Chapter 5
Chapter Five
STEVIE
I’m still wearing the underwear I ruined in court.
That’s what I’m thinking about as two federal agents hustle me through a back entrance of some government building I don’t recognize.
Not the trial. Not Dario’s face when I pointed at him. Not the way his eyes went dark when I came on the witness stand while testifying against him.
The underwear.
Soaked through during my courtroom orgasm, now cold and uncomfortable against my skin, a physical reminder that I’m the kind of disaster who gets off while destroying someone’s life.
Someone else will find the empty chocolate box on my counter. The cookie containers in my sink. The evidence of my complete unraveling scattered across an apartment I’ll never see again.
My brain grabs the small wrong thing because the big right thing has teeth.
The agent on my left is short, balding, the kind of face you’d forget mid-conversation. I’ve been studying him for six minutes and I still couldn’t pick him out of a lineup. Beige suit. Beige energy. Wedding ring he keeps touching like a rosary.
I wonder if his wife remembers what he looks like when he comes home. If she has to check his badge to confirm it’s the right beige man.
The one on my right is taller, darker hair, somehow even more forgettable. They could be the same person wearing different amounts of hair. The federal government’s photocopier running low on toner.
I’m pretty sure there’s a class at Quantico called “Introduction to Forgettable” where they practice being nobody until it sticks.
Balding keeps a hand on my elbow like I might bolt. Where would I go? Back to my apartment to change my underwear? To the courthouse to ask Dario if he noticed when I came?
I catalog him anyway because my brain is a broken slot machine that only pays out in inappropriate observations and crippling anxiety.
The way his thumb presses harder when we turn corners. How he smells like drugstore aftershave and the specific anxiety of someone who’s done this before and hates it every time. The scuff on his left shoe that he either hasn’t noticed or doesn’t care about.
Details. Endless, useless details.
Tall Guy walks ahead, scanning doorways like we’re about to get ambushed in a federal building. His posture says military. His haircut says budget. His complete disinterest in me says you’re cargo now, sweetheart, and I’ve got three more shipments today.
“Where are we going?” I ask, just to hear my own voice. Just to confirm I still exist.
“Temporary holding until processing,” Balding says.
Processing.
Like I’m evidence. Or a chicken at a factory. Stamped and wrapped and shipped out before I’m even cold.
They take me down a hallway that smells like floor wax and broken dreams. Through a door that requires a keycard. Into an elevator that hums with the particular emptiness of government buildings after hours.
I count the seconds between floors because if I don’t count something I’ll scream.
One, two, three. Always three.
The elevator opens onto carpet that’s seen better decades. Past a water cooler nobody’s refilled. Past a bulletin board with notices so old they’ve yellowed into archaeological artifacts.
And finally, a door.
Balding opens it. Gestures me inside.
The room is beige.
Not metaphorically beige. Not ‘oh, it’s a bit bland’ beige.
Aggressively, oppressively, weaponized beige.
This is what death looks like. Beige walls. Beige furniture. A kitchenette with a coffee maker and zero coffee, which feels like psychological warfare.
Someone designed this room specifically to crush the human spirit.
They succeeded.
“Someone will be with you shortly,” Tall Guy says without looking at me.
He doesn’t say who. Doesn’t say when. Just closes the door and leaves me in the void.
I stand in the middle of the room wondering if this is hell. If I died in the courtroom, orgasm-related aneurysm, what a way to go, and this is my eternal punishment.
Beige forever. No windows. No clock. Just me and the crushing weight of Nothing.
I sit on the couch. The cushions sigh like they’ve given up on life too.
I stand up.
Sit back down.
Try to find something, anything, to focus on.
There’s nothing. The room is designed to be empty. To give you nothing to hold onto while you wait to stop existing.
I think about Dario.
His face when I said his name in court. The way he nodded like I was doing something brave instead of something that would cost him twenty years. The smile he gave me right before I came, small and private, like he knew.
Do what you need to do. I’ll be okay.
I did what I needed to do.
And now I’m sitting in purgatory.
I count ceiling tiles because I need to count something. Twelve across, eight deep. Ninety-six tiles between me and whatever comes next.
I’m on my third recount when the door opens.
And the man who walks in is wrong.
Wrong for this building. Wrong for this moment. Wrong for the beige nightmare I’ve been drowning in.
He’s tall. Not Dario-tall, not that lean predatory height. This is different. Broader. Solid in a way that makes you think about load-bearing walls and which ones in this building could survive a structural collapse caused by orgasms.
Stop it.
No really, STOP IT.
But I can’t stop it. My brain’s already cataloging.
Shoulders that could carry things. Boxes. Groceries. Me, probably, without breaking a sweat.
Hands. Jesus Christ, his hands. Big and capable-looking, the kind that have actually done things. Fixed engines. Built furniture. The kind of hands that know how to grip a steering wheel, a jaw, a throat, a thigh.
My pussy just jolted awake like it smelled testosterone and remembered it has needs. She’s blinking sleep out of her eyes and asking who the fuck is that? and how do we climb him?
Light brown hair that’s too long, like haircuts keep sliding down his priority list. Scruff on his jaw past shadow but not quite beard. That perfect length to scrape inner thighs while you ride his face. A small scar through his left eyebrow that I want to lick like a stamp and put in my scrapbook.
And his eyes.
Blue. Not sharp electric blue. Softer. Faded denim blue. The kind that’s been washed a hundred times until it’s finally comfortable.
The kind of blue that looks like it’s seen things and decided to be gentle anyway.
I’m losing my entire identity and all I can think about is what his dick might taste like.
I hate myself a little.
Add it to the list.
“Stevie Reeves?”
His voice is deep. Rough like gravel wrapped in flannel. The kind of voice that makes you agree to things before you realize you’re nodding.
If this man ever reads audiobooks I’m fucked. Completely, irrevocably fucked.
And there’s something in the way he says my name, my real name, the one I’m about to lose, that doesn’t sound like a file he memorized.
I imagine my name in his mouth as he comes undone.
“Yes.”
He closes the door. Crosses the room with an ease that shouldn’t be possible in a place this depressing.
His thighs in those pants should be illegal in seventeen states.
I just came on a witness stand this morning and now I’m thirsting after my federal handler.
What is wrong with me?
He extends his hand.
“I’m Saul Bennett. U.S. Marshal. I’ll be handling your case through this process.”
Saul. That’s a name with good mouth feel.
I shake his hand because that’s what humans do.
His palm is warm. Callused in specific places, the webbing between thumb and forefinger, the base of his fingers. Working hands. Hands that know how to hold things without breaking them.
I want to map those calluses with my tongue.
I want to ask what made them.
Every drop of blood I have reroutes itself to my clit like it’s GPS-guided.
This is a problem.
This is a BIG problem.
I just testified against one hot criminal and now I’m being babysat by another man I want knuckles deep in me. My grief has a type and it’s emotionally unavailable men in positions of authority.
The handshake lasts exactly the appropriate amount of time and I’m furious at myself for wishing it lasted longer.
He sits in the chair across from me. Not behind a desk. Not standing over me with a clipboard. Just... sits. Elbows on his knees, leaning forward slightly.
Like I’m a person he wants to talk to instead of a problem he needs to process.
It’s disarming.
His forearms are obscene. The way his sleeves are rolled up, showing tanned skin and the flex of muscle when he shifts his weight.
I’m in hell. This is definitely hell.
“I know this is overwhelming,” he says, and his voice is so fucking kind it makes my nipples hurt. “I know you just testified and probably didn’t get a chance to process before they pulled you out. But I need you to understand what happens next.”
I nod because words feel impossible.
He’s explaining how my life is ending and all I can focus on is the way his mouth moves. The fullness of his bottom lip. That mouth closing on my nipple. Whether he’d nip or full-on bite.
Therapy. I need so much therapy.
“You’re going into witness protection. Full program. New identity, new location, new life.” He pauses. Watches my face like he actually cares what he sees there. “Everything from before, your name, your job, your apartment, your friends, that all goes away.”
Your apartment with the empty chocolate box.
Your kitchen that still smells like cookies you made for a man you’ll never see again.
Your complete inability to be normal about attractive men.
No, that one probably stays.
“I’m sorry,” he says, and he sounds like he means it. “I know that’s not what you want to hear.”
“When?” My voice comes out tissue-thin.
“Today. We’re processing your documents now. New ID, new background, new everything.” He leans back slightly, giving me space I didn’t ask for and immediately want to fill. “Once that’s done, I’ll drive you to your new location myself. Get you settled.”
Himself.
Not handed off to another pair of forgettable agents.
He’ll do it himself.
Why is that hot? Why is “I’ll personally supervise your identity death” activating every kink I didn’t know I had?
Totally normal hormonal response.
“I’ll stay local for the first week,” he continues, completely unaware that I’m having a crisis. “Make sure you’re adjusting. Make sure you’re safe. After that, I check in regularly, but you’ll mostly be on your own.”
On your own.
As whoever they decide you are now.
“Okay,” I say, because what else is there?
He’s quiet for a moment. Just looking at me.
And there’s something in his expression I can’t quite catalog. Not pity. Not professional detachment. Something closer to... recognition? Like he sees the earthquake happening under my skin and isn’t going to pretend it’s not there.
It makes me want to cry.
It makes me want to ask if his hands are as steady as they look when he’s holding someone together.
It makes me want things I absolutely should not want from my witness protection handler.
Dario just sent you chocolates and you came thinking about him in court and now you’re mind-fucking your marshal. Get it together, Stevie.
But Dario didn’t just anything.
Dario is somewhere I’ll never know. Past tense. Closed door.
And this man with the kind eyes and the capable hands is present tense, sitting three feet away, waiting for me to finish breaking so he can help pick up the pieces.
“There’s one more thing,” Saul says gently.
I look up. Meet those faded denim eyes.
“We need to change your appearance. Hair, mainly.” He hesitates like he knows this will hurt. “We have someone here who can do it now, before we leave. It’s safer that way.”
My hand goes to my hair without permission.
Dark brown. The same color it’s been my whole life. The color my mother had. The color I see in the mirror every morning when I’m still Stevie Reeves.
The woman who notices too much.
The woman who gets inappropriately horny during federal processing.
Add it to the fucking resume.
“What color?” I ask, and my voice doesn’t sound like mine.
“Lighter. Blonde, probably. Shorter too.” His jaw tightens just slightly. “I’m sorry. I know it’s a lot.”
Blonde.
I wonder if Stevie Reeves will scream when the dye hits her scalp.
Or if she’s already gone.
“I’ll be there with you,” he adds quietly. “During the process. If that helps.”
It shouldn’t help.
He’s a stranger. A government employee doing his job. A set of kind eyes and capable hands and thighs I want to straddle and ride attached to a man I met four minutes ago.
But when I nod, something in my chest unclenches.
Just slightly.
Just enough to breathe.
Why is this hot? Why is “I’ll supervise your traumatic haircut” making me want to climb into his lap?
My vagina is actively sabotaging me.
“Okay,” I whisper.
He stands. Offers me his hand to help me up.
I take it.
Two of his fingers could undo me.
His grip is exactly as steady as I thought it would be.
Exactly as warm.
Exactly as dangerous to my remaining sanity.
I follow him out of the beige room toward whatever comes next.
Toward blonde hair and a new name and a life that doesn’t belong to me.
Toward the woman I’ll have to become now that Stevie Reeves is done.
And I’m still thinking about a mobster’s hands and a marshal’s eyes and the way I can’t seem to stop wanting men who represent various flavors of terrible life choices.
The woman I’ll become probably won’t be better at this.
She’ll just have different hair.