CHAPTER TWO #2
An angry growl reverberating through the room announced Griffin’s arrival, but Apollo had already sensed his presence.
Rocko didn’t move, though he could tell the guy’s senses were on high alert.
Apollo raised his hand, quieting his longtime friend and second-in-command.
All they needed was for Griffin to go ballistic in here, protecting Apollo.
They’d made some good friends in town over the months, but he doubted it would be enough to accept Griffin’s wilder side.
“Obviously, I’m Apollo, and this is Griffin,” he remarked as his second came around the table and sat in the third chair.
“As you no doubt already know, I’m Detective Rocko Owens. I believe Brick contacted you about me coming here and brought you up to date on what occurred when I got off the plane.”
“Why are you sitting at this table?” Griffin demanded.
“I needed a damn coffee—you?” Rocko asked with one raised eyebrow.
Griffin’s eyes narrowed. “Are you trying to annoy me?”
“Yes. But somehow I doubt that takes a great deal of effort.”
Apollo couldn’t help but chuckle.
“You can always turn your ass around and leave,” Griffin warned. “I’ll tell you exactly where to go.”
“Are you trying to annoy me?” Rocko asked with a grin.
“Yes.”
“Touche,” Rocko said before holding up his cup of steaming coffee in salute, taking a drink, and groaning in satisfaction. “Hell, it’s been a long trip, and you trippin’ all over yourself making me feel so at home is touchin’ really.”
Apollo saw the start of a grin on Griffin’s face, but the stoic man caught it before it fully appeared.
The two were sizing each other up, and Apollo had to admit that the guy had balls.
He was enjoying their back-and-forth. People typically avoided the abrasive Griffin for good reason.
His second filled his own coffee cup and raised it to his lips.
“You sure about having more caffeine, friend?” Rocko asked. “You seem wound tight enough.”
“It’ll help stop me from gutting you,” Griffin said. “And I’m not your friend.”
“Now you’re coming on to me,” Rocko said with a wink.
Shit, this was going to be an interesting couple of weeks.
“Okay, let’s get a few things straight,” Apollo said. “Your visit with us is temporary and can be revoked at any time. You follow our rules, and if you do anything to endanger any person on my team, no one will ever find your body. Understood?”
“Fair enough,” Rocko agreed without much of a fuss. “I’d never do anything to harm innocent people.”
“We’re not so innocent,” Griffin growled.
“With you, that doesn’t surprise me,” Rocko chuckled.
“We don’t need any of your hero bullshit here,” Griffin stated.
“Who said anything about being a hero?” Rocko asked.
“Heard about you stepping in with that cop. Hope you learned your lesson about helping fuckups?”
Apollo saw Griffin’s claws were out, and he groaned inwardly. How much damage control would he have to do with these two idiots and their dick measuring?
“Fuckers were standing in front of my rental. Tried to move their shit along, I was on a timeline.”
“Yeah, right, you’re a dick-tective, it’s in your blood to go all knight on a white horse.”
“By the looks of things, I’d say some four-legged DNA got mixed up in your blood,” Rocko shot back.
Apollo nudged Griffin, who unwillingly retracted his claws.
“Okay, let’s get moving before you two totally fuck up what we have in this town. We can reach the compound before dark,” Apollo said. “Rocko, you can follow our truck.”
Rocko reached for his wallet to pay for his coffee.
“Don’t worry about it. We run a monthly tab,” Apollo said as he nodded to Mary.
“Have a good night, fellas. I’ll let my dad know you were asking about him,” she said.
“Tell him to reach out when he’s ready to move that old shed of his. We’ll come by and give him a hand.”
“Thanks again, Apollo,” she said with a wave.
“Mary’s a friend, so don’t get any ideas,” Griffin growled, stalking around the table.
“She’s beautiful, but my tastes run more to dick,” Rocko said bluntly, tossing a few dollars on the table.
Apollo grinned to himself, and for the first time, took a good look at guy.
He was obviously comfortable in his sexuality, which, Apollo admitted, was something.
The man was a fine specimen – from an outsider’s view, he amended hastily.
He certainly wouldn’t be falling for the guy’s assets.
Rocko placed an additional bill on the table.
“That’s a tip for her time bringing the coffee. ”
With a nod, Apollo led the way out, as always in front because if shit was going down, he wanted to be the first to deal with it.
“I’ll follow you guys then,” Rocko said.
“Stay close,” Griffin growled. “Wouldn’t want you to get lost, Dick.”
“Right,” Rocko said before walking across the street to his truck.
“So, what do you think?” Griffin asked as he hopped into the passenger seat of Apollo’s truck. Their hardware order was boxed up in the back.
“We’ll watch him, see how he fits. I’m not reading any hostility or danger, except when you’re around, but I’d rather reserve judgment.” Oh yeah, and for some reason he calms me the fuck down to the point of something I haven’t had in a long time. Peace.
“What can I say? I bring out the best in people,” Griffin joked.
“The best, right,” Apollo drawled.
“What do you think he wants?” Griffin asked.
“I think he’s looking for a place to belong. We can all relate to that feeling at one time. Never knowing who to trust or be able to let your guard down. He proved himself useful to Brick’s team; perhaps he’ll be the same for us.”
“You want to fuck him,” Griffin chuckled. “What was it? The blond hair, muscles, tan, or maybe it was his blue eyes.” He batted his lashes at his old friend.
“Not all of us are run by our hormones like you,” Apollo chuckled. “Rocko intrigues me.”
“You call it intrigue. I call it what it is.”
“And what’s that?” Apollo asked.
“Sex.”
Apollo shook his head and concentrated on the road.
***
Rocko
Will you ever learn to shut up?
As he climbed back into his rental, Rocko was assaulted by his constant string of thoughts.
His brain was overanalyzing every minuscule event around him, memorizing locations, scenes, and people’s characteristics, spitting out facts, and more.
For a far-too-brief moment back in the diner, he’d been free from the constant onslaught.
Rocko couldn’t explain the anomaly, but he had a suspicion it had quieted down when he sat at the table in the restaurant.
Weird, right? he mused. Was it something in the restaurant suppressing his overloaded mind, or something to do with one of the men he’d been sitting with?
He groaned loudly. Please don’t let that fool Griffin be the reason.
He’d rather have brain overload than suffer that fucker more than he had to. Now Apollo on the other hand…
Christ, he was a huge fucker. Brick had told him the guy was large, but he thought it might have been an exaggeration.
Rocko had never met a man over seven and a half feet tall.
His tight shirt did nothing to hide his muscles, but finding clothing that size must be a hell of a task.
They’d probably have to be made to size.
He couldn’t help but notice the man filled out his worn jeans to perfection, and the big black boots he wore completed the imposing and dangerous image.
Rocko thought the other man’s dark eyes seemed troubled, and he wanted to learn more about the surly man who seemed to carry the weight of the world on his broad shoulders.
Shit, I have to get my head on straight. The guy isn’t on the menu.
Griffin, on the other hand, was easy to read, an angry and volatile combination designed to keep everyone at arm’s length. Rocko understood that—he did the same. It seemed to be a common behavior among the survivors.
With a tired, frustrated huff, he waited for Apollo’s truck to drive by.
He pulled behind them to follow them out of town.
They turned down Interstate 22 and drove for roughly fifteen minutes before turning off to the left toward Lake Champlain.
The chill in the air was intensifying as the sun’s warmth sank lower in the sky.
After several twists and turns down gravel roads and through the thick wall of trees making up the forest around him, at times blocking out the sky, and once they went over a set of train tracks, Apollo’s truck slowed, suddenly turned, and appeared to vanish.
Rocko slowed, scanning the area thoroughly until he caught a glimpse of taillights through the brush and carefully maneuvered his rental through what could best be described as a game trail until, eventually, the trees opened into a large clearing.
Rocko didn’t miss the many sensors set up along the perimeter, guessing they were the beginning of safety and security features surrounding this place.
Hell, Apollo had been right; Rocko hated admitting it, but he would never have found this place on his own.
The clearing was larger than he’d imagined and surrounded by walls of thick forest. There were three large buildings, a group of travel trailers, a row of fifth wheels, and other outbuildings in various stages of construction.
He followed Apollo’s truck alongside one of the larger buildings and parked.
Multiple people began to emerge from the buildings and trailers, likely curious to check out the newcomer.
The group gathered around Apollo as Rocko steeled his nerves and stepped out of his truck.
He could easily make out the personalities of a few team members.
Those who confidently stepped up, and those who lingered farther back.
His senses were working overtime, his brain on edge from cataloging all the new stimuli around him.
Smells, sounds, expressions, bodily movements, locations of objects, buildings, temperature, wind direction… it was a full-on sensory assault.
The feeling of being the lone outsider crept into him, cold and sharp.
Rocko embraced that pain and held it close just as he’d done since the day he was dropped off in the orphanage like a mongrel because of who and what he was, transferred from one cage to another.
Where would he fit if he didn’t fit in here with his fellow survivors?
This unanswered question plagued him without end, and by the expressions on the faces surrounding him, Rocko realized this place may not hold the answers he’d been desperately looking for.
He ground his teeth together and forced a smile.