Page 66 of Agency

“You don’t,” I said. “You shouldn’t have been in harm’s way like that in the first place. It was my fault.”

“I’d say we’re even, then,” he replied with that perpetual grin of his, “but I think I’ll end up feeling like I cheated you. So, nah. Still owe you one.”

Morgan closed the Lexus’s rear door and came walking up, both hands loaded for bear with duffel bags. Together, the three of us went to join Jericho on the front porch, where he was already unlocking the front doors. He went inside and flipped on the lights.

Yeah, this was definitely a nicer safe house than I’d expected. Decent-looking furniture filled the open living room and thick, plush area rugs covered the hardwood floors. A giant fireplace dominated one side of the area and promised plenty of warmth for when winter settled in, and was likely large enough to even be able to heat the upstairs, which consisted of several rooms connecting to a balcony that overlooked us all. Even the air smelled fresh and alive, as if the building had been used recently.

“Andrew,” Jericho said, already heading for the stairs, “you check the kitchen and back of house. See what we’ve got in the way of frozen meats, dry goods, and so on. Might be here a while. Morgan, you sit tight with the prisoner while I check the rest of the place out and see what they have arms-wise.”

“Prisoner?” Morgan asked Jericho’s back before he was even halfway up his climb.

He didn’t pause, just grumbled back: “Well, she ain’t our fucking house guest.”

Morgan did some of his own grumbling as he set down the duffel bags and shut the door behind us, threw the double deadbolts.

“Well?” he asked. “What do you think?”

“I once spent a week in Turkish jail,” I replied, going over to stand next to the fireplace as I looked over the place. “I’ve seen worse.” I glanced to the mantle, to a picture of three good-looking men and a beautiful blonde standing in front of this very cabin. One of the men I recognized from earlier in the night. Sure, he wasn’t gripping and pulling at my pants leg in this picture, or holding an ice pack to the back of his head, but the man in the picture was definitely him.

Thomas, I think his name was?

All three of them were hard-faced and sturdily built, but smiling. Definitely soldiering types, especially with those grins that just screamed “I know life is good right now, because I’ve seen it at its worst!” And, from the way they stood close and so hands-on with the blonde, there was something beyond just friendship or camaraderie there. Don’t get me wrong. Both of those things were still there. But a woman who is “just friends” with a man doesn’t back herself up into him like that, or have his friend’s hands digging into and holding her hips while her fingers are interlaced so intimately with a third man.

“All four of them?” I asked, glancing back to Morgan.

“Yep,” he said, coming up behind me as I looked back to the picture, my stomach fluttering for a moment as I considered what her life must be like be at the center of all that affection and care.

Could I ever do that? Open myself up enough to be cared for, loved… protected?

Even now, I could practically feel the heat of Morgan’s body as he came to a stop behind me. And, at that moment, I pictured Jericho’s face on one of the men in the picture, and Andrew’s on another. And, instead of blonde hair, there was a crown of fiery red…

“Lucky her,” I said, finally, as Jericho’s heavy, pissed-off, stomping bootfalls continued to echo from upstairs.

Morgan cleared his throat, and I could tell his mouth was close enough to lean down to my ear and tenderly bite if he’d wanted to.

Or, if I’d wanted him to. I bit my lip a little, strictly on reflex, as I glanced back towards him.

Oh, who was I kidding? Of course I wanted him to.

“You want to sit?” he asked after a second.

“With my hands like this?” I asked, wiggling my fingers at the small of my back for emphasis. He was standing close–so infuriatingly close!–as I did, and my fingers brushed across the front of his twill pants.

He sucked in a sharp breath, and I jerked my fingers away as if they’d been stupidly brushing against a moltenly hot cast iron skillet. But then, heart hammering, I stretched my fingers back out and began to reach…

“You guys hungry?”

Morgan took a step back just before Andrew came stomping in from the kitchen. “No food? No one’s hungry?”

Letting out a groan of frustration, I couldn’t help but feel like a fifteen-year-old busted by her chaperon for not leaving enough room for Jesus.

“It’s three in the fucking morning,” Morgan said, already dropped to a knee by one of the duffel bags. “Should be sleeping, not eating.”

“Whatever, old man,” Andrew said. His eyes shifted to me. “What about you? Can you eat?”

Turning, I wiggled my fingers for him. “You going to convince Jericho to release these?”

“I could lock you to your chair,” Andrew said, then shrugged. “Or momma-bird it.”