Chapter Thirty-Two

Gavin

Reaching for her across the sheets, I come up empty. It’s no surprise at this point. The dark circles under her eyes have started to stain her face. She doesn’t sleep, and she barely eats the dinners she cooks. It takes days of insomnia for her to finally be able to crash to the point she can sleep, and even then, she wakes up thrashing around in a panic. She’s having night terrors, dreams that paralyze her body until her mind can wake it up. Instead of sleeping, she stalks the house at night, constantly alert, checking the windows and feeding her paranoia. She’s had the locks changed, twice, despite my attempts to put her at ease.

She doesn’t feel safe with you.

Every day I reach out, and every day she takes another step away. Intimacy seems like a thing of the past. I pride myself on being a patient man but seeing her so close and not being able to touch her, after I’ve had free rein for so long, is agony. This morning, she caught me fucking my fist in the shower. I was close to coming when she stepped into the bathroom, surprising me after taking Noah to school. Once she caught sight of me, rock hard, teeth gnashing, I swear I saw a hint of hunger in her eyes before they flit away. Her apology left me standing there feeling like a sick fuck.

Katy is the most highly sexual woman I’ve ever known. Once she gave me access to her heart and body, I free fell into my addiction to her. She’s finally home, and I’m still living in the headspace we were in when she left. Not only are we not on the same page anymore, we’re reading completely different books. That I knew she would come home this way doesn’t make it any less hard. I am fucking madly in love with my wife, always have been, and my need to close the distance is growing every day. She’s here, but it feels like an apparition; like I could reach out, and instead of touching flesh and bone, she’d slip through my fingers.

Staring at her empty pillow, I can still picture her the night before she left for Baghdad, smiling over at me while I read on my iPad.

“What are you reading?”

I turn the screen her way, hoping to jog her interest. “The updated ATP, tactics for infantry and ambush.”

“Man, are you getting boring,” she teases as she ducks under my upheld arm, laying her head on my shoulder. She reads along with me for a minute before her fingers start to explore my chest.

Instantly my cock rises to the occasion, along with a touch of anxiety. My fear stems from knowing her first term was served stateside. As a captain, I’m proud of her for serving her country. As a husband, I don’t fucking want my wife there. In a matter of seconds, she reads me and calls my bullshit.

“I went to boot, same as you, and spent an additional sixty-eight weeks of training to be a medic. I’m as ready as I’ll ever be, Captain. I’m more than qualified.”

It takes everything I have to show her faith, instead of fear, with my answer. “You are.”

“Besides, I’ll be on base, chained to the clinic,” she says, pressing a kiss to my neck. “And please don’t ever forget, I can kick your ass.”

That earns her a chuckle. Katy is unbelievably strong for her size.

“Bet you wish you would’ve married a house mouse now, huh?” I hear a little vulnerability and knock it down as I pull her closer.

“You did it for me; it’s my turn. I wouldn’t have put a ring on any other woman. And I damn sure wouldn’t have settled down this early.”

“Early? When exactly did you plan to do that? You’re ancient,” she teases. “And please don’t go getting too sentimental yet, Captain.”

Inhaling the scent of her hair, I roll her on her back and stare down at her blue eyes as they dilate, her breathing picking up. Every part of this is for me.

“Ancient, huh?” I parrot sarcastically before running my fingers up her calf and stopping at her thigh.

“Did I say ancient? I meant wise, distinguished.” Her breath is coming faster. “And sophisticated?” When my fingers inch up in response, she rambles on. “Intelligent?”

“Is that a question?”

“No,” she rasps out. “Very intelligent.”

“As much good as it does you,” I scoff. “You don’t want tactical lectures.”

“Fuck-hot sexy?” she offers.

“Another question?” I prompt, sliding my hand into her soaked panties, I press my thumb to her clit.

“And loving.”

Massaging her beneath the silky material, her eyes hood with need.

“Sooo loving.”

“You don’t want sentiment either, so what exactly is it that you want, Mrs. Walsh?”

She looks up at the ceiling as if she’s thinking, before her thighs fall open, giving me more access.

“Meh, can’t think of anything at the moment.” It’s a play for power, and she will most definitely lose, but I’ll make sure she doesn’t regret it.

“No?” I whisper as I dip and kiss her breastbone from one side to the other while inching her cami down to cradle her perfect tits. I suck one rose-colored nipple into my mouth as she clutches my head to keep me there.

“Gavin,” she whispers. “If you start this…” Her voice trails off as she lifts her hips so I can slide her panties down.

“What?”

Spreading her soaked lips with my fingers, I slide two in her drenched middle and twist them inside her. She’s bucking in my hand, all words falling away as I massage her clit with my thumb, and she comes on my fingers, feverishly she kisses me before I pull away to admire her reaction to my touch.

Her blue eyes are turbulent, filled with lust. She’s nowhere near done. She’s insatiable, and I’m more than up for the challenge.

“What?”

“You know what,” she demands, gripping my engorged cock and sliding the drip of precum over the tip while I grind my hips.

“Not so boring now, huh?” I say, lining myself up with her entrance. Teasing her with just the tip, I rub it through her slickness. We’ve always been good at this. It comes so natural to us.

Her perfect lips part as my resolve splinters “I want you.”

In one swift thrust, I’m buried to the hilt and her body bows. She’s the perfect fit, and I pride myself at being her only lover. My eyes close briefly at the feel of us before I pull back and drive in, watching filthy words fall from her mouth as she pleads for more. She rides me from below, matching my thrusts by pumping her hips. She pulls me in deep, dragging me in further, her muscled thighs wrapping around my back.

“Harder,” she begs as I swivel my hips, hitting deep, the way I know she likes it.

“Fuck, baby,” I whisper, while she stares up at me like I’m her God. Chest igniting with all that I feel for her, I pin her by the wrists and thread our fingers together. Pushing off the pads of my feet, I go deeper than I’ve ever gone, fusing our bodies together. Chests rubbing and covered in sweat, she takes everything I give her.

“Gavin,” she rasps out as she tightens around me, coming long and hard. Her moan pulls the last of my restraint away as I quicken my pace. She floods on my cock as I fly over with her, filling her up. As I collapse on her chest, I’m only able to take a single breath before my lips turn up at her next order.

“I’m going to need you to do that again, Captain.”

We bared both our fears without words, fucking hard and fast then making love soft and slow before coming back to earth wrapped in the other. The next morning, I’d spied her reading the tactics manual when she thought I was sleeping. Rolling her wedding ring on her finger with her thumb, she worried her lower lip in concentration. “Stop staring at me like that, Captain,” she says as she flips a page on the tablet. “Unless you plan to do something about it.” Whether or not she’s doing it for me, I’m glad she’s doing it. And for a split second, her bravery scares me.

Fiery, demanding, opinionated, relentless, insatiable, and brave. Those were the words I’d use to describe the woman that left me months ago. And I know she’s still in there.

Brave. My wife was brave.

I’ll wait.

Slipping out of bed, I pull on a sweatshirt and step into my slippers. Cracking Noah’s door, I see he’s fast asleep, and it’s then I feel the draft coming from downstairs. Making my way down, I stop in my tracks when I realize where it’s coming from. The back door is wide open. Rushing to it, I step out on the porch to see Katy sitting in the middle of our backyard, dressed in full uniform. It’s twenty degrees outside, and she’s rocking back and forth with her knees drawn, mumbling words I can’t make out. Soundlessly I pull the back door shut, before I start to cross the freezing grass, softly calling her name, her face coming into view as I slowly creep past her.

She doesn’t pause her rocking. She’s too far gone as she sits in wait, for what, I can’t even fathom.

“Please,” is the only word I can make out as I slowly circle her before crouching down in front of her a few feet away.

The skies are clear, and from the half-crest light of the moon, I can see the alarming tint in her face. Her lips are blue.

How long has she been out here?

“Katy,” I whisper again and again as she looks up at the moon and begs.

“Please, please.”

“Katy,” I say sharply, inching closer. Her eyes gloss over and slowly drift to meet mine. It’s only when she says my name that I feel the heat of the water trailing down my cheeks.

“Help me,” she pleads. “Help me. Please, God, help me.”

“Anything. I’ll do anything, Katy. Tell me what to do.”

Her jaw shakes involuntarily as she tries to speak and closes her eyes tight. I pull off my sweatshirt and lay it across her shoulders before I kneel in front of her. “I can’t get out,” she whimpers. “I can’t get out.”

“What did they do to you, baby?” My voice cracks as she opens her eyes, looking past me.

“It’s too late,” she whispers, her hand fisting the front of her shirt. “I’m never getting out.” She’s trapped in her hell and speaking to me from where she was, as opposed to where she is, sitting in the cold, breaking apart.

Unable to handle another second, I pull her to my chest, and she clings to me like she never has, the same two words spilling from her lips over and over as she clutches me tight. “Help me.”

It’s then I realize that I’m only half the man she needs, because I can’t. I can’t help her. And her tears still won’t come.