Chapter 17
17
Asher
Sienna’s warm body stirred in my arms. I’d been skating on the edge of a weird dream, only to be brought out of it with her naked body curled up against my chest. At least I wasn’t waking up in a cold sweat like some mornings.
It had been a while since I’d woken up with a woman, but after the night we’d had together, passing out in her bed with her just felt natural.
Making love to her had been mind-blowing, and the more I thought about it, the stiffer my dick became. I wanted to wake her up and do it all over again, but time had other plans. The sun was glowing brighter through her window now. That meant alarms would go off soon, ruining this moment.
I placed a kiss on her shoulder, right where the bullet had entered her body. I knew firsthand how that felt—that burning sting of lead tearing through your flesh. I’d never had a bullet shatter a bone though, so I knew hers hurt worse.
Her body might be mostly healed, but she was still healing. Yesterday, taking her to the range… I couldn’t regret that decision. I wanted her in my life which meant she had to embrace all sides of me, just like I had to respect all of her—wounds and all.
Her black hair was messy and wild from my hands being woven in it while she’d used that wicked mouth on me. Just thinking about how she’d sucked the shit out of me was sending blood right back into it. I wanted to flip her around and plant her clit right back on my mouth again. Make her lose count on how many times I’d made her come.
It sucked that she had to go to work. I wanted to make her cry out my name a dozen more times. I moved a lock of her hair off her shoulder, studying the small, strawberry birthmark on her neck. It felt familiar, like a memory I couldn’t place.
Sienna drew in a deep breath and then yawned. She turned to face me, brightening my morning with the beauty of her smile. I just wanted to crawl back inside her and spend hours slowly fucking her into oblivion.
She blinked up at me. “Morning.”
I brushed the hair off her face, falling hard for her smile. The thought of spending the rest of my life waking up to this woman crossed my mind. “Morning, babe.”
She snuggled into my chest. “I don’t want to get up.”
I couldn’t remember the last time I’d felt this peaceful and rested, as if all the noise in my head was silenced in her presence. I kissed her forehead, loving how she snuggled deeper.
Her old alarm clock started buzzing a few seconds before my phone went off. Seven o’clock came way too soon. She pushed up off the bed and twisted her naked body across my chest to reach the alarm. As soon as she turned hers off, she handed me my cell. I tapped the screen and tossed it to the side, seizing the opportunity to hold her on top of me. I pulled her mouth to mine.
Just like last night, she instantly melted into me, giving me back everything I was feeling. I grabbed her thigh. “Climb up on me.”
“I’m going to be late,” she said while sucking my lip. She scraped her teeth in that way that would lead to more.
I spread her wider, seeking the heat between her legs. “I’ll be quick.” A moment later, I had her on her back, fingers hard at work while she moaned in my mouth. My own needs would have to wait. We’d spent the few condoms I’d had in my pack, and as much as I wanted to seat myself in that hot wetness, I knew she wasn’t on any birth control.
I worked her deep, enjoying how hard she was breathing, putting her pleas for me not to stop right in my mouth.
“That’s it, babe. Let go.” I could spend my life watching Sienna unravel. It was a beautiful sight, feeling her walls flutter and clamp down on my fingers as she cried out.
It was a heady thing, that power to make her quake and shudder in the aftershocks. I planted a kiss on her, loving how she smiled on my lips.
I knew she was watching me as I headed to her bathroom. I turned the shower on while I was in there. A few minutes later, she joined me in the tub, and with a talented, soapy hand, she drained the ache right out of me.
I was on the treadmill when Hawk finally met me in the gym at the station. We tried to meet up at least twice a week on our days off to get a session in, but now that he was deep in love with Skye, getting him to show up once a week was like pulling teeth.
We used to hit up one of the local gyms when finding a woman in tight workout gear was a priority. Now, free workouts at the station were enough.
Hawk was like a brother to me, like the brother I wished I had. My own brother Liam was turning into nothing more than a distant memory. We’d had our issues as kids, but those issues had turned into insurmountable obstacles.
“What’s up, Dipshit,” Hawk said as he set his mug of coffee down on the table in our exercise room. Instead of getting to it, he sat there, legs crossed at the ankles, sipping his drink.
I kept my pace at a good jog, feeling another trickle of sweat drip down my neck. It didn’t matter how much I pushed my body; nothing was going to erase the taste of Sienna from my mind. I was going to refresh those memories again tonight. I’d have to stop at my place for a change of clothes and fifty more condoms.
“Well, someone is finally smiling.”
I glanced over at Hawk and that smug grin he was hiding behind his coffee mug. And then he froze.
“You got laid last night,” he said way too loud.
I managed a shrug. Yeah, there was no hiding it. I was in a great fucking mood.
“Things better?” he asked.
I knew what he was asking. Hawk knew Sienna had put me in radio silence while we’d been on shift Saturday. There were things I wasn’t going to share, like her ex taking a shot at her, but if things progressed to where she felt like sharing that with others, then I’d leave that up to her.
The treadmill beeped, taking my pace down to a brisk walk, and then slower. I pressed the power button and stepped off. My thighs were still in motion.
“Well?” Hawk asked as if he was annoyed by me not answering quick enough. I grabbed the chair across from him and sat down.
I rubbed a towel over my head. “I saw her yesterday.”
“And?” he prompted.
“Woke up with her this morning.”
Hawk’s smile widened. “It’s a good feeling, right?”
It was beyond good. “Different.”
He studied me for a long while, and then he shrugged. “When you know, you know. Hits you right between the eyes, bro. One minute you’re happy flying solo, and the next all you want is to make pancakes naked together.”
“Yeah. Took that hit last night.” Maybe it hit me on the range first, or when I had her in my office, deescalating her panic. Or when I had her beneath me in her bed, her greedy hands on my ass pulling me in. Somewhere in between all of that, she’d wrapped my heart in her hands. “Seeing her tonight.”
Hawk finished his coffee, set his mug down, and stood. Then he cracked me in the arm. “Good. Maybe you’ll stop being such a miserable prick from now on.”
It was a joke, but his words hit deep. I’d been going through life, doing whatever I wanted, but doing it solo. No ties. No one nagging me or expecting anything that led to their disappointment. Sienna had shown me some unhappiness yesterday when I decided she was going to get over her fear of weapons. “I took her to the range yesterday.”
Hawk slid another twenty-pound weight onto the bench press bar. “So romantic. And she still fucked you after that?”
I couldn’t hide my smile. “She was actually a good shot.”
“Great. Now you’re teaching your crazy girlfriends how to kill you. Smart move.” Hawk sat back on the bench press and slid beneath the bar. “Spot me.”
I stood behind the bench, counting his reps as he pushed the bar. Sienna hadn’t been the same after we’d left the private range. I saw her find new confidence, and the way she let her guard down last night as she pressed her hands into my chest while taking me deep inside her, it had changed me too in ways I couldn’t quite describe.
A woman that into me wouldn’t stray… would she? I’d thought that before in the past and look where that got me—on a one-way bus to Fort Benning.
Hawk groaned loudly on that final push. I grabbed the bar and set it back on the rack before it could fall back on his chest.
He sat up and grabbed his towel. “Glad to see you happy, bro, but for real… Be careful. A woman who doesn’t text back these days has one foot out the door. I send a message to Skye and she’s replying twenty seconds later.”
I sat down at the workout station to do some chest presses, feeling the strain from several hours of phenomenal sex ache through my muscles. “I know. She actually broke her phone.”
Hawk stared at me like I was fucking stupid.
“I saw it. She showed it to me when I went over to her place after shift yesterday. Her screen was shattered from the blast at the mall.”
He rested his hands on his hips. By the way his jaw was working back and forth, he was holding back giving me his thoughts.
I did a set of chest presses. “Say what you’re gonna say already.”
“Is she good for you?” He tapped his chest. “She’s a gorgeous woman, Hayes. No denying that. But women that pretty bring complications. Just wondering if that blast fucked her up to where you feel good about fixing her.”
Those words lingered for the rest of the day. I’d been running on adrenaline and distractions for almost two decades, trying to put the sting of past betrayal in a grave of its own. It was time to put that shit to bed forever. Liam. Jillian. Seeing my Army brothers get their hearts pulverized by women who weren’t in it for the long haul, like my mother had been. Dedicated to a man who was on the road more than he’d been home.
The man hadn’t been much of a father figure. Hard to be that when you’re never around, leaving Mom’s care up to two kids struggling to become men on their own. Sienna was young… younger than me. I had eleven more years of bullshit to contend with. And she’d lived a lifetime of regret on her own. Maybe she was exactly what I needed—someone to figure out how to have a beautiful life in a fucked-up world with me.
Last night had gone way beyond sex. I know she’d felt it too. Last night, everything changed, and I was good with that.
One thing I was absolutely sure of: I couldn’t wait to see her again.