Chapter 28 Lizzie
LIZZIE
I stood at the window, vigilant, with a shotgun in my hand. Every once in a while, I reached down and made sure that I carried extra ammunition and some throwing knives. They weren’t my throwing knives, but I’d be able to wield them just the same.
Just in case, you know?
With King and the guys gone, there was nothing but a skeleton crew manning the safehouse. I knew something big was happening. Maybe this was it. Maybe this was the night that the guys would execute whatever plan it was that they had in mind.
I hoped so.
I missed Doc with a passion that I couldn’t convey in our letters any longer.
“Anything?” Anna asked from the hallway.
I peered over my shoulder from the front window and simply shook my head.
I’d never seen Anna chew on her nails before.
But I watched the way she worried over her brother every time he left.
I watched the way she was filled with relief every time he came back.
She nodded at me before she turned on a swivel, her hand moving back up to her mouth.
She disappeared down the hallway, taking a sharp left before her pacing started up again.
I wanted to hug her so badly.
She didn’t seem like a hugger, though.
Amanda and Ariel were off doing whatever it was the two of them did in order to distract themselves. I wasn’t sure half of the time. Jasmine lost herself in a book, curled up in one of the chairs with a blanket thrown over her legs. I noticed that she didn’t turn the page much, though.
I wondered if she was even reading.
And then, there was Marla. My Em. My best friend. She snored softly on the couch, and I couldn’t help but smile. I walked over and perched on the edge of the couch next to her hip, fully intent on just watching over things.
Until she peeked an eye open.
“Sorry,” I muttered as I reached out and rubbed her leg. “Didn’t mean to wake you.”
She grunted as she pushed herself upright. “You didn’t.”
I giggled. “You looked pretty asleep.”
She smoothed her hair away from her forehead. “One eye open, and all that.”
I tilted my head. “You worried?”
She shook her head. “Just miss him, that’s all.”
“Me, too.”
She smiled tiredly at me. “Yeah? You miss Doc?”
I smiled back at her. “Yeah, I do.”
She kicked me playfully with her foot. “I like you two together. He really complements you.”
“I could hear him rattle on about anything any day of the week.”
Em shoved herself in my direction until we sat next to one another. She laid her head on my shoulder and yawned. “I feel like it’s been forever since we’ve talked.”
I nuzzled my cheek against her head. “I know. Things have been so crazy lately.”
“We’ve been in the same damn house living together with all of these other women, and we still barely talk.”
I snickered, but her words had my heart heavy. “I’m sorry.”
She linked her arm with mine. “Me, too. I’ve been a bit wrapped up in Ranger and—”
“Hush now,” I said before I kissed her head mindlessly. “No justifications. Ranger’s a good guy, and he’s good for you.”
She picked her head up and looked at me. “You think so?”
“I know so. I see how he looks at you. How he dotes on you. How he still worries over you, even though, according to Doc, you’ve healed quite well.”
“You don’t look too bad yourself, you know.”
I flicked my hair over my shoulder a bit. “Well, I do try.”
We leaned our heads together and I closed my eyes. The silence with my best friend was nice. Sometimes silence was how we connected. Just sitting with one another felt like such a productive activity. Like parallel play, but for adults.
I couldn’t help the question out of my mouth, though.
“You think they’ll be back tonight?”
Marla snuggled down against my shoulder. “I hope so.”
“Do you think they told anyone their plans?”
“No, I think they’ve kept it in between the crews this time.”
“You think that’s why Anna’s so worried? Because she doesn’t know what King’s up to this time?”
“King?” she asked as she looked at me with a furrowed brow. “You mean, Brutus?”
I slowly turned my attention toward her and crooked an eyebrow. “You think Anna’s that worried over the guy she torments with pickle breath?”
We laughed about that as we leaned back, talking about the antics of Anna and Brutus.
We talked about how Amanda and Wrecker were much too loud at night, and how her favorite thing that Ranger did had nothing to do with the bedroom, but the bathroom.
Apparently, Ranger was a fan of shaving her legs, and she held her leg up for me to touch just to boast of his straight razor shaves.
“Wow,” I said as I smoothed my hand up and down her leg.
She beamed with pride as she rolled her pants leg back down. “That’s three days of growth.”
My eyes bulged. “I’m a woolly mammoth after three days. What!?”
Marla’s head fell back in laughter. “I swear, it’s the shit he uses to shave me with. I’ll have to check out the label. I always forget the name, but Ranger uses the same product on his hair. Says it keeps it from getting all tangled up under his helmet.”
“Must work,” I said with an impressed smile.
Em wiggled her eyebrows. “Does Doc do anything like that in the shower?”
We talked until my voice was damn near hoarse. We laughed until it hurt to breathe. And before we knew it, the morning sun crested through the trees, spraying shots of sunshine through the windows of the safehouse.
And the guys still weren’t back.
“I’m sure they’re all right,” I said as I reached out and rubbed Marla’s back.
“How did you know what I was thinking?” she asked as she peered over her shoulder at me.
But I just found myself staring at the front door.
Please walk through. Please walk through. Please walk through.
“I can’t stand this shit,” Anna said as she stormed down the hallway. “This is bullshit. None of us are sleeping. We’re barely eating. We deserve to know what the fuck is going on!”
“Yeah!” Jasmine said as she pumped her fist in the air from the chair she was still perched in.
Reading the same book.
I wondered how many pages she actually turned in it.
“I think that we should call someone and demand some answers right the fuck know!” Anna declared.
“Yeah!” Amanda exclaimed as she came out of her room.
Ariel dipped her head out into the hallway as well. “Who are we harassing for answers? Because I’m in.”
“You guys know they’re doing this to keep us safe,” I said as I went back and took my position up at the front window.
With my shotgun.
Just in case.
“Well, you know what I think?” Anna asked as she stormed up to me, staring at the profile of my face. “I think that—”
Vroom-room-room-room-room.
The girls gasped as they leapt to their feet.
I smiled at Anna. “What was that?”
Her wide eyes turned to the window.
Vroom-room-room-room-room.
“Oh. My God,” Marla said as she raced to the front door. “Is that what I think it is?”
Vroom-room-room-room-room!
Louder and louder the sound became until a row of bikes burst through the treeline.
The black leather jackets and the gleaming helmets told us everything that we needed to know.
Smoke heard them before any of us did. He’d been lying near the door all morning like a draft stopper, but the second the distant rumble started up, his head snapped up and his tail began to move.
By the time the bikes broke through the treeline, he was on his feet, doing this tight little circle that was just about the most undignified thing I’d ever seen from an animal who carried himself like a general.
“Gee!” Jasmine squealed as she raced out the front door.
“Holy fuck,” Anna said breathlessly.
I’d never seen her move so fast.
“Range!” Em exclaimed as she darted out with the girls.
Amanda and Ariel were hot on their heels.
Smoke blew past all of them. The dog hit the door at a dead sprint, all that military composure gone the second Ranger swung his leg off the bike.
He didn’t jump up, didn’t bowl him over.
He just planted himself against Ranger’s leg and pressed there, solid and shaking, tail going like a propeller, and made this sound.
Low and broken, somewhere between a whine and a groan.
The kind of sound that came from somewhere deep in a chest that had been holding things in for too long.
Ranger crouched down. He got all the way down to the dog’s level, both hands going into the fur on either side of Smoke’s face, and he just held him there for a moment.
Smoke licked him once, right across the nose, and Ranger huffed out a breath that might have been a laugh if it wasn’t so rough around the edges.
He pressed his forehead to the top of the dog’s head and stayed there.
I watched Marla stop running. She stood a few feet away with her hand over her mouth, watching the two of them, and I saw the moment it broke her open a little.
She had been with that dog for weeks. She knew what he was.
She knew what it cost Ranger to leave him behind, and she knew what Smoke did with that time.
When Ranger finally lifted his head and looked up at her, she closed the distance between them at a dead run and threw herself into his arms. He caught her without standing up, the dog tucking himself against both of them like he was completing some kind of circuit.
But I just kept watching at the window.
Jasmine tackled her man to the ground. Ariel couldn’t get Cap’s helmet off quickly enough. There were kisses and hugs all around.
My feet were filled with lead, however. To be honest, I wasn’t sure which one was Doc.
On their bikes with their helmets and their jackets, especially with the sun only just starting to rise, it was hard to get a read on who was underneath everything.
For a moment, I questioned things. How could I not know which one Doc was?
What did that mean? Was I not paying attention enough?
Would he be upset that I wasn’t out there, tackling him with all of his gear on?
I must’ve been in my head for much too long, because when I finally came to, I found someone standing in my field of vision. In front of the window I was staring at. And when I tilted my head back, I found him smiling down at me.
Waving at me, through the window.
But the smile didn’t quite reach his eyes.
Something happened.
The instant I moved for the front door, he moved swiftly as the wind. The door was open, his arms were around me, and the shotgun dropped from my hands as he gathered me into his arms.
“I gotcha,” he whispered as he kicked the shotgun away from us.
“Daniel,” I whimpered as I wrapped my legs around him.
“I gotcha. I’m back. We’re all back,” he said as he rubbed my back.
“Don’t ever leave for that long again, okay?” I whispered.
He pressed a kiss to my temple as he walked us back toward our bedroom that we hadn’t shared with one another in days.
“We have much to discuss,” he muttered in my ear. “But first, I wish to hold you, my Liz.”
I sure as hell didn’t need to be told twice, either.