Eight Years Ago
He fucking hated this.
As good as he'd gotten at learning how to wait he wouldn't ever like it; he was a man who wanted to make or at the very least be given a plan that he could then act upon, preferably as soon as was physically possible. But he couldn't do that here. Couldn't do it with Tess. Sometimes, when she let him or when he knew what the problem was but he didn't with this. She'd been doing so well, smiling and laughing and talking and now…
Yeah she was chatting with JoJo but he'd bet his left arm she was only doing it for his sake, and to not worry the other woman. He would give his left arm to know what Ian had said to her. Jay had been watching their conversation and it had seemed to be going well, neither of them had given any signs of aggression, or even frustration. And he may not be as trained as them but he'd been watching the man's teammates too and they also hadn't looked like anything was amiss. But whatever they'd discussed had caused Tess to go back inside herself and while he had a few ideas on how he could pull her out he didn't know if he should. Not right away anyway, it could take time but she always opened to him in the end. The way her grip on his arm kept intermittently tightening was the perfect reminder, using him to soothe herself just like he did with her.
Whatever happened they were in it together.
To whatever end.
The thought pushed back his doubt but not his concern, especially when Tess was so lost in her own he had to guide her out of the cab and into their building, the look he shared with JoJo the same as the one he shared with Greg. His roommate was relaxing on the couch watching a basketball game but he was quick to turn it off.
"So how was dinner?"
Thank God.
His friend's voice did what he hadn't been able to and he had to hold back a sigh of relief when she blinked before giving him a small, awkward but genuine smile.
"We ran into some of my coworkers. Someone from The Farm." Greg made the same face he was sure he had and her smile turned wry. "Give me a minute to change?"
Thank God.
With a quick look at his friend he followed her into their room, more of his concern easing when she took the Henley he'd been wearing for herself. Jay was certain that whatever she was about to share was going to piss him off but as he watched her change he could see that while she wasn't looking forward to it she wasn't afraid of it. And considering how little she'd taken about her time at the training facility he thought it was past time she unburden herself.
Greg was where they'd left him but the tv was off now and he'd gotten him a beer and her what he assumed was a rum and coke, waiting until they settled before he smirked at her. "So. Do we need to kick anyone's ass?"
"You would too." Tess mumbled but her smile grew when he scoffed.
"Damn right I would."
He would.
And so would he.
"I didn't know two of them but they were fine. Nicer than most are to me." She started with a small shake of her head but he caught her soft intake of breath. "And Ian…"
"What did he say?"
"He apologized. He didn't have to."
Jay didn't agree with that, she was owed a lot of apologies but he let his own frustration go to focus on hers.
"He wasn't the worst of them, wasn't even in the group that targeted me, he just…"
"He let it happen." He and Greg said together and he hated her sigh as she nodded, her gaze turning to her drink, though she didn't drink it.
"He did. One time…" He also hated her hesitation to tell these stories, both for her own pain and because she didn't want to cause them any. "We were practicing scaling walls and I was near the top, beating some of them when one of the others… He kicked my hand so I lost my grip. Ian could've caught me, but he didn't. So I fell. And finished last."
"What a dick."
That was a polite way of putting it but he had something else on his mind.
"How far?"
"Ten feet. Onto a padded mat." Tess told them with raised brows but that didn't mean shit.
If she'd fallen at the wrong ankle she might not have just broken an arm or a leg, she could've snapped her fucking neck. Which they probably would've liked. And that Ian could have helped her and had chosen not to?
He should've knocked the prick out.
"What else did they do?"
Her hand taking his made him feel better, but only marginally. "Ian and his friends never did anything. Not at first but later… they kept the others in line."
"Later?" Greg asked, sharing a look with him when she took another breath.
"Two of the other recruits were just goons, being dicks for the sake of it. And because they believed I deserved it. But their ring leader…" Jay was already pissed but when she took her first sip of her drink his blood started to freeze, knowing that as bad as things had been for her this was why she'd never talked about her time there. "Whenever I think of him I call him Ralon of Malven."
She chuckled at them, because that was a weird fucking name but for some reason it rang a bell in the back of his head but as hard as he tried he couldn't place it.
"Why does that sound familiar?"
"He's a character from one of my book series. The Song of the Lioness. The first one." She explained with a smile, and a soft look that even in the middle of his anger made his heart skip a beat.
Everyone called her a tempest, except for Mouse who called her a moose and as accurate as that could be a lioness made a hell of a lot of sense too.
"A young girl wants to train to become a knight, she has to pretend to be a boy which I didn't but otherwise it's the same. One of the other page boys bullies her relentlessly until she snaps and kicks his ass and he gets exiled/runs away in shame."
"That's our girl." Greg said with a grin but it fell fast when her head gave another of those small shakes. "That's not what happened?"
"In the book, yeah. In real life… he struck first." She said with another shrug, not unbothered but used to it. "All along he'd been telling everyone that I wouldn't even make it halfway so when it got close… Apparently he got desperate. One night he followed me into the showers. He didn't."
He heard her words but it wasn't until Tess's fingers slid between his that he could make sense of them, not that it did much good when she continued.
"I think he just wanted to scare me… He snuck up behind me and slipped a garroting cord-"
"Mother fucker."
"Bastard."
Her lips pursed when he and Greg cussed, not in fear of them but her own hatred of getting them upset which was why they fought so hard to get themselves under control. They still had to give her looks once they did to let her know they could handle it, and to say that even if they couldn't that was their issue, not hers.
"I don't think he was intending to kill me, not at first but when I fought back… It got nasty. Fast." She said quietly, and wryly, again so used to being attacked that it made his blood boil. This was why she was so used to it. "Ian and one of the other guys, Devon, ran in right after I put my thumb in his eye. I went at them too until I realized they were there to help. And then… I left."
The way she didn't continue told him the aftermath had likely been as hard as the fight itself and Jay hoped one day she would tell him about it.
He also hoped all those pricks who'd let it happen understood now she wasn't someone to be messed with.
"What happened to him?"
His anger banked when she lifted her head, his heart tugging at her steady, proud gaze. "He was exiled/ran away in shame."
"Good." Greg said fiercely but he didn't agree.
Good would be if someone did to him what he'd done to her.
Better would be if he was dead.
"I don't… I don't know why but I keep seeing Ian's face that night." Tess said quietly, back to looking at her drink with a look of lost confusion that made his heart tug for a different reason. "And tonight. And Atith's."
Oh.
His girl.
So smart, but so dumb. But considering she'd been holding this inside her for years, nearly half a decade he supposed it made sense. Plus considering how obtuse he could be he had no right to judge.
Greg gave him a look to say he was thinking the same thing, laughing at her when she scowled. "You really don't know why?"
"Because they both represent the same thing to you." He said gently, loving how her scrunched brows smoothed out when she looked at him, still confused but trusting that he had the answer.
And he did.
"A reason to fight."
Her mouth formed a soft 'o' before her lips pursed and then quirked to the side, giving them both a wry but grateful look. Sometimes he thought Tess was getting so used to fighting she forgot why she was doing it, so lost in the losses she lost sight of the victories. It happened to the best of them, couldn't not when someone was immersed in so much death and destruction but whenever she needed a reminder that there was light in the world, that she was the brightest of them all he would remind her.
To whatever end.
