The exchange, pleasant and calming as it was, made her notice there was another feeling bubbling under the surface. This one was even more complicated and confusing than the initial emotions that had nearly incapacitated her just a few moments before. It wasn’t as demanding, and it wasn’t until the curious mixture of fear and relief subsided that she noticed it at all.
A part of her didn’t want to leave because leaving meant not being with Hammer.
That was an absurd thought, and she tried to banish it from her mind. Charlie certainly had no intentions of not going home. That wasn’t even on the table.
Charlie was an academic, for Christ’s sake. A student. A scholar. She read books and studied, and though she didn’t mind getting dirty, she wasn’t a fighter. All she had been doing since th
