Page 32 of Sullied Saints

Dirk scoffs. “Don’t we all.”

***

The picture from inside the warehouse has already hit the television breaking news by the time I make it back to the station. Asshole must have had a contact or headed straight for one of the news studios.

I don't stay to talk to Needler, not even meeting his eye as he looks up from where he's lying on the bed, staring idly at the ceiling. With a loud clang, I shove the case file into his food hatch, then slam it closed. "I'll be back tomorrow. You need to have something of use."

***

Dirk is picking me up from the front of my building. We're finally getting that real date. I pulled a black miniskirt from somewhere in the pile of clothes fallen to the bottom of my cupboard, and threw on a semi-see-through top with a heavy fur jacket over it all. Looking in the mirror as I brush the ponytail kink out of my hair, I have to question if Dirk will even recognise me since I don't really recognise myself. But I suppose this is what effort looks like. I put on a pair of skin-coloured stockings, then warm ankle boots, and it’s time to go.

He surprises me by meeting me on foot.

"Oh my god," he says, stepping up to me. He looks good, like always. His hair is brushed, sweeping back in natural waves, his tan jacket open. He looks considerably warmer than I feel. "Are you wearingmakeup?" he squints at my face.

I roll my eyes. "Is this not what people do for dates?"

Laughing, he takes back the hand I've snatched away. "I'm not criticizing. I'm just surprised. You look great."

I purse my lips. "Fine. Where are we going?"

Raising an eyebrow, he pulls me against him. "Dinner is about two blocks from here, but we could go back upstairs instead."

Pushing back on his chest, I smile. "You owe me aproperdate, mister. Now deliver."

"I do, don’t I." His hands are warm inside my jacket, against my waist. With a sigh, he lets me go, taking my hand instead. And just in time too, since I was pretty close to caving and taking him upstairs. Reservations be damned.

Around one corner, we walk down an entire shopping street of smashed windows. I stop, staring into the defunct shopfronts. "Jesus, is this from the riots today?"

“Yeah, that picture pretty much had the effect we thought it would.” Dirk tugs me on, but something catches my eye, drawing back around to look at the next glass shopfront.

The street is empty now, dead, and will probably stay that way until someone is brave enough to start doing business again. But for now, graffiti and spray paint mars the walls, obscuring the glass and even the posters stuck there by the rioters. And one of them, with a big red cross over it, is me, a blurry enlargement of my face, slightly turned away. Taken at a crime scene when I wasn’t paying attention, evidently.

I don’t want to care, much like the first time I saw this new take on my role in all of this. But I do.

“Don’t look at it, El.”

Dipping my gaze, I do as he says. “They’re not going to relent,” I predict.

“Not until we give them her.”

Squeezing my hand, he swings my arm. “Come on, no work talk.” And he pulls me against his side. “I’m wining and dining tonight.”

“Nice,” I poke his chest, the smile that comes to my face chasing away the lurch of seeing another poster of my face and my wrongs. “I’m almost convinced you’re actually a gentleman.”

He gives me a roguish grin. “Wait till we get home. I’ll fix that.”

Somehow, I don’t doubt it.

We make it to my bed this time, and even fully naked. As he poises over me, all hardness under soft skin in the orange light sifting through from the open door, I bite my lip, running my hands down his body. When I wriggle further back onto the bed, he follows, chasing me to the other side and then letting his weight down on me.

Mouth opening in a soft breath, I lift my hips, inviting. I expect to feel him slide inside me then, as I so desperately need. Our bodies promised that in the elevator ride up, wrapped around each other, barely patient enough to hold out until my floor.

Keeping his weight up, an inch between us, Dirk leans down and claims my mouth again, and my hand snakes around the back of his neck, lifting to deepen. I feel him position himself, gasping against his mouth as the head of him pushes my slick opening.

But he stops there, barely giving me an inch, pulling back in response to my hips lifting to try to take more. When I try again, he clearly denies me.

My eyes pop open, meeting his in their smoky intensity, but there's a smirk there too as he watches me wriggle in longing and need. He inches forward again, sliding past the initial tightness and that slight resistance, and stops. My head falls back against the pillow, neck bared as he lingers there, never giving me even half of himself. I feel my muscles squeeze in anticipation, only to be denied. "Dirk," I bite out in a gasp, my nails scraping his shoulders. "What are you…?"

---