Life Over Love (10 page)

She walked down the little walk
way and this time hugging her chest, she stood directly in front of Officer Sexy pants. “OK officerrrr--?” She didn’t feel right calling him by the name she’d chosen and she didn’t remember if he’d told her his name. “Danner ma’am, Ryker Ian Danner, it’s nice to see you again, by the way.”

Oh you really are officer
yummy pants aren’t you? She almost forgot about the thank you speech had planned until Chelsea knocked on the window. She waved at him and held up a picture of the smiley face police man she’d drawn for him.

Ryker laughed at the
little beauty that was a small replica of the sexy lady standing outside with him, freezing her fanny off. He snuffed out the cigarette with his boot and walked to the door.

Chelsea opened the door a tiny crack
, just enough to slip the picture out and into his hand. “Thank you princess” He leaned in to peek at the sweet girl. Surprising them both she pecked his cheek and slammed the door in his face!

Brianna was doubled over from laughing so hard, if he’d moved any slower
Chelsea would’ve slammed his nose in the door. He’d been quick enough to avoid that, but he’d slipped and fallen, hard, on his butt.

It was difficult to remain cocky when he’d literally fallen head over feet for a five year old femme fatale. He got to his feet with as much dignity as he could muster, resisting the urge to dust off his backside.

By the time Brianna was almost finished laughing, Ryker was nearly back inside the squad car, he hadn’t realized she was holding something out to him until he looked up at her. “ You forgot something” She was waving the smiley face drawing in front of  his line of vision and struggling to keep a straight face.

He snatched his present back from her and buckled up.
“Listen I’m sorry, Officer Danner, but sometimes that kid just cracks me up. I can’t help it.” He lifted his eyebrows questioningly, rested his arms on the top of the steering wheel, and smiled back at Brianna.

“She is a cute little thing,
looks just like her momma. By the way what’s your name? If you don’t mind my asking.” Wow she thought, he really has that whole James Dean meets Rhett Butler thing down pat. “Brianna Leah Garcia, and I flagged you down because I wanted to thank you for bringing the kids home today, I was too wigged out to say so earlier, so yeah um, sorry about that too by the way.”

He looked at her until she sta
rted blushing “I’m sorry that I scared you like that. You seemed to pull yourself together though, even though you were pretty upset.”  She bristled at the comment defensively and straightened up. “I’m fine I just didn’t appreciate him seeing fit to find out where we live, I wanted to tell him when I felt like telling him, and as soon as he gets out, I’ll be sure to inform
him               
of that too.”

Ryker didn’t like the determined glint in her eye as she’d said that and he told her as much. “Brianna as a police officer I feel
it’s my responsibility to warn you against that. I’ve seen what could happen---” She cut him off midsentence. “Well I appreciate your concern officer, but I’m not afraid of him anymore, and I’m not going to let him think that he has any control over my life, ever again!”

He didn’t make a habit
of arguing with women, or anyone for that matter, but he found it near impossible to avoid arguing with this one, at the moment. She didn’t strike him as one who’d cower or run from a fight, which is why he was so concerned, and there was no mistaking the fear she’d displayed earlier that morning.

He would bet his bottom dollar that she had lived through and witnessed plenty to be afraid of at the hands of that piece of crap.  Which only
lent weight to his argument, and he wasn’t leaving her until he felt sure that she wasn’t going to go off half- cocked when her ex got out, the guy would probably make this his first stop.

Ryker took the keys out of the ignition and stepped slowly out of the car, her
filching and stepping back to put space between them didn’t go unnoticed either.        Brianna was determined not to be intimidated by him, someone she didn’t even know in the first place. Besides she’d never be free if she didn’t grow a backbone.  She squared her shoulders wishing she were warmer so that she could stop shivering. “Well Officer I’ve said thanks for all your help and everything, if that’s all, now you can be on your way”.

He leaned forward as deliberately and slow as he could so as not to startle her, he could barely contain his aggravation, and he wanted to be sure she took what
he was about to tell her seriously . “No ma’am that’s not all, that man I arrested today, your ex-husband, yeah I booked him on charges which consisted of driving with a suspended silence, operating a vehicle without proper registration, and a charge of carrying a loaded gun without a permit, seeing as how he has been convicted of domestic battery, bumped that last one up to a felony.”

Brianna tilted her head and asked incredulously “So what are you saying, what
, that he had a
gun
?” Ryker nodded his head in the affirmative, he began lecturing again, and was crushing out his cigarette when he heard the thump that meant she had fainted, not even four feet away. He cursed under his breath and gently lifted her off the cold ground. 

When Ryker carried her inside the apartment, Chelsea stood unmoving in the hallway, and Brody was asleep on the living room floor. “Did you hurt my momma
, Mr. Officer Danner?” Chelsea was sucking her two first fingers like she’d done when she was a baby, and stood still, watching Ryker holding Brianna in the living room. “No baby, your momma just got too cold outside and fainted, he looked around for a place to lay her, but aside from the TV on the coffee table there was no other furniture anywhere as far as he could tell.

Chelsea believed him and showed him to Brianna’s room. Ryker was glad to see that she had a comfortable place to rest, and he slowly lowered her onto the bed. He regretted having to let her go just as he regretted
having to put her in such a state in the first place.

He felt like a clumsy brute amongst all her dainty things. In the bathroom
he found a purple washcloth ran cool water over it and hustled back to her room, almost knocking the pictures of the wall in the hallway, in his hurry to get back to her.

Brianna murmured at first when she was coming to, but was too disoriented. Then seeing him in her bedroom, had freaked her out at first. She jumped up and in her haste to get away from him she fell off the side of the bed.

She scurried backwards li
ke a crab in the sand until backed into the corner of the wall, and covered her face with her hands. She broke down into heaving sobs because she was embarrassed by the way she’d reacted to him, and could not stop crying.

Chelsea stood in the door way with her fingers still in her mouth, wide eyed looking from one to the other
, she started to cry as well and before he could make heads or tails out of the thing, he had two hysterical females to tend to.

He went to Chelsea
, picking her up he sang what he could remember from his boyhood infatuation with the Little Mermaid, He tucked her in and assured her that he was going to take good care of her momma.

After do
uble checking that she was really asleep, he went to check on Brianna, and said a silent prayer that he’d given her plenty of time to recover, so that he could make his exit, and not upset her any further.

He knocked softly on the wall
before entering. When he got back in the room he wasn’t surprised to see that she was still in the corner, sound asleep. He worried that she might have hit her head too hard when she backed up into the wall.

Ryker
shook her shoulder, he felt awful having been the one to cause those tear stained cheeks, he was half way tempted to cover her with a blanket and go on home, but he wanted to see her pretty eyes and apologize before he left.

Brianna stirred under his gentle nudging, and she groaned. He snatched back his hand as if he’d been burned. “
Don’t you have a job to be at, officer sexy pants? Geez mon?  He thought, she did a pretty good imitation of the crab from the Little Mermaid.  He sat back against the wall laughing and explained that he’d been on his way home when she’d called him over. There was no way to pretend that he didn’t notice her cleavage beneath the thin t shirt.

He arched his brow asking “officer sexy p
ants?” She didn’t want to eg him on so she sat up. “Well you think, you are!”  He put his arm around her and pulled her close, after what they’d been through that night, he felt as if he’d known her for years.

Ryker scooted
her up to sit on his lap. He kissed her like he’d never kissed any other woman before, feeling as if once he started he never wanted to let her go. Her hands were on his shoulders, sliding up to his neck and his were in her hair. She was so clear headed all of a sudden, where just seconds before she’d been groggy.

She had the opposite effect on him and he couldn’t complete a full thought. She bit his lower
lip in her hurry to taste more, but she still took time learning about him, his hair was soft between her fingers, and his jaw had an exciting way of flexing when he kissed his ear and tasted his neck.

Her hands had found their way into his shirt
. She felt greedy, wanting to know him, touch him, taste him, and see more of him. Ryker was busy learning more about her too, and seeing her reaction to his touch had a powerful effect on his mind, the tables were instantly turned, and he knew by the quickness of her breath and the heaviness of her eyes, that she was going on pure instinct. She felt soft beneath his calloused hands, her breath on his neck and ear was enough drive him over the edge. His brain was no longer dull and slow moving, but sharp and focused.

Taking advantage of his moment of clarity he lifted her up of the floor and placed her on the bed.
He kissed her until he was afraid he really wouldn’t be able to stop short of devouring her. He kissed her mouth, cheeks, ears, and her neck. They were both eager to learn more of the other, tasting, touching, smelling. Ryker was interested in pleasing her, he paid close attention to every response as he sought to know more. He heard her sounds and was careful to remember what made her sigh.

He kissed her
flesh through the soft t shirt material feeling as though if he went any further we would not be able to ever leave the room again, he laid his head on her stomach.

A few minutes passed and her skin burned under his hands where they had
rested on her waist.  The sound of his ragged breathing in her ear and the feel of the blood pulsing in her body, as they touched were all she was aware of.

He rose above her on the bed tilted her chin with one hand to make her look at him, and held himself up above her with the other. He almost forgot his resolve when she ran her hand through her hair and wrapped her legs around his waist, but he was determined in his effort
to slow it down before things went any further.

Her eyes were darker than before and he had a very hard time remembering what he’d been trying to say. He closed his eyes
tight and shook his head before trying to go on “Brianna I want to see you again’’.  Her hand was still tangled in her hair, but she reached up to shush him. Ryker growled an oath, kissed her palm, and rubbed his cheek on her hand, smelling her long soft hair that was still entangled in her fingers.   

She arched her back in response,
and he very nearly lost control then. He was like a blind man who’d suddenly been given the gift of sight, he wanted to see more and remember everything.

Frustrated by the need to finish what they had started and the conflicting need to do right by
her, he pounded his fist on the bed in an attempt to break the spell.  Defensively she recoiled, and involuntarily jerked away from him.

He was sorry immediately, he gathered her close to his chest, and murmured soothingly into her hair. She understood that she had reacted
normally, the same as anyone else who had been through what she had.

Understanding didn’t make her feel like any less of a freak
though, and she wanted to feel like a normal, desirable woman, if only for a moment. She felt so overwhelmed by her inadequacies that she couldn’t help, but to cry into his chest.

He laid with her for a while giving her the time she needed to cry it out, and him
self the time to catch his breath. He sat her up and brought her with him. “Brianna I’m sorry I almost lost it for a minute, I’m usually more in control of myself than this. I uh don’t know what’s gotten into me. No that’s not true, I do know what’s gotten into me, you have, it’s you.”

H
e felt like a babbling idiot. He wanted to look into her eyes and tell her these things. So when he asked her to look at him, and she’d complied he wondered what he had gotten himself into with this one, and marveled that he had been able to stop at all.

To Ryker she was so alluring, she stirred in
him a fierce need to experience everything about her, and it wasn’t just the physical stuff either. From the first day he’d seen her at the store, he’d been curious about her, but after the short time just being with her, seeing her play with her kids, he’d been smitten.