Page 32 of Dusty and Dented
“What do you want to drink?”he asked, looking down at her, his eyes twinkling.
“Are you going to make me drink whiskey again?”
“Not unless you want it.You’re not in shock this morning, but you’ve been through a lot.No one will say anything if you want a drink or two, even with breakfast.Besides, you wouldn’t be the first.”
She stared at him for a moment, mentally debating.“Do you have Hooligan’s Irish Red?”
Dagger frowned.“I don’t know.I think so.”
“If you have that, I’ll take that.If not, I’ll take a diet Pepsi.”
“I’ll be right back,” he said, then turned and walked away.She slid into a chair and pulled the plate with the roast and potatoes on it closer, then made sure she set a couple of napkins and one set of flatware next to his plate.She was staring down at her plate, wondering if it was rude to start eating before he got back, when the thump of a glass on the table caught her attention.Dagger was back.He’d set two bottles on the table and was even now sliding into the seat beside her.
“Waiting for something?”he asked, glancing down at her plate.
Not wanting to tell him what she’d been thinking, she shook her head and began to eat.
They ate in companionable silence for several minutes.People walked by, a couple spoke to Dagger in passing, but no one stopped, and Andy was thankful for that.She didn’t want to have to talk about how she was doing or her brother, not right now.
She ate the last bite off her plate and pushed it away, planning to take it into the kitchen and deal with it in a few minutes, but she wasn’t ready to get up, not yet.
As if there had been some signal she’d missed, two of the men in the room stood up from where they were sitting at a table on the opposite side of the room and headed their way.She watched them but also let her gaze play over the rest of the room.They weren’t the ones moving, but they were the only ones headed straight towards her and Dagger.
She wondered for a moment if she wasn’t being paranoid.Was she imagining it?
When they each grabbed a chair and sat on the far side from where she and Dagger sat, she knew she was right.They had been coming for them.She looked over at Dagger and found him watching her, his gaze intense as if he was trying to see what she was thinking.
“What’s going on?”she glanced around, her heart seemed to race as everyone watched her for way longer than seemed normal.“What did I do?Are you throwing me out?”Her voice shook despite her attempt to keep it steady.
“No.We’re not throwing you out.I’d never do that.”Dagger wrapped an arm around her shoulders and tugged her closer to him.She tried to relax some.If they weren’t going to put her out to deal with whatever was going on by herself, then she could get through this, whatever it was.
“We just have some questions,” one man said.He’d turned his chair around backwards and straddled the back.He now had his arms folded and resting across the top of the back as he watched her.The patch on his right shoulder read Hawkeye.What was with these guys and their names?She knew better than to ask but she still wondered.
“What questions?”She met his gaze.The other guy was big and the scowl he wore was more than a little intimidating.As if reading her mind, Dagger kicked one foot out until it collided with the bigger man.She wanted to scoot away so she wasn’t in the way when the huge man retaliated.
“Knock it off, you’re scaring her,” Dagger told the man with Bear on his name patch.Bear.
That name was fitting, as he was as big as one.The big man turned his scowl on Dagger.Andy looked up at Dagger and found him watching the bigger man with an unimpressed look.
“What do you want to know?”she asked, keeping her gaze on Dagger for a moment.
“Can you think of anyone who would want to hurt you?”Hawkeye asked.
“Excuse me?”she asked as she turned to look at him.Surely, she’d heard that wrong.
“Is there anyone you know of who would want to hurt you?”he rephrased the question slightly, then added on, “anyone who might pay someone to get their hands on you?”
She looked down at the tabletop, her mind spinning.Did this mean that the guy who had taken her from her home had been after her?Actually after her and not just gotten her by accident or coincidence like she’d assumed.Not that she’d thought about it much.She hadn’t had the attention span to do much thinking about it.She would rather try to forget about it, at least for a while.
“Not that I can think of,” she looked up at Hawkeye’s face.She glanced over at Bear but focused on Hawkeye—he wasn’t as scary looking.“What makes you think this was because of me?That it was someone I know?”
Hawkeye didn’t say anything, but his gaze flicked to Dagger.
Andy turned slowly to look at Dagger herself.
“Did you find something out while I slept?”she asked.Her mind flashed on the blood splattering him when he’d come back and gotten in the shower.Glancing down, she noticed his knuckles were bruised and scraped.“What were you doing while I slept?”
“I can’t tell you exactly what I was doing, Sparky, but I can tell you that I was questioning someone and, yes, I found something out while you slept.”He closed his eyes for a moment.He took a deep breath and let it out slowly.Since he still held her against him, she was able to feel the movement in his chest.When he opened his eyes again, he wasn’t looking at her.Instead, he was scowling across the table at Hawkeye.When he let his gaze drop back to her, the hostility it had held toward the man he called his brother was gone.“Until I questioned the person I was talking to, I had assumed your kidnapping was because of us, because of the Angels.It seems I was mistaken.”
