“What?” Foster snapped.
Thank God this was all a drill, or we’d have our hands tied.
We wouldn’t have had the time to wait and question why Derek wasn’t there.
And we wouldn’t have been here to realize that things were going wrong at ‘Cop Row.’
“I just got a 9-1-1 call from Rowen Tremaine.” Royal’s eyes met mine. “She said that someone was shooting at her brother.”
The team didn’t take long to assemble after that.
“Let’s go,” Foster ordered.
Chapter 18
Having a weird mom builds character.
-T-shirt
Avery
I blinked my eyes open to see my mother and father staring at me.
I frowned.
“What are y’all doing here?” I asked. “Together?”
Dad grinned, as did my mom.
“We’re married and we love each other, sweetheart.” My mother rolled her eyes as if what I’d just said was the silliest of questions. “We may have done some funky things during our marriage, but what we did made us happy. We’re adventurous. Don’t you like adventures?”
I frowned, knowing that I needed to ask them something.
But I didn’t know what.
My brain was foggy, and I couldn’t make it work right.
“Mom,” I said. “How are you?”
My mother smiled, placing her hands underneath her chin as she smiled down at me with happiness.
My dad nudged my mother to the side and curled his arms around me. “You’ve made us really proud.”
My eyes filled up with tears.
“I’ve missed you,” I whispered to them. “You have no idea how much.”
“We have an idea,” Dad said. “Because we’ve gone just as long without you.”
I felt my throat swell as tears started to burn in the backs of my eyes.
“You need to wake up, though,” Mom said. “It’s not time.”
“What’s not time?” I asked, so confused it wasn’t even funny. “I don’t want to leave.”
I wasn’t sure why seeing them was so important, but I felt like my entire heart was once again whole.
“You can’t stay here,” Dad said, squeezing me even tighter.
“I want to stay here, though,” I said.
“What about Derek?” my mother asked, wrapping her arms around me, too.
My chest restricted, this time because of realizing that Derek wasn’t here with me, not because my parents were now squeezing me to death.
“Oh, Derek,” I said. “I need Derek.”
“It’ll be okay. I promise.” Mom squeezed me tighter.
And tighter.
And tighter.
And tighter.
It felt like I couldn’t breathe.
“Dad,” I croaked.
“It’s okay, baby. You can go,” were my dad’s final words.
I hadn’t realized that I’d closed my eyes until I heard my name being called urgently.
“Avery, baby. Wake up,” Derek ordered gruffly.
I blinked open my eyes and stared at the man I loved. Like really, really loved.
“I love you, too,” he said to me, grin taking over his face. “You’re beautiful.”
I felt like my chest was still constricted tight, but I couldn’t figure out why.
“My chest hurts,” I said to him.
He blew out a deep breath.
“The gun that Rachel stole out of my police cruiser was a bean bag one,” he said. “Your chest hurts, and you were knocked unconscious, but you didn’t actually get shot with a shotgun. You might have a broken rib. Or ribs.”
“I have her tied up with zip ties,” Rowen said as she walked into view. “Wow, you look rough, girl.”
I would’ve smiled if everything didn’t hurt.
I wanted to sit up, but when I tried, Derek held me down.
“No,” he said. “You’ve got a lot of blood all over you, and you have thorns everywhere from falling in the rosebushes. You need to lie still until the ambulance arrives.”
The ambulance did arrive, hot on the heels of the entire freakin’ SWAT team.
They all piled out just as Rachel started to stir on the ground.
“Did you shoot her?” I asked curiously.
Derek looked sheepish for a few seconds, then shook his head. “Ummm, no. I might have kicked her.”
“Where?” Booth asked as he hunkered down next to the zip-tied woman. “In her head?”
Derek shrugged. “She’d shot Avery, and I just… I fucking knocked her out the fastest way I could think of. And that might’ve been by way of kicking her in the head.”
“Nice,” Ford said as he looked down at her. “She’ll be okay, though.” His eyes turned to me. “You?”
It was then that Derek cursed. “I told you to keep lying there.”
I rolled my eyes at his overprotectiveness.
“I’m getting up, Derek,” I said as I stood.
He helped me stand, then cursed when he realized that I was standing half naked in front of the entire SWAT team.
He was lucky that I was in a bra and sweatpants. It could’ve been worse. I could’ve walked out here in just his t-shirt like I’d contemplated doing.
But then I’d thought, what if he’s not alone? I can’t go out there scantily clad and chance seeing one of his teammates.
So I’d put on clothes. Hell, I’d even put on a bra.
“Derek,” I said, patting his hands that were now trying to cover me. “It’s fine.”
Derek sighed and shucked his sweatshirt.
He pulled it over my head in the next moment, causing me to smile.
“Thanks,” I drawled.
He winked at me then turned to Foster and started explaining what had happened.
I leaned next to Rowen and said, “These bean bags really hurt. I think my boob is bruised.”
Rowen snorted.
“I heard the commotion and turned on the lights,” she said. “I didn’t come out because I wasn’t sure what the hell was going on. So I peeked through the blinds and saw it all happen. I’d already called 9-1-1 before Derek told me to.”
“You’re fuckin’ lucky you stayed your ass inside,” Dax growled.
Rowen rolled her eyes, then leaned her head against the man’s chest.
“That was scary, Dax,” she said. “I never thought anyone would be able to get in here so easily and break into a police car.”
“She had a key,” Louis, also known as our calendar’s Mr. May, said. “None of it is broken into. Not a single thing.”
***
Derek
Each cruiser was equipped with a lockable gun safe in the back hatch area. There was a code that was needed, and a key. That’d been why I hadn’t brought the gun inside.