Chapter 45
Charity
I slipped into Dom’s room as he had suggested to set my bag down and the first thing I saw was the pile of photos and mementos sitting on top of the contents of his wastebasket. It made my heart hurt a little and I quickly salvaged the pictures and EKG readout strips, tucking them into one of the end pockets of my gym bag. I felt like I was sparing him from a horrible mistake. That he might have been hurting when he’d tossed these things, but some day there would be regret. This way, he could be rid of them, but when the day came that he regretted throwing these things out, I would have them for him.
I tucked my bag on the floor on my side of the bed and slipped out into the kitchen, giving the bathroom door a wider than necessary berth. I’d use it eventually, but figured it would be after a glass or three of wine to loosen up. I found two bottles, a white and a red, chilling in his refrigerator. I selected the white and after some cursory hunting in the cabinets and drawers, came up with a couple of glasses and a cork screw.
“Need a hand?” he asked, coming through the back slider. I smiled and nodded. He took the bottle of wine and the corkscrew from me, and got it open. I poured us a couple of generous glasses and followed him out into the twilight.
We settled into our respective seats and set our glasses on the little table between the wooden lounge chairs. He’d brought the bottle out and I sighed with utter contentment.
“What is that?” I asked, over the crackle of fire and the emerging sounds of frogs and insects.
“What is what?” he asked.
“Can’t you see it?”
“See what?” he asked laughing, looking around.
“The little sparkles in the air,” I said.
“Are you serious?” he asked.
“Of course I’m serious! What are they?”
“Haven’t you ever seen lightning bugs before?”
“What, like fireflies?”
“Yeah.”
I sat back in my chair, and my hand naturally drifted to find his between our seats, “No,” I said, “I’m a California girl; they aren’t that far west and the university I went to was too far north. I’ve never seen them before.”
“Well, now you have,” he said and brought the back of my hand to his lips, planting a soft kiss against my knuckles.
We sipped wine, and alternately watched the fire and fireflies, listening to the night come alive. It was beautiful, and soothing, and I wouldn’t trade these moments for the world, but eventually the wine worked its magic and I had to go break the proverbial seal. Damn alcohol and its diuretic effects, I thought with a sigh.
“Bathroom,” I murmured and hauled myself to my feet.
“Toilet’s broken in the one in my room; sorry, Baby,” he murmured back. I nodded and slipped back into the house. I went to the bathroom, steeled myself and opened the door, flipping on the light and gasped.
It was completely different. The walls were now a light grey with light blue undertones, like a mist settled on a lake on a rainy day. The floor was slate tile rather than the cheap linoleum it used to be. The vanity had a granite sink and an old fashioned fixture. Even the lights above the oval, silver framed, antique looking mirror bespoke a classic era. The delicate, frosted glass of the shades casting a muted glow into the room.
He’d bought lighter gray bath mats and the shower curtain was beautiful too. A magnolia tree depicted on the light gray cloth, the trunk a darker gray with white and pink blossoms. A white little bird perched in the branches.
I heard the scrape of Dom’s boot on the hard wood of the hall and turned to look at him, tears in my eyes.
“You did this for me?” I asked.
He took me into his arms and nodded carefully, “I want you to feel comfortable here, I want you to feel safe,” he uttered.
“So you tear out your entire bathroom and redo it, rather than just getting a new shower curtain and maybe some new rugs?” I asked, the first tears from the overwhelming, just love and gratitude began to fall.
“Does it make you happy?” he asked.
“Oh my god, you have no idea!” I wrapped my arms around his neck, and buried my face in his chest and felt so incredibly guilty about going behind his back with the Watch Commander.
“Shh, hey, it’s okay, Baby,” he said laughing a little.
“No, it’s not!” I cried. “I’ve done something incredibly stupid and I feel so bad about it but you have to understand, you are so wasted painting houses! Just promise when I tell you, that you won’t be mad at me.”
“Charity, Baby, what’s wrong? What did you do?”
I spilled it. The whole thing, and the look on his face was surprised, but he gave absolutely nothing else away.
“Please say something,” I begged and his face broke into a wide grin.
“Go to the bathroom and come back outside, we’ll talk about it.” He smoothed his thumbs through the wetness on my face and the smile on his was beatific. “I promise, I’m not mad.”
“Okay,” I said, apprehensive.
“Go to the bathroom, Charity, and meet me back outside,” he said and I nodded.
I used the brand new, beautiful restroom. Even the towel bars were ornamental, a decorative brushed steel with old fashioned end caps. The towels that hung on them gray, white and pink, matching the shower curtain. He really had thought of everything.
I quickly washed up, and splashed some cold water on my face in hopes of diminishing the blotchiness. I ugly cried any time I cried, which is why I didn’t make a habit of doing it often.
I went back outside and retook my seat. Dom looked over at me and handed me my wine. I took a fortifying sip and set the glass back down and he took my hand in his.
“Better?” he asked, and I nodded. He looked thoughtful for a second and said, “You’re right. I’m not meant to paint houses, I’m meant to be out there helping people and I know your heart’s in the right place, Baby, because you’re just like me in that regard.”
I nodded again, sensing he wasn’t done speaking, and I was right. He drew a deep breath, let it out slowly and said, “I want to ask you something, and you can say ‘no,’ or ‘not right now’ but…” he pulled a shopping bag up from the other side of his chair and held it out to me. I took it and looked inside.
“No, way!” I said stunned. He smiled and hung his head, and I pulled the leather vest out of the bag. “Are you sure?” I asked quietly, “I mean, are you really sure?”
“Babe, you’re taking care of me, as much as I’m trying to take care of you… and yeah, I’m sure. I want this, but only if you want it, and if what you’re saying is true and Figaro is offering the top of the pay scale for both of us, then yeah. I’m in, let’s do it.”
I stood up, and crossed in front of the fire, straddling his lap in his chair, kissing him fiercely, the shopping bag getting crushed between us. He put his arms around me and held me tight.
When we finally came up for air he said, “Figaro is a fucking budget Nazi, if he’s hurting bad enough to offer the top of the pay scale right off the bat, then we need to get our boots on the ground and do some good; he just doesn’t do that.”
“I don’t care about him right now, I care about you and me and us,” I told him.
“God, Charity, I love you,” he groaned and his mouth crashed down over the top of mine again. I kissed him back soundly, glad for the six foot privacy fence ringing in the back yard. I should have known better that he wouldn’t leave us out here. Instead he stood, with me clinging to him, like I hardly weighed anything at all. He carried me into the house but we didn’t make it to the bedroom. Instead, he laid me on the couch, covering my body with his.
It was a frenzy of blind groping to get our clothing off as we didn’t want to stop kissing and when we finally did manage to get it far enough removed to make sex possible, neither one of us wanted to slow down long enough to make it last. Instead, we crashed together in an explosion of passion, love, and ecstasy.
I wrapped my legs around his hips and held on as he thrust into me hard and harder, that golden weight of orgasm building at a phenomenal rate until I came, crying out, and holding on as my world disappeared completely only to fade back into existence. Dom kissed me, and I kissed him, and we lay crammed on the couch which was too small to accommodate us both, panting and breathless, but complete.
***
“You nervous?” I asked, five days later.
Dom’s fingers tapped out some unknown pattern on his jeans clad knee, belying his answer of “No, I’m cool.”
I smiled to myself and pulled us off the interstate, the sun shining down, and the world golden and new and full of such promise. We’d gone for an extended ride with the rest of the club on Saturday. On Sunday, the club had helped move my things into Dom’s house. On Monday, Dom and I had spent the day in varying stages of undress, putting everything away and having sex something like two or nine times.
Yesterday, he and Gator had gone to paint the exterior of a house and today, now, we were headed back to the warehouse full of ambulances to make good on my promise to Watch Commander Figaro and to see if he would make good on his.
When we pulled up in front of the building, Figaro was outside smoking a cigarette, standing with another medic whose face split into a wide grin. Figaro said, “Well, I’ll be damned,” and the other medic started laughing and clapping. I shut off the Jeep and Dom and I got out.
“She really talk you into coming back, boy?” Figaro asked.
“She did indeed,” Dom said and went to him, holding out a hand. They shook, heartily and Figaro looked at me. I raised an eyebrow.
“Okay, Princess. You got me; I didn’t think you could do it.”
“Never, ever, doubt a Virtue,” I told him, “We’ll surprise you every time.”
“Virtue?” he asked.
“There are three of them, Sir. Charity is the youngest, Hope’s the oldest and you have Faith in the middle.”
“That right? They medically trained too?”
“Hope’s a defense contractor, Faith’s between jobs. I’m the only medically trained one of the bunch, sorry.”
“Well, come on in, let’s get some of this paperwork filled out and talk salary.”
Dom and I traded a look and I raised my eyebrows, “Don’t believe there’s anything to talk about salary wise. You said ‘top of the pay scale’ and that’s exactly what we mean to collect.” I said, following him to the office.
“Ballsy, ain’t she?” Figaro asked Dom and Dom laughed.
“You have no idea, and you should meet Hope.”
“Eh, I think I can do without, and she’s right. You know me, Shep, I stick to my word.”
“That you do, Sir. That you do.”
“You want anything else?” Figaro asked and I smiled with the devil’s own grin…
“Actually, there is one thing…” And that is how Dom and I ended up in the back of one of the ambulances, giggling and trying not to grope each other as we took each other’s EKG readings and printed them out. I had something specific in mind for his, and an offer to make him when it came to Corrine’s and Katy’s but that was for another day. For right now, I just needed to get the print outs.
“Why do you want to do this?” he asked me, and kissed me gently.
“Because reasons!” I said playfully.
“Because reasons… that is so helpful, Baby. Really, no seriously… don’t quit your day job.”
“Hey, thanks to me we both have day jobs,” I said and tore off the strip of his readout writing ‘Galahad’ in the corner.
“This is true,” he said, clipping the leads to the stickers covering my torso.
I wriggled and he laughed, “Will you hold still?” he demanded.
“I can’t! It tickles,” I said and we both dissolved into a fit of happy laughter.
“You know, I can’t thank you enough,” he said and he was so very serious it gave me pause.
“For what?”
“For bringing my smile back, and for breathing life back into me.”
“It was there all along, you just needed a little bit more of a guide wire out of the dark.”
“Yeah, and that lifeline was you, silly girl, and when I get us home, I’m going to have to thank you proper, over,” he kissed me, “And over,” he kissed me again, “And over again.”
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
I jumped and let out a shriek, and both Dom and I dissolved into fits and peals of laughter.
Figaro called out, “All right you two! That’s enough shenanigans for one day, get on out of there, it’s time for this bus to get out on the street.”
“Sir, yes, sir!” I called out and Dom tore my EKG readout strip off the machine.
He jumped down out of the back of the ambulance first and lifted me down after him. Figaro chuckled.
“We’ll be seein’ you day after next; you’re on the night watch.”
“That’ll do for now,” Dom said, “But eventually, I’d like to get us on a day shift.”
“Noted,” Figaro said, “Now get on out of here.”
We left, and I drove us home…