Otterly Scorched

by Tara Sivec

Everyone around here knew what went down when Phina Giordano, a phlebotomist manager at the local hospital. But especially me, since I was a detective when it happened. I can only imagine the kind of guilt Dax went through, but it wasn’t his fault. No one blamed him.

  “I’m sure you’ll get to see Phina and DJ soon, and I’ll let her tell you what happened that night. It’s not really my story to tell. I quit the force right after everything, because it fucked me up. I walked away from my promotion, and my friends, and as you can probably guess…” he trails off.

  “Lather, rinse, repeat, ragers, women, and dollah-dollah bills, yo,” I finish for him, giving him a small smile.

  He nods, staring down at the circles I’m still gently drawing in his palm.

  “Dad cut the money off again, and since I was broke as fuck and feeling like the lowest piece of shit in the world after what happened with Phina, I didn’t put up much of a fight when he told me he pulled some strings again, and I had to reenlist in the army and get my shit together again if I wanted access to my money.” Dax sighs, closing his eyes for a second before opening them again to look at me. “Had to start over again with basic training and lost my rank, since I’d been out so long, but I did it. And then the old Dax started creeping back in when I was shipped overseas immediately after basic and boredom set in. I don’t know if you’re aware of this, but you can get away with a lot of shit in the army before they kick you out. And I tested that to the very limits. The best way I can describe it is if you’ve ever seen basically any military movie ever. There’s always some fuck-up doing things he isn’t supposed to behind his commanding officer’s back. Well, I was that fuck-up. I was totally selling counterfeit merchandise over there, setting up boxing matches and taking illegal bets, going places I wasn’t supposed to, and getting reprimanded every damn week. But I didn’t care. If I wasn’t doing something risky, it gave me too much time to think and let the guilt come back in.”

  Dax pauses when the waiter comes back to our table, and we break apart for a moment while he clears off place settings, leaving the check behind in a leather billfold. Once he’s gone, our hands meet again in the middle of the table.

  “One day, I was driving a Humvee picking up supplies, dicking around and not paying attention. I was chatting on my headset with a woman back at command that I’d been trying to sleep with for weeks. Started swerving all over the place, telling her over the mic what I was doing, and saying some stupid shit about how I’d crash the Humvee if she didn’t say yes to stopping by my barracks later. Next thing I know, there’s a loud explosion, I’m flying through the air, and the inside of my vehicle is on fire, along with my skin.”

  My heart is beating fast while he quickly tells this story, and I keep my mouth closed and don’t interrupt him, knowing he needs to get it out and over with.

  “The only good thing is that I was alone in the vehicle and my stupidity didn’t hurt anyone else, but it could have. It could have been a lot worse.”

  I stop drawing circles on his palm to wrap my hand around his and squeeze it. Dax brings my hand up to his mouth, placing a soft kiss on top.

  “When I got discharged after leaving the army hospital, after all my surgeries to fix my burns and pull out all the shrapnel, I was at the complete opposite end of lather, rinse, repeat. I just didn’t care about anything anymore,” he tells me, staring down at my hand he’s still holding in both of his on the table. “I had been stationed near Chicago, so I got a small apartment, locked myself in there in the dark, and only came out to start getting tattoos to cover up my scars and for therapy at the VA when I felt like, which wasn’t that often. A guy who owns a gym called The Barracks for wounded veterans came in when I was walking out one day. I guess he heard about all the stunts I pulled overseas and about the stupid boxing matches I organized. He gave me his card and told me to stop by the gym. I did it a few times then decided I’d much rather sit in my dark, empty apartment and feel sorry for myself.”

  “Clearly, that didn’t last long. Those extra muscles came from somewhere,” I interject.

  “I love it when you tell me I’m hot.” Dax smirks, adding a little lightness to this heavy subject.

  “I didn’t. Stop fishing for compliments and continue, please.” I smile and bat my eyelashes at him.

  “When I stopped showing up at the gym, Baker came to my place and punched me in the gut as soon as I opened the door.”

  “What the hell?”

  Dax laughs at my outrage. “It’s fine. It’s what I needed at the time. Someone to kick my ass and pull me out of the personal hell I put myself in. Do you have any idea how hard it is for someone as pretty as me to have scars? It was devastating,” he jokes, pressing his hand over his heart and trying to look at me seriously.

  I know he’s not really joking when he says this, and there were definitely some issues he had with the scarring that he felt the need to try to cover everything up. At least he doesn’t seem to be as serious talking about this as he was talking about everything else, so I let him have his jokes for now.

  “Anyway, Baker forced me to go back to The Barracks on a regular basis and figure out what I wanted to do with the rest of my life. I worked out some of my anger and depression on a punching bag, talking with other wounded vets, in training, and taking the gym title in the boxing ring. Kept feeding my tattoo addiction I never knew I had until the first time the needle pierced my skin, and I got my bachelor’s in zoology while I worked at an aquarium in Chicago. Other than that, I kept to myself so I wouldn’t fuck anything else up or almost ruin anyone else’s life.”

  “Then your dad bought you an animal sanctuary,” I finish.

  “Then my dad bought me a fucking animal sanctuary.” He laughs softly. “And as you saw yesterday, I’m still not doing very well with the whole letting go and moving on thing when it comes to him. But I’m working on it. You might have to help me out a little. Just try not to always be so high when we’re around him. It’s very distracting.”

  “Oh, God. That emotional support limb isn’t going to be enough,” I mutter worriedly, completely ignoring his sarcastic comment. “I should have splurged and got the entire baby and all her body parts.”

  Dax slides his arms across the table to bring himself closer to me, wrapping his hands around the backs of my arms while they still lay crossed in front of me on the table.

  “Get that panicked look off your face,” he orders quietly, tugging on my arms to bring me closer to him in the middle of the small table for two. “I’m fine. I’m no longer mentally unstable. I let go of all the guilt I felt about Phina and DJ. I have a therapist I can call if I need him, and I still talk to Baker several times a week, because it turns out I give great dating advice, even though this is the first date I’ve been on. Baker is very needy.”

  Closing the few inches of distance between us, I press my lips to his for a few seconds before pulling back.

  “You’ll be happy to know I’m giving this first date five stars,” I reassure him. “You are exceptionally good at dating.”

  We’re staring at each other with goofy smiles on our faces like a couple of teenagers on their first date instead of grown-ass adults. This is the best date I’ve ever been on, and I’m not ashamed to admit it.

  All of a sudden, a very small bald man wearing a tuxedo with a very impressive mustache walks up to our table. He pulls a violin up and rests it on his shoulder, dragging the bow across the strings. The small bald man starts singing to me loudly in Italian, accompanied by the even louder playing of his violin.

  I turn away from him to glare at Dax, who is happily smiling up at the violinist serenading me while the entire restaurant stops eating to stare at us. Dax finally turns away from him to look at me and smiles even brighter when he sees my annoyance.

  “It’s so cute you thought I was kidding about the awkward violin playing!” he speaks up over the very loud singing and music, giving me a wink.

  Grabbing my wine glass from the table, I h
old it up to him in cheers.

  “It’s so cute you think I’m ever going to touch your penis now!” I tell him loudly over the serenade, and with my own big smile, I tip the glass back and finish off my wine.

  CHAPTER 16

  I’m Still Game if You Are

  Harley

  Oh, I am absolutely touching his penis tonight.

  When Dax walked me up to my front door a few minutes ago to say goodnight, and I unlocked the deadbolt and turned back to face him, he recited another rule about how a goodnight kiss could only happen if he asked permission first. I shut him up by grabbing onto the front of his white dress shirt and pulling his mouth to mine.

  I should have known an innocent goodnight kiss wouldn’t stay innocent for very long.

  Dax’s tongue swirls around mine, and as soon as I whimper into his mouth, I’m roughly backed up against my front door. I hitch one of my legs around Dax’s hip, and he changes the angle of the kiss, making it deeper, and rougher, and making me moan again when he sucks my tongue into his mouth.

  At least I forgot to turn my porch light on before I left, and none of my neighbors are getting a front row seat of this.

  My arms tighten around Dax’s shoulders when he suddenly bends his knees and pushes the lower half of his body roughly up between my thighs, bringing my remaining foot on the ground up off of it. His strong body braces mine against the door, and that penis I vowed not to touch at dinner is thick and hard inside the pants he’s wearing. It rubs right against a spot on my body that hasn’t been rubbed up against in far too long.

  I’m grinding against him and seeing stars behind my closed eyes when his mouth leaves mine to trail kisses down my cheek and the side of my neck. My head thunks back against the door, and I moan loudly when Dax gently bites against my skin at the same time he rubs his cock against me again.

  “Oh my God,” I whisper, clutching onto fistfuls of his hair and holding his face tighter against the side of my throat.

  I didn’t even know I had an erogenous zone there, but Dax has found it, and holy hell, every time his teeth nip and suck that part where my neck meets my shoulder, it feels like someone is pressing a vibrator right to my clit.

  Am I really doing this? Am I really going to have sex with Dax Trevino?

  One of his arms lets go of its tight hold around my waist to come up between us and slide around the back of my neck. I feel his fingertips gently digging into my skin back there when I shift my hips and rub myself against his hardness again, and he bites down once more. It feels possessive. And hot.

  And holy shit, I think I’m going to have sex with Dax tonight!

  Ovaries: Finally! Why should every other female in the world sample the goods but us?

  “Wait!” I shout, my eyes flying open as I grip Dax’s hair tighter and pull his head back so I can see his face.

  Ovaries: We take it back! We didn’t mean it! Pretend we never said anything! He’s a virgin saint who has slept with no one before you!

  I let out a small groan at the loss of his warm, wet mouth against my skin, until Dax’s eyes are on mine, and his face is a few inches from me. His hand is still tightly gripping the back of my neck, his other arm is still wrapped securely around me, and he’s still pushed up firmly between my thighs. It’s making it hard for me to concentrate and remember why I pulled his mouth away from me.

  Oh that’s right. Because this is our first date, and even though he’s no longer the womanizing douchebag he used to be, should I really be doing this on date one? Just like every other female he’s ever come in contact with before me?

  Ovaries: Yes. 100 percent yes.

  Shut up. Your opinion is invalid. You only care about sex.

  Ovaries: That is literally the only reason we were put in your body. Are you new here?

  “What’s wrong? Is this too much? Too fast?” Dax asks, his brows furrowing, clearly worried that I might be freaking out.

  Ovaries: You are freaking out. It’s annoying. Stop it.

  “I don’t know. Maybe?” I reply softly.

  “You’re right.” He nods, his grip around my neck and my waist easing a little. “Having sex on the first date can be uncomfortable and awkward, especially if trust has not fully been built between the couple. It’s best to wait until at least the third date, when a mutual discussion has been had and agreed upon, which will foster a much more respectful relationship.”

  I smile at him, a little bit of my anxiety easing.

  “No more googling for you. And for the record, I do trust you. And I really, really want to keep doing what we were just doing.”

  “But?” Dax asks when I pause.

  I clear my throat, looking away from his concerned eyes to stare at the tattoo design swirling up out of the opening of his shirt.

  “You know you can say anything to me, right?” Dax asks softly.

  I continue following the lines of a rose vine inked onto Dax’s collarbone, and his grip on me becomes less possessive, and more soft and comforting.

  Closing my eyes, I blurt out my insecurities as fast as possible.

  “I know we make jokes about me forgetting guys I date, but I’m the one who’s forgettable. And you had a reputation. And I’m sorry I’m thinking about that right now, and I know that’s shitty of me when you’ve done everything you can to show me you’ve changed. I know you’ve changed. I know you’re not that person anymore. I just… I just don’t want this to happen and then have you forget about me, because that would really suck.”

  By the time I get to that last part, I’m whispering so softly I’m not even sure he heard me. I expect to hear a chuckle out of Dax and a comment about me being ridiculous, but he doesn’t say anything for several long, quiet seconds. Then, he bends his knees and ducks his head until he can find my eyes, forcing me to follow them when he stands back up.

  “Your favorite music is the soundtrack from The Greatest Showman, but you tell everyone it’s Alanis’s Jagged Little Pill album, so people won’t think you’re less of a badass,” he tells me softly, making me roll my eyes.

  “I love them both equally. I just feel a little less emo when I’m belting out “This is Me” in the shower.”

  He kisses the tip of my nose before continuing, and I rest my palms on his chest.

  “Whenever anyone asks you what your favorite animal is, you go into a deep rage about how all animals should receive the same amount of love. You do so much for your family, putting their needs before your own all the time, that I don’t understand how you haven’t had a complete breakdown yet. You rub the tip of your nose twice when you’re nervous about something. You eat the white of your sunny-side up eggs completely before you even touch the yolk. You always order pizza with sausage, even though you forget the word for sausage, and you always pick it off and never eat it.”

  I roll my eyes at him again.

  “Very funny. I like the flavor sausage leaves on the pizza; I just don’t want to eat it. I order it, because my dad and Davidson like it.”

  Dax smiles sweetly at me, I get all warm and gooey inside once more, and he continues.

  “You love coconut-flavored things, but you hate actual coconut. You don’t have one single match to any of the socks you own. You love to play golf, but you will immediately fall asleep and take a nap if it’s on television. You love going in hot tubs, but you think taking baths is disgusting. You’re funny, and you’re kind, and you tell me when I’m being an idiot, and you calm me when I’m losing my mind. You have a big heart, and you can put away an insane amount of food for someone so small, and if you think for one minute that I could ever, ever forget about you, Harley Blake, you have lost your goddamn mind.”

  Both of his hands come up to cradle my face, and I clutch tightly onto his vest before my knees give out at how much better he is than me with words and stuff.

  “I’ve been waiting for a second chance with you for five years. We don’t have to do anything you’re not ready for. You are too important to me
to screw this up and—”

  “Shut up.” I laugh, blinking away the stupid tears that were pooling in my eyes.

  “Seriously, I—”

  Pushing up on my toes, I cut him off again with a quick kiss, pulling back to look at him.

  “Just shut up,” I whisper. “You had me at ‘How’s that half-dash of cinnamon been working out for you, sweetheart?’”

  Dax’s mouth that I want back on mine as soon as possible drops open in shock a little.

  “Really? The first day we saw each other again, huh?”

  He smirks, and I glare at him.

  “Whatever. Like you didn’t see this coming.”

  Leaning forward, I press my lips against his bottom lip and then gently drag that full, gorgeous thing through my teeth. Dax groans, and his hips jerk against me, letting me know my pausing of our festivities to have feelings and shit did not bore the beast in his pants to sleep.

  He drops his hands from my face to wrap them around me again and hug me tightly to him. Sliding my arms the rest of the way up his chest to wrap them around Dax’s shoulders, I kiss my way from his mouth to his ear. Then, I apply the same treatment to his earlobe that I did with his bottom lip, dragging it through my teeth and smiling when I hear him groan again, and his arms get tighter around my waist.

  “I’m still game if you are,” I whisper in his ear.

  A loud shriek comes out of me when Dax immediately lifts me up off the ground, and I quickly wrap both my legs around his waist. I laugh as he frantically struggles with my front door handle until he finally gets it open and hurriedly carries me into my house, tightly held against him.

  I stop laughing when we’re inside my completely dark house. Dax slams the door closed behind us and then slams me up against the wall in my entryway, along with his mouth against mine.

  His tongue plunges deeply into my mouth, and my thighs tighten around his hips, urging him to start moving between my legs again before I die. Dax starts thrusting his hips between my thighs, his cock rubbing against that perfect spot over and over again, until I’m so wet I know I’m going to die.