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It was dark out when we finally made it into Virginia, getting to the hotel Astrid had texted to tell us she had gotten reservations for us just a few minutes later.
And it took about three minutes from there to figure out that Astrid had - yet again - attempted to fuck with us.
She'd gotten us one room.
And the lady at the front desk told us with a sorry head shake that there were no other rooms available, something that made Roderick fight to hold back a smile.
"She thinks I need to get laid," I told him as we unlocked our door, figuring it was best to clear the air, get the elephant out of the room and all that.
"And she thinks I'd be the man for the job?" he asked, and damn that smirk of his, bringing out his dimples. Never before had I been a fan of the darn things, always finding them boyish. But on Roderick, those boyish marks were somehow, well, sexy.
"She gets these... ideas in her head," I said, sidestepping the question as we moved into a room dominated by a king-sized bed covered in creams and champagnes, taunting us, I felt. Or maybe that was just my libido talking.
"And follows through with them," Roderick agreed, taking my bag from my hands, putting it inside the closet with his.
"That's my Astrid alright."
"She's a good kid. A handful, I'd imagine, but well-intentioned."
"So, do you think this meeting is going to be worth our time?" I asked, moving away from the bed to look out the windows. At the lovely view of the parking lot.
"I don't think he's going to have the Double Trigger, but if he has the Eagle then we can't complain too much. That is two of them out of the way since you still have the Howdah."
"True," I agreed, inwardly worried about the Double Trigger, the one that had been impossible to find in the first place, the whole reason I had needed to steal from Roderick to begin with.
"And maybe by the time we get back to the city, Astrid and Cam will have made some progress on the last one. There's still time."
"Is Reign pissed at me?" I asked, having secretly harbored the worry for a few weeks in secret.
"For stealing from us?" he clarified. "Nah. I mean, he's not happy to be out a gun, to have a pissed off client, but he's always been the kind of man to understand everyone else's hustle. You had to do what you had to do. Now he has to do what he has to do."
"And if we don't find the gun in time?"
"Honestly," he started, sitting down on the foot of the bed. "I don't know. But that's my problem."
"How is it your problem when I was the one who stole from you?" I demanded, annoyed for him on principle. "And, not to split hairs, but he was the one to send you there alone, wasn't he? No backup."
"It was still my job to make sure we made the drop, to protect the goods, to keep the client happy. That was on me. I failed at all three. Which makes it my fault in his eyes."
"You wouldn't... get kicked out for this, would you?"
"Honestly, I don't know. No one has fucked up like this since I have been a member, so I'm not sure how this is handled. Just an ass kicking or some kind of re-prospecting period or what..."
"I think you got pain enough for it," I mused, walking over to touch the material covering his forearm, shocking back a bit when he flinched. "Does it still hurt? Shouldn't it be healed by now?"
"I forgot to pack my new batch of antibiotics," he admitted, reaching to roll his sleeve up, peeling back the fresh gauze he had rolled on before we had left the city. "The first ones weren't cutting it."
"Dog saliva is pretty filthy," I agreed, moving closer, trying not to let the worry show on my face at the very red gash down his arm still. It should have been mostly healed, on its way to getting the stitches out, not sore and angry looking.
"You can say it," he said, giving me a small smile. "It looks pretty bad."
"The antibiotics, are they oral or topical?"
"Oral."
"Time for something topical then," I told him, going to grab my wallet out of the side of my bag.
"Where are you going?"
"To get something for your arm before it gets gangrenous and has to be chopped off. I mean, how can you ride a bike with one arm missing, right?" I asked, rushing out the door.
I was browsing the supplies at the closest pharmacy when my phone rang.
"You're never allowed to be in charge of setting up the reservations ever again," I greeted Astrid.
"Oh, stop. You know you are already all a-flutter at the idea of being in bed with that yummy piece of man meat."
