Summer Wish

by Jill Sanders

  As it was, his recovery was slower than she’d anticipated. She knew that he couldn’t withstand any injury to his leg and still heal properly. All it would have taken was one of the four large men kicking or hitting him in the thigh, and he would have been down for the count.

  She doubted men like that would stop fighting simply because he’d passed out or fallen to the ground.

  So she’d done what she’d been taught to do. Nothing.

  Thankfully, there had been enough people around them to call the police, and they had arrived before the men had thought to pull Brett from the booth.

  She hated watching the men hit him with his cane. She doubted she would ever forget the sound of the wood breaking on his back as he was hit repeatedly with it.

  It had taken all her will to not cry out, to not fight back. But in that moment, she’d vowed to herself to sign up for Aubrey’s judo classes the following day.

  There was no way she was going to allow herself to feel so helpless again. Not when she had someone worth fighting for.

  She parked in her driveway, turned off Brett’s car, and looked at her little house for a moment.

  “Nice place,” Brett said.

  He’d helped her move into the place less than a year ago, but she couldn’t remember the last time he’d been over there.

  “Yeah.” She nodded. Her entire body had started to shake, and she knew it was the last of her adrenaline leaving her as her body finally caught up with what had happened.

  “Hey.” Brett took her hand in his when she reached for the door.

  She shook her head, willing the tears not to fall. “Inside,” she said, hearing her voice crack slightly. “I think I need some wine.”

  Brett nodded and followed her slowly inside.

  She locked the door and tossed her purse down on the entryway table and took a moment to take in a deep breath.

  She smelled the lavender and mint scents of her home and settled herself before walking into the kitchen and pulling out a bottle of her favorite wine. As she poured two glasses, Brett moved over and leaned against the bar top, leaning a hip on one of her bar stools.

  “Wow, you’ve done a lot in here. I like your color choices.” He took the glass that she offered him. “Bright and cheery.” He took a drink as he looked around.

  She glanced around and realized just how much better she felt since she’d walked through the door. Especially having Brett around.

  “To Paige.” She held up her glass and tapped his glass before drinking the entire glass in one swallow.

  She didn’t know who moved first, but after that, they moved as if in unison. They set their glasses on the breakfast bar, and then they were suddenly in each other’s arms, their lips fused together as their hands moved quickly to remove each other’s clothes.

  The moment his skin was under her fingertips, she sighed with relief. It felt as if she was breathing for the first time in hours.

  Her fingers shook as she pulled his pants snap loose, and she knew that it had nothing to do with what they’d just gone through in the last hour. Her desires and wishes were completely under the control of her body at this point.

  She needed Brett. Needed to feel him over her. In her. Around her.

  “Please,” she said as he trailed his mouth down her neck while he hiked up the skirt to her dress. “I need to feel you inside me.”

  A low groan reverberating in his chest made her smile. Then, in one swift move, he hoisted her up, knocking over their glasses as he set her on the countertop.

  She laughed with excitement and joy as he ripped her black silk panties from her and tossed them onto the floor. Then his mouth covered her pussy while her fingers dug into his hair. She held onto him while he lapped at her, and when he plunged his tongue into her pussy, it made her come almost instantly.

  “My god,” he said as he trailed his mouth along her inner thigh. “You taste like nectar.”

  “Brett.” She didn’t know what she was going to say, only that she needed more.

  When he moved up to wrap his arms around her, she reached for him, but he leaned back slightly.

  “I want to have you in a bed, this first time.” His eyes searched hers. “I hate that I can’t carry you there myself…”

  She smiled and pulled him close. “You can do that later.” She took his hand and slid off the counter.

  He was standing there in nothing more than his shoes and blue boxer briefs, looking sexier than any man she’d ever seen before.

  Since his injury, he’d been working more on lifting weights and now he had even more beautiful muscles and a new six-pack to show for all his hard work.

  How had she gotten so lucky to be with someone like him? He was beautiful inside and out.

  They moved down the hallway and into her bedroom together, slowly. She tried to move over to her bed, but he stopped her and searched for the light switch.

  When she opened her mouth to argue, he found the switch and her bedroom was bathed in bright light.

  “The lamp is less bright.” She walked over to turn on the bedside lamp. He flipped off the main light, and she helped him towards the bed. She knelt beside him when he sat on the edge of her bed and removed his shoes.

  “Careful,” he said with a chuckle. “I might get used to you waiting on me.”

  She laughed. “Once that leg is healed, you’re on your own again.”

  He nodded, then gripped her hips and pulled her up onto his body as he lay back on her bed. She was careful around his left leg, but after he started kissing her again, she forgot all about his pain, focusing only on the pleasure he was giving her.

  When his finger dipped into her pussy, she cried out, on the brink of coming again. Part of her mind screamed that she needed to move, to give him as much pleasure as he was giving her, so she reached for him.

  He was hard and as she rubbed him through the cotton of his boxer briefs, and she enjoyed feeling his hips swaying with her movements.

  “Lea, tell me you have some condoms,” he practically groaned out.

  “Yes.” She smiled and reached for the box of condoms on her nightstand. She’d purchased them in hopes that this very scenario would play out.

  Taking one, she knelt next to him and helped him slide off his boxers. The doctor in her zoned in on his puckered scar, looking for any signs of infection or damage that might have happened in tonight’s events. Seeing none, she leaned over him, opened the foil package, and slowly slid the condom over his length.

  When he made a sound, her eyes moved to him.

  “Am I hurting you?” she asked.

  “God no,” he groaned quickly. “You’re killing me.”

  Her hands stilled over him, gripping him slightly tighter. “This?” she asked, sliding up and down him slowly. She smiled when his hips jerked, and he fisted his hands on her bedspread.

  “Lea.” It was a warning, one she should have headed, but she continued to slide her hand up and down his length as she leaned forward and placed her lips over his six-pack.

  She licked her way over the ridges of his muscles, tasted him, working her way up his body until she finally straddled his hips.

  His hands moved over her breasts, pinching and teasing her nipples lightly. Then they worked down to her hips and he guided her to slide down, taking all of him deep into her.

  She arched back, enjoying the feeling of being complete. Marveling at how wonderful he felt inside her, under her.

  She opened her eyes and watched his enjoyment flood his face for a heartbeat. Then she began to move and lost herself completely in his blue eyes until they fell together.

  The dream started differently this time. Instead of a bunch of college kids heckling her for being too smart and too young, there were four large men dressed in red, white, and blue surrounding her. Taunting her, pushing her, telling her to go back to where she came from.

  In her dream, all four of them had canes. Instead of using them just on Brett, they lifted them to
wards her. And, as if in slow motion, powerful arms with thick wooden canes descending on her small form. She knew in that instant that she was going to die. There was no way she would survive such a vicious attack. It was impossible.

  “Lea!” Brett was shouting at her, shaking her body.

  When her eyes flew open, she had to blink a few times for his worried face to come into focus.

  “My god. Are you okay?” Brett asked as he pulled her into his arms.

  “I…” She held onto his naked body and closed her eyes. She breathed his scent in and instantly felt steadier. “It was a dream,” she said a few times. more to reassure herself as much as him.

  “You were screaming like someone was killing you.” He held onto her. She felt him stiffen in her arms. “Was it about last night?” He leaned back slightly to run his eyes over her.

  That’s when she noticed it was daylight out. They must have fallen asleep, holding onto one another.

  She instantly wished they would have woken up slowly, wrapped in each other’s embrace, and made love again. Instead, the terrible dream had taken that from her.

  “I’m okay.” She laid her hand on his face, enjoying the stubble that had grown overnight on his otherwise smooth skin. “It was just a dream.”

  His eyes searched her face, and he must have been able to tell that she didn’t want those four men to ruin any more of their time together. He relaxed and moved to pull her closer.

  Shifting, she laid her cheek against his chest as he leaned back on her headboard. She felt him tense for a moment, but then he sighed and relaxed.

  “I don’t suppose you’d be willing to help me move my things out of the cabin this morning?” he asked her.

  She smiled. “Since it’s my official day off… I’d be happy to. Just as long as we make enough time to stop and have breakfast first.” She glanced up at him as she trailed a finger over his chest. “For some reason, I’m famished this morning.”

  His smile was quick just before he dipped his head down and kissed her.

  “We might have a few moments to grab something to eat,” he said between kisses. “After a very hot, very long shower.”

  “Hm,” she groaned, running her hands over his shoulders.

  She’d never woken up in a man’s arms before. Actually, she’d never let a man spend the night at her place or slept with one in a bed before. There were a lot of firsts she planned on doing with Brett. One of those firsts was taking a shower with him.

  “A very long… hot…”—she shifted slightly, rubbing her body against his— “shower sounds really good.”

  He smiled up at her. “Witch.” He chuckled as she jumped up from the bed.

  She had just turned on the shower, warming it up, when he stepped into the bathroom and made his way towards her. Just then, she happened to get a look at his back in the mirror and gasped.

  “What did they do to you?” She moved around him and ran her fingers lightly over his black and purple skin. There were two long shallow cuts along his right shoulder blade. When she looked closer, she saw a few splinters of wood from his cane embedded in his skin.

  “It’s nothing.” He started to move past her, but she stopped him and nudged him until he sat on the counter, facing away from her.

  “You have chunks of wood in here from your cane and you’re bleeding,” she informed him.

  “I am?” He glanced back into the mirror and then winced. “It looks worse than it feels.”

  She grabbed her first aid kit from under the sink and quickly took a couple of pictures of his shoulder for the police file before she started cleaning his back. He sat patiently as she used her tweezers to gently pull the pieces of wood from his skin. He hissed when she cleaned it.

  “I’m not going to bandage it, since I’ll want to rinse it out in the shower. After, I’ll put a bandage on it.” She opened the shower door and helped him hobble in. “Sit on the shower bench,” she said as she stepped in.

  “Yes, doctor,” Brett said. He wiggled his eyebrows, making her smile.

  “Oh, you want to play?” She moved over to him and picked up her shampoo bottle behind his back. After he sat down on the shower bench, she turned the bottle upside down and dumped a bunch on his head while the water ran over the both of them.

  He gripped her hips and kissed her until she melted against him.

  When she stepped out of the shower, she was trying to figure out how to convince him to spend the entire day in bed with her. But the sound of her cell phone ringing and the dozen or so messages on her phone had instant worry replacing those thoughts.

  Images of something going wrong with baby Paige had her answering Zoey’s call.

  “What’s up? Is Paige, okay?” she answered quickly.

  “Yes, we’re all fine. How about you?” Zoey asked, and Lea could hear the worry in her tone.

  “We’re— I’m good,” she corrected quickly.

  “You don’t know, do you?” Zoey asked.

  “Know?” Lea glanced over and saw Brett check his phone and frown down at it. Then he turned his screen towards hers, and she saw a grainy image of last night.

  “It went national,” Zoey said softly. “What the two of you went through last night.”

  Lea closed her eyes and sat on the edge of her bed with the towel still wrapped around her. All thoughts of sexy fun time with Brett disappeared.

  She remembered telling the girl last night that it was okay to share the video. After all, if there was a possibility that it would help someone else out, she was all for it. Besides, she didn’t think anyone would be able to tell who they were, since the video was very grainy and taken from outside the Whataburger.

  “I… didn’t think… We’re okay,” she reiterated. “Brett has some bruises.”

  “Bruises?” Zoey jumped in. “Hang on, I’m putting you on speaker phone. We’re all here.”

  “Here?” Lea asked.

  “Still at the hospital. We’re checking out in a few hours and heading home,” Zoey answered. “But the gang is all here.”

  “Hi,” several people called out at the same time.

  “Brett’s here too,” she said, putting her phone on speaker. It wasn’t until the other side of the call went quiet that she realized that she had just broadcasted to everyone they knew that they’d just spend the night together.

  “Morning,” Brett said easily. “As Lea said, I’m okay.”

  “What the hell,” Aiden said. “Tell us the four of them are rotting in a cell.”

  “Yes, Carl hauled them away and assured me that they’ll be charged for last night’s hate crime and attack on an officer, since I clearly told them I was the police, and my official retirement isn’t until next month,” Brett said. She must have been too busy trying to stay calm last night to hear that bit of information. To be honest, she wasn’t quite sure how she’d made it through everything, let alone made it home.

  “Good,” Aiden said. “So now you’re famous again.”

  Brett sighed and looked at her. “We’re going to stop off and get some breakfast… then Lea’s going to help me move my stuff back to my place.”

  “We’ll come help,” Aiden said. “See you in about an hour. We can get the full story then.”

  “Sound good,” Brett said and then hung up.

  “I’m sorry,” she said once the line went dead. “I… didn’t mean to tell them about us.”

  “Why not?” Brett frowned over at her. “Whatever this is, I hadn’t planned on it being a secret. Not from our friends.”

  She relaxed. “You didn’t?”

  He smiled and pulled her close to him. “No. Something this good, I don’t want to hide.”

  Chapter 14

  He knew his friends were trying to make them feel better about what they’d been through the night before, but he was worried that highlighting the scenario was just pouring salt on Lea’s open wound.

  Even though she laughed and joked when everyone packed up his stuff in three
boxes to take back to his place, he remembered seeing her cry out and shiver as he woke her from the nightmare that morning.

  He’d wanted to protect her last night and had failed, having to wait around for people who could. That played heavily on his ego, something he hadn’t struggled with for years. He supposed it was because he had never been weak or vulnerable before now.

  Whatever the reason, he wasn’t enjoying it now. Especially sitting back with his feet up, watching his friends cart out his stuff and load it in his car. After which, no doubt, everyone would end up at his place to listen to the entire story of last night.

  Everyone, that was, that didn’t have to work that day. An hour later, sure enough, his apartment was crowded with Aubrey, Aiden, Elle, Levi, and Scarlett. Someone had stopped off and grabbed sandwiches and beer. He sat on the sofa, his left leg propped up again, as they conveyed everything that had happened to them.

  To be honest, at this point, after having taken more than two dozen calls, he was tired of the story and knew that Lea felt the same way.

  Her parents had called her in a frantic state of worry when they’d been driving back to his place, and he’d listened to the two-sided conversation through her car’s speakers while she explained that they were both okay.

  He felt honored that her parents had been equally as concerned for him as they were for their own daughter. After everyone had left his apartment later that night, he realized that there was one phone call he hadn’t gotten that day. The one from his own parents.

  What had he expected? After all, the men that had attacked them last night were his dad’s kind of people. Right?

  Still, seeing as their son was on national television being attacked a little over a month after he’d been shot, he would have hoped that they’d call to see how he was doing.

  “You’re quiet,” Lea said as she helped clean up the dishes and toss the beer and soda cans away.

  “Just… thinking,” he said with a sigh. “My parents didn’t call.” He glanced down at his phone.

  She stopped clearing the coffee table and set the pile of plates down. She sat next to him and took his hands in hers.