On the Way Home by Skye Warren
“Katie, there’s only you and me here.” And Clint in the house. But I left that part off. The less people who knew about him, the better.
Especially if he suddenly disappeared.
She was reaching over the side of the truck, trying to feel around at the bottom. Her arms didn’t quite reach.
“Sweetie?” I asked, uncertain and a little bit scared. What if being alone in that house, with visitors only every other day, had made her a little unhinged? All that solitude sounded like bliss to me, but then I’d been cursed with an overabundance of contact from an early age.
“I thought I saw something,” she finally confessed, stepping back on her heels. “I can’t make things out too well. There are barely shapes, much less faces. But this morning when I was watering my plants, hidden behind that one azalea with the wild branches, I heard something from your house. I thought it was you, so I almost said hello, but then I noticed how fast it was moving, real low to the ground. And wider than you.”
A shiver ran through me. “Lower and wider, huh? Maybe it was an animal. Like a dog or a cat.”
“Maybe,” Katie said, her voice doubtful. Doubting the idea of an animal or doubting herself? It must be tough to not know what you saw, to be afraid of shadows that would never become clear.
I glanced back into the bed of truck—which was definitely empty. Whatever Katie had or hadn’t seen slinking around my truck this morning was gone. The tarp was pretty heavy in my arms, so I rolled it into a rough ball and walked it over to the garage.
When I returned to the truck, I said, “I’m sorry,” even though I wasn’t sure what for. Because Katie had been worried. Because she’d been wrong. But mostly because I really had to go inside. After the awful meeting with Dmitri this morning and this strange scare, I was ready for a hot bath and a long nap. Preferably with a sexy soldier to keep me company during both of them.
* * *
My anxiety level rose when I searched the house and found it empty.
“Clint,” I called from the central living room, but only silence answered me.
I’d specifically ordered him to stay put, and he’d defied me, which pissed me off more than anything else. But I was also worried about him. What if Dmitri had sent some guys and picked up “the package” himself? There were no signs of a struggle, and I had to believe a trained soldier could at least put up a fight, even if they had sent three or four guys. And even if they had caught him by surprise.
The other disconcerting thought was that he might have returned to that bitch he’d been with. The one who had ditched him when he’d just come back from a long deployment, right when he’d needed her most. If she’d met him at the airport, he wouldn’t have looked twice at me. He wouldn’t be at my house right now. He’d be safe. Or at least, safer than he was now, disappeared to some mysterious place.
I forced myself to sit on the couch and keep a book open, even though I had no idea what the pages said. Was he okay? What if he’d just run to the store? Should I call the police?
The irony was enough to knock me over.
I did fall, partially, staggering off the cushions and up the stairs. Clint’s faded green duffel bag was still sitting in the guest bedroom. His toothbrush was still in the bathroom. There. He wouldn’t have gone too far without his stuff. Unless he hadn’t gone willingly.
But I couldn’t think like that. I should go downstairs and have a cup of tea. And wonder what Dmitri was doing to my sister right now. It was killing me that I hadn’t seen her. Hadn’t spoken with her since that phone call. We weren’t even close, really. Not since we were kids. Things had gotten tense when we were both working at the club, and Dmitri knew how to play our sibling rivalry to the fullest. Next thing I knew, Caro was stepping onto the stage during my dances and giving my regulars a free ride. Anything I said got twisted as if I was the one making trouble for her.
When Dmitri left to make his big deal overseas, I’d been so relieved. Let’s get regular jobs. Regular lives. We still have each other. Only Caro had been pissed at getting left behind. She had something going with him, which I suspected meant he fucked her whenever he wanted and ignored her the rest of the time. So it wasn’t a huge surprise that she’d hooked up with him again as soon as he was back in town.
The surprise had been the “delivery” request, along with the thinly veiled threat to my sister.
I couldn’t let her die. Even if she’d gotten herself into this. Even if she should have known better. God, sometimes it killed me that she knew how awful he was but she still went to him. Despite all that, I couldn’t let her get hurt.
Clint’s bag was sitting against the wall, zipped up and unassuming. I remembered what he’d said that night in bed with me, about the list he had. I’d been out of my mind with lust, teetering on the edge of the sharpest climax of my life, but I’d heard him. It wasn’t hard to figure out that Dmitri wanted that list.
What if I gave it to him?
It seemed like a long shot, about as long of a shot as the eight thousand bucks had been. Dmitri would probably shoot me on sight once he found out I knew about the list. And he wasn’t the kind of man to leave a loose end alone. And Clint would definitely be a loose end.
You think he just left something that important lying around?
I didn’t know where he’d leave something like that. If I ever came across something that volatile, that dangerous, I’d run the hell away from it. I didn’t seek out trouble, but it had a way of finding me, like burs that stuck to my feet as I walked through the forest. They stung me on contact and left little pricks in my skin even when I pulled them out.
Are you going to violate Clint’s privacy now?
Clint’s privacy was the least of my worries. His life… now that was a big worry.
My decision made, I glanced behind me at the empty hallway and knelt in front of the bag. The zippers weren’t locked. No precautions had been taken, which led me to believe Clint was trusting in general. Either that or he just trusted me. Neither idea sat well with me.
Passport.
Dog tags.
Some paperwork from the US Government with cryptic-sounding words.
If I’d had any doubts about his military status, they were settled now. This man was a soldier, a member of the US Army, a goddamn hero. I should be doing my part to protect him, not drag him into this. He dragged himself into this. It would be a relief to believe that, but he hadn’t written the orders to send himself overseas and fight some faceless cartel assholes. Assholes like Dmitri’s associates.
There were stacks of clothes, plain T-shirts of worn cotton and jeans. The familiar scent of him—musky and comforting—wafted up from the fabric as I pushed it aside. I didn’t deserve that comfort. At the bottom of the bag I found a few books, some history books and a well-worn copy of the Bible. That raised my eyebrows.
A religious freak?
They would come by the strip club some nights, passing out pamphlets and telling us we’d go to hell. But Clint hadn’t seemed particularly religious. He’d been living with that other girl without being married to her. And he’d taken my confession of being a stripper with more grace than most guys would.
I opened the book, surprised anew at the highlights and underlines and unreadable scribbles in the margin. This Bible wasn’t lip service to a childhood commandment. He had read this. He’d studied it.
I opened to a random highlighted line: for all have sinned and fall short of the glory of God.
That one was highlighted, and I snorted. Yeah, that was true enough. I had no moral high ground to stand on, but I saw guys in the club who did. Doctors and professors and politicians who’d talk a lot of shit about cleaning up society; meanwhile they’d be sneaking in through the back door to buy drugs and a pair of girls for an hour. We were dirty, all of us. Except Clint, I suspected.
And another: For I am with you, and no one is going to attack and harm you, because I have many people in this city.
My smile s
Wasn’t it? Clint may be a member of the army, but I wasn’t sure he had many people in this city. I wasn’t sure he’d be able to protect me from an attack, and he sure as hell wouldn’t be able to protect Caro. And if he knew what I’d done, he wouldn’t even be with me anymore.
Therefore confess your sins to each other and pray for each other so that you may be healed.
Now there was an idea. Confess my sins to Clint and be healed. If only it worked that way. I had deceived him. I’d plotted to kill him. I would still, most likely, lead him to his death. This kind of truth couldn’t set me free; it was a prison, one built with the ironclad knowledge that I deserved his scorn.
I slammed the Bible shut and practically threw it against the wall. It thudded and fell to the ground. Fuck.
Swallowing hard, I forced myself to glance into the bottom of the bag again. My heart pounded as if I might find snakes or grenades or something else as equally awful as that Bible.
The only thing left was a dark velvet box about the size of my palm. There was no chance he’d keep some computer disk thing in a jewelry box. I was just snooping now. But I thought of that girl Chelsea and imagined him getting down on one knee. Even though it seemed a little big for a ring.
But she didn’t deserve a necklace either, or anything at all. I hated the thought of him looking through the jewelry cases, picking something out for her while she’d been here fucking some guy. It made me a hypocrite to be pissed about what she’d done to him, cheating on him and abandoning him and kicking him out of his own apartment, but I couldn’t help it.
You’re just snooping now. No good intentions.
I had no good intentions, only an illicit curiosity for a man I couldn’t really have. A man who was fiercely loyal. What would it feel like to be loved by him? I opened the box to find out.
A medal stared back at me. It did more than that. It punched me in the gut and stole my breath. It shone a spotlight on all the horrible, degrading things in my life, including agreeing to help Dmitri kill this man. The one who had earned this.
“It’s a Purple Heart.”
The words came from the doorway, and I whipped around, almost dropping the box in my panic. I managed to grab hold of it and ease the lid shut. I set the velvet box in his bag gingerly—as if anything would help now—and stood up.
“I’m so sorry.” I bit my lip, forcing the tears back. My throat grew tight. “God, I’m sorry.”
“Why?” His expression was bemused.
For conspiring to kill you. “For looking through your stuff.”
He shrugged. “You were probably wondering where I went.”
Then I heard the soft rumble of tires and glanced out the window. I had a clear view of the driveway now that I was standing. A dark sedan, an older model, pulled out and drove away. I looked back at Clint. “Who’s that?”
Please don’t say Chelsea.
“My friend James. You might remember him. He was on the plane with me.”
Thank you, Jesus.
“Oh,” I said, way more casually than I felt. “I didn’t know you had plans.”
“I didn’t. Something came up, and I couldn’t leave a note. Sorry about that.”
“You don’t have to apologize to me.” In fact, I really wish you wouldn’t. “But that doesn’t give me a right to look through your stuff. I just… Shit, I don’t have an excuse.”
He smiled slightly. “Don’t worry about it. I’m not super secretive anyway. More of an open book. Only problem is it’s a pretty boring story.”
I glanced back at the open duffel bag, hesitating. “I’d like to hear it anyway, if you don’t mind. All of it, your whole story, but also how you got that medal.” Fear thumped as if we were going back in time, as if I’d been his girlfriend and gotten a call with bad news. “You were injured? You have to be injured to get that, right?”
“Yeah.” He huffed a laugh. “Kind of a morbid requirement, if you ask me. But they don’t ask me. They just hand those things out like candy.”
I walked up to him, and there wasn’t any artifice in me. It felt strange to approach a man without wanting anything from him—not money, not leniency. It felt naked. I just wanted to be near him.
My hands went up around his neck, and his settled on my waist. We flowed into that kiss like water in a cool brook, slipping and sliding and glinting in the sun. There was no better feeling than the touch of his tongue against mine.
I pulled back, missing the heat of his mouth immediately. My gaze met his, and I shook my head slowly. “You can try to make it seem small, but I’m not buying it. They gave you this medal because you’re brave and strong. And even if you didn’t have it, I’d already know that about you. You’re the most noble man I’ve ever met.”
Something flashed in his eyes, hard and almost bitter. “Noble, huh?”
“Yeah. And loyal. And kind.” I hesitated. In some ways it felt like spilling my darkest secret. But something compelled me to say it anyway. “I haven’t known a lot of kind men.”
Clint reached up and curled a lock of hair behind my ear. Then he stroked a hand down my temple, my cheek. My neck. “That why you’re letting me stay?”
“I don’t know,” I said honestly. I wasn’t sure if I kept him here because I liked him or so I could deliver him to Dmitri, which just went to show how fucked up I was. Love or kill. There was no in-between in my world, no gray area. Only absolutes.
I thought he might ask me more questions and demand some answers this time—Lord knew he deserved them. Instead he bent his head and kissed me again, featherlight and painfully sweet. Ahhh yes. And when he pulled my body flush against his, I knew exactly what to do. I couldn’t give him my loyalty. There would be no medal waiting for him at the end of this. But I could give him my body—my tongue and my pussy and all the roughing up his cute ass could take.
Reaching around behind him, I squeezed the hard cheeks of his ass. He clenched them in response, which made it almost impossible to press my fingers in. Unless I used my nails. He made a sound like a yelp—of surprise, of surrender.
“Jesus,” he said against my mouth.
I smiled, not breaking the kiss. I wanted to kiss him with smiles and frowns and everything in between. I would fuse myself to him with glue made of sexual pleasure alone, because that was the only thing I knew how to make.
“You like a little pain, soldier?” I whispered.
He didn’t answer, and I thought he wasn’t going to. That was okay. In some ways it was a rhetorical question. I’d already noted his excitement, the throbbing of his cock when I squeezed a little too tight. But when he did respond—Lord, that was sweet.
“I’m not sure.” In halting words, he said, “Sometimes when I’m beating one out, I’ll squeeze my… my balls. Real tight. I don’t even realize I’m doing it until I come.”
The mental image of him laid out on a little cot, his body too long and strung up with self-contained lust, was enough to make my body shudder for him. I imagined his eyes shut tight and his fist shut tight and his hand closed tight around his balls, everything coiled and tense and painful until he climaxed in long, ropy sprays.
“What else?” I asked, surprised I could still talk. My voice was husky with a breathlessness born of desire, but I knew he liked me this way. I knew because his eyes widened and his whole body went still. There was a part of me that wanted a repeat of last night, where I pushed and poked and prodded at him until he lost control. Then he would flip me over and fuck me. He’d make me come.
There was a thrill in winding up a man, then letting him stomp around on the ground like a toy monkey with a drum set. It was a cold kind of power.
But a greater part of me wanted to give him orders that he’d follow. To hurt him and please him and control him in a way that wasn’t cold. It was so damn hot I might incinerate just from thinking about it.
“I pinch my nipples sometimes,” he said, and I almost came on the spot. It took two deep breaths to get myself under control.
Then I said, “Show me.” All calm and collected, as if I watched men strip for me every day. I was the one who stripped, who bared myself. With every other man, in every other way. But Clint took off his shirt and tossed it on the ground. He gave me a nervous look, as if I might stop him now. As if. Then he looked down at his chest and pressed a nipple between his thumb and forefinger.
“Is that how you usually do it?” I asked. “That soft?”
“No, I—” His cheeks colored a deep shade of plum. Like the head of his cock must be. “Harder.”
I pinched his other nipple. “Like this?”
He made a strangled sound. “Della.”
It wasn’t technically an answer, but I let it slide. Or maybe I didn’t, because when I twisted his nipple, it felt a little like punishment. Especially when he sucked in a sharp breath and closed his eyes. That was fine with me, though. I could look at the length of him, from the broad shoulders to the tapered hips to the thighs so lovingly encased by old denim.
Oh, and his cock. The erection had grown to impressive proportions beneath his fly. He’d have to be careful with that zipper on its way down.
“Take off your pants. And your underwear, if you’re wearing any.”
The look he gave me was filled with desperation. For me to go easier? Or harder? It didn’t really matter. I’d never had this much control over a man this strong. It was heady, intoxicating. Was this how people felt when they shot chemicals into their veins? I’d tried it a couple times and only felt dizzy and sick. This, though. This was a miracle.
He stripped and waited for instructions. What a good boy. What a big boy.
I knelt in front of him, ignoring his murmured, halfhearted protests. You don’t have to. Let me… But this wasn’t for him, not really. I wanted to taste his cock, so I did. Salty. Earthy. I wanted to watch him squirm, so I licked the crown of his cock and the slit on the top until he was panting and humping my mouth. It should have been degrading for him, humiliating the way those paid sex acts had always been for me, but he just looked so beautiful. He looked like an angel with his body rippling and shaking, and I couldn’t help but admire him.