Page 51 of Misadventures in Blue
But survive it I must, and survive it I do for the next week. I bury my pain in work, coming in early and staying up late in an attempt to exhaust my body and my mind. In an attempt to keep the sadness at bay and make myself too tired to miss Jace at night. It doesn’t work on either count, so I only succeed in making myself tired and miserable, which I feel like I deserve.
I resist the urge to call.
I resist the urge to visit, even after I hear he’s been released from the hospital.
I resist the urge to throw myself at his feet and beg, beg, beg his forgiveness.
It’s for his own good.
It’s unfair that I have to be the strong one right now—the wise one—when all I want to do is curl up in his lap and have him play with my hair. When all I want to do is marry him and have lots of gray-eyed babies and spend the rest of our lives making each other breakfast and sharing the job we love.
Because, yes, I see that now. I thought I hated that he was a cop as well. I thought I could never live with it, but now that we’re apart…I miss it. I miss having someone to talk over a case with, someone who understands the uniquely exhausting and exhilarating parts of the job. I miss having someone to share it with.
All this tired unhappiness makes me jittery and anxious on the evening of the commendation ceremony. I pull on my dress uniform and pin on my brass with trembling fingers, and I don’t bother to apply lipstick because I know I’ll make a mess of it. And all because the man I love and had to push away will be there too.
Get it together, Cat.
But I can’t. My stomach is hollowed out and my pulse is pounding when I get to the central station and walk inside. It’s like every beat of my heart is saying Jace, Jace, Jace.
I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry.
I detest these ceremonies anyway. They’re anemic and bureaucratic and pointless. I already have several commendations on my wall. I’ve already gone to this same small reception room six times in my career and shaken the chief’s hand and received a signed piece of paper I’ll never look at again.
And now I’ll have to go and do all this for the case that both brought me to Jace and also nearly got him killed?
It’s very tempting to take this heavy dress hat off and go back to my car. Tempting just to walk away from it all—the ceremony and the memories and the inevitable agony I’ll feel when I finally lay eyes on the man I love.
The man I hurt.
But it’s not in my nature to shirk my duties, even if I think the duty pointless, so I keep the hat on and enter the reception hall, not surprised to see that it’s only half full, and that half is all Jace’s family.
His mom looks over her shoulder at me as I walk in, and a flush rises to my cheeks, wondering if she hates me now that I’ve hurt Jace. Wondering if she now sees me as the predator I initially feared she would.
Her face opens in a smile, and she gives me a small wave, her husband doing the same, and I manage a nod back as my heart squeezes. Even still, I want his family to like me. How foolish is that?
There is, of course, nobody here for me. It’s much too trivial to ask my parents to come over from France, and I don’t have anyone else. No siblings. No close friends.
A bolt of loneliness hits me so hard that I can barely keep my back straight…and that’s before I see him standing in front of me. Because when I see him, I think I might drop to my knees.
He’s shaved for the ceremony, exposing fully that bladed jaw and that solemn, sensual mouth, but his hair is longer than he normally keeps it, dark and just a little messy, practically begging for my fingers to sift through it. The long-sleeved dress shirt stretches across his broad shoulders, testing the seams, and then the fitted fabric hugs the lean lines of his torso and waist. The tailored pants fit him almost indecently well, showing off narrow hips and long, powerful thighs, and even with his wounded arm up in a sling, he’s still all potent, dominant male.
And when his fierce gray eyes lock on me, I know exactly whom he wants to dominate.
My body answers immediately, obedient to his silent command, and my nipples harden against the silk of my bra. I hope the thick fabric of the uniform is enough to conceal my response, but I know there’s no hope for the blush on my cheekbones or the dilation of my pupils. He owns even the automatic responses of my body. He owns everything. So much so that even in front of this small crowd, I want to drag him off by his uniform tie and mount him in the first empty room we find.
No, Cat.
For his own good, remember?
And anyway, his desire is fueled by his palpable anger with me. I can feel it radiating off him, seething, lustful hurt, and God help me, it makes me want him more than ever. I want all of that possessive, revengeful man over me and underneath
me. Claiming me. Destroying all my fears that he’ll one day want a younger woman, obliterating my fear for his safety with the primal, urgent proof of his life.
I want to surrender the responsibility of doing the right thing. I want him to be the one to make all the hard choices now, and I want him to choose me.
I want to tell him I love him and that I’m sorry.
It hurts to tear my eyes from his, but I manage, approaching my chair and sitting without acknowledging him, which he scowls at. He also takes his seat, his long legs making it so our thighs brush briefly as he sits, and I can feel the shudder run through him as we touch. See his entire body quiver in ferocious restraint as the chief begins talking to the crowd.
