Chapter 10
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When Andrea and Hayden finally made it inside the safe house—which was an apartment in yet another apartment building—she was both shaky and tired.
It was exhilarating to be part of that chase and yet terrifying at the same time.
When she walked in, he locked the door behind her.
She glanced back and asked, “What about Trent and Oakley?”
“They will be on their way,” he replied, “but they’ll take their time and shake any tail. We can’t take any chances right now.”
She nodded. “I had no idea your life was so exciting,” she murmured.
“Hardly exciting,” he quipped, “unless damsels in distress are the name of the game.”
She chuckled. “I never thought to be a damsel in distress.”
“Of course not,” he stated. “It’s not something that anybody ever aims for. And believe me that we aren’t blaming you.”
She sighed and added, “But I’m blaming me.”
He frowned at her and asked, “What good will that do?”
“Hopefully I learn something here. Maybe I won’t repeat my earlier mistakes.” She shrugged and sank down onto the couch, looking around. “I didn’t even think safe houses were real. Safe houses that were apartments too. I mean, movies talk about them all the time, but—”
“But what? Where else will you go when you’re being pursued?
Back home? These guys will just walk right up to your apartment and knock on the door.
It may not be today or tomorrow, but it’ll happen eventually.
Some time in the future, when you’re not expecting anybody, they’ll just pop you one, as you open your front door. ”
She stared at him, all the color fading from her face.
He muttered, “Okay, that might’ve been a little more graphic than I intended.”
She continued to stare at him. Once the shock wore off, she winced. “Good God, how do we … How do we get out of this so my life can get back to normal?”
“First, we capture those two men who were coming toward us in the mall parking lot. Still, we don’t know how many men were involved in just that one op or how many follow vehicles were included either. So that’s the bigger question.”
Just then a text came on his phone. He snatched his phone, quickly read it, and nodded. “Okay, Oakley and Trent are outside.” He opened the door, and Trent, a tired look on his face, stepped in.
“I’ve got a massive headache.” He walked to the small couch but detoured to one of the large armchairs and crashed down there.
She frowned at him. “You really took a whopper, didn’t you?”
“Yeah, I did,” he admitted, “and it hurts like hell.”
She winced. “I am so sorry.”
He nodded. “Not your fault.”
“Feels like it’s my fault because they have my phone and my wallet.”
“It’s not as if you just gave them your things. So let yourself off the hook. These guys get up in this shit all the damn time.” Trent gave her a smile. “For the most part, we’re damn tired of it all too.”
“I haven’t done any of this kind of work,” she noted, “and I’m already fed up and pissed off about it all.”
He nodded, turned to Hayden. “I don’t suppose anybody thought to pick up food, huh?”
“No, I didn’t.” Hayden stared at him. “Do you need medical attention?”
“The head sucks,” Trent confirmed, “but, no, I don’t need medical attention.
I had gotten out to check the trunk in terms of supplies, weapons, and things.
As I got back inside the car, I was just about to lock the door, and it was pulled open, and a crunch came down on my head, and I was out.
Next thing I knew, I had Oakley shaking my shoulders, as if I had been out for hours.
I don’t think I was though. I figure Oakley interrupted what else they had planned for me. So I couldn’t have been out for long.”
“Even feeling that way is not good news.” Hayden frowned as he studied him, focused on his eyes, watching for anything to worry about.
“I know. I know. And I’m fine. I swear. I’m fine. I’m more pissed off at getting caught than anything, and yet I know it can happen to anybody. I get it.”
She watched as the two of them had this conversation. “Do you guys ever really listen to yourselves?”
“Nope,” Hayden declared, with a smile. “Trent’s trying to not feel guilty as hell. And I’m trying to make him not feel as guilty as hell. And we’re both failing.”
She eyed him in astonishment. “On that note, I’ll see if there’s anything to eat in this kitchen.”
“You’re hungry?” Hayden asked in astonishment.
“No, but Trent needs food for that head to heal.”
Trent turned to her and smiled. “It’ll be fine.”
“Sure, it will.” She smirked at him. “That sounds almost as good as any other lie you’ve told in the last ten minutes.”
Trent turned to her, a big smile crossing his face. “It’s really nice to see spunky women confident enough to argue back.”
She snorted. “Only because you aren’t dating somebody like that. The minute you are, all you’ll want to do is shut them up.”
Trent raised one eyebrow, then grimaced in pain from the movement. He asked Hayden, “Was that you?”
“No, that was never me.” He got up and followed her into the small kitchen area. She was checking the fridge, as he leaned against the doorjamb. “What was that comment about?” he asked.
“Sorry,” she muttered, “it just came out … wrong. I didn’t really give myself a chance to even think about it before it popped out.”
“Maybe it was something you needed to say,” he noted, “but I had no idea that was inside.”
“I guess I forgot about a lot of it too,” she muttered, showing her palms. “Anyway it’s not that big a deal.”
“No, it’s not that big a deal,” he replied, “but it is a deal.”
When she glared at him, he put up his hands in mock surrender. “I’m not trying to fight. I just want to know that you’re okay.”
“I’m fine,” she muttered. “I’m just fine.”
“Good enough.” He glanced around and added, “Probably won’t find any fresh food, but we should at least have some canned goods, some dried foodstuff.”
She spent a few minutes checking out what was available in the kitchen. “I see food in the cupboards and in the freezer, but I don’t know what Trent needs. I’m not exactly nursing material.”
He smiled. “Sometimes it’s just knowing that somebody cares,” he noted, with a chuckle. “We can probably pull together something from the freezer.”
He walked over to the freezer and opened the door.
“Appears to be a bunch of stuff, … including steaks.” He pulled those out and set them on the counter to thaw.
“I would prefer to cook them on a barbecue pit, but I can certainly fry them in a pan or broil them. So, we’ll need something to go with them. ”
“I found potatoes.”
And, with that, between the two of them, they started working on a meal. The only issue was the frozen steaks.
He frowned at them and shrugged. “Might have to cook them frozen.”
“That sounds like the wrong thing to do,” she said.
“Yeah, it sure is. But, when you’re hungry and when you’ve got people to feed, you do things you wouldn’t do otherwise.”
She nodded. “Good point. So how do we cook them?”
He searched around and noted they had a small patio outdoors. She went to draw back the curtain, but he called out to her. “No, leave it closed.”
“I was thinking we could sit out there.”
“That’s a bad idea right now.”
She sighed. “I was just thinking that maybe life was starting to return to normal. But instead here we are in the same craziness we started out in.”
“And yet, in some ways, we’re a whole lot better off,” Hayden clarified.
“First, there’s four of us, not just two, even though one is injured but not too badly.
Second, we have another one as backup, enjoying the bliss of having found the right partner, with more team members at our beck and call.
” He had to smile at both those thoughts.
“Third, we have a much better idea of what we’re facing. ”
“Sure, but what we’re facing isn’t going away,” she declared. “So, I guess we shouldn’t be counting ourselves as too much better off.”
He just smiled, took the steaks out of their packaging, and very carefully started to microwave them.
She chuckled, overseeing his technique. “My father would shoot you right about now.”
“I would shoot myself,” he admitted, “but I do have people to feed.”
“Right,” she muttered, with a headshake again. “I keep forgetting those priorities.”
“Let me finish off this meal, and then we can get Trent into bed and resting.” He turned to her and suggested, “Go check out the bedrooms and see what there are for options.”
She disappeared and came back a few minutes later. “Three bedrooms.”
“And where is Trent right now?” he asked.
“He’s crashed on that big chair. He looks as if he really wants to go to sleep, but Oakley’s not letting him.”
“Good, that’s part of the whole concussion thing, but he’ll need to crash and burn soon,” he murmured.
About ten minutes later, Hayden called them all for dinner. Everybody came in, sat down, and ate. When they were finished, Hayden looked over at Trent and nodded. “Go get some sleep.”
Trent got up, stumbled to the first bedroom, and, without even a thought, crashed on the bed and was out cold.
Andrea got up, walked over to check on Trent, and returned to Hayden. “He’s out. I hope he gets a good night’s sleep. I hope we all do.”
“We will but in shifts,” he shared, “because we will be taking watch throughout the night.”
She frowned at him. “I thought you said we would be safer here. Isn’t that the point of a safe house?”
He smiled. “It’s a safe house until it’s not a safe house.” He shrugged. “Did they follow us? I don’t think so. Could they have followed us? Absolutely. I suspect we’re fine, but we still won’t take any chances.”
Her shoulders slumped, and she nodded. “So, everything’s okay until it’s not okay.”
“Exactly,” he agreed. “So, after the kitchen is cleaned up, we’ll be taking turns and setting up a watch schedule.”
She nodded. “I’m fine with whatever you guys decide to do. It’s okay by me,” she noted. “It’s Trent that we need to worry about.”