Page 68 of Trigger Discipline

PACKING HEAT

Blake brushed some damp hair from his forehead and sighed. He was sore, and the laceration on his head was throbbing; it had stopped bleeding, but it was still tender.

With all the shades drawn, it was difficult to tell if night had fallen or not. They kept all the lights off, using a big three wicked candle in the middle of the room to give them some light. Their mood was less than somber; it was resigned. For the first time since the whole thing began, no one was talking. Judd didn’t have his cards out, and Phin wasn’t grumbling about something.

The silence was worse than the sounds of fighting that periodically rattled the windows.

Back at the station, there had been an undercurrent of tenacity. A quiet acceptance that it’ll be hard, but they were going to do it. Theycoulddo it. Now, no one was sure.

Not even when Tommy had valiantly distributed clean clothes and they used the back of the toilet to give themselves sponge baths had their mood been lifted. Now, wearing a pair of borrowed jeans that were two sizes too big and aBaltimore Ravenshoodie, Blake was trying to quiet his mind.

Unlike his body, his mind was racing. Like a ticking bomb,it felt like it was counting down to something, pumping adrenaline into a body so battered and bruised, he wasn’t sure he could do anything about it, even if he knew what to do.

Rubbing his hand across his head, he tried to settle back against an ottoman. Above him, Victoria was sitting in the plush chair, her leg propped up on several pillows piled atop the tufted top. She had pulled the top of her flight suit down and tied the arms around her waist, and was wearing a tuxedo t-shirt. She’d made a face when Tommy handed it to her, but it was the only thing in the apartment that would fit.

Across from him, Phin was still sprawled out on the couch. Tommy refused to let him get up, cleaning him up with a damp rag. He’d been uncharacteristically silent during his sponge bath, but Blake suspected it was taking everything he had just to stay conscious. The piece of shrapnel that he’d taken in his leg hadn’t hit the artery, but it had done some serious damage. It was only his massive size that kept him from hemorrhaging out.

But the real testament to their beaten down mentality was Judd. The scout hadn’t made a single quip about Phin getting a sponge bath. He’d just flopped onto the floor, arms crossed over his borrowed t-shirt and sweats, glaring at the textured ceiling with a crease between his brows.

Which was fine by Blake. The silence was heavy, but it was fitting. A punishment they deserved for having the audacity to live when so many had died.

When Gabriel told them Scott died, his response had been‘Oh’.

That’s it—a single syllable. A young, capable man whom he’d spent time with, that he’d survived with, died, and it was like he’d been told it was going to rain that afternoon.

Blake was used to pushing aside his feelings. To being professional in the face of the horrors he’d seen in the back of his ambulance, but he’d never lost his empathy. He’d justpaused it so he could do what he needed to. But now? Now he was just…numb.

He tried to think logically. Tried to quiet everything but the next steps; to push through the flashing memories, the horror and guilt clogging his throat andget up.

Before he could, Gabriel strode back into the room. He’d been shooed to the bedroom to get some sleep—the barrier of a closed door was the only way the commander was able to let go for an hour or two for some actual rest. And he looked better for it. Wearing a clean long-sleeved compression shirt, the tactical pants he refused to change out of, and his light brown hair slicked back with water—he looked good. Refreshed. Strong.

Confident.

And with his presence, the tension began to dissipate. Gabriel crossed his arms, taking a moment to look them all over.

“Tommy, would you mind grabbing some food?”

Nodding, the EMT padded to the kitchen on bare feet. A moment later, they heard a cabinet bang open.

“All right,” Gabriel said, voice low and firm. “We’ve had a moment to lick our wounds. Now we need to make a plan.”

Judd scoffed. “A plan? Are you serious?” he sat up, his light curly hair falling into his face. “Aliens are waging war outside that door, and you want to…what? Have a sitrep? Take stock of our supplies?”

Gabriel’s face was stony. “That’s exactly what we’re going to do.”

“Are you delusional?” Judd whisper shouted. “There’stwo of them.We thought getting the shield down would solve all our problems, and all we did was make things so much worse!”

Blake flinched. He was the one who’d brought the shield down, the one who let the second set of aliens in. If he hadn’t done that—no. He felt guilty for a lot of things, but bringingthe shield down wasn’t one of them. It was coming down whether he crashed a snowplow into it or not. At the time, they thought it was the right move. It would allow them to communicate with the outside world. And it had, Gabriel had told him about the quick call with Irving, and it had been hopeful. But now it wasn’t.

Gabriel’s jaw worked. “And now we’re going to fix it.”

Judd glared up at him for a long moment before kissing his teeth and pushing himself to his feet. “You think you can just make some kind of bold declaration and everything fixes itself? You don’t have that kind of plot armor.”

“God, you’re such a bitch when you’re hungry,” Phin groused from the couch. “Go get something to eat.”

“Oh, just shut up and bleed,” Judd snapped as he stormed past them into the kitchen.

Gabriel watched him go before turning his attention back to Blake. His face was sharp edged in the flickering light from the candle. Outwardly, he was all cool confidence, but Blake saw the way his eyebrow twitched, the way he stuffed his hands in his pockets and worked the crochet hook over.