“Yeah.” Harper’s handsome face was unreadable as he fiddled with his pool cue. “Heard you’re here with your boyfriend.”
“I am.” Zack met him stare for stare. “Got a problem with that?”
“Listen...” Harper chewed the corner of his mouth. “I know you probably think I was going to let you die out there.”
“You sure as hell seemed like it.” Anger Zack hadn’t realized he’d had bubbled over. He’d been helpless, dependent on whether Harper overcame homophobia in time to call for help or not.
“I... I wasn’t at my best, okay? I heard you and Cobb and I kinda freaked. But...” Harper looked away. “You’ve always had my back. Right from the first day of BUD/S. Always. And I wasn’t going to let you die. Not on my watch.”
“Thanks.” Zack rubbed his neck, like that could ease the scratchiness of his throat.
“I might not understand...that.” Harper made a vague gesture in the directon of the table with Pike. “But I’m going to have your back when we’re out there, okay?”
“Okay.” Zack had to force the word out. They probably weren’t ever going to be as close as they once were, but this was a start. A good start.
He and Pike stayed a little longer, but the heavy, greasy food wasn’t what Zack needed. He’d made his point.
“Want to get some real food?” he asked Pike.
“Absolutely.” Pike grinned at him, enjoyment radiating from him. He fit in far better than Zack had hoped. Hell, he probably fit in better than Zack.
That thought carried him through the goodbyes and well-wishes for seeing him back on duty and out into the parking lot. He did what he’d wanted to do the past two hours and grabbed Pike’s hand. “Thank you for coming with me. It meant a lot.”
Pike turned toward him. “You don’t have to thank me. You were really damn brave there and—”
“Nelson!” A drunken voice roared and Cobb stepped from behind a large souped-up truck.
“What do you want, Cobb?”
“I want to know why in the hell I’ve got transfer orders to Little Creek and some chick breathing down my neck about a fucking inquiry.”
“Not my business to educate you.” Zack’s hand tightened around Pike’s. He wasn’t dropping it. Not this time.
“Suppose this is your fucking boyfriend.” Cobb’s lips curled upward like a pit bull.
“It is, and you can show some goddamned respect.”
“Whoa. You finally did it, huh? Outed your pansy ass?”
Without thinking, Zack’s free hand fisted, drew back, finally ready to give Cobb what he’d had coming—
And met an immovable wall of granite. “Don’t do it,” Apollo ordered, coming seemingly out of nowhere, capturing Zack’s fist. “Do not get into a fight here.”
“Who the hell are you?” Cobb demanded. “Let him at me. I can take his queer ass.”
“Lieutenant Apollo Floros. And you, Petty Officer Cobb, are way out of line. Are you supposed to be talking to Nelson right now? At all?”
Cobb rubbed his head. “No, sir.”
“You want me to haul you in to answer to Lieutenant Hernandez?”
“No, sir. But Nelson started it—”
“The fuck I did.”
“He came on to me.” Cobb played the one trump card he had, the one Zack had been expecting him to plunk down all along.
Apollo’s laugh echoed through the parking lot. “In front of his boyfriend? Right here?”
“Not exactly...”
“You can tell whatever story you want to Lieutenant Hernandez, but right now, you are going to roll your drunk ass into a cab and head home.”
“I can drive—”
“That’s an order, not an option.”
“You just wait,” Cobb spat at Zack. “No one’s going to want anything to do with you. Not when I’m through—”
“You don’t have any power over me anymore.” Zack said the words, surprised how much he meant them. This was done. Cobb would face the disciplinary process and whatever would come of that would come, out of Zack’s control. But this? This he could control. “I’m not afraid of you.”
“You can be afraid of me.” Apollo got right in Cobb’s face. “You come around Nelson again, your CO and Lieutenant Hernandez are going on my speed dial, understand?”
Cobb gulped. “Got it.”
“Got it, sir.” Apollo corrected him.
“Yes, sir.” Cobb teetered off, in the direction of the sidewalk where some cabs idled.
“What are you doing here?” Zack asked Apollo as soon as Cobb was gone.
“Having a beer. Same as you.” Apollo winked at him. He’d been looking out for Zack. Morrison and Reyes said they’d do the same. Hell, even Harper said he wouldn’t let him die. He’d been afraid of no one having his back, but now he felt bolstered by the promises he’d gotten that night. He wasn’t alone anymore. “But I better get home to the kids now.”
“Kids?” This badass warrior had kids?
“Yup. Two. And a sitter waiting to be paid.” Apollo turned toward Pike. “I’d been intending to meet you under better circumstances. You and Zack want to come to breakfast on Sunday? Bunch of us will be there, and I think Ryan might even be coming down.”