Stella sighed. God, it was glorious to sit and talk about normal shit for once. She cleared her throat. She hated to bring up this shit, but it was their life.
“So, I talked to Agent Harris today. The protective detail is going to stay on the house for a while longer. They still haven’t located Jamie, but when they do they want me to wear a wire and get him to admit to what he did.”
“Big surprise. Jesse and I haven’t been able to find him either.” George took a nonchalant sip of his Jameson and scowled at her scowl.
“George!” she reprimanded, attempting another kick under the table. “I don’t want you getting deeper into this clusterfuck and getting hurt. We’ve talked about this.”
Was that a whine? She didn’t whine.
She had to admit that she knew George and Jesse were looking for Jamie, and had been since the Keys; maybe she just didn’t want to hear about their progress or lack thereof. The thought of George and Jesse going after Jamie made her more anxious than ever, almost as anxious as she was knowing that Jamie had been in their house, just waiting for her. Or Millie. Christ, what if he went after Millie? Patrick was looking for him too, and while she was worried about Patrick, it was a different type of worry. Patrick, at least, knew Jamie well enough to have some insight into his thought process, however deranged it might be. Her money was on Patrick finding the bastard.
“El!” George interrupted her racing thoughts with a swift squeeze on the thigh. “Back off with the shoes, Love. Try not to worry about me and Jesse.” His face softened and he stroked her leg under the table. “I do feel better with the security detail on the house, though, don’t you? And the press hasn’t been as bad.”
“Fucking press. Everyone feels very sorry for me. Again,” she commented, putting the last bite of snapper in her mouth. “How do people cook like this? I want to be able to cook you meals. I’m a horrible cook,” she rambled.
“You’re not that bad. You have five, wait—six—things you can cook well. Just stick with those.”
“You’re okay with me not being a good cook?” Stella asked.
“I’m okay with just about anything as long as you get naked at the end of the night.” George’s dimples danced in the candlelight.
“Well, that’s true.” She giggled. “Sex makes everything okay for you.”
He smirked as he finished his shrimp and grits. “As a matter of fact, yes it does.”
Chapter Five
Nothing Like A Backyard BBQ
#whentheshitgoesdownyoubetterbeready
Stella climbed on the back of George’s bike and gave him a squeeze with her thighs to let him know she was ready to go, but it just made his dick hard. He backed them out of the garage slowly, then threw the bike in gear and headed toward Patrick and Millie’s for the game and dinner. He felt Stella lay her chin on his shoulder and snake her right hand underneath his t-shirt and around his waist. He sighed, wishing it was a longer drive. Within a few minutes, they had driven the three miles between the houses and he pulled onto the tree-lined street.
The last few weeks had been insane and they were in need of fun. A BBQ with Stella’s former roommates and best friend was the perfect distraction, not to mention Penn State football was on the agenda. George slowed his bike and pulled up to the curb in front of Stella’s old house. Patrick’s car was gone and there was a different car in the driveway. He cut the engine and Stella leaned closer, kissing his neck.
“Love?” he asked in response to her public display.
Her tender kisses continued down his neck, then he felt her tongue run up the back of his neck and graze his hairline before he twisted sideways and pulled himself off, careful to balance the bike. She cocked her head at him.
“If I stayed on that bike any longer I was just going to drive back home,” he admitted with a grin.
She smiled and pulled at the neckline of her very low, very tight tank top. They were having an extremely warm fall; it was late September and the leaves hadn’t even started to turn yet. As much as George appreciated the view her tank top afforded, he couldn’t wait for sweater weather. Every time he saw her scars it pissed him off—what that fucker had done to her. He’d never tell her that, though.
“We could be a little late,” she suggested and gave him a real smile. He’d missed those lately. “I bet no one here would give a shit.” Stella patted the seat in front of her and George was just about to get back on when the front door opened.
Millie smiled uncomfortably at them. “Hey guys!” Her eyes looked around wildly, clearly confused about something. “Patrick and Billy are grabbing a few last minute things.”
“Hey, Mil. What’s up?” Stella pulled off her helmet and climbed off the bike with George holding her hand for balance. She started smoothing her hand over her hair without much improvement. After she took off her motorcycle helmet, her hair always looked like she’d just been fucked.
His heart felt full, like all was right in the world even though he knew it wasn’t. They’d left the FBI detail and media in front of their house and were having a normal cookout with friends. Normal was possible.
“So, undoubtedly, Patrick invited one of his coworkers over without telling me,” Millie said as she rushed down the stairs toward them. “He’s already here,” she whispered.
“That’s cool, Millie. I brought enough food by yesterday to feed an army,” Stella soothed. “Don’t worry about one more.”
George felt Stella stiffen beside him and his gaze followed hers up to the doorway. Shock. Pure fucking anger. Heat spiked through George as he dropped Stella’s hand and rushed the motherfucker grinning from the doorway. He tackled Jamie at full speed; they fell into the house and hit the hardwood floor with a crash.
Due to his surprise attack, George got in several punches before Jamie got his wits about him. Once he did, Jamie came up fighting immediately; he landed his first punch on George’s eye. George felt a popping sensation, then nothing. He felt nothing. No pain, no fear, not a single blow that Jamie landed, not a single punch he managed to connect. George barely heard Millie and Stella screaming, but couldn’t focus on the words.
It was as if he was watching himself from above. George watched as he pushed himself off the floor and hit the motherfucker who almost took El from him. He hit him as many times as he could before he felt arms pulling at him. George felt the bone in his nose break and heard the snapping sound. He threw all his weight into the next punch and blood spurted from the rip in Jamie’s flesh.
“George! George!” Stella was screaming.
The arms on him pulled harder, dragging him off the guy he’d like to kill with his bare fucking hands. Billy and Patrick were suddenly there. Where did they come from?
Patrick had Jamie and was dragging him out the front door. Stella was following them; she was yelling something. There was a rushing sound in his ears, but he couldn’t actually hear anything. He felt nothing except fury now. Rage hit him like a wave crashing onto the shore. What the fuck was Jamie doing here, at our BBQ? Why was he in DC at all? Did Patrick know he was back?
He scrambled to shake off Billy’s grip. Billy’s fingers slipped on the sweat and blood on George’s arm and George was suddenly free from his grasp. He saw Billy’s lips moving, but he could only hear the rushing. George pushed off Billy and ran outside, tackling Jamie again, this time from behind. They both hit the sidewalk hard, Jamie’s face bouncing off the concrete as they hit. George’s skin burned from the friction, but he didn’t care. All his rage, all his fear and pain, everything he and Stella had endured over the last couple of months, came out through his fists. He wanted to kill this fucker, to make him hurt as much as Stella had in the last few years. He threw punch after punch and Jamie kept fighting back, which made George even angrier. Billy and Patrick were trying to separate them again, not very successfully. Not being able to pull George off Jamie himself, Billy called for reinforcements.
“El, come help me!”
Stella bent down
and put her face in his line of sight. “George, that’s enough.”
He could almost see her; almost see her face through the haze of his fury, through the bubbling of his rage. Was she talking?
“George, please,” she said without emotion, then grabbed his right arm.
Her touch brought him back to reality; George stopped mid-punch and looked in her eyes. Pain skittered across them, along with anger. Jamie writhed in pain under him.
“This is nowhere close to enough,” George said between clenched teeth.
Before he could land the next punch, Patrick and Billy were able to separate Jamie from him and walked him down the block. Jamie wasn’t very mobile and they were sort of dragging him down the sidewalk. Patrick was yelling, mostly obscenities. George couldn’t make out the words, but he didn’t care where the fucker was going anyway, as long as it was away from him. Maybe they’d get lucky and he’d get hit by a car crawling back into his fucking hole.
Billy turned and looked back at them, making eye contact with Stella. George’s rage was red hot and pulsed through his entire body. He clenched and released his fists rhythmically while he tried to calm his fury.
“George!” Stella was calling his name. She still had him by the arm and was pulling him toward his bike.
Without a word, George pulled up the hem of his shirt and wiped the blood from his face, then got on this bike and cranked it. He waited for Stella to get on and then took off, trying not to drive as fast as he wanted.
Stella clung to George as they rode back to their house. She could actually feel the hatred rolling off his back. She was astonished that Jamie just showed up; couldn’t believe the audacity of the bastard. What the hell was he thinking?
When they entered the garage and the door went back down, she released the breath she’d been holding. She got off the bike slowly and helped George take off his helmet. She examined his face, skating her fingertips over his quickly swelling eye. “Are you hurt?”
George scowled in response, turning his head away from her touch. “I hope I broke that fucker’s face.”
“Well, it looked like that might be a possibility,” Stella retorted.
George gingerly got off his bike and stalked into the house. He walked to the freezer and grabbed a bag of frozen peas. Stella followed him. Cooper followed her, his tail frozen; he could tell something was wrong.
“Are you okay?” She touched his back, which was bloody and dirty from the fight.
“NO!” He turned and faced her, blood dried to his cheek and fury still in his eyes. His right eye was turning an angry purple and there was a ragged cut underneath it. There were scrapes along his chin and Stella reached up to wipe some of the blood off his jawline. “No, I’m not fucking okay! I’m not okay that the guy that shot you and kidnapped you just fucking showed up at our friends’ fucking house like it was fucking nothing! I’m. Not. Fucking. Okay!” he yelled. His hands formed fists so tight he ripped his makeshift ice pack, peas scattering all over the floor.
“That’s a lot of fucks you got there,” Stella appeased, ignoring the peas. “Just think of it this way—we don’t have to look for him anymore.” She raised her eyebrows in appeal. It wasn’t like Stella to look for the positive in the situation—that was always George’s place.
“Awesome,” he agreed with an exasperated sigh. “Fucking great.”
“He’s here and he’s close. And confident enough in his asshole self to just ‘stop by,’” she pointed out. “Patrick didn’t know he was going to be there, either, George. He was just as shocked as we were.”
Cooper wagged his tail along the floor; swish, swish, swish. “Millie thinks you just beat the shit out of someone who works with Patrick.”
“Yeah, I guess that might be difficult to explain.”
“George.” Stella wrapped her arms gently around his waist and laid her head on his chest. “You beat someone up for me,” she said and laughed. “I feel like I’m in high school.”
George didn’t think that was funny at all. His face turned impossibly redder through the purple bruises and spots of blood; Stella couldn’t tell if he was embarrassed or enraged. “He’s lucky I didn’t have a gun,” he ground out against her hair. “I would’ve finished all this.”
Angry it is.
“Come on, Rocky.” Stella pulled him by his bruised and bleeding hand and led him up the stairs.
George kept the remaining peas on his face until they got into the bathroom. Stella took her clothes off and then undressed him, watching as he moved his ice pack further and further away from his face. She pushed him unceremoniously into the shower and grabbed a washcloth. Turning the rain cannon on, Stella soaked her washcloth with warm water and took the peas from George, throwing them outside the shower with a plop, stifling a giggle as more peas rolled out of the bag. She closed the glass door behind her and delicately began to wipe away the blood on George’s face.
“I love that you felt you needed to do that, George,” she admitted quietly, “but I don’t think it’s the way to solve this problem.”
George ran his hands up the sides of her body and then pulled her toward him. “And how do you suppose we solve this problem, El?” He leaned down and pulled her earlobe into his mouth.
She moaned and grabbed his face, kissing him as tenderly as she could, feeling like they couldn’t be close enough. She wished they could stay in this shower forever and hide from the world like they were in a warm, safe cocoon. She sighed into his chest. “George, I worry that I’m a bit like a hurricane and if you’re in the path you’ll be destroyed.” She pulled back and looked into his eyes. “I can’t take you getting hurt because of me.”
George gave a resigned sigh and ran one of his hands down her body, walking her to the bench. He sat down and enveloped her in his strong, safe arms, pulling her onto his lap and meshing his swollen lips to hers. His hands were all over her, like he couldn’t get enough.
“You think this may solve our problems?” she asked in between kisses.
“Less talking, more kissing,” George retorted, ignoring her.
George rolled over as the early morning light coming from behind the new shades Stella bought woke him. His entire body hurt. His ribs, his face, his fucking pride… He wanted to kill Jamie. I WILL kill Jamie. Now that he knew Jamie was back in town, taunting them both with his confident demeanor, it gave him more focus. Stella let out a sigh in her sleep and his heart clenched. He ran his hand down her leg. Both of his hands throbbed; he should’ve taken pain medication last night.
“Love?” he said and cleared his throat. He wished his mind wasn’t full of cobwebs.
Last night after their shower they’d shared wine and whiskey, too much wine and whiskey, both of them lost in their own thoughts of what this really meant for them. Jamie was back and it was go time for them both. Stella was going to be bait for the FBI and George needed a plan ready to get rid of that fucker once and for all. He’d call Jesse. Jesse would help him figure out what he needed to do.
Stella ran her fingertips over his chest for a few seconds before she opened her eyes and focused on him. Her eyes were full of regret, dreams lost, and determination. It was a strange combination, but quintessentially Stella and he knew she’d been dreaming again.
“Love?” he whispered again.
“Yes?” she answered perkily, arranging her lips in her perfect fake smile.
“Stop with the fake smile,” he said without moving his lips that much.
“You look like shit,” she observed, the smile falling off her face.
“I feel worse than shit. My face feels like someone kicked it with a boot after that boot stepped in a pile of shit.”
“Wow. That was really descriptive.” Stella leaned in and kissed his cheek. “Your lip is split. Does it hurt?”
“My entire face feels like it looks—like I was hit with a frying pan several times, El. Can’t you tell?”
She gave him an exaggerated once over.
Ge
orge rolled onto his back. “I think we need to talk to Patrick. See what he knows about what’s going on.”
“I think you may need to go to a doctor.” Stella’s voice was full of concern and she ran her fingertips gently over his right cheek where his cut had begun to scab over.
“You should see the other guy.” He smirked and then stopped when he felt his lip crack.
“I did. I guarantee you he’s seen a doctor.”
George inhaled deeply and exhaled. “No. I’m fine. I have to go to the bar today anyway.”
“How are you going to explain…this?” Stella motioned in front of his face.
“I didn’t really think about that.” George closed his eyes. “I fell grilling?”
“Oh, I like it. Was there a hole by the grill?”
He stared at the ceiling. “I dug it myself and then fell in it while looking at my girl.”
“Because your girl was prancing around in her undies?” Stella giggled.
“Do you wear undies?” he asked, chuckling.
“No,” she said, grabbing his hand and putting it somewhere he loved.
“Ugh, I can’t even move this morning,” he moaned, his voice full of regret.
“Don’t worry, Rocky. I can.”
Chapter Six
Throwing Shit and Breathing
Cooper followed Stella around the house as she searched the rooms aimlessly, looking for her boxes. Then she remembered where she put them. She rushed to the top floor hallway and pulled the string attached to the panel on the ceiling until it groaned, the panel moving downward and releasing the ladder to the attic. She put down the wine bottle she was drinking from and climbed up carefully, inhaling the sweet, musty smell of old stuff. When she was at the top of the ladder, she looked around the attic to determine the area where her boxes were stored. Last year, George had brought everything to the attic from her apartment and she had no idea where he put anything up here. She spotted the box she was looking for a few piles to the left, thankfully not too far into the depths of the attic. Just as she stepped off the ladder and onto the creaky wooden planks, she heard a sound behind her and laughed out loud when she saw Cooper trying to climb his way up the ladder as well. He’d made it up two rungs and was frozen, panicked and whining.
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