Page 10 of Gypsy Angel

“You call me ma’am again and as Diesel’s wedding present, I’ll castrate you. Clear?” Captain Irby said before walking away, causing the women of Alpha Squad to chuckle.

“If it makes you feel better, she’s said the same thing to Highlander and Marcus as well.” Diesel murmured when Viper looked back at her.

“I’ll take that under advisement. To answer your earlier question, yes Cheryl. I’m one hundred percent positive about it. I wouldn’t have volunteered tribute if I wasn’t.” Viper softly told Diesel as he smoothed the frown from her lips.

Diesel couldn’t respond verbally so she just nodded, smiling weakly at Viper who just winked at her, seemingly to understand she was overwhelmed at the moment. She didn’t resist when Viper pulled her towards him, wrapping his arms around her as he just held her, giving her his warmth and comfort.

After several minutes, she leaned back and looked over shoulder to see Jacko had walked up. “I think Jacko needs his boss for a bit. Go. I’ll be ok. I’m surrounded at the moment.”

“I’ll be right back.”

Diesel watched as Viper got up and walked over to Jacko. She smiled when Pratt pulled her forward before sitting behind her, her back against the wall before pulling Diesel to lean back against her and wrapping her arms around her in a cocoon. Raso and York joined them, each sitting on either side of them and leaning their heads on Diesel’s shoulders. She lost count how many times they’d done this with her through the years as she grieved.

“Hey Diez!” Joker said softly, walking up to the group. “Can I talk to you for a minute?”

“Joker, you’ve said your peace. Let me ask you a few questions and I’m asking them in front of them because they know all about our times together. I have no secrets from them…well, anymore secrets.” Diesel said, the weariness obvious in her voice.

Joker hesitated for several seconds, looking between Pratt, Raso and York with slight irritation but nodded for Diesel to continue.

“Why have you never called me by my first name?” Diesel asked, watching his reaction to that question.

“What kind of question is that? Everyone calls you Diesel. We all go by our call signs…”

“No. Laura has called her husband by his name. She goes back and forth between the two. Lindsey rarely calls Marcus by his call sign, only when she’s going to crack a joke. Yeah, they all call me Diesel or Diez, but you’ve always made a face the times they have called me Cheryl. When we’ve been intimately involved, granted it was just fucking, you never once said my name, cuddled with me. You couldn’t even call me to tell me that you had a girlfriend. You sent me a text saying ‘Hey ditz, just to let you know I’ll be unable to hang out for a while. I met someone’. That’s it.”

Joker’s face scrunched up as he listened to what Diesel had to say about their friendship. “I get it, I messed up. I should have called you. But damn it, what does that biker guy know about you?”

When she felt Raso and Pratt getting ready to respond, she held a hand up to ward them off. “First, we’ve talked a bit. Yeah, we’ve bickered and annoyed the hell out of each other, but we’ve talked. He doesn’t talk shit about the fact I ride a Harley or scold me for showing up on it like you. He talks to me. He doesn’t talk down to me and he doesn’t scold me. Dean also calls me by my first name almost as much as he does my last name. He’s willing to let me continue to be me, while I have the bodyguards that I know he’s going to place on me and my team. “

Diesel reached out for Joker’s hand, who just looked down at their hands, not moving closer to her or doing anything else. “Sammy, we both knew our fuck buddy plan had a time frame. We just didn’t know when. Hell, we hadn’t even fucked in the last two months. And that was before you met the chick that you’re with now. You’ve been home and I’ve been home. It ran its course. I’ll always be your friend. I hope you’ll be the same, no matter what.”

Diesel watched Joker just stood there and stared at their hands. Without saying anything, Joker strode away, past his team leader and out of the house. Broken, exhausted and utterly wiped, Diesel turned into Pratt’s arms and cried. Her team, all of seven of them, huddled in the corner of the living room, held her, letting her cry.

NINE

Viper followed Joker out of the house, knowing that Jacko, Highlander and Marcus were hot on his tail. “That was a dick move back there. I get it, you don’t like me for whatever your reasons are, but you hurt her, and I’m not ok with that.”

“Fuck and you! You’ve won! She’s hitching herself to you…” Joker yelled out at Viper, throwing his hands in the air.

“I didn’t know we were in competition. If you stopped and think for one fucking second, you’d see the logic. Do you honestly think that your commanding officer is just going to stand your team down for an unknown amount of time while they figure out what the next move is or where this guy and her daughter are? Joker, I haven’t been out of the military that fucking long, and while Afghanistan isn’t a happening spot anymore, even I fucking know they aren’t going to stand your team down. This is about her safety, not who won rights to fuck her until she says next!” Viper commented venomously, angry at Joker’s words.

“Yeah, and how about the fact that you know my fucking dick has been in her, you still going to let us be friends?” Joker screamed back at him, getting in Viper’s face.

“Dude, I don’t tell Cheryl who to be friends with. If and that’s a huge if, we did get serious, I would trust her. You are her friend, always had been. You just had the added benefits. Do I like knowing you had her before me? No, and that’s me being honest and the cave man in me. Truth is, I don’t like knowing any man has had their dick in her before me.”

“You don’t even love her!” Joker fired back, daring Viper to deny it.

“I don’t want to control her, Joker. I want to keep her alive!”

Viper watched as Joker stormed away before stopping by his truck door. He punched his door before storming back towards Viper who just stood there. “You let anything happen to her…”

“You’ll get first fucking swing!” Viper vowed, never backing down from Joker, staring him in the eyes.

Both men stared each other down for several seconds, before Highlander and Marcus stepped on either side of him. “Enough, Samuel. Go home. Ye girlfriend has been blowing ye phone up all night.”

“Sammy, ye know the twat ye are banging is cheating on ye. Why didn’t ye offer to break up with her when the lasses were talking about someone tying themselves to Diesel?” Highlander asked, standing in front of Joker staring him in the eyes. When Joker didn’t respond, just stared at his Lt. for several seconds. “That’s what I thought. Ye damn da has ye so fucked up in the head, even just putting it on paper to save someone’s life ye couldn’t do it. She’s not mad at ye if that’s what ye are thinking. She will always be there for ye as a friend. Don’t ruin that too with ye anger at the situation. Viper is right, we can’t stand down right now. This is the best option. He only cares about her safety!”

Viper watched as Joker just continued to stare at his team leader. Without saying a word, Joker just walked away, got into his truck and drove off. Viper sighed deeply, one hand on his hip and the other scratching his head.

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