Bulletproof (29/52)
Title: Bulletproof
Author: blasthisass
Rating: PG-13 to NC-17
Summary: AU- when Luke is shot by Colonel Mayer, his condition quickly deteriorates. In order to save his life, Bob calls in a young, hotshot doctor from Texas, brilliant and already making a name for himself.
Disclaimers: All characters and such property of ATWT, CBS and anyone else who can legally take credit for them. If they were mine, I would take infinitely better care of them.
Title from the song by La Roux. There is dialogue from both the time in which the story takes place as well as the LuRe storyline.
A/N: This is unbeta'd, so any mistakes are mine.
Comments much appreciated . . . I love them like Reid loves Luke.
Previous parts: prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28
***
“His what, now?” Reid demanded, whirling around and raising an eyebrow at Noah, wondering what on earth would possess the boy to hand off his boyfriend to someone else. Not that he would complain if he didn’t think there was something unbelievably fishy going on.
Luke’s mouth dropped open as he started incredulously at Noah, not even registering the stern-looking man in a suit and young Iraqi girl in a burqa standing with him.
Noah laughed awkwardly, strolling over and hitting Reid in feigned playfulness on the shoulder. “Oh, Dr. Oliver, you are a kidder, aren’t you?” he chuckled.
Reid pulled away, scowling and turning to Luke. “Let me know when he regains some semblance of sanity,” he instructed, smiling at Luke, suddenly both incredibly displeased with his decision and wholly satisfied. He hated that Luke Snyder did that to him. He raised an eyebrow at Noah before disappearing into Java.
Noah flashed Luke a glance that was half apologetic, half warning as he turned back to the man in the suit, laughing awkwardly. “Dr. Oliver isn’t the most outgoing of guys.”
All he received in return was raised eyebrow and a flat frown. “I see.” He turned away from Noah and smiled at the Iraqi girl. “Ms. Aziz-”
“Mrs. Mayer,” she corrected quietly, as though she weren’t quite sure of the fact yet, as Luke’s mouth dropped further open in utter shock.
The man in the suit raised his eyebrow, as though he didn’t quite believe her when she said it, but nodded and gestured toward the coffee shop. She flashed Noah a nervous look, but followed the man in, leaving Luke and Noah outside. Noah waited until they were out of earshot before inclining his head toward the nearest shop. He shushed Luke when the latter tried to speak and made his way into the bookstore.
Luke shook his head in incredulity, his mind racing. He glanced behind him, hoping to see Reid through the windows of the café but, catching no sight of him, followed Noah into store. He spotted him disappearing down one of the aisles and trailed after, pausing next to him as Noah pretended to peruse the shelves for books he needed for class.
“Noah, what the hell is going on?” Luke demanded, turning to face his boyfriend, arms crossed in front of his chest, eyes blazing dangerously.
“Could you please keep it down?” Noah murmured, flipping the pages and glancing down the aisle, as though afraid they were being watched.
“Keep it down? Keep it down?” Luke cried in a hushed whisper, acutely aware that Noah must have gone into the bookstore on purpose, fully aware that Luke couldn’t bring himself to raise his voice in an establishment dedicated to housing the volumes of knowledge. “Noah, you texted me days ago that you were going underground for a couple of days because of a massive project you had to finish for your film class. Next thing I know, you show up with some sketchy guy in a suit and an Irani-”
“Iraqi.”
Luke snorted. “Yeah, like that really fucking matters right now. You show up with some Iraqi girl who refers to herself as Mrs. Mayer and you pass me off as a friend and Dr. Oliver’s boyfriend to a complete stranger. And you’re asking me to keep it down?”
“Luke, let me explain-”
“Oh, this should be good.”
“Damn it, Luke!” Noah exclaimed in frustration, shoving the book he’d been holding back onto the shelf with almost enough force to knock it over before grabbing another one to keep up appearances. “Look, I was coming to meet you when I ran into this girl. She sought me out in the library, said her name was Ameera Al Aziz, and told me about how my dad knew her mom while he was over there for service-”
Luke snorted. “Knew? Or knew, like in the Biblical sense? Because then this whole thing would be so much worse-”
“Oh, come on, Luke!” Noah groaned.
“Noah, this is ridiculous! How do you know this girl isn’t playing you?”
“Because I’m not-” Noah started, his voice raised. He met the stern glance of a shop worker and dropped it, inclining his head slightly toward Luke. “I’m not an idiot. She showed me proof.”
“What, a birth certificate?” Luke muttered bitterly.
“He’s not her father, Luke!” Noah groaned. “She’s my age, so he’d have had to been over there when I was being conceived. And photo evidence.”
Luke shook his head in disbelief. “So explain to me how she went from Ameera Al Aziz, daughter of some woman your psycho father knew, to Mrs. (I’m assuming Noah) Mayer?”
Noah sighed, leaning back against the bookshelves and looking apologetically at Luke, how still looked positively infuriated. He shook his head, trying to sort out his thoughts, which suddenly sounded very implausible in light of the fact that Luke was actually in front of him. “She wanted to see my dad, so we drove to prison to see him. It turned out that Homeland Security was on her tail and they wanted to ship her back to Iraq. And Luke, she was telling me about how awful it is there and how much danger she would be in if she went back and . . . I don’t know . . . I wanted to help her-”
Luke shook his head, aghast. “So you married her?”
“It was the only thing we could think of to get Homeland Security off her case,” Noah explained, eyes desperate to get Luke to understand where he was coming from.
Luke shook his head, wishing that they were in a café or a restaurant or somewhere where he could sit down. His legs were shaking as hard as his mind was racing fast. “I . . .” His heart throbbed as he saw himself as a mere oversight in this case. “You . . . have a boyfriend, and you went and married her and . . . and you didn’t even think to tell me anything?” he murmured, falling back against the bookshelves, as though his legs had regained their paralyzed state, unable to hold up his weight any longer.
“It was just something I needed to do. I didn’t want you to get involved.”
“But I am involved, Noah! We are involved! And I would have wanted to help!” Luke cried, eyes filling up slightly with tears as he desperately tried to grasp the concept of their relationship. “I’m you’re boyfriend! How do you think I feel seeing you show up after days of not being apart and seeing you with some girl? I . . . Noah, if you don’t trust me enough to let me in on something major you have going on . . . then what the hell are we doing here?”
Noah’s mouth dropped open, as though he’d never really considered that the mild-mannered Luke that he thought he knew would react in quite so violent a manner. His gaze softened sympathetically and, after glancing around tentatively around them to make sure they were relatively unwatched, he approached slowly, brushing his fingers gently around Luke’s wrist and smiling as Luke’s eyes tentatively went up to his own. “Luke, it’s not like that. I just . . . I thought about you and what you would do and . . . I just wanted to help and it was the only way I knew how.”
Luke shook his head, control slipping from his grasp. Never had the ground of their relationship felt more unstable, not since they’d finally gotten together. “Noah . . . this isn’t . . . this isn’t like last time? With Maddie?”
Noah’s eyes widened, as though he’d never even considered the possibility. “Luke . . .” he muttered softly, the light grip of his fingers brushing against Luke’s wrist. “Luke, you know I’m not comfortable talking about my feelings but . . . I care about you. More than you will ever know. This has nothing to do with that.”
Luke shook his head. “How can you expect me to believe that?”
“Luke, I’ve known this girl for a couple of days. I wouldn’t marry her on a whim if I just wanted to retreat into the closet. That would be an unnecessary commitment,” Noah said softly. “I just . . . I feel like she’s in a predicament I once found myself in and I want to do something good.”
Luke shook his head. As much as he wanted to be proud of Noah for doing something to help this girl he barely knew, each rationalization that Noah made cut him like a knife because, above all, he felt as though he were being pushed further and further away. “Well, it’s done, isn’t it? Nothing I can do.”
“Luke . . .”
“Hold on!” Luke started, eyes darting back up to Noah’s face as he recalled what had been happening when Noah had shown up and tensed the air with emotions. “Then why the hell would you tell that Men in Black guy that my doctor is actually my boyfriend?”
Noah sighed, bracing himself. “Okay, just hear me out on this, okay? Just let me talk?”
“Oh . . . kay . . .” Luke replied nervously.
“Okay, so . . . The marriage wouldn’t automatically get Homeland Security to lay off of Ameera. In fact, apparently they look really closely into these cases like these, making sure that the marriage is real . . . so . . .”
Luke shook his head, wondering how each time he thought his disbelief had reached new heights, Noah sent it sky-rocketing again. “So we have to make them believe your marriage is real. Which means that you’re shoving us in the corner.”
“I can’t let them know that I’m gay because that would blow this whole thing out of the water. And I saw you with him and the ICE guy asked me about you in . . . I don’t know, a knowing tone and I just panicked and my mouth just ran away without my brain. But,” Noah paused, holding up his hand. “But think about it, it could work. I know he’s an ass and you don’t really like him, but that would make it perfect. He’s a neurosurgeon, so you don’t have to even hang out with him because he’s ‘busy with his work all the time.’ He's definitely a private guy (hell, I barely see him unless he's with you), so if you didn't publicly do out at all it wouldn't be suspicious. Besides, he’s flying back to Dallas, so you guys can just pretend do the ‘long distance relationship’ thing for a while. I mean, as long as you can convince him not to say anything to anyone before he goes-”
“He’s not leaving,” Luke murmured softly, wondering whether he should be happy with this sort of arrangement. He felt as though he were teetering on a dangerous edge with his emotions and even convincing Reid to go along with this ploy might sent him over the edge.
Noah frowned. “Oh . . . well, that doesn’t have to change things.”
“Noah, I’m tired of hiding who I am and what I feel.”
“We’re not hiding, not really! We just have to lay low for a bit until this gets resolved and then we’ll be home free,” Noah murmured, flashing Luke a sad look. “Come on . . . We’re already in this. Together. We can’t not see it through. Not without there being consequences. For her and me.”
Luke shook his head, biting his lip. He’d never wanted to say “No” to something more in his life, but he felt as though he couldn’t let Noah down. Certainly couldn’t turn him in. And . . . and he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life looking for something he might already have. It was like that with his parents, wasn't it? They were always looking for something and then realizing it was right in front of them the whole time. All that back and forth and, in the end, it didn't matter. He didn't want to make their mistakes. “Noah . . . I don’t like this.”
Noah smiled at this agreement, looking relieved. “I don’t like it either. But it’ll blow over. You’ll see. And then you and I can move on with our lives knowing that we’ve done a good thing.”
Luke shook his head, unconvinced. He suddenly wanted nothing more than to be alone with his thoughts, so numerous they were crushing him in the tiny space of the bookstore, not nearly big enough to house them all. “Should you be getting back?”
Noah started, as though he’d forgotten about Ameera despite an entire conversation devoted to her. “Yeah. Talk to Dr. Oliver, yeah?”
“Sure . . .”
“Great,” Noah smiled, slapping Luke lightly on the arm in a manner that reminded Luke more of Burt than his boyfriend. “Love you for this,” he muttered before leaving the aisle and disappearing into the town square.
Luke shook his head, feeling melancholy and small. Helpless. “But you wouldn’t without this? Is that what you’re saying?” he murmured softly to himself, a single tear pushing itself out of the corner of his eye. He didn’t believe that that was the way love could ever work.
Chapter 30-->
Author: blasthisass
Rating: PG-13 to NC-17
Summary: AU- when Luke is shot by Colonel Mayer, his condition quickly deteriorates. In order to save his life, Bob calls in a young, hotshot doctor from Texas, brilliant and already making a name for himself.
Disclaimers: All characters and such property of ATWT, CBS and anyone else who can legally take credit for them. If they were mine, I would take infinitely better care of them.
Title from the song by La Roux. There is dialogue from both the time in which the story takes place as well as the LuRe storyline.
A/N: This is unbeta'd, so any mistakes are mine.
Comments much appreciated . . . I love them like Reid loves Luke.
Previous parts: prologue | 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28
***
“His what, now?” Reid demanded, whirling around and raising an eyebrow at Noah, wondering what on earth would possess the boy to hand off his boyfriend to someone else. Not that he would complain if he didn’t think there was something unbelievably fishy going on.
Luke’s mouth dropped open as he started incredulously at Noah, not even registering the stern-looking man in a suit and young Iraqi girl in a burqa standing with him.
Noah laughed awkwardly, strolling over and hitting Reid in feigned playfulness on the shoulder. “Oh, Dr. Oliver, you are a kidder, aren’t you?” he chuckled.
Reid pulled away, scowling and turning to Luke. “Let me know when he regains some semblance of sanity,” he instructed, smiling at Luke, suddenly both incredibly displeased with his decision and wholly satisfied. He hated that Luke Snyder did that to him. He raised an eyebrow at Noah before disappearing into Java.
Noah flashed Luke a glance that was half apologetic, half warning as he turned back to the man in the suit, laughing awkwardly. “Dr. Oliver isn’t the most outgoing of guys.”
All he received in return was raised eyebrow and a flat frown. “I see.” He turned away from Noah and smiled at the Iraqi girl. “Ms. Aziz-”
“Mrs. Mayer,” she corrected quietly, as though she weren’t quite sure of the fact yet, as Luke’s mouth dropped further open in utter shock.
The man in the suit raised his eyebrow, as though he didn’t quite believe her when she said it, but nodded and gestured toward the coffee shop. She flashed Noah a nervous look, but followed the man in, leaving Luke and Noah outside. Noah waited until they were out of earshot before inclining his head toward the nearest shop. He shushed Luke when the latter tried to speak and made his way into the bookstore.
Luke shook his head in incredulity, his mind racing. He glanced behind him, hoping to see Reid through the windows of the café but, catching no sight of him, followed Noah into store. He spotted him disappearing down one of the aisles and trailed after, pausing next to him as Noah pretended to peruse the shelves for books he needed for class.
“Noah, what the hell is going on?” Luke demanded, turning to face his boyfriend, arms crossed in front of his chest, eyes blazing dangerously.
“Could you please keep it down?” Noah murmured, flipping the pages and glancing down the aisle, as though afraid they were being watched.
“Keep it down? Keep it down?” Luke cried in a hushed whisper, acutely aware that Noah must have gone into the bookstore on purpose, fully aware that Luke couldn’t bring himself to raise his voice in an establishment dedicated to housing the volumes of knowledge. “Noah, you texted me days ago that you were going underground for a couple of days because of a massive project you had to finish for your film class. Next thing I know, you show up with some sketchy guy in a suit and an Irani-”
“Iraqi.”
Luke snorted. “Yeah, like that really fucking matters right now. You show up with some Iraqi girl who refers to herself as Mrs. Mayer and you pass me off as a friend and Dr. Oliver’s boyfriend to a complete stranger. And you’re asking me to keep it down?”
“Luke, let me explain-”
“Oh, this should be good.”
“Damn it, Luke!” Noah exclaimed in frustration, shoving the book he’d been holding back onto the shelf with almost enough force to knock it over before grabbing another one to keep up appearances. “Look, I was coming to meet you when I ran into this girl. She sought me out in the library, said her name was Ameera Al Aziz, and told me about how my dad knew her mom while he was over there for service-”
Luke snorted. “Knew? Or knew, like in the Biblical sense? Because then this whole thing would be so much worse-”
“Oh, come on, Luke!” Noah groaned.
“Noah, this is ridiculous! How do you know this girl isn’t playing you?”
“Because I’m not-” Noah started, his voice raised. He met the stern glance of a shop worker and dropped it, inclining his head slightly toward Luke. “I’m not an idiot. She showed me proof.”
“What, a birth certificate?” Luke muttered bitterly.
“He’s not her father, Luke!” Noah groaned. “She’s my age, so he’d have had to been over there when I was being conceived. And photo evidence.”
Luke shook his head in disbelief. “So explain to me how she went from Ameera Al Aziz, daughter of some woman your psycho father knew, to Mrs. (I’m assuming Noah) Mayer?”
Noah sighed, leaning back against the bookshelves and looking apologetically at Luke, how still looked positively infuriated. He shook his head, trying to sort out his thoughts, which suddenly sounded very implausible in light of the fact that Luke was actually in front of him. “She wanted to see my dad, so we drove to prison to see him. It turned out that Homeland Security was on her tail and they wanted to ship her back to Iraq. And Luke, she was telling me about how awful it is there and how much danger she would be in if she went back and . . . I don’t know . . . I wanted to help her-”
Luke shook his head, aghast. “So you married her?”
“It was the only thing we could think of to get Homeland Security off her case,” Noah explained, eyes desperate to get Luke to understand where he was coming from.
Luke shook his head, wishing that they were in a café or a restaurant or somewhere where he could sit down. His legs were shaking as hard as his mind was racing fast. “I . . .” His heart throbbed as he saw himself as a mere oversight in this case. “You . . . have a boyfriend, and you went and married her and . . . and you didn’t even think to tell me anything?” he murmured, falling back against the bookshelves, as though his legs had regained their paralyzed state, unable to hold up his weight any longer.
“It was just something I needed to do. I didn’t want you to get involved.”
“But I am involved, Noah! We are involved! And I would have wanted to help!” Luke cried, eyes filling up slightly with tears as he desperately tried to grasp the concept of their relationship. “I’m you’re boyfriend! How do you think I feel seeing you show up after days of not being apart and seeing you with some girl? I . . . Noah, if you don’t trust me enough to let me in on something major you have going on . . . then what the hell are we doing here?”
Noah’s mouth dropped open, as though he’d never really considered that the mild-mannered Luke that he thought he knew would react in quite so violent a manner. His gaze softened sympathetically and, after glancing around tentatively around them to make sure they were relatively unwatched, he approached slowly, brushing his fingers gently around Luke’s wrist and smiling as Luke’s eyes tentatively went up to his own. “Luke, it’s not like that. I just . . . I thought about you and what you would do and . . . I just wanted to help and it was the only way I knew how.”
Luke shook his head, control slipping from his grasp. Never had the ground of their relationship felt more unstable, not since they’d finally gotten together. “Noah . . . this isn’t . . . this isn’t like last time? With Maddie?”
Noah’s eyes widened, as though he’d never even considered the possibility. “Luke . . .” he muttered softly, the light grip of his fingers brushing against Luke’s wrist. “Luke, you know I’m not comfortable talking about my feelings but . . . I care about you. More than you will ever know. This has nothing to do with that.”
Luke shook his head. “How can you expect me to believe that?”
“Luke, I’ve known this girl for a couple of days. I wouldn’t marry her on a whim if I just wanted to retreat into the closet. That would be an unnecessary commitment,” Noah said softly. “I just . . . I feel like she’s in a predicament I once found myself in and I want to do something good.”
Luke shook his head. As much as he wanted to be proud of Noah for doing something to help this girl he barely knew, each rationalization that Noah made cut him like a knife because, above all, he felt as though he were being pushed further and further away. “Well, it’s done, isn’t it? Nothing I can do.”
“Luke . . .”
“Hold on!” Luke started, eyes darting back up to Noah’s face as he recalled what had been happening when Noah had shown up and tensed the air with emotions. “Then why the hell would you tell that Men in Black guy that my doctor is actually my boyfriend?”
Noah sighed, bracing himself. “Okay, just hear me out on this, okay? Just let me talk?”
“Oh . . . kay . . .” Luke replied nervously.
“Okay, so . . . The marriage wouldn’t automatically get Homeland Security to lay off of Ameera. In fact, apparently they look really closely into these cases like these, making sure that the marriage is real . . . so . . .”
Luke shook his head, wondering how each time he thought his disbelief had reached new heights, Noah sent it sky-rocketing again. “So we have to make them believe your marriage is real. Which means that you’re shoving us in the corner.”
“I can’t let them know that I’m gay because that would blow this whole thing out of the water. And I saw you with him and the ICE guy asked me about you in . . . I don’t know, a knowing tone and I just panicked and my mouth just ran away without my brain. But,” Noah paused, holding up his hand. “But think about it, it could work. I know he’s an ass and you don’t really like him, but that would make it perfect. He’s a neurosurgeon, so you don’t have to even hang out with him because he’s ‘busy with his work all the time.’ He's definitely a private guy (hell, I barely see him unless he's with you), so if you didn't publicly do out at all it wouldn't be suspicious. Besides, he’s flying back to Dallas, so you guys can just pretend do the ‘long distance relationship’ thing for a while. I mean, as long as you can convince him not to say anything to anyone before he goes-”
“He’s not leaving,” Luke murmured softly, wondering whether he should be happy with this sort of arrangement. He felt as though he were teetering on a dangerous edge with his emotions and even convincing Reid to go along with this ploy might sent him over the edge.
Noah frowned. “Oh . . . well, that doesn’t have to change things.”
“Noah, I’m tired of hiding who I am and what I feel.”
“We’re not hiding, not really! We just have to lay low for a bit until this gets resolved and then we’ll be home free,” Noah murmured, flashing Luke a sad look. “Come on . . . We’re already in this. Together. We can’t not see it through. Not without there being consequences. For her and me.”
Luke shook his head, biting his lip. He’d never wanted to say “No” to something more in his life, but he felt as though he couldn’t let Noah down. Certainly couldn’t turn him in. And . . . and he didn’t want to spend the rest of his life looking for something he might already have. It was like that with his parents, wasn't it? They were always looking for something and then realizing it was right in front of them the whole time. All that back and forth and, in the end, it didn't matter. He didn't want to make their mistakes. “Noah . . . I don’t like this.”
Noah smiled at this agreement, looking relieved. “I don’t like it either. But it’ll blow over. You’ll see. And then you and I can move on with our lives knowing that we’ve done a good thing.”
Luke shook his head, unconvinced. He suddenly wanted nothing more than to be alone with his thoughts, so numerous they were crushing him in the tiny space of the bookstore, not nearly big enough to house them all. “Should you be getting back?”
Noah started, as though he’d forgotten about Ameera despite an entire conversation devoted to her. “Yeah. Talk to Dr. Oliver, yeah?”
“Sure . . .”
“Great,” Noah smiled, slapping Luke lightly on the arm in a manner that reminded Luke more of Burt than his boyfriend. “Love you for this,” he muttered before leaving the aisle and disappearing into the town square.
Luke shook his head, feeling melancholy and small. Helpless. “But you wouldn’t without this? Is that what you’re saying?” he murmured softly to himself, a single tear pushing itself out of the corner of his eye. He didn’t believe that that was the way love could ever work.
Chapter 30-->