Damon turned back to the road.
“What is up with everyone these days?” Sami snapped. “You’re all just horny dogs.”
Tace bit his lip.
“Sorry,” Damon said. “Um, to answer your question, if any soldier wants to keep a, well, companion, then they can. But Mercs are soldiers, all male, and anybody keeping somebody is fully responsible for them.”
“Keeping?” Sami asked slowly.
Damon held up a hand. “All consensual and all voluntary. Greyson double checks with anybody living in the territory, especially women, to make sure they want to be there. Period.”
Good. “So you’re hoarding resources and pawning civilians off on us,” Tace said, watching a couple of shadows move near the street corner. He tensed and lifted his gun to the open window.
Sami lifted herself to see better and brushed her breast against his arm.
Electricity jolted through him. He kept perfectly still and tracked two women digging through rubble. “Slow down.”
Damon sighed but slowed to nearly a stop.
Both women looked up, their bodies tensed to flee. They were in ripped jeans and heavy jackets, both with long hair already formed into dreadlocks. Dirt marred their faces, and scratches showed down their arms.
“Rippers?” Sami whispered.
“Not sure.” Tace leaned out the window. “Do you ladies need help?” He let his twang free.
The first woman, rail thin and about fifty, shook her head.
The other one, a twentysomething, didn’t move.
“All right.” Tace pointed back the way they’d come. “If you go about a mile east, you’ll enter Vanguard territory. Scouts will find you and take you to food and shelter, if you want.”
The younger woman shook her head. “We’re fine on our own.”
“We have vitamin B,” Tace said.
The women looked at each other.
“Your choice,” Damon called out, shifting the gear into DRIVE. “Good luck.” He drove away from the corner and around an abandoned library that had books scattered all over the front steps. “That’s why you’re almost out of provisions.”
“Maybe we’ll just take yours,” Tace said evenly.
“You can sure try,” Damon said agreeably. He sped up as the road cleared. “So, tell me about that April chick. She with anybody?”
Tace slowly turned his head toward the Mercenary soldier. “Yes.”
Sami started. “No, she isn’t.”
“As far as the Mercs are concerned, she is,” Tace countered. Protectiveness for the young widow who’d lost so much rose in him so quickly, he nearly gasped. The last time he’d felt this way had been for his two sisters back in Texas. Neither had survived Scorpius. “Listen, Damon. I don’t like you, I don’t like the Mercs, and I’m going to help today because I’m a medic and that’s what I do.” Not entirely true. “If we do form some sort of alliance, which I doubt will truly happen, then we’re still not gonna be friends. You all got rid of the civilians, so you don’t get to come cherry-pickin’ for a good lay now.”
Sami’s eyes widened. “That’s the longest conversation I’ve heard from you since you were infected with Scorpius.”
Had he been that laconic? Maybe. “Humph.”
“Sorry, buddy,” Damon said, speeding up even more. “Didn’t know I was stepping on your toes.”
“You ask about Vanguard at all, and you’re past my toes to my feet,” Tace returned. “At which point I shove my foot up your ass.”
Damon lost the grin, and he turned toward Tace, his brown eyes darkening. “You’re not the only one who can fight, Texas. Might want to keep that in mind.”
