Grudge (Virtue & Vice Book 5)

by Cait Forester

  “How’s he doing?” Martin asked.

  Taggart shrugged. “He’s pretty much house trained. Seems pretty smart. Won’t sit worth a damn just yet but I think we’re getting there.”

  “Good,” Martin said. He gave Grunt a last rub, and stood. “And how are you?”

  “Doing okay,” Taggart said. He jerked his chin at Grunt. “He’s a little noisy at night sometimes, but so am I, probably. Wakes me up a few times a night. Cleaning his shit is a bitch, but I guess it counts as extra exercise.”

  Martin nodded slowly, and waved his clipboard at Taggart’s thigh. “I meant more about the leg. Any blisters, chafing, things like that? Soreness from the exercises?”

  “Oh,” Taggart said. He frowned. “Yeah, it’s all good.”

  “No soreness at all?” Martin asked. He set the clipboard on the little counter near the massage table and came to stand a few feet from Taggart.

  Taggart rubbed the top of his thigh again. “I guess it’s a little sore, but it’s no big deal.”

  “Have you been consistent at home?” Martin asked. “Getting the exercises done on schedule?”

  “Yeah, I’m doing my homework,” Taggart said. “Had to work with Scott last Friday. Were you sick or something?”

  Martin looked away, to where Grunt was nosing his toy. “No, I — I just had some family stuff to deal with.”

  Everyone in Willow’s End knew that the Warner boys lived with their aunt, and that their father was a junkie. Taggart didn’t know about Martin’s mom, but he suspected she wasn’t in the picture either. From Martin’s tone, the ‘family stuff’ wasn’t a birthday.

  “Sorry,” Taggart said. “None of my business. So, what’s on the docket today?”

  “First, let’s check on the muscles in that leg,” Martin said. “Then, if it looks good we’ll move you on to the next set of exercises.”

  Martin waited for Taggart to remove his fake leg, and the cuff underneath. Taggart did so with a flat expression, pushing through the self-conscious embarrassment which always came with exposing his stump. Martin took them without comment, of course, but Taggart saw his eyes linger for a moment. He couldn’t blame the guy. Mostly, Taggart tried not to look at it. The only other time he normally doffed the leg was before he went to bed, in the dark.

  “Pull your shorts up, if you would,” Martin said when Taggart laid down on his back.

  “Oh, sure,” Taggart muttered. He reached down and rolled the heavy cotton up as best he could.

  Martin’s fingers were warm. Taggart’s eyes closed, and he endured the probing touch quietly. He probably didn’t have to tell Martin where he ached — he winced once or twice, and Martin seemed to hone in on the most painful spots with ease.

  “Pretty tense,” Martin muttered.

  “That’s me in a nutshell,” Taggart said.

  “Hang tight,” Martin told him, and left him for a moment. When he returned, and put his hands back on Taggart’s thigh, they were slick. “This might hurt a little at first.”

  It did. Martin pressed the heel of his hand down into the muscle and worked it up gradually toward Taggart’s hip. Pain was an old friend at this point, and Taggart didn’t show it outwardly, but damn if Martin wasn’t trying to drag it out.

  “So,” Taggart grunted, “what family stuff?”

  “Excuse me?” Martin asked. The pressure lessened before it renewed.

  Taggart held his breath for just a second. “You left town for family stuff, you said,” he groaned. “You go back to Willow’s End?”

  “Yeah,” Martin said.

  “Something going on with Keith?” Taggart asked.

  Martin eased up, and before he removed his hand entirely. The ache lingered briefly, and Taggart could breathe again.

  “Keith, ah . . .he died. In Iraq. It was a couple of years ago.”

  Taggart opened his eyes and looked at Martin. His heart sped up, and he wasn’t sure what to say. He bought time by pushing himself up onto his elbows, but once he was up he still wasn’t ready. “Shit,” he breathed. “I’m sorry.”

  “You didn’t know,” Martin said.

  “I didn’t mean to get into your personal . . . stuff,” Taggart said. “I’ll mind my own business.”

  “Doesn’t matter,” Martin muttered. “Don’t worry about it. Lay back.”

  Taggart nodded, and lowered himself back down on the table. He stared at the ceiling, still trying to figure out what he should say. There was nothing to say, though. He knew that.

  So instead he kept his stupid mouth shut.

  Martin’s hands moved over his thigh, searching out the places that hurt and punishing them. After a few minutes, the worst of it seemed to be over.

  “We’re gonna stretch a little,” Martin said when he’d finished taking out his aggressions. “Bring it up.”

  Taggart did, pointing what was left of his leg at the ceiling with some effort and assistance, and breathed like Martin told him as Martin pressed Taggart’s thigh up toward his stomach until it wouldn’t go any further.

  “Good,” Martin said. He let Taggart bring his thigh back to a more natural position. “And out to the side.”

  Taggart rotated his leg out and away, and winced when the tendon in his groin caught.

  Martin steadied the stump, and pressed his hand into the tendon near where the knee should have been, and then a few inches further up. “Are you — wearing underwear?”

  Taggart lifted his head. “What?”

  Martin’s cheeks were a little pink. “Are you wearing underwear?” He repeated.

  Taggart opened his mouth, and closed it. He wasn’t in the habit. Frankly, he barely put on clothes most days. He only really left the house to get groceries or come here. “Why do you want to know?”

  “Tag, just— ”

  “No,” Taggart said. He grimaced. “Sorry. Why?”

  “It’s no big deal,” Martin said. “We’ll work on it next time, just wear briefs or something.”

  “I don’t care what you see, Martin,” Taggart sighed. “You get over privacy real quick in the corps.”

  Martin hesitated, and cleared his throat. “Yeah, well. Look, just, if you could, kinda — move your bits off to one side and hold them out of the way, then.”

  Taggart snorted a laugh, and rolled his eyes. “Can’t tell me you’re a gay guy who’s afraid of accidentally touching some dick.”

  “I’m a PT who doesn’t want to feel you up,” Martin sighed. “Just move your junk, please.”

  Taggart grinned, and stuck his hand in his shorts, gathering his balls in one hand to shift them to his right. “All clear.”

  Martin nodded and eased Taggart’s thigh to one side again. His hand glided along Taggart’s inner thigh, right up to the groin. In other circumstances, it might have been enough to get Taggart excited.

  If it hadn’t hurt so much, that thought would have maybe made him a little antsy. As it was, the pain made the whole experience decidedly non-arousing. He had to grit his teeth, and roll his eyes up to keep from groaning. His thigh trembled, while Martin coached him to breathe.

  It seemed to take forever. Eventually, though, Martin let up. When he withdrew his hand, his fingers trailed slightly, sending a sudden shiver through Taggart’s thigh. He sucked in a sharp breath.

  “You alright?” Martin asked.

  Taggart nodded. “Fine.”

  But he wasn’t. It was just a brief sensation. It took place in the space of a heartbeat. But it lingered, and did it’s work, and Taggart started to get hard. Probably it had nothing to do with Martin. Could have been anyone, right? Taggart hadn’t been touched, purposefully or not, like that since . . .

  “I just need a second,” he said.

  “Okay,” Martin said. “I’m gonna put that stretch on your list.”

  “Sounds good,” Taggart muttered.

  He tried to think unsexy thoughts. Baseball, math — the makeshift latrines he had to dig on the start of his tour, and the process of refi
lling them when it was time to move.

  His mind kept being drawn back to Martin’s hand, though. His fingers.

  Martin cleared his throat. “You’re gonna need both hands for the next part, Tag.”

  “You, ah —do me a favor and check on Grunt?” Taggart asked.

  Martin looked around, and down. “He’s fine. Napping, looks like.”

  “Yeah,” Taggart muttered. “Okay.”

  Martin was quiet. Then, after another few moments, he moved away. “I’m just — I’m gonna hit the head real quick. Sorry. I’ll — it’ll just be a minute.”

  “Sure thing,” Taggart told him. His face grew warmer. Martin knew. He had to. It wasn’t like he didn’t have a dick himself.

  When the door closed, Taggart withdrew his hand from his shorts. He pushed himself up and swung his leg-and-a-half over the side of the table.

  “Come on, you little fucker,” he grumbled at his over-excited, under-touched dick, “calm down. Son of a bitch.”

  In a minute or so, thankfully, it did. Martin came back in, his eyes on the ground, on the puppy, on the exercise equipment — anywhere but on Taggart’s face.

  Whatever residual arousal was left was quickly banished by the exercises that Martin put Taggart through, which was for the best. When they were done, Martin took him to the nurse’s station to make his appointment, and both of them seemed to have silently agreed to simply not talk about what had happened. That made sense. Plenty of it.

  But it didn’t keep Taggart from suddenly realizing how much he’d missed being touched, and how badly his body wanted it again.

  18

  Doctor Kate met Taggart and Grunt with puppy treats, which engendered an instant rapport with Grunt, but when she handed a few to Taggart the puppy showed his true allegiance and settled onto Taggart’s lap after he took his seat on the couch.

  For a little while, she observed the two of them as Taggart urged the dog to sit still and rewarded him with a treat. “He’s getting there,” Taggart explained. “He’s just got a lot of energy. Loves to run around and tear things up.”

  Kate smiled. “You seem to be very patient with him.”

  Taggart shrugged. “Sure. He’s a dog, it’s not like he knows better. Plus he’s young, only about four months.”

  “I somehow expected you to go for a somewhat older, more subdued dog,” Kate admitted. “I’m pleased to see you picked this one.”

  “I bet there’s some head-shrinking stuff you could read into why I did,” Taggart said. “We’ve got a little in common.”

  “I can see that,” Kate said. “How do you feel about it?”

  “Like I saved him,” Taggart said. If it was any more complicated than that, he couldn’t say.

  “How so?” Kate asked.

  Taggart idly massaged Grunt’s back, and the hollows behind his ears. “I figured no one else was gonna adopt a defective puppy. People want four legs on a dog, you know?”

  Kate raised an eyebrow. “Defective? That’s a heavy word.”

  “A gun missing a part is defective,” Taggart told her. “A car missing the brakes is defective. A soldier missing a leg is defective. Means ‘it doesn’t work right’.”

  “Ah,” Kate said. She looked at her pad a moment, and back up at him without making any notes. “Have you introduced Grunt to your family, or friends?”

  “Nah,” Taggart said. “Just Martin, but he was there when I picked him up. Plus, I bring him in here.”

  “Martin?” Kate asked. She shook her head slightly. “Is he a friend?”

  Taggart shrugged. “He’s my PT. Hell, you and him see more of me than my sister. You two are pretty much the extent of my limited social circle. I’m a real butterfly.”

  “How long have you been seeing Martin?” Kate asked.

  He rapped on the fiberglass cuff of the fake leg under his shorts sleeve. “Since they upgraded me. We actually knew each other before, though, before . . . well, in high school.”

  “Good catch,” Kate said, smiling.

  “I do try, you know,” Taggart grunted. Dividing his life into before the corps and after the corps was one of the first habits she tried to get him to break. Part of some hippie-dippie ‘reclaiming’ process. Still, following orders gave him a sense of security — also something Kate had pointed out — even if he thought they were silly.

  Kate clicked her pen. “Were you and Martin friends in high school?”

  Taggart looked down at Grunt, and let the puppy chew on his finger. “Not, not exactly.”

  “What was your relationship like? Casual?”

  “I don’t know,” Taggart muttered. “Sure. We just, you know, saw each other once in awhile.”

  Kate eyed him in that way she did when she was about to shrink his head. “Is there a reason talking about him makes you apprehensive?”

  He snorted. “No. What makes you ask that?”

  “Because you look away and seek distractions when we talk about something that bothers you, Taggart.” Kate smiled sympathetically. “It’s my job to pay attention.”

  Taggart sniffed, and helped Grunt down onto the floor when he started peering over the edge to figure out if he could make the jump. “That okay? He’s house broken.”

  “Of course,” Kate said. “So — what about Martin makes you hesitant to talk?”

  He frowned, and folded his arms, keeping a watchful eye on Grunt as the puppy sniffed around and explored. “I was . . .sort of a jerk when we knew each other before. In school.”

  “Okay,” Kate said. She scribbled something on her pad. “And how do you feel about that now?”

  “I don’t know, Doc,” Taggart sighed. “You tell me.”

  “I’d rather hear it from you,” Kate said softly. “You realize this is the first time you’ve talked to me about your life before you enlisted. Other than talking about your father and sister.”

  “Is that so?” He wondered. Maybe it was true. It was hard to tell. “Well, it had to happen sometime, right?”

  “I hoped so,” Kate said. “Why now? Why with Martin?”

  “Aren’t you supposed to tell me that stuff?” Taggart demanded.

  Kate’s expression didn’t change.

  He ran his fingers over his buzzed hair. “Sorry.”

  “It’s okay,” Kate assured him. “How do you feel about Martin now?”

  Taggart chewed the inside of his cheek. His heart started beating a bit faster. Grunt puttered around the legs of the coffee table, and gave one of them an experimental bite. “Leave it,” he told the puppy.

  Grunt glanced at him, but left the wood alone.

  “He’ll gnaw anything you don’t tell him not to,” Taggart explained.

  “Looks like you’re training him well,” Kate said. She sighed. “If you’re not ready to talk about Martin, Taggart, we can move on to something —”

  “I’m not afraid to talk about him,” Taggart said.

  Kate raised an eyebrow. “I didn’t suggest you’re afraid,” she said. “You might be angry, or just uncertain how you feel, or —”

  “Uncertain how?” Taggart asked. He shook his head. “You’re off the mark here. There’s nothing to shrink, Doc. What do you want me to tell you about Martin? He’s my PT. That’s it. He helped me out to pick up Grunt. We’re friendly, I guess, but I wouldn’t say we’re friends. How could we be?”

  Kate made a note, and watched Taggart carefully.

  That look wheedled into Taggart’s stomach, worming around until he had to move a bit to get comfortable again. “I never hit him or anything,” he said quietly. “Not physically. But I was more than just a jerk. I don’t know what I was thinking at the time. I wasn’t thinking. I pushed him around, and called him names and made him do things for me. Nothing, like, sexual or anything.”

  It was rare to get any real reaction out of Kate — she was pretty solid, and he’d even yelled at her a couple of times — but now she raised both eyebrows and leaned back in her chair. “Why would I think you
meant it like that?” she asked.

  “Hell if I know,” Taggart grumbled. He waved a hand at her. “I don’t know what’s in those notes.”

  Kate nodded slowly, her eyebrows going back to their accustomed position. She pursed her lips a moment, and changed direction on him. “And now, Martin is helping you. Helping you get used to your new situation, and even taking you to the shelter, it sounds like. That must be confusing.”

  Taggart shook his head. “Nah . . . I mean, it’s his job. I don’t know if he likes it or not but I know why he’s—”

  “I’m sorry,” Kate said, shaking her head as she raised a hand. “I should have been clear. I meant it must be confusing for him.”

  Taggart stared at her. He started to ask why she’d say that, but the answer came to him on it’s own. Of course it must be confusing for Martin. How had he not thought of it?

  “I guess it must be,” he said softly. “Shit.”

  “Have the two of you talked about it?” Kate asked.

  “No,” Taggart said. “Not really. I apologized. I mean, kind of, anyway.”

  Kate nodded slowly. “Okay. That’s a start, I think. But maybe you should talk a little more. It’s clear to me that this is something that bothers you.”

  “What if he doesn’t want to talk?” Taggart asked. “He didn’t seem keen before, and I can’t really blame him. I don’t see why he should want to have anything to do with me.”

  “And yet,” Kate said softly, “he does. And more than that, he wants to help you. Seems to me that’s the kind of person that might make a good friend, don’t you think?”

  “I don’t know,” Taggart said. “Look, there’s the whole — professional thing, you know? Lines we can’t cross and stuff. Ethics, right?”

  “That only really applies to more intimate relationships,” Kate said.

  The quiet that followed made Taggart uncomfortable.

  Kate scribbled something on her pad. Taggart desperately wanted to know what it was, but held his tongue. Maybe — maybe he didn’t want to know.

  Grunt spread his forepaws and leaned forward, and peed on Kate’s carpet.

  Taggart sighed. “Sorry, Doc.”

  “It’s okay,” Kate said, and stood from her chair. “It happens more often than you’d think.”