AH collections

No matter what I got your back (1)

Jeremwood
Word count: 3611
Chapters: 2

Ryan rarely lied to his crew. He did sometimes, like when they asked stuff like 'who blew up that car?!' or 'who keeps buying all these plants?'. But it was never anything that would cause any real backlash or harm to any of his crewmates, to his family.

He didn't really consider his relationship with Jeremy a lie, anyways. After all, no one had ever even asked if he was gay, let alone if he was dating anyone.

But he knew, really, that if he were to get asked, he'd have to lie to them about it. Ryan stayed up many nights thinking about a situation were he could openly tell his crew about his boyfriend – about their apartment in the nicer part of the city and their cats, but. He knew it really wasn't an option. Every one of those scenarios always ended in him having to leave the crew first, retire from this high profile, dangerous life style. Ryan loved Jeremy, liked their domestic life, but he wasn't anywhere near ready to leave this part of him behind.

It wasn't like Jeremy didn't know about him being the Vagabond. He was part of the crime business too. He'd actually met Ryan during a negotiation between the Fakes and the crew that Jeremy had been working for at the time. The deal got messy, and Ryan was barely able to pull Gavin out of the way of getting shot in the chest. Jeremy, not extremely loyal to that crew, didn't see why his bosses had attacked the pair of Fakes. Instead of attacking, he slipped away and helped Ryan carry a bleeding Gavin to an escape vehicle.

Ryan didn't tell Geoff about the man, and Gavin had been too out of it to remember. He didn't even think about it until he ran into Jeremy again in an alleyway two months later.

Well, it wasn't really like that. 'Ran into' implies that they casually bumped into each other while walking, something normal. Not Ryan pulling a guy twice Jeremy's size off of him after punching the big guy's friends. Jeremy hadn't recognized him without the mask, but gave him a hearty hand shake once the muggers had ran off, and even asked him if he wanted to catch a bite to eat. As a thank you for helping him.

They had their first date that night in a 24 hour diner, on the corner of the street Ryan saved him. It wasn't romantic in any way, and Jeremy would later say that it wasn't their first date, it didn't count. But Ryan counted it, because it was the first time Ryan had gotten to know someone outside of the crew and he'd loved it. What the diner lacked in atmosphere, Jeremy made up for in personality.

It wasn't until Ryan was walking Jeremy back to his apartment that he asked, "Why'd you go against orders and save the Golden Boy and I back a couple months ago?"

Jeremy went dead silent for a minute. Ryan could see the question processing in the shorter man's brain. He'd looked over at Ryan, right in the eyes, the one thing that he could remember seeing through the skull mask, and laughed. Ryan joined in with his own deep laughter, thinking of how ridiculous this whole thing was.

Jeremy calmed down after a minute or so, elbowing Ryan. He didn't ever really tell him why he did what he did that day, instead saying "I saved you back then, which means that you saving me tonight made us even. Guess you owe me another date to make up for this one," Ryan smiled, and asked for his number.

The rest was history from there.

He liked keeping that life separate from work. Jeremy wanted to meet his crew, wanted to meet the people that mattered so much to his boyfriend, but understood why it would be an issue. He worked for other crews, some of whom were not on the Fakes' good side.

Jeremy tried to stay out of those jobs, never wanting any chance of a run-in with Ryan or one of his friends, but money was money. He refused to let Ryan pay for everything, even though Ryan made so much every time they heisted.