Chapter 30

Thirty

“How long has she been at it today?” I pitched the question in a low voice, though I doubted Patch would have noticed, much less acknowledged us. Since she assembled her new system, she’d been at the computer near nonstop.

The only way I got her to rest at all was to pull the power supply. The first night I’d done that, she’d been so pissed off she hadn’t spoken to me for two days. She’d slept. So, I considered it a win.

Since then, she’d argued she had “modified” her schedule to include sleep. I could debate that part and would. More than once, she’d been up in the middle of the night. She didn’t always leave her room, but I would hear her moving around. She also maintained that the level of research she needed to do involved a lot of search and skims that none of us could do.

“Almost ten hours,” Remington stated in an ice dipped voice. His accent grew more pronounced when he was upset. Or maybe I was just projecting. The Brit didn’t seem to get upset. Made sense. An assassin needed low blood pressure and a cool demeanor.

I wouldn’t mistake it for indifference though. Nothing about Michael Remington was even remotely indifferent for our Patch.

“Ten hours,” I repeated, then checked my watch. It was already after eight in the evening. “She was up early today.” She’d gotten up during my watch. It was four that morning, but I would have sworn she was earlier than that. She just didn’t leave her room until four.

“Sounds right,” Remington said. “Locke told me she took a break around nine. But she was back at the computer at ten.”

So she was up from four until nine working, then ten until now?

That was more like fifteen hours.

Even if she wanted to declare the break was enough, she was pushing it. The bruises had decreased from black and blue to green and yellow in most places that we could see. That didn’t detail the hits she’d taken to her ribs or the deeper cuts, burns, and abrasions.

Her feet were still a mess. Everything Locke and Remington found to help her were useful, but they couldn’t speed her healing. Particularly if she didn’t sleep.

I scratched at the beard I’d been growing in steadily for the last few weeks. Normally, I kept it shorn for missions unless having facial hair was useful. But I’d been on the go and I’d worried more about getting her out than what my appearance was.

I’d finally trimmed it a couple of days previous when I realized I was getting length on it. A beard was fine, particularly when combined with a hat and sunglasses, it helped to muddy facial recognition. I didn’t care for it being unkempt or dirty.

“Did she eat?”

“A sandwich,” Remington answered in the same neutral tone I’d attempted to use. “It’s been almost all coffee today.”

I flicked a look to the oversized tumbler she lifted and took a long drink from before she resumed scanning the tables and tables of data scrolling in front of her.

“Got it.” Folding my arms, I leaned back against the counter. “Get some sleep.”

Remington slid me a look but I didn’t tackle his unasked question. He’d had Patch watch for the last several hours. If he’d wanted her up and out of that chair, he should have done something then.

Me? I set an internal timer to count down to her next break, whether she was willing or not. The last thing I wanted to do was scare her, but kid gloves weren’t doing her any favors either. If she looked after herself like this when we weren’t around…

I scowled. It was absolutely her choice to do what she needed when she needed—and I would support her a thousand percent after she healed. Stress, in addition to not eating well and not sleeping, was not remotely conducive to recovery.

The assassin continued to stare at me for another minute before he nodded. Instead of just heading to his room, though, he paused to put a hand on her shoulder. She glanced up, blinking owlishly as though she hadn’t even realized he was there.

Or maybe she’d just forgotten. I added that to the mental inventory I’d been taking. Remington spoke to her in low tones. Clearly, he didn’t want me eavesdropping. Rather than lean closer, I moved into the kitchen and started putting together a small meal.

It wasn’t fancy like the dishes Remington made or even particularly specific like Locke’s straightforward meals. I could grill, I could heat up an MRE and I could make sandwiches. The rest never seemed like something I needed to learn.

As it was, I sectioned the meat and the cheese into bite sizes and added some Ritz crackers and a little honey. She seemed to like the honey.

By the time I had it ready, Remington was gone. The lights were all low in the kitchen and the living room. The windows were covered with both blinds and curtains. None of us cared for the sight lines so we closed them all.

I carried the plate over to her desk. “Break time,” I told her and she sighed, impatience edging the long exhale before she glanced up at me.

“I might have something.” Not her best argument. If she actually had something, she’d tell me what it was instead of a vague notion.

“Then it will be there when you’re done. You haven’t taken a break in a while and you need one.” When she would have taken the plate, I held it away from her. “Nope. A break means you get up and you eat somewhere that isn’t in front of that computer.”

That earned me the sourest look. Those gray eyes were pure steel. “McQuade, I don’t have time to play games.”

“Then don’t play, Sugar Bear. Just get up and eat. You should get up and move around anyway, sitting for too long…”

She didn’t even let me finish the admonishment before she pushed the chair back and stood. A grimace rippled over her face and I didn’t miss how she put a hand against the desktop to steady herself. Inch by inch she straightened. She also tried to cover, but it was way too late.

Yeah, she’d been sitting in that chair for far too long.

“Come on,” however, was all I said. “Something to drink?”

“Fine,” she said on a long exhale then headed for the breakfast bar on the other side of the kitchen. There was a definite hitch to her steps. She wasn’t quite limping, but she wasn’t moving evenly either.

I didn’t say a word when she leaned against the counter rather than sit. She’d grown paler while she moved. Away from the light of her screen, her pallor seemed even more clear.

“Drink?” I asked after setting the plate in front of her. She stared at the food with a kind of weariness I could feel in my bones. The faintly baffled look suggested she wasn’t even clear on what the food was.

Yeah, someone had definitely been overdoing it. The pussy footing from the assassin and the thief was not doing her any favors.

None.

“I don’t even know if I can eat all of this,” she admitted. Well, that was a start.

“You don’t have to,” I told her. “But you do need to eat some because you need to take your meds, including your pain meds.”

“I don’t like them.” Yeah, she didn’t have to tell me that. She’d more than made that clear. I went to the fridge and studied the options inside of it. No sugar or caffeine. She needed rest.

I pulled out a cold bottle of water and opened it. When I put it in front of her, she stared at it for a beat. Then rubbed a hand against her face before she claimed it. It was like someone had pulled the plug and all of her energy swirled down the drain.

After piling some of the meat and cheese onto a cracker with a little bit of the honey, I waited for her to finish the long swallow of water then held it up to her. The confusion in her eyes took a little longer to clear, then she accepted the offering.

Rather than argue, I just kept feeding her in small bites in between her sips of water. When she waved off the next bite, I ate it myself and earned a faint smile.

“If you were hungry,” she murmured. “You should eat too.”

“I eat when I am hungry,” I pointed out. “No one has to tempt me with food or honey.”

“Really?” She shook her head, then drained the water.

“Sugar Bear, don’t know if you’ve noticed, but you’re the only one we have to coax. You don’t see me waving cheese and crackers at Remington or Locke.”

She chuckled, then rubbed her face again. Now that she wasn’t leaning fully against the counter, she swayed.

“You’re tired.”

“We’re all tired,” she countered. “I need to work.”

“It’ll be there,” I reminded her. We’d all been keeping our distance. The trauma signs were there. I’d seen them enough in the field. I’d kept a running catalog of every reaction. Every time the shadows slid through her eyes, or she jerked in surprise from contact—every single time, it just made me want to inflict that much more damage.

But right now, what she needed was someone to take care of her and not back away from it or her.

“C’mon,” I told her. “You’re exhausted and you hurt. Now that you’ve eaten, you can take your meds and get some sleep.”

“I don’t want to go to sleep,” she argued. “I have work to do and—” She tried to push away from the counter like she would head back to her desk, and pain tightened her whole expression.

“Sorry, Sugar Bear.” I told her as I intercepted and scooped her up. “That’s enough. You’ve overdone it and you need to rest. You healing is nonnegotiable. If that means I take more than the power supply, I’ll do it.”

She glared at me as I headed for her room. “McQuade…”

“Yes, Sugar Bear?” I grinned at her as her eyes narrowed. Riling her up was fun, it flushed her cheeks with a little color and gave her that snappy little tone she used to spank me with on the phone.

I liked it.

“You can’t keep picking me up and just ordering me around,” she argued as I shouldered open her door then nudged it closed with my foot.

“Okay,” I said as I met the blazing anger in her eyes. “Stop me.”

She blinked. “What?”

“You just said I can’t do this anymore.” I was still cradling her. “If I can’t, then stop me.”

She eyed me for the longest time while wearing the fiercest frown. “I can’t kick your ass.”

“Accepted.”

“I could get Remy or Locke to do it.”

I grinned. “They could try, Sugar Bear. But Locke’s not a fighter. Not really. Remington? He would only do it if he didn’t see the value in my interruptions.”

Her groan shouldn’t have been a reward yet it was. “You do not fight fair.”

“There is no such thing as a fair fight. There’s the fight you win and the fight you lose. Right now, this is a fight you will lose. Not because I’m bigger or stronger, but because you are a lot smarter than you are stubborn. You could stop me with three words.” I raised my eyebrows. “You know it. I know it. So, if you want me to stop—what do you say?”

“Stop it, McQuade.”

The fact she didn’t even pretend like she didn’t know what the words were satisfied something deeply primitive inside of me. The lizard brain that understood the needs for fight and survive and for protect and defend.

With care, I put her on her feet and only kept one hand on her hip lightly to steady her when she swayed. “Three words, Sugar Bear. In truth, you only ever have to use one. I will listen. If you say it to anyone else while I’m there, trust me, I will make sure they listen too.”

Pushing her wasn’t a kind thing to do, but not pushing her seemed almost less kind. Because it meant letting her hurt herself.

When she tilted her head back, baring her throat, the restlessness in me settled. It wasn’t a true surrender in the way of such things, but she was relinquishing this particular battle.

“I hate being weak,” she muttered. “I hate being a victim.”

“You are not weak and you are not a victim.” I gripped her chin lightly, not letting her look away from me. “You were a prisoner of war. You were tortured. You suffered. Now you’re free. Freedom—doesn’t always fit after you’ve been through the kinds of things you’ve been through. That’s okay. You work it like any other problem—one day at a time.”

“I wasn’t all that normal before,” she protested, then she scraped her teeth over her already abused lower lip. “McQuade… what if I can’t do it?”

“You will.”

“But what if I can’t?”

“Then you’ll find a new way. Remember, what is the only bad plan?”

“Not having one.” She closed her eyes and when I should have pulled my hand back, I found myself cradling her cheek. Then she rested her face against my palm. “I don’t like to sleep.”

“Okay, what can I do?” Because I would do whatever she needed.

“I need—I need to work. I need to have what I can control, what I can do—I need my power back.” The adage that you just had to admit what a problem was to begin to defeat it annoyed me. On the one hand, it was partially true. But identifying it also meant letting yourself be vulnerable.

Right now, the very last thing Patch wanted was more vulnerability.

I dipped my head and brushed her lips with mine. I intended for it to be a quick kiss. A sip. A single taste. But the brief moment turned into so much more. She parted her lips, sealing my fate. I all but fell into the kiss like a dying man in the desert. She was the oasis and the promise of heaven all at once.

Devouring her would be so fucking easy and my cock had gone rock hard at the first tentative touch of her tongue. I’d brought her in here to get her to sleep, not to seduce her. I forced myself to break the kiss because no matter how badly I wanted her, she wasn’t ready for me.

She wasn’t ready for that right now.

“You need a shower,” I told her. “It’ll help with the stiffness. Then into some pajamas and take your pain meds. Then I’ll stay with you until you go to sleep.”

She blinked up at me. The shadows in her eyes darkened the gray to something bruised and aching.

“Trust me,” I whispered. “I know I just kissed you, but I promise, I’ll be a fucking priest while I help you. No one is going to touch you without your consent.”

Her silence speaks volumes and then she presses a hand over my chest.

“I believe you.”

Three beautiful words.

“Will you help me?”

Four more. Raw. Vulnerable. Open.

“With anything,” I promised.

Maybe I couldn’t fight her demons head on, but I could back her up every step of the way.