivering the file to Seo. Seo showing him what was in it. The hair grab. The corridor. The name said out loud.

He immediately realised that Seo had used Oren to deliver information about Ruaan. And then Seo had shown Oren that information. And the only reason to do both of those things in sequence was to either make Oren interested in Ruaan or to make Oren feel like Ruaan was a problem to handle.

And now Oren was standing in a gym at midnight talking about separating Ruaan from Harolin.

"He’s been trying to get to you," Ruaan said. "Seo. I’m sure he’s going to stalk you or try to grind his ass on your cock through your pants." He shrugged. "That’s how Seo works. He would do anything to make you his."

Oren looked at him.

"I’m not an object," Oren said.

"I know that. You know that. Seo finds it interesting that you know that." Ruaan leaned against the treadmill. "He likes difficult things. Like you."

Oren looked at the ceiling briefly. The expression of a man accepting an explanation he had already half arrived at himself.

"And you," Oren said. "You’re fine with all of this."

"Fine with what? I’m just friends with Seo," Ruaan said. "We’re not dating or anything, so you can say yes to him."

"No, no... That’s not what I mean," Seo was silent. He thought of advising Ruaan to stay away from Seo since he was obviously bad news. "You see, Seo..."

The door opened and both of them turned.

Seo stepped in wearing his grey uniform and his broken glasses and carrying nothing, which was unusual enough that it was the first thing Ruaan noticed. No comic. No LEGO box. Just Seo walking into a gym at midnight like he had been heading here the whole time.

He looked at Ruaan and looked at Oren.

His expression did not change.

"Oh," Seo said pleasantly. "You two are here together." He tilted his head. "I’m sure I heard my name."

"Huh?" Ruaan tilted his head.

Over Ruaan’s shoulder, Seo locked eyes with Oren.

And in the half second before his face went back to its usual open friendliness, something moved across it. Sharp and specific and directed entirely at Oren.

One finger came up, pressed to Seo’s lips.

The message was clear and required no translation.

’Not a word.’

Oren looked at Seo.

Ruaan looked between them.

"Hey Seo," Ruaan said, waving. "Couldn’t sleep either?"

Seo smiled at him warmly. "Something like that, dear Ruaan."