THE END
6
Wounded Hearts
Chapter 1 - Sergeant Colton Walker
The sand seems to fall from the sky like rain, it dances around us in blinding clouds. I notice that it doesn’t hurt this time as it twists and whips against us. Not like how it usually grinds against our faces, leaving tiny stab wounds on our flesh.
I push forward, leading my guys on foot to our target. I know what’s going to happen next. I can see it before it even begins. The shots fired. The men I kill. The bullet I take. Yet, I can’t stop myself from pressing forward. I have a sworn duty to uphold. Fear is no excuse.
I climb a crumbling hill of dirt and lift my rifle, holding it at the ready. This is it. It’s fucking show time. My finger slowly squeezes the trigger, but instead of the familiar, even comforting sound of gunfire, I hear a loud squeal. What the hell?
My eyes blink open and I wipe a strand of drool from my chin as I look around the hospital room. As my ears are assaulted by the sound of the squeaky food cart out in the hall, I press the button on my bed to lift me up until I’m sitting comfortably.
“Well, look who finally decided to join the party,” Corporal Pike smirks at me from the next bunk. At twenty, he’s still got the energy of a puppy dog. He hasn’t been worn down by a career of deployments, shift work and drills. Not yet.
“Yeah, yeah,” I flip my hand at him dismissively, “sounds to me like I got up at the right time.” I jerk my thumb toward the door where the whine of the lunch cart is getting more pronounced. “Besides, I wouldn’t want to interrupt your Katy Perry or anything,” I nod up at the TV playing the singer’s “Fireworks” video across the room.
“I wasn’t even watching that,” Pike mumbles, but grabs the remote quickly and flicks through the channels until he finds a soccer game. His eyes dart over to me for approval as he sets the remote back down beside him.
I’m just busting his balls. I don’t care if the kid rocks out to pop music or zones out to sports. It’s all the same. It’s decompression. It’s distraction. It’s a way of putting a little space between us and what we just experienced.
I look at his casted arm. When I was a kid I snapped my arm pretty good by falling from a homemade zip line in my backyard. I remember thinking that it was a bad break, but my little forearm cast covered in ‘get well’ messages and stick drawings was nothing compared to the plaster encasing Pike from his hand to his shoulder.
“How you holding up?” I nod at his injury and I see a flash in his green eyes. I’m familiar with it. It’s the haunted look of someone who got a wake-up call, who realized they’re not invincible. I remember the day I realized that being a part of Canada’s most elite force, the JTF2, didn’t actually make me a superhero. It sounds silly, but that’s how guys think. And after you make it through the grueling screening and get accepted in with the select few, it’s how you feel.
Until you get hurt.
Pike pushes away the thoughts I can see polluting his mind with a smirk, “Good Sarg, no problem. I’m more worried about what my mom’s gonna say than about me,” he tries to shrug, but winces as he seems to remember his limited mobility.
“You don’t have to do that with me, it’s okay if you’re feeling a bit shaken, Corporal.”
“Naw, psssh, me? Shaken, no, it’s not like that,” he overacts. I won’t push it, I can see I’ve already bruised his ego.
Silence falls between us, I can hear a lady’s voice from the next room delivering the lunch I’m starving for to a couple of other patients. My stomach rumbles loudly.
“Sergeant?”
“Yeah,” I look back at Pike.
“I wanted to say, well, I want to thank you,” his voice is tight and he looks down at his thin blanket covering his legs. “If you didn’t pull me out of there, well, my mom wouldn’t have a chance to get mad about my arm, she’d be a Silver Cross Mother.” His voice wavers and he swallows hard as he looks up at me.
“You’d do the same,” I answer confidently, “I’m glad we made it out with the minor injuries we did,” I admit.
“True, it could’ve been a shit show,” he agrees.
The high-pitched squeal enters our room, but I can barely hear it. Instead, I feel like the air has been knocked out of my lungs as I look up at the nurse pushing the cart.
She’s stunning.
I can hear the whooshing of my heart in my ears as my adrenaline courses through my veins. It’s the same noise I hear every time I do a mission, but this time it’s not because I want to fight or flee, it’s for the third “F”.
Fuck.
“Hello,” she smiles and her round face lights up as she introduces herself, “I’m Nurse Alana Keller,” her German accent makes me pay closer attention to her words. To her lips. Those plump, juicy, red lips. “Welcome to Landstuhl Regional, we’re a little backed up right now with the influx of casualties, so I’m bringing around the lunches for this hall, but I’m also your nurse.” I can see a warmth in her chocolate eyes as she waits for us to respond.
“I’m Sergeant Walker,” I manage to find my voice.
“Corporal Pike.”
“Great, I have a couple of options for lunch,” I know she’s talking, but I can’t concentrate on her words. Instead, I let my eyes travel her full frame. My God, her tits are amazing! I let my gaze lick over her rounded belly and down to her beautiful shapely ass, then over her thick thighs. I love how her scrubs cling to her sexy curves, teasing me with the womanly beauty underneath.
“So, which would you like?”
My eyes snap back up to meet hers and I realize I missed the question. I don’t want to admit I was too busy undressing her with my eyes to listen, “Uh, whichever you like more,” I answer.
Her smile tells me I’m in the clear as she lays a tray on my bedside table. “Enjoy,” her voice is thick as she drops her eyes down my body. Her cheeks flush a deep red and her eyes open wide as she bites her lip shyly then goes back to her cart and scurries away.
I watch her hips sway seductively as her big, beautiful ass hypnotically swings from side to side. Damn.
Now part of me is wishing I didn’t have such a minor injury, because I could die a happy man waking up to that woman everyday.
Chapter 2 - Alana
What are you doing, Alana? I slink from the room and lean back against the wall, closing my eyes. I know patients are off-limits. I feel so unprofessional for checking him out like that, but at the same time, I can’t remember the last time I’ve ever felt so instantly connected to a man.
It doesn’t matter. A long shiver of desire quivers down my spine as I imagine running my hands through his short, dark hair. My pussy clenches as I can almost feel the heat radiating from his muscular body, pressing into mine. I feel a spark ignite a flame of passion that’s long been dead in my soul as I think about his icy blue eyes.
Not that there was anything cold about them. More than his rugged good looks, it was the kindness so clearly captured in those eyes that makes my heart flutter out of control like this. It’s been a long time since I’ve been with a good man, in fact, I can’t think of any off the top of my head. And it isn’t because there’s just oh-so-many to choose from.
Alana snap out of it! I open my eyes and take a deep, unsteady breath as I force myself to stand up straight and try to get rid of this feeling. But it’s impossible to shake off the feeling of your soul coming back to life.
Stop. I shouldn’t even be thinking about any of that.
“God, did you see her? I’m surprised there were any lunches left on that cart. She looks like she could eat them all,” the younger patient from inside the room laughs and my heart drops.
This isn’t some kind of revelation. I’ve been a big girl my entire life and I’ve heard it all before. Since I was a kid people have been telling me that I’d be pretty if I only lost some weight. Throughout the years people have even been crueller than that, sneering at me as they called me a cow or a pig or disgusting.
Just because I’ve been beaten down by all the mean words, doesn’t mean I’ve gotten used to hearing them. Every single time someone takes it upon themselves to look down their nose at me, or try to humiliate me, it still hurts.
“You’re just a kid, you don’t know shit about anything,” I hear Sergeant Walker’s voice rumbling deeply and my thighs squeeze together tight. His voice is like the roll of thunder that all kids fear more than the bright strike of lightning. As if, instinctually, we understand that what we hear can hurt us just as much as the pain that can touch our bodies.
“I know when someone needs to stop stuffing her face,” the Corporal chimes in and my mouth tugs down in the corners as hard as my heart strings do in my breast.
“You think you know anything about women? How many girlfriends have you had? How many women have you loved? You think women are all supposed to come from the same cookie cutter, like on your music videos?” His voice grows more agitated. “That woman was stunning, period. A beauty inside and out and if you’re too shallow and inexperienced to see that then I feel sad for you, cause you’re really missing out.”
I smile so big it hurts my cheeks as I push the cart further down the hallway. I shouldn’t be listening in anyway, but I’d be lying if I said I didn’t love what I heard.
My mind travels to another dimension. One where I could have met the Sergeant outside of these hospital walls and gotten to know him better. I lose myself in a world of different circumstances where I could know what it feels like to be spoiled by a man who truly sees me. Sees that I’m not just pretty for a fat girl. I’m pretty. End of sentence. I explore an alternate reality where I could also let myself feel every inch of him pressed against me. Pressed inside me. I let myself indulge in my fantasy, because I know that’s all it will ever be.
Still, a girl can dream, right?
Chapter 3 - Alana
I gently rap my fingers against the doorframe of room 1423 and take a deep lungful of air. He’s just a patient and I’m his nurse. That’s it. I’ve never had a relationship with a single patient in my twelve years of nursing and I’m not about to start now. I nod my head curtly in agreement with my thoughts and jut out my chin, determined to stay calm, cool and professional.
“Hello?” Sergeant Walker turns and sweetly smiles.
Okay, all bets are off.
No! No, Alana, remember who you are. You’re not some silly school girl with a crush, you’re a grown woman with a career you take seriously. Enough of this.
Of course, it doesn’t help when he looks at me like that. He lets his eyes hungrily explore my body the way I wish his lips would and my pussy grows slick with the thought.
Swallowing hard, I push the thought into the corner of my mind and softly close the door behind me before walking to the side of his bed. “I’m here to change your dressing,” I hold up my handful of supplies as if I feel the need to prove it to him.
“Oh, okay, sure,” he looks down at his injured thigh.
I place the bandages and creams on his table and reach up to circle the curtain suspended from the ceiling around his bed for privacy.
“You don’t have to do that,” he holds up his hand and I stop. “Corporal Pike is having his arm examined by a specialist, so it’s just you and me.” It’s amazing how someone so chiseled and tough can look so warm and inviting. I want to just climb into his bed and snuggle up to him while listening to him tell me stories about his life in his deep voice. The thought quickly disappears from my mind, but the comfort it brings lingers inside me. “Certainly, it’s up to you, Sergeant,” I agree.
“Call me Colton,” he meets my eyes and I’m drawn in. His eyes are magnetic, pulling me in, drawing me closer against my better judgement.
“Colton,” I like the way his name tastes on my tongue. I wonder if the rest of him is as sweet. I blush at my sexy thoughts and focus on the bandaging. Colton pushes back his blankets to reveal his wound.
My mouth drops open slightly as more than just his leg is presented to me. I knew the bullet wound was on his inner thigh, but I wasn’t expecting him to have no underwear on when I pictured changing his dressing. I divert my eyes away from the large, sleeping snake resting on his balls and busy myself by putting on my gloves.
“Didn’t you say your name is Alana? Do you mind if I call you by your first name?”
“That’s right,” I answer, “and no, I don’t mind at all.”
“It’s a beautiful name,” he continues. “It suits you perfectly.”
My breathing quickens along with my heartbeat. I’m not used to being called beautiful but the way Colton looks at me when he says it leaves no doubt that he’s speaking from his heart.
I pick up my scissors and cut the old bandage from his thigh, careful not to brush against his dick.
Calm.
My hand shakes slightly.
Cool.
Tiny beads of sweat form at my hairline.
Professional.
I let my eyes peek over only for a second, less than that even, at his thickening cock. My eyes widen and I force myself to fight my curiosity and stare down at his wound instead.
“It doesn’t look too bad at all,” I fight the tug of my eyeballs to look back at his dick. “You’ll be healed up fine in no time,” I meet his eyes, confident in my medical knowledge.
“That’s a damned shame,” he shakes his head woefully as I grab new bandages and begin redressing the hole in his leg.
“Oh? Why is that?” I focus on my hands. I feel like it’s the only safe place to look right now. Looking in his eyes makes me want to climb in this bed and cuddle him while looking over at his growing cock makes me want to climb in this bed and ride him. My hands are the only truly safe territory.
“Because that means I won’t have much time with you,” he smiles at me.
I don’t expect the pang of disappointment that washes over me. I’ve grown attached to patients before. Some because of their inspiring resilience, or their wonderful humor, but never like this… primal desire I have stirring inside me.
I finish changing his wound and I see it. That I’m not the only one fighting animalistic desires. His cock is standing tall and proud, saluting me in full force. I can’t help but notice it. With its thick, veiny shaft and bell shaped head like a flesh helmet on top, it looks like the perfect cock for a war hero.
I clear my throat and step back. “Well, at least you know it still works, right?” I try to lighten the mood with a smile.
“For the right woman, it does anyway,” he stares straight at me, making my insides quiver and my pussy aches at the suggestion.
Suddenly the door loudly clicks as it’s opened for the Corporal returning from the specialist. Colton quickly yanks his blanket up over his erection modestly and I retreat from the room quickly with an intense heat burning on my cheeks. However, it’s nothing compared to the intense burning need he’s awoken inside me.
Chapter 4 - Colton
I look up at the clock on the wall for the hundredth time and then back down to the paperwork in my lap.
I’m going home.
Late yesterday afternoon I was informed that I’m being discharged from Landstuhl and being put up in a hotel for a couple of nights before I’m taking a red eye service flight back to Canada.
The officer who went over the orders and travel plans with me kept smiling at me broadly, expecting me to be overjoyed or excited. However, all I could think about was saying goodbye to Alana.
After only a couple of weeks in her care, I’ve gotten to know her better than I would’ve expected. She’s told me about her family, her career, her life and I’ve shared my stories. I’ve been looking forward to seeing her each day so much that my desire to get my boots back on Canadian soil has been put on the back burner. All but forgotten. Until yesterday.
I look back up at the clock, as if I can will time to stop ticking. As if I can delay the inevitable somehow. But I can’t. I hate that I have to leave Alana behind, it feels lik
e a cruel twist of fate to ever cross paths with a woman so amazing, so sweet and so sexy only to leave her country and her life forever.
At the very least, I’ve been clinging on to hope that I could say goodbye before I’m discharged at eleven. However, I haven’t seen Alana at all today and as I gaze over at my few packed belongings and glare at the clock that’s ticking down the time I have left here, I can’t help but wonder if I’ll get that chance.
“I’m telling ya, Sarg, I can’t wait to step off that plane and get my post-deployment leave started,” Pike interrupts my brooding thoughts.
“Oh yeah?” I answer half-heartedly.
“Sure! I mean, it’s not like I’m going to be surfing or anything crazy with my arm all busted up, but it’ll just be nice to relax for a while, won’t it? Drink some beer, sleep in late, enjoy what’s left of summer,” he rambles on.
“Yeah, that sounds like a good time,” I mumble, looking at the clock again. In twenty minutes, we’re being escorted out of this hospital and over to our hotel. A crushing weight of disappointment presses down on my heart as reality sinks in, I’m not going to see her. Not now. Not ever again.
“You know once we get checked in at the hotel you and I should go for a drink or two. What do you think? It might be cool to actually see a bit of Germany before we have to go, huh?” Pike is practically bounding with excitement.
“Huh?” I have to concentrate to let his words sink in. “Oh, uh, yeah sure. I guess.” I don’t mean to sound so down about it. Pike’s a good kid and a great soldier. He might have pissed me off the first day we met Alana, but he apologized after. He’s not totally stupid, he just lets his mouth shoot off before his brain has a chance to think sometimes.
Our door creaks open and my head snaps over like it’s on a swivel, my heart squeezes in my chest and my mouth gapes open.
It’s her.
Alana looks as radiant as ever, her chestnut hair swept back in a bun while her peaches and cream complexion tempts me to rush over to her and cup her beautiful face with my hands. Her naturally red lips entice me to cover them with a kiss.
Night Time Rendez-Vous: 3 sizzling novellas that will keep you up all night Page 43