Jon grunted, shut the door behind them, and said to Lynnette, “I appreciate you taking him off my hands. My condolences.”
“Wow,” Lance said through a laugh, “asshole.”
Lynn threaded her fingers through his and quipped, “I was under the impression he was going out with you today? Pretty sure that implies we’ll have shared custody moving forward.”
Jon chuckled and Lance barked out a full laugh.
“Lynnette!” Jenna exclaimed as they cleared the hall and stepped into the crowded sitting room. She hopped to her feet, one hand clutching a mug of still-steaming liquid, and slippedpast the two standing walls of muscle as she rushed to her friend. “I’m so sorry I wasn’t able to check in with you after everything at the hospital the other day. Are you okay?”
Lance felt the sigh Lynn breathed out and bit back his smile.
“Yes, I’m okay. And you had plenty to worry about on your own, it’s fine.”
“Speaking of which,” Jon said as he moved up to his fiancée and looped an arm around her middle. “You’re supposed to be taking it easy on that ankle, baby.”
Lance dropped his gaze down to their hostess’s otherwise bare feet, noting that one ankle was wrapped nice and tight.
Herb, sitting back on the sofa, clicked his tongue. “Gotta take better care of yourself,chica.”
Billy, who’d claimed the only chair, chuckled. “Got yourself a rule-breaker, CO.”
Jenna’s face flamed red. “I just wanted to greet my friend.”
Lynn propped her free hand on her hip. “As if I wouldn’t have come to you. Besides, it seems like I’m going to be here all day, we have plenty of time to catch up.”
“You heard her,” Jon said. “Let’s go sit back down.”
While Jon was doting on his flustered fiancée, Lance pulled Lynn’s attention to the rest of the room. It had occurred to him she hadn’t had occasion to meet their old friends, and while the men would be leaving with them for the hunt, it still seemed appropriate to make introductions. So, to the room at large, he said, “Guys, this is my girl, Lynn.”
“Girlfriend,” Lynn corrected, making no effort to tuck behind him or otherwise duck from their assessing stares. “He means ‘girlfriend’. I’m still training him.”
Lance grinned.
His friends laughed.
One by one, he made introductions, starting with the closest familiar face. “Lynn, this is Foxe. He will talk your ear off about his baby girl if you give him half a chance, fair warning.”
Foxe offered a smile as more laughter followed.
Lance indicated the messy-haired Hispanic who’d trimmed up a bit in the nine-odd years since he’d left the Corps. “That clever fuck is Herberto, goes by Herb.”
Herb raised a hand in a lazy wave from his seat. “My condolences for whatever short straw you drew to land that one,señorita.”
Lance flipped his friend the bird while Lynn laughed softly, then moved on to the dork who still combed his hair in a side sweep. “Blondie over there is Billy. Makes up for his bum leg with his big guns.”
“Damn right,” Billy said with a firm nod. He smacked the side of the leg that had gotten him sent home. “I move all right these days, too.”
“Bet your wife’s glad for that,” Foxe said.
As the others laughed, Lance moved his focus to the one unfamiliar face in the room. Another tall, respectably muscular male, dark hair that hung over the tops of his ears and brown, assessing eyes that didn’t flinch from Lance’s stare. So, Lance said, “I don’t know you.”
The man propped his hands on his hips. “And yet it’s your fault I got dragged into this mess, arguably.”
Lance cocked a brow.
Jon stepped forward, mimicking Lance’s earlier motion of gesturing between them. “Lance, Alex. You spoke on the phone a few days ago.”
The memory clicked and Lance’s eyes widened. “Oh! Army Alex!” He was the guy who’d answered the phone at the storage company where Jon’s inheritance had been kept.
