—:—
“Would you like something to eat?” Malin asked.
“You got any of Sofia’s food left?”
“We have all of it.”
“I figured Dutch would’ve polished it all off by now.”
“He didn’t have time. First, we went for a run, although not together, and then right after he got back, he called you and left.”
“I could go for some of that,” Onyx said, standing to help her get it all out of the refrigerator.
“You said you had a story to tell me.”
Onyx nodded. “I’ve known Dutch a long time. Not as long as some of the other guys have, but long enough to have seen him transition from who he was when I met him to who he is now.”
Malin nodded as she dished food onto a plate to reheat in the microwave.
“Some of us grow up quicker than others.”
She laughed.
“Dutch…he lived in the past for a long while. From the day I met him, I knew he had a thing for Alegria, not that it made any sense to me.”
Malin took her plate out and put Onyx’s in, and then went and sat at the counter.
“It was kind of like watching someone with a celebrity.”
Malin rolled her eyes, and Onyx laughed.
“Just that they hung out and all, but it was more like he was in love with the idea of the woman rather than the woman herself.”
“He went from my bed to hers pretty damn quick.”
“I’m not saying anything he did was right. I just know that when the opportunity presented itself for him to have something he’d wanted for so long, he didn’t think with the right part of his anatomy.”
“If this is supposed to make me feel better, it’s doing the opposite.”
“All I’m saying is that I think he gets it now.”
“Now that she’s with Mantis.”
Onyx sat at the counter next to her and shoveled food in faster than she’d even seen Dutch do.
“No, it was before that. The reason Dutch was in Germany was because he begged Doc for a mission—any mission. He walked away to give his two best friends in the world the chance to get their shit together and figure out they were made for each other.”
Onyx stood and walked back over to where the containers of food were still on the counter. “Want some more?”
“I’m good,” she answered, taking her plate over to the sink.
“Mantis told me that when he rescued him from the pirates in Somalia, one of the first things Dutch asked was if he wanted him to back away.”
“And?”
“Mantis said no, but Dutch did it anyway.”
“How noble of him.”