Suzette gave Swanson a scowl.
"That is not the same at all." She informed him frostily. Not expecting a man to understand these kinds of things
anyway. "Andi has never been in love before." As far as she could guess in fact, the tall doctor had never even
slept with anyone before. Which couldn't be healthy at her age. Thanks to her puritanical upbringing the English
woman didn't have any emotional callouses in place the way she should. "She doesn't understand how to put
defenses in place."
"What makes you think he's going to be the one that hurts her?" Swanson asked, defensive for his friend now.
"She's much more likely to break his heart."
Suzette took umbrage.
"Merde." She snapped. "He is the dangerous one. He will hurt her without a second thought and who will put the
pieces of her back together then?"
"Bull shit." He flung back. "He's the one that's taking this whole thing too seriously. She's going to realize how
difficult it is being a Delta's woman and decide he's not worth the hassle."
"Actually, they're going to fall in love and live happily ever after." It was Mike's dry voice and they both looked up to
see him standing in the doorway to the hanger. Well able to over hear their conversation thanks to their rising
voices. "Until about a year or two from now when he gets himself killed and we all get to watch everything that's
open and alive and bright inside her wither away into nothing but a shell." His face stayed expressionless and he
straightened up and headed back out the door. "Come on, Suz. Its almost curfew.”
Swanson shook his head. "See what you started with your mouth?" He said to Suzette as Suzette went to breeze
past him towards Mike to return to the Red Cross camp.
"I started nothing. It's your friend that started everything."
"Like she was an unwilling accomplice or something" Swanson sneered.
The kiss went slower and deeper than she'd meant it to. A greeting kiss since they hadn't managed one earlier.
And reassurance too. That he was very much alive and here now. Her hand spread against his chest, soaking in
the warmth and feel of his skin against hers. Missed him. Oh, she'd missed him...
A soft, content sound escaped her and her lips curved against his. "Scruffy." She murmured, rubbing her thumb
against his jaw.
Suzette's hand flew out suddenly, surprising them both.
"You will never speak of her with that tone of face again." She snapped and Swanson, once he got over the shock
of being slapped, was surprised to see tears in the Frenchwoman's eyes. "We are all just whores and games to you
men. I know. We give our hearts and you break them and toss them aside and move on to the next. You don't
understand how a woman must change inside to bear that." She jerked her wrist out of his hand where he'd
automatically secured it after the first attack. "She is more breakable than most of us. You will see." And then she
turned and fled into the night.
He chuckled a bit, his mouth quirking up at the corners. "Well, if they wouldn't let me have a pillow, what made you
think they'd let me have a razor?" He pointed out. "Oh the things I could have done with one, cut the restraints,
then cut the sheet up to make restraints for Potter over there..."
"Which would still have left you streaking out into the moonlight." Potter pointed out, eating his sandwich with one
hand and reading his book with the other. "Hard to sneak away w hen everyone's seeing a full moon on a cloudy
night."
"He always gets caught up in the details." Hector said.
Swanson followed Mike and Suzette out, never one to let things lie. Even when a certain French doctor had tried to
make as dramatic an exit as she could. But dammit, his face still hurt and his fair skin wasn't hiding the hand mark
well at all.
"Ever think that he's a bit fragile under the firepower and the muscles and the distracting comments?" Swanson
said. Someone had to stand up for Hector, since Hector couldn't. Hector didn't even know what was going on, and if
Swanson had his way, he never would until this had run its course and they were bitching about women over hot
wings and football. "I've known the guy for over ten years, and you know what? He doesn't let anyone in. There's a
reason for that." He didn't know the reason any more than anyone else did, but he knew there had to be a reason
for someone to be like that. "But he let her in. Ever think maybe he's setting himself up for a fall when she decides a
military boyfriend isn't worth it and decides to move on to someone easier?"
Andi rested her forehead against Hector's and laughed.
"Oh the pictures you paint for me." She commented. Then she straightened up and started pulling things out of the
bag on her lap again. "Luckily, I'm much more trustworthy looking than you are. So they gave me one." She slanted
him a glance. "Which I will hand over to Potter after this because its too easy to picture you wielding a razor as you
make a run starkers for the exit." She was teasing. Because she couldn't see him trying to hurt anyone that he
worked with. But she could easily see him coming up with other ingenious uses for the razor in escaping. She set
the bottle of warm water she'd gotten from the kitchen next to the bowl and looked over at him. Arching slim
eyebrows.
"Trust me for this?" She asked. He could do it himself. But without a mirror he could also take chunks out of his jaw
while he was at it.
Suzette spun around when Swanson caught her. Feeling guilty over the mark on his face and angry that she should
feel guilty. Or that she'd let him get that close in the first place. And it didn't help that she actually liked Hector
either. She like him and she liked what he did to her friend. For now. But he wouldn't always make Andi happy the
way he did now. He'd turn male, the way they all did, and that's when he'd start making her willowy friend miserable.
She wasn't sure how exactly. Just that men always did.
She didn't like Swanson reminding her of what Andi had told her along the same lines either. That Hector held you
as if he felt at any minute he was going to lose you. She didn't want to start feeling sympathy for Andi's soldier
because then she wouldn't be able to spot the warning signs when they started.
And where was Mike when you needed him to show up and interfere anyway?
She put her hands on her hips.
"You think I have not told her?!" She demanded. "You think I have not said he is more trouble than he is worth?
That she should leave him now, quickly? But she does not listen to me. She gets angry with me. She tells me he
makes her feel safe. And she smiles. She smiles and it breaks my hearts she is so happy. And when he is gone,
she breaks my heart because there is so much worry in her eyes and she will not speak of it. She is not here
anymore! She works next to me and jokes and teases but there is a part of her that is always gone now. Walking
wherever it is that he is walking. And it scares me that she has already given so much of herself to him. That he has
already taken so much of her inside himself. People are not meant to love that way and when they tear apart I am
afraid there will be nothing left." Her shoulders slumped and she finished softly: "I want to protect her. And she will
not let me."
Hector laughed. "I snagged some sweat pants. Or at least convinced them that I should have a pair, so no full
moons tonight. Unless Potter asks me really nicely, t hen maybe we can convince the Rangers to go streaking." He
said as she set up the things for shaving. "You 're the only one." He said honestly. He was sure if anyone else had
their way, he'd be missing chunks to punish him for his behavior so far. He wouldn't put it past them.
Though he was completely capable of shaving without a mirror.
Swanson looked around, expecting Mike to pop out of the wood work at any moment to interrupt them, right when
they were at the core of honesty here. But the ex operative was no where to be seen, which meant he had to be
listening somewhere. And Swanson didn't care less. He knew Mike had reservations as well, and Hector didn't
deserve that.
Their chalk was a brotherhood of the truest sense. If Swanson needed defense, he knew Hector would be the first
on the line.
"Look, no matter what anyone says, this is going to go their way and not ours." He pointed out. "So why don't you
be a friend, sigh over the details or whatever females do and just be her friend instead of her critic? Right now, with
Hector in the shape he's in, she doesn’t need that. I can tell she's worried sick about him and I don't even know her
well. And I know his job is deeply dangerous. Anything could happen to him at any time, or nothing could happen to
him. Its not in our hands."
"Leave the poor children alone." She chided affectionately, shifting over on the bed so she was sitting close to
Hector facing him. Moving one of his long fingered hands so it curled around her hip. Trading vulnerability for
vulnerability. "Swanson has already glared enough tonight for an entire squad of you."
He didn't look bad with a beard, she thought as she draped a towel over his shoulder and set about lathering up his
cheeks, chin, and jaw line. Maybe a bit older but it still looked good on him.
"I learned this with a straight razor." She told him as she started with the gentle, smooth strokes. "But this was all
they had. I used to shave Grandda. After his stroke. I left my internship. He couldn't talk or write anymore but there
was nothing wrong with his eyes. And he thought a beard made him look unkept." She smiled softly at the memory.
Distracting herself with it. Because if she paid too much attention to the way this felt now she was going to get
distracted in a different way. It was surprising how aware she was of Hector's body and its closeness to her own.
Her slim fingers were steady and efficient as they touched the side of his face as she worked with the razor in the
other. "He'd be awake when I woke up in the morning and we'd get him ready for the day. And than I'd move his
chair into a spot of sun where he could watch the sidewalk out the window and I'd run our errands for the day."
Trying to stretch her grandfather's meager pension past breaking to support two people instead of the one it barely
had to start with. What Swanson had seen tonight didn't touch on how resourceful she could manage to be when
the need called for it. "We'd listen to big band music on the radio when I got back and I'd make us an early dinner."
She gently turned Hector's chin for the angle. The lines of his face were amazing. Skin stretched over bone. She'd
never had an excuse to trace them with her fingers before. Her lips curved softly. "We'd spend most nights listening
to old programs on the radio or I'd read to him. We must have read everything C.S. Lewis ever wrote. Three or four
times. I was going to borrow the BBC radio version of the Narnia stories for him. But I put it off too long. And that
wasn't the story I meant to tell you. What I was going to say was that I used to like shaving him." She met his eyes
and gave a small smile. "It was how I got to show him that I loved him."
"I'm not a man." Suzette sounded insulted. "I know when to keep my opinion to myself. I do my worrying in private.
You did not see me dragging her in there to look for that ring, did you? No. I let you help me. Because they do not
realize what they're doing."
Mike, head tipped back against the back of the seat in the jeep, wondered, if he honked the horn loudly whether it
was more likely he'd be shot or actually get Suzette to show up anywhere close to time.
"No, you didn't drag her in there because you didn't want to see the look on her face when you didn't find one."
Swanson pointed out. "I don't know what kind of men you've been involved with, but not every man is like that, and
Hector is in his own classification." Swanson wasn't sure if that was bad or good, honestly. "Look, go home. They're
chaperoned by the MP, remember?"
Hector just listened quietly. After all, talking would mean moving his jaw and facial muscles, never a good idea when
shaving or being shaved. When she stopped to rinse off the razor, he guessed he was getting fuzzy with the
amount of dark whiskers mixed in with the lather and water, he spoke.
"I was always more partial to Lord of The Rings trilogy than Narnia." He confessed with a grin. "Just seemed on a
grander but smaller scale to me." He shrugged, everyone had their own literary tastes. If he tried to discuss
literature with one of his sisters, he was sure he'd get a gushing review on the latest Harlequin romance novel, had
happened before.
"I did not bring Andi because *she* would not have let me go through his things." Suzette told Swanson with a lift of
her brow. After all, for all his protestations, he'd been right there next to her searching. "And I do not need your
dismissal. I need you to step out of my way." He'd chased her out here. Not the other way around. She didn't feel so
bad about the hand print on his face now. Swanson moved with an arch of his own eyebrows and a mocking bow
and she sniffed and swept past.
"But you are wrong if you think they need to be alone for the way they melt their souls together. A room full of your
military police would not make a difference."
She hadn't meant to get so emotional or dramatic tonight. And she certainly hadn't meant to say the things she had.
It bothered her on her walk back to the jeep but she reminded herself that Swanson was just a man and he'd forget
half of what she said and dismiss the rest. The point of tonight at least had been resolved. There was no ring. Yet.
That was reassuring.
"Ready?" Mike asked as she climbed into the seat next to him. Voice dry. She leaned over with a smile and patted
his cheek. Noting that he needed to shave again.
"Much better."
He shook his head and gave a chuckle as he shifted gear and headed out into the African night.
"Suz, leave the poor man alone. He's got enough going on right now."
And she wasn't sure if he meant Hector. Or Robert.