A/N — yes, it's been too long. Only a few more chapters so I'm hoping to finish up by the end of June. Happy summer all! xoxo — kals

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Chapter 20 — Jesse and Wolf

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Wolf dropped his tray onto an empty table at the far corner of the cafeteria, pretending not to see the empty places at the tables the team was occupying. Under normal circumstances, he would have made some effort to stop by and drop an encouraging word, knowing that the team was young and green and needed all the help that they could get. At the moment, however, Wolf wasn't sure he could think of a single positive thing to say. No wonder Danny planned to start joining the teams in the field.

They were all wankers.

Digging a fork into something that looked vaguely like spaghetti, assuming that spaghetti was supposed to come in the shape of letters obviously designed for two-year-olds, Wolf tried to relax his body. It wasn't entirely fair to blame the team he was currently supervising for yesterday's kerfuffle. The sheriff in this backwater town started the dispute by insisting on proof that the rag-tag group before him were, in fact, part of the United States military and not a band of hooligans trying to talk their way past the entrance checkpoint. Unfortunately, the recently-promoted Lieutenant Morgan, who was all of nineteen years old, crumbled under the older man's glare. Since photographic ID hadn't been high on anyone's list prior to the team's departure two weeks ago and Wolf's own credentials, identifying him as a member of the Royal Australian Navy only made Sheriff Laddin more suspicious, they had been forced to get first Danny, then Sasha and finally Mike on the horn. By the time they talked their way in, a full day was lost and there was no time for the volunteers from the Red Cross they were escorting to get down to the business of checking hospitals, making lists of survivors, and finding out what other aid this tiny town in West Virginia might need. After considering the problem, Mike decided to have them stay put until he could get IDs made and delivered.

So until then, Wolf was stuck here, in the high school cafeteria, eating food that probably went into a can around the time he was born. Wolf paused, wondering when people stopped using lead to seal the cans, before deciding that lead poisoning couldn't be worse than starvation.

He had just shoveled another mouthful of spaghetti into his mouth when someone dropped a tray on the table opposite him. Looking up, Wolf suppressed a groan. Given their current lack of helicopter pilots, he really should have known.

Jesse slid into the chair and tossed a package across the table. "Slattery said you needed these ASAP."

Opening the brown package to find a stack of what appeared to be IDs, Wolf placed the bag back on the table and nodded at Jesse's train. "Unless you enjoy seeing your food twice, I'd skip the spaghetti."

Jesse studied him for a moment, then she graced him with a dazzling smile. "You are a hard man to track down."

"I didn't know you were looking," Wolf replied, lifting an eyebrow. "Did you miss me?"

She tilted her head, considering him. "Yes, I did." Bypassing her plate of food, she lifted a glass of water. "I went by your place, but Miller said you were in the field. Or something like that. The kid was practically shaking in his boots."

Wolf was about to defend Eric when another thought occurred. "Did Sasha tell you to smooth things over?"

Wolf had realized fairly quickly that Sasha getting Jesse to St. Louis really didn't have anything to do with him personally. The United States was desperate for helicopter pilots and getting Jesse — someone who was not just a talented pilot but someone they could trust — here was a major coup. That didn't mean, however, that Sasha would ignore an opportunity to do something about what she termed his unfortunate situation.

Jesse paused, glass hanging midair. "Do you really think that Sasha could get me to do anything I didn't want to do?"

No.

Wolf's mouth twitched. "Then why did you go by my place and terrorize my mate?"

"I wanted to talk to you," Jesse said. It was her tone, soft and ... almost regretful, that caught Wolf's attention. He set down his fork. "That night ... I was wrong. You weren't the one who was messed up. Or, at least, you weren't the only one."

The confession caught him off-guard, and then it clicked. "Because of Damian."

Jesse's mouth tightened, her eyes slipping shut, before they sprang open and met his gaze. "He was all I had left."

Wolf thought back to that horrible night on the Nathan James when he put his cards on the table and asked Jesse to take a chance on him — on them — only for her to walk away. At the time, he had been too hurt and, he could admit in retrospect, angry to look beyond the obvious. Now, however, Wolf could understand how Jesse might have projected her feelings about Damien's death onto Wolf, imagining that he was similarly impacted by the loss of Val. And, in a way, Jesse was right. Wolf had been changed by Val's loss. Any illusions he had left that the virus would change the world for the better, that TPTB would pull together the way the crew of the Nathan James had done to help others, were shattered by Val's death. As painful as it was to admit, Jesse might have been right to put pause on things between them last year. Time and space had allowed them both to heal or, at least, to find a way to move on.

"Eh, you weren't the only one messed up," Wolf allowed. He leaned back in his chair. "Is that why you agreed to pop into West Virginia? To explain why you really broke my heart?"

"You seem healthy enough to me." She studied him. "What are you doing tonight?"

Wolf grinned. "Are you asking me on a date, Ms. Kamat?"

Rolling her eyes, Jesse stood. "Only if letting you tag along on my off-the-books trip to Virginia counts as a date. In case you're worried, I'll have you back by morning."

Standing and lifting his tray, Wolf found himself happier than he had been in weeks. "Sounds like a date to me."