by Selena Kitt
She tossed the phone on the counter and went back to making breakfast. She wondered how soon Diane would sign the papers, trying to decide how long she’d wait before going go to the ethics committee of the licensing board. She’d checked the web site and they even had a convenient link for filing complaints. She’d told her she had two days, but that was too long to wait. If she didn’t get it done by the end of the day, then fuck the bitch. She’d report her in the morning.
Bobby came in and ate breakfast, giving her sullen looks, but fortunately didn’t speak. He was another problem. He wouldn’t protest in any serious way when she left, but he’d be upset and make being at home a drag. It didn’t make sense to rock the boat before Trevor had his new orders. Once it was all in hand she’d tell Bobby she was going on the road, that she’d be traveling most of the time for work. She’d hadn’t decided when or if she’d tell him about her relationship with Trevor.
When he finished his breakfast, Bobby gave her cheek a perfunctory kiss and wordlessly left for work. The house felt more peaceful with him gone. Maybe she should dump him now. Thinking things through she found it hard to think of any reason to string this along. She didn’t like being around him, and in bed he seemed almost lifeless compared to Trevor.
Thinking through her decisions and new plans gave her a confidence she hadn’t felt in a time. Soon, with the new orders, she’d regain the upper hand with Trevor. Her influence with the brass determined his fate and eventually he’d learn to love the thrill of being a star. Of course, she was getting to understand him and knew she’d have to give him some slack. He liked fooling around, and she’d have to look the other way when he fucked other women. As long as they were one-night stands she didn’t care. Okay, she did care, but it would be worth putting up with that to keep him on her leash. When she had him under control the sky was the limit.
Tina found Trevor sipping an ice tea in the restaurant and sat across from him. “How did the talks go this morning?”
He tossed his tennis ball up in the air and caught it. Tina saw something flicker in his eyes. Pain? “It was a good session. Interesting. I met a couple of other guys from Sanders’ unit and we all had a good talk. It makes me feel like I’m doing something useful. It’s a relief from all the other shit. It’s constructive.”
The look in his eyes made her think she saw ideas floating by and made Tina nervous. “I know things have been difficult recently and it’s made us both crazy,” Tina said.
“Things have been crazy and that’s made them difficult.”
“What?”
“Your statement is true in both directions—things have been difficult and it’s made them crazy.”
“But I have everything under control now. Well, I’m getting it all under control. You’ll see soon.”
Trevor looked at her. “What are you talking about? What are you getting under control?”
“Among other things, I’m tired of this waiting around. I’m getting you back on active duty.”
“You can do that? How?”
She grinned at his surprise. It was hard to surprise him. “I found a way to apply a little pressure. Now things will start moving along.”
She basked in his smile. “Great. I can hardly wait to get back to the real Army. I’m sick of this pr bullshit.”
The words jolted her. “No, don’t say that.”
“But it’s true. I’m a soldier and this isn’t work for a soldier.”
“You are doing so much good. The Army is thrilled with the events you’ve done. They are so pleased that I had to fight with them about canceling the morning events so you could talk to the soldiers. I had to tell lie. I told them it was for extra therapy sessions.” She saw him flinch slightly. “Is something wrong?”
“No. Not really. It’s a muscle twinge. I might have overdone the exercise routine recently. But it’s coming along.”
“Good.”
“You need to know that I’ve volunteered to return to combat duty. I’m out of my element with your events and some things I learned can save lives if I’m over there to use them.”
“You are valuable here.”
“I need to do things. Just being me isn’t the same as doing something.”
She smiled. “You don’t need to get all macho and impress me or anyone else, Trevor. You did your bit. Now it’s time to enjoy the admiration of the people you did it for.”
“I’ve already done more basking in glory than I can stand.”
“That’s because we are stuck here. And it’s all settled. When you are back on active duty the Army wants us to put the show on the road. They want you to visit the entire country. Think about it. We can travel in style and then enjoy each other at night.”
“What sort of fantasy world do you live in? That would be a living hell. You are a great little distraction, Tina, but having you in bed is not going to convince me to do this PR shit full time.”
“That’s what the Army wants.”
He glared at her. “How the fuck would you know what they want?”
“They accepted my PR proposal. Before I even met you I, when we heard about you, I put together the strategy. The things we’ve been doing were just to fill time and prove out my idea. It’s worked brilliantly and the plan is budgeted and approved.”
“Coming back from combat is supposed to earn me my choice of duty, and that sure as hell wouldn’t be it.”
“It’s the way it will be. The orders are ready to cut as soon as you are fit for duty.”
Trevor stood up. “You are a conniving bitch. You’ve been using me to get what you want.”
“And you’ve been using me.”
He stared at her for a moment, then let his breathing become regular. That is not how I intend my life, orders or no orders.”
Tina watched him leave. He can’t run away. He can’t ignore orders. The sooner I get him to realize that his duty is to help me execute the plan, the better.
She checked her phone calendar. The rest of the day was clear. There had been one event but it was postponed and Trevor had physical therapy for two hours that afternoon. She needed to act. No more stalling. She called up the web site of the board that licensed therapists. She ordered a thali from the waiter and while she waited, she filled out the complaint form. After a leisurely and filling lunch, she headed home. She’d have to let Trevor calm down, maybe give him space until the new orders came through. Once it was inevitable…
Jacob had lived in the city a lot of years, and when he suggested a modest French bistro on the outskirts of town, she was delighted to try something new. In the year in this job she’d scarcely taken the time to explore the restaurants between work and home—and they generally were much the same.
The bistro was small, with only ten tables, and uncrowded. The waiter welcomed Jacob in French, and he answered with a surprising fluency. “I’m impressed.”
“I’ve always wanted to live in Paris.” He gave her a careless and disarming shrug. “I’d move there tomorrow, but who can afford that?”
She laughed. “Perhaps a trainer of celebrities.”
“We live in hope. This town hasn’t many, and there are a lot of trainers. So maybe, but that’s as much a long shot as winning the lottery.”
He was relaxed and calm, and that relaxed her. The tension seeped out of her as they drank and danced, and in the most natural way of things, touching on the dance floor led to other caresses, somewhat more intimate, and a soft, but passionate kiss in the parking lot carried them effortlessly to her apartment and into her bed. Jacob was as smooth there as in the gym, and the way he undressed her made her body vibrate with desire so powerfully that she was ready to come almost the moment his cock entered her. He tasted her neck and breasts with his mouth as he filled her with his cock. And she did come, in a long a low-level orgasm that kept her shuddering with pleasure as she felt his body tense, his hard cock throbbing, jerking, pulsing inside her as he came.
They rested, then drank some wi
ne, and talked about nothing, then he put her hand on his cock and she found he was hard again. As he lay back on her bed, she took him in her mouth and teased and sucked his shaft, running her tongue over it as if one end would taste different than the other. She cradled his massive balls in one hand and stroked him with the other while she sucked him, and released his spurts of cream into her mouth.
When he tipped her onto her back and began to devour her pussy, she cried out senselessly, letting her joy out unfiltered. His mouth and fingers explored her pussy, he licked and then penetrated her anus with a finger wet with her juices and fucked her ass with it while he ate her until shimmering light consumed her and she clamped her thighs around his damp face.
Sometime in the night, as they lay like spoons, she woke to him drawing her leg back over his body, slipping a hard, throbbing shaft of flesh into her again, and fucking her slowly, gently, and almost forever.
In the morning, he was gone. It had been perfect. It had been joyous. And it meant nothing. He’d enjoyed himself, but she was his entertainment, his release, and he had been hers. It was her first one-night stand. She was delighted she had allowed it, frightened that she might have enjoyed it too much. Unwrapping her emotions she discovered something—she harbored an anger that it hadn’t been Trevor she’d spent the night with. But then, she couldn’t have allowed it to happen with him and it had been good with Jacob.
She lay in the tangled sheets, smelling the odors of sex and letting herself wallow in the mixed emotions. Recalling sex with Jacob, she recalled looking up at his face when he came. He had a face that was so hot to look at, but in the moment of his climax, the face she saw was Trevor’s.
Jacob was a wonderful man, more dynamic than Paul, who was also a good man. They both wanted her. And she wanted Trevor, whom she couldn’t have, couldn’t even find out if he really wanted her.
Life could be such a bitch.
Chapter 10
Her office seemed turbulent. Everything was where it should be, all the inanimate objects dutiful unmoving, but there was a turbulence. Something was in the air, or in her bones. An unsettling vibration, or smell she couldn’t detect consciously? An intuition? She hoped it wasn’t an intuition. She didn’t truly believe in them.
Certainly the growing awareness that she cared for Trevor Foster than she wanted to, or wanted to admit, at least, fueled part of her unease. She fidgeted. Her training had covered the perils of becoming involved with clients, but primarily in the form of warnings that it compromised your objectivity and was generally a bad idea. It never seemed to occur to anyone that feelings didn’t switch on and off conveniently, that you couldn’t decide to be objective. And the job hadn’t come with a handy checklist of things to do if for some insane reason you became infatuated with a client and had reason to think he felt the same.
What could she have done differently? She’d tried to get Paul to take her off his case and he’d refused. She’d tried to keep a distance, but her feelings were no respecters of distance, choosing to travel them effortlessly. How could she defend against such a devious attack?
The ringtone on her phone jump started her heart. It was Jacob.
“I was going to call you,” she said. “It’s my turn to buy dinner.”
“I have to say something.” He sounded serious. “Last night I started to realize that you and I aren’t going anywhere with our relationship. You don’t seem interested in it being more than what it is now. I like you, and it’s been fun, but I was hoping it would develop into something more. I’m tired of being alone. Stringing this out will just delay that from happening.”
The sting of his words came from the fact that they were true. He wasn’t trying to hurt her, but he saw his situation and their relationship with surprising accuracy. They talked more, but added little to the conversation. With his opening words, Jacob had spoken his heart, simply, clearly, without hysteria. She wished everyone would do that.
Why couldn’t she?
Why was she rooted in the ground while her emotions fluttered around her like mad butterflies? It wasn’t that she didn’t know what she wanted. Or was it? In a way she wanted too many things. She wanted to help Trevor adjust from his shock to the somewhat saner world. She wanted not to be his therapist so she could return his kiss. And she wanted them both, simultaneously. She was greedy. Her greed paralyzed her. No matter how she turned, she would lose one of them.
Her heart and head waged their war. It was a silent battle, but she knew then that the turbulence was the two sides preparing for mortal combat. This war would tear her apart. And now she had lost the solace, the relief that Jacob had provided. Getting over him wasn’t the problem; adjusting to the fact that he wasn’t going to be there any more was harder. He had provided good company, a growing friendship, and some good sex and she’d miss all three. But he was right. It would never have become anything more, at least not while Trevor was around. Not until she’d dealt with her feelings for him one way or another.
The moment she came into Paul’s office she felt the tension. He sat stiffly behind his desk, waiting for her to sit. There was no banter, no joking. She wondered if he’d found out about her affair with Jacob. How would he though? They were from different worlds, and Jacob’s only connection to the base was through her.
She took the seat and waited, noting some papers on Paul’s desk. “What’s happening.”
“Charges are being brought against you,” he said.
“Charges? What on earth…”
He tapped the papers. “Some troubling accusations have been lodged against you with the licensing board, specifically with the ethics committee. They are launching an investigation and naturally contacted me, since this has to do with your work here.”
“Investigation into what?”
“The charge is that you’ve had sexual relations with a client.”
For an instant she thought it had to be an elaborate joke, but Paul’s stern expression wasn’t the way he delivered those lines. “That’s absurd. Who is accusing me? Which client am I supposed to have had sex with?”
“I don’t know who made the accusations. Until the committee reviews the claims and interviews the person making the accusations, they are keeping that close to their vests. I assume they are worried you might try and influence them.”
“Fine.”
“But they did name the patient—Trevor Foster.”
She caught a gasp before it could escape. “Then I know who made this idiotic claim. The PR lady that is handing his events, Tina Clarke, called me a few days back, saying she’d seen me in bed with Captain Foster and that if I didn’t sign his evaluation and return him to active duty she’d make trouble for me. I thought she was trying to scare me.”
“You didn’t mention that to me.”
“No. I didn’t see any reason to. She wasn’t the client and she had her facts all wrong. Listening to her rant on the phone I thought she might be delusional.”
“You should have told me.”
“I called but you were out of the office. I intended to mention it and forgot.”
“Forgot?”
“There was no truth to it and I didn’t think she’d actually do anything. It’s just a fantasy, Paul. I think she believes it quite sincerely, but it’s crap.”
He looked at the papers. “This summary doesn’t give the exact date, but one night I tried to call you and you didn’t answer. You never returned my call. Another night you begged off from a date saying you were busy.”
Her hackles went up. Paul was putting two and two together and coming up with six. Now she understood why he was taking the claim so seriously. The man was jealous. “I wasn’t with Foster that night or any other night. I have not had sex with him.”
“Then who were you with?”
“First of all Paul, you don’t know the date, so this is all bullshit. Beyond that, you are the one crossing boundaries here. As my boss you are well within your rights to tell me I have to be prepared t
o answer charges in front of the committee or even ask questions that relate to them, but don’t mix that up with personal attitudes. I’ll admit that I was evasive with you. I told you I was busy and I didn’t say with what. Even if I was with another man that night that doesn’t mean I breached professional ethics.”
The last part made him flinch. “The committee will summon you when they are ready to hear your response. You are here now because I have to tell you that, effective immediately, you are suspended.”
“What?”