Chapter Ten

CPR Certified

The ringing phone wakes me from my slumber and I keep my eyes closed, praying whoever is calling me hangs up and gives me another five minutes of sleep. Of course, that’s just wishful thinking on my behalf. I’m not a young woman recovering from a night of great sex. I’m a single mother who had to pull lots of strings to get a night alone with the man she’s been dating for a month—a man who just happens to have the patience of a saint and the body of a God.

A moan sounds from the back of my throat as I blindly roll onto my side and pat the nightstand for the offensive device. My fingers fumble as I make a grab for it. With one eye open, I stare at the screen and see it’s my sister FaceTiming me. Normally, I wouldn’t engage with Amber without having at least two cups of coffee and especially not when I’m in a man’s bed, but she took Christopher for the night.

I quickly sit up and force my eyes open as I accept the call. Forgetting I probably have the worst case of bed hair in history or that I’m wearing nothing but one of Jimmy’s t-shirts, I smile at my boy as his face appears.

“Hi Mommy,” Christopher says, his little face squished against the screen. “Whatcha doing?”

Leaning against the headboard, I steal a glance at Jimmy and find him in all his naked glory stirring beside me. Careful to keep the phone far away from him, I offer Christopher a smile.

“I’m just getting up. What about you? Is everything okay?”

“Aunt Amber burned the eggs,” he reveals. “Now, she’s trying not to burn the bacon too. When are you coming to pick me up?”

I’m not sure how she survives on her own, my sister can’t make toast without burning it.

“I’ll be there soon, baby,” I promise. “Why don’t you have a bowl of cereal and when I pick you up, I’ll take you for breakfast.”

“Okay!” he says. “How was your trip?”

“My trip?”

“I heard Aunt Amber talking to grandma,” he explains. “She said with any luck you’d see stars. I thought that meant you were going to the moon.”

I’m going to kill my sister.

As I’m about to tell my son to ignore everything his aunt says, I feel Jimmy’s hand on my thigh. Turning my gaze to him, I take in the amused smirk on his face.

“Did you see stars?” he whispers huskily.

At the sound of his bedroom voice, I bite my lower lip to suppress a whimper. I thought seeing Jimmy in uniform was something to behold but, this, him naked with his salt and pepper hair all mussed, smiling at me with that sexy grin of his—well, let’s just say a woman can get used to this.

Bringing my index finger to my lips, I motion to the phone.

“Oh, Mommy, I’ve got to go. PJ Masks is on. Here’s Aunt Amber,” my little guy calls into the phone. Before I can tell him goodbye or assure him I didn’t take a trip to the moon, he drops the phone. A second later Amber’s face fills the screen and her eyes go wide.

“Well, well, look at you,” she sing-songs. A shit eating grin spreads across her face and she wiggles her eyebrows suggestively.

I really hate my sister.

“Shut up,” I hiss, smoothing down my hair.

“Please tell me you finally got Jimmy’s hose otherwise I’m not sure I can be your sister anymore.”

I feel the heat spread to my cheeks as I grit my teeth and stare daggers at the screen.

“Amber,” I seethe.

“Where is he anyway?”

“Good morning, Amber,” Jimmy says smoothly. Chancing a glance at him from the corner my eye, I watch him fold his hands behind his head with a smug expression on his handsome face.

“He really is a hero,” Amber says. Tearing my eyes away from Jimmy, I look back at Amber and furrow my brows. “He saved your vagina from death.”

Jimmy laughs as he rolls onto his side and runs his hand up my thigh. Bending his head his mouth finds my nipple through his shirt and a gasp slides past my lips.

“Jimmy,” I whisper.

“Get it Jimmy,” Amber cheers.

Pushing him away, I lean the phone away from us and glare at my sister.

“I’ll be there in an hour to pick up Christopher.”

“Take your time,” she says. “You have five years of sex you need to make up for.” Robbing me of the satisfaction of hanging up on her, she disconnects the call. I really hope the revolving door to Amber’s bedroom shuts because if it does, I’m going to wreak as much havoc on her as she has done to me.

God help the poor bastard who revives her vagina.

Embarrassed by my sister’s brutal honesty, I drop the phone back onto the nightstand and force myself to meet Jimmy’s eyes.

“Well, that was fun,” he says. The sly grin on his face reminds me of all the ways he revived me throughout the night.

“My sister has no filter.”

“I’m just glad I could be of service,” he teases. Sliding between my legs, he bends my knee and places a kiss on the inside of my thigh. “Tell me, Melissa, did you see stars?”

“Watch it, Jimmy,” I warn hoarsely as he continues to pepper my thigh with kisses. “Your head might not fit into your helmet anymore.”

He smiles against my thigh before draping it over his shoulder. Lifting the hem of the t-shirt, he exposes my bare pussy to his eyes and a guttural groan escapes his lips.

“It’s a risk I’m willing to take,” he says. Lowering his mouth, he uses his fingers to spread my lips and takes his time, lavishly licking me.

“What are you doing?” I murmur. After last night, I know how this goes. It starts with oral and quickly escalates. Before either of us know it, we’ll be going at it for hours and multiple orgasms will be had by all.  “I have to go.”

“CPR,” he growls, sliding two thick fingers inside of me as his tongue finds my clit.

“Jimmy,” I protest. “I really have to go.”

My voice is weak even to my own ears and I instinctively throw my other leg over his shoulder as I thread my fingers through his hair. Cradling the back of his head, I lift my hips and start to ride his fingers and his tongue.

He nips and sucks at the tiny bundle of nerves, unraveling me with every teasing motion as he continues to pump his fingers in and out of me. Keeping one hand on the back of his head, I lift the other to my breast and roll one of my nipples between my fingers.

“Right there,” I moan. “Yes, God, yes,” I whimper as my hips buck and he crooks his fingers. My orgasm hits me hard and my body goes lax as I ride the wave. His fingers and mouth leave me, and my legs fall to the sides of him. Before I can come down from the high, he pushes his cock deep inside of me, hitting all the right places. Lifting my arms above my head, he drops his mouth to mine and swallows my moans, almost instantly bringing me to another orgasm.

Jimmy continues to drive in and out of me mercilessly until we’re both panting and screaming one another’s name as we come. It’s in that moment, when he drops his weight and kisses my cheek, that I wonder how I’ve gone five years without the physical contact of a man. As much as I missed the orgasms, I missed having someone hold me and kiss me. I missed staring into someone’s eyes and knowing there was no place in the world either of us would rather be.

That’s not saying it isn’t strange looking into Jimmy’s eyes or having him be the man that holds me. I never imagined I’d want anyone else in my life, that I would share this with anyone other than Chris and yet, here I am, in Jimmy’s bed wishing we had more time, wishing we had forever.

While I may have allowed myself to move on, I’m not sure I’ll ever allow myself to believe in forever. Especially not with a man who risks his life every day he wakes.

I don’t think—no, I know I can’t survive giving my heart to another man only to lose him again.

“When can I see you again?” Jimmy asks, twirling a lock of my hair around his finger. Forcing the morbid thoughts to the back of my mind, I lift my hand to his cheek and stroke the five o’clock shadow covering his face.

“What you really mean to ask is when can we spend the night together again isn’t it?”

Bending his head, he gives my lips a quick peck before pulling out and rolling onto his back beside me. Taking my hand in his, he brushes his lips over my knuckles and stares at me.

“That too.”

“I’m not sure,” I answer honestly.

“I have a busy week before school breaks for Thanksgiving.”

Pausing for a beat, I cock my head to the side. We’ve only been seriously together for a month and now, the holidays are quickly approaching. Neither of us has mentioned our plans and I’m suddenly curious as to how Jimmy spends his holidays. Other than his daughters, he doesn’t speak much of family. If he has a pain in the ass sister like me, she’s not in his life nagging him like mine is and I never asked about his parents.

“We’ll figure it out,” he says. “Gianna is coming home from college, but I won’t see her until the weekend.”

“You don’t have the girls on Thanksgiving?”

“Nah,” he says with a shake of the head. “Lisa always gets them on Thanksgiving. I get them on Christmas Eve and every other Easter,” he explains. Propping up on his elbow, he rests his head on his hand and stares at me. “What about you? What do you do on Thanksgiving?”

Biting my lip, I don’t answer right away. For the last couple of years, Christopher and I have gone to Chris’s moms for Thanksgiving. It was his favorite holiday and Bea thought it would be a great way to honor him. In fact, she still sets a place for him at the table right beside me.

When things started to get serious with Jimmy, I confessed to the woman who would’ve been my mother-in-law that I was seeing someone. To my surprise, she wasn’t all that upset that I was trying to move on. She wished me well and asked me if I would be bringing my new boyfriend to Thanksgiving dinner, making it clear me and Christopher were still expected to share the holiday with her.

“We go to Chris’s parent’s house for Thanksgiving,” I confess. “It’s been a tradition since he passed.”

The expression on his face remains neutral as he nods.

“What did you do before?”

“Well, after we first got engaged, we started having the holiday at our house. Chris loved Thanksgiving. We would get up around two in the morning and go down to watch them blow up the balloons for the Macy’s Thanksgiving Day parade. Once that was over, we would go back home, and watch the parade on television while we cooked.”

“Sounds like a great tradition.”

“It was,” I say sadly. Realizing I’m naked in Jimmy’s bed talking about another man, I lift my eyes to his and frown. “I’m sorry,” I whisper. “I shouldn’t be talking about this now.”

“Hey,” he calls softly as his hand touches my cheek. “It’s okay to talk about him with me. He was part of your life, Melissa, and he’s your son’s father,” he pauses for a beat. “I think it’s beautiful that you share the holidays with his family. Especially for the sake of your son.”

“Thank you,” I whisper, tugging the sheet further up my body. Desperate to change the subject, I run my fingers through my hair and force a smile. “So, if you don’t have the girls what are your plans?”

“Work.”

I’ve always known our first responders work on the holidays, that they often forfeit time with their family to protect the public courageously. However, the magnitude of the sacrifice didn’t hit me until this very moment. I guess that’s what happens when a first responder isn’t just a faceless stranger.

“Do you always work the holidays?”

“We rotate mostly but I don’t mind working when I don’t have the girls. Back when they were babies, yeah, it sucked. I always tried to at least be off for Christmas but after Lisa and I got divorced, I found myself working more. Now, it’s different. My kids are grown and couldn't care less about turkey. Plus, a lot of the guys in my house are young, just starting their families. If I can help them savor those moments by putting in some time, I’m happy to help.”

If there was any doubt that Jimmy was selfless that statement would change my mind. He’s more than just a hero, he’s the man you hope for and if you’re not careful, he’s the man you’ll fall in love with.

Or at least that’s what Jimmy is to me.