“This is Rowan; she’s a guest. You’ve already met Beau. Next to him is Travis, and across from Travis are Jonah and Grace. What do you want to eat? There are pancakes, eggs, sausage, bacon, and hash browns, if Allison is going with the usual today.”
Ro looked up at Graham in semi-shock. That might have been the longest string of words she’d heard come out of his mouth yet.
A female voice called from the window in the kitchen, “There’s also toast and blackberry preserves.”
Rowan looked toward the sound of the voice and saw a woman around her age, dressed in what looked to be a homespun blue dress with a white apron. It reminded Ro of what Amish women wore and seemed out of place among the commandos.
From the seat he had pulled up between her and Beau, Zach faux whispered, “That’s Allison. She’s married to that brute across from you, although none of us can figure out why. And that sweet little girl covered in syrup is Grace. Why she’s not terrified of Jonah, we aren’t sure.”
The maligned Jonah threw a piece of bacon at Zach. Zach caught it in flight and popped it into his mouth.
Jonah rolled his eyes and gave Ro a manly chin jerk. “Nice to meet you. I understand you had a bit of a rough trip on the way here.”
Ro looked down to the table and the plate of scrambled eggs, bacon, sausage, and pancakes that was shoved in front of her. A mug of coffee followed. She looked at Graham questioningly, as he seated himself at the head of the table, just to her left. He just shrugged. “Eat. You need it.”
Opting not to argue with him, she answered Jonah. “It wasn’t a picnic, but I did all right.”
Beau spoke up. “How’s your ankle feeling this morning?”
Ro tentatively rotated it in a circle under the table.
“Actually, it feels pretty good. I don’t think it was as bad as it looked last night.”
Graham interrupted, “We’ll let Beau decide that after breakfast.”
Whatever, Ro thought as she dug into her food. It was delicious. The eggs were light and fluffy, the bacon crispy, and the pancakes tasted like her mom’s homemade buttermilk recipe, which Ro hadn’t had since her mom passed away when she was a kid. She blinked back the tears that misted at the memory.
“So,” Travis began, “where ya headed?”
Ro could swear she heard Graham mumble, “Great fucking question.” She ignored him and focused on Travis.
“Home.”
“Care to elaborate? And did you really come all the way from Chicago on foot?”
“I’m a little off my bearings, but my family’s farm shouldn’t be too much farther northeast of here. My dad and sister will be waiting on me. And yeah, I left Chicago pretty quickly after whatever happened, happened.”
Jonah looked up from where he was still helping Grace eat her pancakes. “How did you know to get out of the city that fast? Figuring the distance, walking, you must have left the day the EMP took out the grid, or at least by the day after.”
“So it was an electromagnetic pulse? I wondered.”
Jonah nodded, eyes narrowing.
“I left the city the day it happened.”
“Most people wouldn’t have left that fast. Or known what the hell an EMP was.” He paused, and his assessment made Ro feel self-conscious. “I’ve seen your bag.” He gestured to the corner of the mess hall. Ro looked and was relieved to see her pack on the floor. “You had everything you’d need for the trip in your kit. How’d that come about?”
“As much as I’d like the answer to that question, Rowan needs to eat while her food is still hot,” Graham decreed.
For once, Ro was actually grateful for Graham’s highhanded behavior and took a huge bite. She didn’t really want to explain. After she chewed and swallowed, she asked the question that had been nagging her since she’d arrived, “How do you still have working electronics when no one else does?”
“Just eat, woman,” Graham ordered.
Ro let the question go, for the moment, but only because she was starving. She ignored the stares of the other men as she worked on tucking away her giant breakfast. Whatever, boys. A girl’s gotta eat.
After she was finished, she pushed away from the table and went to stand, momentarily forgetting about her ankle. Surprisingly, the two seconds she put weight on it before Graham shoved her back down onto the chair, she felt only a twinge of pain.
“What the hell are you doing?”
“Calm down, Conan. I’m fine.”
The other men at the table bit back grins at her nickname for Graham. She hadn’t actually meant to let that slip out.
Beau intervened before she and Graham could square off and verbally spar.
“Let me take a look at it.” He turned her chair so he could crouch in front of her and peeled off her sock. He unwrapped the bandage and manipulated her ankle. The bruising was still there, but the swelling was almost completely gone.