Page 67 of Cut Me Down

“You didn’t, I just…” I stop myself, suddenly feeling my throat constrict. Do I want to admit that I missed him laying next to me?

“Just what?” He squints his eyes, confused.

“You weren’t next to me…” I say quietly. Feeling the need to pause as the embarrassment creeps in. “So, I just…wanted to make sure you were okay.” He smiles at me and licks his bottom lip ever so slightly. His eyes brighten, and droop lightly into a fond expression.

“Yeah, I'm okay. Just catching up on some work from today.” Did he not finish earlier because he was worried about me again? Have I become such an interruption in his life that he can’t focus while he’s out?

“I love how you call it ‘work’. It sounds so normal.” I laugh, trying to conceal my feelings.

“I'm anything but normal, baby girl.” He smirks at me, and I can’t help the smile that spreads across my face.

“I’ve noticed.” I bite my lip, and try to refrain from bothering him any longer. He obviously needs to get that done, and I can’t mess him up anymore that I already could have. “Well, um, I'll let you get back to it.” I start to turn back.

“Don’t go.” The words slip from his lips so effortlessly. Like he was already planning on saying them. I look back at him and meet the pleading look in his gaze. “ Come here. Let me show you what I'm doing.” I stare at him for a moment awe. He wants to show me what he’s doing for ‘work’? What if he messes something up because I'm staring?

“I don’t want to be a distraction.” I gently shake my head.

“You’re not a distraction. I don’t care what the kid on the podcast thinks.” His face turns stern, as if the online speculation angered him.

“Heard that did you?” I chuckle.

“It’s about time they confirmed it’s not a one man operation. You'd think they’d be smarter than that.” I giggle as he grins. “You're not a distraction, little wolf.”

“So you don’t think of me when you're working?”

“Of course I do. I always think of you.” I bite my lips between my teeth to try and suppress the heat flooding my face.

“Isn’t that dangerous? It kind of sounds like I'm a distraction. I can’t be more important than your work Damien.”

“Why not?” He asks seriously.

“Because you save lives and get rid of criminals. I can’t get in the way of that, and what happens…” I pause again, unsure of his reaction. “What happens if you get hurt or you get caught because you’re not focused?” His face softens, and he takes a breath in.

“You don’t get in the way, but you're damn right you’re always on my mind. You are the most important thing to me, but that doesn’t mean I can’t do my job at the same time.” I gently shake my head at his stubbornness as he smiles at me. “You don’t have to worry about me getting hurt or caught. I told you that nothing was going to keep me from you and I meant it.” His lips curl at the end in a slight, mischievous grin, and he gently pats on the couch next to him. “Come here.” I walk over and sit down next to him on the couch. Pulling my blanket tighter against my naked body. “Do you know what geographical profiling is?”

“I’ve seen it on Criminal Minds.” We laugh.

“It’s pretty much the same thing, but it’s not the same offenders. So right now we have a large map of the city put up on the wall, and we use different markers to keep track of the crime. Once we finish some upgrades, it’ll be computerized, and save us a lot of time, but for now we do it this way.” He picks up a stack of papers. “Every week, I go through these, sort them out, and then place their markers on the map. Different crimes have different colors, and the ones we respond to have different pins then the ones we don’t.”

“The ones you don’t?” I say, surprised that there’s something this man can’t do, and he shrugs.

“Yeah, we can’t get to everything that’s called in. I wish we could, but we’re just not at the place to do that.”

“So, how do you decide?”

“Well, that’s where the map comes in. By keeping track, we can see if there’s patterns, or an abundance of crime in a certain location. If that’s the case, I have one my patrols stake that area instead.” I pick up one of the pieces of paper and study it. The layout and font look familiar, and the tone of the text on the page is extremely professional.

“Is this a copy of a dispatch report?”

“Yeah.” He exclaims proudly, paired with a slight jerk of his head.

“So you have access to police dispatch?”

“Sure do. We’ve been able to get into their whole database for a while now. That’s how we can respond so quickly and avoid police.” I widen my eyes. So, that explains how he knows so much. The thought of how much time and effort it must have taken to be able to hack into something as secure as that is impressive. I obviously knew that he could hack into cameras and other things such as the hospital database, but this just proves that his organization is on a whole other level.

“That’s pretty cool. I'll be sure not to tell Tony.” I joke.

“Yeah, please don’t.” We laugh and he starts to put all of the papers up, but I grab a lone sheet off the end of the table. Wondering why this one is pushed aside.

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