Page 99 of Hounded: Ashes to Ashes

Abigail raised her hand timidly, and Sully gave her a thumbs up.

“Got you, girl. Be right back.”

She headed toward the front desk while Loren’s name came up next on the roster.

I hopped up so he could retrieve the glittery blue ball waiting in the return, then I settled into his empty seat.

It made me snicker to see my typically graceful partner tiptoe across the waxed floor as if he expected the shoes to slide out from under him like skates on ice. I waited until he’d taken his position at the end of our lane to let out a whoop and whistle.

“Knock ‘em dead, hot stuff!”

I could practically see his hackles rise, and I snorted another laugh.

Loren rolled his shoulders, then sent the bowling ball spinning down the lane. Awkward as he’d been walking up there and as carefully as he stood now, he had a nice form. Or maybe just a nice body with legs and arms that felt better than nice when they wrapped around me…

“You’re good for him.” Whitney’s statement brought my thoughts to a skidding stop.

I glanced over to find him holding Sully’s drink and peering into it. Probably trying to decide if the stuff was potable.

“You mind telling him that when he gets back?” I jerked my thumb toward where Loren was waiting by the ball return. “Maybe I’ll be in less trouble for catcalling him.”

Whitney raised his shoulder. “I don’t think he minds it all that much. Seems he’s more a bother to himself than anything. In contrast, you’re probably quite tolerable.”

“Tolerable.” My nose crinkled. “That’s… a compliment I think?”

“It is.”

Loren took his ball from the return and padded slowly to the end of the lane. He was getting his feet set when Dottie jumped up and darted to his side. I couldn’t make out their conversation, but the way she flicked her hands at him and bumped the side of her shoe into his, forcibly moving him into a different stance, it seemed the bowling queen had tips to share.

Loren hugged his ball almost defensively as Dottie adjusted his pose. While she fussed, he glanced back at me, looking exasperated. I giggled.

With a parting pat on the back, Dottie returned to her seat, and I consulted Whitney again.

“Well, thanks,” I told him. “Sully seems to findyoutolerable.” I wrapped my lips around my straw and blew fresh bubbles into my beer while Whitney smiled.

“She’s a good woman.”

Another laugh escaped me in a hiccup. “You are effusive tonight,” I teased through a grin. “What’s the occasion?”

Whitney rested Sully’s drink on his knee as he hunched forward. His gaze cut aside, green eyes intense in the shadow of his brow. “Indy, I need to tell you something. I feel like… I want to apologize.”

“What for?”

He sniffed a breath, growing even more serious as he replied, “When I was alive, when I was a soldier, there was a man in my platoon who was… like you. And Loren.”

Loren and I were more different than alike, but I caught his meaning.

“You mean gay?”

Whitney dropped his gaze. “It was an… aberrant behavior. At least, I thought it was at the time. I reported him for it.”

The sound of bowling pins scattering tempted me to look away, but Whitney’s face was so riddled with remorse that it held my focus.

“What happened to him?” I asked.

Knowing more of my own history had also informed me of the ways of the world throughout time. I was aware enough of the social climate during the Revolutionary War, Whitney’s era, to guess the answer to my question before Whitney gave it.

“He was court-martialed,” he replied. “Convicted.”

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