Page 184 of Entering Stronghold

“No, I wanted to talk tomorrow. I mean today. I mean, yesterday I wanted to talk tomorrow!” Maria glared at him.

“Yes, you did,” he said in a placating tone. “We should have talked this morning. I’m sorry we didn’t.” Well, now he was sorry. If he had to do it over again, maybe he would have made a different decision, but maybe not. After all, she really hadn’t given him much to go on last night, despite their talk about communication. Which was something he’d explain to her when she was sober.

“Oh...” Seemingly struck by his apology, Maria deflated, leeched of the anger that had puffed her up. Lexie gave him a thumbs up from behind Maria’s back.

Although Rick would have liked to see what Maria said next, he was also incredibly relieved when his doorbell rang. All three women twisted around, trying to look toward the noise with a look of surprise on their faces.

“Who’s that?”

“Back-up,” Rick replied dryly, already halfway to the door.

Both parties, as it turned out.

“Uh oh...” Angel said it in a sing-song way, but she was definitely looking a bit like a trapped kitten when Adam caught her eye from across the room. She smiled hopefully and then tried to hide under Maria’s hair when Adam didn’t smile back.

“Well shit.” Lexie glared at Patrick, who glared right back. Truthfully, Rick hadn’t been entirely sure who to contact for her, but he figured Patrick was better than her parents.

Patrick crossed his arms over his chest at almost the exact same time as Adam. For a moment, Rick almost felt sorry for the little troublemakers. Almost.

“What are you doing here?”

“I thought we talked about not interfering in our friends’ relationships,” Adam said, right on top of Patrick’s question.

All three men winced as the room erupted with sound, Lexie, Angel, and Maria all trying to explain at once. At the top of their lungs. Rick slammed the door shut behind him. He’d done it to keep the noise out of the hall, but it had the added benefit of making the women jump in surprise and shut up.

“Come on, Angel,” Adam said, sighing as he let his arms drop, his hard expression already softening. Sometimes Rick couldn’t believe how much Angel had changed his friend. Mostly in good ways, although Adam was turning into a big softie when it came to her. “Let’s go home and we’ll talk about this tomorrow.”

Making a face, Angel pushed herself up and stumbled, nearly falling on the floor before Adam darted forward to catch her. “Okay pest—“

“Don’t call me that!”

“Time to go.” He swung her up into his arms and turned, heading for the door. Which Rick obligingly opened for him.

Patrick and Lexie were still caught up in a glaring match. Next to Lexie, Maria had shrunken in on herself as if trying to avoid Patrick’s gaze. She really didn’t need to worry about that. Rick was pretty sure Patrick was solely focused on Lexie, to the exclusion of everything else going on around him.

“Why weren’t you at work tonight?” Patrick barked out finally.

“Umm... girls’ night. Duh. Don’t worry, Olivia was there to keep an eye on me.” Lexie rolled her eyes expressively.

“Obviously not a very good one.”

“Obviously she recognizes I’ve grown up and treats me like an adult.”

“I’ll treat you like an adult when you act like one.”

Lexie flipped him off, sticking her tongue out at him at the same time. Patrick snorted.

“Yeah, that’s exactly what I mean,” he said, shaking his head as he moved forward, obviously intending to pick her up from the couch.

“I can stand on my own,” she said furiously, pushing herself up and away from Maria, who was watching the whole scene with big eyes, trying not to do anything to draw attention to herself. Rick couldn’t blame her, he was finding it pretty fascinating too.

“Barely.” But Patrick stopped just a couple feet short of her. “You’re so drunk it’s amazing you can stand at all.”

“I’m twenty-four, I can handle my liquor.”

“You’re twenty-three.”

“I—oh. Yeah, but I’m almost twenty-four, my birthday’s—“

---