“Nice try, but here’s the game plan. You call Julian and see how he’s doing. I’ll go make sure she doesn’t fall in the shower. I’ll tuck her in, and you can have bed shift watching over her while she’s asleep. I’ll run out and get her something appropriate and for CJ too.”
“Okay. I’ll make breakfast.”
Now, Blackhawk laughed.
“What?” he asked. “Lyzee taught me to cook. I can make us all something to eat.”
“My wife gets off on seeing you in a flowered apron, that’s why she offered to teach you to cook.”
Whitefox grinned, and then the small lightness faltered, and he slipped back into grimness of devastation and pain.
“Come here,” Blackhawk ordered, pulling his brother into his arms and hugging him. “We’ll get through this and you are never going to be alone.”
It staggered Callen that his brother knew exactly what he was so afraid of in his heart. He loved the old man, but now it was like his only parent was gone, and he was abandoned. Wyler was his biological father but Timothy raised him. “I don’t know if I can get through this, Ethan. I feel so damn empty.”
“You have Elizabeth and me.”
“I don’t want to live on the Rez. I can’t bear thinking about it.” His body shook when he let out a breath.
“You don’t have to live there, Cal. You have a bedroom right here.” From the way his brother was speaking, he assumed he wasn’t going back to Desdemona’s either. “You have a home here with us.”
Callen looked up at his brother and wiped his eyes. “You’re really lucky. Elizabeth is pretty special, and you picked an amazing wife. The woman I picked didn’t even care to come back with us. No text. No call. I think I rushed into it and made a huge mistake,” he finally confessed out loud.
Ethan suspected, as did his wife and their granddad, but it wasn’t their business to intervene. “We’ll work through it.”
“I have to go back and help her out, and then find closure there too.”
Blackhawk nodded. “We’ll finish it up together,” he added, starting towards the stairs and his wife.
“Why? You both obviously dislike her now.”
He stopped and looked over his shoulder. “Because Cal, we’re Blackhawks. We finish what we start, we stand together, and no matter what, ‘The Three Musketeers’ always have each other’s backs.” His brother gave him a reassuring grin and then bounded up the stairs.
All Callen could think was, ‘thank God that his mother knew who knocked her up all those years ago.’
He won the family lottery.
Elizabeth stood under the hot spray and closed her eyes. Her mind was going a mile a minute, checking all the items off her mental list, and making sure she had it all done. When her husband’s hands slid around her waist, it caught her off guard. And when his lips left a trail along her neck and shoulder, a shudder went through her body.
“I missed you baby,” he whispered, knowing exactly what she needed to stop thinking and focus on herself briefly.
Elizabeth enjoyed the feel of her husband’s hands on her body; it was the perfect distraction when she needed it. When he began washing her hair, she was in complete heaven. The man had amazing fingers. A moan left her lips, and she could feel his body go taut behind her. Maybe it could be a distraction for them both.
She stepped under the water and the shampoo rinsed free from her hair, sliding silkily down her body, and she looked over at him. He was most definitely her warrior. The tattoos across his body heated her blood, and gave her peace when she was experiencing turmoil.
“I need you now, Elizabeth,” he said.
She simply nodded, and they rushed each other. It felt like months, not days since she touched her husband. He picked her up and Elizabeth wrapped her long legs around his waist, trapping his erection between them.
Now would come the heat, the need, and the fire of mouths doing battle, going to war to win the ultimate prizes. Peace, comfort and solace in each other’s arms.
Hands roamed while mouths stayed fused, as they sought and found what they desired most.
They needed each other and comfort, lost in moments of raw need.
“God baby, I missed you,” he muttered, as her mouth did wild things with his.
“Ethan, I missed all of you.” She ran her fingers across the tattoo of the raven and her name and felt peace.
He moved to the bench in the shower and sat, holding her on his lap. “I want to bury myself in my wife and forget for a while.” And then he slid into the warmth of woman and was suddenly at peace, as he found home.
“Ethan,” she moaned, as he slid in achingly slow.
“Ride me, Elizabeth,” he whispered, resting his head against the tile, eyes open so he could watch the woman who owned his heart and soul do what she did best.
Captivate him.
Distract him.
Heal him.
Elizabeth began the slow, wet glide up and down his body, moving in a way she knew would torture her husband. Already, his body shook beneath her.
“So good, baby!” The words came out as a moan as she punctuated each glide with grinding down when she reached the base. “Christ, you undo all the knots that tie me up.”
Elizabeth was too distracted to speak. The feel of her husband in her body was all she wanted and needed. Right now she just needed to feel something other than loss and complete emptiness.
Then she began moving faster, taking what she needed to block out the previous day and night.
Blackhawk couldn’t get past the complete pleasure. Here was a gorgeous woman bouncing in his lap and offering his body immeasurable amounts of pure ecstasy. “Close Elizabeth,” he warned.
“No Ethan, not yet!” She refused to give up the feeling. She wanted more, and was going to take all she needed for the day in this moment.
Ethan had never been told no. She usually went first and he followed, but he knew she needed the solace today too. He did his best to not let his control slip. Just for her, he’d suffer. “Use me,” he whispered, and felt more control fray.
Elizabeth heard the words and kept riding. She was on the precipice and could fall at any moment, but she wanted to stay in the moment, a moment filled with love and heat.
Blackhawk was moaning, as she did truly wicked things to his body and control. It took everything he had to not explode. It was to the point he couldn’t look at her or he was gone.
The heat built and she touched his cheek and had his attention. “Now Ethan,” she whispered, and then slammed down one last time, as she felt him quake beneath her. Her mouth met his and they kissed through the erupting storm that pulled them both under. The kiss soothed and healed both of their hearts, filling the loss with love. Pleasure was the Band-Aid to get them through the moment.
When they both calmed, neither moved. The kiss continued, until Elizabeth broke away and stared at him with icy blue eyes.
“I love you,” she whispered, “more than you’ll ever know.”
And for that he was infinitely grateful. “I love you, Lyzee.”
Ethan could finally feel his lower extremities, and he stood them in the shower for a few more minutes just to enjoy the hot water and the feel of his wife against his body.
Turning it off, he grabbed a towel and wrapped it around her body first, and then watched her walk out of their bathroom. The pain started surfacing again of what was coming.
“Ethan, we’ll get through it,” she called back over her shoulder, as she continued to their room. “I promise.”
He watched her walk away.
And prayed she was right.
Callen dialed the number in Elizabeth’s phone and waited for Julian to answer. He needed an update for Blackhawk, and also needed a favor.
“Littlemoon.”
“Julian, it’s Callen Whitefox.”
There was a pause. “I heard about your grandfather. Tell your family I send my condolences.”
“Thank you.” Im
mediately, his eyes filled with tears and he struggled to hold them back and remain composed.
“Is there something I can do for you and your brother?” he asked, sincerely. He understood how hard it was when your family was broken by death.
“No, we’re getting through it. The ceremony is today, the teepee tonight, and burial tomorrow morning. I’m calling for an update on the other situation.”
It wasn’t lost on the man that in the midst of death he was calling about more death. This is why he didn’t want to work for the FBI full time. It greatly lacked appeal to Julian.
“Nothing yet, but I have three more likely locations the tribes have suggested.”
“Can you do me a favor?”
“Certainly. What do you need, Callen?”
Whitefox didn’t know how to phrase it. “Desdemona Adare needs to be ‘watched’. We think it’s stalker related still, but we can’t figure out what’s going on. If you get a moment, can you swing by her grandmother’s house and just check the area?”
“Give me the address.”
He rattled off the street address and waited.
“I was going to check that swamp tomorrow morning, so I’ll be in that area anyway. No favor needed.”
Whitefox felt relief. He was pretty sure the idea of marriage was over with the woman, too much damage had been done, but he still cared about her and wanted her safe. “We’ll be back in Cypress Grove Monday afternoon.”
“Okay, I’ll update you later. Hang in there.”
Whitefox knew he wasn’t talking about the Desdemona situation, since that was the furthest from his mind.
“Be safe, Julian,” he said, hanging up the phone. It was just in time to see his brother bounding down the stairs with renewed energy, and he suspected he knew why.
“That’s completely unfair unless you're going to share with the rest of the class,” he said, trying to find humor in it, and faking it completely.
Blackhawk grinned. “She’s dressing and then going to sleep a while. You look like hell. I suggest you do that too. Food can wait, but sleep will help you forget.”
Whitefox nodded as he watched his brother get ready. “Dad has CJ. He took him for a walk. He said he needed to clear his head.”
“Okay, I’ll be back in a couple of hours. You hold down the fort.”
Whitefox smiled. “Those comments are funnier coming from Elizabeth.” He loved her little phrases she threw in expectantly.
“I’m grotesquely inadequate, but at least I try.” He walked over to his brother and patted his shoulder. “Sleep.”
He nodded and watched him walk out the door.
Callen felt restless and wandered the living room like a caged animal. Finally he came to stop in front of the bookshelf that held the family pictures. There were ones of Elizabeth and Ethan, Callen and Elizabeth, plus the rest of the men in the family sitting there. Then he saw the ones of his grandfather, and his eyes filled with tears.
“It’s hard to believe he’s gone.”
Callen turned at the sound of her voice. Something about her voice always gave him calm when he was lost in the turmoil. Now he was grateful she wasn’t sleeping, but right there with him.
“I feel so empty, Lyzee.”
Elizabeth went to his side and understood. She’d felt that way too. “He’s still here Callen. I know he is, and you need to believe that, no matter what happens in life. Timothy lives inside you, and you carry him with you.”
He nodded, struggling to believe that a man that good could live in a man so unworthy.
Elizabeth could see the exhaustion on his face. “How about you and I curl up on the couch and take a nap together?”
The idea held merit. There was nothing he liked more than having her beside his body. It offered him peace and warmth. Mostly the heat was from sexual need and attraction, but he’d rather feel that than what was living in his heart at that moment. “Okay, Lyzee. You need to sleep more than I do. I slept when CJ was using me as a pillow.”
It touched her heart that the man had loved her son, and nurtured him while her husband rested. Elizabeth led him to the couch, waiting for him to lounge. Then Elizabeth found a comfortable place at his side.
“Are you okay?” she asked, “Or am I too heavy.”
He laughed. What he was feeling had nothing to do with her weight, but where her body was pressed against his. “Yeah, if I say your heavy you’ll hit me.”
“I can move,” she offered.
“Please don’t. I need you right now.” It was said with all the raw emotion surfacing at once, and pouring out in complete honesty to the woman he loved.
Elizabeth looked into his eyes and gave him peace by kissing him softly. It wasn’t a kiss she’d normally give him, or one she’d share with her husband, but somewhere in between. For now it was to offer him reassurance that he wasn’t going to be alone.
The note granddad left her made her promise, and she’d give Callen a safe place to reside until he was strong enough to go out in the world.
The kiss caught him off-guard, and his arms came around Elizabeth and held her tightly to his body, kissing her back. For the first time in a day, Callen let go some of the pain he’d buried deep.
Then he realized what he did and the line he potentially crossed. “I’m sorry.”
Elizabeth laid her head on his shoulder and closed her eyes. “Don’t be. Love should be shared, not locked away until someone dies. Let’s sleep for a while.”
Callen relaxed and let the warmth flow through his body from the contact with her. None of it was sexual, but it gave him peace and warmth anyway. He felt safe and home.
The pain ebbed away for a while as he listened to her slow easy breathing. Before he knew it, he fell into the darkness with her protectively over half his body. Cold was gone, and silence surrounded him, as he finally slept peacefully.
Arriving home two hours later, Ethan found his brother holding his wife in sleep, as they both collapsed from exhaustion and grief on the couch. Instead of jealousy, it gave him peace. Elizabeth, even exhausted, was offering what she had in her to a man who was slipping away into the darkness of life. She would anchor Callen to the family, and he was willing to let her do just that. Pulling the throw off the back of his couch, he placed it over their bodies, tucking them in together.
The door to the back yard was open, and outside he found his father lying on the grass with his son on a blanket. He was telling him Native stories that granddad had told Ethan when he was a boy. He remembered the same stories from his childhood. Ethan smiled as he was transported to his own past, and back to the man who had raised him.
Family would prevail, even if it was now smaller. The loss of Timothy was completely and utterly staggering, but they’d all hold together. They had to. The old man was probably watching right now, wishing he could boss them around.
Ethan smiled up at the blue sky and the possibility that his granddad was still with them, and it gave him calm.
“I love you, Granddad. I hope you can see us. We’re going to be fine.”
Then he made the promise to do whatever it took to help his wife hold them all together.
* * *
Desdemona walked into the bed and breakfast, hoping they’d see her. After all, she’d been horrible to both of them. Blaming the booze was a cop out. She’d held those emotions deep within her body for months and finally they broke free. Unfortunately, she should have said them privately to her fiancé and not in front of old acquaintances and Elizabeth.
She couldn’t believe Elizabeth didn’t beat the shit out of her for putting her hands on her. She’d heard the stories, and knew the consequences. Maybe she was hoping Elizabeth would hit her. Then maybe Callen would see that the woman wasn’t as perfect and saint-like. Her life was at a new low when she actually wanted an ass kicking from her boss.
All she could hope was Callen would forgive her and listen to her apology. She had to have hope. He didn’t ask for the ring back yet, so m
aybe there was still a chance she could be part of his life.
Her heart just wanted that one glimmering ray of hope that she could undo what she so carelessly shattered.
Inside she stopped at the desk and waited for the woman.
“Oh hi! Desdemona, right?” asked the woman, behind the counter once she recognized the friend of the Blackhawks.
“Yes, I was wondering if they were up yet.”
“Oh, they never came back last night. Elizabeth called and said they were going to visit some people out of town, but to hold their room. They’d be back later.”
Desdemona wasn’t surprised they left. She figured she was going to be on her own, and could she blame them? It came to mind to tell the woman don’t hold her breath on them coming back.
Leaving the bed and breakfast, she hopped in her Mercedes and decided to go find someone to keep her company. She really enjoyed spending time with Holly and Ivy Delray the night before. Well, before she got shitfaced drunk, slapped her boss, and physically assaulted her fiancé.
Maybe they would keep her busy and help her figure out where the hell her sister had gone. She swore on everything that was holy, if her sister just popped back up, she was going to kill her. After what she just threw away coming back there, hell would have no mercy…
Julian watched Desdemona walk out of the bed and breakfast. It made his job easier since she came to him. He was going to go after her and tell her where Elizabeth and Callen were, but then it occurred to him. Wouldn’t she already know? Last he knew she was engaged to Whitefox.
The entire situation didn’t bode well if she was aimlessly wandering with no clue what was going on in Callen’s life.
Whitefox was sharing a room with Elizabeth and not staying with his woman. Well, really he couldn’t blame him; he’d like to cozy up to Elizabeth too. On second thought, he knew how wicked she was with a gun and the ability to kill first and rationalize later.
Why take that risk?
Deep Dark Mire (An FBI Romance Thriller ~ book four) Page 16