Asher's War (Asher Benson #3)
Page 26
We sat in silence for several moments, drinking our microbrews. She’d taken the information I’d dumped on her rather well. It wasn’t every day that someone told you about telepaths, mind control, and telekinesis. She’d known that something abnormal was afoot when she’d witnessed me kick that bench’s ass, but she definitely hadn’t expected everything I’d unloaded on her.
“So you haven’t had anyone get close to you since your head injury?” she asked abruptly. “You’ve been alone for that long?”
“Just Drew. And now Nami, I guess.”
“What about Sammy? I thought the two of you were... close.”
I felt a lump form in my throat. “I didn’t really know her. She was trying to help me, but it got her...” I let the sentence trail off, afraid that my emotions would get the best of me.
Another tidbit I’d held back from Allison, and everyone else, was Sammy’s recent haunting of my cranium. There were some things I just couldn’t share. Fortunately, I hadn’t heard Sammy whisper anything to me since we’d escaped the amusement park.
She could always pop up again, but I doubted it. As I’d recovered from being shot, yet again, I’d thought a lot about her presence in my head. Sammy wouldn’t have said the awful things I heard every day. She was kind and beautiful, inside and out.
No matter what had happened to her, she would never have hurt me that way. I was now convinced that her whispers were nothing more than my own guilt manifesting in a way that would damage me the most.
What the hell did that say about my mental health? Christ, I was a mess. Entire books could be written about the nonsense going on in my head.
“It wasn’t your fault,” Allison said. “Her death.”
“Except that it—”
Allison put her hand on top of mine, cutting me off. “You know that I lost my husband a couple of years ago. He died doing something for me. I blamed myself for a long, long time. When I met you, I was such a mess that I wouldn’t let anyone even see me outside of work.” She chewed on her lip. “It wasn’t until that damn cell phone signal that I finally woke up and realized that I didn’t kill my husband. Bad things happen to good people all the time. There’s no rhyme or reason to it, no predicting it. All we can do is put our best foot forward and be the best we can be.”
I didn’t quite buy what she was selling, but I did like the sound of it. Rather than respond, I took another drink of beer.
Allison kept her hand on mine for a few more seconds before retracting it. I didn’t want her to. I wasn’t used to people touching me with anything other than their fists. A compassionate moment was a rare occurrence for me.
“Are you going to get in trouble for telling me this?” she asked.
“Probably. But if you don’t tattle, then maybe no one will find out.”
“Deal.”
I didn’t really know if Nelson, or Thomas, or whoever else was involved in overseeing me anymore, would find out that I’d told Allison a few things. And I didn’t care. I deserved a little leeway, even if that meant breaking a few of their precious rules.
It wasn’t like national security was a big deal anyway, right?
My shoulder was stiff, so I rubbed at it a bit, doing my best not to tear the stitches. I’d now been shot in the shoulders multiple times. What a lucky guy. Still, I was better off than Drew. By the time we’d arrived at a hospital, he’d lost a lot of blood.
They’d given him a transfusion and God knows what else. I was too busy whining about all the needles they were poking in me in the next room to worry about him too much at the time. He’d been discharged and was resting in the compound now, helping Nami with some research.
The rest of the team had earned a weeklong vacation. Shea and Huxx had disappeared for a while before coming back and starting their training together. Tate had stayed behind, helping to organize our system for future ops and anything else that could be thrown our way. He was a real dick, but the man knew how to work a mission.
Manning hadn’t left either, which didn’t translate to the best of times since she and Tate were constantly at each other’s throats. She’d earned a modicum of Tate’s respect because she’d apparently kicked all kinds of ass when they were rescuing me. Knowing that he had to give her a little bit of credit only seemed to piss him off even more.
Bree had spent a lot of time helping Drew get around the compound. She changed his bandages sometimes too. I didn’t know if she felt sorry for him, or if they had a thing going on. I’d been too drunk lately to really care.
At first, everyone was worried they’d be arrested when we touched down after my extraction. Apparently, they’d disobeyed a direct order to come and rescue my sweet ass. For that, I owed them my life.
But fortunately for all of us, we hadn’t been whisked away to some secret prison in South America. President Thomas was so pleased to hear that I’d killed Smith that he’d granted us all full immunity for our supposed crimes.
He’d announced the death of the terrorist behind all the atrocities committed over the past year with great relish. The riots had stopped, the markets had risen, and people weren’t as scared anymore. Things weren’t all sunshine and rainbows, though. Rumors swirled that impeachment hearings could begin for Thomas soon.
A lot of people still wanted his head.
Christie Tolbert had become something of a celebrity for what had happened to her. I hadn’t checked up on her much, but Drew had said she was doing well. She’d apparently made several trips around the talk show circuit and was pulling in a bit of coin for her troubles.
Allison brushed a lock of hair from her forehead.
I caught myself staring at her and had to look away. Her skin had a much healthier hue than the last time I’d seen her. She was attractive then, but she was practically glowing across from me now. After what I’d seen happen to her, I never would have guessed she would have rebounded so quickly.
“What are you going to do now? Do you still work for the government?”
“I don’t have much of a choice. They wouldn’t let me walk away even if I wanted to.” I nodded at a table of agents pretending to be civilians on the other side of the bar. “See those guys?”
Allison glanced over at them. “Yeah?”
“They’re following me. There are at least another dozen outside surrounding the building.”
“Really?” Allison hunched down a bit, as if she was trying to hide behind the booth we sat in. “They’re always watching you?”
“Yup. I’m used to it.” Polishing off my pint, I gestured for another. I had a good buzz going. It felt nice. “And we didn’t get all the men who had a hand in The Massacre. One of them got away. I have to find him before I even think about how I can get away from all of this.”
The Man in Black was out there somewhere with a ton of data that Smith had handed to him. He and I had a rubbermatch in our near future.
“Aren’t you scared of going after him again?”
I mulled it over. “Honestly? Yeah, it scares me. I don’t particularly want to die, but if I don’t do it, someone else will have to. And I don’t have anything to lose.”
“I don’t have anything left to lose either.” Allison leaned forward. “That’s why I’m here. Knowing what you could do and your involvement with all of these crazy things would have scared me away before. But I lost what little I had the day we met.”
“I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be. All we can do is keep going forward.” She put her hand on mine again. “Could I see you again? I think we can help each other. Like you said, it’s not like we have anything to lose.”
I looked down at her hand, shocked. Was she hitting on me? Or just a lonely soul like me looking for companionship? Did I really care which one it was?
“I’d like that.”
She smiled at me.
A vibration in my pocket startled me. I jumped a bit in the seat.
“Stupid phone.” I fished a small cell from my pocket.
“What can I say? I’m a deep and complex guy.” I looked down at the screen and saw that it was Drew calling. I answered. “Hey, sweet cheeks.”
“That’s just nasty,” Nami said. “Don’t get me wrong, my ass is sweet, but I don’t wanna hear that shit from you.”
“I thought you were Drew.”
“And that makes it better?”
I mouthed sorry to Allison. “Why are you calling from his phone?”
“Cause the queen does what she wants, Gigantor.”
“Would you get to the point? I’m busy right now.”
“You on a date or something?”
I didn’t answer. I considered hanging up, but I was genuinely curious as to why she was calling me.
Nami huffed. “Fine. Baldie wanted me to call you because we think we have a hit on that Xavier thing you mentioned. So get your ass back here so we can get to work.”
“Got it. Nice work, Short Round.”
“Hashtag—eat me.”
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About the Author
"JASON BRANT" is an anagram for Bas Trojann, a former Bigfoot hunter who, after being abducted (and subsequently returned) by aliens, decided to hang up his ghillie suit and enter the world of professional arm wrestling. Despite back-to-back first place finishes in the South Dakota World Championship League, Bas receded from athletics to invent cheese and give Al Gore the initiative to create the internet.
Nearly a decade after writing the bestselling self-help series, Tomato Soup and Grilled Cheese (Cut into Four Pieces) for the Soul, Bas has left his life of notoriety and critical acclaim behind him to write existential, erotic poetry.
His wife washes their clothing on his abs.
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