Avenging You

Chapter 27

Ryan

Hearing how bad of shape I was in makes me wince with pain.

Parker compliments Skye on how well she handled herself and she did do amazing. I’m proud we’ve taught her so well because her precision was impeccable. She was able to electrocute all of them simultaneously without shocking me at all.

Slowly everyone dismisses themselves to bed, but Parker goes outside. I want to follow her, but I don’t want to be too obvious, so I stay with Skye.

It took five minutes before Skye said, “Go be with her.”

I chuckle trying to play it off and I say, “What are you-?”

She cuts me off, “Look, I don’t know what’s going on with the two of you, but I do know that you are closer than you used to be. She needs your reassurance so go reassure her that you’re fine.”

I nod, “Thanks Skye.”

She nods, and I go out of the bunker. Parker is sitting with her knees to her chest and looking up at the sky. I walk up behind her and ask, “Can I sit with you?”

She’s crying. I can tell from the sound of her voice when she chokes out the word, “Yeah.”

I sit behind her and put my legs on either side of her as I pull her against me. I kiss the side of her face and can feel that it’s wet from her tears and I say reassuringly, “I’m fine, Parker.”

She takes a sharp breath and says, “If it weren’t for Emma then you would be dead.”

“But we have Emma and I’m not dead.”

She huffs, “He’s not going to stop, Ryan. What if next time we aren’t so lucky?”

“Hey, Par, don’t think about the what ifs… that’s a bad trail to let your mind go down. All that matters is we are both fine. And we will defeat Hunter in the right timing.”

She’s quiet and I just rub her arm reassuringly hoping that I’m making her feel comforted and loved. Suddenly, she turns around and straddles me and she kisses me.

I’m taken aback by how bold she’s being. We’ve made out before, but this is different. This seems like it could lead to more and I’m not sure if she’s really ready for that, so it makes me hesitate.

She begins to tug on the hem of my shirt, and I pull away from her and say, “Parker.”

Her eyes meet mine and I shake my head no and say softly, “We can’t do this. Not right now.”

Her eyes flash hurt, and she gets off of me and stands up and says, “You don’t want me.”

I chuckle, “No, no, Parker, it’s not that.” I stand up, but she takes a couple of steps away from me and I can’t help but feel sad about her distancing herself from me.

I take a step forward and again she takes a step back. I can see the hurt in her face, and I huff, “Parker, I want you more than anything.”

She whispers, “Then why would you reject me?”

I scoff and run a hand through my hair and ask, “Is this how you would want our first time to be, Parker? Outside where anyone could open up that hatch and see us? Or even worse we could get attacked? On top of that, it’s been a high stress day and I want our first time together to be special. Not something that you chose to do just because you thought you were going to lose me.”

Her jaw is clenched tightly and she turns away from me and walks back towards the bunker and says, “Let’s go to bed.”

I sigh as she leaves me. I know I made the right decision, but with as stressful as today was it would’ve been nice to spend a little more time with her.

Parker

I lie down next to AJ.

I feel absolutely humiliated.

After almost losing Ryan I knew I was ready to take our relationship to the next level and feel closer with him. But he stopped me.

I mean, I understand why he did it, but it doesn’t stop it from hurting me any less.

AJ seems to sense my presence because he cuddles into my side. I lie here playing with his hair as I think back on the day. If it weren’t for Emma, then Ryan would be dead right now.

It hurts my heart just the thought of him no longer being in my life. A part of me wants to stop our relationship and distance myself, but the other part of me wants to soak up all the time I have with him while I still have it.

Suddenly, AJ’s face pops up in front of my eyes and he looks at me with a very serious expression and I ask, “Are you okay, baby?”

He nods as he states, “Your eyes are a dark blue.”

I look at him curiously and he says, “You’re sad. Why are you sad, mama?”

I smile softly as my fingers run through his hair and I say, “I feel overwhelmed from today. I got scared and I started to think about what ifs. It made me sad thinking about something happening to someone in our family.”

His lips are puckered in a pout while his eyebrows are arched down in frustration and I run my thumb over his face trying to get him to relax and I ask, “What is it, my love?”

“Nothing bad happened, right?”

“No, no, love, nothing too bad happened. We’re all safe.”

He nods and lies back down next to me and says with a yawn, “I love our family, mama.”

I smile, “I do too, AJ.”

“Promise me, we won’t ever leave?”

I kiss his forehead, “I promise, love, now go back to sleep.”

It takes a while for me to be able to fall asleep, but once I do, I am completely out.

Until the scenery changes and Hunter stands in front of me. I get pulled out of the dream quickly and I sit up startled and AJ looks at me and I can see the concern and fear in his face.

I have to cradle and rock him to help get us both back to sleep.