"What the hell do you mean you got lost?" Katie had to suppress a giggle at the utter bewilderment in her father's voice. "How do you get lost going from Vancouver to Solana Beach? It's a straight shot down the coast!" He frowned. "Why are you even driving? You could have been here in two hours by shuttle."
She narrowed her eyes and countered with her own question. "What do you mean by 'here'? I thought you were going back to Arcturus."
"You're not the only one who can change plans at the drop of a hat, sweetheart."
"I didn't change any plans, Dad. You made plans for me; I just chose not to follow them." She rolled her eyes. "Anyway, to answer your question, if you'd been cooped up in a hospital for three weeks, would you want to spend even two hours packed into a flying sardine can with a bunch of strangers?"
"I suppose that's a fair point," he conceded after a moment's thought. He looked decidedly jealous as he took in the shape of the car she was perched on top of and asked, "But why the vintage road car? Why not a skycar?"
"Still too sardine-like." She shuddered slightly at the idea. "I needed to feel the sun on my face and the wind in my hair."
"You are definitely your mother's daughter," he said with a mournful smile. "I imagine she'd be seething with envy if she could see you right now."
"You mean the way you are?" Katie teased.
He chuckled. "Worse. She was as obsessed with vintage cars as Jeff is with flying."
"Damn. That is obsessed."
"Indeed."
"So you're okay with this?" Katie asked tentatively, breaking a minutes-long silence that had fallen between them. "You've been uncharacteristically calm this entire conversation."
He raised an eyebrow. "Would you rather I scolded?"
"No, definitely not. Already got plenty of that from Zaeed when he found out we were lost."
"And where is he, exactly?" Her father narrowed his eyes, as if he was trying to see directly into her mind, find out exactly what she might have done with Zaeed. "You didn't dump him on the side of the road, did you?"
She rolled her eyes. "Of course not. We stopped at a motel to ask directions and then decided to stay instead of going any further tonight. He's inside getting us a room."
"A room?"
"Yes, Dad. A room." She couldn't stop the sigh of exasperation that escaped her lips at the look on her father's face. "I've been sharing a room, and occasionally a bed, off and on with Jeff since we were little and you never batted an eye."
"Sharing a room, or a bed, with Jeff Moreau is worlds apart from sharing one with Zaeed Massani."
"Oh, bringing out full names now. He must be mad," Zaeed said as he walked up to stand beside the car and slung an arm around Katie's shoulders. "Why would it be any different, Steven? Don't you trust me?"
"If I didn't, I wouldn't have asked you to pick her up."
Katie cringed internally at her father's tone of voice, one that sounded calm and collected but usually meant he was anything but.
"So, you don't trust me?" she asked bracingly. "Are we going to have to have yet another talk about how I'm an adult and –"
"No, no, just forget I ever said anything." He pinched the bridge of his nose and appeared to be counting down from one hundred, though he didn't finish before he changed the subject entirely. "When exactly do you expect to get into Solana Beach?"
She shrugged. "Probably either late tomorrow night or early the next day."
"That long?" His response of a heavy sigh seemed dramatic even for him. "Emma's getting antsy and if I have to hear her squealing about how long it's been since she last saw you, I'm going to drown myself in the ocean."
Katie exchanged amused glances with Zaeed and then smiled sweetly at her father. "Sorry to hear that, Dad. But you'll be fine, I promise. See you whenever we get there."
"Are you two not capable of having a conversation that doesn't turn into a goddamn confrontation?" Zaeed asked as he lifted Katie off the hood of the car and walked around to get their bags from the back seat.
"No, not really." She winced as she stretched her arms over her head, her shoulders and back stiff from sitting still for so long. "Not long conversations anyway. Short ones are usually pleasant-ish, as long as they start out that way."
"I noticed you didn't tell him the real reason for the detour."
"With the way he panics when anything goes off-plan? I've had enough of his panicking over small things to last a lifetime." She sighed and leaned into Zaeed as he led the way to their room. "If I'd told him about the reporters that had been following us, he'd have had a shuttle here within the hour to 'extract' me from a 'dangerous situation.'"
"Aye, that sounds like Steven all right," Zaeed mused.
Katie's next thought was swallowed up by a wide yawn as she stumbled up to the door.
"You need sleep, kitten," he said after she fell face-first onto the bed the moment they walked into the room.
"Thank you, Dr. Obvious." She yawned to cover the little giggle that she'd let out when he'd called her kitten before she turned on her side to glare at him. "And how do you propose I do that?"
He put the bags on the couch and sat next to her on the bed. "When's the last time you had a proper night's sleep?"
"The night before my third birthday," she answered automatically, the question one she'd heard numerous times over the years. "Maybe the night before that."
"Jesus."
She shrugged as she sat up and moved so she was leaning back against the headboard. "You asked, I answered."
"Sorry I did that, now."
She laughed in spite of the gravity of the conversation. "Yeah, that's usually the response I get when I answer that question."
Zaeed raised an eyebrow. "Been asked that one a lot, have you?"
"More times than I can count, honestly."
As usual, it had been Jason who'd clued her father in on the real reason she'd gone weeks without nightmares when she was a kid. It hadn't been the numerous shrinks he'd taken her to; they'd all been scared off one by one anyway. It had been after-school gaming sessions with Jeff, and when things were really bad, late-night vid chats with Ryan.
After Jason's call, she'd been too scared to bring up the vid chats, going more than a week without talking to Ryan, until her father had finally assured her that he and Jason were both fine with them. They'd continued throughout their childhoods, with varying frequency, until just before her last summer visit between her freshman and sophomore years. The one that no amount of talking would ever erase from her mind, or her nightmares.
Overwhelmed by the sudden rush of memories, Katie slid off the bed to the floor, hugging her knees to her chest. The mattress creaked a moment later as Zaeed sat with her but said nothing, a comforting presence without making her feel crowded.
The silence stretched on for what felt like an eternity, until a shrill alarm erupted from Katie's omni-tool, making them both jump.
"What the bloody hell is that?" Zaeed asked as she scrambled to turn it off. "And why is it so goddamn loud?"
They both sighed in relief as the alarm finally stopped wailing. "Emma was playing games on my 'tool yesterday. She must have hit the volume control at some point," Katie said, using Zaeed's shoulder and the edge of the bed to hoist herself up off the floor. "It's time for my pain pills. But first, a shower, and dinner."
"Dinner sounds good," Zaeed said, his stomach rumbling as he got up as well. "In or out?"
"Definitely in." Katie scrounged through her duffel, looking for her toiletry bag. "I'm not going out anywhere 'til we leave in the morning."
"Fair enough. You have anything in particular in mind?"
She shook her head more vigorously than a response demanded, freeing her hair from the braid one of the nurses had put it in just before Katie had fled from the hospital. "I don't care; as long as it's food and it's edible, I'll eat it."
Zaeed stood by the room's front door. "And you'll be all right 'til I get back?"
"Of course!" she said, her voice more cheerful than she actually felt. She loved spending time with Zaeed, moreso than with most anyone else, especially right now, but even a short time completely alone would do her a world of good. Probably.
Either that, or he'd come back to find her huddled in the shower, bawling.
"Just go," she insisted when he stood a moment longer in the doorway, an eyebrow raised in question. "I'll be fine!"
And she was, until she stepped into the shower and realized the shower head didn't have adjustable water pressure like the one in her hospital room.
Just my luck, she thought as she tentatively stepped under the spray, all the crappy motels I've stayed in and this one actually has water pressure.
By the time Zaeed returned with the food, Katie had finally stopped bawling from the most painful shower of her life, and she'd started the equally painful process of trying to put medicated cream on her back.
"You can ask for help, y'know," he said when she growled in frustration for the umpteenth time as she struggled to reach her back while simultaneously keeping her towel from falling.
"Could, don't want to," she said, her eyes meeting his for half a second before she went back to twisting around in the mirror to stare at the worst of the acid burns. "Gonna have to do it myself at some point, so might as well start now."
"Christ, it's like your veins are filled with stubbornness instead of blood." He sighed and stopped unpacking the food, instead walking across the room to take the cream from her hand. "You're on leave for at least the next three weeks, yes?"
"Yeah, so?" She knew exactly where he was going with this, but played dumb anyway.
"And you only have to keep up this routine until you go back to the doctor. So, unless you plan to spend all that time in complete isolation, you won't have to turn into a goddamn contortionist every time you have to put this shit on."
"Oh you do have a way with words, Zaeed," she cooed mockingly as she made a show of trudging across the room to flop face first onto the bed once again, readjusting the towel so her entire back was exposed but everything else was covered. "I happen to like being a contortionist, thank you very much, but have it your way."
He chuckled but said nothing.
She felt the bed dip as he sat on the edge, and heard the small pop as he opened the tube of cream, and then nothing. She hadn't realized she'd finally fallen asleep until she woke with a start sometime later, lying exactly as she had been before, covered with a blanket over the towel.
She sat up and hugged the blanket around herself, though the room was so dark, she could have gone dancing naked across the room and no one would have seen a thing. "Zaeed?"
"And Sleeping Beauty finally awakes, all on her own, without a goddamn kiss." She couldn't quite place where his voice was coming from until she took another look around the room and saw the faint glow of a cigar about where she figured the couch was.
"You sound disappointed," she teased, feeling around the bed for her duffel, but coming up short. "Where's my clothes, Prince Charming?"
"Can't remember. I'm turning on the lights. You covered?"
She nodded.
"I don't have night vision, kitten. You're gonna have to say yes or no."
She rolled her eyes at her own stupidity. "Yes, I'm covered."
A moment later, the sconces above the bed turned on and Katie discovered her duffel was exactly where she'd left it, and only an inch or two further than she'd reached.
Zaeed stubbed out his cigar and got up to cross the room. "Don't get dressed just yet. I didn't finish with your back."
"Why not?"
He shrugged. "I stopped when I realized you were asleep."
"Well, aren't you the surprising gentleman," she murmured, hiding her face in the bedspread again to hide the sudden blush she felt rising on her cheeks. After a moment, she turned her head to glance up at him as he sat on the edge of the bed. "You could have finished, y'know. I wouldn't have minded."
He shrugged again. "Maybe not, or you might have woken up in the middle of it all, panicked, and punched me in the throat."
"Oh I see." She snorted a laugh. "Self-preservation then."
"Mm. Your left hook is legendary." The teasing quality of his voice vanished and he sounded almost somber when he continued, his hands pausing in their movement across her back. "I just didn't want you to wake up and think I was taking advantage of you or something."
She sat up and turned to face him, catching the blanket in the nick of time to cover up. "I would never think… I…" She sighed and leaned back against the headboard. "No, you're right. And thank you. A lot of men wouldn't be that considerate."
"I know."
She reached across the distance between them and squeezed his hand for a moment, both regretting it instantly as the cream squished between their fingers. "Ugh. Can three weeks be up already? This is… gross."
"Very. What the hell is this shit for anyway?"
She shrugged and carefully scooted off the bed to wash her hands in the sink. "Hell if I know. I barely listened to dosing instructions, never mind what everything's actually for."
He chuckled. "Oh, you must be a goddamn peach as a patient."
She grinned. "You know it!"
He joined her at the sink just as she'd finished. "So, if you don't know what it's for, why use it?"
"It's harmless," she said, pulling a t-shirt and a pair of shorts from her duffel. "Probably some fancy version of aloe, to keep my skin from peeling or something."
"Lovely. Well, with that mental image, let's eat."
"Finally!" Katie hurried into her clothes while Zaeed's attention was on the fridge in the corner. "What'd you get?"
He shuddered as he turned with a plate in hand. "Fried chicken."
