Um. No. That would be Chase andHalliewho were the most popular kids when we were in Madison High. Football player and cheerleader. Both in honors classes. Prom king and queen. I was the third wheel until I found my own thing, making my own way.
I struggle to match his grin. “They won’t have to know we got stuck in a prison town. We can blame Mav. He’s a former cop.”
“You were on the job?” Chase asks, surprise in the question.
Maverick matches it. “Yeah. You know about it?”
Chase shrugs. “My uncle was a DT in Madison. Had another one who drove around in a patrol car in Woodbridge. Grandpa, too. Made it to lieutenant before he retired.”
“A family of cops,” Maverick marvels, nodding. “I knew there was something about you I liked. Didn’t enroll in the academy yourself?”
“Nah. My girlfriend pushed me to follow my own passions. Help people my own way.” A wistful expression twists his handsome features and I know he’s thinking of Hallie again. “I was getting my Master’s in social work when the world ended.”
And Hallie was taking nighttime classes in psychiatry while spending her mornings working at the local bagel shop to save up cash for her future with Chase…
Maverick nods in approval. “Would’ve made a fine officer, though. You ever handle a gun?”
“Yeah.” A dark look flashes over his face. “Used plenty on New Year’s.”
After Chase dropped Hallie off, he went home to discover his family was just as lost. In the Knight home, there was a gun safe, and Chase used it until he ran out of ammo.
Like the rest of us, he doesn’t like to dwell on the past. I don’t want him here, but I don’t want Mav to poke and prod and ask painful questions, either.
“Maybe we should start moving on again?—”
“Wait. Your hands are free now. I don’t have a gun… a spare gun,” Maverick corrects when he sees the glare I can’t quite hide, “but this might help.”
He removes his backpack. Opening the front pouch, he digs around the inside of it. A few moments later, he pulls out a brown leather holster with something black stowed inside of it. It looks suspicious like a gun, only much thicker and fatter.
“Here. Put this on. If you ever need to disarm a rogue, it should help.”
Chase accepts it from Maverick. “What is this?”
“A taser.”
Whoa. “Really?”
Maverick nods. “I don’t know if Darryl had any handguns in East Jersey. Probably not.” Which would explain his hard-on to get Mav’s during the auction. “But they did have tasers. The COs at the prison carried these instead of firearms. Chloe knew where to find one. She snuck it to me.”
From a distance, it would look like a gun. Up close, it’s obvious it isn’t. Still, if Chase can get off a shot, tasing a threat, he can take a rogue down if necessary without having to kill them.
I don’t ask why he’s giving it to Chase. It’s easy to blame it on misogyny, but even I’d admit that putting a taser in my hand isn’t the best idea. I have my pocketknife and my matches, and I’m happy with that.
Chase gets to work on putting the chest holster on while I think about what Maverick said.
Chloe…
“Why would she risk Darryl’s temper by sneaking you a taser?”
For a second, I’m sure Maverick isn’t going to answer me. And then, with a sigh, he says, “Because she’s family.”
Excuse me?
Maverick thins his lips. “Cousin. That’s how I found my way to East Jersey the first time. I was heading toward that part of New Jersey to check on Chloe and her family a month or two after the Turning. The prison had already overthrown her city, renaming it East Jersey under Darryl’s rule. Her husband was dead. Tim was dead. And she was married to Darryl now.”
Suddenly, it all makes a lot more sense. How Darryl was pulled away, distracted by one of his wives, giving Chase and me and Maverick a few moments to talk before he came up to the room. How Maverick was able to sneak through the house to blow away the back of his head, and we fled, finding our packs and gear waiting for us in the living room.
Chloe did it.