Save Me If You Can

by Jones, Christina C

  Pristine white fabric stretched over her deep brown skin, clinging to the curves of her breasts and hips. The neckline was high, but the hemline was short – just barely covering enough of her thighs to still be tasteful. Her hair was sleek – freshly straightened and combed into that sophisticated bob. And her lips – painted in a sexy bright red that made them look like candy – were parted in surprise at the sight of him.

  “W-wha—” she tried to speak up, but it was like the words kept catching in her throat, and she stepped forward, shaking her head as she extended her hands toward him. “Harriso—”

  “I tried to keep you out of this.” He shook his head, moving away from her touch. “But you…” he gestured at what she was wearing, then shook his head again. “A private room, Savannah? Him touching you?!”

  She grabbed his hands, clutching them between hers and pressing them against her chest. “I’m just trying to help. I’m ready for this all to be over with, so we can finally—”

  Harrison looked away from Savi, over to Renata who had loudly cleared her throat. He’d honestly forgotten that anyone except Savi was in the room, but suddenly they were surrounded by the whole house.

  “Um…,” Renata started, looking back and forth between them. “Maybe you two need some privacy. Savi… perhaps you could escort Harrison back to his room?”

  Savi looked to Harrison, her eyes pleading, and after a long moment, he nodded. He ignored the stares as he limped across the room and out the door with Savi at his side, then finished the short trek down the hall.

  He went in first, but Savi was right behind him, closing and locking the door. As soon as they were alone, she spoke.

  “Nothing happened, Harrison. Right? I’m completely fine. I’m right here, unharmed, because whether or not you see it… this is my job. Was my job,” she corrected, shaking her head as she took a step forward. “For twelve years of my life, I lived and breathed stuff like this. Did it every day.”

  Harrison blew out a puff of air. “Yeah, but King is—”

  “Not even close to the most dangerous man I’ve ever dealt with. This was a cakewalk when I think of the other things I’ve done, under much less controlled conditions. I had backup, Harrison. Kendall and Inez were there. I was fine. I am fine. I wish you’d stop acting like you’ve ever known me to be some fragile, helpless little girl.”

  “It’s not just that,” Harrison said, then dropped down onto the corner of the bed as Savi pulled a packet of tissues from her purse, and began scrubbing the makeup off her face. He immediately regretted it as pain shot through his leg, but he closed his eyes in an attempt to just bear it.

  Savi’s eyes widened in concern, but she stayed where she was, a few feet away. “Okay so tell me… what is it, then?”

  “All of it,” he said, laying back on the bed to stare up at the ceiling. “Him looking at you, talking to you… touching you.”

  “It wasn’t as bad as it probably looked.” Savi’s voice grew a little louder as she came closer, standing right in front of where he was sprawled on the bed. “On camera… maybe it looked like he groped me, but it was really more of a… brush.”

  Harrison scoffed. “You don’t have to do that.”

  “Don’t have to do what?”

  He sat up. “Lie… to make it seem better than it was. To make me feel better.” He remained quiet, waiting on her to insist she was telling the truth, that it really hadn’t been a full-on grope, and when that moment came, he suddenly felt sick. “I’m gonna kill that motherfucker.”

  “Harrison…”

  “I’m going to fucking kill him.”

  “I know you’re upset, but—”

  “But nothing!” Harrison growled. “Sooner or later, his ass is mine. He’s gotten away with too much already. I’m sick of it.”

  Savi frowned. “What is too much?” she asked. “Are you taking on Wolfe’s vendetta, or your own? This sounds… personal for you.”

  “Because it is!”

  “How?!” Savi shook her head, running a hand through her hair, tousling the perfectly-laid tresses into a mess around her face. “How is it personal?! You never… you never tell me anything, Harrison! I mean… I know you. I love you. But I don’t… know you. And if we’re going to be together again – if you want to be together again – like, really together… you’re gonna have to open up to me at some point. Otherwise… what’s the point? Do you not trust me?”

  Harrison groaned. “Of course I trust you.”

  “Then what?! Give me something here. Some part of you to let me know I’m not in this alone. Unless you don’t think you can depend on me, or—”

  “It’s not that! I just… I’ve held on to this shit myself for so long that… it’s not anybody else’s burden to bear.”

  Savi reached down, cupping Harrison’s face in her hands. “Please… just tell me. Lighten your load.”

  Closing his eyes, Harrison sucked in a deep breath. After a long moment, he opened them again and then looked up into Savi’s big browns, glossy and brimming with tears.

  “My mother,” he said, finally. “My mother was… everything to me. Biggest cheerleader, biggest fan. Sent me to college, wanted me to make something of myself. And that motherfucker… Terry King, he… he took her from me. She’s gone, and as far as I’m concerned, that blame rests solely on him.”

  Savi was quiet for several moments, and then she lowered her forehead, touching her head to his. “I’m so sorry.”

  “Nothing to be sorry about it. Not for you, at least,” he said. “But I don’t want to talk about that anymore. I don’t wanna talk about anything, or anyone else related to this. I just want…” he raised his hands, sliding them up and over her hips, “to be in your presence. I missed you today.”

  Savi smiled. “Yeah… off on secret missions.”

  Harrison sucked his teeth. “Don’t remind me. Talk to me about anything else.”

  “Okay,” Savi said, leaning down to brush her lips against his. “We’ll drop it for now. Thank you for opening up to me.”

  “You make it hard not to. I… I wish I could just tell you everything.”

  “So tell me.” The pained expression in her eyes made his chest ache, and he swallowed hard as she blinked back tears. “You can trust me, Harrison. With anything.”

  “I know that.” He brought his hands up to her face, brushing errant tears from her cheeks. “I do. It’s just… some things, once you’ve held on to them by yourself for so long… it’s like you can’t even find the words to tell someone else. Like it’s embedded in you so deep that sharing it would… I don’t know. Tear you apart. And as much I do trust you, and as much I love you… I’m just not at a place where I can do that. I hope you can understand that.”

  Harrison’s shoulder sagged in relief when she gave him a subtle nod. “I do. And I love you too.”

  Harrison groaned as she pressed her lips to his, then slipped her tongue into his mouth with an urgency that came out of nowhere. Just the sight of her had him unbelievably hard, and when she reached between them, her hot fingers gripping his rigid erection through his sweats, he just about lost it. He caught her by the hips, dragging her onto his lap to straddle him, testing the limits of that slim-fitting bandage dress.

  “Wait,” Savi panted, grabbing his shoulders for leverage as she stood up. “I need… help me with this,” she said, turning her back to him, indicating the zipper of her dress.

  Harrison lifted an eyebrow. “Do you have something else to wear?”

  With her lip pulled between her teeth, Savi glanced over her shoulder. “Do I… need something else to wear?”

  She held Harrison’s gaze, and after a moment, he understood her meaning, and his eyes went wide. For the entire five weeks now that they’d been reconnected, they’d danced around the subject of sex between them again.

  Savi wasn’t, by any measure, a woman who was shy about asking for what she wanted. Because of the way they’d separated – or rather, the way he’d
separated them – Harrison figured it was best to follow her lead. He only wished she’d lead them into the direction of the bed, for something other than long kisses that left both of them horny and frustrated. But so far, she hadn’t. She seemed to want to take it slow, and he respected that, so he never broached the subject. But this… this seemed like an invitation. And he was certainly going to accept it.

  His fingers went to the delicate zipper, and he slowly pulled it down, revealing a sliver of warm brown skin inch by inch as he went. When he reached the bottom, she stepped away, turning around to face him as the pristine white fabric fell away from her body into a puddle on the floor.

  At first, a little surge of anger rushed through him. Why the hell would she go for a meeting with Terry King with nothing on under that dress?! But then, he realized the illusion, that her panties and bra were the same rich dark bronze as her skin. He shifted in his seat on the bed as his eyes traveled up her body. The super-fit, toned body she’d had when they were first together was gone, replaced with lush curves that he’d been dying to get skin to skin with. The sway of her hips held a distinct aura of seduction as she sauntered back up to him.

  Harrison smiled at her, reaching up to run a thumb across the delicate lace cup of her bra, then trail a finger over the small gun holstered between her breasts. “This feels like déjà vu,” he murmured, unstrapping the gun, and pulling it out. Savi grinned as she climbed onto his lap, carefully avoiding his injured leg before she slipped the gun from his hand and gripped it, pressing the short barrel into the space between his chin and neck.

  “It does, doesn’t it?”

  She pulled the gun away, depositing it on the nightstand before she turned back to press her mouth against his. She probed the seam of his lips with her tongue, requesting and receiving entry, then plunged in, mating her tongue against his.

  Harrison groaned as she pressed the heat between her thighs against him, subtly rocking her hips. “Savannah,” he murmured, making her gasp as he slipped his fingers under the flimsy layer of her panties to plunge them into her. “You know I’m not with all this teasing and shit… are we doing this?”

  “Yes,” she said, half moan, half whimper, as he buried his fingers deeper. “Please.”

  “Then come here.”

  Harrison laid back on the bed, and in a swift motion, had Savi on top of him, positioned so that her legs were on either side of his head. He cursed under his breath at the continued presence of her panties, then grabbed both sides of one seam, then the other, ripping them off and tossing them aside.

  Savi laughed as he hooked his arms around her thighs, pulling her onto his mouth. Her giggles turned quickly into soft little sounds of pleasure as he devoured her like it had been… exactly as long as it had been. Unfiltered lust ripped through him as he moved his tongue, savoring the slick arousal that covered her lips. Above him, she moaned his name, in a slow, sensually tortured whimper. He closed his mouth over her clit, sucking and nibbling and licking until her thighs clenched tight against his head.

  “Damn, you taste just as good as I remember,” he mumbled, then covered her with his mouth again as she shamelessly rocked her hips.

  He kept one hand hooked around her leg, but moved the other so he could sink his fingers inside her, moving them in concert with his mouth as he licked, flicked, and pleased. Her body began to shake, and spasm, so he stroked her harder, faster.

  “Oh my God. Ooooh, my God,” she whined, over and over, in labored breaths. He tugged her clit between his teeth and then sucked it, hard as he moved his other hand from around her thigh. He slid it up her body and underneath the cup of her bra to caress and pinch her nipple, tugging and teasing until it was hard. Savi cried out in pleasure as she came, and Harrison kept devouring her, slurping and licking up every ounce of ecstasy her body gave. She tried to move away from the sensation by pitching herself forward, and before Harrison could catch her, that forward momentum sent her right off the bed, crashing onto the floor.

  “Oh, shit!” he said, ignoring the pain in his leg to get himself off the bed, and down onto the floor with Savi, who was sitting up, but had her head down as her shoulders shook. “Are you okay? Are you hurt?”

  After a moment, she looked up, wiping tears from her eyes. Harrison’s first thought was panic that she was crying, but as she tossed her head back, he realized she wasn’t crying at all. She was laughing.

  “What the hell just happened?” she giggled, turning to look at the bed. “That just took all the fun out of my orgasm.”

  Harrison chuckled. “I guess we were too close to the end of the bed.”

  Shaking her head, Savi wiped her face, and then moved closer to Harrison, lust and laughter still dancing together in her eyes. She tugged the front of his sweats and boxers down, then straddled his lap. “So how about we just stay down here?”

  A low groan worked out of Harrison’s throat as Savi sank down onto him. She let out a rasping moan herself as her body clenched around him, burying him in hotness, and wetness, and… bliss. He grabbed her thighs and pulled her down hard, pulling a cry from her. She was so damned tight, and felt so damned good, he…

  “Shit, Agent Briggs,” he muttered, holding her tight against him, trying to calm himself as his dick throbbed, impatient, ready for more.

  With her face buried against his neck, Savi giggled, then raised her head to meet his gaze. “Yeah. Ditto.” She planted her knees in the plush carpeted floor and began to move, anchoring her hands on his shoulders as she rolled her hips against him.

  Harrison sat back, his fingers buried in the plump swell of her ass cheeks as she rode him. Up, down, up, down, and… shit. He let his head fall back against the bed as she leaned into him, kissing and biting his neck, driving him crazy with her knowledge of exactly the places that took him there. She knew his body like he knew hers, knew just how hard and all the right spots.

  He moved his hands up her back, bringing them to bury in her hair so he could pull her mouth to his. He kissed her hard, devouring her lips and tongue with all the pent-up passion of six years apart. Next, he undid her bra, smiling at the fact that she kept riding him as they pulled it off. He eased her backward, separating her body from his so he could dip his head, pulling the rich brown tip of one of her breasts into his mouth.

  Her breath began to come in short pants as he suckled her nipples, taking turns between them. Kissing, sucking, licking biting, making her feel it everywhere, until she tossed her head back, and her gyrations lost their rhythm. But Harrison didn’t need rhythm, he just needed to be inside her, getting buried in pleasure over and over as she pulsed around him.

  Their kisses were feverish, hungry, as sweat slickened their skin. He was relieved when he felt the frantic way she began to contract around him, the tension in her lips, the tremors in her legs, because that meant he could stop holding back. She wrapped her arms around his neck, holding him tight as she came with a gasp, and a few second later, he was growling through his own explosion inside her.

  Neither of them moved. Savi kept her arms around him, resting her face against his neck. Harrison moved his arms around her waist, running his thumb along her spine as their hearts stopped racing and pounding in their chests.

  “Savi…”

  It took a moment, but she finally moved her head, lifting her eyes to meet his gaze. “Yeah?”

  “I love you,” he said, reaching up to caress her face. “Whatever happens… I need you to know what. Need you to know that I never stopped.”

  She licked her lips, then slowly, she nodded. “I love you too, but… what do you mean, whatever happens? What do you think is going to happen to you?”

  “Nothing,” he said, though he knew different. “I’m just saying… just in case.”

  Savi didn’t look convinced, but she nodded again, resting her head against his chest. If he had to guess, there were probably a million thoughts swimming in her mind. Thoughts that were, by his estimation, better left to him.

&nb
sp; But there was nothing he could do about it. Savi was a smart woman, and that intelligence lent itself to a natural curiosity. He’d already said too much, and it was only a matter of time before he was figured out. It was time to formulate a real plan, one that included getting out of this house, and finally completing the task he’d been working toward since he was barely an adult.

  Now that that Savi had been deployed against Terry King, he felt like his time was running out. What if her cover wasn’t strong enough? What if King wanted to see her again, and sought her out? What if… there were too many what ifs. It was time to move, now, before Savi or anyone figured it all out. He had no doubt that they’d stop him, plead for real justice, jail time, whatever. But that didn’t work for Harrison. For the retribution he wanted, there would have to be loss of life.

  Twelve

  Returning the message was never an option.

  Still though, Renata would be lying if she said she’d never thought about it.

  Most people would, after all, be moved in one way or another by a correspondence from a father they’d desperately wished for, but never known.

  The email seemed innocuous enough. From: Old Man. Subject: Reaching Out. Renata shook her head as she looked at the message in her inbox, knowing that if it had come anywhere other than her official FBI inbox, there was a good chance she may never have seen it. And really, she wished she hadn’t.

  Terry King was out of his mind.

  He had to be, to think that Renata would ever in a billion years be interested in the fact that he was “reaching out”. According to the email, sent about a week after the attempted invasion, and ignored for another week after that, he wanted to “try to be the father he should have been”, and be “present in the life of his grandchild”.

  As if.

  Certainly not, not when the other half of that grandchild’s parentage was Damien Wolfe, King’s sworn enemy. And besides that, Renata was well past the point of “needing” a father, especially the likes of Terry King. So no, she pretended that she hadn’t seen it, and tried – in vain – to forget it existed. She had no idea what King’s end game was, but she had no interest in being a part of it. And she would kill his ass first before he laid a hand on Taylor.