Page 13 of Hold Me Down (KRK Security #4)

If leaving for work without Dave was weird, arriving at the office alone was even worse—there was an itch under Travis's skin, clearly stating that something was off, something wasn't right, and although he knew what it was, that answer didn't help him much.

He'd been coming to work with Dave at his side for so many years now that anything different seemed like a mistake that deserved immediate fixing.

And yet, there was no quick fix, only months of healing, and needing to wait, and pretending that spending so much time apart wasn't as painful as it actually was.

After dropping off his backpack in their small office, Travis headed to the kitchen—both for a coffee and a catch-up with his friends.

None of them had given him any grief so far, and the group chats offered the usual amount of chatter, but he wouldn't be surprised if someone blamed him for what had happened and treated him differently because of it.

Hell , he blamed himself, so how could he expect anyone else not to do so?

Ian was the first one who spotted him, and he offered Travis a smile and a nod.

"Look who's here!"

That, of course, prompted everyone to turn around, so Travis had no time to take them one by one but was hit with Clay, Martinez, and Jeremy staring at him all at once.

After a second-long pause that felt like forever, Martinez raised his eyebrows.

"Huh, I feel like I know this guy but can't quite place him. It must have been forever since I saw him."

Travis snorted, relaxing a bit under the familiarity of Martinez's teasing.

"I can see you missed me greatly."

"In your dreams." Martinez sat up and dropped his smile. "How's Dave, for real?"

They all had updates on the main group chat, of course, but Martinez was right to question them, since Dave tended to downplay things and never admitted he was hurting or struggling, instead focusing his narrative on boredom and wishing he was at work.

"The leg's as good as it can be, fortunately, but it's hard to juggle the healing and making sure other muscles don't weaken too much."

"Yeah." Martinez rubbed at his side, maybe remembering his own recovery after getting shot. "It's a pain, no pun intended."

"We got an exercise plan from Melody, and we're following it. Dave just wishes he could do more and, frankly, I don't blame him."

As he finished, Travis's gaze fell on Jeremy, who was pressing his lips together and staring at the mug in his hand.

"What?" Travis asked before he could talk himself out of it.

Then again, he didn't want to overthink it later and wonder what Jeremy had wanted to say. He also didn't want to appear like he wasn't ready to face the consequences of this mess.

Jeremy lifted his head and caught Travis's gaze. "What do you mean?"

"I can see you have things to say." Travis made sure his voice was steady and calm. "I'm not trying to pick a fight here, to be clear. If you want to say something, I'm open to hearing it. I know I fucked up."

"Which time?"

And, ouch . Maybe Travis should have picked someone else for this.

Not everyone would be willing to confront him like this, though—Jeremy didn't give a fuck about appearing nice over being honest.

"Which time do you want to talk about?" Travis tried, aware of the other three watching—and probably judging—him.

Jeremy squared his shoulders. "Frankly, I don't want to talk about any of them, because it's not like you listened before."

"Fair." Travis nodded sharply, knowing it was true. "But I'm listening now, and while you don't owe me anything, you clearly have things to say, and I don't want things to fester between us if we can avoid it."

Look at me, trying to communicate properly , the dry voice at the back of his head supplied. Doctor Kumar would be proud .

Fully facing Travis now, Jeremy held his gaze for an uncomfortably long time before nodding.

"Fine. I'm pissed that your partner had to break his leg during a fucking training exercise for you to see you've been a match always ready to burn the shit to the ground for months now.

I know people had told you this, one way or another, but you blew us all off, so while I appreciate you taking responsibility now, it's too late. "

Travis nodded. "You're right."

What else could he say? This didn't hurt as much as the dressing-down from Kalei in that hospital room had, but it still stung. Jeremy was a guy whom everyone respected highly around here, and his opinions counted for a lot—partially because he didn't offer them too often.

You asked for this , Travis reminded himself.

"It is too late, and I can't go back in time and change things," he said. "Trust me, I would if I could. I'd prefer to break both my legs instead of one of Dave's."

"Yeah, maybe the solution is that no one breaks anything," Clay said from his place at the small table. He'd been silent from the moment Travis had shown up, and he was frowning now. "It won't help anybody, including Dave, if you think your injuries are somehow okay."

"That's not what I meant—"

"That's how you've been acting." Jeremy put his mug at the table and crossed his arms, making Travis's arms twitch in response, wanting to mirror the gesture. "You've been taking risks as if nothing else mattered but the rush of it."

Travis swallowed back a protest, because… Well, because he couldn't argue with that, could he? He had been pushing it, he had been feeling reckless and unbalanced, and he'd somehow found a flicker of comfort on that edge of danger.

He should have known better. He'd seen what happened to the guys who couldn't turn the heat down and always chased the next high.

But he'd ignored all of the warnings— from Kalei, and Ian, and a few other guys, some more direct and some disguised as jokes and taunts—because whatever was going on with him certainly wasn't PTSD, which meant he was fine, only a bit of an adrenaline junkie.

Thinking that way now seemed stupid, but that was honestly how he'd felt before. As if PTSD was the only option. As if he could only be perfectly fine or suffer from a raging PTSD that destroyed his life, with nothing in between.

He cleared his throat. "I'm working on it now."

It wasn't an easy admission, but he made sure to meet everyone's eyes, showing them he was serious. These were his teammates and they had his back, and a part of having his back meant not letting him off the hook too easily when he screwed up.

"Good." Jeremy dropped his arms to his sides before picking up his mug. "Glad to hear it."

With that, he headed to the door, clapping Travis on the shoulder on his way out.

Martinez followed a moment later, with a reassuring smile and a pat of his own. "What he said."

Inhaling slowly, Travis looked at Clay, who rolled his eyes at him.

"Yeah, if you're really committed to working on it, we're good."

"And taking care of Dave," Ian added, "but we don't have to tell you that, do we?"

This one was easy.

"No, you don't."

"Figured." Ian nodded. "Now, what are you doing here? Aren't you supposed to be working from home, rechecking all of Kalei's beloved procedures?"

"Watch it." Travis turned to make sure their boss wasn't there. "You know he has ears everywhere."

"I'm certain he knows there's no one around here who loves procedures more than he does."

"He still wishes we would."

To be fair, most of them did appreciate having clear directives on the adequate responses for any and all situations—even if all of them hated the fact that they'd needed to create one for a kidnapping of one of their own after what happened to Eddie.

"No one could ever compete." Ian shook his head. "Unless you're falling for them, too, now that you're going over them with a fine toothcomb?"

Travis chuckled. "I'm not changing that much. That said, while I'm pretty sure Kalei gave me this task as a punishment, the joke may be on him, because I already have pages of notes."

"Or it's a way back into his good graces." Clay sat back in his chair. "Offering to make his beloveds even better."

"We'll see, I guess." Travis didn't have big hopes of making things up to Kalei any time soon, but he still had some.

Treating Kalei as the ultimate authority figure had been carved into Travis back in his military days and there was no going back.

"Today I'm only here to finish the two reports I have pending.

There's no way I want to bring Vic's ire on myself on top of everything else. "

"It would have probably worked better if you'd filed them on time in the first place." Vic paused in the kitchen entrance with a frown. "Alas, here we are."

Fuck .

"I'll go do them now."

"Very well. I'll walk you to your office, then, since there's something else I want to discuss with you."

Double fuck . Travis left the kitchen quickly, with Vic on his heels, and he was already sitting down in his chair when he remembered he hadn't actually poured himself any coffee.

Which meant he was going to have to push through those reports—and whatever else Vic needed from him—without a caffeine boost.

"Stop looking like that." Vic took a seat on one of the chairs at the side table after turning it to face Travis. "I'm not here to pile any more shit on you."

"That's a relief," Travis admitted. "But I wouldn't blame you if you did."

Vic shrugged. "I'm not a mental health professional, so I wouldn't be able to tell you anything that hasn't already been said.

I might have had an urge to go all 'hurt Dave again and they won't find your body', but then I remembered you'd have likely buried yourself alive first before I could get to you if that happened, so. I'm letting it go."

Travis stared at Vic for a long moment.

"You know you're one of the scariest people at this company, right?"

With a flash of teeth, Vic grinned, which made Travis realize that he'd never seen him grin before. Smile, yes. Laugh, yes. But not grin.

"At any other company, I'd be offended not to be considered the scariest, but at this one, I'll take it as the compliment it is."

Chuckling, Travis relaxed back into his chair.

Damn , it was good to be back.

A flash of guilt ran through him at the thought, and he glanced at Dave's empty desk. It wasn't fair that Travis got to be here like this, hanging out with their co-workers and friends, when Dave was stuck back at home.

The only thing Travis could do now, though, was take care of his shit.

"Go on, then." He sat up and turned his computer on. "Lay it on me, what do you need?"

The sooner he was done here, the sooner he could go back home.

There was no place he'd rather be, anyway.