Quid Pro Quo

by Sherryl Hancock

  “Topping” for lesbians meant a show of domination—it wasn’t always literal, but for Finley it was a distinct cue, and it was therefore something she never allowed a woman to do to her. However, it had seemed completely natural when Kai had done just that, and she’d been so caught up in the raw sexual chemistry between them she hadn’t really thought too much about it.

  As they lay together, Finley remembered something. “Um…” she said, smiling as she looked over at Kai.

  “What?” Kai asked, her grin open.

  “I saw something…” Finley said, reaching down to touch the back of Kai’s right hip. “And I think I need to see it better.”

  Kai chuckled, knowing exactly what Finley was referring to. She turned over.

  On the back of Kai’s right hip, three inches in diameter, was a brightly colored, finely detailed Marine Corps logo.

  “Wow, this took a lot of work…” Finley said, touching the tattoo reverently.

  “Yeah, it took a while.”

  “Is that the only one?” Finley asked as Kai turned back over, pulling her back down with her.

  “Yep.”

  Finley settled comfortably against Kai’s side, lying with her head against the inside of Kai’s shoulder, still amazed by how incredible the woman looked. Her jawline was strong, assumedly from her American Indian ancestors; her cheek bones were high, her skin smooth and tight. Kai’s dark eyes were almond-shaped and framed with long black eyelashes, with jet black eyebrows. Her look was indeed very exotic, but in such a way it was hard to put her finger on it.

  Kai was looking at Finley and thinking along the same lines—that the woman was really just too beautiful to be a doctor, with honey-blond curls that fell a couple of inches past her shoulders and her perfect sweetheart-shaped face with clear, tanned skin. Her eyes were one of her most incredible features, the color of brandy, a red-brown that combined perfectly with her blond good looks. She had something sultry about her, and Kai couldn’t begin to imagine how much more beautiful she’d be with makeup. As it was, the woman was a stunner.

  “So,” Finley said, giving Kai a pointed look. “Why the Marines?”

  Kai grinned. “Family business. Six generations of Temples.”

  “Wow. Wait, did Remi call your dad ‘the general’?”

  Kai nodded. “Yeah.”

  “That’s pretty high up, isn’t it?”

  “As high as you can go, just about.”

  “What about you?” Finley asked, really curious about this side of Kai.

  “I was only a colonel when I got out.”

  “Only?” Finley asked, sounding skeptical. “Isn’t that pretty high up too?”

  Kai shrugged. “It wasn’t high enough for my father, but for a woman, yeah, it’s pretty good.”

  Finley narrowed her eyes slightly. “Why do I feel like you’re underplaying that?”

  Kai’s lips curled in a grin. “I don’t know—why do you?”

  “How many female colonels are there in the Marines?” Finley asked pointedly.

  Kai pressed her lips together, her dark eyes sparkling. “’Bout nineteen.”

  “In the entire Corps?” Finley asked, flabbergasted.

  Kai nodded.

  “And you were one of them.”

  “Yes.”

  “And that wasn’t good enough for your father?”

  “Nope,” Kai said simply.

  “He thought you should go higher?”

  “Yeah, except there are literally only two women of higher rank in the entire Corps, so…”

  “Well, that’s complete bullshit,” Finley muttered.

  Kai chuckled. “I agree, which is why I got out.”

  “But you’re still a reserve?”

  “Yeah.”

  “So wait—to be an officer didn’t you have to have a college degree?”

  “That’s right,” Kai said, nodding.

  “And where did you get your degree? And what in?”

  “Ah, I got my degree in General Engineering, from the US Naval Academy in Annapolis.”

  “You went to Annapolis?”

  “I went to Annapolis,” Kai confirmed with an odd grin.

  “Don’t you, like, have to get recommended by someone in Congress to go there?”

  “And you know this why?”

  “One of the many things I thought about for school when I was a kid.”

  “I see,” Kai said, thinking the drill sergeants would have had a field day with someone like Finley, with her looks.

  “So?”

  “So? Oh, Congress,” Kai said, waving her hand. “That was easy. My dad’s a four-star general.”

  “Is that all?” Finley asked, her tone belying the blasé look on her face.

  Kai chuckled. “It just wasn’t that hard to get in for me.”

  “So what did you do in the Marines?”

  “For about half of my time I was all kinds of things. I was a training instructor for infantry, did some engineering work with a few of the units, and commanded a few platoons. The other half of the time I worked with the dogs.”

  “Did you know Remi in the Marines?”

  “Yeah. I never commanded her unit, but I commanded one adjacent to it, and we were friends.”

  “Were you two ever…”

  “Oh, no—no,” Kai said, grinning as she shook her head. “Not anything like that.”

  “Oh, I just ask because I know that Jet and Skyler were a thing in the Army at one point and all…”

  Kai nodded. “Yeah, it happens, but no, I would never have endangered my commission or Remi’s career like that, even if either of us had been interested, which neither of us was.”

  Finley nodded. “I see. Because you were an officer and she wasn’t?”

  “And DADT.”

  “Oh yeah, you guys were in during that, weren’t you?”

  “Most of my career was under the cloud of DADT,” Kai said seriously.

  “So you always had to be super careful, right?”

  “Well, I usually was, yeah.”

  “Usually?”

  “I had one major lapse in judgment, which fortunately didn’t blow up in my face too badly, at least career-wise.”

  “Do you want to explain that one?”

  “When you saw me at The Club, did you see a blonde around me?”

  “Uh, yeah, the particularly nasty one with the sharp tongue?”

  Kai blinked a couple of times. “How do you know that part?”

  “Well, I was kind of on the patio at the same time you two were having your… uh… discussion. Unfortunately I was on the other side of the patio from you two and couldn’t get inside without interrupting, so I just kind of stayed out of the way.”

  “So you heard everything?” Kai asked, looking a bit mortified.

  Finley grimaced. “Yeah, and she was one nasty piece of work.”

  “Oh, you have no idea,” Kai said, shaking her head. “Well, she was my commanding officer at one point.”

  “Oh…” Finley said when she understood the connotation.

  “Yeah. So that could have cost me my career.”

  “But it’s worse than that, isn’t it?” Finley asked, sensing it from what she’d overheard that night at the bar and from the way Kai tiptoed around the subject.

  Kai nodded, her look guarded.

  “But you really don’t want to talk about it, do you?”

  “It’s not a particularly proud time in my life.”

  “I understand,” Finley said. “Seems like that’s most of my love life these days,” she added, looking embarrassed.

  “How so?”

  Finley bit her lip. She hadn’t meant to say that, but knew it wasn’t fair of her to clam up now, not with all Kai had told her.

  “Let’s just say that my dating record is lengthy but not substantive,” she said.

  Kai chuckled. “Okay, you’re definitely going to have to explain that.”

  Finley looked pensive for a long moment, sl
iding her hand back and forth over Kai’s stomach, still marveling at the feel of her muscles. When she looked back up at Kai, her expression was quizzical.

  “Would you be surprised to know that you are the first butch I’ve ever been with?” she asked.

  Kai looked back at her for a long moment, trying to decide the answer to that question. “I’m not sure surprised is the word for it—curious as to why, though.”

  Finley hesitated again, not wanting to offend Kai with her personal issues and biases, especially against her type.

  “Tell me,” Kai said softly.

  “Well, suffice it to say that I never want any woman to control me.”

  “And you assume all butches are going to want to control you?” Kai asked, her eyebrow lifting slightly.

  “Don’t butches tend to take charge in a relationship?”

  Kai considered the question. “I think that more often than not a femme gets involved with a butch expecting them to take charge, but I don’t think it’s an imperative to being butch.”

  Finley stared back at Kai openmouthed, unable to believe the extremely intelligent, well thought out and completely logical answer she’d just received.

  “Why are you looking at me that way?” Kai asked.

  “Because,” Finley said, shaking her head with a smile on her lips, “I’m not used to this level of conversation with someone I’m lying naked next to.”

  Kai’s eyes widened slightly. “Should I ask what level of conversation you’re used to?”

  “Well, the last woman I slept with was about twenty…”

  “Well, that’s why,” Kai said, grinning. “Can you even have a conversation with a twenty-year-old that doesn’t involve the words selfie, Snapchat, Twitter, or Starbucks?”

  Finley laughed, shaking her head. “I really don’t think so, at least not in my experience.”

  “So you’ve been dating twenty-year-old femmes?” Kai asked, almost aghast.

  Finley nodded, looking a bit abashed at that point.

  “Okay, I’m about as exact opposite from that as one can get. Twice that age, and very definitely not femme. So why the aberration, Doc?”

  “Wow, yeah, I have to ask you about that, are you seriously 39?” Finely remembered seeing it on Kai’s chart and thinking that someone had written it down wrong.

  Kai chuckled. “I am, actually. How old did you think I was?”

  “I would have guessed twenty-nine, although I guess that would have made you like seventeen when you joined the Marines…” Finley said, grimacing.

  “So I’ve got two marks against me now,” Kai said, grinning. “I’m old and butch.”

  “You are so not old.”

  “How old are you?”

  “Thirty-four.”

  Kai nodded. “Okay, maybe not too old compared to you, but certainly compared to the children you were dating before.”

  “Children?” Finley repeated with a grin.

  “Not even drinking age?” Kai said. “Makes them children in my book.”

  “Jackie at work calls them ‘pop tarts.’”

  “Oh, Jackie, that’s my girl…”

  “Excuse me?” Finley said, looking surprised.

  “Who do you think got me my clothes and my phone while I was in the hospital?” Kai said, grinning unrepentantly.

  “That little brat!” Finley exclaimed. “She never even fessed up!”

  Kai laughed. “That’s between you two. But I like her phrase, ‘pop tarts.’”

  “Oh, that’s just what I need, you and Jacks in cahoots,” Finley said, shaking her head.

  “So why do you feel the need to be in control?” Kai asked, searching Finley’s eyes.

  Finley was taken aback by the question; no one had ever asked her that. “I guess because of my childhood.”

  “And what happened then?” Kai asked, not one to shy away from getting to the heart of a matter.

  Finley looked back at her for a long moment, unable to fathom why Kai would care and wondering if she’d sound crazy if she told her. “Let’s just say that my mother was ultra-controlling—she still is. You have no idea how rough it is, having every aspect of your life planned for you and forced on you.”

  Kai pressed her lips together, widening her eyes slightly. “My parents are both Asian, and my father is a general. I think I might know a thing or two about having one’s life planned out.”

  Finley was surprised by the statement, but then realized she really hadn’t thought about it that way. “So how did you get through it?”

  “By doing whatever the hell I wanted.”

  “Joining the Marines because it was the family business?” Finley asked skeptically.

  “Yeah, but I did it under my own choice. I’ve been making my own choices since I was fourteen, which was the last time I let them make a decision for me.”

  “What was the decision?”

  “My dad deciding to put me in military boarding school because he caught me with a girl.”

  “You were put in military boarding school because you were gay?”

  “I was dumped in military boarding school because I was gay, yes.”

  “What was that like for you?” Finley couldn’t even imagine such a fate.

  “Painful for the first six months,” Kai said, grinning.

  “Because of the PT stuff?”

  Kai pressed her lips together, then licked them, her expression indicating how far from right Finley was. “Because they beat the crap out of me constantly.”

  “They actually struck you?” Finley asked, looking stunned.

  Kai chuckled. “Yeah.”

  “Isn’t that illegal? I mean, instructors laying hands on students and all…”

  Kai grinned, biting her lower lip in an effort not to flat out laugh at Finley’s naivete. “I’m sure it’s illegal somehow. Unless the father that put you in there is a two-star general and tells them to beat the gay out of his daughter.”

  Finley couldn’t even formulate a response to that. She put her hand to Kai’s cheek, wanting to do something to show her empathy. “I’m so sorry that happened to you,” she said softly.

  “It’s past,” Kai said, shaking her head. “I’m over it. But I don’t let people tell me what I can and can’t do anymore.”

  Finley nodded, understanding what Kai was saying. “You have to meet my mother to understand. Anyway, I guess it just made me unwilling to be controlled by anyone after that.”

  “Sometimes the chains we think we wear aren’t nearly as real as we believe,” Kai said gently.

  Finley looked back at her. “You’re saying I imagine that my mother is trying to control me now?”

  “I can’t say what your mother is or isn’t doing. What I can say is that you are a successful, intelligent woman with a perfectly good mind of her own, so I can’t see where the problem lies.”

  Finley shifted over, putting her face against Kai’s side, her thoughts in turmoil. Kai could sense it and let things lie for a bit. They were both silent. Kai’s hand at Finley’s back, stroking back and forth, soothingly lulled Finley into sleep. Kai fell asleep shortly thereafter.

  In the middle of the night, Kai heard the dogs alert on someone coming into the house. She listened, and there were no other noises from the dogs, so she knew that meant Cassiana had come home. A moment later, Cassiana stuck her head in Kai’s still open bedroom door and saw the very blond doctor sleeping next to Kai. Fortunately, both Kai and Finley were fully covered at that point. Cassiana’s eyes widened, but then she smiled happily, and Kai motioned for her to be quiet. They exchanged a look, and it was easy to see that Cassiana fully approved of the idea of her sister with the beautiful doctor. Kai finally shook her head, grinning, and nodded toward the door. Cassiana closed it behind her.

  Chapter 5

  Early the next morning, Finley woke feeling Kai’s warmth next to her on the bed. She was lying on her side, exactly as she’d fallen asleep. Kai’s left arm was still wrapped around her shou
lders, her hand on Finley’s back, holding her to her side. Kai was still asleep. It gave Finley some time to simply stare at this amazing-looking woman. Looking at her, however, led to desire to touch her. Finley found that she was inexplicably drawn to touching Kai. The feeling of silken skin over corded muscles was irresistible, and Finley was not someone who resisted urges she felt when there was no logical reason to do so.

  Sliding her hand over Kai’s stomach, Finley leaned in to press her lips to the hollow of Kai’s shoulder. The scent of Kai’s skin was kind of woodsy with a hint of something fresh that Finley couldn’t identify. What she did know was that the woman smelled damned good in a very sexy, non-girly way. For some reason the fact that Kai was very butch was a major draw for Finley, like knowing that something that could be so bad for her was so good at the same time. She also found that she wanted to make Kai react to her sexually. It was a power play, and in her head she knew that, but it was something she’d already begun to crave. Kai had so thoroughly dominated their sexual interactions thus far, Finley felt like she needed to get back some of her own.

  Finley continued to touch Kai’s skin, sliding her fingers upward, touching her breasts but only lightly brushing her nipples. Leaning closer, she kissed Kai’s skin, moving down a bit so she could press her lips to those amazing ab muscles. Before long she felt the need to lie more directly over Kai, so she levered herself up on her elbow to lean over her, and continued kissing her and caressing her with her other hand.

  Kai woke to the sensation of lips and fingertips on her skin, and her body humming with excitement. She stirred, opening her eyes and looking down at Finley’s blond curls as she bent her head to kiss the area just above Kai’s left breast. Flexing her fingers, Kai pressed Finley’s body closer to hers.

  Finley looked up, seeing that Kai was now awake. She moved so that she lay over Kai, levering herself up on her hands. Kai’s dark eyes widened slightly at the movement. In response, Finley leaned down and kissed Kai’s lips deeply, her tongue slipping over them sensually. She felt Kai’s long-fingered hands slide over her back, flexing when her tongue touched Kai’s lips. Finley began to move her hips against Kai’s pelvis, pressing her legs apart with her body.