Chapter 6 #2
I groan and murmur into her mouth, “I want you now Dag, but you’re hurt.
” She laughs and pushes me back to lie flat on the bed and slides onto me in a graceful move that should confuse me because she’s been stabbed, right?
But whatever I thought flies from my head as she lowers herself, all the honey warmth of her pussy enveloping my cock all the way down until she sits on my balls.
“My god. I must be in heaven and you feel like a very naughty angel, perfect—”
She moves then, shutting me up and all I can do is groan as pleasure thunders through me like my blood’s been lit on fire. Reaching for her greedily, I hold her full breasts in my hands as she leans forward, murmuring. I can’t understand what she’s saying and that’s so strange.
I squeeze her nipples to hear her moan and she laughs, pressing against me, covering my mouth with hers as she moves her hips up and down effortlessly.
I want to please her, to ask her how she feels, but the inferno inside me is so close to exploding as she moves relentlessly.
Feeling helpless as the crescendo of desire rushes to its peak, I call out her name--
Starting awake, I find myself in a dark hospital room, sweaty, and my hand holding hers, shaking. Fuck. She’s still hooked up to the IV, still bandaged, still recovering from stab wounds.
And I’m still a fool for her.
In the morning after the nurses shoo me out of the room and go back to Holy Trinity Security’s office-residence that I’d rather refer to as headquarters—I freshen up.
Then I turn around and return to Mass General Hospital, a short walk down the street from our headquarters.
It feels a lot like being in the service again. We sleep where we work.
Not that I’ve had much of a life outside work as State Police Captain for the past dozen years. Martha’s Vineyard is a small island and Captain was my identity. My friends, and everyone else on the island who didn’t report to me, called me Cap.
Now I’m Collin again, but even without the title of Lieutenant, I feel more like I’m back in the unit than back to who I was before any of that.
In fact, I don’t even remember what it’s like to be Collin.
I have no idea who that man is if he’s not on a mission, protecting, rescuing, or going up against the enemy, more often than not involving violence.
As I knock on the door and walk into her hospital room, a terrible déjà vu takes hold and stills me.
From across the room, Dagmar beckons me to the bed, more awake than last night.
I move forward automatically, shaking the dark thoughts as she surprises me when she reaches for my hand.
I don’t question the gesture. Taking her hand in mine, I sit in the chair that was last night’s bed.
“Feeling better this morning?”
She snorts and my heart double-taps. I’m about to lean in and dare a small kiss when the door swings open and Joe walks in. He has Kat with him. I straighten, but I don’t get up and I don’t let go of Dag’s hand.
“Good morning, Dag,” Joe says. “I see you’re still lying down on the job.”
She lifts the hand I’m not holding, needle, tube and all, and flips Joe her middle finger, but she gives him a grin, only slightly weakened by her sorry state.
Joe laughs and moves into the room with Kat, until they’re bedside. I don’t stand or say a word since this is Dag’s party. Or it should be. Kat’s eyes are on me and I notice her glance down at my hand holding Dag’s. I don’t tug it away.
“I wanted to personally thank you. Both of you.” Kat’s eyes flick briefly to encompass Dag. She smiles and meets my gaze. “But I see you’re having a tender moment and I don’t want to intrude.”
Dag starts, “It’s not—”
I interrupt her. “Thank you, Kat. It was a pleasure working with you. Stay safe.”
Kat nods and after a deep inhale, grins. “Bravo Zulu, guys.” She salutes us and walks from the room, leaving Joe standing there with a laugh. He turns back to us with a curious expression.
“Maybe I should go, too, then?”
“Maybe you should,” I agree.
Dag squeezes my hand. “No, Joe is one of us.”
“No, he’s not. This trinity ain’t that holy.”
She laughs. “You mean unholy, don’t you?”
Joe shakes his head and waves us off. “I’ll be back later. There’s a Kitten who I owe a call.”
“I bet.” I’m glad he’s found better company for the rest of the day.
The door clicks closed behind Joe and we’re truly alone now. Or as much as we can be in a hospital room. But seeing Dag’s white face and half-closed glassy eyes, it’s not like I can act on my first impulse to take her in my arms and ravage her.
I don’t know what to say to her or even if we should go down the path to being lovers again.
All my panicked fervor that boiled over into acting on impulse seems to have cooled off in the light of day.
But my heart still beats fast and hard in my chest, making me feel more alive and in danger than ever as I gaze into her familiar eyes, the ones I’ve never forgotten.
“Now what?” she says, putting it all on me.
Heaving a breath, I accept the load because she’s right. I’m the one who spent the night holding her hand, right?
“Now we know I…” I can’t let go of the natural constriction on my deepest emotions, can’t let go and say what I feel. Part of my hesitation is uncertainty in the light of day. And the rest--
“You what? Still have feelings for me? What a surprise.” She grins and then grimaces, touching her face where a bandage covers a wound near her eye.
My protective impulse—which has free reign especially when it comes to her—has me leaning over to examine the small bandage.
But as I breathe in her scent, so familiar and heady, even cloaked under the antiseptic hospital smells, a wave of something impossible to ignore rushes through me and I kiss the bandage softly.
“You’re right.” Damn impulses. I straighten against the pull of that look in her eyes that tells me she has feelings too. Better ones than mine, stronger, truer ones because she never buries them. She has no fear.
My feelings are always complicated, always questioned, always to be wary about, and mostly feared. Even now when I can’t deny them.
“How about you, Dag? How do you feel about a lover who left you?”
“I know why.”
“That makes one of us.”
“You’ll figure it out someday. In the meantime, we’re back.”
My heart almost stops. “We are?”
She laughs. “You’re afraid of me?”
“Is there any reason I shouldn’t be?”
She shakes her head once, gently. “None at all. Because I’m onto you, Collin. And I heard your words when you thought I was sleeping. And as soon as I’m recovered—which I predict will be in record time, I’m going to seduce you into being my lover again.”
The lump of emotion in my throat is in the exact shape of my heart and I can’t swallow, can’t breathe, worst of all, I can’t think. I can only feel and I want her. So fucking badly.
I nod and force a gulp to get my voice back, a smile shoving its way onto my face. “I can handle that.” I wiggle my brows for good measure because joy takes over and I let it, pushing aside the fear and all the other things that have gotten between us.
She tugs my hand. “Kiss me. A real kiss. And never mind the bandages and the IV line.”
Holding her eyes with mine I lean down, lowering my mouth to within a whisper of hers. “I’ve missed you, Dag.”
“What happened to sweetheart?” Her eyes twinkle with the devil and my chest constricts as I take her lips, nibble and suck on them, make love to her mouth with mine until I feel like I own her, knowing she owns me. Knowing on some level that ownership is an illusion.
A deep sigh comes from her as she wraps her hand into my hair, claiming her ownership, real or not, the way she always did, dragging me back all the way to before we started accumulating the baggage that tore us apart.
A bang on the door precedes the voice of her nurse. “I knew there was a good reason for that spike in your heart-rate.”
I release her mouth and reluctantly straighten while Dag quietly laughs, mostly with her eyes.
“Don’t worry. My heart is battle-tested and still ticking just fine.”
“I’ll bet,” the nurse says as she approaches and shoos me away with a mean you-should-know-better look.
I back away to allow her room to do her thing.
“I’ll be back, Dag.” I don’t know where I’m going, but there’s only one place. “I’m going to our…headquarters.”
“You mean home. You’re going to our new home, Col.” She gives me a challenging look even while the nurse pokes and prods at her.
The rush of reality in her words hits me like a punch in the nose, smashing my smile. “Right. I’m going home to eat something and I’ll be back.”
“It’s good to be back,” she says.
I nod and when I turn to leave, I meet Joe coming in.
“Hope you guys are ready because we have another job—"
He stops short when he sees the nurse. Dag asks her to give us a few minutes.
“I thought you had a Kitten to see?”
He shrugs. “I got side-tracked with business.”
I grunt. Business means another mission.
As the nurse leaves, my juices amp up and fear returns because the last thing I want Dag thinking about is the next mission or job or whatever it is we’re doing—because she needs to recover and she’ll always be too vulnerable for what we do. Whatever we label it, it’s still dangerous.
“Another job already?” she says, perking up. “You’re quite the rainmaker, Joe.” She smiles like she’s happy about it while she’s lying there barely out of the woods from her injuries—stab wounds for fuck’s sake.
“It doesn’t matter. You’re not ready for it,” I tell her.
She opens her mouth and I can see her disbelief morph into anger.
Joe quickly intervenes “No worries. The job starts in a few days and Dag will be out of here and on light duty by then.”
“Light duty? She’ll still be in fucking bed.
” I allow the sarcasm to drip from my words, not holding back on my emotions or even trying to control how I feel even a little.
I’m fucking out of control already and it’s been one fucking day back together.
Taking deep breaths, I close my eyes for a beat to reign in my turmoil.
“It’ll be fine, Collin,” Joe says. “I care about Dag as much as you do—”
“No you do not,” I bark, glaring at him.
He puts up two hands. “I’m not going to argue the point, but you get what I mean. While she’s resting, she can work behind the scenes doing research and provide intel for this one.”
“Hey—I’m right here.” Dag looks like she’s going to say more, to argue, but she doesn’t. “Who’s the new subject?”
I calm down because she didn’t argue about staying behind the scenes. But I know her, and her silence doesn’t mean she has any intentions of staying out of the action.
Joe grins, “You’ll never believe who we’ll be protecting—”
# The End #