by CD Reiss
I had to scan my memory of the past hour to recall that I had been about to tell him about the vial Defense sent. “How much I like you.”
“Like you too.”
“And that you’re a fool for pushing yourself so hard, but I can’t help but admire it.”
I got up to leave, but I didn’t quite make it to the door.
“Major.”
“Yes?”
“Please don’t go.”
“I have to.” But I went back to him.
“I keep seeing their faces. Then their wounds. And the screaming. I keep hearing the screams.” He turned away from the wall and held his hand out to me. “I’m too tired to try anything. All this… in my head. It’s just sensory overload. But it’s bad. Stay. Please.”
I sat on the edge of the bed, not intending to do more than that, but he pulled me down with him. My body was strong enough to resist, but my heart was weak. After days of talking to men who never admitted a need or a weakness, Caden’s raw humanity touched me. He was fearless in so many things that I hadn’t expected vulnerability.
I curled into him, my shoulder blades to his chest, and let him put his arms around me. Against my back, he wept from exhaustion and pain. From tension and sorrow. I had to wipe my own eyes and swallow a hard lump of sobs.
Eventually, his body stopped shaking, and he slept. I waited until his breathing changed and his arms were dead weights before I slipped out of them. Kneeling by the bed, I touched his cheek. His tears had dried, but his black lashes were still stuck together.
“You’re not cut out for this, Captain,” I said softly.
Maybe no one was.
I put a blanket over him and left.
* * *
DAY FIVE
20:43:00
The first chopper had come in an hour before, but we had enough doctors to take care of them. I’d kept a close eye on the time and peeked in on Caden’s bunk twice. Five hours of solid sleep. He’d need another few days’ worth to catch up, but he wouldn’t get it. The last push into Fallujah was brutal, and they were coming faster than they could be admitted.
“Where’s St. John?” Colonel Brogue shouted in triage.
“Resting,” a nurse replied, getting her gloves on.
“Someone get him.”
“I’ll do it.” I jumped up.
“Quick. We have more coming.”
I ran to Caden’s trailer, and when there was no answer to my knock, I went in. He was still on his back with his hands crossed over his chest. He didn’t react to the light being turned on. I sat on the edge of his bed and leaned into his chest. Breathing steady. He didn’t move when I took his pulse or when I let my hand linger over his before pulling away.
“Caden,” I said.
No answer. He was out.
“Caden.” I tapped his cheek. “Come on. Casualties.”
I tapped his cheek harder. Nothing. I pinched his forearm gently, then harder.
He groaned.
“I’m sorry. They need you.”
Deep suck of breath.
“Casualties,” I repeated.
He swallowed.
“Okay,” he said thickly, eyes clamping tight before opening.
“Let me help you.”
I took his wrists and pulled him up. He was dead weight, but I managed to swing his legs over the side of the bed and get him sitting. His shoulders hunched, and his head hung.
“Wake up.”
“Can’t.”
“I’ll help you. Come on.”
I pulled his arms, got him up a little, but he sat back down.
“Melatonin.”
He named the hormone responsible for sleep. If his blood was flooded with it, he wouldn’t be able to get up no matter how hard he tried.
“Do you want something to help you wake up?”
He dropped back until his head was against the wall. “Slap me.”
“What?”
He didn’t answer. His eyes closed again. I patted his cheek, but his breathing got the slow cadence of sleep again. I slapped harder.
“Adrenaline,” he whispered.
He wanted me to slap him hard enough that the need to fight or run would release adrenaline, which would override the melatonin. He was using his own body like a pharmacy.
Fine. I planted my knees on either side of him. “I apologize in advance.”
I slapped him hard. He grunted. I slapped him again. Deep, waking breath. The next slap was hard enough to make my hand hurt, so the next one was a backhand. That got him up. My hand was back for another.
“Stop. We’re good.”
“You sure?”
He rested his hands on my hips, making me realize I was straddling him. “Any more and you’re going to turn me on. Oops, too late.”
“A cold shower’s going to cure you of two problems then.”
Standing, I held my hand out to help him up. He stumbled to standing, looking around as if the idea of three-dimensional space confused him.
“Oh, man.” He ran his fingers through his hair. “Okay. Let’s do this.”
* * *
I was worried about him. On the way to the showers, he’d seemed disoriented, struggling to put together one coherent thought after another. He’d make a sharp comeback to something I said, then go silent or forget what he’d said. Waiting for him outside the showers, I called out to Ronin as he passed.
“Why you stalking the men’s showers?”
“I’m waiting on a tired surgeon.”
“St. John?”
“Yeah. He’s had five hours but needs a week.”
“They need him.”
“I’m going to use the Defense stuff.”
He nodded. “I’ll go get it.”
“Wait.”
“What?”
I didn’t want him to see me give the shot. He’d see how much I admired my patient’s bottom, and I’d be ashamed. “Wait on my order.”
He smirked. The effort to not look at my tits after getting an order from me was tearing him in two. I could see the thoughts behind his eyes like a movie. “Roger that.”
He took off toward the psych office.
* * *
Caden got out of the shower trailer looking cleaner and smelling better.
“Your boot’s untied.”
He looked down. “Huh.” Surprised, he crouched and laced it up.
I crouched with him. “Caden.”
“Major.”
“This isn’t giving me confidence that you should be in an operating room.”
The thup-thup-thup of choppers came from the sky.
“It’s an untied boot.”
“I’m going to give you a shot before you go in.”
“More speed?”
“Yes.”
“Can you do me a favor?” he asked as we stood.
“Depends.”
“Go in my trailer. In my footlocker’s a set of keys with a rabbit’s foot. It’s right on top. Take the rabbit’s foot off and put it in your pocket.”
“For what?”
“For you. You need it.”
“What do I need a rabbit’s foot for?”
“It’s a useless talisman but might take the edge off your worry.”
I put my hands on my hips. Was he being a jerk? Or was he doing something helpful and nice? I couldn’t assume malice. “Thanks, I guess.”
“Combination’s 2259.”
“See you in the scrub room.”
* * *
After I gave him the shot, I went to his bunk. I slid his footlocker from under his bed and opened it. The scent that came from it was concentrated sex. Freshly ground coffee. Wool. His clothes were neatly pressed and folded. He might have learned that in the military, but I doubted it. A man was born with this level of precision.
His keys weren’t on top. They were under the first layer of army-green shirts.
A car key for a Mercedes. A house key. A metal keychain inscribed with “Never Forget 9/11.”
A white rabbit’s foot.
I removed the furry knob and replaced the keys. Before closing the lid, I inhaled deeply and ran my hand over the shirts, pretending he was in them.
Chapter Four
DAY EIGHT
14:56:00
The battle took five weeks, but the initial offensive was over after eight days.
Caden had gone three more nonstop. No catnaps. No lie-downs. The synthetic speed did its job twice over.
When the last soldier was sewn up and the party had started in the mess hall, he was in no condition to celebrate. I found him standing shirtless over the linen hamper, scrubs balled in a fist, a marble statue of a man.
“Hey,” I said. “It’s over for now.”
He opened his fist and let the scrubs fall into the bin. “I’m tired.”
“Ya think?”
I reached for his hand so I could check his pulse. That was what I told myself. But when I took it and slid my hands to his wrist and down to his elbow in a long stroke and he lifted his arm to cup my jaw, there was no more lying.
He kissed me as if he’d been on hunger strike and our first kiss was the nourishment he’d been denying himself. As if he couldn’t bear to not kiss me for another second.
Or maybe that was what I was feeling, because I clutched the back of his neck like a woman terrified of losing something. My mouth devoured him with the force of a catapult held in tension for too long yet sprung too fast. My hands released his neck and ran over the crests and valleys of his body. He pushed me against the table and pressed his fingers between my legs. The fabric was damp and hot.
“Fuck,” he growled between his teeth before planting his mouth on mine again.
I wrapped my legs around his waist, and he pushed his erection against me. Through three layers of army-issue garments, he was hot and hard, pushing against my pussy as if he could disintegrate everything between us. He jerked his hips to stimulate my clit, and I shifted mine to rub against the length of him.
“Yes,” I groaned. “That’s good.”
He jerked again, and I shifted again, until we fell into such a hard rhythm we couldn’t kiss anymore. We rubbed together, hard against hot, watching each other’s faces, panting against the other’s lips.
His eyes scrunched, and his jaw clenched. He planted his elbows behind my shoulders and held my head.
“Close, I’m—” I gasped.
He ground against me harder. Faster. “Yes.”
The orgasm went on and on—a gradual release of pressure through the tiniest hole. Even as he thrust his cock against me, the incidental stimulation wasn’t ever enough all at once. It was cumulative, and I broke slowly, over and over, spilling my climax into tears and long, hitching sobs as he had his own orgasm, exhaling into my neck.
My tears didn’t stop. I wept onto his skin, shaking under him. The stories I’d heard. The pain I’d seen. Everything. The brain-injured bodies being shipped home. I’d watched so much suffering and bottled it away. Caden shattered it, then kissed the tears off my cheeks.
He reached for a towel and wiped his semen off the front of my uniform as I wept. His dick had come free of the drawstring scrubs. He wiped off his belly, redid the string, and reached over me for a new shirt.
I tried to get up, but that only drove me into his arms. God, I wanted him.
“Sleep with me,” he said.
“Like last time?”
“No. This time, I’m going to try to fuck you, and you’re going to let me.”
* * *
My trailer was nicer, but we went to his without discussion. The entire camp was relaxing with music and alcohol, but when he closed the door, we were in our own world. He peeled off his shirt and dropped his scrubs, stepping out of his underwear in one move.
The floodlights came through a crack in the blinds, casting his cock’s shadow over his leg. I unbuttoned my shirt, and he got on his knees before me, undoing the metal belt buckle.
“You hungry?” He slid the belt through the metal clasp.
“No.”
“Thirsty?” Button and zipper undone, he kissed the panties under it.
“I’m all right.”
“I have bottled water for later.”
“How much later can you stay awake?”
He slid my pants down as I got my shirt off.
“I can stay awake long enough to come in you. Come on you. Come with you.” He looked up at me and pulled my panties down. “I can stay awake long enough to suck you, finger you, fuck you.” His hands ran down my legs to get my underwear off. When he got to my feet, he pushed them apart. “As long as you can stay awake tonight.” Watching my face, he ran his fingers from deep in the crack of my ass, to my wet pussy, to the throbbing nub at the other side. “That’s how long you’ll be coming.”
He slid two fingers inside me. “Look at me.”
I did. Even from waist level, he was in charge.
“Birth control,” he said.
“I’m on it.”
He spread the lips apart and laid his fluttering tongue against my exposed clit. My knees turned to jelly, and I nearly fell over. He stood and whipped the chair from behind the desk, guiding me into it.
“These past eight days,” he said, lifting one of my legs over an arm of the chair. “Eight days of hell. You made them bearable.” He draped the other leg over the other arm, until my wet pussy was fully exposed to him. The way he looked at it was more arousing than my previous lovers’ touches. “I trusted you with myself, and you did right by me.” He was on his knees again, a hand on the inside of each thigh. “Thank you.”
“You could just write me a note.”
“I might still,” He kissed my knee and all the way up to the center. “But I’ve wanted you since the minute I saw you.” He gave my clit a little suck. “You came off the Chinook like you could conquer the Republican Army all by yourself.” Another suck, and I put my fingers in his hair. “So fucking sexy.” He took my hands away and laid them on my knees. “All I wanted to do was conquer you.”
He held my hands and knees together and went to work with his tongue. Sucking and licking until I was close, then stopping to circle my entrance to bring the sensations there. Back up to my clit, over and over.
“Let me come,” I gasped, looking down at him. “Don’t stop this time.”
“You don’t rank me here.”
“What do you want?”
“Say please.”
“Please.”
He brought me close again, then stopped to run his tongue over my opening again.
“Please, Caden.”
“You’re too sexy when you’re close.” He sucked me gently. Stopped.
“No! God, please let me come. Please. I’m begging.”
“I like that.”
“Please,” I whispered.
He ran his tongue along me and put his lips over my clit, locking on it with a hard suck that he continued while flicking his tongue against the raw, needy flesh.
The climax was blinding. My body pulsed, pushed, throbbed with him.
His lips were on mine, and I tasted myself in his mouth. He lifted me onto the bed. I was overstimulated, still shaking when he put the head of his cock against me and pushed. I wasn’t big enough for him, but I was so slick he got in, stretching me to pain I didn’t find unpleasant.
Holding my hands over my head, he kissed me, fucked me, owned me. When I came again, he drove harder and deeper, as if he wanted to bury himself inside me, and the pain grounded me and drove me over the edge at the same time.
“Take it,” he gasped his last command.
He came in a twist of muscle, gripping tight, white-knuckled, red in the face, then releasing like a shattered glass in an explosion of potential energy gone kinetic and dissolving into sweat and gulped breaths.
“Wow,” he said, kissing my collarbone, still inside me.
“Wow is right.” I held his cheeks while he caught his breath.
“Wow.”
&
nbsp; “Right. Yes…”
“That was a great start.”
* * *
Late in the night, pleasantly sore and sticky where it counted, I drifted off to sleep while he stroked my shoulder in a way that was both casual and intentional.
“Why aren’t you sleeping?” I asked with the last of my waking energy.
“I fell asleep first last time.”
“Didn’t count.”
“I like looking at you.”
“Mm.”
He kissed my shoulder. I hoped he didn’t want to fuck again. I was tired, and I was sure that if he wanted to, he’d need thirty seconds to make me want him again.
“All the time,” he continued. “You’re hard to not look at. When you’re working with some jarhead who would rather be dead than talking to a psychiatrist, the way you listen? Even if he’s got his back turned to you or he’s telling you to fuck off? Like there’s no one else in the world but that one guy? You’re stunning. If you ever looked at me like that, I’d tell you everything.”
I wanted to say, “Tell me everything right now.” But my lips wouldn’t form the words, and my lungs could only breathe in the rhythms of slumber.
Part Two
After the eight
Chapter Five
The week after the first surge, the doctors went on doctoring while the surgeons were put on rest. Casualties came in at a manageable rate for the normal rotation, which I no longer oversaw.
After our first night together, Caden had slept for twenty-four hours. Most of the surgeons had. He owned me the two nights after that. Rotation last night. And tonight? If it was up to me, I’d be his again tonight.
The army was a huge net of people with tight knots of community. The way Ronin and I had found each other from basic, to Walter Reed, back around again to a common assignment in Iraq wasn’t unheard of. But Caden? He wasn’t part of the net. He’d sought out a commission during a time of war. As soon as his obligation was done, he could, and would, leave to pick up his life where he’d left it.
Like a soldier who’d witnessed the unthinkable, I tried not to think about it.
