Adrian's Eagles: Book Four (Life After War) (39 page)

 
“I’m sorry. So much, I can’t even say.”

Angela tried to smile, closing her eyes as John started on the fifth neat stitch. “You were my shadow?”

Marc’s anger was fading into heavy guilt. “Never saw him.”

Angela didn’t react to the needle now sewing part of her shoulder back together, grateful she had a high tolerance for pain. If Kenny hadn’t helped her build it up, Marc would be in torment right now at her misery. She hurt!

“He used the fog, knew there was no way we could see him on the ground.”

“Adrian will have someone up high on the camp from now on.”

“Yeah.” Angela felt the needle strike the bone as John tried to get it all back in place and her stomach twisted at the bright red flash. She needed to get these comforting sessions over with so she could have a personal moment.

“Will you send in the boy? He’s worried long enough.”

With a last miserable glance, Marc ducked out of the tent, not responding to any of the questions from the dozen or so men waiting. He gestured at Charlie. “Keep your mom company while I help the Eagles.”

Charlie moved into the tent gratefully and slid into the chair by her leg after only a fast glance at the bloody wound.

“You’re okay?”

Angela grinned. “I’m all doped up. Better than okay.” She hoped the doctor wouldn’t give her away and felt his understanding. The boy was already feeling like his father, thinking he shouldn’t have left her to go get Adrian.

“
Gonna
have a great scar to show off,” she boasted confidently, fingernails digging into her palms when the sharp needle sunk into her flesh for the ninth time. “Could use a different shirt, I guess. And for someone to tell the next group of mourners I’ll be ready in about five minutes.”

Grinning and eager to help, the boy was gone in a flash and Angela let out a sigh of relief, sucking in the cool air that had rushed through.

Charlie stepped from the medical tent to find Kyle and his Eagles standing nearby, waiting. “She’s ready for the next group in five. I guess that’s you.”

 
The easy tone had them relaxing a bit, but the tension returned when they trooped inside to see her grimace as John helped her remove the ripped shirt.
 
All of the men spun around while the doctor helped her put on a clean white tank top from his personal drawer.

“It’s okay now.” John swept her wild, tacky hair into a bun and then began to wipe the drying blood from her pale skin as Kyle’s team gathered around.

“You
gonna
be okay?” Angela nodded and had to control her reaction again as the tent spun. “Left arm’s hit, I’m all good here.”

Men smiled and made jokes back that were right, but their eyes said they were deeply upset and needed some way to feel better about how it had all played out.

Giving her a break, John moved back and watched in fascination as her breathing slowed and the static electricity in the tent tripled. When her eyes opened, he flinched back at the red orbs.

“There are survivors, fuel tankers, and a working radio station in Omaha… medical supplies back in Cottonwood… survivors in Martin…”

The list went on for a long minute while John wondered if even Adrian knew what all she might be capable of. John’s own thoughts were often consumed by his illness (confirmed stomach Cancer that would kill him in the next months) and for that second, there was hope for him also. There were stories flying around camp that she was different. They were clearly true.

When the Eagles left, each promising to return later, Angela gave John a sigh. “Finish it up now?”

Seeing how much misery she was in had him nodding. After he was done stitching her up, he would find a way to slip something into her system for the pain.

After Kyle’s team, there was still a line of people waiting to be reassured. When she trembled under his fingers, John moved to the flap. He hadn’t liked helping mar that pretty skin with stitches. “Come back after lunch!”

He snapped the flap shut with angry movements. ”I’m going to the Mess. You need anything?”

Angela smiled, feeling the clammy bumps and chills of nausea. “That depends on how long I’m in for, sheriff,” she joked.

The doctor’s face melted. “I’d not chain you either. Give your system time to heal, that’s all.”

“Thank you. For everything.” As soon as he left her alone, Angela reached for the basin.

The camp wasn’t doing well either. No one knew of Angela’s past with the brothers and now that there had been a few hours to consider what the attack meant, there was unrest. Were they all so unsafe that anyone might sneak in and slit their throats? It was a feeling more than a few people wore.

Adrian hated it, worried about losing them, but he also understood they had to wake up before they could become stronger. Would this be enough to get some more of them into his army, where they belonged? Only time would tell. For right now, something had to settle everyone down and make them feel safe again.

3

Under the influence of the painkillers John had forced on her, Angela could hear the silent chaos of Safe Haven. It buzzed unpleasantly around Kenn’s newly inflated laughter and the Eagles’ disbelieving shock.

The camp was Adrian’s chore (and she would help there anyway), but Kenn was her chain. When she regained her strength, she would handle it one final time and be done with the new games he was now hesitantly planning. They didn’t have time for this. When the brother didn’t report back, wouldn’t the Slavers come in force and wipe them out? They’d had a tank last time. What would they ambush these sheep with now? Poison came to mind and the doctor inside flinched. In these conditions, there would be nothing she or John could do.

During her hours of extra stitches, pain, and rest, Angela’s mind went over everything that had happened. As she drifted, she hesitantly found that room inside her heart that was hidden deep behind doors covered with webs. She’d only been to this place a few times in her life and she opened the gates with a reminder not to get lost in the past.

Inside the miserable crypt were half a dozen small boxes. Her eyes went over each only fleetingly; her childhood, Marc’s betrayal, losing her infant. This was where she placed all those things that were so horrific she had to get away from them or be consumed by the grief.

Angela took an empty container from the endless stack on the shelf, mentally cringing at so many waiting to be filled. She pulled the day’s horrors together; Charlie’s screams, Dean’s evil touch, the pretending to be fine when she needed to cry… and shoved them deep inside. A fast flip had the lid sealed and she slid it next to the box marked
Aftermath
. There were seven crippling horrors in here now. How many boxes would she fill as an Eagle?

“Too many to ever go back,”
the Witch warned.

Angela responded furiously. “Good. I’d stack them ten feet high to help these people,
my people
, survive!”

Snapping awake, Angela carefully stood up and moved to the flap. She could feel the unrest growing, and she was shocked to see so many of the camp members gathered outside the tent to wait for word. She’d found a home with all of these shattered, hopeful refugees and they would stand together. She would help Adrian see to it with all she had, and that included her life. They were hers!

In that moment, she understood how to ease them and she didn’t hesitate to share her story this time. Walking with careful steps and a wolf at her heels, Angela let them see the personal hatred the brothers had held, and smothered the Witch when she told them that she finally felt safe now.

A short time later, the explanation was spreading across Safe Haven, leaving calming notes and allowing that golden light to once again drown out the crimson.

4

“I can’t make it. Again.”

Sam looked up from the cup of coffee she’d lifted from the Mess, hands still dusty brown from working in the garden all day. “More quake trouble?”

Neil shook his head, trying not to peer down the front of her gaping sweater. “I have to make a run. I’ll be back tonight, but it’ll be too late.”

“Checking for more problems?”

“Yeah. Me and Brady are
gonna
go have a look-see.”

Very glad Angie was okay, Sam shrugged, smiling. “We’ll do it another time. Be careful.”

“Thanks.” For an instant, the Trooper thought about asking her if she wanted to come along and turned away instead. What was wrong with him?

“Will you tell him there might be a… storm? A lot of… dirty rain.”

“Yes.”

Neil didn’t ask any of the questions he wanted to as he headed for the parking area. He had already suspected Sam was special from the way Adrian had her hidden whenever she weather-watched and he wondered curiously about her gifts. How much like Angie was she?

Adrian was silently screaming at the men who had been on duty and they felt every word he didn’t speak. Someone had gotten through the wire. They had failed.

The Leader stared at his men for a long time, choosing, reordering, and yet his mind said she wouldn’t like it, to go easy on them. If Brady hadn’t noticed Dean during the chaos, how could he expect these months-long fighters to? With nothing to say, Adrian didn’t offer comfort or threats. Instead, he didn’t talk to them at all. He went to the medical tent while the camp was settling for evening Mess, hoping she would be alone.

Adrian paused outside the flap, listening. Was she really okay?

“
Come in and see for yourself,”
the Witch invited, always quick to make him welcome.

He ducked inside to see Angela reclined in a chair, smoking a joint. Her eyes were closed, dark lashes on pale skin and she didn’t open them.

“I’m better now. Going to either make him pay or thank him later,” she muttered, exhaling. “John slipped a few happy drops into the last of my water bottle. He knew I’d guzzle it and notice the taste too late.” He had done it while she was distracted by her son’s last quick visit and Angela wasn’t sure if she was glad or mad.

“Good.” Adrian moved closer to the red and white bandage covering her shoulder. “How bad is it?”

She was covered in a heated blanket and he had no idea how John was managing to do that, but didn’t get snagged on it as she shrugged

Angela winced at another dizzying lance of pain. “It’s fine til I do that.”

Adrian grinned tightly, playing along, “Then don’t do that.”

Angela still didn’t open her eyes. She had heard about Brady leaving camp on a recon and wasn’t surprised to feel relieved. He would be distracted by Neil and she would have a little time to finish sorting things out. Like Adrian had known when he’d sent Marc with the Trooper, she realized. “Anyone ever tell these people that they are very lucky you chose them?”

“It doesn’t feel that way, watching the blood run down your arm.”

She sighed tiredly. “Yeah, that top one won’t stay closed. John will do it again when he gets back.”

Adrian scowled this time and Angela’s tone grew hard. “It could have been worse.”

His voice was pointed. “Almost was, right? You could have been stabbed and shot.”

That sent her startled gaze to his. “How do you know? I blocked that from you.”

His frown expanded. “It’s common sense. With you gone, Kenn might have been able to earn true forgiveness.”

She raised a brow. “Saving my life hasn’t?”

“No. I’m grateful and I’ll show it, but nothing can ever be the way it was.”

Angela was glad Adrian knew the truth. An honestly good man, Kenn may never be. That didn’t mean they could do without him.

“What comes next?”

“We get ready for the main group to find us again.”

There was silence again as they both considered that final battle and then he broke it, unable to keep from asking. “Where were you headed when you left the hayroom?”

Angela’s thoughts were unprotected and he shared the memory with her.

She had woken while Charlie dressed, listening to his worried thoughts. The Slavers were here! Was she ready? No, but it would have to be enough.

As soon as Charlie was gone, she prepared herself as best she could for battle. If the evil group was nearby, she would slip out and surrender, give Adrian time to run again.

“He won’t,” the Witch warned. “He’ll fight for you and lose every man.”

“Not if I can get to Cesar, bluff him down with an offer of giving him my power.”

The Witch didn’t answer and that was good enough for her. She had to get out of here before all these lives were lost on account of her curse.

Angela turned around to say she’d planned to kill Cesar during the power-transfer, and found herself alone in the tent. What would he do now?

5

Worried, and determined to not let the injury interfere, Angela was on duty near the back of the vet area just before dawn. Set up on a corner post, where three rotating patrols crossed, the small dirt bike they’d insisted on placing under a nearby tree made a decent seat when her shoulder began throbbing.