Chapter 17 #2
"But you could have!" My voice rose. "Jesus, Code.
You could have been shot. You could have been killed.
And I was just sitting at Sophie's apartment drinking coffee, completely useless while you were…
While you were putting your life on the line for me.
" I pressed the heels of my hands into my eyes.
"You were safe. That's what mattered."
I stood up, shaking, and went into the kitchenette. Sophie stayed on the couch, shaken. "What did the Russian tell you when you interrogated him?"
"Viktor wants the deepfake technology. Russell is blackmailing Eddie Pope for twenty million dollars. If Russell releases what he has, it could lead investigators to Viktor, back to the Russian funding, back to everything."
He looked past me, to Sophie. “And if he gets you, he could use you to draw out Russell. We need to keep you safe and hidden.” He looked back at me. “And you.”
“And me? What did he say about me?"
Code's expression hardened. "He said if your blackmail leads investigators to the technology, to Viktor's involvement, then you become a liability."
My stomach sank and I felt nauseous. "A liability that needs to be eliminated."
"Yes."
The word sat between us, cold and final.
"So, things just got worse."
"Significantly worse."
"What about everyone else? Angelica, Jase's family?"
“They have no connection to the technology or to Viktor. They're not on his radar."
"But you are." The realization hit me hard. "You killed one of his men tonight. You're absolutely on his radar now."
"I've been on Russian radar for years. This isn't new."
"It's new to me." I opened the freezer and found ice trays. I dumped the ice cubes into a kitchen towel. "Sit down." I pointed to the couch.
"Katherine, I'm fine."
"You have a bruise the size of a softball on your face. Sit down."
We walked to the couch. Sophie moved to a recliner and Code and I sat. I pressed the ice against his jaw as gently as I could. He hissed but didn't pull away.
"Tell us the rest. How did you get away before the police came?"
"We’d parked far away, and went out the back. Krause went to an off-the-books medic he knows. I came to get you."
"Is Krause okay?"
"He'll be fine. He's had worse."
I moved the ice to the cut above his eyebrow. "And you? What else are you hiding?"
"I'm not hiding anything."
"Code."
"I'm fine, Katherine."
I looked him over. He held his shoulders tensely and breathed too carefully. He'd winced getting out of the car and held his arm across his torso all the way down the street.
Sophie stood up. “I need to lay down. My head is killing me. I’m sorry.”
“It’s all right. I can hardly blame you.” I grabbed my purse. “Do you need aspirin?”
“No. Thank you, but I have migraine medicine in my purse.” She opened it and rummaged around. “I’ll take this and be out like a light.” She pulled out a prescription bottle and looked at Code. “Thank you for keeping me safe. I’m sorry my brother…” she trailed off.
“It’s not on you, Sophie,” Code said his voice softening.
She nodded and tried at a smile. Then she turned and headed for one of the bedrooms.
As soon as she closed the door behind her, I turned to Code. "Take off your shirt."
His eyebrows rose. "What?"
"You heard me. Take off your shirt."
Code actually grinned at me. "This really isn't the time for—”
"I'm not propositioning you. I want to see what you're not telling me." I stepped back and crossed my arms. "Shirt. Off. Now."
He stared at me for a long moment, then sighed and pulled his shirt over his head, wincing as he did.
The entire left side of his ribcage was purple—bruised, swollen, angry looking.
"Oh my fucking God." My hands shook. "Code, those are broken."
"Cracked. Not broken."
"That's not better!" I moved back, afraid to touch him. "You need a hospital. X-rays, pain medication, proper treatment."
"My ribs aren't that serious."
"Not that serious? You can barely breathe!"
"I can breathe fine."
"You're in pain."
"I've had worse."
"Stop saying that!" My voice cracked. "Stop acting like this is nothing. You have cracked ribs, Code. Cracked. You could have a punctured lung, internal bleeding, any number of serious complications."
"I don't."
"You don't know that!"
"I know what cracked ribs feel like. I've had them before."
"Great, wonderful, you're an expert at getting injured.
That doesn't make this okay!" I paced the room.
"You went into that house and fought trained Russian operatives, and you could have died.
You could have been shot in the head or the chest or bled out on that floor and I would have just been sitting at Sophie's waiting for a phone call that never came. "
"But that didn't happen."
"But it could have! Don't you get that?" I looked into his eyes. "It could have happened. And now you're sitting here with cracked ribs acting like it's no big deal when you can barely move without wincing."
"Katherine."
"No, don't ‘Katherine’ me. This is serious. You're seriously hurt. And you're trying to minimize it like it's just a scratch or a stubbed toe when you probably need to be in a hospital right now getting actual medical treatment."
He stood up slowly. "Katherine, I promise you, I'm okay."
"You're not okay! Look at you!" I stood up beside him.
Tears burned behind my eyes and I refused to let them fall.
"You're hurt and you're in pain and you're acting like it's nothing and I can't…
" I stopped and took a breath. "I can't watch you do this.
I can't watch you minimize getting hurt when all I can think about is what could have happened to you tonight. "
"Nothing happened to me."
"Something did happen! You have cracked ribs and a black eye and you killed someone and fought for your life and that's not nothing, Code. That's not nothing." The last came out as a whisper.
"I know."
"Then stop acting like it is!" My voice rose, then I remembered Sophie in the other room and I dropped it again. "Just let me be upset that you're hurt. Let me care that you could have died tonight."
"Okay, sweetheart. You be as upset as you need to be."
That just pissed me off more.
"Don’t tell me how to feel. I’ll tell you what I want.
I want you to be careful. I want you to not take stupid risks with your life.
I want." I broke off, struggling for words.
"I want you to understand that it matters to me.
That you matter to me. And seeing you hurt like this, knowing you were in that much danger. .. It kills."
He grabbed me into his arms with a hiss of pain.
He didn’t seem to care as his mouth slammed onto mine.
My gasp met his hiss, then there was just the feel of our lips fused together.
Hard. Desperate. I knew what he was doing.
He was cutting off my words before I said too much.
I didn’t care. I needed to feel this, to feel him—alive and passionate in my arms.
I was careful as I lightly traced my hands up his shoulders to twine around his neck, just resting, not pulling, holding.
His tongue plunged into my mouth like a marauder.
He tilted me off balance both metaphorically and physically, and I found myself sprawled on the couch with Code on top of me.
I looked up at him. His expression was hard.
I couldn’t tell if it was from pain or passion. I must have asked him out loud.
“Passion,” he answered. “I need you, Katherine.”
“Then we do this slowly and carefully. I’m not finishing what some Russian mobster started.”
He huffed out a laugh.
I slowly pushed us up into a sitting position, brushing my hands over every piece of warm male flesh I could reach. Even injured, Code was the most breathtaking man I had ever seen. I knelt up, then pushed off the couch and held out my hands to him.
“I look that decrepit, huh?” he asked as he took my hands.
“I just want you to save your strength for the bedroom.” He allowed me to take a little bit of his weight as he came off the couch, then we walked to one of the two bedrooms. It was as nondescript as the rest of the place—dresser, nightstand, white metal blinds over the window and a queen bed with a wooden headboard.
Code let me continue to take the lead, which I was both surprised and grateful for.
I was in a mood that I couldn’t quite interpret.
I was still angry at the thought of him in so much danger, and I was also bone-deep scared.
Not for what might be lurking around the next corner, but at the idea of him being hurt.
In less than two weeks, he had become the center of my world, and I didn’t know how in the hell that had happened.
Now I wanted to make love to him, not the other way around.
I settled my fingers over his belt buckle, and he stayed my hands.
“I don’t have another condom.”
“Before you, it’d been a couple of years, and I’ve been tested since. I’m on birth control,” I said, meeting his eyes.
“I was tested before retirement. I’m good.” His voice was equally solemn.
He sat down on the edge of the bed and bent to untie his boot. He couldn’t help the groan that escaped.
“Let me, you idiot.” I crouched down and had him out of his boots and socks in record time. When I looked up at him, his pupils were so wide, the color of his eyes looked emerald in the late afternoon light. “What?” I asked.
“You shouldn’t have to do that for me,” he whispered softly.