Chapter 12
REID
The locker room smells like bleach, stale sweat, and the distinct, metallic scent of adrenaline fading out. It’s the smell of a shift done right.
I slam my locker shut, the metal clang echoing off the tile. Twelve hours. Three overdoses, one cardiac arrest with ROSC, and a choking toddler. My body is wrecked, aching in the low back and shoulders, but my head?
My head is clear. Finally.
"You're smiling."
I look over my shoulder. Tony is leaning against the row of lockers behind me, arms crossed over his chest. He’s watching me with that look he’s had for months—half-suspicious, half-worried mother hen.
"I'm not smiling," I say, sitting on the bench to swap my boots for sneakers. "I'm tired."
"Bullshit. You're humming. You haven't hummed in four months. Usually, you just growl." Tony kicks the toe of my boot lightly. "Spill it. Did she call you?"
"No." I tie my laces, focusing on the knot. The questions, then the silence over the last few months was painful. Now, I'm actually in a good place. These questions don't hurt. It's funny what a little hope will do. "I'm giving her space."
"Space." Tony rolls the word around like he doesn't believe it. I guess I can't blame him. He watched me fall apart. "Last time you gave her 'space,' you ended up parked outside her apartment at three a.m. staring at her window."
I wince. "That was a low point. I admit that. I wasn't... stable."
"And you're stable now?"
I stand up, grabbing my duffel. I take a second to actually assess myself.
The constant, buzzing anxiety that lived under my skin for the last few months is gone.
The anger at Blake—the white-hot rage that made me want to put my fist through a wall—has cooled into something manageable.
We’re not perfect. The house is still quiet, and we still walk on eggshells sometimes, but we’re functioning.
"Yeah," I say, and I mean it. "I'm stable. Laine and I had a moment at the ER the other night. A real moment. No yelling, no crying. Just... us. And Blake and I are figuring it out. We're not back to what we were before, but we're heading to okay."
Tony studies me for another second, looking for cracks maybe. When he doesn’t find any, the tension in his frame finally snaps. He slumps against the lockers, exhaling a heavy breath.
"Good," he says, rubbing a hand over his face. "That’s good, Reid. Seriously. I was worried we were gonna have to lock you up."
Tony looks wrecked. Like, properly wrecked — the kind of dark circles that have nothing to do with a bad shift and everything to do with a newborn who doesn't believe in sleep.
His wife's running on fumes. He's running on fumes.
The guy should be home, face-down on any horizontal surface, stealing whatever twenty minutes he can get.
And yet.
For the last few months — every single time I started sinking into my own head, circling the drain in that house that's way too quiet — Tony was just there.
Dragging me out the front door. Shoving actual food at me like I'd forget how forks work.
Or just sitting on my porch in the freezing cold, not saying a damn thing, because he didn't want to leave me alone with the silence.
He shouldn't have had the time for me. He made the time.
"I know," I say, dropping the humor. I step closer, invading his personal space because boundaries are for people who haven't saved your life. "Tony, look at me."
He lowers his hand, meeting my eyes.
"You have a newborn, man. You and Angie haven't slept in a hundred years, and you still spent half your off-duty time babysitting a grown-ass man.
" I shake my head, the weight of it actually hitting me.
I'm really fucking lucky to have him. "I know I wasn't easy.
And I know I crashed a lot of family dinners where I probably wasn't exactly the life of the party. "
"Angie didn't mind," Tony says, though we both know Angie is a saint who definitely minded but loves me anyway. "She was worried, too. You’re family, Reid. You don’t leave family behind just because they’re bleeding."
"Yeah, well." I reach out, gripping his shoulder hard. "I'm not bleeding anymore. So go home. Kiss the wife. Hug the kid. Tell Angie I owe her a spa day. A weekend. Whatever she wants."
Tony cracks a smile. "I'm holding you to that. Diapers are expensive."
"Done. I'm serious, T. Thank you. For everything."
"Always," he says, pushing off the locker. He pats my cheek—a hard, solid slap that stings just enough to ground me. "Now get out of here. Go home. Eat something that isn't wrapped in plastic."
The house is dark when I pull into the driveway.
Blake's truck is gone, which means he's still down at the encampment. He’s been spending three, four nights a week there, handing out supplies, doing basic medical checks, fixing tents.
Hatch was right about him—he needed a mission.
He needed to feel useful again. It's sure as fuck better than hanging around here.
Spending too much time alone, in his own head, is a bad idea.
Hell, it's a shitty idea for me too.
I unlock the front door and flip the lights on. The silence doesn't bother me as much as it used to. It feels peaceful tonight.
I drop my bag by the stairs and head for the kitchen. My stomach is hollowed out, so I pull ingredients from the fridge. Peppers, onions, the leftover steak from Tuesday. I get the cast iron skillet hot, waiting until the oil shimmers before tossing the vegetables in.
The sizzle fills the room. I'm getting a hang of this cooking thing. I've been trying to not leave so much on Blake's shoulders. So the cooking channel and videos have been on a steady rotation for the last few weeks.
Turns out, it's not as hard as I thought. That's probably thanks to Laine. She's the best, most patient teacher I've ever had. Prettiest too.
While the peppers soften, I check my phone. No messages. I open my text thread with Laine. The last message is from months ago.
I type out: Thinking of you.
My thumb hovers over the send button.
Don't push, asshole. You promised her you wouldn't push.
I delete the text and toss the phone onto the counter. Patience. That's the mission. Prove I'm solid. Prove I can handle the complications. Prove that Blake being here isn't a threat to us but a part of the package she can trust again.
I plate my food, then grab a second container. Scoop a massive portion of stir-fry into it — extra steak, extra peppers — and snap the lid on. Set it on the center of the middle shelf in the fridge, right where he can't miss it.
Eat something, brother.
I'm just forking the first bite into my mouth when the back door handle jiggles.
Cold air slices through the kitchen as the door swings open. The wind howls for a second before the door slams shut behind him.
Blake stands on the mat.
He looks like he’s been in a wreck. His face is gray, drained of all blood. His hair is a mess, windblown and wild, and he’s shivering so hard I can see the tremors from across the room.
He’s staring at the floor, his chest heaving like he just sprinted a mile.
"Jesus," I say, dropping my fork. I'm off the stool in a second, closing the distance between us. "Blake?"
He doesn't look up. He’s gripping the strap of his bag so tight his knuckles are white.
"Rough night?" I ask, keeping my voice low. Calm. Professional. I don't know what I'm dealing with, but he's on the verge of shock, that much is for sure.
He nods, a jerky, mechanical motion.
I stop a few feet away, assessing him. No visible blood. No injuries I can see. But the smell coming off him is intense—woodsmoke, and the sharp, sour scent of cold sweat.
"Was it the kid again?" I ask. There was a young vet he’d been worried about last week. "Or did something happen with the cops?"
"No," he croaks. His voice is wrecked. "Just... cold. It's cold."
"Yeah, it's freezing out there." I step closer, reaching out to take the bag from his shoulder. "Let me take this. I made food. It's in the—"
My hand brushes his arm.
He flinches so violently he almost hits the wall.
I freeze, hand in mid-air. Blake has backed up against the doorframe, his eyes wide now, staring at me with something that looks a hell of a lot like panic.
"Woah," I say softly, putting my hands up, palms out. "Easy. It's just me. You're home."
He stares at me for a heartbeat longer, his chest rising and falling rapidly. Then he blinks, and the panic is replaced by a crushing kind of misery. He looks down at his boots again.
"Sorry," he mumbles. "Startled me."
"It's okay."
My gut twists. He’s worse than I thought. The camp must have triggered something. Flashbacks. Afghanistan. He’s seeing ghosts again. I hate that he’s suffering, but part of me is relieved that I’m here to catch him. I can handle this. I can help him fix this. For once, I can help put him together.
"You need to decompress," I say, stepping back to give him a clear path. "Go grab a shower. Get that smoke off you. I'll heat up the food whenever you're ready."
"I'm not hungry," he says. He pushes off the wall, moving past me without making eye contact. He’s moving fast, like he’s escaping.
"Blake," I say.
He stops at the bottom of the stairs, his back to me. Rigid. Tension radiating off him in waves.
"You're doing good work out there," I tell him. "I know it takes a toll. But I'm proud of you."
His shoulders hike up, tight against his ears. He stands there for a long second, silent, vibrating with whatever demons he brought home with him.
"Proud," he whispers. "Fuck."
Then he takes the stairs two at a time, disappearing into the dark of the second floor. A moment later, I hear his bedroom door shut.
I stand alone in the kitchen, listening to the silence settle back over the house.
It’s fine. He just needs sleep. We’re stable. I’ll check on him in the morning.
"We're getting there," I say to the empty room. "We're gonna be fine."