章節 12: Chapter 12: THE EX RETURNS
Christopher spent the morning filling out reports; incident reports, breach of security report, points of contact reports. When he was done he went down into the gym room and retrieved the CD and Ashleigh's cap. He quietly stared at the monitors, ran his sweeps, but his mind was deep in thought. No one bothered him. Carlos mumbled, "She's going to be alright, Beast."
He gave the man a surprised look. But Carlos tucked his head down and hurried away. Bruce walked into the security room later that evening. Christopher looked up from the screens waiting to get his ass chewed for leaving the area without permission.
"I got a report from the hospital. The civilian…uh the girl, Miss Dalton has been released and she's doing just fine." Christopher sighed. "Go down into the lockers and secure her property. I don't want any of her belongings getting stolen."
"Yes, sir." He stood up quickly and hurried out the door, but paused and turned back to Bruce. "Thank you, sir."
"She's a tough, cookie. She must have been feeling bad for days and came in every day and pushed herself. I didn't have men at boot camp who pushed themselves as hard."
Christopher nodded. He agreed.
~*~
"You two are making me hot!" Ashleigh grumbled. Lance was cuddled up in her bed to the right and Kendra to the left. He made to get up and Ashleigh gripped his shirt and pulled him back down. He chuckled when she sighed in contentment.
She'd spent most of the day at the hospital. It was confirmed; she had diabetes. Ashleigh had pulled her lip into her mouth and almost cried. The needles, the regulated diet, no more rice… She had to have PF Chang's twice a week, she just had to!
But sometimes when a door closed a window opened. DeAngelo had shown up at the hospital. He had been among her emergency contacts and he'd dropped everything to rush to the hospital and to be at her side! He had looked terrified when he saw her pale face. He gripped her hand and kissed her fingers.
"Baby, what's wrong? Are you okay, Ashleigh?" She'd stared at him in surprise. Kendra and Lance had rolled their eyes at his show of affection but had backed away—not leaving all-together, of course. But they had given her a bit of space to talk to him.
She explained about the black out and he had blanched. "Jesus…" He had stayed with her during the diagnosis and had asked questions when the doctors explained that her A1C test was at 12 which is why she had to immediately take insulin instead of pills. He held her hand during the injections. He had even offered to drive her back home but Lance said that his WIFE would be worried about him.
Ashleigh narrowed her eyes at Lance but it was true. "You should go. My friends are going to drive me home."
DeAngelo had given her a steady look. "I'm your friend too, you know." He leaned forward and kissed her lips lightly. "I thought…I thought you would have forgiven me by now. I don't want to lose you Ash, you gotta tell me how to make this right between us."
"Okay," Lance stormed forward. "You want to know how to make everything right? You fucking disappear! You leave her alone and stay out of her life!"
"Lance," Kendra placed a calming hand on his narrow shoulder. Ashleigh couldn't believe that Lance was attacking DeAngelo like that! He was half the man's size. But in that moment he looked like he would whup DeAngelo's ass.
"You know what? I'm sick of your mouth!" DeAngelo stood up but Lance didn't back down. Ashleigh tugged his hand.
"DeAngelo…you should go."
He turned to her, his brow going up. "You're choosing him over me?!"
She narrowed her eyes at him. "You chose someone else over me!"
DeAngelo turned for the door, he paused as he left and looked at Ashleigh. "I'll call you, Ash…when there aren't so many people around." He said staring pointedly at Kendra and Lance. Then he disappeared.
Ashleigh reached her hand out for Lance and he interlocked his fingers with hers. "Are you insane?" She asked. "You're trying to go up against DeAngelo?"
"He doesn't scare me." The smaller man said as he leaned lightly against her. He placed a kiss on her forehead. "You can do better."
"People do learn from their mistakes," she whispered.
Now the three of them were huddled in her oversized bed. They'd force fed her chicken soup and it wasn't homemade or even Progresso…but Campbell's with that one lone little square of chicken floating in salty broth and tons of soggy noodles; and she loved every spoonful! She'd had two bowls and had even begged for crackers but they wouldn't give her any.
Before that they'd watched her give herself her first insulin shot. She was so scared that Kendra almost snatched the needle from her and did it herself but Lance proclaimed that she'd have to learn to do it. She finally stabbed herself and injected the medicine—all with her eyes closed. When she opened them Lance had blanched. He gave her a shaky smile.
She dozed and when she woke up they were still there. She loved these guys.
She went to work the next day; Kendra drove her since she had left her car, and then the two went down into the subbasement together to get her things out of the locker. For some reason she decided to check the gym. It was filled with toned bodies completing their before-work exercises—but Lt. Christopher Jameson wasn't present. Of course he wouldn't be present. He ended his workout at 6am; an hour and a half ago.
"What are you looking at?" Kendra asked.
"I was looking for the guy that helped me yesterday. I wanted to tell him thanks." She looked at her friend as they walked back to the elevators. "Didn't you see him in the nurse's station?"
"What's he look like?"
"Well he's a giant, at least 6'5" and he was wearing all black and a hood over his face. His face is like—all scarred up-"
"Oh my god…do you think you were seeing the Angel of Death?! You weren't that sick-"
Ashleigh rolled her eyes. "I am not describing the Angel of Death. The guy I'm talking about was wearing a NIKES hoodie and sweat pants."
Kendra pressed the button for the elevator. "Well I didn't see anybody like that—and I don't want to see anybody like that. Ever."
Ashleigh shrugged. "He was nice. He's in there every day when I work out." As the doors to the elevators opened she leaned in and whispered. "This subbasement is the base of operations for Homeland Security."
"Really?" Kendra said dismissively.
"You think I'm delusional."
The two women walked to the cafeteria. Kendra chuckled. "No. I'm just taking everything you say with a grain of salt for another few days."
They grabbed breakfast; Ashleigh had an egg white omelet and turkey sausage…which, incidentally is what she had been eating from the canteen since dieting anyways. Well she planned to kick this diabetes thing. She was diagnosed with type 2 and if she got her weight down then there was a chance that she could throw away those dreaded needles.
Tomorrow was Friday. She would allow herself the rest of the week and weekend to recuperate but starting Monday she planned to be right back at the gym. Before it was about remaking herself into an image more appealing to the man of her dreams, but now it was about making herself as healthy as possible.
Christopher watched Ashleigh through the monitors as she and her friend carried their breakfast up to their office. He'd been running reports when TK announced that she was in the subbasement. Only now they called her 'Little Trooper'.
"The Little Trooper's back!" Carlos had called out. Several men had come running. Christopher got out of his chair and nudged people aside, a frown on his heavily scarred face.
"She's not planning to work out is she?" someone asked.
"She better not," TK spoke. "Or I'll be down there to spank her hiney…her very ample, nice juicy-"
Roddy nudged him when Christopher's face darkened. "What's she doing?"
"She's looking for Beast. She wants to give him a thank you kiss." Someone made kiss smacking noises and Beast reached out and swatted the back of their head. When the two women returned to the elevators everyone cleared out except Christopher. He sat down and flipped cameras until he located Ashleigh and her friend. She looked good, healthy, pretty. He was satisfied that she was all right. But he still didn't turn away from the camera.
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