“He’s limping,” Rue pointed out.
“Fucker won’t care,” Bolo said with a shrug. “If we don’t give him pain meds he’ll steal them.”
“He’ll still be worth four to six Collective guys, even though he’s injured,” Flir added.
“Four to six?” Bolo asked. “I’d think you’d have that dialed in a bit more.”
“Ah, well, my scoring metrics are based on calculations of body mass index, muscular strength, and combatives training with a multiplier appropriate for each category, however without knowing the combatives training experience of The Collective men, nor their physical fitness regimen, I’ve had to make assumptions based on the limited encounters we’ve had with Rhino and the others we’ve followed.”
Bolo stared at him in disbelief, trying desperately to come up with a response before settling on “Shut up, nerd. What the hell is a combatives multiplier? Rhetorical question!” he shouted the last part while pointing at Flir, who was about to start up again.
Everyone was sitting out here. We’d all been waiting to see how Relay was doing. We knew he was alive because we could all hear him bitching the entire time Drifter was working on him.
“I really like your brothers,” Rue said, coming over to me and wrapping an arm around my waist.
Grinning down at her, I asked, “Yeah? You’d be the only one.”
“Fuck off,” Kilo said, “we’re great.”
“Sure,” I said with a wink aimed at Rue. “Can we fucking go to bed now?” I asked, dragging her down the hall with me.
“Sure,” she said with a yawn, “but you have to drive. I’m too tired after-” She paused as I stopped in front of a door and shoved it open.
She ducked and moved away from the hold I had on her, walking into our new apartment. Her eyes were wide as she spun around, taking everything in. “It’s…”
“You like it?” I asked after a few moments of silence. “Flir said you can decorate it anyway you want. Just let him know what you need.” The anticipation was building with every silent breath.
Why isn’t she saying anything?
“It’s so big,” she finally whispered.
“Well…yeah,” I replied. “It needs to hold us and two teenagers.” I didn’t mention the hope that maybe one day there’d be a nursery in here as well.
She looked over her shoulder at me, her eyes filled with tears. “They can stay, too?”
“Of course,” I told her. “Wherever you go, they go.” I stepped closer and pulled her into my arms. “And where you go, I go.”
She searched my eyes, as though trying to see if I was telling the truth. It was the closest I could get to telling her I planned to keep her…forever. If I said that right now, she’d bolt. She’d said herself she had abandonment issues. One wrong move and I’d inadvertently push her away. That was the last damn thing I wanted.
You’d think a woman who’d experienced too many people walking away from her would be dying for someone who would stick things out long-term. And maybe, deep down, she was, but on the surface that kind of loyalty would scare her off.
“Take a look around,” I said, turning her and nudging her forward. “You don’t have to make any decisions tonight, but if you see anything you can’t live without until the morning we can go drag Flir out of bed.”
She laughed and shook her head at me, giving me a soft look I really liked being on the receiving end of.
I followed her around as she inspected the apartment. She peeked into closets, the spare bedrooms, the guest bath, then into the room that would be ours together. She sat down on the bed, giving me a look I couldn’t quite read. “What’s wrong?”
“Nothing,” she said.
But she looked so…lost…sitting there.
“Something’s wrong.” I sat next to her so she wouldn’t have to stare into my eyes. I was hoping that would help her admit some of her truths to me.
“There are five bedrooms.” She shrugged her shoulders. “Why are there so many?”
“Like I said,” I told her. “We’ll need the space with two teens living with us. They eat a lot, where else would we put their food?” She laughed, but wasn’t buying it.
She stared down at her hands in her lap. “You asked for it to be built this way?”
