salute ➳ 〚h.s.〛 〚a.u.〛

chapter 36 - unbreakable bonds & bright futures

Three weeks later

"I don't belong here."

Niall had been staring across the room at Marlow like a lovesick puppy but he looked over at Piper with a confused scowl when she finally broke the heavy silence that had been hanging between them.

"What're you on about?" Niall shook his head as he rolled his eyes. "If there's anyone in this room that belongs here, it's you."

Here was a conference room on the top floor of New Scotland Yard where a big ceremony was going to be starting in the next fifteen minutes to honour some of the officers who had performed admirably in the events around the London Stock Exchange takeover. And somehow, one of those "officers" was her.

She blamed it on the picture that someone had taken, of her creeping into the building behind Perrie. She'd been wearing a Kevlar vest with POLICE in big blaring letters on the back so it was no wonder that everyone had made the wrong impression.

"I'm just really nervous," she admitted to Niall with a heavy sigh.

He gave her a strange look and then tossed his arm around her shoulders, pulling her into a sideways hug that did wonders for calming her down. She took a big breath as Niall rubbed his hand gently up and down her arm.

"You always overthink these things. You did a really great thing for the city and now you're getting recognized for it. You should be proud."

"I just hate the idea that I'm getting something that I don't deserve. It was my code that started this thing in the first place. I feel like I haven't earned this." The people crowding the room were real police officers and paramedics and firemen; men and women who risked their lives every day to keep people safe. And then there was her, the cause for all this mess. "These people are heroes," Piper murmured. "I'm not a hero."

"You're my hero," Niall told her. She looked up surprised, expecting a grin on his face like this was all some big joke to him. But he was smiling gently and there was a genuineness in his eyes that couldn't be faked. Piper felt a big lump forming in her throat and she had to blink before she started crying.

"What?"

"'Course you are," he said as if it was the most obvious thing in the world. "A hero is someone you admire and who is brave and courageous and protects the people they love and keeps going even when they're afraid. That's you, Piper. That's always been you."

She must have made some sort of face like she was about to have an emotional breakdown because Niall tsked and said something Irish under his breath as he pulled her in for a proper hug. She wrapped her arms around him, tightening her fists into the fabric of his shirt as she tried desperately not to start crying right there in the middle of everything.

"Is he being a big marshmallow?"

Piper pulled back from Niall with a big sniffle, smiling weakly at Marlow who had come to join them. "He's trying to make me cry."

"I'm not trying to make you cry," Niall said exasperated as he threw his arms up. "And I'm not a big marshmallow."

"Yes you are," Piper and Marlow said at the same time, giving each other satisfied smirks when they did.

"All I'm trying to say," Niall insisted as he scowled between the two of them, "is that you've earned it. So just accept the damn thing and smile."

Marlow cooed as she reached up to pinch Niall's cheek. He tried to flinch away but she was quick, snagging his cheek and giving it a good squeeze. "You don't need to get defensive, mi querido," she told him which only made him pout harder and cross his arms in a huff. Marlow patted his cheek tenderly to make up for it and then rounded on Piper, quirking one perfect eyebrow. "And what's this about not having earned it? You basically saved the city."