“A dog,” Gail said for what was probably the tenth time.“I mean, who would have fucking thunk it.”
“How could he not see?”Joey asked for the first time.
Gail glanced at him.“See what?”
“That the dog was… was a predator.Not even a reasonable one.It was… it wascreatedto kill.You can’t take your eye off a predator.You just can’t!”His voice rose an octave, and he was remembering the sound his phone had made when he’d thrown it on the pavement from the bus those months ago.He’d been waiting for his father to text him since, and he kept wondering what he was risking by not watching his back twenty-four seven.He couldn’t, though.He had to watch his team’s back.
That threatened loss as Crosby had been bleeding out on the dirty pavement resurfaced, and he realized with a faint shock he would have been just as frightened if it had been Gail or Harding or Natalia or Kylie.
For a moment his thoughts strayed to Gideon, bleeding out like Crosby had been, and first came that moment in the bathroom, realizing Gideon’s ordinary hazel eyes were really muted gold, and then came a terrible moment of vertigo, followed by queasiness so bad he’d almost popped his head over the side of the bed to toss his cookies.
Pain.Pain like you haven’t felt since Grandfather… oh God.Can’t think.Pain.
And for the first time, Joey realized that there were big holes in his life where his heart had been as a child, and these people here were offering to fill them.
For a moment, on the bed next to Gail, he wanted to walk away.He thought about quitting.Going underground.He could spend his entire life living off the grid, doing odd jobs, drifting from place to place.His father would never find him, and he would never find anybody he cared about like the people who’d had his back for the last six months.
Crosby moaned from the bed like he was coming out of it, and Joey realized he had one foot on the ground in what even he had to admit was flight.
“The fuck areyougoing?”Gideon asked irritably, striding into the room.“You get one grilling from the gambling commission and you’re out of here?”
Carlyle stared at him.“Soda,” he said weakly, not sure how transparent he’d been.
Gideon snorted.“The hell,” he said.
Crosby moaned again, and both their attention turned toward him on the bed.
Gail hopped off and now stood at the side of the bed, murmuring, “Heya, Olaf—how you doing?”
“Ow,” he said, eyes still closed.
“Yeah, so we heard.You up to a debrief?”
“From who?”He could barely talk.
“Some asshole from the gambling commission who wants to know if there was any way we could have avoided shooting the dog,” she said, her voice laced with disgust.
“Send him in,” Crosby breathed.“I’ll bleed on him.”
And then he passed out.
“Really?”Gideon asked, his eyebrows raised.“Really?”
“Shh!”Gail shushed him, and Gideon gestured them outside the room.
“Really what?”Joey asked as they settled in front of the door.Then, “Are we sure he’s okay?”
“His vitals were fine,” Gideon reassured him, but not absently.“I checked in with the nurses.He’s not supposed to come to for an hour.Which is how long we waited on-site while animal control came and bailed out all the fucking dogs, taking most of them to shelters.”His voice grew thick.“Most of them will have to be destroyed, and it’s a goddamned shame.”
“Our civilian?”Gail asked, and Joey could have kicked himself.He’d almost forgotten.
“Is fine.So’s his little dog, who was in the cage next to the giant dog crate where they were keeping the civilian.”Gideon’s face fell.“They were practically hugging each other as the paramedics escorted them out.”
And again that curious sense of vertigo.In the military, Joey would have regarded the civilian and his dog with a grim duty.The man, anyway, was whom Joey was assigned to protect.But no affection, and certainly no pity.
But here, after the horrific death and desecration of the dog that almost killed his friend, the thought of that perfectly nice man with the unruly Chihuahua walking away from that entire nightmare situation made Joey feel…
Better.
