by A. J. Downey
“All wonderful things, I promise,” Anne said, releasing my hand. I stuck it back in the pocket of my jean jacket.
“Give us a minute?” Brody asked, his eyes fixed on mine.
“Take all the time that you need.” Maia’s dad smiled once more and he and his wife moved off toward the double doors that would take them to the waiting room, pausing to talk softly in front of them.
“I’m so sorry I interrupted,” I said. “I just… I just wanted to see you before you went back. You know… ah…”
“To thank me?” he asked, his lip raising at the corners in a specter of a smile.
“No, I think my mom’s done enough of that for the both of us.”
He chuckled and raised his hand with the IV stuck in the back of it to cover my hands where they gripped the railing on the side of his bed. I nearly groaned. His hands were so warm and reassuring. I do know I closed my eyes and some of the tension drained out of the set of my shoulders at the simple touch.
“You worried?” he asked softly, and I nodded without opening my eyes.
“Yeah.”
“Don’t be.” I flicked my eyes open and stared at his serious face, no trace of a smile, not even a smirk. His steely blue eyes roved my face, and the smile came gently. A fondness edging it that made my toes curl in my worn out Doc Marten boots.
“I’ll be okay,” he said and gave my hands a squeeze over the bedrail.
“I know,” I said. “But its surgery and surgery is always scary.”
“That’s fair,” he said with a chuckle.
“I should get going.” I didn’t want to leave, but Maia’s parents were looking at us from across the surgical prep area and I was feeling self-conscious.
“Come see me again, later?” he asked and his expression, his tone was so hopeful… which was silly. Of course I had every intention of coming to see him post-surgery. My heart leaped for joy that he would even ask me.
“Yeah, sure, after you’re out and after I get out of work,” I agreed.
“Okay,” he said, his warm hand slipping off of mine to fall back to his side. “Have a good day at work, and I mean it, don’t worry about me.”
Oh, but I did worry. I couldn’t take my mind off of him the entire day I bussed tables and washed dishes and I fought to keep my attentions on even the simplest of tasks. When my part-time shift was over, I hung up my apron and slipped out before I could be asked to do anything else. Making a beeline for my rundown little car, I zipped through traffic and the deepening gloom of twilight to the hospital.
I parked in the garage, going deep to avoid potentially running into my mother. I had texted her, and she said she would be staying at the hospital with Lucas tonight. I had lied. Had told her I would be home. I didn’t know why I did it. I guess I thought she would freak out if she knew I was coming to see Brody and not Luke but I saw Luke every day.
I refused to feel guilty for taking this time for myself but I felt guilty for an altogether different reason when I stopped in the doorway to Brody’s overnight observation room. He laid still in the middle of the bed, eyes closed; deep dark circles under his eyes. A wrinkle of pain marred his forehead between his eyebrows while his lashes made dark crescents against his cheeks. He looked drawn with pain and it was all such a moving sacrifice to save my little brother’s life… for me.
He hurt so that Luke and I didn’t have to anymore and I loved him deeply for it. I loved him deeply, and I wasn’t sure if that was okay… I mean, he had kept careful boundaries and I didn’t want to overstep. I liked the carefully cultivated friendship we shared. I liked the mutual network of support we’d built for one another. I didn’t want to be the one to mess it up.
Still, as I drew even with his bedside, I couldn’t help myself. He was asleep and deeply drugged on pain medicine and I wouldn’t have another chance like this one. I had nothing with which to express my gratitude. Nothing but…
I swallowed hard, my throat thick with a mixture of tears and the fear that he would wake and reject me, but I couldn’t keep myself still. I folded at the waist and carefully placed my lips at the corner of his in a light kiss.
Brody sucked in a sharp breath, his eyes flying open and I blushed hotly at being caught, but I refused to be sorry. I met his eyes evenly as I slowly drew back but his voice caught me.
“Come back here and do that again,” he ordered gently and there was such a longing in his voice.
Tears of relief coursed down my cheeks as I bent and kissed him again, only this time he kissed me back, his hand gentle along my jaw, his lips soft against mine, his neat beard tickling my face.
“How are you feeling?” I whispered against his cheek, withdrawing to wipe at my tears.
“Sore, but good. I’d be better if you’d get in here with me.”
“What?” I blinked in surprise.
“Take off your jacket, take off your shoes, and get in here with me,” he said with a light chuckle.
I bit my lips together and lifted my purse over my head, setting it in the chair beside the bed. My jacket followed, and I toed off my shoes beneath the hospital bed. I was a practiced hand at this. I cuddled Luke when he was sick, crying, and in pain plenty of times. Except when I eased myself down on my side beside Brody, he had other plans.
He gathered me against his chest and pressed my head to his shoulder. I was super careful of him, knowing just how fragile his lower extremities were. I kept my legs away from his as much as possible and kept my free arm well above his waist. We settled carefully with only a mild amount of wincing from him and he sighed out as if complete once we were settled.
“Now I can sleep properly,” he murmured, and I smiled and closed my eyes too, listening to the steady cadence of his heart over the quiet hush of the ward.
9
Brody
We were sleeping peacefully when one of the nurses came in in a huff to chase Annika out.
“Relax, she’s my girlfriend,” I said flatly and wasn’t even surprised to realize I meant it. I loved Annika, and I wanted her to be a part of my life. Waking up like some sort of gender-bent sleeping beauty had sealed the deal. Knowing that her heart longed for mine just as much as mine had begun to long for hers the past few weeks was something magic.
Annika went to push up off of me and I pressed a kiss to her forehead before she could escape. The nurse harrumphed and went about doing whatever it was she was supposed to do while I ground my teeth as much in irritation over the interruption as I did in pain.
All in all, it wasn’t too bad. It quite literally felt like I had badly sprained my ass. There were muscles that hurt that I hadn’t even known I’d owned but it was for a good cause. A week or two and I would be my old self again and the only thing that made me want to speed the healing process was clambering out of the narrow hospital bed, smoothing her dark hair behind her delicate ears.
“I shouldn’t have stayed so late,” she said shakily and I smiled.
“Glad you did.”
She was eying me as she sank onto the edge of the seat beside the bed to put on her shoes, like she was trying to gauge something of me. I smiled and held out a hand. She reached for it and I gave her fingers a squeeze as the nurse left the room.
“I’d like to take you on a proper date, when I’m all healed up if you’ll let me.”
She nodded carefully.
“I’d like that.” She swallowed hard and her bottom lip trembled slightly with emotion.
“What’s wrong?” I asked.
“I mean,” she looked away before finishing, “you’re sure? Like, really sure?”
“I am.” I nodded gravely.
She blushed faintly and used her finger to help her heel slide into her last shoe. She stood then and took up her purse.
“Just text me,” she murmured.
“Just kiss me goodbye,” I said, and she smiled a little and leaned over me.
Her lips were the softest silk against my own. I drank her in and savored every moment
of it, and it was hard to keep things chaste and to just a simple long press of lips.
“Drive safe,” I whispered softly.
“I will,” she promised and then she was gone, the scent of her lingering. She smelled like clean linen and summer rain and I closed my eyes and savored that, too.
It was hard to go back to sleep after that.
It was over two weeks of just keeping it to texting every moment either of us could spare. I wanted to be fully healed before having her over and she was in the thick of things with supporting her mom. Her dad had come back and was dead set on a divorce. To make things worse, he was threatening to clean her mom out and leave her and Luke destitute. He was being so nasty about it, Annika wanted nothing to do with him and every moment she spent not working was devoted to her little brother and giving her mother a break.
The lawyers were involved and only by the grace of the best interest for the child had the courts blocked daddy dearest from kicking Luke off of his health insurance.
Annika’s mother, to her credit, had practically moved in to Luke’s hospital room, permanently. She was terrified that if she were gone for too long, that Annika’s father would somehow stop her from seeing her son.
While we all pretty much agreed the guy had gone off the deep end and was totally being an asshole, I didn’t think he would get that kind of douchey. He was hurt, angry, and was lashing out like a toddler in the midst of one serious maelstrom of a tantrum, but I didn’t think he would go that low. Then again, he had gone as low as to attempt to remove his son from his insurance in the midst of his battle with leukemia.
It was a mess, and Annika was caught in the midst of it all and I could tell some nights she was barely hanging on. It’d made me switch from our private messaging to actual phone calls. Hearing her voice helped me to gauge how bad of a day it’d been.
Now I waited anxiously for her to arrive. I’d wanted to do something low-key, something that was just her and I, so I had suggested that she come over. I wanted to do something special for her. Give because she was always the one giving. She sacrificed so much for her family, so I wanted to do something that was about her.
I asked for a list of her favorite movies, wanted to know her favorite foods, and even wanted to know her favorite color.
She’d been hard to pin down, asking why I’d wanted to know these things but that would have ruined the surprise.
She’d thought our entire evening would be ruined when her car had broken down earlier in the day but I had an app for that. I’d ordered her a Lyft and was just waiting on the front porch for her to pull up. I had sent her a screenshot of the car’s make, model, and license plate. I had made her swear to not get into any other vehicle. I would have picked her up myself but I wanted her dinner to be made, wanted it to be fresh when she slipped through my door.
I perked up at the sound of a car coming up the street and her equally anxious face peered out of the back seat’s window, relief flooding it when she saw me on the porch. The driver stopped at the curb and she got out. I tipped him generously on my phone as she walked up the drive and stuck it back in my pocket as she reached me.
“Hi,” I murmured, and she looked so tired but it couldn’t take away from the smile she turned up at me.
“Hi,” she said back, almost shyly and folded into my arms so artfully, like an origami rose.
I held her tightly and breathed her in, rocking her gently from side to side. She pulled back enough to look at me and I stole the moment and the words from her mouth with my lips on hers. She melted into me and that kiss was everything I’d needed it to be.
She parted her lips, and I slipped my tongue past them, stroking mine against hers, a sensual and erotic frisson of energy washing over my back along my spine. My scalp felt tingly.
“Wow,” she whispered surprised.
I chuckled slightly and said, “Come on in.”
I led her into my house, into my kitchen and we talked while I put the finishing touches on our meal. We ate casually at the kitchen counter, perched on the high kitchen chairs, sipping a decent wine. I didn’t care about her age. I cared about her relaxing and indulging in an adult moment that wasn’t fraught with anxiety and fear. That wasn’t something that felt like a life or death decision.
“I can’t believe you went to all this trouble for me,” she murmured and I smiled.
“No trouble,” I said. “Not for you.”
“When you said dinner and a movie…”
“Ah, yeah.” I felt my smile grow. “Movie. I picked up your top three. Ladies choice.”
She laughed and said, “What if I chose the total chick flick?” she demanded.
“Then I curl up on the couch with you and watch a chick flick. Pretty sure there are worse things in life,” I said, and she stared at me in wonder, her mouth slightly agape and those lush lips of hers begging for my kiss all over again.
I resisted, barely. I wanted this night to be everything that she wanted but no pressure.
“Okay, then I’ll take door number one,” she proclaimed.
I nodded and got up out of my seat, holding out my hand to her. “Right this way.”
She looked small curled in the corner of my overstuffed couch like a cat. I pulled the soft chenille throw blanket in her favorite color purple off the back and draped it across her lap while I cued up the Blue-ray player and my television.
I’d never actually seen The Notebook but I had to admit, it was pretty good. Made all the better by the enraptured look on Annika’s face as I held her in my arms beneath the blanket, soaking in her warmth, her head on my shoulder. I admit, I spent more time watching her reflection in the glass front of the cabinet holding the cable box, Blue-ray, and gaming systems than I did the movie.
When the credits rolled, so did a few tears from beneath her closed lids. I held her tighter and pressed a kiss to her temple as she whispered, “Now what?”
“Whatever you want,” I told her and I meant it.
“What if what I want is you?” she asked boldly and I smiled.
“Like I said,” I dropped my voice intentionally, whispering in her ear, “whatever you want.”
She turned her face toward mine and captured my mouth with hers, her hand laid lightly along my cheek as we kissed. I hadn’t been kissed like this in a while, and I realized just how desperate I was to love her. To give and take with her like I hadn’t since well before I’d lost my wife.
While Maia might be gone, she would never be forgotten, and I felt it deep down in my very soul that Maia had a little something to do with this. With moving the very stars into alignment for Annika and I to meet like we did, both online and in person.
Sweet Annika who moaned softly into my mouth, whose body melded into the front of mine, her lush curves sultry and sweet, the taste of her rich and decadent. I wanted to lose myself in her completely.
I broke the kiss just long enough to beg her, “Let me take you to the bedroom.”
“Okay.” She was breathless, wanting, and I couldn’t wait to have her in my bed, writhing beneath me as I made her feel so good it made everything else just fall away.
10
Annika
I lay back in the softness of Brody’s bed as he laid gentle kisses all over my body. It was hard not to writhe, each touch of his lips sparking a euphoric wash over my skin, his hands warm where he trailed them over me, gooseflesh following in their wake. I barely remembered to breathe as he explored me so thoroughly, bringing my body alive with lust and the blush of desire wherever he touched.
He went slow, asking after every touch of his lips, “Is this okay?”
I smiled, touching his hair, twining my fingers lightly through it and answered, “Yes.”
“How about this?” he asked after another kiss, lower than the first.
“Mm, yeah.”
“And here?” He pressed his lips to my skin, just below my belly button. I giggled, the touch tickling me, and nodded.
“Mm-
hm.”
His eyes captured mine as he stared up the length of my prone figure and the smile slid off of his face, his eyebrows going up in something akin to surprise, wonder in his eyes. I felt my breath catch as I asked, “What is it? Brody, what’s wrong?”
“Wrong?” he echoed. “Nothing is wrong, baby. Everything is right. I guess I just got a little starstruck.”
I laughed uneasily. “By what?”
“By you. You’re just incredible,” he breathed. “You’re beautiful, brave, and selfless and I can’t believe that you’re here. That you’re letting me love you.”
“Me? Selfless?” I asked incredulously. I mean, wasn’t just me being here selfish? I hadn’t done anything. I wasn’t the one who had just given up my bone marrow a couple of weeks ago.
“Yes, you,” he said and before I could continue the argument, he stole my words by pushing himself up right and sliding between my legs, his mouth coming down over mine, his cock, thick, hot and so erect, branding the inside of my thigh with its heat.
He kissed me, both of us writhing against each other, breaths rasping in an erotic cadence in counterpoint to one another. He moaned into my mouth and I whimpered in response. Just the feel of his skin against mine sent me close to the edge. His warmth, the hardness of his body, the way he devoured me from the mouth down as if he were a man starving.
All of it sent every one of my senses reeling and I wanted so badly for him to be inside me, but he wouldn’t be rushed. He took his time; kissing, licking and exploring every inch of me. His touch was so gentle, the play of his lips along my skin so enticing, and the way the warmth of his breath rushed over my skin sent me into delicate shivers of delight.
“You good?” he inquired lazily, and I smiled and bit my bottom lip coyly.
“Be better if you’d come back up here and kiss me,” I murmured.
“Not yet,” he smiled impishly. “I’m just getting to the best part.”
