Page 50 of Her Paramedic
Slate had been morbidly impressed because what she was coming up with were things he didn’t think militias would do to get information out of their worst enemy. Her setting his car on fire had been the nail in her coffin, and the last any of them heard, she was serving her time in jail.
Their server came, placing their check on the table, and he didn’t miss the way Ace’s eyes dipped to the sway of her hips. Slate shook his head in amusement as he finished his beer. He got the feeling his friend would leave the restaurant with more than the to-go dessert he’d asked for.
14
“Thanks for picking me up. Axel got called into a situation at work,” Killian said as Slate pulled out of the airport pickup lane.
“It’s no problem. I planned to spend the day with Talia tomorrow since they’re celebrating Journee’s birthday tonight.”
The women were going to dinner, and Slate knew that Kaydence had informed Axel it was a girls’ night dinner and that they were going to a club afterward. Killian and Axel had both assumed they could meet them there if they wanted to, and since his cousin had flown in to surprise Journee for her birthday, even if that hadn’t been what Kaydence meant, it was now. It seemed they were both surprising their girlfriends.
Twenty minutes later, they pulled into Axel’s driveway. Killian grabbed the spare key from behind the porch light and let them in. While the newly married couple primarily stayed at Kaydence’s house until they found one they wanted to buy, Slate knew Axel still stopped at his place when he was pulling a double and needed to change, since it was closer to the station.
They didn’t have plans until later that evening, when they would go out for dinner before meeting the women at the club. Since it was a surprise, they’d hang out at Axel’s until then.
“Have you heard from Ace?” Killian asked as they sat on the couch. “I texted and invited him, but he didn’t respond.”
“His NSW is running drills this weekend,” Slate informed, and his cousin nodded in understanding. Their friend would be radio silent until it was over.
“Did you consider joining the naval reserves before you were discharged?” Killian asked. “I don’t think I’ve ever asked you.”
“Briefly, but I had no interest in Naval Special Warfare or Explosive Ordnance Disposal. I’d been shot at enough and damn near blown up enough. I still wanted some excitement, but not quite that.”
His time enlisted had been worth it; he’d served his country and wouldn’t change it. Well, he might change having to set his bone, cauterize two wounds, and still be responsible for saving two other people’s lives, but it’d worked out. Slate felt that he’d given all he could, and when his last contract ended, he’d shifted his focus. For some people, like his cousin, Jax, and Ace, to an extent, it was a lifelong career. For him, it was a part of his life that he’d lived, learned something, and walked away better because of it.
They settled on a movie to watch until Axel got off, and they needed to prepare to leave.
“No one at our table is interested,” Slate said to the two women sitting at the table beside them.
They kept leaning over now and then, batting their eyelashes, trying to hold conversations or butting into the one they would be having. Which meant they were listening far too closely because the three of them weren’t loud. They hadn’t taken the hint the first two times, which were hard to miss when they comprised Axel stating he was married and Killian throwing out a bored, “You’re interrupting.” Yet, it hadn’t bothered either of the women as they kept up their round-robin flirting.
“I’m sorry?” one woman questioned.
“You should be,” Slate countered.
“You’re rude,” the other woman replied.
He shrugged. “And you’re disrespectful and oblivious. But if you kept your focus at your table and out of our business, you would have never learned I was rude. Blame yourself.”
He returned his attention to their table, and Axel chuckled, shaking his head. “I sometimes forget how much of an asshole you can be.”
“Only when necessary,” Slate countered, and he could feel the women staring daggers at him.
He was fed up with the two women and had no intention of dealing with them butting in any longer than he had. It also ticked him off because they acted as if their actions were okay. If the roles were reversed and it was the three of them constantly hitting on the women after being dismissed, they would have felt violated and uncomfortable. The double standard was crazy.
“What time are they going to the club?” Killian asked.
“They should be on their way there,” Axel responded.
Killian flagged their server and asked for the check. Slate and Axel pulled out some cash to leave the server a tip, while Killian handed the young man his card when the bill came.
A few minutes later, they exited the restaurant. Slate and Killian slid into his car while Axel got into his. It’d made more sense since they were going to separate destinations once they ended the night.
He followed Axel to the club, and they paid to park in a lot a block away. As luck would have it, their spots were close to Kaydence’s car. They paid the cover charge, and it didn’t take them long to find half of the women as they entered. They were seated at a table to the right, away from gyrating bodies.
When they approached the table, Axel went to his wife to kiss her as everyone else greeted one another.
“Your girlfriends are on the dance floor,” Nova informed them, and Slate turned his attention to the dance floor and spotted them.
