Page 29 of Control (Everyday Heroes 3.50)
Chapter Eleven
Reznor
The coffee scalds my tongue, but it’s worth it in the morning silence. The still air is filled with birds chattering and somewhere in the distance a rooster crows. The jingle of dog collars and sharp nails on wooden floors can be heard from where I sit, and I notice how last night’s rain washed away the mud from yesterday where it fell off the tarp and onto the concrete.
The door opens and dogs bound out of the house to the grass area. She appears shortly behind them in a different outfit from last night—but one that has me thinking about how her tits lifted with the fabric when I pulled her tank over her head.
Shit.
So many things I’ve relived about last night and yet I’m sitting here. I’m waiting for her. I’m wondering what the hell is going on.
The dogs—one black, one multi-colored, one with only three legs—do their business, but it’s only when she turns to go into the house that she sees me sitting in the chair in the far corner of her porch.
Her yelp fills the air and her hand flies up to her chest. “What are you doing here?” she asks. But there is something in her eyes—genuine fear—that makes me think her being startled has to do with so much more than me surprising her.
“Sorry,” I murmur and then knock on the table in the pattern I established earlier. Knock-knock. Knock-knock-knock. “Hi, it’s me.”
She huffs out a breath and rolls her eyes. “So?”
“Just enjoying my morning coffee,” I say in a slow, steady drawl as her eyes narrow, and she tries to figure out what’s really going on. “The dogs were good, then?”
She walks over slowly and takes a seat opposite me as the dogs come to greet me. I take my time giving them love so she can wonder more, and when the dogs go back to explore the yard and leave us be, I return my attention to my coffee.
When the waft of her shampoo or body spray or whatever the hell it is hits my nose over the dark roast, last night comes rushing back—not like it was far from my mind. The taste of her skin. The feel of her pussy. The sound of her moaning my name.
The panic in her voice when she jolted out of bed afterward.
“My job is interesting most days,” I begin and see her stiffen in attention out of the corner of my eye.
“Self-defense?”
I snort a chuckle. “Nah. SWAT.” I think about everything I’m missing by being here. Am I missing it or do I miss the chaotic normalcy and unpredictability? “Some weeks it’s neverending boredom. Hour after hour. Day after day. Sitting and waiting for the next call, the next crazy person, the next whoever needs our help. Other weeks, we can’t even put our weapons in their lockboxes before the next call comes in.”
“It sounds—”
“Exciting? Daunting? Unconventional?” I ask as she nods cautiously, inquisitive eyes cast my way. “You could say that.”
“I’m sure you’ve seen more than most people could ever imagine.”
“Pretty much.” I bring the mug to my lips. For some reason, I wish there was a little something stronger in it...when that’s not something I’ve wanted in a long time. “It’s all about control.”
“What is?”
“My job.” My life. “Who has it. Who wants it. How to transfer it from one person to another with the least amount of damage to everyone involved.”
“It’s a power play.”
“Most times, yes.”
I look her way and the barrage of questions normally thrown at me are in her eyes: Do you ever burn out? What’s the worst you’ve seen? Have you ever been injured? And on and on...but she doesn’t ask. She sits there with patient eyes and a soft smile, waiting for me to talk.
“I don’t sleep at night, Desi, because every time I close my eyes I picture things I don’t want to see.”
“Rez—”
“A call went bad a few weeks ago. A hostage situation where kids were involved. I made the call to breach the house. Instead of the suspect taking his anger out on my team—shooting at us—he killed his kids, because he didn’t want us to give them back to their mother.”
“Christ.”
