38. June 1, 2023
Cherry
For the past six weeks, she’d been a shell of herself. She went about her job with the usual efficiency, her focus undisturbed, but she felt hollow. The guys tried to watch over her without hovering, but they had their own work to do. Projects didn’t stop just because their medic was missing.
And that’s what he was. Missing. No one seemed to know where he was. She was back to worrying about him like she had the months before they’d gone to St. Lucia. Was he safe? Was he strung out somewhere? Was he alive?
In the face of uncertainty over Demon, the group needed a new medic, so Waters ordered her to search for options. Each folder she started never got completed. Her heart wasn’t in it, so they sat there, gathering dust. Waters didn’t push, but she knew he would have to start doing so soon.
And every day since their return, she’d tortured herself by entering Demon’s apartment.
The first night she walked in, there was a hollowness to the sound of her heels against the floor in the foyer.
It didn’t take much to realize that the space was clearly unoccupied.
All his belongings, such as they were, still remained, but it felt like the apartment was merely a storage space now, rather than a place that housed anyone.
The only sign of life was his signature scent: sand, sun, and sea.
She could almost taste it in the air. That first night, she’d collapsed in his walk-in closet and sobbed.
When no one could find her, they went into panic mode, and Midas turned on her tracker.
Waters eventually found her on the floor, curled into a ball, and held her as she’d cried.
He’d said nothing. Just held her, one hand cradling her head to his chest, the other running up and down her back in a soothing gesture.
He didn’t complain about how long it took for her to cry herself out.
But when she finally did, he carried her out of the apartment, took her to her own, sat her on the edge of the bed, undid and removed her jacket, slipped off her shoes, and tucked her into bed.
The next morning, she was back at her desk.
Calm. Cool. Collected. As if nothing traumatic had ever happened to her.
As if he’d never existed. Midas was still tracking Zion, Howard, and Andres.
TB and Steel left occasionally to check out leads.
Sometimes they found something, sometimes they didn’t, but all three men were still working the case along with other projects.
They said nothing to her about it, but she was able to read their reports, so she knew what was going on.
Steel had even gone out to his beach house. Nothing remained there either.
Eventually, over the weeks, his scent had disappeared, but she swore she could still smell him.
Her visits to his apartment didn’t stop.
Tonight, she stood in front of his door, her fingers hovering over the keypad.
She didn’t understand why she kept going.
She needed to stop torturing herself. It wasn’t as if anything was going to change.
But not tonight. This would be the last time, and then she would move on .
She entered his code and walked through the door.
Tonight, something was different. A solitary light over the breakfast bar was shining straight down on a piece of paper folded in half once and leaned to create a tent so it stood up. In his bold scrawl was her name.
As if the paper were a wild animal that she feared would bite her, she slowly stepped over to the counter.
Her hand shook as she reached out for the paper, pinching it closed with two fingers as she picked it up.
She had no idea how long she stood there, staring at the note, afraid to flip it open to its secrets.
For a few moments of panic, it was exactly like she’d felt that day her father had been taken from her.
Frightened or not, she needed to open the note and read it. Pretending she hadn’t seen it, or ripping it up and throwing it away without knowing what its contents were, was the act of a bratty teenager, and she hadn’t been one of those even when she was a teenager.
She flipped open the top half with her name on it.
Open the bag.
That’s it? Three words? All the angels in heaven, why couldn’t he just say it in a note? Better yet, why couldn’t he be a man and tell her to her face?
Next to where the note had sat, there was a small black gift bag about five inches wide and seven inches tall.
It wouldn’t fit much in it, especially stuffed with the gold tissue paper that was sticking out of the top.
She picked it up by the handles, brought it toward her, and peeked inside.
Unfortunately, the tissue was artfully arranged so that she couldn’t see what was in the bag without opening it up.
She set down the note and the bag on the edge of the counter and wiped her hands on her skirt.
Peeling the tissue back gently, she saw what looked like red cloth.
Her brow furrowing, she reached into the bag and extracted the contents.
Laying out the three scraps of fabric on the breakfast bar, she discovered it was a red bikini and a translucent cover-up in the same color.
The swimsuit, if you could call it that, had so little fabric that if she put it on, only the bare essentials would be covered.
What the hell was he up to?
Suddenly, a memory popped up. Something she’d said. His reply whispered hotly in her ear. Involuntarily, she sucked in a breath.
Without a second thought, she grabbed the bag and flew out the door toward the elevator.
Multiple stabs to the down button seemed to actually slow the elevator rather than make it rise faster.
Fuck! How long had he been waiting? He had ultimate patience, but even the most patient could give up if they thought the person they were meeting wasn’t going to arrive.
When the elevator opened, she hadn’t learned her lesson. She began to frantically push at the buttons again, swearing at the doors that didn’t close fast enough and then at the carriage that seemed determined to thwart her attempts to get to the garage.
The doors finally opened, and she raced to her car.
She was barely inside before she started the vehicle and backed out of her spot while simultaneously closing her door.
Again, the building seemed to want to keep her inside its confines as she waited for the electric gate to rise enough.
Only waiting as long as it took for her car to clear the bottom of the metal door, she gunned the engine, racing through the streets of L.A.
like she was escaping the police after starring in The Italian Job .
Never had she been happier for those defensive driving courses she’d taken.
Miraculously, she avoided every stoplight and didn’t get pulled over. When she arrived at the beach near Demon’s hut, she rushed out of the car, barely remembering to lock it, yanked off her shoes, and took off running for the building.
Inside, the lights were on. “Demon?” she called out. There was no answer. Okay. He clearly had been here recently.
She began to pull off her clothes, leaving them in a pile on the floor.
Her hands shook as she pulled the bottoms on and clipped the chains that held the nearly nonexistent fabric together to the eyelets on either side of her hips.
They were still shaking as she put the second set of chains around her neck, clipped them together, pulled the material down over her breasts, and clipped the front together.
She took just enough time to carefully arrange the triangles of fabric appropriately enough to cover what needed it, then she slipped the cover-up on and headed out the door to the beach.
To her right was a pier. It was deserted at the moment because it didn’t have any lights above it as the other ones did.
As swiftly as she could, she walked over to the pier and underneath it.
She crossed to the edge of the water, looking out to the horizon where the moon could be seen through the two opposing pylons at the end of it.
She hoped she wasn’t making a total fool of herself.
Settling herself on the sand, she made sure to lay her lower half in the water so that the waves crashed between her thighs, wetting the gusset of the bikini bottoms and doing absolutely nothing to cool the fire she felt in her core.
She leaned back on her elbows and shook out her hair to trail behind her. Watching the water, she waited.
A few moments later, a long shape dove off the top of the pier, barely making a sound as it cut the water.
Then a head popped up in the shallows, and a figure slowly rose from the water, inch by glorious inch.
Sweet baby Jesus, he truly was an ocean sex god!
His broad swimmer’s shoulders, his tight pecs, and the washboard abs she could count even from here, which felt both hard and soft to the touch at the same time.
When he reached waist level, he stopped for a moment, slicking his hair back from his face, then continued his stealthy approach.
Naked as he rose from the water, despite the cool temperature of the ocean, his cock was fully erect, curving up to his stomach.
Reaching her feet, he nudged them, and as she spread her legs apart, he knelt between them.
His hands slid up her stomach and to her breasts, cupping them from underneath.
Sliding his thumbs beneath the material to stroke lightly over her nipples, a deft click of the chains, and they separated at the bottom of the material.
With nothing to hold it in place, the material slid to her sides to reveal her to his gaze.
She noticed, even in the darkness beneath the pier, his green eyes darkening appreciatively at her form.
“You came back. Where did you go?”
“I stayed in St. Lucia. Unfinished business.”