18. Andrie
Andrie
It took me a while to fall asleep after Xander left, tossing and turning for several hours.
When I did finally fall asleep, I dreamed of Demi, gray and cold, reaching for me.
No matter how hard I tried, he stayed just out of reach.
Right when I thought we’d manage to touch, he turned away from me, and Xander came out of the shadows, pulling me to him.
Even as I burrowed into the safety of his arms, I screamed for Demi, who was nowhere to be found.
By the time my alarm went off, I was sweating, twisted up in my sheets, and damn near falling off my mattress.
Bleary-eyed, I’d barely sat up when my cell pinged with a text message.
Xander, telling me—not asking—that he’d be there in ten minutes to make breakfast before we went to work.
Before I could answer in no uncertain terms to what would and wouldn’t be happening today, it rang in my hand. Steve.
Worried, I answered. This was the second time Steve had called on a day he wasn’t scheduled for an appointment.
The last, the morning I’d woken up with Xander in my bed, I’d been so scattered I hadn’t realized until later that we hadn’t touched on anything I’d have thought Steve would’ve deemed worthy of needing to see me for, aside from being a little nervous about seeing his old unit.
I’d pushed the thought aside, realizing he must have decided he wasn’t ready to share, but something must have prodded him to reach out to me again in between appointments.
“Hey, did I wake you?” he asked as I struggled to extract myself from my bed.
“No,” I was quick to reassure him, “Just getting ready for the day. Did you need to see me? I thought we re-scheduled you for next week when I have a chance to move into the new office,” I babbled.
His voice was rough, echoing how I felt.
“Actually, my wife insisted I talk with you. I’ve been having some …
issues … the last few days. I know you said my anxiety and feelings would swing around a bit, now that we’re cutting back the last of the anti-anxiety meds, but this is worse than I expected. ”
“Can you elaborate?” I asked, frowning. For the soldier to admit he was struggling, when he’d been doing so well processing his experiences, was cause for concern.
Steve knew the scars—physical and mental—wouldn’t go away with time, but he’d put in the work to get through it, and I’d thought he’d be ready to get back to his unit when he and his wife returned to their base in a few weeks.
I listened to his run-down. Difficulty sleeping, feeling watched, his senses on edge, even afraid he was trailing down to paranoid when he’d driven in circles for almost thirty minutes last night after he and his wife had gone out to dinner, thinking he was being followed.
“Seriously, Doc. I feel like I’m in the middle of a war-zone,” he admitted, sounding ashamed.
“I can’t get myself to stand down. Hell, I even slept upright in the hall in case anyone tried to break in last night.
And this rental isn’t in a bad part of town or anything, so rationally, I know it wasn’t necessary. I was just too keyed up, you know?”
“My normal office isn’t available,” I told him, not elaborating why.
I hadn’t told any of my patients what had happened, just that I was moving offices and my window to move had changed.
“Do you want me to call my new building and see if they can allow us in today, or would you feel more comfortable for me to come to you?” I didn’t do house calls often, not unless they were necessary, but in cases like this, it just made sense.
There was a pregnant pause before Steve sighed. “Here. Let’s do it here.”
“All right,” I said, keeping my voice businesslike as I heard Xander walk in—without knocking—and head down the hallway to my bedroom.
“Let me grab a pen and get your address.” I didn’t bother asking him to text it.
If he were on edge, having him send out a text on an unsecured phone to where he and his family were wouldn’t go over well.
After writing down the address, I strode to my closet, still ignoring Xander, who was staring at me from the doorway.
“I’ll be there in an hour. I’ll bring over pastries for breakfast. And coffee,” I added, more reverently than intended.
“Coffee would be great.” His appreciation mirrored mine.
I described my car, not wanting to add to his stress, before hanging up to glare at Xander.
“You broke into my house,” I accused mildly, not looking at him as I scrounged around the closet for some clothing that would both work for my morning with a patient and be comfortable enough to clean in.
“Vik gave me his key.” He matched my tone carefully, his body language telling me he wasn’t sure if he was about to get kicked out or not.
“I have to go to a patient this morning.” Arms full, I looked up at him briefly before making my way to my bathroom. “And then I’ll be cleaning up the mess in my office. I appreciate the offer to make breakfast, but I’m going to stop at Sweet Nothings on the way and grab something from Claire.”
“Not going to let you dismiss me,” he called out, even as I shut and locked the bathroom door. “You know as well as I do that whoever broke into your office didn’t get what they were looking for. Which means you could be in danger.”
“I carry a taser and pepper spray,” I assured him, not wanting to rise to the bait.
“Which is pretty useless unless you see the person coming,” he said dryly.
I ignored his point, letting the silence linger as I changed. I was pulling my hair up when I heard him huff.
“Let me rephrase, sunshine. I’m not about to let you go anywhere alone until the powers that be have some time to look into some things.
And even if security wasn’t an issue, I wouldn’t allow you to spend most of the day cleaning and sorting through broken shit while I stay here and do nothing.
You’re lucky I was able to stave off Vik until this afternoon.
That gives him a chance to get some sleep before his grumpy-ass helps do whatever you need done later on today. ”
Pissed from the start of this conversation, I yanked the door open. “Let me? Who the hell do you think you are, believing you have any right to decide what I can and cannot do?”
Fists clenched, nostrils flaring, he practically stomped over from where he’d still been standing near the doorway.
“I haven’t sacrificed my very life to get us to where we are right now only to lose you,” I thought I heard him mutter.
But before I could ask, he swept me up into his arms, his mouth coming down on my upturned one.
The kiss was brutally hard, claiming, and powerful. But for once, I didn’t follow meekly, I gave him as good as I got, letting the fire I carefully banked and controlled for more years than I could count flare freely.
I felt more than heard his growl as his fingers burrowed into my hair, pulling it free of the half-done bun I’d been putting it into. Mine weren’t idle either. My nails scratched down his back, needing him to feel that pinch of pain, of temper.
Tongues still battling for control, Xander lifted me onto the bathroom counter, stepping in between my thighs.
The heat from anger was quickly being drowned out by unadulterated lust. I wasn’t sure which one of us started it, but clothes went flying as both of us tore through buttons and fabric, craving skin.
No sooner had I unearthed his cock from his boxers than he speared my core with two fingers, making my head jerk back in reflex as my hips jolted in response. Andrie would have whimpered meekly, but the Alex I used to be was in full control right now. “More,” I gasped, pulling him toward me.
We both cried out as he removed his fingers and positioned himself more firmly between my legs, pushing into me in one motion, impossibly deep and scorching hot.
He came to a stop, either to let me adjust or to tease, I wasn’t sure.
Either way, I wasn’t about to let him stop the sensations pulsing through me, and I growled, practically attacking his neck in bites and licks while working the muscles at my core, urging him on.
To my surprise, he chuckled even as his hands tightened onto my hips, jerking me closer to the side of the counter, angling me to get even deeper before he pulled back, only to snap his hips back to me a second later.
The angle, speed, and need hurried my climax, though I tried to starve it off, wanting more. All too soon, I could hear my own unabashed cries, so unlike me, as I plummeted off the precipice. Echoes of Xander’s shout rang in my ears as we clung to each other in the aftermath.
Ultimately, I didn’t have time to argue Xander’s high-handedness, nor he couldn’t argue my decision to visit a patient at home.
Still panting, I’d registered the time and, in a panic, rushed us both out the door.
Xander insisted on driving, and I called in an order to Claire as he sped down the back streets in an effort to make up time.
Claire, bless her heart, had my order ready to go when we swung through her pick-up window, and apart from a single eye-brow lift at Xander accompanying me, she didn’t say a word.
Though, judging by the way she was reaching for her phone before we’d even pulled away, her boyfriend was going to get an earful.
I wanted to groan at the thought. Royce was sure to tell his sister, probably at Claire’s direction—who would be sure to want to say something about it the next time we saw each other.
Forcing the thought aside, I focused on pulling myself together in preparation for this session. Steve deserved my full attention. My personal life would have to be shoved into a box and examined later.
When we pulled into the driveway, I placed a restraining hand on Xander’s arm. “Stay here,” I braced for an argument, but though he didn’t look happy, he gave me a single nod.
“Yeah, I imagine he wouldn’t feel comfortable opening up to a stranger who’s just tagging along today,” he grumbled even as he grabbed his coffee cup from the tray.
“Are you just going to stay here, or do you want me to call you when we’re done?” I asked, fingers curled around the door handle.
Xander grunted, looking around at the surroundings.
The house was in an older neighborhood, but everything was still nicely maintained, with mature trees and bushes.
The hedges were slightly overgrown, making it impossible to see the house from where he’d parked the car in the drive, but it still had a homey feel to it that fit in with the houses surrounding it.
I was a little surprised at the location—I would have pegged Steve as a condo in the city type of guy, but I also knew he was renting, and I was sure a house like this would be more affordable and easier to find than something in the city.
“Even being a bit back from the street, I’m sure someone might notice me staying in the car. If I think I’m drawing too much attention, I’ll drive around a bit. Send me a text as you’re wrapping up, and I’ll be sure to be here. I’ll stay close if I do go anywhere.”
His jaw was still tight, little lines around his eyes more pronounced than they’d been earlier, and I wondered why he felt uneasy. I paused, reading into his hesitation, but unsure of the source behind it.
“I know you can’t tell me much,” he finally said without preamble. “But is this guy a regular of yours, and does he give you any reason to think he might become violent if he’s worked up?”
I relaxed, giving him a soft smile, realizing why he was worried.
“He’s not a regular, just someone I’ve seen a few times while he’s here rehabbing, but he isn’t a new patient or anything.
Steve’s not violent, just working through some things.
In fact,” I paused, then decided I wasn’t going too far past my own lines of confidentiality, “he’s one of my Tier One military patients, so you can be sure I’ll be safe from someone attacking me or anything while I’m with him. ”
Realizing I was about to be late, I jumped out of the car and hurried through the bushes to the front door, juggling my briefcase in one hand and the coffee and pastry bag in the other.
The door opened as I rushed up the steps, and I pasted on a smile as I saw Steve. “I’ve brought coffee and some sweets from one of my favorite places in the city,” I assured him, noticing too late what he was holding in his other hand.
I went down before I had a chance to turn, let alone scream. The slam of the door was the only thing that registered, blocking me from view of the one person who could have saved me.