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Daire was back from his run in under an hour, as instructed. The sun was up by the time she opened the trailer door and kicked the laundry sack to the threshold. That was when she saw Daire approaching H, a few feet from the door.
“Get some sleep,” H said to Daire. “There are errands to do in town, I’ll pick up my kit from the motel. We’ll eat and strategize at nine.”
Daire nodded once.
“You want me to wash what you’re wearing?” Tess asked.
Oh… crap. The words just came out of her mouth before her brain could pull them back. Danny’s clothes she didn’t mind washing. Daire’s… it seemed sort of rude to ask… and she still considered him an asshole. She didn’t know the guy. Who knew how deep his shittiness went? On top of that, he was still wearing the clothes. The last thing she wanted was for him to strip right there.
Why couldn’t she wrap her head around it? Danny naked was no big deal, so normal it was practically pedestrian. But Daire…
“He has enough to be going on with,” H said. “We’ll bring food back, make sure you’re ready.”
When H started to go, Tess bent down to wrap the top of the laundry bag around her wrist a couple of times before hauling it up to toss it on her shoulder.
“What’s on your mind, agent?” H asked, attracting her attention, except he wasn’t looking at her. He was looking at Daire, who seemed to be fixated on something somewhere around her abdomen. “We’ll bring the truck back, if you’re worried about being stranded—”
“I don’t give a damn about stranded,” Daire said. Obviously, training was over. Apparently that meant he was free to say whatever he liked… What was the signal of the transition? She couldn’t begin to guess. “Arm yourself when you’re alone with Pandora.”
Oh, the… He wasn’t actually suggesting… “What the—I’m not going to hurt anyone,” Tess said, offended that he’d have the audacity to accuse her of being violent when she was the pursued not the pursuer. “I’m not a secret assassin.” Like some people.
Neither man paid her any heed.
“Why?” H asked, closing in on Daire. “What have you seen?”
“It’s like you said,” Daire answered. “The marker is out there.”
“You were so sure Z wouldn’t come unless there was someone to kill.”
“Maybe he thinks there is.”
H’s chin rose. “If you’re in contact with him—”
“If I wanted to hand him Pandora, I could’ve done it fifty times,” Daire said without hesitating to square up to H. “You wanna walk with her, you arm yourself. It’s that or you don’t walk.”
She rolled her tongue in her mouth. How long would it take them to pedal down? Daire being pissed off was understandable. H had been treating him like a monkey for hours… for his whole life really. The only chance he had to grab for his own self-respect was to pick his battles.
“I just want to do laundry,” Tess said, jumping down from the trailer to the grass. “You two can stand here and have your little pissing match… I don’t know what you think it will accomplish…”
Wandering away, she went around the front of the trailer, hoping someone would follow with the truck keys. The bag was heavy, and she hadn’t got enough sleep. Everything was a drag.
Only a few seconds later, H came storming after her. Going on straight past, he unlocked the truck and got into the driver’s side. After she dumped the laundry bag in the back, she got into her usual seat, usual before H. It was then she saw him take the gun from his pants to tuck it into the door well. Daire had won the battle.
That was interesting. Why? What was the point of the battle? No idea.
H got them moving, and she relaxed into her seat. They got out onto the road. Still, he hadn’t said a word.
“Who is Z?”
Tess didn’t need to talk; she’d be just as happy to sit in silence. Except the only way to get answers was to push for them. Being ensconced alone in the vehicle was an opportunity not to be wasted.
“The man who was in charge of Olympus.”
She frowned. “I thought you were the principal agent.”
“There were three of us at the top. Me, Zeus—”
“And Poseidon,” she interjected, shrugging when he tossed a scowl at her. “I read a lot about Greek myths while trying to figure this out.”
