Stripper: The Fringe, Book 4 (26 page)

“Yes.” After running his fingers through her still damp hair, Duster stroked down her shoulders to her back. “You are so strong and sweet.”

“I’m thinking it’s pointless to even ask, since you seem bound and determined to spoil Scott rotten, but can we get a puppy?”

“Actually, Richards’s dog, Muffin, just had puppies. Not old enough to take home yet, but we can go take a look. I think they’re mutt dogs. Some kind of mix of shepherd and Lab, I think. We can go see.”

“Let me guess, your house—”

“Our house,” he reminded gently.

“Our house,” Diane corrected, “is already set up for a dog too?”

“Puppies and kids have a lot in common. If the house is safe for kids, I doubt there’s much damage a puppy could do.”

“Have you ever had a dog?”

“No.”

“You are in for a big surprise.” She laughed into his chest.

“Am I?”

“Absolutely. They chew on everything. You have to walk them and train them and bathe them and—”

“Sounds like another family project.”

“You’re loving this, aren’t you?” She pulled away just enough to look him in the eye. “Even Scott’s sudden hostility toward you.”

“I’m not loving that, but I understand where it’s coming from.” Duster slipped off his robe and hers and pulled her back into bed. “He’s had you to himself his whole life. And now, he has to share you with me. Right on the cusp of where he’s pulling away. It’s going to be a bit touchy.”

“And you know this because?”

“MacKay’s twin boys have been going through it the last year. They alternately want their mom all to themselves, hate their father, yet identify more and more with him. As Kraft would say, ‘It’s a complicated dance.’ And it’s normal. He’s had you all to himself, and suddenly, his dad shows up and takes you away.”

“He dreamed that you literally took me away.”

“Given the last few days, I’m not surprised. He’s coping. We all are.”

“Duster, I—”

“Tell me why you were crying before Scott came in.”

Diane offered exhaustion as an excuse, and Duster let it slide with an understanding nod. Whatever it was, they could talk about it tomorrow. He pulled her close and stroked his hand through her hair. Lulled by his gentle touch, Diane’s breathing slowed but she didn’t fall asleep. Like him, she hung on the edge of wakefulness.

Duster heard a chorus of crickets outside, clicking in a slow rhythm to the cool night air. Normally that sound put him into instant slumber, but not tonight. Not with so many changes. He thought about further puppy-proofing his home, and then wondered if Diane and Scott would be able to handle the hot, dry summer of Windmere. Spring was just now fading, and soon summer would come full blast.

Diane pressed close, and her lush body made surrender to the sandman elusive. Michael’s words, that she would betray him again, echoed in his mind. As much as he wanted to push past their prior history, that voice of niggling doubt refused to fully retreat. He kept wondering how she could possibly betray him again, then berated himself for such thoughts. Wanting to trust her wasn’t going to force his heart to change overnight. He sighed. It would take time, that was all. Time for them to relearn one another, to learn to live as a family.

“My wife.” Groaning low, Duster breathed deep of her, the cool night air, the very feel of his house full of someone other than his lonesome self. “Thank you for being here.”

“Thank Mary. Or Michael. Or yourself. I had little to do with it.” Her voice sounded sad and almost…defeated.

“You have everything to do with it.” Duster kissed the top of her head. “I’ve been waiting to have you back for so long I almost can’t believe you’re really here.” Straight from his heart, Duster told her the truth. “It’s almost like my time here has been in a holding pattern while I’ve been waiting for you and Scott. I’ve made it all ready for you.”

“It’s wonderful, truly.”

She kissed him, and he finally fell asleep with his own happy thoughts.

When his wrist com pealed off three short beeps, pause, three short beeps, Duster shut it down, slipped from bed, grabbed his robe and went into the main room of his house before he answered. “Michael?”

“Get to base,” Michael demanded. “Now.”

Normally, Michael started off with a greeting, not a bellowed command, so something must have been very wrong. And Duster thought he knew exactly what had put Michael in such a mood. “Mary?”

“Yes,” Michael confirmed. “She’s not—I don’t know what’s wrong with her.”

“You told her about the ALS?”

“I did, and she’s not—”

“Don’t bother Duster with this,” Mary cut in. “I’m fine.”

Mary sounded perfectly normal. In fact, she sounded calm and rational while Michael was the one who sounded frenzied. Rolling his eyes, peeved he’d been woken up at six in the morning for this, Duster asked, “Mary?”

“Michael’s all pissed off because I’m not hysterical.”

Switching off his wrist com when he fired up an audvid in the living room, Duster found both Mary and Michael in Michael’s office. Dawn was breaking just beyond the windows behind him, filling his living room with a rosy orange glow. It would have been peaceful if not for their drama. Duster had inserted himself into their courtship and willingly played referee, but that was then, and this was now.

Dressed in her usual royal purple, Mary seemed bright-eyed and ready to face the day. Her hair was clean and loose, her clothes freshly pressed, her boots recently brushed. God only knew what tricks she had down her boots or up her sleeves or hiding in her skull.

And then Duster assessed his boss. Yikes. Michael wore his signature black leather pants and nothing else, and they weren’t even buttoned up all the way. His face was dark with the shadow of an unshaved beard, and his hair looked like he’d been methodically brushing his fingers through it. Red-rimmed eyes completed his look of death warmed over.

“You should be hysterical,” Michael said with resentment and crossed arms.

“Yet I’m not. Duster? Stay home. I’m fine. Michael is the one who—”

“I’m begging you. Get—”

“Stop,” he hissed low and quiet into his com as he shut off the vid in the main room. “If you two are gonna make me referee, then both of you shut up and let me wake up.” Readjusting his robe, he made his way to the kitchen and turned the audvid on in there. “Mary? Since you seem a bit saner than Michael, tell me your side first.”

“ALS. Two years. Fine. It didn’t take much for me to see the writing on the wall thanks to Doctor-let’s-leave-no-stone-unturned Murphy. That gives me time to have our child, give her the best possible start in life and then fade away. It sucks, but that’s the deal. I’ve got no denial about it at all. I also bypassed the anger and bargaining phases too. Murphy said there’s like five steps to the grieving process, and Michael is all bent because I pole vaulted to acceptance. It’s called ‘suck it up and deal because life isn’t fair’.”

“And I ask you, is that normal?” Michael asked Duster.

For the life of him, Duster thought Mary would react totally differently. That she didn’t somehow didn’t really surprise him. Mary never did what anyone thought she would. Mary just behaved like…Mary.

“Bootstraps, ever heard of them?” Mary directed the question to the very air. “I could rant and rail and scream at the sky, and what would that display get me? A big load of wasted energy that could best be expended elsewhere.” Mary took a deep breath and cast Michael a look full of meaning, then turned to face the audvid. “He won’t even make love to me because he’s so afraid of hurting me. I’m not going to ask you if that’s normal ’cause I know for myself it isn’t.” Mary shook her head. “Go back to bed, Duster. I’m sorry Michael bothered you. Go back to Diane, and Scott, and—oh, yeah, you missed a trick with your pool, but I caught it.”

“What?”

“The cover goes rigid but for where you located the sensor. I angled it up a few degrees. Now the whole cover goes so tight you can’t get a fingernail in there.”

Duster couldn’t help it, he laughed. “Just last night, I told Diane if there was some kinda shortage of security around here, you’d tell me about it. After you fixed it.”

“Damn straight. Tell Michael bye-bye.” Mary lifted something off her shirt. Over the audvid, it looked like a little black dot resting on her index finger. After considering it for a moment, she thrust it close to the audvid. “Say bye-bye, Duster.”

“Mary?” Using his sing-song voice, more amused than afraid, Duster asked, “What is that?”

“A tiny EMF that can go wide.” Grinning, holding it up, Mary turned toward Michael. “If you don’t want communications planetwide to go down in a chain reaction, you tell Duster everything is fine.” Mary nodded to her hand. “Or I’ll make it not fine and give you all something legitimate to worry about.”

“Mary, please don’t,” Duster said calmly. “I’d like to spend today with my family.” Not a doubt in his mind she’d do exactly what she threatened. Duster considered what a tiny EMF that could go wide might do. Mary managed to make
Whisper
blow enough EMF to take out an entire quadrant of equipment. God only knew what she could make the tiny black dot on her fingertip do. Frankly, he didn’t want to find out.

“You’re a respectful man, Duster. I appreciate that.” Mary kept her right hand up and her left hand hitched to a belt loop of her purple pants. “I want to spend the day with my husband. Michael wants you to come here to base and talk sense into me that—what was the problem, my beloved? I’m
not
hysterical?” Rolling her eyes first at Michael, then at Duster, Mary added, “I get the ramification of this disease. Every motor-nerve in my body is going to slowly die and so am I. You don’t need to stick it up my nose. I get it. Two years left to me, give or take a few months. Moving on. I want this day with Michael. I want to not have to worry about anything. I don’t want you to worry about it either, Duster, given your situation. I vote MacKay step up to the plate. Hell in a hand basket comes, he’s got two fail-safes. Three, if you count Nash.”

Stunned and impressed by Mary, Duster offered, “MacKay is good to go, Michael. I wouldn’t mind Nash sitting fourth behind you and me.”

“You’re agreeing with her?” Bleary-eyed, Michael cast a stunned gaze at Duster over the link.

Looking at the worn, exhausted face of his boss, Duster gently said, “Take at least half a day off. Make love to your wife. Take her back to where you picnicked for the first time.”

“Where she eluded me.” Michael grinned.

“No one wants me to use this.” Mary held up the tiny dot on her finger. “Ugly all around. So. That puts me in charge.” She lifted her free hand, breathed on her nails, rubbed them briskly across her chest. “Give.”

Michael shook his exhausted head. “I give.”

“Duster?”

“I give.”

Mary fiddled with one of the op-pans. “MacKay?”

Within seconds, MacKay came on to the split-screen audvid as he brushed back his long hair from his slightly balding pate. “Yes”—casting his gaze to the split-feed, he promptly said—“sir, sir and ma’am.” Since he didn’t know who was in charge, MacKay covered the bases well. If nothing else, MacKay was ever polite and sharply aware of the fluctuating power system of Windmere.

Michael broke the moment. “Duster and Mary both sponsor you as a candidate for Master-of-Arms. Is this a position you would vie for?”

“Yes.” MacKay stood a bit straighter, as if he’d been waiting his whole life for this moment. MacKay didn’t care if he was sworn in as Master-of-Arms to Prime Bastard or Windmere. He would die to defend this ball of rock because his family, three generations deep, called this world home.

“For the next six hours, you are in charge. Should a worthy crisis erupt, you contact me, then Duster, then Nash. In that order. But you take the front.”

MacKay nodded with a solemn pride. “Yes, sir.”

“I think you are forgetting something, Michael.” Mary lifted her black-dotted finger so MacKay could inspect it. He did so with respectful interest.

“Commander.” MacKay nodded to Michael. “Sir.” MacKay nodded to Duster. “I would respectfully ask you both to define Mary’s position in the chain of command.”

Michael uttered the first genuine laugh Duster had heard from him since this started. Michael seemed to revive in an instant, and his exhaustion melted away. “Mary, Mary, quite contrary.”

“As I’ve said before, Michael, if you must resort to name-calling, I prefer Purple Lady of Corona.”

“Indeed.” Michael laughed again and turned his gaze to Duster. With a wink, he sauntered behind Mary. “I surrender.” He lifted his hand and stroked from the top of her head to the small of her back.

Mary grinned. “Smart man.” She cast stripping brown eyes to Duster and MacKay via audvid. “I willingly defer to my husband in the chain of command. Mind you that to bother him is to bother me.”

It wasn’t a classic threat, but the peril of bothering either Michael or Mary came through loud and clear.

To MacKay, Michael said, “I want you here, at base, A-sap.”

“Yes, sir.”

Michael closed the connection, then turned to the audvid com Duster watched. “You make third at this point. MacKay, me, then you.”