by SM Olivier
“More than even,” he muttered in relief. “I owe you a life debt.”
“Avery?” I heard my name at the same time a female voice cried out for Axel.
I turned my head and had to blink twice before I realized he wasn’t a mirage. He was tall, built like a football player, wide shoulders, broad chest, narrow waist, long legs, and muscular all over. His ash-blond hair had been shorn close to his head, and a few days’ growth of facial hair covered his strong jawline. Eyes that changed from light green to gray assessed me as if he were seeing a ghost.
I vaguely noticed the Asian woman running past me and launching herself at Axel. I blinked in shock but wasn’t able to compute the hollow feeling in my chest as I was nearly barreled over by Corbin.
“Corbin,” I cried out as my sais clattered to the ground.
The moment his arms wrapped around me, I felt... home. My body seemed to melt into him instinctively.
His presence no longer represented pain; instead, it signified security. He was the boy who’d once cleaned up my boo-boos when I fell off my bike. He was the teen who helped me fix one of my mom's favorite lamps before she found out I had broken it playing ball in the house. He was the “nearly adult” who sat next to me at my mother's funeral, holding my hand in his.
How had I not seen how much he had been there for me growing up? Sure, Trevor had been my best friend, companion, even my shield, but Corbin… Corbin had been my protector.
I threw my arms around his neck as he lifted me. He squeezed me tightly to his hard chest. I wrapped my legs around his waist, not caring that we were both covered in blood, sweat, and other disgusting things. I felt him take a few steps before my body connected with the wall. I noticed his arms were trembling, and I felt a wetness on the side of my neck.
After several moments he pulled back. His eyes were red as if he had been crying. “How?” he asked in wonderment.
I was confused by his strong emotions and shocked when his mouth crushed down on mine. He wasn’t gentle. When he nipped my lip, I tasted the metallic taste of my blood on my tongue. I gasped, and his tongue drove into my mouth with ownership. My brain told me to push him away. But my body recognized how right he felt.
I gripped his shoulders, tempted to shove him away, when I noticed the delicious warmth of his skin under my fingertips. His powerful muscles rippled under my hands. My body won, as I surrendered to his skillful lips. I softened my mouth against his, returning his kiss. After some time, he groaned and pulled back. I noticed his ragged breathing first before I realized I could barely breathe myself.
“How are you here?” he finally rasped once more.
“I came with Axel and the men. Sylvia, BJ, Mikey, and Miller,” I explained to him, mystified. I was rambling. I never rambled unless I was nervous. “And… oh yeah, we found these kids and got some dogs, too.”
I heard Wyatt’s gasp right before I saw him stagger back into Axel and Chad. “Avery? But… you’re dead…” Both Axel and Chad were struggling to keep him upright.
Wyatt’s usually gelled, russet-colored hair was standing on end like he had been running his fingers through it a million times, and his emerald green eyes were red, like he had been crying, too. There was an unhealthy pallor to his typically fair skin, and the spattering of brown freckles across the bridge of his nose and cheeks stood out starkly.
“What are you talking about, Wy?” Axel gently prodded the stunned man.
I vaguely realized that Axel no longer had the Asian girl plastered against him. I made a mental note to ask him about her later. Our… thing… was still in the infancy stages. I assumed he was unattached. After Trevor, I wasn’t going to be so blind anymore. If he wanted to be with her, then I was out, regardless of his pretty words and willingness to share me.
“How?” Wyatt muttered, capturing my attention once more. “We saw your body. You were dead!” Wyatt cried out.
Chapter 12
“We saw your truck, so we all pulled over,” Corbin began to explain as we went out to the vehicles to grab the rest of our party. “We passed a guns and ammo store, and Mom swore she saw your truck in the parking lot. I looped back around, and Steph confirmed it. When we saw you—no, someone wearing your sweatshirt−” he stopped and shook his head. “There was a woman with dark hair, a blond-headed man, and a little dark-haired boy,” his voice rasped.
He rubbed his face, suddenly looking tired. “We couldn’t recognize them. The infected did a number on them. So, yeah… She had on your shirt, then? The man must have had on BJ’s desert tan boots and fleece jacket. The little boy… he had on Miller’s favorite Green Lantern t-shirt. We went searching for Sylvia and Mikey. We looked for hours. By then, we thought we should let the rest of the team know what was going on. They were told not to come here because I knew it would be overrun.”
My stomach roiled. “Rosa and Luke, they stole my truck. They had another little boy, Ben. You didn’t find him?”
“Aunt Pam thought she saw a dark-haired boy, but she was so distraught. Steph, too,” Wyatt muttered before he was hauling me into his arms.
I didn’t tense against him but allowed him to take comfort in my arms. He held me close while he buried his head in my neck. “You’re alive,” he muttered against me, his lips brushing along my jawline.
How did this become the new norm? I accepted their familiarity and embraces as I never had before. I was also completely okay with the little kisses− or in Corbin’s case, not so little kisses. This hadn’t been us in the past, so how were we slipping into these roles with such ease?
“I’m alive, yes!” I laughed as I embraced him in return.
My families were huggers. We weren’t always, but Aunt Pam and Aunt Carol grew up in average, loving homes. They had to reform my dad, Mom, Uncle Mitch, and Uncle Scott and had made them huggers, too. Then they all taught us to be huggers.
It was nothing to embrace our cousins when we saw them or when we were leaving. As kids, it was comfortable; as teens, it became more perfunctory. I didn’t think I’d ever considered how it would feel to be in Wyatt’s or Corbin’s arms, but now, without my single-minded thoughts of Trevor, I had to admit it was beyond lovely. I couldn’t deny the awareness that prickled across my skin.
I didn’t care that we were in the middle of a parking lot, or that it was in front of Axel, Corbin, Felix, and Chad. I let Wyatt take comfort in my arms, and I permitted myself to feel pleasure in his touch. He peppered kisses along my jawline, and I ran my fingers through his hair.
“Wyatt! Corbin!” Sylvia cried out.
I looked up to see Sylvia climb out of the Tahoe and embrace Corbin, laughing, and crying at the same time.
“Am I cleared to come down?” BJ yelled down from his position up on the tower.
Axel merely nodded and waved him down. I could see the smile spread across BJ's face, even from this distance, as he clamored down. I knew he was just as excited to see Wyatt and Corbin, too.
Sylvia ran over to us next and hugged Wyatt. He embraced her with one arm, seemingly unwilling to let me go just yet.
The back doors to the Tahoe opened, and Mikey and Miller came tumbling out, holding the leashes of the Rottweiler, Jack Russell, and Sylvia’s ugly but cute dogs.
“Can we walk the dogs?” Miller asked. “They really need to go.”
“Stay near us,” I called back.
“Okay,” they simultaneously responded before they walked over to our van.
“And keep their leashes on them!” I added. We had no clue if the dogs would run off, and I’d hate to lose them right after we had just rescued them.
“Dogs?” Corbin laughed. “Where the heck did the dogs come from?”
“A shelter.” I smirked. “A woman we ran into was a volunteer at one. She thinks they unsettle the infected. We couldn’t let them starve to death in the shelter, and it was worth checking out the theory.”
“I should go get the babies,” Sylvia chirped. “They were getting restless.”
/> “I’ll grab the princess,” Chad eagerly volunteered as he followed her.
I smiled at his retreating back. He loved that baby, and we could already tell Jenny adored him, too.
“Babies?” Wyatt added with a raised brow.
I frowned, feeling sad. “We found Phillip and Jenny on the way out here. Their mother was… taken by the infected. Sylvia rescued them before they could become infected food. The mom was only eighteen, with no real family to speak of.”
I saw the grim expressions settle on their faces. No one wanted to think about the helpless that had no one to rescue them.
A loud, low bark erupted in warning before I saw Bane charge towards me. Once he reached me, he circled me, whining loudly. He made me feel lighter, a balm to my troubled soul.
“It’s okay, boy,” I crooned. “Were you a good dog?”
“That’s not a dog, that’s a horse,” Wyatt teased.
I smiled. “I know, and he’s just a puppy!”
“How are we supposed to feed him?” Corbin smirked.
“We got food.” I feigned a sniff.
“Bane did well,” Axel stated with a satisfying twist of his lips. “He didn’t chew up anything or have any accidents; however, your side of the door now has claw marks embedded in it. Looks like he didn’t like you leaving him.”
I kneeled and stroked Bane’s coat. “Want me to train you, Baney boy, wanna come with Mama when she’s out kicking infected booty?” I hummed. I was pleased to see he didn’t seem to need a leash. Perhaps he’d be one of those dogs that wouldn’t run.
“She’s baby-talking a dog,” Corbin mocked, talking out of the side of his mouth to Wyatt. He held out his hand and I stood up, taking it.
“And that’s a surprise?” Wyatt quipped back. “She used to apologize to the nightcrawlers before she put them on the hook, and then thank the fish when she caught them.”
“She did not,” Axel remarked with mock horror.
“Not surprised.” Felix smirked. I could tell he was still shaken from his near-death experience.
“She used to apologize and thank the deer we used to hunt, too.” BJ joined into my roasting as he extended his hand to Corbin.
Corbin took it and did one of those weird male rituals of shaking it, pulling him in, and slapping his back as he embraced him. “I heard you’ve improved you’re shooting.” Corbin smiled at him.
“Didn’t you see all those bodies we had to climb over to get out here? That’s why I call him Boy Wonder,” Axel added with his look of pride. “The kid’s a sniper.”
I saw the flush of pleasure come over BJ’s face. I knew he was trying to act “manly” as he received his compliments.
“He got expert in the academy,” I bragged on him.
BJ turned red some more. Wyatt laughed and pulled BJ into a manly hug next. “He always was a good shot, I imagine the academy just made him better.” Wyatt clapped him on the back loudly.
“We should get out of here, you guys smell,” Sylvia said, wrinkling her nose but smiling as she jostled Phillip on her hip.
Chad was slightly behind her, patting Jenny’s little back. I noticed he had wiped down and was wearing a new shirt.
I looked down at myself, noticing I was in desperate need of a shower, too. I removed my jacket and placed it on the hood of the van. I made a mental note to wipe it down later.
I heard an appreciative sound and noticed Corbin, Wyatt, and Axel watching me. So far, I was glad to see Axel had no qualms with seeing me in Corbin’s or Wyatt’s arms. Maybe he really didn’t mind seeing me with his men…
I shifted, slightly self-conscious. It was nice knowing they desired me but still such a new concept for me to process. In theory, it sounded great; in practice, it seemed a lot more complicated.
“I think we should stay here tonight,” Axel finally said, pulling his gaze away from me, as he looked down at his watch. “We have about seven hours of daylight left. We still need to clear and burn the bodies, and we can’t guarantee that we’re not going to run into any issues heading to the campground. We can get anything in here while it's secured. I’m not sure if it would be wise to return once the locals realize it’s clear. I’m going to come up with a game plan and need everyone to meet me in the food court in fifteen.”
He turned to Felix. “Find a spot we can keep Mrs. Cavalier, Mrs. Harris, Sylvia, Avery, and the kids. The women and children don’t need to see the carnage in there.”
“Copy that,” Felix said without hesitation as he took off running back towards the mall.
“I’ll help with the cleanup,” I said with a frown.
Axel sighed as he put his hand on his hips. “You’re a civilian.”
I raised my brow at him, walking back towards the circle of sorts they had formed. I was conscious of Wyatt’s and Corbin’s gazes still on me. “I’m a civilian that helped make that mess, and I’m sure you expected BJ to help as well.” I imitated his stance, putting my hands on my hips, too.
Axel scowled at me. “BJ went to the academy. He already had one foot in the door and the training.”
I scoffed at him. I knew he was just trying to give me a break, but I also knew if he weren’t involved with me, he would still expect me to pull my weight.
“I’m helping, you can’t stop me,” I said mutinously, crossing my arms over my chest.
I think I heard Corbin stifle a laugh, but it was quickly covered up with a cough. He stepped up behind me and wrapped his arms around my waist and lowered his chin on my shoulder.
It felt so natural just to lean back into him. It was hard to concentrate on my ire towards Axel with Corbin's body so near.
I could see Axel’s jaw work as he had one of his inward battles.
“Mommy!” Mikey screamed out unexpectedly as he took off at a run.
Miller was steps behind him with six dogs hot on their heels. I turned to see Steph and Aunt Pam breaking away from a group of a few civilians and JOpS. They were both sobbing. Steph opened her arms and her boys fell into them. I felt my eyes water at their reunion and smiled before Aunt Pam’s petite frame barrelled into me.
“Oh, Avery, I thought you were dead!” she sobbed, pinning me against Corbin's chest. She pulled my face down to hers so she could kiss both of my cheeks. “I saw your long dark hair, your truck, your favorite hoodie with your name on it! BJ!” she called out.
“Yes, ma’am,” he dutifully replied, coming over without her voicing her request.
Soon, all four of us were in a hug, and tears were shed. Corbin was rubbing his mom’s back and mine, murmuring reassurances.
“My babies, I missed my babies,” she kept repeating, sobbing. “I thought I would never see them again.”
“I’m here now,” I reassured her. “I’m sorry I’ve haven’t called or texted that much. I’m sorry I was taking my…hurt out on you. No more. I promise.”
She pulled back and looked at me. Tears were coursing down her face still. “It was okay to heal, baby. I understood. I just didn’t want to push you, but I wanted you to understand I will always feel like a mother to you, more than an aunt.”
I swallowed back my tears. “And I’ll always look at you more than an aunt.” I tried to stem the tears from falling from myeyes. “I know I’m lucky, not only to have had my mom, but you, too. You were just as much a mom to us as she was. We never… I never doubted your love for me.”
She began to cry again in earnest once more.
I heard a throat clear and saw Trevor’s solemn gaze on me. “Avery.” He held his arms out.
He hadn’t changed much in the year I had last seen him. He was still maybe two inches or so taller than me. He’d stopped wrestling long ago, so had lost some of his muscle mass, but still looked in great shape. His ash-blond hair was still shorter on the sides but kept longer on top, parted and gelled to one side. His soulful brown eyes were the same, always so expressive. He never could lie without his face giving him away.
I wasn’t going to count hi
s lies of omission. I never outright considered him cheating on me, so I had never asked. Had I asked back then, though, I’m sure it would have been written all over his face. I wish I would’ve asked him before we got pregnant. It would’ve changed a lot of things and probably wouldn’t have ended in one of my most significant heartbreaks.
I continued my perusal of him. Even his clothing style was still the same. In our senior year of high school, he started to dress preppy and was fastidious in his looks. Despite the fact we were in the middle of an apocalypse, his khaki shorts were wrinkle and dirt free. His white polo shirt and white shoes were still pristine, as if he’d just purchased them.
I stared at him and felt…empty. There was no sharp, suffocating pain left in my heart. In its place was just sadness; not because he’d broken my heart in the worst way possible, but because I missed the best friend I’d once had. I realized now I no longer missed him like I would have for a lover but as a dear friend. And for the first time, I felt like I could learn to forgive him. My unwillingness to do so had put me in shackles. I hadn’t been free from my self-imposed prison since the day I walked out of his frat house.
We’d never have the relationship we once had, and I knew there wasn’t going to be an immediate absolution. I predicted it was going to take time. I wasn’t ever going to forget, but it was time I made the right steps to free my soul and let go of the pain, anger, and hurt I felt.
As I warred with myself, I hadn’t noticed that Corbin had taken a protective stance between his brother and me. I looked up at him and smiled.
“It’s okay.” I patted his chest, then whispered, “He might be the man that hurt me, but he’s still the boy that used to be my best friend.”
“Are you sure?” he said with a frown, searching my features, cradling my cheek. “If you need−”
I cut him off and smiled once more. “I’m sure.”
Trevor’s eyes looked confused and somewhat inquisitive as he looked between me and Corbin. A sheen of tears filled his eyes which were full of regret, uncertainty, and… longing. With his arms open, I could see his silent plea, asking me to step inside them. I sighed but moved towards him, one step at a time.