Ajax
Rory
"You want me to kill her now, Commander?"
The man with dirty blonde hair, forest green eyes, and a slightly more muscular build than Griffen enters the room behind us. He winks at me before sitting on Finley's other side. Griffen shakes his head, and Kage hands him a cup of a coffee mug that says Witches' Brew inside a cauldron.
"I see you're alive, Ajax. Where's he that shall not be named?" Kage asks, drawing attention to him.
He shrugs. "Probably still with that chick, he picked up. He should be home soon," Ajax comments insouciantly.
Kage snaps the wooden spoon in his hand, which startles me. I swear I jumped a foot off this bar stool. Griffen's hand lands on my knee while Fin moves to stroke my lower back. I have to swallow the lump in my throat.
"He will not hurt you," Griffen's sultry voice is soft and cajoling.
Griffen then focuses his attention on Kage. He was speaking to him in some beautiful foreign language.
Kage appears sheepish, then looks at me. "Sorry, beautiful. I lost my temper. I'm mad at Avery's decision."
He turns back to cooking the food. When he turns back around, in hand is a plate of a giant delicious-smelling omelet. Booker set condiments down in front of me.
"Eat Rory. The other's food will be done shortly. Sorry for spooking you." Kage gives me a flirtatious smile that I return before digging in.
That wasn't the worst reaction I've had to something triggering my past trauma. Kage didn't scare me that bad. I can look at it objectively as I eat.
Kage reacted to Avery's being with a woman.
Is there some unrequited love happening between those two? Maybe some unexpressed feelings or gestures that have been missed?
Or maybe there is some miscommunication between them or none?
What is their relationship?
I'm going to be watching them closely.
After we all sit down to eat, Griffen and Finley gather plates to wash. "Would you like to tell us why the spoon snapping caused you to jump? I know the look you had on your face well. We all have PTSD." So, Griffen misses nothing.
I catch Finley's gaze. He knows about the years of abuse at my ex-husband's hands. It came up in one of our early morning discussions. When he accidentally triggered me way worse than the snapping spoon did. It wasn't easy sharing my space with a man again at first. There was a lot of mistrust in the male gender that I had to reconcile and work through.
"I was abused by my ex-husband. Not just verbal and mental, but physical as well. It's not something I like to dwell on, but I have trauma from it. I can't control my actions sometimes when I relive the past."
They all nod as if they deal with it together all the time.
"Griff nearly killed me with a garrote around my neck made from my guitar string when a car backfired while we were training," Finley says.
I frown because I never knew that about him. Finley rereads my mind.
"Booker was teaching me to play before training, so I just set it down. I'm horrible, by the way. So when Griff destroyed my guitar, I gave up." He doesn't hold Griffen in contempt for trying to kill him.
"I've almost killed Avery multiple times in my sleep, reliving the past. He tried to kill me too," Kage says.
They sleep in the same bed. There is something more than friendship between those two.
"I've almost killed everyone here at least once," Ajax shrugs nonchalantly. "I'll kill you if you leave or betray us."
Was that a joke? I can not tell if he is serious or not.
"Water dripping," Booker utters, which has every single guy around me shuddering slightly.
"We all have scars from Booker being triggered. Por el sol, we could have ended up dead at his hands," Finely comments, throwing up his hands in exasperation.
I look at the boyish Booker and just cannot see that. Booker shrugs, saying words under his breath that sound vaguely like French.
I guess I'll find out living with them. I'll probably trigger and go into hiding if any of them are.
"I wish I could speak all these other languages like these guys do. Being the tech guy sucks sometimes," Ajax grouses.
"We removed you from the field for a reason, Ajax. You're too valuable to lose," Griffen says, pointing his fork at the man.
Ajax rolls his eyes at him. "Yeah, well, being cooped up isn't a picnic when you're used to fighting. I'm the one who taught Booker everything I know about knives and swords. You just taught them all how to shoot. I know what weapons you prefer, Demon Commander," Ajax teases Griffen, which doesn't seem that smart to me as cold as the man is.
"You're right. You were valuable in the field. You're even more valuable now behind a computer," Griffen reminds him. I wonder what was going on with Ajax that Griffen had to sideline him.
"I'm going back to bed," Ajax rasps, starting back toward the hall.
"I'm taking you to your appointment in four hours," Griffen reminds him, but his words make Ajax pause.
"No. Fin can take me," Ajax replies.
Griffen doesn't argue with the man. he just nods to him. He walks out the backdoor towards the pool.
Fin sighs. "Griff is such a worrywart. Ajax won't miss the appointment even if we have to tie up Ajax to get him there. I'll be out most of the day. Will you be okay with that?"
I move so that I'm in his lap, straddling his waist. I curl my fingers in his brown hair. "So long as you top up before you go. Can't have you snacking on an innocent human again, now, can we?"
He scoffs, "That human was far from innocent. He tried to…"
I press my finger to his lips to silence him. "I know, Fin."
I looked around to find Booker and Kage had gone outside with Griffen, thankfully. This is not a conversation I want to have with human men present. Of course, since I met them with Duncan Shaw in his Inf form, they might not mind too much. Still, it's best to keep this between Finley and me.
"Let's go upstairs. We have things to do before that appointment." One of those being his teeth in my skin as he drinks my blood. Thanks to my rapid healing, no marks are ever left.