Chapter 27
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
“We need to stop.” Jorja nudged Remi. “I have no idea how you can be almost asleep at the keyboard when you’ve consumed enough Monster to fuel a jet.”
“Wrong drink.” Remi’s words were slurred. “It’s Red Bull which gives you wings, not Monster.”
“I don’t care which it is.” She stood up and put her hand under his elbow. “The only place you are flying to is bed.”
“Can’t. I need to sign off with Gunnar and the guys.” He reached for his headset, and she snatched it out of his hands.
“I’ll do it. How does this thing work?”
“Tap here.” He hit the button in the center of the earpiece. “And you’re good to go.”
“Zipper?”
She jumped when Gunnar’s voice sounded as if he was either standing right beside her or directly in her head. “Umm, no, it’s me.”
“Beautiful, is everything okay?”
Even with the worry evident in his tone, Gunnar sounded ridiculously pleased to hear her voice. “Yes, I promise,” she reassured him. “G-dog, or bear, or whatever name you are called on here, your brother is done for the day. I’m taking him to bed…”
“You’re what now?”
“We’re tired. Unless you need him for something, he’s done for the day,” she explained.
“He’s worked since dawn and his head is almost touching the keyboard.
Even with me here, it’s too much. So, either you tell me it’s okay to haul his butt to his place, or I’m going to remind you that you are an asshole at times.
This being one of said times.” She was aware she was blurting out the words so fast Gunnar probably couldn’t keep up, but she too was way past tired.
“My eyes hurt, my head hurts, and if I sit down another second, my butt is going to cry and die on the spot.” She paused and waited for an answer.
When none was forthcoming, she narrowed her eyes. “Gunnar?
“Gunnar?
“Hello, am I talking to the wall?
“Jerk-God, I swear—”
A burst of laughter, which she knew didn’t come from Gunnar as it was completely different to his normal deep chuckle, sounded in her head. “I think Grizzly is stuck on the ‘you are taking his brother to bed’ bit, Ma’am.”
“What?”
“Yeah.” The voice snorted. “He broke the glass he was holding because he squeezed it too tight. One moment, please.”
“Who is this? And tell Colt or Talon to smack him hard for being stupid.”
Give me strength. Does he really think I’d jump into bed with his brother the second his back is turned?
“It’s Zorro, Ma’am. We can all hear you, as the comms keeps us all connected,” he explained, then yelled something which clearly wasn’t meant for her. “Yo, Radar, bash Grizzly on the head, will ya? F. Tock’s orders. Colt broke his comms unit, so I had to yell, as he’s closest to the boss.”
“First, F-Tock? Explain?”
“Female Tactical Operations Center or Command.”
Military men and their freaking anagrams. “If you keep making crap up, I’m going to need a dictionary with the codes so I understand what the heck you are saying.” Her snarky reply earned a round of laughter from the others in her ear.
“You said first,” Tyrone prompted. “What’s the second?”
“Tell…” even though he’d used Colt’s code name a second ago, she double-checked her list just to be sure she had the correct one, “Radar, that he owes Zipper a case of Monster for breaking his equipment.”
“Second, turn off your earpieces—all of them—except Grizzly’s.” She didn’t need to look up his name; it was already transcribed in her soul. “He is still wearing his, right?”
“No, Ma’am, it’s on the table in front of him.”
Give me strength, because I need to have a conversation with his momma about having raised an idiot.
“Ask him to put it back on, please.” She was probably overstepping more than a couple of boundaries here, but she would not allow him to keep thinking she would betray him. She heard Tyrone passing on the message and murmuring from Gunnar, then a pause where everything went silent in her head.
Is this thing even on anymore?
She glanced at the screen over the top of Remi’s head and noted a green dot next to Gunnar’s call sign. All the others were red, which meant at least his was still active.
“Gunnar?”
“Yup.”
Is he only going to give me one-word answers? Wonderful.
“I’m not sure if I misspoke or you misunderstood, or a mix of both.
” She decided straight out was the best way to handle this.
“But if you think me dumping your almost comatose brother on his couch is a problem, then I can just leave him to stay sleeping on his keyboard. But you get to listen to his whining about it all day tomorrow.”
Remi helpfully gave a loud snore as if to emphasize her point. Jorja narrowed her eyes at him and leaned over to see his face. To her, he appeared to be sleeping, but that snore was freaking suspicious.
Is he faking being asleep?
“Okay.”
“Gunnar, look, I know you have been hanging around with the one-word response brigade for hours, but in my world, this isn’t how a conversation works.
” Even she could hear her frustration in her voice.
“Please talk to me, and don’t shut down.
” She drew in a breath and let it out slowly.
“I am not her. Don’t put me in the same league as her.
” She heard him sigh, and then the sound of a chair scraping in the background.
“Gimme a minute.”
“Of course.” It was more than one word. They’d graduated to three.
She’d take it. She’d heard the term once bitten, twice shy from her mom more times than she could count.
Especially when she’d asked her why she’d never tried to find someone else to love.
But this was the first time she was dealing with it.
God, I hope I don’t screw this up.
“I’m here,” Gunnar said softly. “I had an audience, and I don’t think I want one for this.”
Jorja glanced at where Remi still lay, either asleep or pretending to be asleep at the computer. “I’m still in the war-room, and Remi is sleeping.”
“The comms signal will reach to the bench outside the door,” he told her. “I’ve used it out there a couple of times.”
“Okay, but if this signal drops, I’m going to be mad,” she warned.
“Understood, and it won’t. I promise.”
She left the war-room, unhooked the door from the wall, and closed it softly. If it locked then she’d just have to wake Remi up by hammering on it when she was done talking to Gunnar. “The door and window are closed, and I’m on the bench.”
“You know, we aren’t meant to be having this conversation while I’m working, right? That’s not what our equipment is for.”
He’s trying to get out of it. Lovely!
“Do you own the equipment or does someone else?”
“I own it.”
“Then who’s going to be mad about you using it to fix a misunderstanding?
” She raised one eyebrow when he grunted in response.
Even though he couldn’t see it, making her suspicion known to the freaking universe made her feel better.
A couple of beats of uncomfortable silence spread between them, and she figured if she didn’t talk, he wouldn’t.
“I’m sorry. What I said must have messed with your head.
I would never sleep with your brother. Ever.
Because A: ew. B: he’s cute and all, but still eww… and most of all, C:…” she trailed off.
“C?”
How did he not know this? Probably because she hadn’t said the freaking words.
He should freaking know. I don’t go around sleeping with every Tom, Dick, and Harry.
That’s what Barry is for.
Do not mention Barry, or he’ll lose his fricking mind.
“Most of all, C: he’s not you, you big dummy.”
A harsh inhale was followed by a muttered, “There aren’t many people who would dare say that to me.”
“Maybe they should,” she grumbled back. “I’m not one of your team. I’m not a soldier or a sailor and I don’t even understand what you people freaking say half the time. I’m your—” she cut herself off because she didn’t know what she was to him. “Argh, you are making me nuts.”
“You’re my what?”
There were so many ways she could answer that question.
She just didn’t know which one fit, because she didn’t know what he wanted her to be.
At least they weren’t having this conversation in person, as she was already blushing.
He didn’t need to know that. But she did, just as she knew it was more from frustration than embarrassment. “I don’t know, Gunnar. You tell me.”
“I—”
She waited for him to continue, but when she only heard the sounds of his soft breathing, she whispered, “See, not so easy, is it?”
“Why do we have to—”
It was so easy to picture him in her mind; he was probably squeezing his fingers into the bridge of his nose. She’d watched him do the same thing multiple times in the days before he’d left for this mission.
“Fuck it.” Gunnar’s voice rumbled through her earpiece. “You’re mine, Jorja, full stop. MINE.” His possessive growl wrapped around her and sank under her skin. It went straight for her heart and scored a direct hit. “Don’t you forget it, baby. You are mine.”
Jorja hadn’t known how much she needed to hear those words until she heard them.
Now those words were hers to keep, and that mattered.
It mattered a lot. She wiped at a single tear which leaked from the corner of one eye.
“Yes, Gunnar, I am yours.” She was not crying.
Crying wasn’t allowed. Not now. “That’s why it hurt that you thought I would betray you.
” She kept her words steady. Someone get her a massive glass of wine, as she’d earned it.
“I wouldn’t do that to anyone—never mind to you, Jerk-God.
” She hiccuped the nickname she’d given him in spite of her resolve.
“I’m sorry, beautiful. I fucked up.” There was an ache in his voice that she couldn’t put a description to. “I won’t do it again.”