Page 46 of Scar

Scar tilted his head in confusion. He’d never told his story to anyone. Not even the Army knew it all, and José only knew what the Army had toldhim. Alpha probably didn’t care, only used Scar’s need for revenge to aim him like a loaded weapon at the terrorist cell.

Yet…for just a moment, a single fleeting moment, Scarwantedto tell Tally.

Not to scare her, not to horrify her. But so she wouldunderstand. So she would know a part of him that no one else in the world knew.

His eyes flew around to the different corners of the storage facility where they were standing.Hersecret. Something none of her friends, or fucking Mark, knew about her. But Scar knew. Scaradmired.

Tally swallowed audibly. “Whatever happened to you, I’m sorry.” She quickly wiped at her eyes, like she was trying to catch tears before they fell. She was…crying?Forhim?For what he’d been through, even though she didn’tknowwhat he’d been through? “Thank you,” she said suddenly, startling Scar even further. “For showing me. It’s not that youwon’ttalk to me. It’s that youcan’ttalk to me.”

Scar had no way of correcting her, so he didn’t.

Tally held her hand out to him, palm up. It took him a moment to realize what it was she was asking for. He pulled a dagger from its sheath around his abdomen, flipped it around, and placed the hilt in her outstretched hand.

Tally took the dagger but didn’t throw it right away. Instead, she held it horizontally between her hands, careful of the extremely sharp edges of the blade. “How about this? I ask you a question. If the answer is ‘yes’, you throw a dagger. If the answer is ‘no’, you don’t and I’ll throw mine. Does that work for you?”

Scar stared at her for a long moment before pulling another blade from his vest. Tally did not flinch as it whizzed by her ear to land in the target next to the other two she’d thrown earlier.

She smiled up at him. “Good. Now I’m going to go collect those three and then we’ll each start with four. Don’t throw anymore until I get back.”

It wasn’t a question but Scar still stayed his hand.

When Tally came back to stand by him, she held out her hand for her fourth blade. He gave it. They were about twelve feet from the targets, which was a little more than average for practice throwing, but Scar was good with it if Tally was.

She moved so they were shoulder to shoulder. “Okay. First question: do you prefer cats over dogs?”

Scar’s lips actually twitched as he reached for a dagger and threw it at the target directly in front of him.

“Interesting. A cat man. You’re a rare breed.” Tally danced a dagger around between the fingers of her right hand. “Next question: are you part robot?”

Scar did not reach for a dagger. After about ten seconds, Tally smiled and threw one of hers.

“You know, I’m not sure if I was hoping for a ‘yes’ or a ‘no’ on that one.” She chuckled to herself and the sound was like music to Scar’s ears. He never wanted her to stop laughing. “Okay, next question: do you sleep? Because it never seems like you do.”

That was a loaded question, but the simplified answer had him throwing a dagger at the target.

Tally pursed her lips, her expression of ponderance exaggerated. “Interesting…” She tapped the blade of a dagger against her chin. “Very interesting. All right. Here’s a good one: do you prefer coffee over tea?”

Scar stayed his hand.

“Tea over water?”

He still did not move.

“Do youonlydrink water?”

Quick as a flash, Scar did an underhand throw, the dagger landing dead center.

Tally’s head turned between the target and Scar. “We’re going to need more daggers, because I haveso manyfood questions to ask you.”

She was joking, but Scar reached inside his vest to pull out his throwing stars. He flung one across the room and he noticed the moment Tally picked up its unique frequency as it flew through the air.

Her entire face lit with excitement. “Oooh. Gimme, gimme.” She made a grabby hand with her right fingers, like a toddler getting a new toy. Scar carefully handed her one of his stars. “Wow,” she breathed out. “I changed my mind. You can take back all your daggers. I want the stars!”

And because Scar seemed helpless not to give this amazing woman everything she wanted, he took back the Merlin daggers and handed over all of his shuriken five-point stars. Once they exchanged weapons, her questions continued.

* * *

[WiseWave620: Goddamn it. I thought this would help me cope, but each message just gets harder to send. I think a part of me was really just hoping you’d show up again. Just walk into the clubhouse like nothing had happened. Anyway, I think this is going to be my last message. For a while at least. Maybe forever. I don’t know. I mean, if you were alive, you’d have let us know, right? Telling you things over a secure chat that you obviously aren’t reading isn’t going to bring you back.]

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