Protecting Dallas

“If I remember correctly, you did quite a bit of defiling yourself.”

“Maybe,” I shrugged.

“Definitely,” insisted Maddox. “Not that we’re complaining, of course.”

He began lifting the metal tops and peeking into every dish. After fifteen minutes of agonizing over the menu, I’d ordered just about one of everything.

For the first few minutes I said nothing, I only let them eat. Maddox inhaled two hamburgers, while pushing the accompanying onion rings away. Austin picked at a little bit of everything, eating a bit from this plate, a bit from that one.

“No beer?”

I nodded to a stainless steel bucket down near the floor. It was filled with frosty cold bottles, surrounded by a whole sea of melting ice.

“You’re the bees knees, you know that?”

“I know.”

Austin twisted the cap off three bottles. He handed one to me and one to Maddox. I tilted my head back, letting the cool liquid slide down my throat. My mind wandered back to the previous nights events, which were somehow even dirtier and more carnal than the first evening we’d arrived.

My beer was half-finished by the time I slammed the bottle back against our little table. The carbonation still burned in my throat.

“So… about Connor…”

Maddox took a deep breath and briefed me on the day’s events. He talked about Woodward, their meeting, their ride back from the Naval base. About how Connor had been in imminent danger, and no one had done anything to help him.

It made me upset, then angry, then sad. I tried to keep things together, to understand why my brother had done what he did. To be angry, not at Connor, or even Woodward for not being able to help him; but at the people who’d taken away the last person who loved me, from my life.

“It’s not his fault,” said Maddox, echoing my own thoughts. “Woodward, that is. From what we could tell, he did what he could. He tried protecting Connor. We’re sure of that.”

Glumly I nodded. The whole thing was fucked, soup to nuts, front to back. I didn’t need to know the specifics of what Connor had been doing, only that he valued it enough to risk his life for it. The only real question I needed answered was who was responsible.

“We’re getting there Dallas,” Austin was saying. “It’s just gonna take a little time.”

I shoveled some scrambled eggs onto a piece of toast and popped the whole thing in my mouth. Though it was well past noon, I was still in the mood for breakfast. Hell, I’d only been up a little over an hour.

Last night had been… well, busy.

“What now?” I asked.

“We have a few things to tie up,” said Maddox. There was a double entendre in there somewhere. He gestured at our not-so-little banquet. “Right after this.”

“Like what?”

He shot Austin a quick glance. “Like checking out Connor’s last apartment again,” he said. “We didn’t get to see it all yet. Might be something we missed.”

I crunched down on some bacon and stood up. “Good. Let me shower, and—”

“Shower, yes,” Maddox interrupted. “Come with? No. You stay here.”

“The fuck I—”

“Dallas,” said Austin, “you can’t come everywhere with us. Besides, we need you to pack us up. We’ll be quick, less than an hour.”

My eyebrows went up. “We’re leaving?”

“Probably, yeah,” Maddox confirmed. “There’s nothing else for us here. We should get home, see what Kane’s managed to dig up.”

Home. Suddenly it was a good word again. A warm word. The thought of seeing Kane again excited me too.