Absolution (The Protectors 1)

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I spent the next half an hour going through the house and stripping off the dust covers on all the furniture and checking the kitchen for supplies. There was nothing in the fridge but the freezer was stocked with food and the pantry wasn’t completely bare so I knew we’d be okay for at least a few days. Geoff, my friend who had inherited the house after his parents died in a car accident, had used this place as an escape from the real world in between deployments. It was isolated so I knew that we wouldn’t be getting any visitors investigating the gunshot Jonas had discharged earlier. The property was more wooded than I would have liked, but my hope was that there was no way for anyone to link me to the property and we wouldn’t be followed. And since Geoff hadn’t had any family left, I knew there wouldn’t be anyone coming to check on the house. Even with Geoff’s death at the hands of a sniper in Afghanistan last month, I suspected it would take a while for whoever was handling his estate to get around to checking on the remote property.

I still hadn’t heard Mace come inside so I closed the front door, but left it unlocked and went upstairs to check on Jonas. There were four bedrooms on the second floor and I checked each one. I’d expected to find Jonas asleep or at least resting in one of them but he wasn’t. I finally heard running water in the bathroom attached to the bedroom that had belonged to Geoff as a child, but the door was locked and there was no light showing from underneath the door. Concern went through me as I knocked and called Jonas’s name.

When there was no answer, I stepped back and gave the door one good kick, breaking it down. I flipped on the lights and slid the shower curtain back. My heart broke as I saw Jonas huddled on one side of the large tub, still fully dressed with water raining down on him.

“Jonas,” I whispered as I reached down to push his wet hair off his face. He was ice cold and I realized he’d run out of hot water at some point and hadn’t noticed or hadn’t cared. Jonas didn’t acknowledge me in any way, so I turned the water off and reached down and wrapped my arms around and lifted him to his feet. His clothes soaked through mine and I cringed at how bitterly cold it felt.

“Jonas, I need to get these clothes off, okay?” I said softly. He didn’t answer me even when I gently cupped his face to force him to look at me. The emptiness in his gaze terrified me, so I focused on the task at hand. I wasn’t sure if he would stay standing on his own so I sat him down on the closed toilet and knelt down to pull his shoes and socks off. His shirt went next and I grabbed a towel and ran it swiftly over his hair and upper body. He made no move to help me in my efforts so I pulled him to his feet and put my arm around him so I could get him to the bedroom. After I sat him down on the edge of the bed, I made quick work of his pants and underwear and then pulled him back into a standing position so I could push the comforter out of the way.

Once I had him settled beneath the covers, I didn’t think too much about what I was doing when I stripped my own shirt off. My pants were damp but not soaked through like my shirt, so I left them on since I didn’t want to frighten Jonas when he came around, only to find himself in bed with a naked man. I climbed in bed next to him and pulled him against me and got us both covered with the comforter. Jonas’s skin felt like ice against mine and his shivering body had me tightening my arms around him. He still hadn’t acknowledged my presence, so I didn’t bother speaking to him. I just kept stroking my hand up and down his back as I tried to work some heat into his system. It took a good hour before I finally felt his body relax against mine and when I looked down, I saw his eyes had drifted shut.

I knew at that point that I should leave him, but I found myself needing the comfort that his body draped over mine brought. I’d been on an adrenaline rush from the moment I’d broken into Mace’s apartment and found his rifle, and the impending crash was hitting me hard. I actually didn’t even realize I’d fallen asleep until I heard Jonas screaming next to me. At first when his fist slammed into my chest, I thought he was attacking me but then I realized he wasn’t even awake. His whole body thrashed on the bed as he begged his unseen attacker to stop.