14. Alex
Chapter fourteen
Alex
I woke to the faint smell of coffee and the sound of rain against the window.
It wasn't the polite, hesitant drizzle of a usual Seattle morning. It was a persistent drumming that filled the bedroom with its rhythm. Michael's apartment had become our fragile vessel, temporarily watertight against the rising tide of external dangers.
My body was pleasantly sore in places that reminded me of the night before. Of Michael.
He was awake beside me and reached out. His fingers brushed lightly across my skin. The callused pads of his fingertips traced a line down the center of my chest until he hit the trail beneath my navel and grinned.
I kept my eyes closed and let myself breathe in. The sheets smelled like us, a blend of sweat, soap, and lingering sex.
For one perfect moment, I let myself believe in mornings again. I'd moved beyond the mechanical act of waking—which I'd managed even in my darkest grief—to tentatively eager anticipation of the sunrise. It meant looking forward to Michael's breath against my neck.
I turned toward him slowly, my eyes finally opening to find his face closer than I expected, watching me with an intensity that should have felt intrusive but made me smile instead.
"Hey." My voice was still rough with sleep.
"Hey, yourself."
Michael climbed out of bed first, and I rolled over to watch the raindrops on the windowpane. I was in someone else's bed, but it almost felt like home.
Minutes later, I dragged myself out of bed and found Michael in the kitchen, barefoot, wearing sweatpants and a worn-out Pike Place Market t-shirt. It was faded navy and so thin his pec muscles left nothing to the imagination.
The coffeemaker worked on an automatic timer and filled the space with the scent of a fresh brew. Michael moved with quiet efficiency, reaching for mugs without looking, knowing exactly where each item belonged in his space.
He handed me a chipped mug with a faded cartoon bulldog on it, like it was normal, something we did every day. The ceramic was warm against my palms.
"Really? This is what you're offering your guests?" I raised an eyebrow at the worn nature of the mug. "I'm honored."
He laughed under his breath. It was a low rumble that started deep inside his chest.
"It was a gift from Miles when I made SWAT. He said I looked like a bulldog when I focused." He took a sip from his own mug—plain black, no chips. "Apparently, that was a compliment."
"And here I thought you were more of a German shepherd." I inhaled the coffee's aroma, letting the steam warm my face. "Loyal, intense, possibly over-protective."
"Is that your professional assessment, Professor?"
"A casual observation." I raised the mug to my lips, hiding a smile behind the rim.
We moved around each other awkwardly, still learning our blocking, bumping elbows and pretending not to care. When I reached for the refrigerator, he stepped back, and our shoulders brushed. When he leaned across me for sugar, his chest pressed briefly against my arm.
Michael pulled bread from a cabinet, dropping two slices into a toaster that had seen better days. The spring mechanism stuck, requiring him to press down twice before it caught.
"I should warn you that I'm not known for my culinary skills."
"Toast is a solid start." I leaned against the counter, watching how his shoulder blades moved beneath the thin shirt. "When I first started living alone, I survived on cereal and takeout for months."
"After Marissa?"
"Yeah." The name didn't hurt as much as it once had. "I couldn't understand the value of cooking for one."
He nodded, understanding without needing elaboration. The toaster popped, and he plated the slightly burnt slices, sliding one toward me alongside a jar of peanut butter.
"Gourmet," I teased.
"Five-star cuisine." He spread peanut butter on his toast with methodical precision, covering every corner. "After dinner last night, it's only right that you get the full McCabe breakfast experience."
I wanted to live in that small, stupid moment forever. The peacefulness was profound. It was the kind of negative space historians rarely documented.
I took a bite of toast, savoring the simple flavors on my tongue.
Michael's burner phone rang. He told me he purchased it a week after returning to Seattle.
It had a sharp, ugly ring that made both of us flinch. The device sat on the counter near his elbow in a utilitarian black plastic case.
Michael's entire demeanor shifted. His shoulders squared, and his jaw tightened as he reached for it. The man who'd laughed over breakfast disappeared, and he became the officer I'd watched run toward danger in Tahiti.
He turned his back to me and answered in a low, clipped voice. "McCabe."
I pretended to focus on my coffee but strained to catch his words. He stood and moved to the living room.
"When?" A pause. "You're sure you saw someone?" Another pause, longer this time. "No. Not yet."
I didn't catch much, just enough to know it was bad news. His posture told me everything his words didn't—the tension in his frame and a slight crouch that signaled he was ready to move if necessary.
"I'll handle it." His voice dropped even lower. "Yes, I understand."
When he hung up, he stood motionless for several beats, staring at the phone's blank screen. His thumb traced its frame as he turned back toward the kitchen.
"Everything okay?" I already knew the answer.
He lied with his body first before saying it out loud. "Nothing urgent."
"Work?" I gave him an opening.
"Just checking in." He picked up his coffee mug but didn't drink from it. "Administrative stuff."
I let him have the lie, even though it hurt. His eyes kept drifting to the window.
I set my mug down. "Michael, what's happening?"
He met my gaze, and for a moment, I thought he might tell me the truth. Instead, he shook his head slightly.
"It's nothing you need to worry about."
The words stung. After everything we'd been through, he was still holding back and trying to shield me. Protector to the end.
I crossed the room before he could entirely shut me out. When we were close again, I touched him—chest first, then shoulders. He froze momentarily and then slowly melted.
I whispered his name, not as a question or demand. It was a recognition that whatever storm approached, we'd already crossed too many boundaries to retreat now.
His hands touched my waist, uncertain at first, then gripping with a quiet desperation that resonated through my bones. "I can't drag you further into this."
"I'm already here." I traced the line of his jaw, feeling the tension there.
He stared into my eyes, searching for hesitation or fear. Finding neither, he pulled me closer, his hands framing my face.
I slid a hand under his thin t-shirt, and he reached for my buttons. We undressed each other slowly and reverently.
The bare skin exposed our scars to the morning light. Michael treated each one like it deserved a moment of silence. His fingers gently glided over my childhood bicycle scar's raised, silvery line, a testament to youthful adventures and missteps.
They lingered on the faded, puckered appendectomy mark at my hip, a reminder of a surgery long past, before moving to the small, smooth burn on my forearm, a relic from a long-ago kitchen mishap.
In return, I traced the thin, pale knife wound on his side, a slash that whispered of danger narrowly avoided. My fingers brushed the slightly indented bullet graze near his shoulder, a close call that spoke of the precarious line between life and death.
Finally, I felt the jagged, uneven scar across his brow, where a suspect's ring had once caught his eyebrow, leaving behind a permanent mark of the unpredictable risks he faced.
He guided me backward toward the bedroom, with our bodies flush against each other, skin warming where we touched. When my knees hit the mattress, he lowered me with surprising tenderness, his weight following me down, solid but balanced on his forearms.
"Is this okay?" he asked, voice roughened with desire but eyes serious, waiting for permission.
I nodded.
His lips brushed against mine, a whisper of a kiss that deepened as we pressed closer. His cock, hard against my thigh, twitched at the sound of my breath catching.
I reached between us, wrapping my fingers around his shaft, feeling the shiver that ran through his body. He groaned, a low rumble in his chest, and his mouth found my neck, tracing a line of heat to my collarbone.
He rolled us over, his muscled abs flexing beneath me. I straddled him, and he slid his hands up my inner thighs, but I wasn't ready for him to enter me. Instead, I gripped our cocks together, slowly stroking as I rolled my head back.
Michael moaned deeply. "You're so beautiful."
He flipped us again, and I wrapped my legs around him. His lips explored the curve of my shoulder.
"Tell me if—" he started, but I silenced him with a breathless, "Don't stop."
He smiled, a flash of teeth, and then he was kissing me again, and I was lost in him, in us, in the way the world had narrowed to just this bed, just this moment.
He reached for the drawer and retrieved the small tube and foil packet. He paused, a single heartbeat of hesitation, and then his hands returned to me, steady and sure. I watched as he tore open the packet with his teeth, the sharp scent of latex mingling with the musk of our skin, and he rolled the condom on with practiced ease.
The lube was cool as he spread it between us, slicking his fingers and then himself, a gasp escaping me at the sudden, thrilling cold. With a slow, almost reverent touch, he slipped two lubed fingers inside me, scissoring slightly to prepare me for his cock.
His breath came heavy as he positioned himself, and he looked at me again, eyes dark and face softer than I'd ever seen it. He pushed inside me, slowly, achingly slow, the stretch turning familiar.
I bit my lip, eyes closing as my body adjusted, welcoming the exquisite pressure and gentle insistence of his movement. He paused again, reading my expression.
I gripped his shoulders to urge him on. He began to move, his breath syncing with mine. I rocked against him, matching his rhythm, my hands tracing the contours of his back, feeling muscles shift beneath warm skin.
When we came, it wasn't like fireworks going off. It was more like two tectonic plates shifting when the pressure was too much, resulting in earthquakes and aftershocks.
There was a deep breath, a tremble, and a shared moment where our bodies moved as one. The room was full of the scents of sweat and musk.
Michael's face, usually so guarded, was open and raw—his brows furrowed, lips slightly open, and eyes locked onto mine like I was his lifeline in a raging sea. "God, I needed this," he murmured as our skin pressed together, sticky and hot.
He held me after, arms so tight around me I almost asked if he were afraid I'd disappear. His heartbeat gradually slowed against my chest, our skin cooling in the aftermath. He pressed his lips to my temple, not quite a kiss, more like assurance.
A terrified thought in the back of my mind told me to run. It said the connection was growing too deep too fast. If I escaped, I wouldn't have to deal with the possibility that I could lose someone again.
I pushed the flee response back and instead traced lazy patterns with a fingertip on Michael's bare chest, memorizing the texture of his skin. He was mine, at least for now.
"Nothing like this has ever happened to me," I mused. "Not even with Marissa. It was different with her—steady, gradual, built over years."
He tensed slightly at the comparison, but then, he reached up to weave his fingers together with mine.
"This is..." I searched for words that wouldn't trivialize what we'd found. "Immediate. Like something that was always there, waiting for us to find each other and notice."
"I know." He rolled onto his side to look at me. "It terrifies me."
The honesty in his admission made me hold him tighter. Neither of us had expected our connection. Neither of us prepared for it, but here we were, tangled in each other's arms, facing whatever came next.
Suddenly, Michael shifted beside me, his body going rigid in a way that made the hairs on the back of my neck rise. It wasn't the gradual return to vigilance I'd observed before. It was something more immediate.
He sat up, head tilting as if listening for something I couldn't hear. His eyes narrowed as he processed something beyond my perception.
"What is it?"
He didn't answer and slid out from beneath the sheets. I watched the muscles in his back flex as he pulled on sweatpants.
He crossed to the window and shifted the blinds just enough to peer through the narrow gap. The pale light carved shadows beneath his cheekbones, highlighting the taut set of his jaw.
He stood there for a long time, silent and still.
Unease pooled in my stomach as the minutes stretched. I sat up, drawing the sheet around me.
"Michael? What is it?"
"Nothing." He didn't turn away from the window.
I considered pressing him, demanding the truth, but something in the rigid line of his shoulders stopped me. He wasn't being stubborn. He was acting as a shield, placing himself between me and whatever danger lurked.
After a final survey, he turned from the window, his expression carefully composed. He came back to bed and wrapped himself around me. His body curled against mine, chest to my back, legs tangled with mine, holding me with a fierceness that bordered on desperation.
We both knew the moment was slipping away, but we stayed inside it as long as possible. The rain continued its steady patter against the windows.
Michael's lips pressed against the nape of my neck. I couldn't shake the certainty that we'd reached a breach point—where the shoreline cracked under the weight of the tide, and something long-contained threatened to flood through.