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"He had it coming," he told me in a small voice. "He put his hands on you," he added when I said nothing, his hand moving from lazily lying over my shoulder to curl around my neck a bit so he could run his finger next to my lip that was split, but healing.
"There were no other witnesses," Astrid added after Roderick's hand dropped and both our gazes moved forward again. "Apparently, in that neighborhood, when they hear bullets, they go hide behind furniture, not look out the window to give IDs to the cops."
"We were lucky," I mumbled. "I felt it in the car."
"Felt what?" Astrid asked, brows furrowing.
"A tingling at the base of my spine. The kind of feeling you get when something isn't right, when you should turn around and walk away."
"We rushed it," Astrid agreed, nodding.
"We will do more due diligence," I decided, noting the way Roderick stiffened beside me, but not knowing why. And, quite frankly, not wanting to go into anything deep right then.
"Friends or Will & Grace?" Astrid asked, moving to the space at the end of the couch, reaching for the remotes.
"Superstore," I corrected, watching as her eyes went knowing. Friends was for causal, mindless viewing. Will & Grace was for when I needed a little laugh. But Superstore, yeah, that was for when I felt like absolute crap and needed a pick-me-up.
Cam moved in near Astrid, the two of them sharing a blanket.
And me, well, I finished my coffee, let Roderick take it from me.
And then I let myself do it.
What I wanted so badly to do.
Curl into him.
Let him gently wrap me up.
And before two episodes had even played, I was fast asleep in his arms.
I woke up to him forcing more pain medicine into me, encouraging me to eat the Chinese Astrid had ordered, then letting me fall asleep next to him again.
The next time I woke up, I was in bed with Roderick.
"How are you feeling?"
"Like a walking bruise," I admitted, shrugging. "It will get better," I added, not wanting to sound like I was wallowing. Which I maybe was a little.
"You just gotta let yourself take it easy," he told me, running a finger down an unmarked part of my cheek.
"There's not a lot of time to wa..."
"You are going to take all the time you need. Right here in this bed. Sleeping. Recovering."
"I never slept. After my bullet wound. After this," I said, waving at the scar on my jaw. "After all the beatings I have taken. I never slept. I couldn't. I don't know what is so different this time."
Except... maybe I did.
Maybe what was different was him.
Maybe I slept because he was there with me, stroking my hair or back, soothing me into unconsciousness even when my mind was trying to tell me I had slept more in the past two days than I had in the past week.
Maybe it was because he was right there with everything I might need each time I woke up. I never had to get up, venture out, fetch all the things I needed.
Maybe it was because he had it all covered.
I always had Astrid and Cam to rely on. Even if I needed a recovery day, they held down the fort for me.
But I always felt like things were falling behind, that I had to get up earlier than I truly wanted to because things needed to get done.
Except, this time, they didn't.
It hadn't escaped me that some of my bedding was freshly washed, that the bathroom had been scrubbed, that all the dishes had been done.
Roderick was handling everything while I rested.
I was sure Cam and Astrid were pitching in, of course. But I got the feeling that the laundry and cleaning wouldn't have been done without Roderick around to do it, that the overflowing sink would have driven me to distraction, making me drag my busted ass into the kitchen to handle it, pain be damned.
But things were simply... handled.
There was nothing to be done.
Cam had even gone and had the car professionally cleaned, new fake plates put on it.
There was nothing to do but rest and get well.
So that was what I let myself do.
And when I wanted to snuggle into Roderick because it made me feel better to do it, I let myself.
Shower, rinse, repeat.
Each day that passed brought less sleep, my body not hurting quite so much, my system not flooded with pain meds that made me tired.
So we talked.
He showed me how to play a game on his phone. We watched movies.
It was just all so... natural.
On the fourth day, I woke up alone, but heard Roderick in the kitchen with something sizzling on the stove. Knowing him, eggs. It seemed to be the one meal he knew how to cook. Unless sandwiches counted. Which they didn't.
