Avenging You

Chapter 20

Skye

I’m watching AJ again while the adults get all of the cameras situated outside. From what Parker said it sounds like she and Ryan got in an argument and didn’t finish and everyone else wasn’t able to get enough done by nightfall.

AJ is laying on the couch with Blaze sitting beside him and AJ whines loudly, “Can we go outside?”

I smirk, “You know your mom wants you down here.”

He huffs and says, “I like playing outside.”

I sigh and look towards the ladder and I say, “Stay here.”

He sits up on his knees and watches me as I leave the bunker. I see Parker only a few yards away and I call out, “Parker.”

She looks towards me and a moment later she appears in front of me. She asks, “Everything okay?”

I nod, “AJ just really wants to spend some time outside. Can I let him out and play with him out here?”

Parker has a serious expression, but closes her eyes and nods, “Yeah, that’s fine. But tell him if he sees any purple the two of you have to go back to the bunker immediately.”

I nod, “Yes ma’am.”

I turn to leave and I hear Parker say, “Hey Skye?”

I look towards her and she says, “Thank you for taking care of him and being so nice to him. He’s grown very fond of you.”

I grin, “I’ve grown fond of him. He’s like my little brother.”

She smiles, “I bet he loves that you think of him that way.”

Parker teleports away and I go back to the hatch and call out, “Come on up, AJ!”

“Yes!” He yells and I watch as he runs to the ladder and climbs out. He gets outside and takes a deep breath and says, “I’ve missed outside.”

I smile and watch as he runs around and eventually challenges me to a game of hide and go seek.

I warn him not to go too far and not to hide anywhere where his mom would get mad and he ran off the second I turned my back.

Ryan

Parker and I have been setting up cameras everywhere that we possibly can. Ava bought a lot more cameras than I think were really necessary, but Parker didn’t complain about it so maybe I’m wrong.

She is positioning the camera right now and waiting for me to tell her that it looks good on the monitor once I tell her that then she teleports back to me and then we walk roughly half a mile or so and then we do the whole thing again.

Most of the time is spent in a comfortable silence, but sometimes we actually talk to one another.

At times it’s hard to figure out what to say to one another. We’ve been in that bunker and around each other constantly for like a month now.

The more time I spend with her the more that I realize that Skye might be right. I’m feeling something for her, and I haven’t felt these kinds of feelings for anyone in forever.

Parker teleports back to me and stretches her legs and says, “Squatting in a tree like that is awful.”

I chuckle because she said the same thing last time and yet she refuses to let me go up in the tree. I follow behind her as she begins to walk. She seems to notice that something is going on with me and she asks, “You okay?”

I nod, “Yeah, yeah, just thinking.”

She stops and turns towards me and her ponytail whipped around and hit her in the face making both of us laugh softly. She shakes her head and asks, “What are you thinking about?”

“It doesn’t matter, we should keep working.”

She looks at me curiously and says, “If it didn’t matter then I wouldn’t have asked. Come on, Ryan, I’m trying- open up.”

I smile and nod, “Just… do you wonder what things would’ve been like if I came with you?”

She rolls her lips into her mouth and her eyebrows are furrowed like she’s upset with me. She grabs the next camera and teleports away from me.

I sigh knowing that I’ve somehow upset her. It’s not my intention, but it’s something I have started to think of often. I wonder if we would’ve become a real couple if I had left with her.

I know it’s not something that would’ve happened immediately, but… would it have happened?

She teleports back to me and ends up a lot closer than I think she intended. Her chocolate brown eyes meet mine as she gasps, I can’t help the pull I feel towards her and I lean in and to my surprise she doesn’t move and our lips meet so softly and then she moves away and whispers, “What the hell was that?”

“I-I’m sorry, Parker, I thought you were-”

“We can’t be together.” She says harshly and she refuses to meet my eyes. I ask, “I’m sorry, I didn’t realize that’s how you felt.”

“You’re like my brother.” Each word she says feels like she’s taking a dagger to my heart. She takes a few steps away from me as she shakes her head, “You were Ashton’s best friend.”

She huffs, “We can’t betray him like that.”

“Betray him? Parker, it’s not like you’re still in a marriage with him. It’s been five years I think he’d be okay with you moving on.”

“Not with you!” She yells back at me and I wince from her loud voice.

“Do you really think he would care, Parker? I think he would be happy just because you are! In fact, I think he would be happy that you were with someone he knew and trusted. Is that the only thing holding you back from being with me?”

Her jaw is clenched tightly, and she turns around to walk away from me. I jog a couple of steps to catch up with her and I grab her arm and pull her towards me. She looks at me as if she hates me and the thought of that kills me.

I say, “Give me an answer.”

“No.” She hisses back, and I ask, “No what? No, you won’t give me an answer? No, that’s not the only reason? No, what?!”

She runs her fingers through her hair in frustration and yells, “I don’t know!”

I rush up to her and grab her face and move my face close to hers so that we’re just one small movement away from kissing. We are both breathing heavily, and I can feel her breath on me as her eyes flicker up and down between my eyes and my lips. I never move my eyes off of her eyes and I say softly, “Tell me you don’t feel this. If you tell me that I’ll back off and we can forget this ever happened and I will only ever view you like a sister for the rest of my life.”

I can see the longing in her eyes, but she won’t speak. I’m desperate to search her head for answers, but I respect her privacy too much to invade her mind like that.

She pulls away from me and I drop my arms down to my sides. She runs towards the bunker and I follow after her and grab her arm again and pull her towards me as I say, “Answer me!”

“Leave me alone!”

Everyone is watching us now and she yanks her arm out of my grip and she opens the hatch and goes down into the bunker and I follow after her. Parker rushes into her room and slams the door shut. I stand outside the door and huff knowing that I need to let her go for now.