Page 63 of Playing for Keeps (Checkmate 4)

I walkwithhim across the living room and around the island counter. Our hands dangle close, our steps perfectly timed. It’s all fun and games to cuff myself to the man, but if I go too fast and pull him off balance, I won’t ever forgive myself.

“Do you want me to get the wheelchair?”

“No.” Grunting to clear his throat, he stands taller, prouder, and keeps moving forward. “No chair. I got it.”

“Okay.” I don’t move too fast, but I angle us toward the fridge, take out the ingredients we’ll need, then shuffle toward the pantry. “I’m gonna bake you some brownies. The special kind, and you’ll enjoy them.”

“The speci– Dee! Pot brownies? No!”

“Yes. It’ll make your pains go away. No one’s gonna arrest you for having a laced brownie, Riley. You’re allowed to not be a perfect boy scout once in your life, and I swear, it’s not going to turn you into a meth head user. So this is what we’re doing. For the first time in…” I pause. “I don’t even know.Years. I’m gonna get stoned, we’re going to do it together, then you’ll sleep like a baby for the first time in weeks. We’ll both sleep for the first time in weeks. Tomorrow, we find another way to cope. I know a million things we could try.”

He moves with me as I take out a mixing bowl and toss the last of the laced butter into the microwave – he’s had it in his fridge this whole time and had no clue.

“Things like what?”

“Well… things like massage, oils, physical therapy, mirror therapy. We could play Bananagrams as a distraction, or take a bath and soak it.”

“I don’t think I’m allowed to soak it in a bath yet.”

I smile, because he’s not fighting me anymore. He’s actively participating, and he hasn’t knocked the pot-butter off the counter yet. “So we could wrap it up tight.” Stretching my arm as far as it can go, I collect a large wooden spoon from the drawer and come back to where his strong body leans against the counter. “Your skin and the incision will stay dry, but you’d still get to feel it float in hot water. I could help you massage it – in fact, I read that massaging the end of your leg will help remind your brain where it ends. Right now, your brain hasn’t figured out your leg is gone, so it’s sending signals to a foot that ain’t there, but if you massage the end every day, soon, your brain will figure it out. The pain should get easier.”

“Dee, we’re talking about pain in a limb that literally doesn’t exist. Look.” He drops his eyes and studies his bare foot. “I’m wiggling my toes – the toes thataren’tthere. My brain is telling them to wiggle, so they are. But they don’t fucking exist! I bet the remedy doesn’t exist, either.”

“Do you wonder if maybe your amputated leg is wiggling in a random lab right now?”

“Andi!”

Laughing, I add flour to my bowl, then cocoa powder and eggs. “If you can’t have a sense of humor about it, then what’s the point? You don’t want to be unhappy for the rest of your life, do you?” I glance up and meet his eyes. “We’ve already established you’re not a cripple. You’re young, I can still count your abs, and when you’re fully healed up, I bet you can dive again, so this massive thing that you think is the end of the world is merely a shitty weekend, no?”

“A shitty weekend?” His eyes grow. “A shitty weekend? Have you lost your damn mind? A shitty weekend is losing your cell in the public bathrooms while in a club. A shitty weekend is getting ordered to clean the tanks at the station because Alex and Oz are besties and run the station like a dictatorship. Unless you’re in their club, you’re shit outta luck. A shitty weekend is being able to run the fucking marathon I wanted to run, and missing my personal best time by twenty minutes. Losing my leg is a fucking life sentence.”

“No.” Patting the flour from my hands and clanging the handcuffs, I step into his space and stand on the very tips of my toes. “Dementia is a life sentence. Losing your mom to dementia is a life sentence. You’re already serving that one; don’t go searching for something else to kick you down. Here.” I scoop up far too much raw batter with my finger and slide it into his mouth. “Get a head start. Let go of the pain. Love me back.” I chase his lips with my own and slide my tongue over his until I get a taste of the batter. “Delicious.”

Winking, I step down and continue mixing. “Can you turn the oven on? I’m ready to pour and eat my feelings.” Bending low and folding my arm back to front, I search for the brownie tray in the storage space beneath the island while Riley shakily moves the three feet expanse and flicks on the oven. “Tastes good, right?”

“Mm.” He doesn’twantto be impressed, but these brownies are the shit. Add a littleextraand a woman ready to pig out with you, and a man has to be in a good space in his life – with or without both his legs. “This is super fucking illegal, Dee.”

I roll my eyes. “You gonna tell the cops? Because I’m not.”

“I am the cops!”

He leans into me with gritted teeth and sparkling eyes that speak of fury, but I still push my lips against his, laugh against his mouth, and pat his chest when he can’t resist. “Word on the street is you quit. You can’t threaten me any more than I can threaten you. In fact, I should citizen’s arrest your ass for squatting in the house I started squatting in. I was here first, and you’re up in my space without my permission.”

“Shut up. Give me this.” He slides the tray from beneath my bowl the very second I finish pouring and tosses it into the oven. “I’m not getting stoned with you, Dee. You can do it yourself out here. I’m going to get bolt cutters from the garage, I’m going to cut us apart, then I’m going to bed. Alone.”

I pull him around slowly and press his back against the island counter. A month or two ago, I’d have already crash tackled him, climbed up until I found a comfortable spot, then I would have let him feast in the most delectable way. But that’s not the way things are now. Instead, I pull him around until he’s steady, then I step into his space, tilt my head to the side, and stare up into light green eyes. “I don’t know why you constantly fight me on this. Ever since you tossed me out of your hospital room, I just figure; if you’re going to be alone, and I’m going to be alone, then why shouldn’t we be alone together, ya know? Why do you need to fight this war by yourself?” I stroke his strong jaw. “There’s no rule book that says so.”

“Because this isn’t your war,” he admits on a sigh. “Because it would be a sin to tie you down.”

“No.” I run my fingertips through the back of his hair. “The only sin is telling me you don’t love me back.”

* * *

Thirty minuteslater and a soft giggle coming from the man who’s been eating the raw batter straight from the bowl, I finish cutting the cooked brownies and stacking them on plates. From his firm ‘no, I won’t do this,’ to hungrily licking the bowl in ways that make my heart sing and my vagina quiver, Riley grabs his crutches and slides his butt off the edge of the counter. He pushes them under his arms and grabs a plate of warm brownies, then his missing leg moves forward as though to take a step.

His eyes widen.

His brain catches up.

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