By the time Chloe’s done, I’m up to sixteen new friends and I’ve found three more listings for people in search of a babysitter. I write out all the listings in my notebook and shut down the computer with a hopeful sigh. This might work. I have to wait a few days for the swelling and bruising on my face to go down before I can see anyone but we can manage with the food and gas I have in the car for a few days.
Chloe is filled with excitement at how much fun she had and chatters away as we leave the library. I have the printout of all the free children’s drop-in programs in my purse and a plan for the rest of the day. We drive around to grocery stores and community centers to look at bulletin boards and I find three more flyers for babysitting as well as two for casual house cleaning. As I drive us to one of the big service stations, I make a plan for tomorrow to go back to the library and use their courtesy phone to call the cleaning ads. My fingers relax on the steering wheel. I can do this. I can make this work.
Easton
Ishut the door behind me and just lean against it with my eyes closed and let the tension of the day flow out of me. I ignore the vibrating phone in my pocket. I’d rather be dodging bullets again than answer the damn thing, it’s been that kind of day. My eyes open and I frown when I hear a crash of something breaking deeper in the house and the cursing that follows it. Ryker is very rarely verbal about his displeasure. He usually sticks to growls, grunts, and death-filled looks when something is pissing him off but he’s been in a dark mood lately. I push away from the door and drop my Hermes briefcase onto the entrance table, frown in annoyance at the half-wilted flower arrangement in the center of it and shrug off the cashmere trench coat before tossing it onto the table.
I follow the sounds of bickering to the massive kitchen and find Zack and Ryder scowling at each other. Shaking my head, I step up to the marble island and lift an eyebrow.
“Honey, I’m home! Fetch me a martini!”
Ryker just grunts while Zack rolls his eyes at me and thrusts a hand through his already messy blond hair.
“You’ll have to fetch it and anything else you want yourself. The agency hasn’t sent a replacement in three days. Apparently, they now consider us to be a hostile workplace.” He spears Ryker with a dark look. “I can’t imagine why!” He finishes sarcastically.
I groan tiredly. “I’m guessing that means there’s no food prepared? Did one of you at least order something?”
Zack perks up with a nod and I try not to groan again at what that means.
“Pizza? Again? You do know that there are other things you can order in, right?”
He shrugs his shoulders and a grin spread across his face making him look like the grunt I met in boot camp what seems like a lifetime ago.
“What can I say? Za is life, man.”
Kanga pads into the room with a chuff as if in agreement with that statement causing Zack to wink at the dog. His grin fades.
“Seriously, though, what are we going to do about the housekeeper situation?”
I sigh at one more thing to add to my overflowing plate. “I’ll call them in the morning.” I turn and spear Ryker with a threatening look. “You have to stop terrorizing them or learn to fucking cook.”
Ryker growls low in his throat causing Kanga to cock his head. “Not my fault they couldn’t take simple direction and squeaked in fear every time I walked into a room.”
Zack smirks and leans back against the counter absently rubbing at his side. “Maybe if you used your words instead of growling and grunting at them, they would stick around longer.”
I interrupt before Ryker has a chance to light into him. “Stop, the both of you are equally to blame and you know it.” I sigh again and rub the space between my eyes, hoping to ease the headache that’s been nagging at me all day. “This is going to double the cost of the standard rate just to get them to send us another replacement. I need you guys to work with me on this!” I glare at them both. “I mean it! You both need to dial it way back so we can keep whoever they send for more than one day. I’ve got enough shit to deal with right now without this to deal with too.”
They both nod grudgingly at me with a hint of guilt. They know how stressful things have been lately with the extra contracts we’ve taken on. Until I can hire the extra manpower we need, the bulk of it has landed on my desk.
Kanga’s tail goes into overdrive seconds before the doorbell rings. I swear that dog has a touch of the sight in him. He always seems to know things right before they happen. He follows me to the door and greets the delivery guy with a chuff and doggy grin as I pay for it and accept the three steaming boxes. Kanga loves pizza probably even more than Zack does.
Ryker passes out beer bottles and napkins as we take seats around one end of the island with a box in front of each of us. I flip open the lid, pull a slice out, and try to pretend that it’s a steak or anything else that’s not pizza as this has been dinner for the last three nights. We each pass down our crusts to Kanga as we finish each slice and go over our latest progress on the new contracts as we eat.
It was never even a question that the four of us would stay together after our tours were up. We spent many nights out in the desert staring up at a foreign sky planning out the details for the security company we have built. With the inherited wealth that I never wanted, sitting and collecting interest, I finally used it to bankroll our startup. I run point and am the face of the company while Ryker handles the training and onsite security setups for our teams to take over. Zack is our computer guru that handles the systems and online security. We might not be dodging bullets anymore but the three of us have been grinding hard to make sure Trident Security will be the best of the best.
With dinner over, we migrate to the living room and settle in with an old Top Gear episode on the TV and I try and relax and let the stress of the day go. I glance across at Zack when he puts his feet up on the coffee table causing the pant leg of his jeans to ride up enough to flash a glimpse of his prosthetic. He rubs absently at his knee and I frown, wishing he was comfortable enough just to take the damn thing off when it was just the three of us and it ached. My fingers tighten around the bottle in my hand as the familiar guilt sets in.
I failed him. I failed all of my team causing four of them to lose their lives and the rest of us to be injured badly enough to end our military careers.
My gaze moves over to Ryker and while he has less visible scars, he still suffers daily from that last engagement. I tilt my head and watch as one of his huge hands digs into Kanga’s fur to scratch when the sleeping dog lying next to him twitches and whines in his sleep. Kanga also carries scars and mental trauma from that day. As close as we are to one another, none of us talk about it much. We each deal with what happened and the aftermath in our own way but something has been bugging Ryker for the last day or so.
“What’s up with you, man? Something happen I should know about?”
His standard frowning resting face just deepens as he grunts and shakes his head.
Zack smirks. “You really think Ry’s going to talk to you about his feel-ings? Want to start a book club too?”
Ryker lets out a growl of annoyance before grumbling out an answer.
