“You two are like old grannies.” She tugged Patch down the hallway and out the front door, scanning the street for people and cars before jumping into his Jeep. “Patch?”
“Yeah?”
“Thank you.”
“For what?”
“Not judging too harshly about the 73. About being so secretive about my job. About being… me.”
He opened the Jeep door and climbed in. “I like you just the way you are, and as far as the rest of it goes? I could’ve confronted you. I could’ve told you what I suspected… what I knew. But what would’ve been the point? You had a job to do, and I had orders to follow. Sometimes they aligned, other times, not so much. All part of why we walked away from each other five years ago.”
“And now?”
“I’m not walking,” he said.
“No, you’re still hiding.”
He leaned closer. “But so are you. The only question is, when you no longer have something to hide from, will you run?”
CHAPTER 7
The Jeep rumbledto a stop in front of Patch’s cabin, tires crunching over gravel and broken twigs. The air was thick with the damp, earthy scent of the bayou, and the last of the sunlight filtered through the moss-draped cypress trees. It should’ve been peaceful, familiar, but something felt off.
Or maybe Patch was just being paranoid.
He glanced in the rearview. He’d done that eight times since they’d made the turn off the main drag and onto the winding dirt road. He couldn’t shake the feeling that someone was watching ever since he’d left McGuire’s. The idea that a hit had been ordered on Savvy’s life had left a sour taste in his mouth.
Savvy was already unbuckling when Patch turned off the engine.
“We won’t be long,” he said. “Grab some clothes, my laptop, and whatever food we can carry. Then we head upriver.”
Savvy nodded, already pushing her door open. “What’s this place like?” she asked. “Does it have running water? Electricity? Is it that much worse than this place?”
“I kind of take offense to that.” He wasn’t sure how to answer without getting slapped. If he was honest, he was sure he’d be sleeping on the floor tonight, and if he lied, same thing. “But myold place sucks in comparison,” he said. “I managed to hook up a water system, but I wouldn’t drink it, so we need to pack as much aqua as possible. Otherwise, we need to boil it. That said, McGuire and Riven can bring us supplies as needed. Showers are possible. However, no power, unless my old generator is working, which we don’t want to use too often. And no one knows it exists outside of the team—and of course, Riven.”
He climbed out of the Jeep, doing a full scan. The sun hadn’t entirely dipped behind the horizon, but it would be dark soon, and it would take a good hour before they’d land at the old clearing. A gator tail splashed in the distance. Patch had long gotten used to the sounds of the swamp. The alligators, snakes, and other critters had become his companions. Before he’d moved closer to civilization, they were the only things with a heartbeat he talked to outside of the team.
McGuire worried Patch had been slowly losing his grasp on reality.
Perhaps there was some truth to it. When he’d moved into this cabin, he’d been more than twitchy. He jumped every time he ran into a human, but the more it happened, the more he’d realized being a ghost had done something to him fundamentally, and he hadn’t welcomed it.
The cabin he’d lived in for the last two months sat just ahead, leaning slightly to one side due to age and humidity. It looked as it always did—weathered but sturdy. It had all the comforts of home, and Patch had slowly started to become the man he’d been before Langley had nearly destroyed them all.
However, seeing Savvy again showed him he’d been barely hanging on by a thread.
As Patch moved closer to the porch, his steps slowed.
The rocking chair had been tipped over and the screen door left ajar.
He stopped cold. “I locked that,” he said.
Savvy’s hand went immediately to the weapon at her side. She didn’t draw it yet, but her body shifted, instincts kicking in, something he’d always admired about her the few times he’d had the chance to work with her in the field. That had only happened three times, and all three times it hadn’t been planned.
Their paths had crossed because she’d been there on an evac mission, and his A-Team had been called in for something entirely different, but his medical services had been required. Regardless, her skills never ceased to amaze him, and he knew he could trust her with his life if necessary. Of course, he knew that when he’d been blind and it was her voice that had brought him home.
Patch pulled his sidearm, moving silently toward the porch. The boards creaked beneath his boots, but he didn’t hesitate. Savvy followed close behind, covering his flank. It was an odd feeling knowing that the two people he trusted most to have his six were the woman he loved… and his best friend, who happened to be her brother.
Patch reached the door and pushed it open with two fingers. “Shit,” he mumbled, staring at the inside of his home. Most would call Patch a minimalist and a neat freak. Everything had a place and he hated it when people didn’t put things back where they belonged. He demanded his guests use coasters. Some thought that an odd request, considering he lived in the swamp. But he valued what little he had.
