Work Text:
It was late in the evening by the time they arrived back at the offices to wrap up their latest job. Parker immediately made a beeline for the kitchen and her cereal, and Eliot followed her.
“Parker? I know that wasn’t easy for you. Going in there with the horses and all.”
She turned to look at him as she poured milk into her bowl.
“It was okay. Horses aren’t so murder-y after all. I just met a bad one, I guess.”
Eliot smiled. “Well, good. But still. I know you were scared and I… Well. Thanks, Parker.”
He wasn’t sure why he was so awkward just trying to thank her. He supposed he hadn’t had all that many people to thank for a while.
She just shrugged. “It’s fine. That’s what we do, right? We’re a team and teams help each other when they need it, don’t they? You said you needed me to do it.”
“I did,” Eliot agreed. “And I’m glad you were there to have my back.”
“Anytime,” Parker assured him, smiling as she walked out into the briefing room.
He followed her out and, as he looked around the table at the four others, Aimee’s words came back to him.
“I’m glad you found a family.”
He’d been sceptical when she’d said it. Those guys? The people he worked with who spent most of their time driving him insane? She thought those guys were his family?
Sophie turned around and smiled at him. “Are you going to join us or are you just going to lurk in the doorway all evening?”
“I’m a lurker, it’s what I do,” Eliot shrugged, but he took the seat next to Sophie and accepted the beer that Nate pushed towards him.
He looked around at them again. Parker eating her cereal and giggling at something Hardison had said. Hardison looking like he’d won the lottery by making her laugh. Sophie gently ribbing Nate about his one solitary persona that he used for cons and all the acting lessons she ought to give him. Nate frowning and insisting that he was a perfectly accomplished grifter and had more than one character, thank you very much. Eliot smiled as he took a sip of his beer.
Yeah. Those guys were his family.