Page 79 of Savagely Yours
Sometimes, during my quiet moments, I imagined someone trying to hurt or take her from me, merely to come up with creative ways to deal with the transgression. If I managed not to kill anyone in the next month, I would accept that there was nothing unusual about wanting to turn someone’s throat into a gourd if they chose to fuck with my woman.
“So that means you need to be careful,” Cerner said.
We were standing just outside Woodhaven, but I had no recollection of at what point we’d finished our “investigation” of the General’s unit. I didn’t even remember the guy’s name, and as far as I was concerned, he’d had it coming. Whatever he’d done to cause that look of relief on the young woman’s face confirmed it.
“What I mean is, be careful because someone is poisoning higher-ups,” Cerner added. “Actually, I sent some uniforms to question the workers in the kitchen. You know one of the head cooks there pretty well, right? What do you think? Would she do something like this?”
I didn’t know in what world he believed I would turn on Mae to satisfy his wishes. Mae was too noble to put shit in his food, which was the real tragedy.
“It would be an idiotic move,” I pointed out. “Poison food, and the first place anyone checks is the source. I don’t think it’s any of the cooks.”
“A server, then? Collins had a mistress arrangement with one of the servers. The girl who was with him.”
I frowned. “Who’s Collins?”
Cerner gestured to the building. “Our fallen comrade, Harding.”
I didn’t know a Collins.
I only knew Larke Tapley.
And, right then, I wanted to spread her like butter.
“Didn’t you say the young woman’s father’s a uniformed guy?” I asked. “You trusted him enough to appoint him to that position.”
“That’s true. However, if Collins was up to anything shady, I could see a father wanting to get revenge for his little girl.”
“But if Collins was up to something shady, why should we care about his death? I mean, you just referred to the server as ‘little girl.’ She’s probably in her early twenties. How old was Collins? Sixty-ish?”
“About.”
“Did she look like she was happy with him?”
“It’s hard to tell.”
“Not for me. Now, here’s my suggestion: drop the bullshit investigation. You keep talking about how you want Totten to be the ‘New World Order.’ For that, you’re going to need a semblance of civility. Hell, you told me to try to be gentle with Tapley. The kind of behavior I’m picking up on from our ‘fallen comrade’ doesn’t jive with the kind of advice you’ve been giving out.”
“And how’s that working out?” he prodded. “You and the attorney, I mean.”
“Poorly. It’s hard not to be…aggressive with her. I want to teach her a lesson.”
A hard lesson.
A deep lesson.
I didn’t know how long it had been since she’d last had sex, but she’d gone on exactly zero dates since the day we met. Given the level of surveillance I was required to keep on her, I would have known if she was sneaking off to some asshole’s place. And I probably would have shown up at the asshole’s place before I could talk myself out of it.
With that in mind, I could have been more gentle. Yet, even the way she’d gingerly walked next to me back to Juniper had turned me on. When I offered to carry her, she refused, claiming she wasn’t bothered by the soreness. That I’d found myself back inside her roughly an hour later meant it was possible she was telling the truth.
God, I wanted to be inside her again.
Right then.
Right now.
I also needed to talk to Dr. Lin. The combination of an incredible woman and phenomenal sex would soon equal “quickly pregnant.” Larke could one hundred percent trust me without latex, except where a kid was concerned. Once I was in, as warm and snug as she was, it took a medieval prayer to pull out.
“Well, you see what happened to Collins,” Cerner said. “Be careful of your approach.”
