Selfish

Eli grinned and nodded his agreement. “Yeah… you’re right.” Sighing, he gave Scarlet a squeeze and turned to kiss her lips gently. “I’ll go to bed and leave them be. Hunter can leave whenever he wants…” 

The movie was long over. The lights were off. The apartment was quiet. Hunter’s fluttered open and he sighed, nuzzling into the warm bundle in his arms. Wait… where was he? He opened his eyes again. Oh yeah. He was at Ryan and Eli’s apartment. He yawned and looked at his watch. It was well after midnight and he sighed. Straightening out a bit, he ran his finger along Ryan’s cheek. He hated to wake her. But it was only right that he go home. They weren’t at the ranch anymore after all. 

Putting the footrest down, he took Ryan in his arms and stood, taking her with him. Carrying her to the hall, he squinted in the dark and paused at the first door, but heard snoring. Nope. The next door was cracked open, and he nudged it open further with his foot. Ah, yep. There was enough moonlight streaming in through the window so he didn’t trip over anything and kill himself, and he carefully went to the bed, gently setting Ryan down. Feeling for her blanket, he pulled it up over her, and leaned down to lightly kiss her lips. “Goodnight,” he whispered. 

Back out in the hall, he almost ran into Zidan, and patted the dog’s head. “Go watch your mistress,” he suggested quietly. "Make sure she doesn't have nay nightmares." Yawning again, he shuffled to the front door where he put his boots and jacket on and grabbed his motorcycle gloves. Maybe he’d take the long way home and enjoy the fresh air. 


As Sam joined him once again, Hal sighed a little and downed the rest of his coffee. There was a rather awkward silence for a few minutes until he finally turned towards her. "I'm sorry," he apologized quietly. "For earlier." He pursed his lips as he studied her face. "I didn't have any right to butt in. You're in charge of Aaron and... I'm sure you can handle yourself a lot better than I gave you credit for." 

His eyes fell to the desk and he shrugged. "I guess I just wanna make sure you're safe, that's all. I don't trust Aaron's intentions and if he hurt you I'd probably kill him, and I don't wanna end up in jail for murder." A sliver of a smile came to his lips and he gave Sam a sidelong glance. "So really, I was just being selfish."


Justin took a moment to study the pictures Scott had taken, silently mulling over Hope's words. "He's lonely and just wants peace," he mused. "Domino sleeping like that is about as peaceful as you can get and he caught it with his camera. The flower is interesting since he took to what he could relate to - something lonely. But the flower had strength to survive and I think Scott's subconscious is trying to do the same. Survive." 

He turned back to Hope, still thinking. "If Garret can tolerate me for a few minutes, I wanna talk to him about Scott controlling his data and see if he's got any suggestions. I have an idea about him helping Scott take his aggression out too, but that's only if Scott can handle it, and only if Garret will play nice with me." He sighed. And now they were on to his own issues. "Nate's still gone, so maybe I can get away with talking to him without any evil stares. I know I messed up but I wish Nate would give me a break."