The Sound of Your Heart

by Laura Ward

  There were angry voices speaking in low whispers. Worried that Julie was being forced to leave, I shuffled across the room quicker.

  “What are you doing here?” Nate’s voice echoed from across the hall. He must have taken her to his room to avoid being overheard. Sometimes he forgot how good my hearing was.

  “I came to see Ben. How is he?” Julie’s voice wavered, her usual confidence missing.

  Nate huffed indignantly. “Why do you want to know?”

  I sighed and shook my head. What an overprotective dick. Why couldn’t he tell her what she wanted to know?

  “Because he’s my friend. Because he left my house last night and was attacked on the way home. Because I care about him.”

  The last five words snapped out of Julie’s mouth like the crack of a whip and a grin pulled across my mouth in reaction. I winced before a full smile could form and reached up to touch the stinging cut on my lip. Great. That shit was probably bleeding again which would only send Nate into mother hen mode.

  “Really?” Nate spat back. “Could have fooled me. Where were you all day? He asked about you. We talked to all your friends trying to track you down. Nada. When he woke up this afternoon, his first question was if you were upset. And I had to tell him that you hadn’t called or stopped by,” Nate shot back.

  Ah fuck. Way to make me sound like a simpering, helpless prick, Nate. Thanks.

  The tip of my cane hit the door and I reached out until my fingers found the cool metal of the knob. I had to get in there before I had no other choice than to kick my brother’s ass for acting like a bag of dicks to my girl. I wanted Julie to see me as a regular guy and he was painting me as a pathetic sack of weakness.

  I opened my door and stepped into the hallway, the smells of the frat house more potent now that I was out of my room. The stench of alcohol and cigarette smoke lingered in the hallway, the ever-present evidence of the hangovers and bad decisions that went on nightly in this place.

  “I got here as soon as I heard Ben was hurt. I get that you’re upset with me, I do, but I don’t give a flying fuck.” Julie’s voice began to rise. “All I want is to see that he’s okay. I promise I won’t wake him up if that’s what has you wrapped as tight as a nun’s asshole. But if he was asking for me, then I’m in the right goddamn place.” There was the sound of a foot stomping as if adding a big fat fucking exclamation mark to her tirade.

  My cane knocked the edge of Nate’s door and I pushed it open the rest of the way. “I’m right here, Jules. Stop stomping your feet and huffing and puffing.” My voice was raspy from sleep.

  There was a surprised gasp and I wished I knew exactly where she was. I wished I was close enough to touch her face, to know what that gasp meant. Was it relief or horror? I didn’t know what I looked like, but I knew that I felt like shit. I only hoped I didn’t look as bad as I felt.

  “Ben,” she said in a relieved breath.

  A tiny body slammed into my chest in a familiar cloud of coconut scent. Jules. Finally. The stress of the day seemed to fade knowing she was finally here. In my arms. Julie wrapped her arms around my back and squeezed like she never wanted to let go.

  “Ow.” I sucked in a breath through clenched teeth and she squeaked, pulling out of my grasp.

  “Holy fuck.”

  “Do I look that bad?” I joked.

  She made a strangled sort of whimper and said, “Your lip is split and both eyes are swollen shut.” Tentatively, she touched my arm like she thought I might break.

  “Good thing I don’t need them then, huh?” I teased, wanting to lighten the mood. The last thing I wanted was for Jules to feel sorry for me. I didn’t need her pity. I just needed...her.

  “You’re a mess,” she whispered, but I could hear the smile in her voice. Her fingertips barely grazed the sides of my face and I leaned into her touch. It centered me. Made me feel grounded. “What happened?” she asked.

  I reached out and set my free hand on her waist, relaxing more with every brush of her fingertips. “I got robbed, or at least they tried to. A couple of guys followed me away from your house and jumped me. My cane probably made me seem like I was an easy target.” I tapped her with said cane and chuckled, running my other hand along Julie’s back in a comforting motion as I pulled her a little closer. “I heard I broke one guy’s nose and the other one has a few cracked ribs.”

  “Seriously?” she asked, surprised.

  Nate’s laugh was dark. “No one takes advantage of my brother. I taught him how to beat the shit out of anyone who bothered him.”

  Julie’s thumb gently stroked my bottom lip. “But it looks like someone beat the shit out of him.”

  It felt that way too, but I didn’t tell her that. “If there had been only one guy, I wouldn’t look nearly so bad.” I grabbed Julie’s hand and laced my fingers with hers, pulling her into my side.

  “What else did they do to you?” Her words were quiet as she sniffled.

  “Nothing permanent. Nothing that can’t be healed with a little TLC from my girl.” I ran my thumb along the palm of her hand and she shivered in response. I liked feeling that shiver. I couldn’t see her expressions to know what she was thinking or feeling so I loved that Julie was so responsive to my touch. I loved knowing what she was feeling by how her body reacted to me. It was like she knew the language I spoke best. Touch.

  Her head dropped softly to my chest and she muttered against my shirt. “This is my fault. I should have walked you home.”

  I shook my head. “And have you walk home alone from my place so you could get jumped instead? I wouldn’t be all right with that.”

  “Maybe they already jumped her,” Nate muttered. “You know how desperate ex-boyfriends get. And she’s got a lot of them.”

  “Excuse me?” Julie snapped. Her head lifted from my chest and her hair tickled my jaw as she spun to face my brother.

  No. This was one battle she was not going to have to fight. I set a hand on Julie’s shoulder, using my cane to usher her to the side and stepped around her.

  “It was a joke,” Nate blurted as I approached him. “Just lightening the mood.” His voice was right in front of me and although I didn’t know whether he was smiling or serious, I knew he’d meant what he’d said. Joke or not, that shit wasn’t funny.

  I put my hand on Nate’s chest and pushed hard. His footsteps were muffled against the carpet as he was forced to back up to keep from falling.

  “Shut the fuck up. This had nothing to do with her.”

  Nate breathed heavily but didn’t respond. I didn’t need to see his face to know what he was thinking. He’d been voicing his concerns about Julie enough over the last week. I knew him too well and the animosity rolling off him was thick enough to touch. Nate had always been with me, through the good and the bad, and I knew him and his feelings as well as I knew my own.

  “Don’t say stupid shit like that,” I warned.

  A chafing sound told me he was probably rubbing the back of his neck in exhaustion and worry. He’d been with me all day and although he always gave me my space and independence, the attack the night before had scared the shit out of him.

  “I’m only protecting you,” Nate said.

  I clenched my jaw in annoyance before answering. “I never needed you to coddle me before, so don’t start now. And I definitely don’t need you talking shit to Jules.”

  Nate didn’t respond but he took a deep breath and I knew he was battling to stay quiet. I had no idea whether he was glaring daggers at Julie in the silence, but I was still standing between the two of them. I loved my brother and I appreciated all that he did for me. But he was wrong this time.

  “Ben...” Nate started to say.

  “Not now, Nate. I’ll talk to you in the morning.” I shook my head, my voice heavy with weariness.

  Without waiting for a response, I groped behind me until I found Julie’s hand again and turned to lead her out into the hallway. My cane scraped along the ground, leading the way. With
out another word, Nate shut his door behind us.

  I stopped in front of my door, my hand sliding up Julie’s arm to cup her cheek. “Sorry he’s such an ass. He doesn’t mean any of that, he’s worried. I know”—I shook my head and shrugged— “that’s no excuse for what he said.” I took a deep breath and released it with a heavy exhale. “I could still use a little TLC from nurse Julie. Can you stay?”

  “Yes.” Julie squeezed my hand and her chin tilted up in my grasp and I could feel her gaze on me. “If that’s okay with you?”

  I leaned forward until my forehead touched hers and I let out a sigh of relief. “I’m not letting you go now that you’re here.” I wrapped my arm around her shoulders and pulled her into my room, locking the door behind me.

  “Ben, I’m so sorry I wasn’t here earlier.” The words tumbled out of Julie as soon as the door was shut. “My mom came by this morning and I left my phone at home. I didn’t even know you were hurt until about fifteen minutes ago. I feel like shit. Nate’s right. I—”

  My hands were on her cheeks and my thumbs found the edges of her mouth as her apology spilled out of her. All it took was a soft kiss to silence her. She kissed me back, her lips gentle against mine, her hands almost hovering over my arms in careful touches.

  Once I was sure she wasn’t going to try to continue the apology, I pulled back.

  “Taren told me your mom showed up unannounced and that you were helping her today. I get it,” I said. “Nate’s just a mother hen. Ignore him.”

  A tendril of hair fell across my fingers as Julie’s head dropped and I brushed it out of her face.

  “You’re here now, and that’s all that matters.”

  My fingertips ran over her hair and face, and contentment settled in my tired, battered body. I needed this. To see her again in my way. To refresh my memory of the girl who had unexpectedly gripped my heart and taken it for herself.

  “I’m gonna lie down.” I tilted my head in the direction of my bed. At least where I thought my bed was. Exhaustion from my injuries and exasperation over Nate’s behavior admittedly had me a little turned around. “Want to join me?”

  “Is that even a question?” Julie asked, incredulous. “I’ve been trying to get you in bed for weeks!”

  “I guess I needed an ass kicking to know what was good for me.” Chuckling, I reached out with the cane and tapped around until I heard the familiar clang of my bed frame hitting plastic. I headed toward it, Julie’s hand clasped in mine. When her arm went taut between us I turned in her direction. “You coming?”

  Julie released my hand. “I’m probably not the best nurse you could ask for since I’m not known for my bedside manner. It’s the other activities in bed I’m better at,” she muttered.

  “Earth to Jules. I’m trying to get you into bed.”

  “Well. Yeah. But you’re still hurt. And I’m here to take care of you. What can I do to help? I can get you anything you need. Orange juice, crackers, ibuprofen, a heating pad, a rub down?”

  I reached behind my head and my ribs ached in protest as I grabbed the neck of my shirt and yanked it over my head before tossing it in the direction of my closet. I leaned over to feel the mattress and then settled onto it, stretching out on the bed so that the pillows propped up my head and shoulders.

  “Rub down?” My eyebrows lifted with the question.

  Julie was silent. And without her touch, without her words, I had no idea what she was thinking. I’d never known what it was like to see with my eyes. My life was touch and sound and taste and smell. And I understood that. But for the first time in a long time, I wished I could see her expression. That I could know what was going through her mind. She’d never seen me without my shirt before. Did she not like what she saw? Was she terrified by the injuries from the attack? Hell, I didn’t even know if I’d like what I saw if I looked in the mirror.

  “Rub down?” I asked again.

  A shuffling sound was all the warning I got before Julie’s weight settled on the edge of the bed. “Yeah. Rub down,” she purred. “In case you were...sore anywhere.” The teasing in her voice was forced, unsure.

  I probably looked even worse than I felt if even her snarky humor was on the fritz.

  When her fingertips stroked my ribs, I flinched from the unexpected touch. She pulled away with the beginning of an apology like she thought she had hurt me. I grabbed her hand before she could totally retreat and placed it back on my skin.

  “Where you going?” I teased. “Tell me more about this magical rub down.”

  She laughed. “Well. It starts with my hands on you. That’s bound to make things better, right?”

  I sighed as she traced my ribs one by one. “I feel like there’s a naughty nurse joke in there somewhere, but I’m too wiped to be clever.”

  “I’m serious. Is there anything I can do? Vaseline might be good for this split lip,” she told me placing a soft kiss on the broken skin.

  I turned my face so that our lips lined up and we were melting into a kiss. Her mouth opened slightly, and the kiss became a slow, slick slide of tongues and breaths and quiet moans.

  A fucking hot kiss was all this mouth needed.

  With a tug of my hand, Julie laid down on the bed next to me and pressed close, her soft curves and coconut scent making my heart rate kick into gear as my exhaustion gave way to more pressing needs. I groaned. “I don’t know about Vaseline, but your mouth is doing wonders. What other healing powers does this body have?” I reached out, hands finding her waist as I pulled her even closer.

  I bent my head toward hers, my mouth searching for hers again, but her back arched as she avoided my lips. “Don’t you think we should be careful?”

  I chuckled. “I’m not broken, Jules. Just a little roughed up.”

  She cleared her throat as my mouth found her neck and I started to lick and suck along the tender skin. “But maybe we should take it easy. I could read to you or something.”

  Now it was my turn to pull back from her. “Read to me? You want to read right now?” After all the sexual innuendos Julie had made over the last few weeks and her near impossible to ignore pleading for me to stay over, reading was the last thing I expected her to offer.

  “You should relax, and I have a brilliant idea. You read using braille, right?”

  “Yes—”

  “I bet you’ve never used braille to read dirty romance novels, have you?” Jules turned away from me and I could hear her fumbling around in a bag or something. A purse maybe?

  I chuckled. “Right again, but I’m not sure where you’re going with this.”

  The soft heat of her chest returned as she snuggled in close to me. “I have to get in my daily dose of smut. And since I figured you’d be too sore to play around tonight, we could gather some ideas for when you’re feeling better.” She adjusted the pillows behind me and propped herself right by my side in bed. “I always carry my Kindle with me and it’s filled with the filthiest stories you can imagine. And I’m going to read one to you.”

  A laugh rumbled through my chest. “Are you now?

  She shuffled closer and I winced at the ache in my ribs that the movement caused, but I didn’t say anything that might make her move away. Julie entwined her legs with mine. “Nurse Julie to the rescue. You don’t get this kind of hands-on care in the hospital,” she teased.

  “Julie Prescott, you’re a genius.”

  “Oh, Ben Sutherland. I’m just getting started.” She gave me a gentle kiss on the corner of my mouth that wasn’t injured, and I growled when she pulled away before I could deepen it. “Patience,” she said, repeating the word to me that I’d told her on so many nights.

  “Or is it payback?” I laughed and quirked my eyebrows.

  “No, I’m trying to be careful.”

  “I’m a little scratched up. I don’t need you careful, I only need you…here.” I nuzzled in to the curve of her neck, running my nose up her soft skin before leaving a chaste kiss under her ear. A shiver skittered
down the left side of her body and I wanted to do it again.

  “Let me read to you, okay?” I could feel the tiny movements of her body as I assumed she was turning on the Kindle. “I’ll skip straight to one of the sexy scenes. Ready?”

  “Been ready all day,” I muttered happily, my fingers tracing her face. Remembering her shape. Drawing a picture in my mind.

  Julie cleared her throat and started to read.

  “Her fingers trailed along my arm and across my chest as she straddled me and sat on my lap. She faced me, legs spread wide on either side of my hips.”

  I coughed, nearly choking at hearing Julie talking about legs spreading wide. “Holy hell. Where’s the plot?”

  “Shush.” She pressed her fingers to my lips. “I told you I was jumping straight to the sexy parts. You can get plots from your library books.”

  Her voice dropped to a sultry tone and she continued.

  “Lifting my hands to her chest, I caressed the swell of her breasts. Her nipples were hard from my touch. ‘See what you do to me?’ she asked.”

  My hand slipped under the edge of Julie’s shirt and made its way across her skin, mimicking what was going on in the story. My fingers grazed the swell of her breast and when I brushed my thumb over her bra, her nipple tightened to a hard point I could feel through the fabric.

  “I see,” I said.

  She hummed happily and kept on reading.

  “She leaned into my touch and over her shoulder I could see our reflection in the window, nothing but the darkness of night on the other side. She was completely naked, her soft curves moving slowly over me, grinding against my lap. She held onto my shoulders and when I leaned forward to kiss the dip at the base of her neck, her head tilted back, inviting me to take what I wanted. I reached between her legs, dragging two fingers up through her center before circling them around the slickness, and then pushing them inside her.”