Work Text:
Sweat and burning torches and the sick-sweet smell of stale White Diamonds permeated every inch of Starlight Ranch: an inaptly named New Vegas whorehouse. Charlie’s footsteps crunched in dry grass as the raucous sound of music and dancing and fucking filtered out from the adjacent tent; she favored her side where, a few weeks earlier, she’d taken a brutal hit during a run-in with some local muscle, hand skimming over her bandaged ribs through her shirt.
Pausing in front of a particular trailer door, she felt a stab of satisfaction that he’d been reduced to this but also a little sick that she was so intimately acquainted with Sebastian Monroe’s living situation. She yanked the door open and stepped inside without announcing herself.
Monroe lay on his side on the narrow bed, blankets drawn up over his shoulder and his face turned away from the door. “Go away, Lou. Don’t care how hot she is,” he grumbled into the stained mattress, voice gravelly with alcohol and smoke.
“It’s not Lou.” Charlie cursed the way her voice cracked, reaching for the bottle of brandy on the little fold-out table. Alcohol sloshed inside as she stepped across the trailer, sinking onto the bed beside him.
Rolling onto his back, Monroe turned a confused blue stare on her, eyes narrowed to sleep-crusted slits. “What are you doing here?”
She unscrewed the cap, tipping the bottle back against her lips, pungent sweet liquid pouring out onto her tongue. “Don’t know.” That was kind of a lie. Wiping her mouth with the back of her hand, she passed the bottle over, heard the splash and gulp of him swallowing.
“What’s wrong?”
Charlie barked a laugh, shaking her head. “Everything.”
“Why aren’t you asleep? Don’t you have your own room?”
“Oh no. I am not the great Jimmy King. I’m currently sharing with Bleach Blonde Hooker #23.”
He didn’t miss a beat, setting the brandy on the floor. “Oh, yes, I know her. Lovely girl. Great rack.”
Charlie tried to give him the long-suffering Matheson stare but his face erupted in that wide, honest smile that crinkled his eyes and she laughed in spite of herself. “Shut up,” she mumbled, dropping her head into her hands.
They sat there in quiet, the sounds of the tent city filtering in around them. He lifted his hand, fingers stroking along her arm, sliding over the lightly raised mess of scar tissue that bore his initial. “What’s the matter, Charlotte?” he asked finally.
Charlie sucked in a breath of cold air, the sting of brandy still lingering on her tongue. “I’m worried. About Miles.”
“He’s only a few days late.” Monroe pushed himself up, blankets tented over his knees. “Besides, he always comes back for you.”
She scoffed, shaking her head. “Right.”
“Don’t be like that. Miles loves you,” he murmured, glancing away to the crack of window visible behind faded floral curtains.
Charlie opened her mouth to protest but there was really nothing she could argue with. Miles did love her, loved both of them.
“Always had a funny way of showing it,” Monroe said as if he’d read her mind, squinting at her in the dim light with his arms curled over his legs. She stared back, just as fierce, hands clenched in her lap.
A sigh escaped him and he leaned over to light the hurricane lamp perched precariously on a shelf, a warm glow spreading over their faces. “Look. You have to understand something about Miles. He gives his heart away, to everybody. To you, to me, to your mom, hell, probably to Danny and he never even knew him.”
Charlie flinched at the mention of her little brother, eyes darting around the trailer so she didn’t have to look at him for a moment, though he continued talking like he hadn’t noticed. “And then, when they don’t understand the significance or, worse, demand more than he was prepared for, he shuts himself off. Slits some throats and pretends he’s a tough guy.” Monroe shot her a look, eyebrows raised. “He’s not.”
“I know that,” Charlie insisted with a frown, forehead knit in indignation. She knew Miles; she’d spent months with him. Knew he licked his lips when he was nervous or deep in thought, knew he clung to a hug like he never wanted to let you go.
“No, you don’t.” Monroe ran his hands through his hair, scratching at the scalp.
“I know he has a dark side.” She twisted her hands together, chasing the brandy on her lips with her tongue, unaware of the Matheson habits as ingrained in her as in Miles.
He laughed, lamplight glinting in his eyes. “Yeah, he’s a regular Darth Vader.”
“Don’t act like I don’t know him. Miles is- Just, never mind. Sweet dreams, General,” she snapped, on her feet before she realized what she was doing, halfway to the door.
“Hey, hey.” Monroe lunged out, catching her fingers. She froze, trying in vain to ignore the dry warmth of his hand and the whorls of his fingertips on hers. It wasn’t what she was expecting, though Monroe was never more unpredictable than at two a.m. The press of the cold, metal doorframe bit into her palm and a silent, frustrated scream rang in her head.
“It’s just, you’ve known him, what? A year? I’ve known him forty years. Being inside Miles’ head is like being inside my own.” He curled his fingers more securely around her wrist and dragged her back down to the bed.
Charlie leaned against his propped-up knees, stiff, looking down at his hand wrapped around her. “What was he like?” she asked, voice quivering just enough to embarrass her as she reached out to pry his fingers off. “Before?” She didn’t shove him away, like she should have, but instead pressed his hand open in hers, palm flat and vulnerable. She drew her fingertips over the tender skin there as she had seen the fortuneteller across the street do a thousand times a day.
“Before what? Before he betrayed me, before he was general? Before the Blackout?”
She shrugged a shoulder, tracing the deepest line down the center of his palm. “Any time. Just before.”
Monroe grew quiet and when she glanced up, his eyes were glued to their hands, both of them hard and calloused and scarred. It was so quiet in the trailer, just the crackling of the hurricane lamp bouncing off chipped paneling, that she nearly jumped when he spoke. “There was an attack on the U.S., just after we got out of high school. It was horrible; thousands of people died. I wanted to, I don’t know, donate to the Red Cross or something. But Miles. Miles was gonna be a patriot.” Monroe laughed, harsh and humorless, at the word.
“So we enlisted. I followed him literally to the miserable ends of the earth and when we came back… He’d already been well on his way to a full-blown alcoholic but after our first tour, he was wrecked. I don’t know what he was like when you dug him out of retirement but it couldn’t have been worse than that first six months home.”
Nine Years Before the Blackout
Bass marched into Sandy’s All-Night Diner at three o’clock in the morning, according to the digital numbers he’d squinted at on his alarm clock as his cell was ringing. A bulky USMC jacket hung over a Starsky & Hutch t-shirt and sweatpants, the flip-flops he’d stuffed his feet into slapping against the linoleum.
“You here to pick up Mr. Marine?” a perky blond asked with a Southern twang and a piece of gum in her cheek.
“How’d you guess?” he growled back. She made a face and gestured down the counter to the dark shape of Miles, half-passed out on the counter with a glass of whiskey in his hand.
Bass dragged his friend off a chrome stool, slamming the glass down on the countertop. “What the hell is wrong with you?” he demanded, shaking Miles. “Not only do you drag me out of bed at three in the morning to come get your drunk ass but you do it at a nostalgic shithole like this?”
“Hey!”
Bass ignored the blond except to slap ten bucks on the counter and drag Miles from the diner, grumbling and cussing under his breath. Every damn day, another bar, another drink or ten, another night, hauling Miles home from his latest bender. He needed a shrink, needed a woman, needed something. Something Bass apparently couldn’t give him.
Glaring noonday sunlight poured in streaky windows as Bass tossed the curtains open, too much for Miles’ no doubt pounding headache. He groaned from the bed, scrabbling with one hand for the covers and jerking them up over his head.
“Miles. Get up, you asshole.” Bass threw a shoe at his best friend, the sneaker bouncing to the floor with a thud. “It’s our last day off and you’ve done nothing but sleep and drink and piss. Get your ass out of bed.”
“Leave me alone.”
“No.” Bass tugged the blankets out of his vice grip and stripped them off the bed. Grabbing a pile of sort-of clean clothes off the dresser, he tossed them at Miles along with a bottle of aspirin, pills rattling inside. “You’re gonna get a goddamn court martial if you keep this up.”
“What made him stop?”
“He never really did. Just found a more destructive behavior to drown in.”
Charlie stared at him until he relented, veins pulsing under her fingertips. “There was- a woman. Someone he never should have been with. She was poison for him, came between him and everything that ever mattered.” She watched his jaw tighten, eyes dart away.
“My mom.”
“Charlotte.” It was a recognizable warning, don’t go there written all over his tone.
She quirked her lips to the side, drawing the edge of a jagged fingernail, dirt caked under it no matter how many times she tried to get clean, along the criss-cross lines in his palm. His eyes had nearly drooped shut when she broke the silence again. “Can I stay here?”
“Why?” Monroe asked, as if it were an unusual request, cracking an eye open at her.
“Bleach Blonde Hooker #23. She snores.”
“So do I.”
“I know. You sound like a wounded doe in heat. But at least you’re a familiar wounded doe in heat.”
Monroe laughed, folding his hands over his chest, eyes crinkled at the corners and teeth flashing bright white. He seemed to consider her a long moment as his mirth died down and she felt a flash of insecurity, hair feeling limp around her face and skin too tight with winter sun. Finally, he lifted the edge of the blanket, nodding to it in invitation. “Well?”
She hesitated, knowing all too well what would happen if she crawled in bed with him. But, then, she’d known when she asked, known three nights ago when she’d let him drive away her nightmares, known the week before that when he’d dragged her behind a tent, high off a fight, and fucked her in the dirt and she’d let him.
“Come on, now, Charlotte. Don’t be a tease: beg me to let you stay and then back out.”
Charlie blushed, toeing off her shoes and stripping out of her pants before grumbling a quiet, “I didn’t beg.” She lifted her knee onto the bed and slid in beside him, letting him throw the blanket over her. Tucking her hand beneath her cheek, she lay there on her side and studied his face. “Tell me more about Miles.”
Eight Years Before the Blackout
The truck rumbled and bucked down a dusty road, jostling the men inside. Bass felt like his teeth were going to rattle right out of his mouth but more pressing was resistance to the urge to vomit. It wasn’t like he’d never seen the effects of torture before, it was all but a fact of life, but for some reason, this one turned his stomach all the more.
Nineteen days ago, he and Miles had played poker with Sergeant Williams, a rougher-than-usual guy who turned to a teddy bear when asked about the photograph above his bunk of two adorable kids and a pretty redheaded wife back home.
Eighteen days ago, Sergeant Williams had been captured.
This morning, their team had busted into an abandoned former school, the walls plastered with propaganda and splattered with- well, Bass tried not to think too hard about what they were splattered with. Sergeant Williams was so battered they’d barely recognized him: missing three molars, his little finger and-
Bass washed his mouth out with sandy water, spitting into the bed of the truck and trying not to listen to Miles yelling at the sergeant on the floor.
“Stay awake, you’re a Marine, look at me, Marine! If I don’t get you home alive, Cindy’s never going to forgive me- you stay alive, you fucking hear me? I’m gonna marry that wife of yours if you die, Williams. Is it true what they say about redheads?”
Somehow, Bass didn’t think it was working but Miles was determined. They’d lost two men out of their unit in the past three months and Miles drank a little more with each one.
The world went white and orange.
When Bass came to, the truck was on its side, the cab up in flames and the driver screaming. Miles was unconscious, pinned under the crumpled metal seat. He didn’t really remember climbing out of the truck but the next thing he knew, Bass was crouched over a bush, emptying his guts. Straightening, he wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, stomach still churning.
The flames were spreading. He wrenched open the back doors, prying the metal seat up with his bare hands. Blood gushed from Miles’ head but Sergeant Williams was far worse off, the corner of the bench pierced clean through his chest. If he’d been upright, Bass could have seen daylight through him. He gagged, grabbing Miles under his arms and dragging him out of the truck.
Bass wasn’t sure how long they lay there in the dust but the truck was burnt to a crisp by the time help arrived. Within minutes they had Miles on a stretcher and his fierce grip grabbed Bass right above his tattoo, almost before he was conscious. “Where’s Williams?” he croaked.
He squeezed his eyes shut. “Didn’t make it.”
“And you saved me instead? Shit, Bass-” Miles cursed, struggling to sit up until the medics jammed a needle in his arm. His eyes glazed over. “He had kids-”
Their CO clapped Bass on the shoulder, a grim set to his jaw. “You did the right thing, Sergeant. You couldn’t have saved Williams.”
Miles still didn’t speak to him for a week.
“You did that?”
“I saved his sorry ass a thousand times in Iraq. And he did the same for me. We were brothers.”
Charlie pulled a lock of hair in between her teeth, eyes dropping to the v of his t-shirt. A tiny scar peeked out along his collarbone and she felt a rush to be one of the few people to know what it felt like under her fingers, what his other scars looked like and felt like and how he’d gotten them. His hand crept up over her waist, settling against the gentle slope and sharp jut of her hipbone, and her eyes closed in resignation.
“We can’t keep doing this,” she murmured, even as he edged closer on the narrow bed.
“Why not?” His voice was scratchy, large hand splayed over her hip, the pressure inviting and cajoling through her shirt.
When she peeked her eyes open, he was right there, nose nearly brushing hers and lips a breath away. “What is Miles gonna think when he finds out you’ve been banging his niece? What about my mom?”
“One bangs hookers and sycophants, of which you are neither.” Monroe slid his hand up over the knobs of her spine, tucking a few strands of hair behind her ear.
“I hate you, that should be reason enough why we can’t.” She nearly rolled her eyes, it was such an overplayed line. Hating him took more energy than she had left in her, if she were honest.
He blanched at the idea, running his fingers through her tangled hair; she winced as he yanked on the loose knots. “Do you really?” It sounded kind of strained and quiet, as if he didn’t really want to hear the answer, though it was an exchange they’d shared a hundred times on the road.
Charlie sighed softly, pressing her palms to his cheeks. Rough stubble burned her skin as she tipped her head to the side, touching her lips to his in a kiss that was almost chaste. They were dry and chapped beneath hers but at least she didn’t feel self-conscious about her split lip or the scratches on her arms and legs from weeks of tramping through dry brush.
She was the first to pull away, the tip of her tongue slammed against the inside of her teeth. Resting her forehead on his, she slowly opened her eyes, hands still framing his face. “Wanting you makes me officially twisted beyond all repair.”
“You’re a Matheson. You never stood a chance.”
She wasn’t sure if he meant a chance at normalcy or a chance against him but he didn’t give her much of an opportunity to think about it, arms wrapping tight around her and rolling her under him. Her fingers gripped his shirt, one hand sliding around to his back as he stroked his tongue over her bottom lip until she relented.
He tasted like, well, like brandy and cheap bitter cigars; some small, sick part of her wondered what he’d have tasted like if she had kissed him in Philadelphia instead of in a ratty, thirty year old trailer in the middle of the Plains Nation.
Charlie spread her legs around him, nestling deeper into the mattress but wincing as pain shot through her bruised body. He must have felt it, or tasted it, because he pulled back a reluctant fraction, eyes narrowed at her.
“How’re your ribs?” He jammed a crooked finger into her ribcage and her vision swam, hands smacking him away.
“Ow.” Charlie glared, clutching her side. “Bastard.”
His lips pressed into a tight, grim smile. “Told you. It’s fractured.” Monroe had been insisting it was fractured, not just bruised, but she was trying to be optimistic. He sank onto an elbow over her, nuzzling at her neck as he pushed her shirt up. “We should change the dressing.”
Charlie groaned against his cheek, breathing in traces of the alcohol he’d doused his cuts in from the evening’s fight. “Later. Want you.” She lifted her arms so he could pull the shirt off, tossing it to the floor, and before she knew what he was doing, he had them rolled over so she sat across his lap.
Smoothing his fingers over the rough bandage wrapped tightly around her torso, he scooted back to lean against the paneled wall. “Better?”
She nodded, draping her arms over his shoulders and leaning in for a kiss, even as she tugged at handfuls of his shirt. He pulled away just long enough to shrug out of it before catching her mouth again. The bristles of his mustache scratched at her lips, her tongue sliding over them, and she moaned at the prick of delicate pain. He’d accused her once of being masochistic. She’d laughed and told him to look in a mirror.
That was the night they’d had sex in the camp, halfway out of the Wastelands, and she’d laid her hand over the rocks piled around the fire, hissing in pain as he brought her off. She still had a slight red slash across her palm.
His teeth scraping across her pulse point, biting at the tender layer of flesh, brought her back to the present. Charlie whined her protest against his temple, fingers in his hair. “You’re gonna leave a mark,” she mumbled. “Kind of juvenile for the general of the Militia, don’t you think?”
He released her throat with a low growl, fingers grabbing her forearm. His thumb rubbed across the ridges of her brand pointedly, shooting deep, liquid arousal through her. That was the sickest part, she thought, that his touch on the place that forever marked both of their failures could bring her right to the edge.
Charlie shuddered above him, grinding down against his hips and finding him hard and yearning. “Enough,” she groaned even as he brought her arm up to his mouth, tongue tracing the brutalized flesh. Shoving a hand down between them, she fumbled at the button of his pants. She jerked them open and he lifted his hips, just enough that she could pull him free, hot and silky in her hand.
Releasing her abruptly, he wrenched his mouth away only to hook his forearm over her shoulders and jerk her close, lips against her ear. She expected him to whisper something biting and cold, or at least raunchy, but he stayed quiet, only reaching down to seat her more firmly against him without actually sliding inside her. Charlie pressed her palm to the paneled wall behind him, eyes slammed shut and his curls tickling her face as she ground into him, slick between her legs with each pass.
They settled into it, this unsatisfyingly safe rhythm, and he brought his hand up to curl around her arm, thumb finding her brand again like he needed to feel it. Her mouth watered, nipples hardening and turning a deep, rosy pink, and she slid her arm down in his grip, tangling her fingers with his. He lifted an eyebrow at her, looking composed but for the tense grit of his teeth and the hard, obvious ache between her thighs.
Slamming the back of his hand to the wall, she twisted just far enough to rub their scars together, rough blistered skin catching and scraping against each other. It felt like nails on a chalkboard, grating and irritating, and yet hot desire pooled in her, the evidence dripping down between them. Monroe groaned, elbow jutting into hers as he relaxed his grip, bucking up between her legs.
“God, Bass,” she mumbled, ridiculous tears nearly springing to her eyes with the twisted want of him. “Want you inside me.”
“Shouldn’t.” His voice was at least as rough as hers and he dropped his free hand between them, slicking his fingers and smearing them across her, irregular enough that she chased after it, hips jerking involuntarily. “S’irresponsible.”
A laugh bubbled up out of her at that, face splitting into an hysterical grin. As if any of this was responsible. Her hand slipped down his chest, releasing his arm, and she wrapped her fingers around him. “Shut up, Bass.” She always found herself doing that, calling him Bass in the middle of sex, like it was something intimate. It wasn’t, not really. Somehow she thought him carrying her unconscious for god knows how far and watching her sleep for a day and a night seemed more intimate than slick body parts rubbing up against each other.
He grunted in weak protest but only clutched at her hips as she carefully guided him inside her, sinking down too quickly so her ribs felt jostled and pain shot through her. Her breath seized in her chest and it was only his hands on her bare skin, low voice coaxing her to just breathe, just breathe, Charlotte, that brought her back down to him.
“We really need to rewrap that,” Monroe mumbled into her shoulder as she leaned against him, breasts crushed up to his chest. He thrust slowly inside her, drawing it out for himself, she knew, but also giving her a chance to rest.
Her brain caught up to her body and she gave a belated moan at the stretch of her muscles and the burn that spread through her at each twitch of his hips. Winding an arm around his neck, she leaned her weight on him, face twisted with pain and a full, thudding pleasure.
He was thick and hard inside her but slow, agonizing, and she drew her fingers over his face, eyes twitching beneath closed lids. “Stop it. I’m not gonna break.”
His hand drifted over her curves, breast small and tender in his large palm. “Don’t want to hurt you.” His voice was muffled in her shoulder but she shook her head fiercely, rolling her hips against his as if to prove she was fine.
“M’fine,” Charlie mumbled back, feeling unfocused and dizzy with unfulfilled arousal.
Monroe seemed to take her to heart because she had to cling to him, nails tearing open his shoulders as he jerked his hips against her, holding her off so he could slide almost out only to slam flush back inside her.
Charlie gasped, choking on her breath, her fingertips coursing over the familiar lines of his face: the crow’s feet stamped at the very corners of his eyes, the furrow in his brow from years of worry and the barest laugh line around his mouth that she’d have thought woefully out-of-place until recently. His lips latched onto her pulse point, thumbnail slicing into her nipple so her whole body tensed, rippled with a delight she almost had the presence of mind to be ashamed of.
He groaned into the curve of her throat, mumbling her name and bodily lifting her up with his hands wrapped tight around her thighs, and she took the hint, shimmying back. Her hand curled around him, still slick and warm from being inside her, free hand braced against the wall and chapped lips brushing his temple. A few wet strokes and he was coming, soaking her fingers and the ratty bedspread.
His arms crushed her to him thoughtlessly and she drove an elbow into his side with a stifled cry, ribs aching. Monroe released her in a second, apology whispered into her mouth, and she felt her skin crawl a little at his tenderness, his hands suddenly in her hair, on her jaw. But the feeling passed and she melted into him, tongue stroking his and her thighs spread wide over him. Charlie moaned, breasts tender where she leaned against him, desperate for the contact, only to have him pull away.
“We need to change that,” he rumbled, extracting himself from her long legs and the tangled sheets.
“-What?” Charlie stared at him, heel of her hand braced behind her on the bed and her legs sprawled out obscenely. “I wasn’t done.”
He ignored her, hitching his pants up and shuffling around in a cabinet for first aid supplies. Sliding her fingers between her legs, she groaned. “God dammit, I’m not one of your Starlight girls, Monroe, you can’t just use me for sex. I-”
Monroe threw a bundle of gauzy bandages at her chest which she caught instinctively, hand flying up. “Shut up, Charlie. I need to change that bandage before you puncture a damn lung.” He leaned over her, swiping two fingers between her legs so she moaned, teeth in her lip. “I’ll get to that in a second.”
Grabbing his knife from under the pillow, (good to know, she couldn’t help thinking), he sliced the bandage off and unwound it. Charlie hissed in protest, horrified by the tears that sprang to the corners of her eyes. “Goddammit.”
She glanced down her body to the purple and red splotches painted across her left side, the bruises as garish and unnatural as they’d been two weeks ago. “Why isn’t it healing?” she asked.
“Ribs are the worst.” Monroe glanced up at her, dipping two fingers into a small jar and smearing the ointment over her ribcage. “All I can do is try and numb it.”
Charlie nodded slightly, tipping her head back as he wound fresh, if stained, bandages around her torso and tied it off. She focused on drawing slow, deep breaths while he straightened, washing his hands in the bowl of stale water by the door. When he returned, he nudged her legs aside and settled on the bed, back against the wall.
“’Scuse you,” she mumbled. “You have a favor to return.”
“What, making sure your lungs don’t slowly fill with blood isn’t good enough for you?” He tugged on her arm though, guiding her back against his chest. Charlie settled between his legs, resting her head on his shoulder as he slid his hand over her thigh, calloused fingers rough and warm on her smooth, young skin.
Monroe brushed her hair over her shoulder, mouth skimming her jaw as he worked his fingers between her legs, spreading her open. The air left her lungs in a moan and she dug her nails into his arm, free hand twisting in the sheets. He slid his fingertips inside her, not nearly enough to satisfy, thumb drifting in aimless, irregular circles. Charlie arched away from him, hips lifting.
Curling his fingers a fraction deeper, he drew her earlobe in his mouth, tongue sweeping out, both tender and lewd in that way that made her ache down to the tips of her toes. He ground his thumb more furiously against her and she felt her body tense, tongue caught between her teeth as she fought it, not quite ready to give up that deep, tingling pleasure.
“Come on, Charlotte.” It was just a whisper, mustache brushing her ear, but it broke her concentration, blood slicking her lips as she bit her tongue. She came with a cry and a gasp, nails cutting into his scar. His free hand ghosted over her hipbone, cupping her breast as she came down, chest heaving with shallow breaths and the reminding pinch of pain in her ribs.
They lay there long minutes, his fingers inside her and her arms tangled up with his, until the cold room and stiff muscles made themselves too much of a nuisance.
Charlie whined low in the back of her throat, ears plugged and her equilibrium a little skewed, but lifted herself off him and tugged the blankets up. He leaned over her to snuff out the light, the trailer suddenly swamped in darkness. For the first time since she’d crawled in bed with him, the sounds of the city seemed to filter in from outside, laughter and yelling and the more obscene sounds of a tent-city brothel.
She felt him settle at her back, relishing his body against hers, as much as she would never admit it aloud. Wrapping her fingers around his wrist, she drew his arm up and he settled over her, hand tucked against her breast so as to carefully avoid her ribcage.
“You know, I’m not usually much for the cuddling.”
Rolling her eyes into the pillow, she yawned, too late to stifle it with her fist. “Bullshit. You’re a sap, Bass Monroe.”
A ray of sunlight, having fought its way through layers of grime to shine through the cracked curtains, fell across Charlie’s face but that wasn’t what woke her up. Rather, it was the hard pressure jutting into her hip, Monroe’s arm flung over her chest. She squeezed her eyes shut, hands folded on her stomach and willed him to move, but he shifted against her and her lips twitched in spite of herself.
“Somebody’s eager this morning.”
He chuckled into her shoulder and she had to wonder how long he’d actually been awake. “Not like there’s anything else to do around here besides lose money and earn new bruises.”
“You’re not wrong.” Charlie slid her hand up his arm, tilting her head to kiss him. She sighed with something she thought might be content, although it wasn’t an emotion she was all that familiar with. “We can’t keep doing this.”
“You’re the Matheson that cried wolf,” he murmured against her lips, rough fingers brushing her jaw. “Stop worrying; this isn’t even a fling. It’s just- something to do.”
It stung, more than she’d have liked it to. But Charlie was more grateful for his refusal to turn the General Monroe charm on her than she was annoyed by his dismissal.
He was still speaking though she thought she might have stopped listening a while ago; he made her look him in the eye before he continued. “I’m never going to expect anything of you, Charlotte. I know you don’t always feel like an equal but you are.”
She silently cursed the way she choked up at that, faced with watery blue eyes and laugh lines. “Stop talking,” Charlie whispered thickly, sealing her lips against his. Pushing a hand down between them, she cupped him through denim, felt him pant against her mouth.
“Charlotte-” Her name came out as a raspy hiss and he grabbed her hip, the resulting bruise sure to blossom in a day or two.
Before she could respond though, the trailer door banged open and a familiar voice groaned. “For Christ’s sake, it’s Pittsburg all over again. I’ve got the enemy on my ass and you’re in bed with a hooker.”
Charlie’s eyes shot wide but before she could scramble to cover herself, Monroe sat up like it was nothing, adjusting himself with one hand. He swung his legs out of the bed and ran his fingers through dirty curls. “Miles. You’re late. Charlotte was starting to get worried.”
“But not you, huh?” Miles shot back, stepping inside the trailer, a hand propped on his sword hilt. “M’sure you’re a perfectly nice girl but feel free to excuse yourself any time now,” he directed to Charlie, her face still hidden behind Monroe.
She drew her lip in between her teeth, having dreaded this moment even when she’d imagined it with clothes on. Charlie sighed, holding the sheet to her chest and sitting up in bed. “Perfectly nice… but not a hooker.”
Miles stared at her over Monroe’s shoulder, face as impenetrable as ever, before he turned to his best friend, grip on his sword tightening ever so slightly. “What- the hell is this? You’re living in a goddamn whorehouse and your libido isn’t distracted enough to keep your handsoff my niece?”
“Miles-” He tried to cut her off but Charlie shook her head fiercely, holding up a hand. “Don’t. I don’t want to hear it. I’m all grown up and I get to make my own mistakes. This? This is a mistake and it’s one I’m taking full responsibility for. I don’t want to hear any of your macho father figure bullshit. Clear?”
Both men stared at her, Monroe with the slightest of smirks on his face and Miles with his nostrils flared in irritation. His tongue darted out over his lips and he gestured sharply to the door. “Get your things. We leave in five.”
“To go where exactly? Is there a plan in there somewhere?” Monroe stood, shrugging on his shirt and throwing a few things in a pack.
Miles kept his eyes glued to his best friend as Charlie dressed quickly beneath the covers and shimmied out of bed. “Not really. Best we got is to stay ahead of them for now.”
“I think I can do better. But you’re not gonna like it.”
“When do I ever?” Miles grunted as Charlie brushed past him, heading for her own trailer to gather her things.
She felt her cheeks heat up as she moved quickly between tents and trailers, Miles’ sudden appearance having reminded her just how much she hated herself for this not-a-fling, or whatever it was. In spite of herself, her toes curled at the thought of all the things they’d done not twelve hours earlier. Letting herself into the trailer, she groaned in her head that it was occupied, BBH #23 sprawled gracelessly on the bed.
Charlie grabbed her bag off the hook and began throwing her few meager belongings inside, much to the chagrin of her roommate.
“You’re leaving?” she cried, sitting up.
“Yeah, Jimmy’s brother finally got into town. We’re moving on.” Charlie buckled her sword belt around her hips, strapping the crossbow over her back and knives to her thigh.
The blond leaped off the bed, throwing her arms around Charlie. “Oh I’m going to miss you, Cherie!”
Charlie pulled a face over her shoulder at the alias ‘Jimmy’ had bestowed on her but reciprocated with a reluctant hug. “Yeah, me too. Thanks for the bed,” she paused, racking her brain for the girl’s real name, or at least the name she went by, “Lorraine.”
“No problem. Crash here if you’re ever in town again!”
Charlie nodded her agreement, slinging the bag over her shoulder and hurrying outside with a distracted wave. The two men stood on the edge of the trailers with a couple of horses, seemingly discussing the logistics of Monroe’s unfavorable plan. As she approached, Miles grabbed his sleeve, their voices low but not completely obscured by the din of the city.
“Don’t you dare pull a Nashua on my niece. She’s worth more than that.”
“I know.” Monroe checked the cinch on his horse’s saddle, shooting the other man a narrow-eyed glance. “Charlie and I have an understanding. She’s not naïve about what this is.”
Miles released him, if reluctantly, and ran a hand through his hair with a sigh. “There is no way this ends well.”
Monroe glanced in her direction as she came within a few feet, clearly within earshot. “I know that too. Come on, no time to waste. Let’s move.”
‘Moving’ turned out to be more like the post-Blackout equivalent of a high speed car chase, if Charlie was accurate on the definition of such a thing. They’d been at a flat-out gallop for twenty minutes, heading deeper and deeper into the Plains Nation with every mile, and the Patriots were close enough that she could just make out their dust over the last ridge.
There was a small shack and a grove of trees up ahead that they’d set their sights on and Miles and Monroe circled around to be sure it was abandoned. They hitched the horses under the overhang, enough weapons drawn to make them look like a small army, and scoped out the inside. It wasn’t much to speak of, just a few sticks of furniture and firewood on a dirt floor, but it offered better protection than they were likely to find on the road.
“We’re gonna have to fight,” she observed from the window, the dim outline of horses and people pounding towards them.
“So much for your war clan,” Miles grumbled in reference to the plan she had yet to be let in on, already stacking furniture against the doors and sweeping the corners for ammo.
Monroe stood over the pile of firewood, eyes narrowed at some crude symbols carved into the wall. “Nah, this place is in Duncan’s territory. With any luck, they’ll catch wind of fighting on their land and send some men out to investigate.”
By the time the fight arrived, Charlie was tucked up on the roof behind the chimney, binoculars trained on the approaching Patriots and crossbow at the ready. She took out the leader, riding in front of his men, and he slumped off his horse, the others scattering around his body in surprise.
Monroe took out two of them when they came to investigate the tied up horses, his double blades slicing through their throats and blood splattering over his face. She slid off the roof when he was finished, tumbling down seven or eight feet to the ground and grimacing as the abrupt contact jarred her ribs.
His hand closed around her upper arm, dragging her to her feet. “You okay?”
Charlie nodded shortly, throwing her bow over her back and palming a knife in each hand. “Fine. Gonna need some more of that salve.”
“That can be arranged.” They hurried around the side of the building, the clang of swords already audible from inside. There was a crash and Charlie jumped straight back into Monroe as a Patriot, nearly dead if not quite, flew out the window, glass shattering all around him. Through the broken frame, she could see two more bearing down on Miles, though she doubted they were much for him.
Still, she flung a blade into one of them and he crumpled to the ground as Monroe knocked out the rest of the glass with his elbow and leapt through the window. Miles ran his opponent through and they stood there, blood and sweat dripping from each of them, only to hear the pounding of hooves nearby.
“Shit, how did they get reinforcements so fast?” Miles swore, swiping the back of his hand across his forehead.
Monroe shook his head. “That’s not Patriots.”
“You can say that again.” A woman on horseback jerked her animal to a stop, peering at them through the broken window, appearing unimpressed by their carnage.
“You’re kinda late to the party.” Miles wiped his swords on a dead Patriot, checking the man for anything valuable and pocketing a few things.
“Well. Our invitation got lost in the mail. Lucky for you, Duncan’d like to make it up. You’re invited to afternoon tea,” she shot back, voice dry like the buzz of junebugs in the breeze, before glancing over her shoulder at someone. “Unhitch their horses. I want to be back before dark.”
It was a quiet group, careful and fastidious as they picked their way through fields and woods, doubling back again and again to check they weren’t being tailed. Miles probably relished the silence but Charlie felt like she was going stir-crazy, alone with her thoughts in a crowd of people. Monroe edged close to her at one point, their horses snuffling at each other amicably as he reached across to settle a reassuring hand on her thigh. She didn’t respond, only squeezed his hand before brushing him away.
It was dusk when they arrived at a camp, near the town of Duncan if she’d kept her compass points straight, and Charlie had to wonder if this ‘Duncan’ was a real name, or even a real person. They were marched straight through camp, a tidy collection of tents, trailers and a handful of wooden buildings that looked like no war clan she’d ever heard of.
They dismounted outside of a little barn, handing over their horses, much to the men’s chagrin, though Charlie found herself more comfortable on foot anyway. It made for a slower but quieter getaway and sometimes the latter was far more important, if the events of the past day were any indication. Inside, the light was dim, so Charlie had to squint to make out the last sunbeams shining through cracks on a sawdust floor and rows of tables.
“Duncan?” Their female escort walked in ahead of them, hands clasped behind her back. “These are our trespassers. Put on a nice little show at the old Miller place, wiped out six or seven of the Cubans.”
A figure stepped out of the shadows and Charlie blinked in surprise to find that Duncan was not only a real person, but a woman, her plaid shirt and scuffed denim making her look less like a warlord and more like one of Cynthia’s friends back in Willoughby. Dark hair was pulled back in a ponytail and a short blade hung at her side, hands clasped in front of her.
“Bass Monroe, oh, I should have known. They were so cocky, announcing your execution to the world.” The woman laughed, shaking her head as she stepped forward.
A wide grin split his face as he took her hands, leaning in to kiss both cheeks. “Duncan. Good to see you.”
Charlie’s eyebrows shot up before she could stop them, coughing into her hand to cover her reaction.
“And your friends are…?”
“Miles and Charlotte Matheson.”
If she was surprised, she didn’t show it. “It’s an honor. You’re welcome to stay here; we’re no friends of the Patriots. No friends of the Militia either, but, from what I understand your world is all but gone now. I was sorry to hear about Philadelphia, Bass, truly.”
A shadow crossed his face and he glanced to the dusty toes of his boots. “Like you said, it’s gone now. We’re just trying to get a little vengeance.”
Charlie cleared her throat at that and he tacked on a begrudging, “And, you know, justice, or whatever.”
“I’m sorry, how do you know each other?” Charlie finally cut in, hand tight on the knife at her waist.
“And how do we know we can trust you? Sounds like it’s been years,” Miles added, flexing his right hand as if he still weren’t quite used to having control of it, since his run-in with Andover.
Duncan’s smile was thin but it reached her eyes nonetheless. “We’re sort of anti-establishment around here. Bass and I had an agreement in the old days, that if he were ever to take the Plains, my territory would remain mine. So, we traded favors now and again. I’d be more than happy to resume our deal.”
“Forgive me for saying so, but you don’t look like much of a war clan to me. If we’re going to beat these assholes, we need real fighters, people who are willing to fight a little dirty,” Charlie protested. That seemed to surprise Miles but his crusade to save her innocence or her good heart or whatever had clearly failed a long time ago; this was a fight she wanted to win, not just feel good about.
Their escort struck a match on the door and leaned over to light a large lantern hanging from the rafters. As the flame flickered to life, she and Miles sucked in gasps of surprise, though Monroe seemed little more than smug. The walls and ceiling of the barn were lined with an impressive array of guns, swords and larger weapons, right down to what looked like the barrel of a cannon in the far corner.
Duncan smirked, clapping her hands together. “I think you’ll be pleasantly surprised by our abilities. Now. We should get you set up in tents; I’m sure you could all use a good night’s sleep in comfortable beds.”
“Some people have gotten a little too used to having a comfortable bed, actually,” Miles mumbled, tightening his grip on the sword as Charlie shot him a glare.
Duncan arched an eyebrow at that, eyes dancing in Monroe’s direction who at least had the courtesy to flush. “Ah, does anyone need a doctor?”
“Charlotte has two fractured ribs,” he offered, gesturing to her.
Charlie ran a hand over her side in agreement. “We’ve been trying to avoid attracting unnecessary attention.”
“I’ll show you the way, then, Charlotte,” Duncan offered.
“It’s- Charlie, actually.”
“Charlie. Give me just a moment?”
She glanced between Monroe and Duncan, the latter’s body turned towards him, intimate. Charlie flashed a thin, insincere smile. “They’ve waited two weeks, they can wait another five minutes. I’ll just be outside.” Excusing herself, she stepped out into the quickly fading light, Miles right on her heels.
“Charlie. What are you thinking?” It was predictable, but, she wasn’t really sure what she would say in his position either.
A small sigh escaped her and she tipped her head back against the barn wall. She listened with half an ear to the low, quiet flirtation of warriors and dictators on the other side of the wall.
“You always did like them young.”
“It’s not like that.”
“Well. Let me know when you’re ready to pick on someone your own age again.”
Squinting at him, Charlie shaded her eyes with a hand. “Maybe I’m not, Miles. Don’t you ever want to just be with someone? Not that you love them, or even that you really like them most of the time, but just because they’re convenient? Because the sex is good and they occasionally make you laugh? Or there’s just nothing else to do?”
He gaped at her a bit, running his fingers through his hair. “Not really, no,” he said finally, eyebrows drawn together.
“It’s all or nothing with you, all the time, with Monroe, with my mom. It sounds exhausting.”
Miles looked a little sad, like he’d forgotten to teach her some big important lesson and now it was too late. But he didn’t push, just leaned against the barn, arm brushing hers, and murmured a quiet, “It is.”
Duncan and Monroe emerged a few minutes later, laughing, the sun having just sunk below the horizon. The men were bundled off to their tents and Charlie found herself alone with this new ally. She shifted her weight from one foot to the other, combing fingers through her hair.
“So, fractured ribs. How did that happen?”
“Um. Just a fight, near the border. They’re bruised; he’s paranoid.” It sounded overly vague and cocky, even to her.
They walked in silence for little more than a few footsteps before Duncan pried for more information. “How long have you been sleeping with him?”
Charlie stopped in her tracks, shoulders squared. “Excuse me?”
“Bass.”
“I know who you mean. I just don’t see how it’s any of your business.”
“It’s not.” Duncan folded her arms over her chest, eyes narrowed in the dim twilight. “My people tell me you’re an excellent shot, your name is Matheson and you’re sleeping with Bass. That’s just- interesting.”
There were a lot of things there Charlie could have chosen to be offended by, or intrigued by, but she latched onto the easiest one instead. “How do they know I’m an excellent shot? Were they watching? What if things hadn’t gone so well? Were they just going to let us die?” she demanded, hands planted on her hips.
Duncan’s lips twitched into a smile. “I don’t go sacrificing my people for strangers and causes I have no stake in. If you’d have died, I wouldn’t have shed any tears, even for Bass. But since you didn’t die, and you’re here,” she paused to lift the tent flap, “let’s get you fixed up, shall we?”
Charlie grit her teeth but stepped inside, the flap falling shut behind her and Duncan disappearing somewhere into the camp. The doctor bandaged her ribs a bit more securely and gave her a fresh bottle of cream, but seemed impressed with Monroe’s road trip paramedics.
She was shown to a small tent of her own, complete with a washbasin and table beside the cot, and gratefully scrubbed her face and arms, wiping off layers of dirt and other people’s blood. Stripping down to her tank and panties, she all but collapsed onto the cot. Almost an hour passed with her unable to fall asleep, the lantern on the table flickering. It was attracting bugs but, nonetheless, warding off her paranoia that this ‘war clan’ was a little too friendly to be true.
Monroe slunk into her tent, his shadow massive and imposing like the ghost of General Monroe. She heard him sit on the edge of the cot, unlacing his boots, and grunting in pain with every move. She’d have ribbed him about his age but it always made her feel a little creepy and, anyway, it wasn’t like she was in much better shape.
He slipped beneath the covers, arms sliding around her and his cold feet nudging between hers. “Want to crawl up inside you and never come out,” he rumbled into her shoulder blade, large, calloused hands burrowing up under her tank.
“I kind of thought you’d be visiting Duncan tonight.” Charlie tugged him tighter around her, even as she winced, her whole body sore from their Patriot skirmish and her ribs still aching.
“Jealous?”
“Hardly.”
He brushed the hair out of her face, long fingers untangling the knots there. “I’m not stupid. We had a thing, long time ago, but I’m not about to fall into bed with the leader of a war clan who could probably get carte blanche amnesty for my head.”
Charlie fell quiet, thumb stroking over his scarred arm, mostly out of habit. When she spoke, it was with a furrowed brow, voice uncharacteristically shaky. “Do you really think we can beat them? I mean, teaming up with war clans, that’s pretty low, Bass.”
“Miles and I have been in way rougher spots.” She rolled towards him just enough that he could see the skepticism on her face, earning herself a small laugh. “Really. When we were in the Marines, the enemy was either fanatics who hated us because, as Americans, we were the spawn of everything evil in the world or they were scared kids who'd had guns stuffed in their hands and crackpot ideas stuffed between their ears. Believe me, both are far worse than a bunch of self-important Washington lobbyists.”
Six Years Before the Blackout
Miles stood next to him on the sidewalk, reeking of body odor and fried lamb and rubbing at his eyes beneath safety glasses for the fifth time in as many minutes. “Jesus. How long we been awake?”
“I’m so tired, I’ve stopped seeing beautiful women in my mirages and started seeing pillowcases.” Bass adjusted his chin strap with a gloved hand, blinking in the bright, Baghdad sun. “It’s been so quiet around here the last couple days, it’s practically putting me to sleep in the first place.”
He really should have known better than to say something so stupid. Miles flew into action almost before the words were out of his mouth, gun raised and sweat dripping down the side of his face. Groaning in his head, Bass watched the too-familiar scene play out in front of him, barely aware of aiming his own gun, let alone the screams around them.
A young man, not more than 15, stood in the center of the marketplace with a cheap cellphone in one hand and his jacket unbuttoned to reveal three blocks of explosives. If he really wanted to die, didn’t he know one would do the trick? But, no, he or, more likely, the puppet master pulling his strings, wanted to take out as many people as possible. And if two Marines happened to get caught in the blast too, that was probably just a bonus.
The kid was yelling something Bass didn’t understand and he nudged Miles. “Come on, man. Just take the shot.”
Miles did this every damn time, broke protocol. Thought he could save them or something. He always pulled the trigger when he had to though. Usually.
A woman in a pink head scarf tugged at Miles’ arm, a baby clutched to her chest. She spoke frantic Arabic, gesturing wildly to the doorway the potential bomber stood by. It wasn’t until then Bass realized the building they’d been standing in front of was a women and children’s clinic. He ground his teeth. It was too late.
With Miles distracted and Bass at the wrong angle, neither of them took the shot. Twelve dead, including the woman’s three-year-old daughter who had been inside, and eighteen injured.
“How are we supposed to fight this?” Miles asked him later as they sat on the torn-up sidewalk, soot and broken concrete strewn around them.
Bass found he didn’t really have an answer.
“And did you beat them?”
“Well. The apocalypse kind of got in the way. But we were getting there.”
Charlie’s smile was faint. “Sounds like an excuse to me,” she teased, sliding her fingers between his.
“Oh, I’m sorry, I’m forgetting my most formidable enemy: Charlotte Matheson and the Rebel Forces.” He squeezed her hand though, brushing a kiss over her shoulder.
“Ha ha, funny man,” Charlie mumbled into the shared pillow, his warmth lulling her to sleep.
His laugh rolled through her like a faraway crash of thunder, curled at her back. “We’ll beat them,” he murmured in her ear. “From this day to the ending of the world, But we in it shall be remember'd.”
She lay in his arms several long minutes, nearly asleep, before sitting up, squinting at him. “What?”
Monroe rolled his eyes, tugging her back down against his chest. “Go to sleep, Charlie.”
She’d told Miles once that he had to help her, he had to care, because they were family. Blood. That memory was almost laughable now, when she’d been the one to run away.
With Bass, it was different. He cared but he didn’t fret. He told the truth, even when she probably didn’t need to hear it. She told herself that was refreshing.
At least, these were the excuses spiraling through her head as she fell asleep, hand curled around Monroe’s arm, the lines and knobs of his scar familiar.
But maybe she was just tired of crying wolf.