Page 7 of Deep Cover

When they drew away, Jolie’s eyes were a little damp, and Stina’s were swimming with tears.

“You’re good now?” Stina’s voice wavered with concern, as if he hadn’t left them to be kidnapped while he bled out in the snow.

“I’m good.”

“We’re fine too, Rivers.” Stina was a little more outspoken of the pair, that much hadn’t changed in the time he was gone.

Jolie glanced at her friend. Then, as if they’d practiced what to say to him, she said, “You didn’t let us down.”

“I’m so damn sorry—” His voice clamped on the words, and his sentence ended in a groan as they hugged him tight again.

He flexed his arms around them and let the moment sink in. He’d been in this line of work long enough to know the difference between a battle scar and the one he carried. The second where he hesitated back on that mountain road would never heal clean, no matter how many times the women he was protecting told him they were fine.

“There he is.” Younger’s voice boomed through the kitchen. “The Rizz Man himself.” Henry Younger was one of the more seasoned members of Sierra, and his eyes creased with his grin as he took a seat at the big dining table.

The ladies let Rivers go and carried their coffees to the table too.

On his way to the coffeepot, Rome clapped Rivers on the back. “The Rizzonator,” he said, deadpan, not looking up from the coffee he poured.

“The Rizzoni.” Carino, known as O for no reason any of them could uncover, flashed a grin at Rivers as he plopped into a seat and planted his elbows on the table.

Heat crawled up Rivers’s neck. “Stop.”

Rorke entered next with Monk right behind them.

“Are we rizzing up Rivers, or what?” Rorke tossed him a smile as he grabbed an entire bag of croissants on his way to the table.

Rorke had been the one to get him to the hospital and he’d been there to hear the things he said when he came out of anesthesia. Only they had it wrong. He hadn’t said rizz.

He’d said Ryss.

“Tell us about this beautiful woman.” O leaned in.

“The one you couldn’t stop talking about when you came out of surgery,” Rome added with a glint in his eyes.

Stina and Jolie gave him identical side-eyes like the best friends they were.

“Rorke told us you talked about how much you missed her.” Stina’s grin widened.

“Ached for her,” Rorke corrected.

Everyone laughed, but Rivers only felt that sharp ache again. In his lowest moments…he’d called out for a woman who’d once been his whole life.

“I was on enough painkillers to sedate a horse.” He poured himself coffee, hoping for nonchalance as he carried it to his usual seat.

Rorke grabbed a croissant. “Dude. You mumbled a whole speech. It was beautiful. Shakespearean even.” He bit off half the croissant.

Stina gaped at him. “Hey! I made those fresh yesterday. Do you know how much work went into them? You’re supposed to savor croissants, not gobble them.”

Rorke ignored her and struck an actor’s pose, croissant raised as a prop skull. “But soft—what light through yonder kitchen breaks? It is the East, and Rizz is the sun.” He pressed a hand to his heart. “Arise, fair sun, and kill the anesthesia, which made me babble like a lovesick fool before my brother.”

“Stop,” Rivers said, but nobody was stopping.

“Parting is such sweet sorrow,” Rorke went on, “that I shall say goodnight till it be morrow—and also possibly hit on a nurse before my liver finishes healing.”

“How did you even come up with that on the fly? You must have been practicing it!” Stina shook with giggles.

Unrepentant, Rorke stuffed the rest of the croissant in his mouth.