Desha's Reno of the Turks Fan Fiction

Chapter 56: First Day Back

Kai wiped the spattered blood off of her cheek with the back of her hand, leaving a faint smear on her skin.

“Let’s try this again,” she said, darkly, “Who is paying the Zenshou to target Shinra property?”

The woman didn’t answer her this time.

When they’d begun, the Zenshou had been arrogant, going so far as to laugh quietly when she saw them walk in and taunting the Turks for having to send in “replacements” and haughtily giving the redhead a once over before stating that she’d have to do a better job killing him next time. That comment had earned her an immediate punch in the face and, Reno was fairly certain, a broken nose, from Kai.

And then the knives had come out.

Reno had watched more than a few “enhanced” interrogations during his days as a Turk – some worse than others – but he’d never seen Kai so brutal before. It was as if every drop of anger and resentment she had towards the woman was being channeled into the beatings. And apparently Kai had anger and resentment to spare. Once, Reno had even had to step in and stop her when she kept it up after their subject had lost consciousness… he still wasn’t sure if it had been from pain or from blood loss.

He’d been sorely tempted to stop the whole thing after that, in fact. He didn’t give a cripshay’s ass about the Zenshou woman after what she’d pulled, but he was more than slightly concerned about Kai. Ultimately, he’d done nothing more to intervene, however. He didn’t like it… but orders were orders. And their orders were to interrogate the prisoner.

The diminutive Turk backhanded the woman, sending a spray of red from her still-bleeding nose across the far wall. It stood out starkly against the once-pristine white tiles.

“Answer me!” she commanded. The woman managed a somewhat feeble, yet still defiant glare, and kept stubbornly silent. Kai’s eyes narrowed, and she turned towards Reno, “Give me your EMR.”

“You sure you wanna –” he began to protest, knowing how dangerous using something like that on a person for more than a second or two could be. They needed her alive, after all. At least until they broke her.

“Now,” she added, the calm tone of her voice making the hair on the back of his neck stand on end. He handed the weapon over without another word. Kai turned back to their prisoner, and glowered at her. “You had your chance to do things the easy way. Now we’re going to do them the hard way…”

---

By lunchtime, Reno was largely convinced that he never wanted to go down to the basement ever again, if he could avoid it. The fact that it was very unlikely that he could avoid it indefinitely was conveniently ignored for the time being. Kai was silent for quite some time after they’d finally emerged from the interrogation room, and had wordlessly handed him back his EMR.

She didn’t speak at all until the elevator delivered them to Turk headquarters on the fifty-eighth floor.

“She’s not going to tell us anything else,” she stated, dully, “She’ll die first. The fact that we got anything at all out of her is nothing short of a miracle.”

“I mean… yeah, I’ve never seen someone hold out like that, but –”

Kai stopped short in her bid for Tseng’s office. “Trust me. I’ve got way more experience with this sort of thing than you do, Baby Turkling. We won’t get anything else. I don’t know who trained her… but Remy was at this for over a month, and got nothing. We were at it for four hours and got next to nothing, and what we did get is useless.” She shook her head. “I can make her bleed. I can make her hurt. I can torture her until her heart gives out. It won’t do any good. She’s already decided she’s going to die, and she’s taking any secrets she may have with her. There are some people even I can’t break.”

“I would take her at her word, Reno,” a familiar voice calmly stated, and Reno, much to his chagrin, let out a faint yelp of surprise.

“Goddammit, Tseng…” he muttered, turning to face his mentor, “Haven’t you traumatized me enough for one day? I’m still freakin’ out about this mornin’, ya know…”

Tseng smiled slightly. “My apologies,” he replied, before turning his attention on Kai, “So… that’s your official opinion on the matter?”

“You want me to go back in, I’ll go back in. You want me to keep going until her body gives out… frankly, after what she did to me and to Reno, I really don’t think I’d lose any sleep over it for once. But in my opinion, it’d be a waste of time. She knows she’s never leaving this building alive. She’s just waiting for us to get off our asses and finish it.” Kai huffed and shook her head. “Four hours, Tseng. Four hours of the most effective techniques I know that don’t involve bringing in someone the subject cares about and doing it all to them instead. And that’s on top of everything Remy’s already tried. All she said was… the next job won’t fail, and honestly? I’m not so sure she even knows what the next job is. Or rather, was, given how long she’s been in custody. If she knows who’s pulling the strings on these thefts, she’s not talking.”

Tseng nodded.

“I see,” he breathed, “I’ll inform Veld. We’ll see what he wants to do. Go and get something to eat… assuming you have much of an appetite after all that.”

Kai snorted softly. “Hard pass,” she replied, “If you need me, I’ll be spending my lunch on the gauntlet… not in the cafeteria.”

Tseng nodded and she walked away, heading towards the lounge.

“As for you…” his mentor continued, shifting his attention to the redhead, “Come with me, please.”

Reno dutifully fell into step behind his mentor as he set off in the opposite direction as Kai, and, somewhat unexpectedly, not towards his office.

“What’s up, Boss?” Reno asked, curious.

“What did you think of the interrogation subject?” he asked as they walked. Reno shrugged slightly.

“What’s it matter? I mean… Kai’s kinda the expert here, not me.”

Tseng paused and fixed his gaze on him.

“I’m not asking because I’m questioning her judgment,” he said, patiently, “I’m asking because I want to know your take on what you heard and saw in there.” He smirked slightly and shook his head. “Get used to it, Reno. I’ll be doing it considerably more often from now on.”

The redhead blinked in surprise as he realized that the question wasn’t just a request for information. It was an evaluation of sorts. He snorted faintly in self-deprecating laughter for not having expected this.

“I’ll level with ya, Boss,” he finally replied, “If Kai’d done any of that to me, I’da spilled every secret I’ve ever had to her about five minutes in. If she really does know anything that might help us out, ‘n that didn’t get her to talk… I’m findin’ it real hard to believe that anything will.”

Tseng nodded and continued on down the hallway.

“… How the hell does someone… not completely break down?” Reno asked, shuddering slightly.

“Given how long she’s lasted… I suspect she’s been heavily conditioned against physical pain. To a degree I’m not sure I’ve ever seen before, to be honest.”

“Yeah, but… how?” he queried. It was pretty unbelievable, from his point of view. Reno generally considered himself to have a pretty high tolerance for pain… but no way in hell would he have lasted under torture like that. Not for hours at a time, anyway. The Zenshou had just… taken it. She’d passed out on more than one occasion, sure. She’d screamed in anguish multiple times. But, barring the initial posturing when they’d first walked in, and what was little more than a parting shot near the end of the session, she’d never actually said anything. Reno was pretty sure he’d have been begging Kai to stop… or to kill him… the entire time, had their positions been reversed.

“There are any number of methods. Some use drugs. Some use implants that shut off nerve centers or stimulate the production of chemicals in the brain that dull the pain. Some simply… inflict pain upon themselves over the course of weeks, months… even years… or have others do so for them, until they learn to tolerate it,” Tseng replied, “Given the length of her stay… I suspect the latter in her case. It would be far more reliable, long-term, than drugs or implants. It’s a technique I myself have employed.”

Reno came to an abrupt halt. “Boss?”

Tseng chuckled softly and turned back to look at his protege.

“I very seriously doubt my own self-conditioning could even begin to hold a candle to hers… but yes. When I was much younger, my pain tolerance was, frankly, somewhat pathetic. I chose to rectify that. It… was a useful, though admitted highly unpleasant, choice.”

“… Am I gonna have to do that?” the redhead hesitantly asked. To his surprise, Tseng actually laughed.

“No,” he stated, still chuckling, “Unless of course you wish to prepare yourself for the possibility of being captured and tortured. I certainly wouldn’t stop you, if it’s truly something you’re concerned about. But… I’ve seen you in pain. You already bear it better than most. Certainly better than I did at your age.”

The redhead breathed a quiet sigh of relief and resumed following the Turk lieutenant around the corner.

“Am… I gonna have to learn to do what Kai does?” he asked after a moment, and Tseng reached for him, gently placing an arm around the younger Turk’s shoulders.

“Perhaps. But not quite yet,” Tseng replied, “You’re… not ready for that. And you may never be ready. It’s not something every Turk is capable of.”

Reno swallowed sharply, and wondered if he was one of those Turks who didn’t have the stomach for torture. Watching was one thing. Actually being the one doing it, though? He really didn’t know if he could do that to another person. Ever. And he wondered what that meant to his mentor. As if reading the younger man’s thoughts, Tseng suddenly smiled.

“You don’t need to be the team’s foremost interrogator to be qualified as Second in Command. No Turk can possibly be an expert at everything… nor do they have to be. That’s the whole reason we try to vary ourselves in terms of skill sets to begin with. So that where one Turk may fall short, another can seamlessly take over.” He chuckled again. “You no more need to be an expert interrogator than you need to be an expert in materia-based combat. The skills you do excel at are more than sufficient.”

Reno snickered at the comment.

“Heh… good thing. ‘Cause if I had to be a materia expert, I’d really be screwed,” he replied, prompting a quiet laugh from the senior Turk. Reno’s attention suddenly snapped to their current location as he realized that they’d walked nearly all the way around the the fifty-eighth floor. They were standing in front of the lounge. “Uh… Boss?”

Tseng cast him a somewhat mischievous smirk.

“We weren’t quite finished when you and Kai returned to headquarters. I needed to stall for time,” he replied, ushering his protege through the door.

“Uhh…” the redhead began, only to be assaulted by a sudden flurry of what he belatedly recognized as confetti and colorful balloons raining from the ceiling.

“Surprise!” a chorus of voices cried out, “Welcome back!”

Reno grinned as he spotted a makeshift buffet of pizza boxes laid out on the table near the coffeemaker… as well as a large cake, emblazoned with “Welcome back, Reno!” written in bright red and orange icing. Sykes, being out of the city on assignment, and Veld were notably absent from the group, but everyone else – even Kai, whom he’d thought had taken off by now – grinned right back at him.

The redhead snickered and shook some of the confetti out of his hair. He really should have seen this coming. Rude had all but straight up told him they were planning something for lunchtime, and then there was the walk around the entire floor for a conversation that could just as easily have happened in Tseng’s office – which they would have had to have walked past the lounge to reach if they hadn’t gone the long way. Of course Tseng had been stalling.

“Oh, thank, Ifrit. I was afraid I was gonna have to eat lunch downstairs my first day back,” he teasingly laughed.

---

Reno stretched out languidly, his feet resting on top of the coffee table in front of the couch, one last slice of pizza in hand. The others had all returned to their own assignments. He was just doing a little… cleanup. After all, someone had to finish off the food.

He glanced over at the mini-buffet line. Okay… maybe not finish it. There was still half a sheetcake left, and honestly… if he ate much more right now, he was going to end up in a food coma all afternoon. Which probably wouldn’t be the the best look for him on his first day back on the job. The door to the lounge opened, and Tseng returned from wherever he’d disappeared to a short while ago.

“Should I have ordered more?” he asked, the ghost of a smile on his lips. Reno grinned as his mentor took a seat beside him on the couch.

“Nah… I think I’m good. Ya know… ’til dinner, anyway.”

Tseng snorted quietly.

“Have you finished freaking out yet? I’m leaving for Junon shortly, and would hate to leave you in distress,” he said, teasingly.

“Ha. Ha.” Reno rolled his eyes and started in on the remnants of the crust. He swallowed the bite and smirked. “And no… I’m not done. Food just calms me down.”

Tseng nodded, chuckling. “I see. Well… in any event, Petra and Liam will meet you on the shooting range, and Sykes should be back in another hour or so to join the three of you in the training hall.” He paused a moment, and fixed the younger Turk with a serious look, “Speaking of whom… I need to speak to you about the latter before I leave.”

The redhead shoved the last bite of pizza into his mouth and sat up.

“Problem?” he asked.

“No… merely a courtesy,” Tseng replied, “One that you are not to extend to anyone else before the morning briefing tomorrow under any circumstances.”

Reno’s eyebrows shot up, and he was suddenly all ears. “What’s goin’ on?”

“I simply want to inform you that, as of tomorrow, we will have one less rookie on the team. Sykes is being promoted.”

A grin spread over the redhead’s face.

“Seriously?” he said with a laugh, “Awesome! Hang on… how come I’m findin’ out early?”

“Because if you are going to train for command, it only makes sense to keep you in the loop on certain command decisions,” Tseng replied, “And also… someone needs to plan the usual after hours celebration. I’ll be gone the rest of the afternoon, and possibly overnight as well… and Veld is a bit tied up at the moment with the Board. The news that the Gongaga incident was the result of the Zenshou’s actions has kept him quite thoroughly occupied with the executives all day.”

“Count on me!” Reno enthusiastically replied.

“Just remember… no one is to know until tomorrow,” Tseng cautioned him, and then pointedly looked him in the eye. “And keep the alcohol levels… moderate. We all have to work the next day, and you and I in particular cannot afford to be hung over, as we’ll be observing final evaluations.”

Reno snickered loudly. “Heh… Okay, Boss…” he laughed, “I’ll try ‘n keep things, ya know… tame. Umm… but, ya know… Gonna be hard to find a venue on such short notice.”

Tseng sighed, noting the obvious inflection in the younger man’s voice.

“Yes, you may use my apartment. Provided you help clean up afterwards.”

“Sweet! Don’t worry, Boss… I got this,” Reno said, with a wide grin. Tseng smiled and shook his head.

“In that case… I have flight to catch. And you have rookies to supervise. I’ll see you later.”

---

“Ah, range training…” Reno said with a faint laugh as he located his two rookies just inside. They ignored him, however, in favor of watching the other person presently utilizing the facility. The redhead snorted softly. “Well, what’d’ya know… the Brat’s doin’ somethin’ useful for a change.”

It was rare that he ran into the vice president in parts of the building – aside from headquarters, which he visited quite frequently – that were, by and large, the domain of the Turks… but at the same time, he was peripherally aware that Rufus did make use of them on occasion. Today, it seemed, he’d decided to get in a little target practice.

“I didn’t know the vice president could shoot…” said Liam, “He’s… not bad.”

Reno peered down the range at the target and shrugged. “Grouping still needs work,” he commented, somewhat teasingly, “But at least he’s hittin’ the target.”

Really, Liam was right. Rufus wasn’t the best shot, but he wasn’t terrible, especially considering that he didn’t practice anywhere close to the same amount as the Turks did. And at least he knew what he was doing now. The redhead didn’t generally have to worry about the brat waving a gun around recklessly and accidentally shooting someone these days. Apparently the first time had been enough to ingrain that lesson firmly in Rufus’ skull. He’d never done anything like that ever again – not while Reno was working with him, at any rate – and took weapons as a whole far more seriously. And all it had cost the Turk was a faint scar on his upper arm. Not a bad trade, really.

Now if he could just get the idiot to actually carry a weapon on a regular basis, instead of leaving it behind in his room or his office, or anywhere else other than on his person. A part of it, Reno suspected, was that, while he did sometimes practice with handguns, Rufus’ weapon of choice was the much heavier and more ungainly shotgun. And even though he’d had one custom made for himself a few years back, it was still a little awkward to cart around. Reno made a mental note to talk to Tseng about maybe refining the design a little more. Make it a little more easily concealed and comfortable to carry.

But that was a matter for another day. Right now, he had rookies who were scheduled for range practice.

They, however, seemed to be somewhat fascinated by the vice president, instead. Petra, in particular, was watching him closely, with a slightly awestruck and adoring expression on her face, and Reno couldn’t help but roll his eyes. She definitely still had a crush on the asshole.

“Heh… tongue back in your mouth, rookie,” he snickered, nudging her, “We got training to get to. You wanna ogle the V.P., do it on your own time.”

Petra blushed deeply, and Liam cast her a knowing grin. Reno took the opportunity, while the pair were gathering their ammunition and targets from the secure lockers, to make his way over to the lone executive, standing behind him, just off to one side. Rufus finished emptying his gun’s current magazine, and set the pistol down on the shelf in front of him before turning to look at the younger man.

“Hmph… So, you really are actually working. I thought for certain you’d merely be sitting in your office, gorging yourself on pizza all afternoon.”

“Who told you there was pizza?” Reno asked, grinning.

“Who do you think paid for that obscene amount of food?” Rufus snorted, which only caused the redhead’s smile to widen.

“Aww… you do care…” he teased. He wasn’t really that surprised that Rufus had been the one to shell out for lunch… though he was vaguely shocked that he’d admitted to it so easily. Rufus pointedly rolled his eyes.

“You… saved my life. Nearly at the expense of your own,” he said, somewhat hesitantly, “I’m… not ungrateful.”

“Yeah, well… that’s what you pay me for,” Reno said, dismissively, before smirking slightly, “… ‘Sides… You’re only a stuck-up pain in the ass about ninety-nine percent of the time. The other one percent, I actually kinda like ya.”

“Imagine my delight,” Rufus deadpanned, “Was there something you wanted, or are you merely here to annoy me?”

“Just here to annoy you,” the redhead replied, grinning. He nodded over his shoulder at the pair of rookies, “And to make sure they don’t shoot anything they’re not s’posed to. They’re impressed, by the way.”

“Is your ego really so frail that it depends upon the dubious awe of novices to survive?” Rufus quipped, turning back to the range and recalling his target sheet. It wasn’t a bad grouping, Reno noted, and he vaguely wondered if the brat had made a habit of coming down here more often since their little misadventure in Wutai. He certainly wouldn’t have blamed him if he had.

“Oh, not me. I meant they were impressed with you. You’re gettin’ to be almost halfway competent with that.”

Rufus looked back at him with an expression of surprise that was quickly masked.

“I… I hardly care about the opinions of your little underlings over there,” he grumbled, though Reno was almost sure he detected the faintest hint of pink coloring the executive’s face.

“Geez… take a compliment once in a while, will ya, sir?” Reno snickered, before turning with an off-handed wave. “Anyway… I gotta get back to work. Don’t wanna leave the kids on their own with live ammo for too long.”

He made his way back over to Liam and Petra, who by then had each taken up residence in a lane, and were simply waiting for Reno to give them to okay to begin.

“Alright… let’s see if you guys’ve been practicin’ while I was gone,” he declared.

---

By the end of the day, Reno was exhausted, but in a good way, for a change… not in the I’ve-been-sitting-around-on-my-ass-doing-nothing-for-hours-on-end way he’d felt stuck at home. How a person could end up tired from sitting on the couch all day, he still didn’t quite understand… but it was a phenomenon he’d become intimately acquainted with of late. Being exhausted for an actual reason was a nice change of pace.

He leaned back in his chair, head tilted back, staring upwards at the ceiling at the end of the day.

Training had gone well. He’d even taken the opportunity to get in a little time on the range himself… and discovered that in addition to being out of shape from his long convalescence, he was also out of practice with his backup weapon. Rufus – who had stuck around for awhile to observe – had been all too quick to “helpfully” point that out to him. He’d shrugged it off. He couldn’t exactly argue it, after all. His target sheets looked like swiss cheese, his shots were so scattered. And besides… the brat had been borderline nice to the rookies, commenting to Petra that “perhaps she ought to have been the one doing the instructing, given that she seemed to have far better aim than the Slum Rat”.

He’d done moderately better in the training hall… but he definitely needed to spend some more time down there. It was amazing how much a person’s skills could deteriorate after more than a month of disuse.

Something prodded him in the side.

“Ow,” he deadpanned, not bothering to shift his gaze to his assailant. Rude snickered softly.

“Tired?” the bald Turk asked.

“I feel like I did after my first week as a rookie. Only with fewer bruises this time.”

“And just think… tomorrow, you get to do it all over again,” Rude teased. Reno calmly raised his left hand and flipped him off. “Come on… afternoon briefing’s starting in a minute.”

“Tell ’em I died,” the redhead shot back.

“Reno…” his friend chided. Reno groaned and sat up.

“Alright, alright… I’m comin’…” he grunted, dragging himself from the chair. He grinned as he got to his feet. “Heh… well, I may be beat, but this is still better than sittin’ on the couch all day.”

He stretched his arms over his head, working out some of the knots that had formed in his shoulders, and trailed behind Rude as he exited their shared office.

“So how was your day? Anything new on the Zenshou front?” he asked.

Rude shrugged. “Maybe. There’s a rumor they may have something planned in the city soon. None of my contacts have any idea what, though. Remy and I have been going over my list of potential targets and making sure that the items on it are under surveillance and as secure as they possibility can be… but without knowing specifically what they’re interested in, or at least narrowing it down, it’s a pretty wide net to cast.”

“Tch… I know what I’d be after,” Reno said, offhandedly, and Rude paused, mid-stride.

“What?” he asked, raising an eyebrow. The younger Turk looked at him incredulously.

“Come on, man… This is an easy one. You gotta know what I’d go after…” When Rude just silently stared him down, the redhead finally relented. “Tch… Her. If it was me, I’d be looking to get her back.”

Rude suddenly paled slightly, and hurriedly reversed course.

“Hey!” Reno called after him, “Where the hell are ya goin’? We got a meeting!”

“To double security on our prisoner!” Rude called back, before vanishing around the corner.

Reno snorted softly. There was plenty of security downstairs… but far be it from him to tell Rude he was being paranoid. Ifrit knew he had his own share of that. He shrugged and continued on to the briefing room on his own, quickly taking a seat next to Remy and noting that – save his paranoid partner, and Tseng, who was still in Junon – he was the last to arrive.

“Where’s Rude?” Veld inquired.

“Addin’ more security to watch our guest downstairs,” he replied, “I… uh… mighta pointed out that she’d make a pretty tempting target if the Zenshou are lookin’ to pull somethin’ in Midgar.”

Veld nodded. “I’ll make this brief, then. There’s not much in the way of updates this afternoon, anyway. Of paramount importance is that the Executive Board was not at all pleased with the results of the Reactor Maintenance Department’s Gongaga investigation. The Company will be implementing additional security procedures at all reactor sites, to be overseen by Junon Base Security. They’re already mobilizing, and we may be called in to assist at some point.”

If Junon security was heading things, Reno mused, that would likely mean that Viridia was going to have her hands full for awhile. He smirked slightly to himself. No wonder Tseng hadn’t tried too hard to make it back to town tonight…

“On a less dire note… we’re obviously going to have to find some space for our new rookies. I thought I’d spare you all the surprise and tell you now. I’ll be assigning them to Sato and Saya’s old office.”

Reno sighed softly to himself, and did his best to push his objections to the back of his mind. He knew perfectly well that it was the best place to put them and there was absolutely no reason not to, but… it just felt wrong. Just like it had when the earlier batch of rookies had moved into Luca’s old office. He had a feeling the others felt the same way… but, like him, refrained from voicing it. It was necessary. They couldn’t just leave a perfectly good office vacant indefinitely. It just felt like… like the final vestiges of their lost friends were being stripped away. That last little bit of them in the office would soon be gone. It was sad, in a way… but they had to move on.

“Besides that, Tseng will be in Junon overnight. Apparently preparations for final evals took a bit longer than expected. He’ll be back first thing in the morning,” Veld continued, “So… if no one has anything else to bring to the team’s attention… ?”

Neither Remy nor Kai said anything. Reno grinned jokingly.

“I’d just like to point out that there’s still half a cake in the lounge…” he stated, “And it literally has my name on it, so… hands off.”

Veld snorted an indulgent laugh.

“Dismissed,” he said, with a roll of his eyes. The others stood, and Reno quickly followed their lead, heading out into the hallway. True to his word, Veld had kept the meeting short, which left him with a little time to kill before he could take off for the day. That in mind, he opted to check in on the rookies one more time before he left.

Before he could do so, however, he found his path blocked by Remy.

“Hey,” he greeted her, grinning widely. She’d been off with Rude most of the day, so he hadn’t really seen much of her… and he was particularly glad to see her now, because when she caught up to him at the end of the day, it was usually to quietly commandeer him for the evening. Tired as he was… it had been weeks since he’d last gotten laid. There was no way in hell he’d be turning her down tonight.

“Dinner?” she asked, after furtively checking to make sure no one had stuck around to overhear. The redhead’s grin widened noticeably.

“Absolutely,” he replied. Remy nodded and continued on to her office, presumably to finish up any remaining tasks left on her list. Reno, meanwhile, resumed his course towards the rookies. It had been a long day. He was sore. He was tired. He was still kinda freaked out about the whole future second in command thing.

It was good to be back.

---

Remy sighed and ran her fingers through her hair as she gazed out at the city skyline from her balcony. A cool breeze whipped past her, an early warning of the impending change in seasons as they edged closer to autumn, and she reflexively pulled her robe tighter around her body. She glanced over her shoulder, into the darkness of her bedroom. The remaining occupant of her bed hadn’t yet stirred, and she was glad.

She’d meant to break things off tonight.

Instead, she’d given in to desire and let the redhead seduce her again. Not that it had really taken much effort on his part. He was… so hard to resist. She could still smell him on her skin, and the scent was intoxicating. She wanted him, even now… even after she’d already had him.

And that was why this had to end.

He was becoming almost an addiction, and the more she partook, the more danger she was in of losing her objectivity. She loved him, dearly. He was sweet and kind and affectionate almost to a fault. How could she not? But she wasn’t in love with him. Not yet. It had to end before that changed, because if she let that happen, there would be no going back.

The more fanciful part of her wondered if it would really be so terrible… so detrimental… to simply let go and allow herself to fall for Reno completely. Her more realistic side, however, was screaming at her to think logically. Reno had been very clear from the beginning. He didn’t want a significant other or a commitment or a partnership. He wanted someone to satisfy his physical needs without any messy emotions getting in the way. And she didn’t want to take on the massive risk that came with falling in love with a comrade in arms.

It had to end. As charming and beautiful and sexy as he was… it had to end, before she couldn’t bring herself to end it at all.

She resolved to do just that… but in the morning. Remy stepped back inside and silently slid the balcony doors shut. She slipped back into bed with the slumbering redhead, and wrapped her arms around him. Reno woke a moment later, his eyes fluttering open. He grinned at her in the darkness.

“Still in the mood, huh?” he teased. Remy smiled slightly and leaned in closer, claiming his lips with her own. “Heh… I’ll take that as a yes.”

Maybe this, too, was a mistake. But if this was going to be her last night with him, she was going to make the most of it.

~end chapter 56~