Chapter 8
Chapter Eight
JULES
“Sir, are you sure you’re okay?”
As the guy with the second-degree burn on his arm, the nurse’s question probably should have been directed at me, but it wasn’t. The question was for Flynn, who was holding the passenger door of the SUV open while the nurse pulled my wheelchair to a stop.
I had the same question because Flynn sure as hell didn’t look okay. He was white as a ghost and looked ready to puke at any moment.
“Fine,” Flynn said curtly before leaving the door open and striding around the SUV to the driver’s side.
Milly, the nurse who’d wheeled me out of the ER despite the fact that I would have been able to walk the distance on my own two feet, seemed hurt by Flynn’s rudeness, so I did my best to thank her for all her help and got into the car as gracefully as I could.
The second I pulled the door closed, Flynn had the SUV moving.
Fast.
“I don’t like hospitals.”
He was on the run. He’d been running from the moment we’d left the ranch. I hadn’t really understood that until his palm had grown increasingly slick with sweat the closer we’d gotten to the hospital. Once we’d arrived, he’d escorted me inside, but when the nurse had asked if he wanted to join me in the treatment room, he’d barked something about needing to park the car and then he’d been gone. He’d never even asked if I wanted or needed him in the room for moral support.
I hadn’t needed him there with me, but I’d wanted him to be.
Now I was glad that he hadn’t tried to force himself to do something he wasn’t capable of doing. He must have spoken with Milly at some point since she’d asked him if he was sure he was okay. That implied that she’d asked him the same question at least once already, so he might have returned to the waiting room after parking the car, but I had no way of knowing for sure.
What I did know was that whatever adrenaline high that was telling him to go the flight instead of fight route was proof that whatever had happened must have been unspeakable. I thought about the picture I’d seen of him with the woman and two children… the one he kept on his nightstand. According to Brooks, it wasn’t completely unheard of for a ranch hand to work and live on a ranch while sending his pay to wherever his family lived because there wasn’t always enough room for families to live together. So it could’ve been the same for Flynn. His wife and kids could be in some other city or state.
But his comment about hospitals and his clear agitation that continued now even though the hospital was in our rearview mirror meant it could be possible that whatever thing had made him hate hospitals so much had included his wife and kids. What if he’d lost one or all of them to some kind of accident? I’d only overheard a few brief snippets between Brooks and Xavier about the newest ranch hand. They’d talked about how he never stayed in one place for long… he was similar to a seasonal worker in that respect.
Now, though, I knew there was something more to his story.
“Do you mind if we grab a bite to eat before we head home?” I casually asked despite the worry that was consuming me as Flynn seemed to focus less and less on the road ahead of him. He was watching the road, but I had a feeling he wasn’t really seeing it.
“I don’t mind eating in the car,” I added since I knew he’d be more likely to agree if he didn’t need to be seen in public with me. Guys like Flynn didn’t hang out with guys like me in macho cowboy world. I was good enough for making out in a car on the side of the road, but even without my makeup and nice outfits, I probably still looked too “girlish” but not “girlish” enough to share a meal in public with.
Flynn didn’t answer me. I waited a good minute or two before I repeated my question, but before I even got to the part about eating in the car, we were turning into the parking lot of a small, very busy-looking diner.
“Did you want something?” I asked. “My treat. It might take a few minutes for them to fill the order, but you can wait out here?—”
Flynn threw the door open in response. Okay, so apparently, he was the one who was going to get the food and leave me in the car. As long as it gave him a few minutes to clear his head, I could get over the sting of his silence. I tried to look at the silver lining that with one arm pretty much out of commission for the moment, it would have been harder for me to carry the food to the car, but before I could argue with myself about that fact, my door swung open. Flynn was standing like stone just outside the door.
I had no idea what he was doing, so I went with the only thing that made sense. “I’ll just have whatever you get,” I said before reaching into my pocket to seek out my wallet.
Flynn wrapped his fingers around my wrist and despite the strength I knew those fingers could wield, his hold was gentle. He didn’t say a word as he leaned into the car and practically brushed up my body while he sought to release the seat belt from the buckle.
Wait, he wants me to go inside with him?
From that moment on, I was nothing more than a well-behaved child who did everything the adult told him to. I let Flynn lead me inside the diner and into a booth. I let him order the same meal for me that he did for himself. I sat quietly across from him as conversation among the other restaurant goers’ voices seemed to get louder. I kept waiting for Flynn’s rock-hard body to relax, but if anything, he only became more and more agitated. My hope of helping him deal with whatever was bothering him so much grew less and less, and by the time he’d paid the check and started to drag me back to the Range Rover, that hope had turned into a heaping pile of bullshit that I wanted to dump Flynn’s ass in.
With my arm hurting like hell and the confusing events of the last several hours, my need for self-preservation kicked in. I’d shown this man too much and I needed to take it back in some way. I couldn’t literally take my words back, but damn if he got to walk all over me now like we were no longer equals.
As we left the diner, Flynn’s hand closed around my upper arm. His hold was gentle but unyielding as he began to lead me to the passenger side of the car. I came to a halt as soon as we reached the vehicle. Flynn was forced to stop moving or hurt me by yanking me forward.
He chose the former.
“What?” he snapped.
“Wow, it speaks,” I bit back. “Give me the keys,” I demanded and held out my hand.
“Why?”
I couldn’t help but look at him like he’d grown a second head. “ Why ? Are you fucking kidding me? I’m not sitting in a car with you behind the wheel as we make our way up a narrow highway to the top of a fucking mountain while you’re acting like a bratty kid who didn’t get his way. I want one of us to actually be paying attention to the road and not feeling sorry for himself.”
“Sorry for myself?”
“Okay, wow, so you can speak words with more than one syllable and you can play the parroting game. Color me impressed,” I said snidely.
Flynn made something that sounded like a growl and then he was forcing me backward until I hit the driver’s side door. “Jules—” he warned.
“Jules, what?” I barked. “Jules, behave yourself. Jules, act your age. Jules, enough with this phase. Guess what, Flynn, it’s not a fucking phase for me like it is for you, and I don’t owe you any explanations for who I am or what I do. But I’m also done apologizing every time you stick your tongue down my throat. If you don’t want to regret cheating on your wife or feel ashamed of how good you’ve started to think a guy’s lips or ass wrapped around your dick would feel, that’s on you, not me.”
“Are you done?” Flynn snapped.
“Yeah, I’m done,” I said. He was clearly pissed, but he wasn’t bothering to engage with me enough that I could finish being pissed myself.
“Tell Brooks to come get me when he has time,” I ordered as I dug my wallet out and flung several twenties at Flynn. “That’s for your time away from work and the rest of it is for you to never look, talk, or even fucking think about me ever again.” I pointed to the small motel attached to the diner. “Hey, maybe if I get lucky, I’ll actually find myself a rich-as-fuck banker stud who will be honest about whose lips are wrapped around his dick and whose ass he’s got his cock balls-deep inside of.”
My righteous anger and the knowledge that I was only minutes away from having a private place to cry my eyes out gave me the strength to shove Flynn aside. I was halfway to the motel’s sign-in office when fingers curled around my arm once again. I opened my mouth to rip him a new one.
“Shut the fuck up,” Flynn snarled. “It’s my turn.” I assumed he was going to try and drag me back to the SUV, so he caught me off guard when he went straight for the motel but not the check-in office. A maid was in the process of coming out of one of the rooms. Before she could shut the door, Flynn intercepted her and asked in a sickeningly sweet aw shucks, ma’am voice if we could have the room while she turned the other cheek. Several hundred-dollar bills later and the maid was moving on to her next room with a pleased smile as I was ushered inside.
I fully expected Flynn to rip me apart with cruel words the second he kicked the motel room door shut, plunging us into darkness, but instead, his mouth crushed down on mine. There was nothing gentle or patient about the kiss. In fact, it seemed like Flynn was trying to punish me with how roughly he was handling me as he consumed my mouth and simultaneously walked me backwards until my legs hit the bed.
If this was the way the man disciplined someone, he’d have a line of women and probably just as many gay men lined up outside the room from here to New York. Thank God I wasn’t at the back of that line.
I groaned as Flynn took control of my mouth, my body, my senses. I welcomed his weight as he pressed me onto the mattress. I couldn’t have gotten away even if I’d wanted to because he outweighed me by so much. He wasn’t crushing me, though, and while I didn’t feel the pain in my arm at the moment, I couldn’t help but notice the way he was keeping from putting any kind of pressure on the injury.
By the time Flynn broke the kiss, my heart was pounding so hard that it felt like I could actually hear my blood running through my veins. It occurred to me that I should be shoving the man off me, or at least trying to, but instead, I’d wrapped my legs around his waist. My cock felt like it was going to bust right through the zipper of my jeans while my whole body was going up in flames. The second Flynn’s mouth was back on mine, he let out a harsh groan. All the rational arguments I’d lobbed at him by the truck had disappeared before he’d even finished bribing the maid to give us the room, so I didn’t bother playing it coy. Instead, I kissed him back and slid my good arm between our bodies.
A belt buckle.
The man was wearing a big-as-fuck belt buckle.
One that I’d never be able to get off with one hand in the dark. Unfortunately, the top of his zipper was hidden beneath the belt buckle. “Roll over,” I demanded between kisses. I continued to fight the belt buckle because I was that desperate. “Are you negative because I need to taste you… all of you.”
Just like that, the kissing stopped. I was overjoyed and didn’t give a crap about my hypocrisy. Even if all I got was Flynn’s thick dick gagging me as he fucked my mouth, I’d die a happy man. I doubted I’d even need to jerk myself off while blowing him. The second he began spilling down my throat, I’d be a goner.
When Flynn lifted his weight off of me, I was already in the process of shifting my body so I’d be able to slip to my knees between his legs once he rolled over. I was getting one chance with this man and as wrong as what I was doing was, I didn’t care. Lust was so much more powerful than reason.
Once Flynn had moved, I shifted to get into the position I wanted but then light suddenly flooded the room, temporarily blinding me. My first thought was that Flynn was going to do exactly what I’d said he wouldn’t have the guts to do. He was going to keep the lights on so he’d know exactly who was blowing him. He wouldn’t be able to hide away in the dark and pretend.
Little zaps of electricity popped beneath my skin as I waited for Flynn to get into position, but once the lights were on, he merely sat down on the mattress, several feet from me. His head was hung and his whole body practically screamed what he was feeling.
Shame.
Cold swept through me as reality kicked in. He’d brought me into the room to yell at me in private rather than continue our fight in the parking lot. As always, things had gone too far too fast. But he’d been the one to kiss me first, right? Or had I gotten that part wrong? God, what if he’d pushed me into the room and grabbed me so he could unleash his anger on me, and I’d read the signs wrong? What if I had kissed him ? What if I’d made that first move?
Something I’d sworn I would never do again.
I felt sick to my stomach. Flynn didn’t move or speak. He didn’t even look at me as I carefully sat up. However, the second I made my move to escape not only him but the room itself, he grabbed my wrist.
The uninjured one.
I didn’t fight him. I couldn’t. I was too numb. I’d learned a long time ago not to let anyone ever hold this kind of control over me, but obviously it had all been some stupid theory that had never been put to the test. Was it just this man who made it so that my need to be with him overrode my instinct to escape him? I was a deer in headlights. Instinct told me to run while the blinding lights mesmerized me, preventing me from realizing my life was in jeopardy.
Flynn’s body was anything but welcoming as he tugged me toward him and his eyes had yet to meet mine, but despite every warning bell going off in my head, I went to him. I didn’t resist when the regret in his eyes met mine as soon as he looked at me. I didn’t stop him while he continued to pull me forward. Even when he urged me to straddle his lap in the most intimate of ways, I did it without protest.
I wanted to go. I wanted to stay. I… wanted .
When Flynn released his hold on my wrist, I could have gotten away. I had a feeling he would have let me. Whatever anger had been in him when we’d entered the room was gone.
It was gone for both of us.
But there was no pleasure. No rush, no relief, no physical release, no natural high, no wondering what it all meant.
Flynn’s eyes dropped to my injured arm. He reached for my fingers and gently lifted my arm but only so he could kiss the outside of my fingers. The featherlight kiss would have ordinarily had my insides fluttering with excitement.
All I felt was dread.
I didn’t move as Flynn took my other hand. He kissed that one too and then he maneuvered both of my hands to the first button on his plaid shirt. He used his fingers to manipulate mine to work the button until it was open. He did the same with the next button. Then he released me. I understood the message and slowly began working the rest of the buttons free. It wasn’t until one of my fingertips grazed something on his chest that I stilled.
No, no, no.
I kept whispering the word over and over, but with each button I opened, I felt the thick raised flesh brush my skin.
I stopped unbuttoning the shirt once I reached his stomach. The point wasn’t to get his shirt off so we could continue where we’d left off just before he’d turned on the light. No, his point was so very, very different.
It was intimate, but not in the way I’d imagined it would be just moments earlier.
I lifted my eyes only to see that Flynn was staring at the nightstand. Was he actually ashamed? Did he think so little of me?
Of course he did. Why shouldn’t he? I’d known when we’d been driving down the mountain that hospitals bothered him, but I hadn’t really gotten it. It wasn’t something I could relate to in any kind of way. I hadn’t been satisfied with what had been a huge offering he’d given me with those few words. No, I’d stomped all over that and taken my own insecurities out on him.
I’d been so desperate into provoking him to interact with me, I hadn’t remembered that he’d done just that. He’d admitted something life altering for him and I’d shit on that just so I could use the chip on my shoulder that I did, in fact, carry around with me on him.
I used my hand to urge Flynn to look at me. I could tell that he didn’t want to, but he did it anyway. I released his chin but kept my eyes on him as I eased each side of the shirt open just a little and then slipped my hands beneath the fabric. His skin felt cold, and his muscles were stretched tight over his ribs.
“Breathe,” I whispered as I pressed my forehead to Flynn’s. It seemed to take forever, but when he let out that first rush of air, his entire body seemed to sink in on itself as some of the tension eased. Several deep breaths later, he had his arms around me and his face pressed against my neck. I removed my hands from his shirt, skimming them only briefly over the long thick scar in the middle of his chest, and wrapped my arms around him. For each little tremor that hit his body, I hugged him a little harder. It wasn’t until Flynn felt more relaxed in my hold that I asked, “When?”
“Two years ago,” Flynn murmured. “The first one was about six months before that.”
The first one?
“Heart attacks?” I asked carefully “With an s ?”
Flynn sighed before nodding. “First one was mild… a warning. I didn’t listen.”
“And the second?”
“The second didn’t really give me a say in the matter. Flatlined in the ambulance, got my chest cracked in the ER, got it stitched back up six hours after a touch-and-go surgery that should have killed me but didn’t. Flatlined three more times in two weeks, got dragged back to life each time by very determined surgeons and spent three months wondering how I was supposed to live with a ticking timebomb inside of me,” Flynn explained. He sounded tired. “Jules, if I could have come into that hospital with you?—”
I shook my head and then brushed a soft kiss over his lips. Tears stung the backs of my eyes as I thought back on all the terrible things I’d said to him. “Flynn,” I began hesitantly.
“Can we just sit here like this for a little while?” he interjected.
“Yeah,” I said shakily. It was all I could do to curtail the tears as I kissed him again.
I couldn’t say how long we sat there like that before Flynn said, “Jules” in such a quiet whisper that I almost didn’t hear him.
“Yeah?”
Flynn turned off the light and then maneuvered us so we were lying down on the bed. His front was to my back. He turned my head just enough to lay a searing kiss on me.
“I know you were hoping to end up in bed with a rich-as-fuck banker stud who will be honest about whose lips are wrapped around his dick and whose ass he’s got his cock balls-deep inside of.”
“I’m sorry, I shouldn’t have said?—”
Flynn kissed me hard to shut me up. “I just wanted to tell you that you’ll have to settle for a rich-as-fuck ex -banker stud who is not only single but very gay and knows exactly whose lips he wants wrapped around his dick and whose ass he’s got his cock balls-deep inside of.”
Between the hot-as-hell kiss and the statement that I had to unpack several times before I even began to understand even a tiny bit of what Flynn was saying, the man kissed my nose and then pulled me back against his chest and promptly fell asleep.