Savage (Demented Souls #15)

23. 23

23

“Y ou’re crashing early,” Sackett said as Savage stepped out of the bathroom into the common area of the bunkhouse. Several of the unattached brothers and prospects had set up some kind of tournament on one of the gaming devices hooked to the TV in the corner. They were taking turns at a first-person shooter game Savage had seen before but couldn’t name.

They appeared to be working in teams, at least for now, from the chatter between them. They encouraged each other, gave directions, and seemed to be battling a common foe. Savage seemed to be waiting for his turn.

“Yeah. Donna’s tired after today and wants to go to bed.”

“And you’re going with her?” Sackett waggled his brows suggesting he knew why Savage was going to call it a night with her.

“I’m going with her. Have a good night with all this.” He waved a hand toward the TV, and the men clustered around yelling at the screen. He didn’t bother to try to tell his brother that there was nothing between him and Donna but that he was caring for her. They wouldn’t believe him even if he did, and he had hopes that there would be more. Maybe not for a while, until she was comfortable with him, but she seemed to be more relaxed, more at ease with him every day.

He made his way out of the bunkhouse and back to the tent, wondering what he’d find when he got there. How had she decided? There was no point in speculating, he knew but he had nothing else to occupy his mind. Well, other than thoughts of her that wouldn’t help making her more comfortable, so he steered his mind away from those.

He reached the tent, unzipped it, and paused, still standing outside, his head poked through the doorway.

“Oh, good. I really think we’ll be more comfortable and sleep better that way,” he said when he saw she’d put the mats together, opened one sleeping bag at the bottom and the other on top.

“I think they’re supposed to zip together, but I can’t make it work.” She knelt on the bags near the middle of the bottom, her hands on the zipper and frustration clear in her face.

“Let me try. Do you need to make a trip to the bathroom before we lay down?”

“Yeah, but I wanted to get this done first.”

He kicked his boots off as he stepped inside, then picked them up and set them in the corner so they wouldn’t track dirt in. “Let me take a look.” He stepped past her and put away his hygiene bag before moving to take her place near the foot of the bedroll she’d created.

She moved, letting him take her place. He bent to see if he could figure out what was wrong. Before he had a chance to get a good look, her shuffling around behind him caught his attention.

“What is it, babe?” He looked up and twisted around to watch her for a moment. He wanted to see her face and body language.

“I feel like I should be doing something to help.” She twisted her hands in front of her.

Savage glanced around the space they shared and saw nothing she needed to do. “I’ve got everything here handled. You said you need to go use the restroom before we go to bed. Do you want to go do that?”

She stared at him for a moment then blinked. “I can do that.” She started for the door.

“Don’t forget your shoes, or your flip-flops and do you need your toothbrush or anything else?” He watched as she went back to her bag and dug out the small bag with her toothbrush, hairbrush, toothpaste, and the like, then pulled out the sandals they’d gotten the day before, then left. Savage shook his head at how easily she got flustered but he didn’t want to say anything to her, for fear of how she’d taken it.

From the way she acted, the jack ass she’d been on the run from when he’d found her had been a real piece of work and had done more than physically abuse her. She’d told him about the fucker hitting her, and he was beginning to think that the mental and emotional abuse she had told him about was only the top of the iceberg.

He would have to be careful with how he said things and giving her orders, at least until she learned to trust him completely and didn’t seem to be waiting for him to turn and slap her, either physically or emotionally, when she was least prepared for it.

Savage bit back the growl of frustration at his inability to find the piece of shit who had done this to the sweet woman who felt so good in has arms as he bent to take a look at what was wrong with the zipper. It didn’t take him long to find the problem. She’d laid the bottom sleeping bag out face down instead of face up. It only took him a few minutes to pick them both up, then lay it out right.

He had just finished zipping the last side of the sleeping bag and turned to make sure everything else was where it was supposed to be when he heard the soft crunch of footsteps approaching. Savage froze, waiting to see what whoever was approaching would do. Thankfully, he was directly under the small light hanging from the top of the tent, so he wasn’t throwing a shadow as he slowly lifted one hand to the small of his back so he could draw his weapon if he needed to. He slowed his breathing as options seemed to pop into his head as he waited. He’d have to reconsider leaving the light up there but, in the moment, he didn’t see anywhere that would be better since the tent could be approached from any side and anywhere else it would be sure to throw shadows, revealing exactly where in the tent he sat and what he was doing.

“Are you still in there?” The soft voice that came through the tent made him instantly relax.

He took a deep breath, let the hand that had been held behind him and at the ready, fall to his side then spoke. “I’m here. Come on in.” Unable to help himself, he let his head drop back as he concentrated on letting the tension that had filled his entire body drain from him.

By the time Donna had unzipped the door, stepped inside, closed the door, and turned back to him, he’d managed to push the instant tension from him. He hoped she had no idea what he’d been through in those few seconds.

“Did you figure it out?” she asked as she put the bag with her things away.

“I did. You had the bottom sleeping bag upside down. I got it all taken care of though.” He opened his belt and pulled it loose from the loops on one side of his jeans, grabbed the holster on his pistol before it had a chance to fall. Then with his other hand pulled his belt free from his jeans, then set both aside. He put his belt on top of his bag and the holstered pistol on his side of the sleeping bag so he could reach it from the bed, just in case.

Savage turned back to find her watching him with wide eyes.

“What?” He knew it wasn’t the pistol. She’d already seen that, the first day, and she hadn’t seemed fazed by it. Besides, she’d spent most of the day pressed up against his back, it would have been impossible for her not to know it was there.

“Um.” She looked down at the floor, then muttered the rest of what she had to say. “I need to change clothes.” Her eyes flicked to him then back to the floor. “And I’m guessing you do too since you asked me not to wear jeans to bed but you still have yours on.” She blushed bright red.

Savage guessed that they both needed to change clothes, and the idea of doing it in front of each other embarrassed her.

“I do. We can do this one of two ways,” he paused and waited for her to look up at him before continuing, “I can get my clothes, step outside and change while you do the same in here.” The shocked look on her face had him stopping. “What’s wrong with that?” he asked, having an idea but wanting to hear her say it.

“But if you change outside, anyone can see you. How could you do that?”

“Babe, you do know I was in the Navy, right?”

“Yeah,” she said with a frown, “you told me that, but what does it have to do with this?”

“In the Navy, hell in all the branches, especially in boot camp, you live in barracks. I mean big rooms of bunks with a bunch of men. There is little privacy. On top of that you’ve got communal showers and eventually you learn to just not care. I could walk through the courtyard around the bunkhouse when everyone’s gathered around, like at mealtime, stark naked and not care. On the other hand, I know you do. So, if you’d like I can step outside. Or we can just turn our backs to each other, and change. I promise I won’t turn around until you say I can.”

She stared at him for a moment, and he wasn’t sure if she was trying to gauge how honest he was being or if she was trying to decide.

“I don’t want you to have to change outside. I couldn’t do that, and I can’t ask you to.” She took a deep breath and let it out before speaking again. “We’re both adults and I trust you. If I didn’t trust you, we wouldn’t be doing this.” She swept one arm toward the sleeping bags he’d finished putting together.

“Ok. I’m going to give you my back then, when you’re ready for me to turn around say something.”

“All right, and you can do the same.” Her voice shook just a little, but she didn’t let it stop her from going to her own bag and pulling out several items.

“Babe, I already told you, I’m not shy. You can turn around any time.” He didn’t bother to mention that he wasn’t taking off his shorts so the most she’d see is his back and his cotton covered ass as he shed his jeans and pulled on a clean t-shirt