9. Big Hero
Chapter 9
Big Hero
Griff
I fucking watched as the Chris Hemsworth look-alike stormed in and beelined straight for Taz. He stopped short of her, his hands out as if he was going to give her a hug.
I placed my hand in my pocket, my fingers pressing on the two challenge coins. The President’s… and my own.
Did I reevaluate my approach to Taz after I took a bullet to the chest? Yes. Yes, I had. Two bullets in a single year was a fucking sign to get my shit together and stop waiting for the right time. With the pending threat from Matthews, I needed to clear this shit up now, right this instant.
This Fireman had to get to the back of the line. Or better yet, go fuck himself.
“Hey, sorry, rain check on dinner? I gotta go, big fire near the Sawmill. Need all hands on deck, ya know?”
Well, aren’t you a big fucking hero?
He leaned forward and took her shoulders in his hands, bending down to give her a kiss on the cheek.
“Of course!” she said with a smile.
“Before I bounce, I just gotta ask… did you ever figure out the equation?”
I needed to get my coin in her pocket. Or better yet, my name tattooed on her ass. Then these Riley scumbags would back the fuck off.
“Yes!” she snapped her fingers. “It’s five pounds of C4 for every pound of body weight.”
What the shit? I remembered that conversation. Was she talking to him the way she talked to me? That was going to end now.
“I thought so.” Riley snapped his fingers, mirroring her gesture, as if it was a real Eureka moment. “When I get back, I want to talk about a thermite solution, alright?” Riley turned ready to bolt out the door, but turned around to yell, “Remind me later, okay?”
“Just come by when you’re through,” she said, before giving him a flirty finger wave.
What. the. Fuck?
I will fuck her right in front of him if that’s what it takes to mark my god damn territory.
“Alright, sweetheart. See you later!” Then he was gone.
My blood boiled, fists clenched at my sides.
I shouldn’t say something.
I shouldn’t.
But I did.
“Are you trying to get rid of a body, Psycho?” I said, a little too loud, as I felt every eye in the room turn to me. “I’ve got easier ways to do that.”
Because I will kill this guy-with-a-girl’s name and you’ll never find his fucking body.
“It’s a purely theoretical exercise.” Taz smiled as she looked out the door where Riley had gone. “But I’ll keep that in mind next time I put a bullet in you.”
Taz started talking to that biker again, and I was fucking done. I ordered a basket of fries, a burger, and onion rings from Ellen, and another couple beers before downing mine.
I was done with her attention being elsewhere. Did that make me a juvenile? Sure. But I had come here to see her, and it was time I had her fucking attention.
“Food’s on its way,” I said, interrupting their conversation, nodding my head to a vacant booth.
“I’ll be there in a sec,” she said without looking at me.
“Come on, Psycho,” I reached out to grab her bicep and pull her from the Jukebox, when the fucking biker prick stepped forward.
“She said she’d be there in a sec,” old biker man scowled.
I prickled. What the fuck was this guy doing? Who the hell was he? Were they friends?
“You in the habit of laying your hands on women without their permission?” His shoulders flexed back, and I was ready to get into a fight. “That’s no way to treat this kind of woman.”
If I couldn’t bend Taz over a table, take her from behind, and mark her with my teeth, then I needed to bloody my fists. I wasn’t above taking on an entire MC to do it.
“Don’t act like you know what kind of woman she is.”
That came out wrong.
Really, really wrong. I’d sound like I was calling her a slut, but I meant that she was a woman who could take care of herself.
It was too late to backtrack now.
“What the hell is that supposed to mean?” The guy had the word “Cobra” tattooed on his knuckles.
“What do you think it means?” Yup, I was dug in now.
Then Taz laughed. And it wasn’t a little quiet, demure, feminine laugh either. It was loud and boisterous, and nearby patrons turned their heads to look at her.
“You’re okay with him treating you like this?” Cobra said, never taking his eyes off me.
Why did I feel like I was on the wrong side of this? Like I was the bad guy, and he was the one on her side?
She studied me with those amused eyes as her pearly teeth glinted in the cheap Edison lights overhead.
“He’s not calling me a skank.” She covered her snicker. “He was trying to say that I can stand up for myself, but then it came out wrong and now he can’t back down.”
I wanted to be mad at her, but I couldn’t be. Not when she was laughing. She didn’t do that enough. I could kiss her when she did that. It would be so easy to grab her face and…
“He’s one of my oldest friends,” she said, smirking at me.
That word again - friend.
I wanted to shake her for using that word. I could punch myself for having not claimed her yet… I shoulda done so long ago.
“Our food’s ready,” I grumbled, looking at the bar where Ellen dropped our food. “Come on, Guerro.”
“Guerro?” asked the biker.
“Taz Guerro,” she said, with a smirk. Then she amended. “Trinity.”
“Really?”
“Yeah,” she looked at me askance, silently asking if there was something strange about her name.
The hair on the back of my head prickled. What had Matthews said about not knowing who she really was? He had said her name. Her full legal name.
“The things we’ll do to Trinity Blaze Guerro…”
I stepped in front of her, pulling her behind me.
“The fuck is it to you, buddy?” I asked, puffing out my chest.
Was he one of them? One of the fuckers that wanted to harm her? Did she just give him the confirmation he needed? Over my dead body. I’d happily take another dozen bullets.
“Griff…” Her hand went to my shoulder, trying to pull me away, but I shrugged her off.
I was ready to fucking fight. Hell, I wanted a fight, just to release the energy in my body. Just so I could feel like I was doing something to protect the woman that I was sure I had put in danger, somehow.
I should never have put her on the paperwork. I had wanted her there for my own sake, because I knew my mom. She’d make it seem like Kristin was my widow if it got my Dad some California electoral votes for his Presidential bid. But I wanted to be clear about who would get everything, and it was the woman standing beside me. Was it a point to make to my parents? Sure.
But it was also because I knew Taz would do something good with everything I left behind. My condo, my money, my truck… all of it.
Maybe she wasn’t my wife but she was the person who had my back. We had been in combat together. That meant something.
“Come on, brother ,” I said the last word satirically. “What’s her name mean to you?”
Are you one of Matthews’ guys? Are you one of the people sent to get her? Just give me a sign, buddy. I’d beat you to within an inch of your life, string you up, and keep you alive, just for the pleasure of breaking you again, mother fucker.
“I thought it was an interesting name,” Cobra said, narrowing his eyes, hunching his shoulders forward as he regarded me. I wanted to puff my chest out, and he wanted to lean in. We were approaching our confrontation like two different animals. “Biblical, ya know? The Holy Trinity.”
“Jesus, dude, you into astrology too? Wanna tell her the numerology of her name and figure out what her fire sign is?” What was he? A spiritual biker?
Cobra coolly lifted a single, thick brow. “Guerro comes from the French word, Guerre, meaning war.”
The man’s eyes turned to Taz, assessing her from head to toe. It threw me off, because he didn’t look at her like she was a woman. No, there was something… paternal about his gaze.
“Together, Trinity Guerro means spiritual warrior.” He let out a soft laugh. “Maybe even someone who goes to war for the Holy Trinity.”
The fuck kind of biker was this? I gazed at the patch on his cut, the Prodigal Sons. Were they some kind of religious MC? A cult? I needed to have Sierra look into them.
I narrowed my eyes, pinning a hard stare on the fucking weirdo with a hard on for my Psycho. I didn’t care if she thought we were in the middle of a dick swinging contest. Not when I’d put her at risk with Cerberus, when this fucker could be linked to Matthews.
“What are you, some kind priest?” There were often religious elements when it came to extremist groups. Was this one of them?
“No, brother, ” he said throwing my sarcasm back at me. “Just a philosopher.”
He pushed himself off the jukebox and gave Taz a small nod. My skin prickled again, and I stood my ground in front of her, as if his gaze was a bullet, and I was ready to catch it… again.
“See you around, warrior,” he said with a wink, walking past us and back to his biker buddies. “Should you ever want to find me, we’re bunked at the warehouse on Amsterdam and Church Street. I’ll usually be there.”
Was that a threat? I couldn’t fucking tell.
As if he could read my question, he turned around, pointed at Taz, and said, “We can even clock your bike on a nice open trail, if you like. You know, for science.”
Matthews was a bad guy. He had been so easy to read, he was practically made in two dimensions. But this guy? I couldn’t read the subtext, even though I knew there was more going beneath the surface. It was like trying to read the depths of a murky lake with the naked eye.
But just because I was paranoid, didn’t mean that people weren’t out to get her. I needed to make my point, just in case he was the guy. How long had the MC been here? Ellen said they had just arrived this week. It was too coincidental.
When his back turned to us, I called out, “If any of your guys come after her, I will rain down so much Hell that none of you will ever be the same.”
He froze mid-step, his head turning a little to the side.
“I respect that, brother,” the sarcasm was gone from that word now. “But don’t say that too loud.”
He looked around, staring at the patrons in the bar: His men, the farmers in from a hard day of work, and all the other residents of this little town.
He turned his head, but not his body, looking back at me with those piercing dark eyes.
“Someone will hear it and think it’s a challenge.”
I followed her home in my midnight blue Mercedes-Maybach - a little splurge I had, after I touched down in Dulles. She banked aggressively along the winding country road. She rode like she was trying to lose me and I stayed hard on her tail, keeping my eyes on her beautiful round ass the entire time.
God, I had missed that sight.
I didn’t know I had a type, but since feeling the raw power of her body beneath me five years ago, it was hard to not crave that strength. Defined thighs, strong calves, an ass that could deadlift an elephant. She could run, but she couldn’t hide. Not this time. I’d pin her down and make her talk, even if I had to tie her to a chair in a CIA black site to do it.
And boy, would that be a delicious fight. We had gone through SERE together, and even our instructors had a hell of a time trying to get a reaction from her. She had a thousand-yard stare and an ability to not react to a damn thing, even when they were punching the living hell out of her.
I, on the other hand, was a fucking wreck. Anytime my teammates got beaten, I was ready to break the fucking bars, even when I knew that this was all just a drill. I knew it’d be over soon, but damn. I couldn’t block shit out the way she could. I think that was when I started developing a small, unacknowledged crush on her.
When shit hit the fan, there was no one better at your side than Trinity “Taz” Guerro.
When she turned into the long dirt road, she slowed down, letting common sense rein in her adrenaline addiction. She dropped the kickstand and dismounted - that act also hot as fuck.
She went into the back of the Denali - my truck. Though it had long since become communal property between us, since I’d let her keep it for so long - and pulled out a cover and started bundling up her baby, the bike.
Of course, she had an enormous firepit. She could roast a full human in that thing. I’d expect nothing else from my firefly.
I came over and helped her, and we silently set the task of protecting her prized possession, just in case it rained tonight.
I shouldn’t be a dick.
I shouldn’t be… but… I was.
“Riley’s a fucking nerd,” I said, as she petted her bike, giving it – Daisy – a kiss over the cover.
She anthropomorphized her vehicles. She gave them names, and personalities. She treated them like they had feelings. It was nutty, but God damn cute at the same time.
She’d nicknamed my Denali, Keanu. Why? I had no idea. She just felt that was his name.
“I’m a nerd too,” she stood, not sparing me eye contact as she walked over to the door of her trailer. I followed behind, again, enjoying the view.
“Not the same thing.”
“Why is that?” She opened the door and stepped through, not holding it for me.
“Because you’re hot, and he’s… he’s…” I was drawing a blank. “His name is Riley and he’s the human equivalent of bland salsa.” Yeah. That’d work. “I’ve had bowel movements more interesting than that guy.”
I shut the door, pulling it taut on the weather stripping to keep out the chill that hung in the air.
She rolled her eyes, turning away from me as she reached a hand to the tiny fridge.
When she was nothing but a silhouette in the refrigerator light, I couldn’t help myself. It was all too close to what had happened two years ago - the night we never spoke of.
I boxed her in, my arms on either side of her head resting my palms on the top of the fridge.
She froze. I leaned down to that space between her ear and shoulder, taking in a deep inhale of her woodsy scent. I never thought that sandalwood could seem feminine, but on her skin, it did. Strong, with just a hint of flowers, interspersed with the comforting scent of smoke and leather.
A scent I had been obsessed with since the night I fell for her.
“He’s a good man,” her voice was just a whisper.
“I’m not disagreeing.” I leaned down a little more, just to get a bit more of her warmth in my lungs. “He’s just not good enough for you.”
“You say that about everyone.”
“And it’s true.”
I waited a beat as she didn’t move. Then she grabbed an Edelweiss beer and closed the door. I stepped back to let her.
“I don’t want to die alone, Griff.”
It was my time to freeze. Was she fucking serious?
“Bullshit,” I snorted, deciding that she was just being sarcastic, as always. “That can’t be why you’re dating that milquetoast.”
She slowly shut the fridge door and turned around. Her eyes were wet, shiny with unshed tears. What the fuck was going on?
“I’m serious, Griff.” She laughed in frustration, shaking her head. “I’m not getting any younger, and you know what? Maybe I don’t want to be on my own forever. Maybe I’m tired.” She placed her palm on her forehead, her eyes shut. “I’m so sick of being lonely.”
I squinted at her face, looking for any sign that I was being fucking punked.
But the tear down her cheek was real.
There was no way that she was scared to die alone. She was surrounded by people all-the-fucking-time. Charlotte and Top were up her ass on the best of days. VD never left the stupid barn that was just down the road, Goose and his daughter were always bugging her to hang out, and then there was me…
Maybe I wasn’t calling her every fucking night. I wasn’t shadowing her the way I wanted to because of work but I was there. I was always there, watching.
It was even on my fucking paperwork to be alerted if anything happened to her, and I’d be on the first flight back, even if it burned my cover.
“You’re not alone, Taz.”
She turned her head away from me and covered her face wiping the tear away.
“I am, Griff. I might have people around me, but that’s not the same. It’s not…” She let out a long sigh. “I want what Top and Charlotte have.” She turned around and looked at me with sad eyes. “What Sandy and Goose had.”
That struck me right in the heart. Sandy killed herself, losing her lifelong battle with depression, leaving Goose with two kids and a hole in his heart. What would I do if there was no Taz in this world? Would I be able to endure like Goose? Fuck no.
“If I died tomorrow, no one would find my body until I missed a few Sunday dinners on the farm or–”
“I’d know,” I interrupted her.
“If they needed a bounty hunter, and no one else was available, then Noam would probably send someone to find me, but I’d be long dead by then…”
“You’re not listening to me, Taz.” I grabbed her chin and turned her face to look at me. “ I would know.”
She pulled away, then rolled her eyes. No shit, rolled them like a teenager, annoyed at a parent.
“Also,” I said, waving a finger in front of her nose. “We’re going to circle back to that bounty hunting thing, because you most definitely have not disclosed that little hobby of yours.”
She rolled her eyes again, and I swear to God, I’d make them roll with orgasms later tonight.
“I would know if something happened to you,” I said to get us back on track, because we were definitely not done talking about whatever Domino Harvey bullshit she was doing.
“Sure, Griff. You’ll figure out I’m gone on my next birthday, when I don’t pick up the phone, right?”
“I would know sooner than that.” I was skirting a line that I shouldn’t be crossing. I was about to reveal far too much, but not enough all at the same time.
“Bullshit.” She turned away from me, crossing her arms as she stared out the stupid window over the tiny sink. I hated that she lived in a trailer, even if it gave her the freedom she had so often craved. Or maybe she didn’t crave it anymore after all.
I wrapped my arm around her waist, pulling her to me until my chest pressed against her back. I took a nip at her earlobe, gratified by a small shiver before I spoke again.
“If your phone doesn’t move for twelve hours, I get notified,” I confessed, knowing that she would know why, and she wouldn’t need to ask questions. “If you’re off the radar for twenty-four hours, they topple the first domino to get me home so I can find you.”
Maybe I wasn’t as good at respecting her privacy as I had originally thought. Now that I said it out loud to someone who wasn’t a spook, it seemed downright invasive.
I leaned down, to kiss the side of her throat as she gasped.
“I get one request - just one. And that’s on October 13th. One phone call that’s non-negotiable. Do you know why?” I knew that she knew, but she’d play dumb. That was just her way. When she shook her head, just a little, I chuckled. “To call you, and tell you happy birthday.”
“Why would you do that?” Her voice was barely a breath.
“Do you really have to ask?”
She didn’t move. I didn’t either. It was like we were both standing on the edge of a cliff, wondering if we were going to topple over.
“No. I’m not your type.” She may as well have slapped me in the face with those words.
Was this the moment for bold moves? I wasn’t sure. But I was losing her. She was slipping from my grasp. If there was a time to go balls to the wall, it was right now.
I leaned my hips forward, and she gasped as she felt my hardened cock against her lower abdomen. “Does that feel like you’re not my type?”
“You’ve been drinking.”
“I’m sober enough to drive. Try again.”
She started to shiver. I was about to hold her in my embrace when she pushed off the sink, crashing into me, throwing me back before walking away. The eyes she turned on me were vicious, and angry. She was ready for a fight, and I didn’t know why.
“Fuck off, Griff.” Her voice was shaky, her bravado faltering. “Just go the fuck right off because I know this is bullshit. You were shit faced the one and only time you… you…”
“Say it, Taz. Fucking say it.” I stepped up to her, closing the distance she made between us as I snarled. “Say it, Firefly. We fucked. You and me.”
She recoiled, like those words burned her. And it wasn’t because of the memories. I knew that because she had enjoyed it every bit as I had. I had played every second over and over again in my head, and I knew she liked it.
“And we never talked about it again,” She scoffed, turning away from me, but I wouldn’t let her.
I took her chin in my hand and made her face me.
“That was your choice. I didn’t sneak out in the morning. You did.”
“I didn’t sneak out! It was my house!”
“Whatever, Baby. I woke up in bed alone, and you wouldn’t look at me for days.”
She pursed her lips and looked away. A sure sign she was trying to think of something to get the upper hand. “I didn’t sneak out. I let you stay in my house until your divorce was final.”
“You spent almost six fucking months taking every assignment you could to get away, and crashing in the team room because I was staying at your place - hell, you insisted I do that so that I didn’t have to go live with Kristin or move into the barracks. I waited for you to come home every day, and you didn’t. I was just there, among your things, waiting to see you and you never showed.” Did I consider trashing her place? A little bit. Too many drunken nights sitting on her couch, smelling her things, waiting for her to come home.
But like clockwork, she waited for me to leave before she ever came and grabbed her things. It was like she had me under surveillance.
“It was like I was standing in my prom dress, and you stood me up! I remember that clear as fucking day. Do you?” I pounded my chest, still remembering the fucking heart ache of my one and only true friend suddenly turning her back on me.
The one teammate I could count on would barely acknowledge me. I didn’t even care if she said that fucking her was a mistake. I needed my friend, and she left.
“You wouldn’t talk to me. Hell, the only way I got you to even acknowledge I existed was by giving you shit. So I gave you hell, because it was better than your fucking silence.”
“You were still married!”
That was her gotcha? Really? Weak sauce.
“I had filed for divorce, you know that.”
“Doesn’t matter. The Army doesn’t acknowledge separation. You could have still been prosecuted for infidelity if anyone found out. I was trying to protect you.”
It sounded like an excuse, but I believed her. I believed her because… well that’s exactly the kind of thing she’d do. Protect me.
“And…” She let out a long sigh, crossing her arms, her head falling forward. “I didn’t want to be that girl.”
“What girl?”
“The kind that slept with her married teammate.”
Her confession struck me right in the heart.
“No one would have thought that of you,” I said, ready to take her in my arms again. “Not the team. You know that.”
“Maybe not, but what about others? The people outside? The people I’d be on a team with after we all moved on?” She was drawing into herself, hugging herself across the middle. And I was jealous of that. I was jealous of the fact that she was holding herself together when that was my job. “I’d be carrying a black mark forever.”
Her excuses made sense. But they were just that now - excuses.
“I’m divorced now,” I said slowly, crowding her, because I could not stand the distance between us. “And we’re not in the Army. So why are we still not talking about it?”