Page 84 of Rarely Pure and Never Simple
"Bounty chaser."
Blaze couldn't help himself, he drew Shudder back into his arms for one more hard hug. "It was good to see you again, Shuds."
"I'll miss you, Bailey." Shudder clung for a moment, adding softly, "And him."
Strange, to be the one walking away and, once in the larger skimmer piloted by the young person charged with taking Blaze to the nearest town, flying away. Blaze stayed half-turned in his seat, forcing himself to watch Shudder grow smaller until his last recognizable feature was his wind-tugged halo of curls.
Over him years ago, he'd told Damien, and he'd even told himself it was true.Guess I'm just not the getting-over-people kind. Which is just great, since I've started a damn collection, apparently.
Once they cleared the cliff entrance to the redoubt, the sunrise greeted them wreathed in red-and-gold glory. Maybe one another day it would have been uplifting—warmth, light, and the promise of a new day—but Blaze was already tired as he ran through the logistics of getting home to his empty apartment. To him, this dawn only conjured blood and fire. Endings, not beginnings.
Gonna be a long trip home.
Keys tossedin the basket in the front hall, Blaze muffled a groan as he bent to take off his boots. He felt older than he should and so tired these days. The apartment greeted him with its same utilitarian, empty silence. A place to sleep and to keep a few things, that's all it was.
He collapsed on the worn, lumpy sofa with a thump and leaned back to close his eyes. Three months. Three gray, endless months since he'd been home, and he still couldn't shake the heavy feeling of just plodding from day to day.
His most recent job had been almost insultingly easy. Tracking down payment-delinquent parents never seemed to pose a challenge, and this dirt bag had left a trail of gambling and grift a mile wide behind him. But it was usually the court system doing the hiring, so they were good bread-and-butter jobs in between more challenging work.
There just hadn't been any interesting cases since he'd gotten home, as if the world conspired to make certain he had way too much time to think.
Three months before, his journey back to Raleigh had been uneventful until Guild agents had intercepted him at the airport and hustled him into a stick-up-its-ass official vehicle, all bright and shiny to make him feel extra filthy. It had taken nearly the entire ride from the airport to the Guild Tower before he'd been able to confirm that he wasn't under arrest. Dr. Parma wanted to see him.
Which couldn't have been any more freaking perfect, since he wanted to see her, too. He didn't say it, but he'd been relieved that she'd met with him in her office in private, her sitting beside her desk, him with the big wingchair from the window pulled up closer.
"I did receive your report, Blaze. Thank you for your diligence." She tapped her screen where the first page of it was displayed. "But I want to hear from you what happened out there."
Blaze cleared his throat, gathering his thoughts in order for a verbal report. "We started at the Western Academy—"
"No, I'm sorry. I don't mean a recitation of events. Your report is thorough. As far as it goes." She held a hand up when Blaze would've protested. "I know there is information of a… confidential nature that you won't give me. Damien has given me the shape of where those things lie in the order of events by his omissions. I'm more concerned with what happened with Damien."
With Damien… Blaze stared down at his clasped hands. That was the whole problem, wasn't it? What the hell had happened with Damien? "I don't…" He lifted his head. "Did he get back here all right?"
"He did. He made his report. We talked."
Blaze swallowed against a suddenly dry throat. "But he's not still here, is he?"
"No, dear." Dr. Parma answered gently. "He's gone."
"He's okay, right? Just went home and stuff?"
Dr. Parma heaved a little breath that could have been a sigh. "He's doing as well as Damien can after emotional upheaval. And yes, he went home."
"Okay… okay." Blaze unclenched his hands with some effort, nodding to himself. Damien was home. Safe. That was the important thing. "He was comfortable around me, like you said he might be. And the more time we spent together, the more, ah, comfortable he got. We both got."
"How comfortable did this end up being?"
Blaze ran a hand over the back of his neck, suddenly not at all comfortable under her sharp gaze. Talking about sex didn't embarrass him. Usually. But she was essentially Damien'smom. "Really,reallycomfortable. Sharing-a-sleeping-bag comfortable."
"I see."
"Doc, I don'tlikepeople," he blurted out in a desperate rush. "Most people annoy the crap out of me. But not Damien. I dunno. Maybe the buffer thing works both ways."
"There's something to be said for compatible variance." She patted his hand. "But I think your connection to Damien is aside from that or in addition to it. It's not quite the same as it is for him."
Blaze nodded. He knew that firsthand, but everything inside his brain was a mess. "The… elemental variant thing. It worked for Damien with another elemental who was with us, too."
"Officially, I have no idea who you mean. Off the record, I know Shudder was with you. No need to talk around him. Did Shudder make it home safely, too?"
