Shades of Gray (20 page)

“You haven’t taken any pain medication, have you? We didn’t even think about that.
You have to be in a lot of pain and we should have had the sense not to plan wine.”

P.J. smiled at Sarah’s genuine worry. “I’m drug free. No need to worry that I’ll be
stoned after a glass of wine. My last dose was yesterday evening. I’m trying not to
take it unless I have to or Cole makes me.”

The others laughed.

“If Cole’s anything like our husbands, and I’m sure he’s just as much an alpha, hardheaded
male, then you have your hands full,” Rachel said with a rueful smile.

“He’s been great,” P.J. said softly.

She lowered her gaze when the other women shared a smug smile, and she sipped idly
at her wine, wondering when one of them was going to bring up the delicate situation
that was essentially the elephant in the room. And her reason for being here in the
first place.

She watched as Sophie scooped three-year-old Charlotte into a hug and then tickled
the toddler’s tummy until she shrieked with laughter.

P.J. had to admit that Charlotte was a complete cutie-pie. She almost made P.J. long
for sweet-smelling babies and sweet little belly laughs. Almost.

There had been a time when P.J. had considered that she was ready to settle down,
have a baby or two and do the whole American pie-and-picket-fence thing. Derek had
quickly dissuaded her of that notion.

He hadn’t wanted children, and moreover, he didn’t want marriage. He thought it was
an outdated, old-fashioned concept and that in the modern world, it made no sense
for a man to commit to one woman.

Okay, so he was a complete dickhead. She knew that then even if she hadn’t immediately
given him his walking papers.

Oddly enough she’d been less tolerant of him being a dirty cop than she had been of
his views on love, marriage and family.

Since then she hadn’t given any thought to anything except her job and making sure
she was the best damn sniper and soldier she could be.

All plans of marriage and family had been thrown out the window. And since then, she’d
decided she just wasn’t mother material. What kind of parent could she be with the
job she held? She loved her job and knew she’d never be happy giving it all up for
home and hearth.

She wondered what Cole’s opinions were on the subject.

She shook her head, determined not to travel that path. It was a good way to set herself
up for disappointment. Besides, what the hell was she doing debating children and
marriage when she was a cold-blooded murderer plotting to make her next kill?

Fat lot of good it would do her to be dreaming in a jail cell. For that matter, if
she was caught in some shit-hole country, it wasn’t the U.S. justice system she’d
have to worry about. She’d be in some deep, dark place subject to treatment that would
make what Nelson and Brumley had done to her a total cakewalk.

Was it worth it? Was it truly worth her life to take Brumley out?

She needed no time to answer that question.

Hell yes. She didn’t even hesitate. It wasn’t just her who’d suffered at that monster’s
hands. So many babies. Young women. She couldn’t even begin to think of the atrocities
so many girls had suffered before. And how many would suffer in the future if she
didn’t shut this asshole down.

Her life certainly was worth it when she compared it to the hundreds—thousands—of
girls she could save by taking his miserable ass out.

“I have no idea what you’re thinking, but it must be pretty awful,” Sarah said.

P.J. blinked and looked at Garrett’s wife, who was sitting across from her in a lawn
chair. For that matter, all the women were staring intently at her.

P.J. offered a grimace. “Nothing worth talking about. Just an asshole who needs killing.”

Sophie lifted her brow. “Several come to mind when you say that.”

Rachel gave a wave. “Don’t listen to her. She’s pretty bloodthirsty.”

P.J. cracked a grin. “She sounds like my kind of woman.”

It was then that P.J. realized Rachel wasn’t drinking any wine, and for that matter,
only four glasses had been placed on the table. She frowned and held her glass in
Rachel’s direction. “Do you want some wine?”

Rachel’s cheeks tinged a soft pink and her eyes lit up like twin sunbeams. Then she
patted her softly rounded belly that P.J. hadn’t noticed before. P.J.’s mouth fell
open.

“You’re pregnant?” P.J. asked.

“With twins!” Rachel exclaimed, her smile getting bigger all the time.

“Holy shit!”

The women all laughed at P.J.’s reaction. P.J. shook her head. “I had no idea. Looks
like I’ve missed a lot in the last six months.”

“If you only knew,” Sarah muttered.

P.J. lifted her eyebrows. “What?”

Rachel sighed. “While you were AWOL, we sort of had an incident at the school where
I’m teaching again. The mom and dad of one of my students split up, and the dad went
bonkers and came to the school with a gun and held my class hostage. This was just
a few days after I’d found out I was having twins. You can imagine that Ethan didn’t
take any of this well.”

“Did they go in and take the fucker out?” P.J. demanded. Then she bit her lip, glancing
in Charlotte’s direction. “Sorry.”

The others laughed.

“Yep, they did,” Sophie said with a grin. “They pissed off a whole host of people
in the process, but the real heroine was Rachel.”

Rachel blushed and shook her head. “I was terrified.”

“I’m sorry I wasn’t here,” P.J. said quietly. She felt protective of these women.
Like they were hers. She’d had a hand in every mission that dealt with them, and it
bugged her that while she’d been out seeking revenge, Rachel could have been killed.

“You’re here now,” Rachel said. “And that’s all that matters. KGI isn’t the same without
you, P.J.”

Shea leaned back in her chair and pried a leaf from Charlotte’s hand before it made
it to her mouth. Then she turned to look directly at P.J.

“Look, P.J., I know Cole called and talked to Sophie, and yeah, he told us about what
happened to you, but we already knew. KGI is family, and even though you don’t hang
around us that much, we all care about you a lot. You’ve been there for each of us
when we needed someone the most. You’ve risked your life for all of us. You risk your
life to keep the men we love safe. That makes you very special to us whether you know
it or not. It also makes us very invested in what goes on with you. When we heard
what happened, we wanted to go kick that fucker’s ass every bit as much as the guys
did.”

P.J. bit the inside of her mouth to keep it from flapping open. She didn’t really
know how to respond to Shea’s impassioned statement. She hadn’t ever considered that
she meant crap to these women. It baffled her that they thought about her at all.
She was just a member of a team that worked for or with their husbands. No one special.
Certainly not
family
. Right?

And yet the mere word had sent a warm flush straight into her heart.

“And I said all of that to let you know that we aren’t here to psychoanalyze you.
We aren’t going to pry into your thoughts. What we do want you to know is that we’re
here for you. Anytime. Whatever you need. If it’s someone to talk to. If you just
want a shoulder to cry on. If you just want to bitch and scream. We’re here. Never
hesitate to call us or come over. You may not be a Kelly in name, but you belong to
us and we take family very seriously.”

Sophie clapped, a broad smile on her face. “Very well said, Shea. Wow, you’re coming
along just fine.” She turned a teasing smile toward P.J. “It wasn’t so long ago that
we were having to convince her she was part of the family and that it was okay to
lean on us.”

Sarah leaned forward, her expression serious, her eyes full of understanding. “I was
raped too, P.J. I know what it feels like. I dealt with it by ignoring it. I shut
everyone out. I just wanted to be left alone.”

“Yes,” P.J. said fiercely, finally latching on fully to part of the conversation.

Sarah’s admission was everything that P.J. had done herself, and as silly as it sounded,
it made her feel not quite so alone that she wasn’t the only one who’d reacted to
what had happened to her the way she had.

“I just didn’t—don’t—want to think about it,” she finished painfully.

Sarah nodded. “I get it. I do. But when you let it go like that for so long, you eventually
reach a breaking point.”

P.J.’s heart thumped, making her feel a little light-headed. She wanted to confide
in her so badly about what happened the night before. The words were burning her lips,
but she was so ashamed, and it simply wasn’t in her nature to confide in others.

She’d always been a loner. It was something drilled into her from the time she was
a child. That wasn’t going to change in the course of a single day, the first time
other females extended their hand in friendship.

When a child couldn’t even count on her parents, how the hell was she supposed to
be able to count on anyone else?

But who said there were rules she had to follow? Just because she was one way her
entire life didn’t mean she couldn’t take steps to change, even if they were baby
steps. She was tired of feeling so alone all the damn time. If that made her weak,
then fine. She was weak.

She rubbed her face tiredly and sat there a long moment before she finally worked
up the courage to say what she’d nearly blurted out just moments before.

“I freaked out last night,” she admitted. “I thought I was ready. I never really thought
about it. I mean, I’m a logical person and I have no trouble separating out what those
bastards did to me with the reality of having someone you care about touch you. I
know Cole would never hurt me. I
know
that! And yet one minute I was in the most fantastic place in the world and the next
I was in full-scale panic and hyperventilating all over the place. I no longer knew
where I was or who I was with. I was so scared that I couldn’t even function. How
stupid is that?”

“It’s not stupid,” Rachel said in a tone that told P.J. she knew exactly what she
was talking about. “I still have episodes of panic and utter despair. Despair doesn’t
even begin to describe the absolute desolation or the feeling that you’re lost in
hell and no one will ever find you. I wake up in the middle of the night thinking
I’m back in that horrible hotbox, in the dark, alone, knowing I have no way out.”

“I have a pretty awful confession to make,” Sarah said with a grimace. “On our wedding
night, I had a panic attack when Garrett tried to make love to me. Talk about stupid.
We’d made love so many times before and I was fine. Maybe it was the stress of the
wedding. I have no idea. But I freaked out when he touched me, and he spent the rest
of our wedding night holding and comforting me. I’ve never felt so awful in my life.
I ruined what should have been the most special night of our lives.”

P.J. felt a twinge of sympathy for the other woman. She knew
exactly
how that felt. It was the way she’d felt the night before when she’d all but begged
Cole to make love to her.

“Ahh honey, I’m sorry,” Sophie said, reaching over to squeeze Sarah’s hand. “I’m sure
Garrett was fine with it. He loves you so much.”

“Oh, he was. It was me who wasn’t fine with it. I’m so tired of allowing that bastard
who raped me to control my life. I don’t want him in my life or my marriage and I
damn sure don’t want him in bed with me and my husband.”

The others giggled. Then Sarah stifled her own laughter and everyone joined in, laughing
at the image of another man in bed with Sarah and Garrett.

It lightened the mood and injected some much-needed levity into the conversation.

“I’ll tell you like we told Shea,” Rachel began. “It may sound stupid, and the initial
reaction is denial, but sometimes you just need someone to talk it out with. I avoided
therapy for the longest time because it frustrated me that I needed to go see a complete
stranger so that I could deal with the things that had happened to me. But once I
got over that feeling of ridiculousness, it really did help.”

“Same for me,” Sarah interjected. “And I tell you something else that really, really
helped. Talking to Garrett and being honest with my feelings. He’s been so understanding,
and I can’t imagine Cole would be any less so.”

P.J. felt heat rise into her cheeks. “You guys are kind of assuming that Cole and
I are a slam dunk.”

Sophie snorted. “Oh please. The man was a walking corpse after you pulled your disappearing
act. You have that man so tied up in knots it isn’t even funny.”

The others nodded their agreement.

“Well hell,” P.J. grumbled. “It’s apparent nothing stays secret around here.”

They hooted in laughter.

“I’m afraid that’s the drawback of being part of a noisy, very close, very intrusive
family. There isn’t much everyone else doesn’t know,” Shea said.

“But it’s the very best kind of family to be a part of,” Rachel said softly. “I wouldn’t
trade them for the world.”

“As long as we’re making confessions, I’ll make one more,” P.J. said with a grimace.
“I was dreading this. And to be honest the only reason I agreed to come was because
Cole was in agony after he made the call to Sam, thinking I’d be pissed that he arranged
it without talking to me first.”

The others smiled but waited for her to continue.

“But I really am enjoying myself and I want to thank you for going to all of this
trouble for someone you don’t even really know.”

“You’ve done so much for all of us,” Shea said. “You say you’re just doing your job.
But to us, you’ve not only put your life on the line for us individually, but you
go out every time our husbands go out and you’re a big part of the reason they come
home to us again. There is nothing we can ever do to repay you for that, so if there
is ever anything any of us can do, we don’t just want you to ask, we
expect
you to ask.”