Phoenix (6 page)

Jack stumbled into his apartment, heading for the bedroom. The door to his room was ajar, a dim light guiding him down the hall. He didn’t remember leaving the side lamp on when he left that morning. He stepped into the room, stunned to see Caroline standing before him.

Her lips twitched. “Hi.”

His wife was breathtaking in a long, flowing white nightgown. Her auburn hair fluttered to her shoulders, and her smile – that beautiful, unexpected smile – lit up the room. Her eyes raked over him. She pressed a hand to her mouth, letting out a small laugh.

“What are you doing here?” he whispered.

She stepped toward him, her arms outstretched. “I’m here for you, silly.”

Giggly and shy. Virtuous and bashful. This was his Caroline? Nothing about this situation felt right.

“But you look so different,” he said. “When I saw you a few hours ago-”

“Don’t worry about that.” She kissed him. “I’ve been waiting for you, darling.”

Her kiss was soft and gentle. A kiss he dreamed about constantly. All of her in one simple intimate romantic gesture. He wanted her to do it again but they needed to talk first. “I’m sorry. I was delayed and I-”

“You don’t need to explain.”

She sure as hell did. After the way they’d left things in the hospital? How had she even known where to find him? “How did you get in here?” he asked.

Caroline unbuttoned his shirt. “I told you not to worry. I’ve been waiting so long. I thought you’d never get back.”

She wasn’t wasting any time. Jack groaned as she kissed his neck. “Sweetheart, I don’t-”

“What’s wrong?” She caressed the hair on his chest.

Fuck, he couldn’t think straight if she kept teasing him like that. “Is this real?”

She knelt to remove his pants. “Of course it is, Monty. Why wouldn’t it be real?”

That pet name. Dammit. Her voice was making him as hard as a rock, internal conflict and all. “I don’t – you were so angry. You threw me out of your room.” He swallowed hard, thinking of the way she’d been touching that asshole’s face. “You were with another man.”

She stood up and took his hands. They were shaking. Maybe she wouldn’t call attention to it. Caroline rubbed them with her thumbs, looking into his eyes. “He means nothing to me, Jack. You are my everything. You always have been.”

“But you-”

“You talk too much sometimes.” She yanked his shirt off the rest of the way and kissed his chest.

Was she feeling angry or playful? Hell if he could tell the difference right now. Jack stroked her hair. It was soft. He could catch a faint hint of her perfume. “Baby, I can’t – what are you doing to me?”

“I’m trying to seduce you. If it isn’t working I can try something else.”

His eyes drifted to the bulge in his boxers. “It’s working.”

Caroline laughed. “I can tell.” She leaned into his hand as he cupped her cheek. “Make love to me.”

She’d never used that kind of language before. Caroline hated that turn of phrase; she found it cheesy and overused. That it tried to say something that couldn’t be expressed in words. It was much easier for her to talk dirty than to use that faux romantic shit. She’d curse like a sailor before she’d start quoting Danielle Steel novels. Jack closed his eyes, forcing a smile.

“Of course,” he said.

She kissed him again. “Be gentle.”

He opened his eyes. He’d do whatever she wanted. Especially tonight. “Always.”

Caroline led him toward the bed. “I need some help getting this off,” she said, indicating her nightgown.

That much he could manage. Jack pulled it off in a heartbeat and she gave him a tremulous smile, her brown eyes brimming with tears.

“I’ve missed you, darling,” she whispered. “So much.”

He swallowed the lump rising in his throat. “I’ve missed you too.” He stepped back to look at her. Full, round breasts, a healthy, curvy figure. Beautiful auburn hair framing a radiant face. Absolute perfection. “You are gorgeous,” he whispered.

Caroline slid onto the bed, resting her head on one of the pillows and spreading her legs wide. Jack drank in the view. “Jesus, woman. Give a man time to orient himself.”

She giggled. “Come here.”

He shrugged off his remaining clothes and knelt on the bed in front of her. He wanted to kiss her, touch her, do any number of things to her. But he hesitated for an unknown reason.

Caroline gave him a coy smile. “What are you waiting for?”

This was real. It had to be real. “I don’t – I’ve missed you,” he said hoarsely.

She pulled him on top of her. “I’ve missed you too. So much.”

She kept saying that. Did she mean it? Something in her voice was off. Maybe she needed proof of how he felt. He could manage that much. Jack started to kiss her breasts, moving down her body, but she tugged on his hair.

“No,” she said. “I’ve waited so long. Please don’t make me wait any more.”

He always took care of her first. Always. She knew that. And on tonight of all nights, he couldn’t skip out on it. “But-”

“I don’t need that. I need you.”

Ugh, she always got him with that pleading tone. Just a shade above begging yet not quite a demand. Jack sat on his haunches, gazing down at her. She lay there waiting for him. Waiting for him to take what he wanted, to give her what she needed. He’d gone too fucking long without her. How the hell had he gotten so lucky?

Caroline pulled him on top of her again. “Please,” she said. “I need you inside me.”

He slid a finger inside her. “You’re so wet.”

She closed her eyes. “All for you. I’ve had to wait so long. Please, Jack. Please.”

He couldn’t turn her down when she talked to him like that. Jack entered her and she sighed. She was so slick that he slid out a couple of times before finding a rhythm. He gasped, surprised by how tight she was. How wanting.

“I’m sorry,” he panted. “I-”

Caroline gave him a loving smile, tousling his hair. “It’s okay.”

He wasn’t acting nearly as capably as he should. She deserved better than a shitty lay. “I just – I’ve dreamt of this and now you’re here and-” She clenched her muscles around his cock and he groaned. “And you’re doing that,” he said. “Fucking hell.”

He moved inside her again, slowly, trying to make it last. Listening to her sighs, her whimpers, her words of love. He wanted to show her how much he’d missed her. He wanted it to be meaningful. Magical. And he never wanted it to fucking end.

Caroline yanked his head up. “Stop with the sweet bullshit. Fuck me,” she said. “Hard.”

A shocking change in behavior. Unexpected under the circumstances. “What?” he asked.

“You heard me. Fuck me like I deserve it. You can do it. You want to.”

Something wasn’t right. She didn’t switch moods without a good reason. But he didn’t pursue it further. This was her night. Her reunion, her desire, her request. Whatever she wanted she would get, and he wouldn’t argue about it. Jack did as she said, thrusting inside her as hard as he could.

“Harder,” she choked.

He did it again, more than once, and she screamed. “Like that?” he asked.

“More,” she whimpered. “Please.”

This was a mistake. He told himself to stop. But she was asking him to do it. He needed to respect her wishes. He owed her that much. “I don’t want to hurt you,” he said. He was afraid he already had.

Caroline clawed at his back, fire in her eyes. “Fuck me,” she said. “Fuck me until I can’t take it anymore, until I’m begging you to stop. Hurt me.”

“But-”

“Do it.”

Jack grasped her hair in his hands. “Fine,” he said. “You get what you want, baby. No going back.”

“Never,” she gasped, as he started to move inside her again.

He pounded into her over and over again. Her screams drove his passion higher. He looked down and saw the tears in her eyes. Tears of pain, not of longing. Not of desire. Pure, anguished pain. But she didn’t tell him to slow down. Didn’t say no. Didn’t tell him to stop. And he didn’t, thrusting in and out of her until he exploded in a rush. It took a moment for her to withdraw her hands from his hair. For her breathing to slow down. Jack pressed his nose against her cheek before wiping the sweat off her face and kissing her softly. He withdrew from her and came to the realization that she was no longer moving.

“Caroline?” he whispered. No response. He said her name again. He shook her shoulder gently. “Sweetheart, are you all right? Baby, wake up!”

He turned her face to the side. It was windswept, battered, bruised. He stroked her cheek, willing her awake, but there was still no response. He momentarily closed his eyes, flashing back to a wintry night that he’d never been able to forget.

“Stay with me, Caroline! We can do this.”

Jack yelled her name, trying to rouse her. But nothing worked. He looked down and realized she was gone. He scanned the room, confused, thinking she had slipped out of the bed without him noticing. And he knew.

He flipped the pillow over, searching through the sheets. “Caroline, I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I never meant to leave you. Please, baby. Come back.”

He collapsed onto the mattress with a strangled noise that didn’t sound human, clinging to the bedcovers in the hope that she would materialize in his arms, knowing deep in his heart that the moment would never come to pass.

*              *              *              *              *

Jack woke up in a tangle of blankets and sheets, calling out her name. He lifted himself up. His boxers were sticky and wet, plastered to his thighs. His eyes drifted downward and he saw his spare pillow, now sullied by his dream.

You just fucked a goddamn pillow, you asshole. Happy now?

This wasn’t a new occurrence. It had happened before. Never this intense, never with this ending, but he’d had the same dream many times. Often it played on repeat. Same dialogue, same scenario. Caroline with the virginal white floor length gown, even though Jack couldn’t remember her ever owning one. A porcelain doll gazing at him with those giant doe eyes – shy, demure, completely innocent. And completely not herself.

Every time he had the dream he knew she truly and honestly wanted him, in all her glowing perfection. That pretty little picture was shattered. He had never harmed her before. The dream always ended tenderly, lovingly. With them laughing in the sheets or cuddling in the chair in the corner of the bedroom. The kind of easy marital behavior they took for granted before their safety slipped away.

Sometimes he’d wake up and swear he could smell her skin, feel her warmth, taste her lips. But this time, it had been so sweet, so meaningful, before turning violent and angry. The way she looked at him wasn’t loving or passionate. It was the way a woman looked at a man who had betrayed her.

Jack tossed the wet pillow off the bed and swept his feet onto the floor, glancing at the empty bottle of scotch on the nightstand.
Fuck
. He’d polished off the entire thing, starting from the moment he’d picked it up at the commissary. Hadn’t cared if any of his enlisted men had seen him drinking straight from the bottle as he walked across the base. Hadn’t given a shit if Haddad caught him, either. No wonder his head was pounding. He must have passed out on the bed because he didn’t remember anything after unlocking his apartment door. Short term memory loss. Fucking great. He threw his boxers in the laundry, stepping down the hall to the bathroom to clean himself up.

That dream was a rough one. Rougher than the others. He was disgusted with himself. Any sensible, loving man would have stopped but he kept going, fueled by her taunts. Wanting to cause her injury. It didn’t matter that it was in his head. It felt so fucking
real
.

Jack leaned over the vanity, avoiding his naked reflection in the mirror. He closed his eyes and tried to picture Caroline as he’d seen her at the beginning of the dream. Beautiful. Uninjured. Happy. But instead he saw an angry woman glaring at him from a hospital bed.

It had been hard for him to keep eye contact with her, though he was ashamed to admit it. She’d been beaten severely. Repeatedly. That much was obvious. And her eyes were no longer warm and kind, but harsh. Cold. Everything about her was as sharp as a fucking razor blade. Her glorious reddish brown locks had been replaced by a dull shade of blond and she had lost at least forty pounds.

The thought of what she must have undergone during her imprisonment had always made him physically ill but tonight, when he’d seen her…

He tried to stop his mind from going into overdrive, tried not to hear the sound of breaking bones, of her screaming and crying and pleading for mercy, tried not to imagine them holding her down while she struggled…

Jack lurched over to the toilet and retched until there was nothing left in his stomach. He pressed his knuckles to the side of his head to make it stop, but it didn’t work. He rocked back and forth on the tile, sweat pouring down his face as he struggled to regain his bearings.

What the fuck had they done to her? He fisted his hair, sitting back against the bathtub, trying to focus on the auburn haired woman in his dream instead of the wounded wife he’d left in the infirmary. It took a while for the attack to stop. For the images to stop flashing through his mind. He wanted to crawl into the tub and turn on the faucet and forget about it all. To end it forever. Wouldn’t be the first time such a thought had come to mind. But instead he rose to his feet and returned to the sink, splashing his face with water, meticulously cleaning his body with a washcloth. Trying to think about anything other than the dream. About her.