“Have I almost lost you a few times, Gunner?” He didn’t answer him, but he supposed that was answer enough for his dad. “When I was a younger man, I wanted to join the army. It was something all young men did then, and I was ready to sign up and be one of the ones that kept this nation safe. But back then, they didn’t allow shifters in the service. I suppose a few of them lied about it and were able to get by. I couldn’t lie about it to them. They knew who I was and what I was before I’d signed up. You see, my mother did that. She was dead set against me going overseas to fight, and let it slip, she told me, that I wasn’t human. I don’t know to this day if I’m happy she did that or upset with her. I’d have not had you boys had I gone, and that right there is enough of a reason for me.”
“Then, I will be thankful for her doing it every day for the rest of my life.” Dad nodded and finally leaned back in his chair. “I hope you and Mom don’t expect me to have a mate. I mean, she might well be out there, but I’m not a person that would be easy on a person. Especially a woman. I just don’t want you to get your hopes up too much.”
“I think whoever is out there for you, Gunner—and she is out there—she’ll be able to put up with anything you can dish out to her.” Dad laughed. “I mean, look at your brother Sawyer. He sure did hit the jackpot on finding someone to put up with him, didn’t he?”
They both laughed and seemed to settle down for a little while. When the deer started to come out to enjoy the salt licks he’d put out for them, they sat there in companionable silence for a long time. As it started to get darker and cooler out, the two of them swapped stories about the others, telling tales that were as funny and sad as they were at the time they happened.
“How will I know when you’re out again?” Gunner asked his dad if he wanted him to tell him. “I’m not sure, now that I think about it. I’ll just worry until you return. No. I don’t want to know. I just decided that. But if you need us, you know you only have to reach out, and we’ll be there for you.”
“I know that, Dad. I’ve always known that.” Dad asked him if he came to see his brothers often when he was away. “I do. Mostly Sawyer. I don’t know why, but he patches me up if I need it and doesn’t ask that many questions. Before you get upset about that, no, I don’t usually need patching up. But on occasion, I need just a cut or something cleaned out.”
He could tell his dad didn’t believe him. Not the part about him being hurt, but the part where he only needed a small amount of work done on him. The times he’d been hurt and had to suffer through it before he could find a place to shift were many. Gunner had scars from the few times he’d been injured without being able to shift. Dad changed the subject then, for which Gunner was grateful.
“I’m thinking of Christmas a lot here lately. It’s going to be a good one. Lots of kids around to play with and spoil. More women around to keep your mom happy. She sure does like having the others around to talk to.” Gunner let him talk—there wasn’t anything he could add to the conversation anyway. “I want to make this one a new start to our lives. Go big, I’m thinking. A big tree with ornaments on every branch. So many gifts under the tree that there isn’t much room for us to walk around the room. And the kids. I want them there the entire time. You know, some families let the kids open gifts first then send them off to play? That’s not right. I want them there forever. And I will make it happen too.”
“If the wives keep coming and children with them, it’s going to be a huge mess once we start on the gifts, Dad. Do you think that’ll be all right with Mom?” Dad laughed and said it was her idea. “Figures. Mom is in seventh heaven with all these children around. The other day I saw her with Pip. That kid has her wrapped around her little finger tighter than any of us ever did, I think.”
“I think you might be right about that. The other day I saw Sawyer with Raven. She’s getting around well for being that far along. But your brother is a mess. He worries about every little thing she does.” They both enjoyed a good laugh at his brother’s expense. “I tell you, Gunner, that man is going to have a complete breakdown when that child is born. I cannot wait to see it.”
At a little before nine, Dad said he’d better go home. They’d spent a good four hours talking, and Gunner felt better than he had in the last few days. He wondered if he could have Dad or one of the others come over often to push away the depression.
Getting up, he picked up the two beer bottles he’d emptied and took them into the house. Beer didn’t do much for him. It didn’t give him any kind of high like it did some. He just got used to drinking it over water when he’d been out of the country. To him, it was safer and cleaner than water. He didn’t think he’d get anything from drinking water someplace else, but why take the chance, he told himself.
There still wasn’t much in the way of furniture in his home. Holly had given him a lot of pieces, but so far, all he’d done with them was put them in the rooms he’d thought they’d go in and not bothered with setting anything up. He’d get around to it, he told himself.
Going to the bedroom he’d claimed as his own, he grinned when he realized he’d forgotten his mattress had arrived. Not that he’d put the bed together yet, but the mattress and the box springs were leaning against the wall for him to use. Gunner decided he’d have to get sheets before he used the bed.
Gunner was nearly asleep when he realized what the day after tomorrow was. Thanksgiving. He had plans that he couldn’t break. His mother had badgered him into telling her what they were. Going to the veteran’s shelter was something he’d not ever been able to do before, and he was excited to do it. She told him he was a good boy.
“You do know I’m not a boy anymore, don’t you, Mom? I mean, I’ve been voting and everything for over ten years now.” She said he’d always be a boy to her. “All right. If that’s the way you want to think about it. But I won’t be there for lunch. I really want to do this. There are a lot of vets there, and I feel I owe them to help out.”
“Well, of course, you do.” She asked him who she contacted to help. “I’ll mention it to the rest of the family, and perhaps they’ll want to help too.”
He didn’t tell her she didn’t have to do that. Gunner thought it might upset her. Besides, there was never enough help at these things. They nearly cried when he asked if he could come and help. Giving her the phone number of the person to contact, he was sure that every one of his family would be there, dishing out food for a wonderful cause.
Closing his eyes again, he thought about having a mate. It scared him to think someone would love him. Not that Gunner thought no one loved him, but this would be someone he would sleep with. The nightmares were too much for him at times. He couldn’t imagine what it would do for someone sleeping beside him.
Only time would tell, he supposed. For all he knew, she could be more badass than he was. Laughing a little, he rolled to his back and let sleep take him under. Tomorrow was going to be a big day, and he wanted to be able to not fall asleep while handing out scoops of mashed potatoes.
Chapter 10
“If you say that to me one more time, I’m going to have someone bury you in an anthill and leave you there to be eaten alive. I told you, several times, I do not want anything to eat. I’m fine right here where I am.” The doctor just stared at her. “Go away. I have better things to do than to have you huffing at me this early in the morning.”
“I think I might have mentioned to you several times, Captain, that this will be the only meal served today. No one has time to cater to your needs when there are so many that actually need help.” Hodge glared at him, telling him again that she’d not asked anyone for special treatment. “That’s right. You want to just lie in your bed or in that contraption you’re in and wallow in your self-pity. Well fine. You can die here for all I care.”
“Nice bedside manner, dick head.” He left her there, slamming the door like a child would do when they didn’t get
their way. Hodge rolled her wheelchair to the window and looked out over the water that was as stagnant as her mind was.
Hodge had been here for almost six weeks now. After she left here, she would go to a rehabilitation center, where they’d work on getting her muscles strengthened again. Then after that, who knew. They’d told her as they were transferring her from the ship she’d been on to get put back together that her career as a grunt was finished. She was as washed up at this job as she was at anything she’d set her heart on.
Smiling to herself, she realized she was wallowing in her own self-pity. Not liking that any more than she did Doctor Fucktard, she leaned her head on the back of her chair and closed her eyes. Reliving her last day on the ground haunted her even in her waking hours.
It had taken them three days of grueling weather to make it across the dark desert. Traveling at night and burying down during the day was hot work, but it was safer for her and her five men. The six of them had been working together for the last sixteen months. Two of them were going home in less than a month. It hurt her that none of them were going home in the style they had counted on after that third morning. At night, they would talk about what they were going to do when they got home.
“I’m going to find me a woman and fuck her until neither of us can move.” They laughed, never thinking of her as anything but one of the men. “Then I’m going to take a shower for two whole days, just to make sure I have all my nooks and crannies cleaned up. Isn’t that what you call them, Captain? Nooks and crannies?”
“Bits and pieces. I suppose you could use that term too, Markley—we’ve seen what you have to offer a woman.” That, of course, was the comment they were waiting on—her to put one or all of them down with a slick insult. “Get to sleep, dumbasses. We have a long night in front of us, and I don’t want any of you saying you didn’t get enough beauty sleep. Becks, you take the first watch.”
The empty building they’d been in since arriving at the little town had running water as well as some dark corners during the day. None of them would use the water to even clean up their hands. They’d been around the block enough to know that things could be put in anything and cause death to the soldier.
She was making sure they were all out of sight and that Becks was out where he could keep an eye on them when they rested. Night work was what they were here for. The sooner they were able to get it done, the quicker she could get back to her base.
The touch to her shoulder was all that was needed to pull her from the nightmarish dream she was having and to bring down the person who had awakened her. Hodge was hurting, her back especially. Hodge didn’t know where the broken cup came from, nor the woman beneath her, but she didn’t move when she started speaking to her.
“I’m sorry.” Hodge wanted to move, to tell the person she’d hurt that she was sorry, but she couldn’t. Moving now would not only make her pass out, but Doc Fucktard would come back in and shoot her up with meds. “I’m so sorry. I should have known better. I’m going to move.”
“Don’t.” The woman nodded. “I cannot move yet. Don’t let the doctor touch me. He’s an idiot.”
“My name is Sippy. Sippy Bishop. I’m here with my family, and one of the others here said you didn’t come out of your room much. I was bringing you something to eat.” She was babbling, Hodge knew that. But moving now would make them both hurt. “I’m a tiger, honey. Anything that happened here, it’s not going to be—”
“Soldier, what the fuck are you doing to my mother? I’m Major Bishop, and you’d better be heeding my warning.” The voice was full of authority. The woman told the person behind her to hush up. “Get up off my mother before I pick you up by your ass and toss you across the room. Did you hear me? What is your name?”
“Captain Andrew Hodge, sir. I can’t move. I can’t move until the pain kills me. Hopefully, that’ll be soon.” She heard the change in his voice as soon as he bent at her level. He asked her where she hurt. “I’m injured everywhere. If I move, you might as well kill me here. If you don’t, that fucking doctor is going to. He thinks that whatever happened over there is all in my mind. That I fed my men to the wolves, so to speak.”
“Mom, I’m going to go and get someone to help out.” The woman beneath her, Sippy, told him not to get the doctor. “I won’t. But Quincy is here, and he might be able to help her out.”
When the shadow that had fallen over her left, she closed her eyes and tried to breathe her way through the pain. Looking at Sippy, she told her again how sorry she was. When she smiled at her, Sippy asked her if her name was really Andrew.
“My mother. She was fifteen when she had me and didn’t know how to spell Andrew in a girly way. I don’t know if there is any way, but that’s what ended up on my birth certificate.” Hodge wasn’t sure that was important at the moment. “The man here, Major Bishop, he’s pissed at me, and I might be able to have him knock me out with his fists. You think?”
“He’d better not if he knows what’s good for him. There they are now. Quincy, could you please help this young lady out? She’s in a great deal of pain.” He said he was going to have to wait on his bag. “Oh, good. I’m glad you’re prepared. Gunner, dear, could you please go and tell Raven that the doctor here needs his butt handed to him? Anyone can see that this happened and isn’t in her mind.”
Hodge didn’t know if Gunner had left or which of the men she’d been referring to. The doctor asked her if she had any allergies. When she told him only to pain, she felt the coolness of a wipe on her arm, then the pinch of the needle. The meds circled around her head quickly, making her slightly dizzy, then she was out.
The pain brought her awake enough to know she was being moved. It didn’t matter that she begged them to leave her alone, she found herself in the bed once again. Waking up a second time, she heard the angry voice of Doc Fucktard and a woman. Whoever she was, Hodge thought for sure she could teach her a few curse words.
The room was bright with light when she woke up again. Her body ached just a little, so she didn’t try moving it. Hodge thought that if the pain was still sleeping, she’d not wake it up just yet.
There was an IV in her arm. Two bags were hanging from the pole was attached to the bed. One of them was clear, the other a piss yellow. Still careful not to move too much, she looked around the room with her eyes. That was when she realized she was in an actual hospital and not the vet center where she’d been before.
It took Hodge three tries before she was able to get enough spit in her mouth to form a word. Longer still to get the words she wanted to say out of her mouth. The room seemed to move a bit too much for her, so she closed her eyes. When she opened them, being ordered to no less, she looked at the face of the man standing over her.
“Gunner.” She nodded, still unsure who he was. “Major Bishop. We spoke four days ago when you were hurting.”
“On your mom.” He nodded and grinned at her. “You’re not charming, so go away. I’d like to die in peace if you’d not mind.”
“I do mind, actually. And you’re not going to die. Not anymore.” Closing her eyes when he moved, she asked him what he was talking about. “How are you feeling? My brother, Quincy, had you brought to a larger hospital after he read over your chart. Raven, my sister-in-law, a ball-buster too, had Doctor Fletcher fired.” She asked him who that was. “Doc Fucktard.”
“He’s an idiot.” Gunner laughed again. “Why am in not at the vet’s center? I was supposed to be learning some skills there that I could use when they put me out to pasture. For that matter, why the hell are you here? Don’t you have some Rambo shit you have to work on or something?”
“Not today. I was able to pull your work record and what happened that brought you here. I assume Fucktard never read it. Or if he did, he just wrote it off as a lie. Whatever his excuses were, he’s out of a job, and the veteran’s association is looking into other accusations against him.�
� Hodge wondered why he’d care, but didn’t ask him. He was looking over a menu from a restaurant she’d never heard of. “I’m hungry. How about you?”
“I know you outrank me. How that works, I’m not really sure, but what the fuck are you doing here? Seriously? No, I’m not hungry. I’m hurting.” She moved but didn’t feel the pain she normally did. “Well, I usually hurt like a fucking train ran over me. But that doesn’t mean I’m any less curious as to why— Something isn’t right. You did something, or your brother did. Your mother, Sippy. She said something while I was hurting her. She— You’re a cat.”
“Yes.” She could have gotten up and socked him in the face. But she thought he’d only laugh at her. “How are you feeling? Better, I’m assuming.”
“You fucking bastard. You gave me your blood, didn’t you? And for you to be able to do that, you’d have to— Mother fuck. You think I’m your mate. No fucking way. There is no fucking way that I’m going to be a— Mother fuck, I hate you right now.”
The door opened, and there stood a woman and two men. The men she knew, the woman she didn’t.
“I guess you told her.” The woman introduced herself as Raven Bishop. “These men are people you know, I guess. Major Wilkerson and Major Partisan are here to speak to you about your stay at the veteran’s center and the doctor that was treating you.” Hodge told them to get out. “They need to know what sort of charges you’re going to press against the—”
“Get the fuck out of this room. Right now.” No one moved until Gunner stood up. “You, sit. You’re going to tell me what the hell you did.”
“You’re a cat too. It was that or let you die. And since you are my mate, I didn’t think that was going to work for me.” She asked why he’d do such a thing without her permission. “I told you. It was that, or you were going to die from the infection that was racing over your body when the doctor at the center decided you weren’t worth his time.”
Wesley: Bishop’s Snowy Leap – Paranormal Tiger Shifter Romance (Bishop's Snowy Leap Book 3) Page 13