Page 21 of Inexplicable

I’d already spoken with Nina, and she’d been suitably horrified about my experience.

She’d sincerely offered to come back to the US to help me, but I’d assured her that I was fine.

Nina had a family, a job, and a life in Australia now. I wasn’t going to ask her to travel across the world for me.

Other than Nina, I had no friends.

No family.

Nobody who truly cared about my well-being.

And I was perfectly okay with that.

I didn’t trust easily, and my career was all-consuming.

I had plenty of acquaintances and colleagues who shared my scientific interests in astrophysics.

I had people who wanted to read my work, millions of people who followed my blog.

That was enough for me.

I’d resigned myself to a life of being solo a long time ago.

I wasn’t a person who could be surrounded by people.

I was self-conscious about my scars, and no amount of counseling had ever fixed that for me.

Luckily, I enjoyed my own company most of the time.

“What about your work?” Marshall questioned.

I shrugged. “What about it? I can work anywhere. I left my position at the observatory to accept a book offer. I can write my book and my blog anywhere. There’s no reason that I can’t leave California for a while.”

“Okay,” Marshall conceded. “I’m not going to ask about anything else. Hell, I’d like to see Brock with someone who is willing to look out for him twenty-four seven until he’s better. I know he won’t accept that kind of help from any of the guys on his team. If he wants you to go with him for a week or two, I’d be damn grateful.”

I shot Marshall a small smile. “I can be pretty stubborn when I want something.”

“Very few people can find your kind of success without some stubbornness,” Marshall drawled. “But you’re probably going to figure out that Brock is just as stubborn as you are, and I don’t think he’s particularly social with people he doesn’t know well.”

Well, then we have something in common.

“I’m not worried about that,” I said honestly. “As long as he lets me stay until he’s healed up. Just out of curiosity, how exactly do you explain injuries that would usually need to be investigated by the police?”

I’d been well-treated, and there had been questions about the mechanism of my injuries.

But weirdly, there had been no questions about my actual kidnapping. I hadn’t offered any information that the health care professionals didn’t need since I’d been warned by Brock’s team not to talk about the kidnapping until they’d gotten the chance to fill me in on Last Hope.

I’d been so worried about Brock’s condition on the way to the hospital that I’d agreed to whatever his team had wanted.

Marshall had eased my mind with his explanations about Last Hope.

It had also been a huge relief that I wasn’t going to have to deal with any kind of media about the whole incident.

Still, how did they sweep gunshot wounds, kidnappings, and head injuries from the butt of a gun under the rug without questions from the police?

“When I told you that Last Hope has allies everywhere, I was serious about that,” he rumbled.

My eyes widened.