Life in Shadows (13 page)

“No, Jack,
no, ssshhh,” Serena counseled. She rose upright on her knees, reluctantly
disengaging from him to turn around and face him. “I’ll take it from here,
Jack,” whispered Serena. “I’ll take it from here. You just lie back.”

With her
partner settled onto the bed, Serena swung her leg over his body and straddled
him in reverse, facing his feet rather than his face. She found his cock still
ready for her, and brought it into herself with another whimper of pleasure.
“Enjoy it, Jack,” Serena said as she began to rock against him. “Enjoy me.
Enjoy it while it lasts.”

* * *

“They can’t
have asked us to stick around here for anything good,” Ian muttered. He stood
beside Shannon in the ER waiting room, taking up one small stretch of wall away
from the patients, the victims and their various companions. The cell phone and
paper Starbuck’s cup in his hands kept him mostly distracted, but he could
still spare enough of his attention to complain.

“We did
everything we could,” shrugged his ambulance partner. Shannon didn’t look up
from her clipboard full of paperwork at him as she spoke.

She had two
years on him. They got along fine as co-workers, though never became
particularly close. Like Shannon, Ian signed on with the company straight out
of his EMT certification tests. Like Shannon, he did a bang-up job with the
company. Like Shannon, he came in with ambitions of working his way through
college to a better-paying medical career.

Unlike
Shannon, he hadn’t actually gone back to school yet. He didn’t carry the burden
of increasing student debt compounded by their crappy pay. Still, he’d been
with the company long enough to know when trouble brewed.

“How long
do we wait?” he asked. He looked around the waiting room, noting that it was as
busy as one would expect on a Monday morning. Adults waited. Children cried.
Almost every seat was filled. None of the remaining empty chairs looked
appealing, given who the immediate neighbors would be.

“Dispatch
said to wait until we were released,” Shannon muttered for the second time. “If
they need us to cut loose, they’ll let us know.”

“Just
sayin’. We could be out there doing stuff.”

“Not sure
there’s that much for us to do if they’re willing to leave us at the hospital’s
mercy.” Shannon glanced down at the game of Tetris he played one-handed on his
phone and considered checking her own, but felt that might look unprofessional.
Bad enough that Ian did it in plain view. It seemed like a silly thing to worry
about, though, given the wait they endured.

Then she
became aware of the heavyset emergency room doctor as he walked up. Shannon
thought he might be about her same age, though his tired eyes and the deep bend
to his lips made him look older than he probably was. Too many hours on duty
could do that to even a young doctor. “Are you the two who brought in George
Upton?” he grumbled.

Shannon
glanced at his nametag. “Yes, Dr. Woerner,” she said. “How’d he turn out?”

“He’s
dead,” Woerner replied.

Shannon
grimaced, but nodded. She had done this for several years now. This sort of
thing happened, especially with patients in their nineties. She had done all
she could.

It still
ruined her day. Every time.

“He hung on
all this time?” Ian asked.

“No. I’ve
been with other patients I couldn’t leave waiting,” snapped the doctor. “You’re
both perfectly healthy, so I figured you would wait. I know how to prioritize
appropriately. It’s more than I can say for either of you.”

“I’m
sorry?” Shannon blinked.

“You two want
to tell me how you turned a simple slip-and-fall transport into a clusterfuck
like this?”

“Wait,
what?” Shannon worked to control her voice. “He had the cardiac in the wagon
while I checked on him. Doctor, we know what we’re doing. I’m a nationally-certified
paramedic and—”

“Not for
long,” the doctor interrupted. “I’ve got my copy of the paperwork. You can
explain this to your bosses before you’re suspended, Ms. Abrams.”

“Suspended
for what?”

“
I
 
didn’t lose that patient, Abrams.” His
finger came up at her chest. “
You
 
did.”
With that, the doctor stormed off.

“What—what
the hell?” Ian burst when his jaw came off the floor. “Is he off his rocker or
something? We did nothing wrong!”

“Off his
rocker or suffering from having his head up his ass,” Shannon concurred.

“I mean,
did you do anything wrong?”

“No.” She
shook her head. It wasn’t her first ambulance ride. She worked to resuscitate
the patient the entire way to the hospital, going above and beyond anything
expected of her by the book. She did nothing out of bounds for her
certification level.

“Because
that guy’s gonna claim we fucked up!”

“He’s gonna
claim I fucked up,” Shannon corrected. “All you did was drive the bus.”

“Jesus.
This is really shitty,” grunted Ian. Shannon noted that his anger had suddenly
diminished into mere annoyance. “Hey, I’m gonna go hit the bathroom and then we
can get out of here, okay?”

“Sure.”
Shannon watched him leave and let out a sigh. It really would all come down on
her head alone. The whole thing was baseless, of course; the doctor had no
case. She hadn’t seen the guy here before. He was probably new. Given his
youth, she wondered if this was the first patient he’d lost. Yet she’d still
wind up having to deal with it, and her supervisor wasn’t exactly known for his
backbone.

Glumly,
Shannon waited for Ian to get back. Boredom got the better of her. She pulled
her cell phone out of the pocket on her pant leg, turned it on and looked for
messages. She found a single text from Brad. Shannon opened it up, hoping for
some sort of encouraging word from her boyfriend of over a year.

“I hope I’m
not an asshole for breaking it to you like this,” read the text, “but it’s just
not working out anymore. There’s just no spark. I think we should both move
on.”

* * *

Serena’s
voice mingled with the weak sighs of her partner as they came together yet
again. Her shapely ass ground against his hips while her hands busily worked
the outer flesh of her sex, drawing out her orgasm well beyond his. Her body
gleamed with sweat. Jack’s grew ever paler.

“Oh, I knew
you’d be a fun job, soldier boy,” the beauty declared as the last spasms of
climax subsided. She didn’t let him go, nor did she take any time to rest.
Instead, she rocked against him once more, still fucking him despite his
breathless pleas.

“Can we
stop a second?” Jack begged weakly. “Please. Gotta rest. Can’t... can’t do
more.”

“But it
feels so good, doesn’t it?” Serena smiled. She didn’t need to look at him to
know how he’d react. “You want it, don’t you?”

“Yeah.
Yes,” he admitted. “Fuck yes. I just... I can’t... I can’t...”

“I can.
Don’t worry. I’ll keep this party going until you’re all finished off, Jack.”
Her grin became malicious. “You should’ve gone to your meeting.”

“Wh...
what?”

“I said you
should’ve gone to your meeting. Maybe you could’ve confessed your crimes there.
But if I was going to let you do that, I wouldn’t be here in the first place.”

“Hhhhuh?”

“Oh, c’mon,
Jack. Big bad warrior like you. Guys like you should know trouble when they see
it.” She inhaled sharply, riding out electric sensations between her legs.
“Should’ve seen it in me.”

“No. Let
go,” he said through cracked lips and a dry throat. “Lemme go.”

“I will,
Jack. I’ll let you go. Right to your eternal reward.” The mere thought made her
shake. “Oh, it’s gonna be so good... for me. Maybe not for you. But you know
that now, right? Can you feel it?”

Jack’s eyes
fluttered open again. Now he saw the broad, black wings, and the tail, and the
reddish hue of her skin. It made her no less sensuous, and did nothing to
diminish the pleasures of being sheathed within her, but Jack’s heart beat
faster.

“Oh fuck,
baby, you’ve got at least another hour in you. I knew you’d be a stallion. Most
of the guys I fuck aren’t nearly this in shape, but you’re a fighter. You’re a
champion. All those people you murdered...mmh! They knew it, too, didn’t they?
Before you died? Unh. I’m not... usually into... challenges... but oh, fuck,
have you been worth it.”

His weak,
trembling hands reached for the nightstand.

“Aw, I took
the gun out of the drawer while you were in the shower, Jack,” Serena taunted.
“Paranoid fool. Sleeping with a gun by the bed. But oh, fuck. Such a good
cock.” Her hands came between her legs to touch his shaft as she rocked back on
it. “All the gun you need, right here.”

Jack’s fear
pushed him to try again. The nightstand was empty. He reached back behind his
head, hardly able to feel anything by touch while overwhelmed by the pleasure
of Serena’s flesh, but he had to try. His hands fumbled back behind the pillow
for the other pistol on its holster hanging below the headboard.

He was
about to come again. He was close. So close. For the first time since he’d met
Serena, he managed to deny himself. His life was at stake.

Jack
pointed the gun at her back. It shook in his trembling hand. Holding it up
seemed all he could do. The final pull of the trigger was almost more than he
could manage.

The bullet
struck her at the base of her skull. Serena immediately flew off of him and
landed face first against the dresser across from the bed. The pistol fell from
Jack’s weak hand. He tried to cough, but couldn’t muster the energy. His eyes
fluttered open once more. The danger was gone. He knew that much, at least. He
could rest now. Rest.

Serena rose
with rage burning in her eyes. Jack’s eyes snapped open again before the flames
erupted from her mouth, engulfing him and his bed. He had no energy left with
which to scream as he died, taking years of violent sins with him.

Almost as
soon as the last wisp of flame left her mouth, she regretted it. She’d acted
out of pain and anger. It was reflex. Sloppy. Stupid. The fire spread quickly,
igniting the wallpaper and the sheets. “Aw, shit,” she cursed at herself.

Serena
looked toward the door for an escape, then the window on the other side of the
room—and saw the gleaming halo and white wings of a young-looking beauty in a
simple white dress as she stepped in straight through the windowsill.

“Well, fuck
me running,” the angel scowled. “I
 
thought
 
I smelled skank in this neighborhood.”

* * *

“Please don’t
call her that.”

“No,
seriously, he’s gotta have some skank,” Ian said. He drove along with one hand
on the wheel and the other holding his burrito. “I mean if he’s ready to dump
you for her after dating you for a year and he does it over text? That means
he’s got somethin’ he doesn’t want to own up to in person. If you think there
might be another woman, then there probably is.”

“Okay, but
if there is somebody else, you don’t have to call her a skank,” mumbled his
partner. For the first time in memory, she had her phone out in the ambulance,
businly keying in commands. “I don’t even know who it might be. I don’t know
what’s going on with them. And it’s not like we had moved in together or
anything.”

“Seriously?
Shannon, she stole your man! She’s a skank!”

“Seriously,
Ian. Stop it,” said Shannon. “That’s a shitty thing to say about anyone and I
don’t need to hear it. Brad chickening out on me is one thing. It doesn’t make
any sense to be mad at her if she even exists when he’s the one who’s pulling
all this shit. She didn’t do wrong by me in any way that I know about. She
might not even know he had a steady girlfriend, or he might have lied about me
and made her think dumping me was healthy for him. So leave her out of it,
okay?

“Nobody
‘steals’ anyone,” she continued. “He’s an adult. He makes his own decisions. If
he’s not interested enough to stay with me, then I don’t want him.”

“Fine,” Ian
shrugged. “Jeez. Sorry.”

He drove on
in sullen silence. She knew he was waiting for an apology for her snapping at him.
It wasn’t forthcoming. Shannon could be firm and loud in an emergency, but she
rarely rebuked him or anyone else with the company. She was always shy at
parties. Quiet. Not withdrawn, but certainly introverted. A rebuke like that
only came out when someone struck a nerve.

She hadn’t
even let anyone know she had a boyfriend until the Christmas party last year.
Now she had lost him, and felt more annoyed than heartbroken. She realized the
heartache would come later. For the moment, her biggest problem was the guy
looking over her shoulder as she tapped at her phone. “Changin’ your
relationship status on your profile, huh?”

“No,”
answered Shannon. “I never post that kind of stuff. I’m tempted to close the
whole stupid account except for all my family out of state.”