Page 10

Chapter Nine

Knova

It’s not even two in the morning when my phone starts vibrating. I groan and press my face into the pillow. I’m cozy and warm, and I don’t want to deal with some fucking telemarketer who got his grubby little paws on my number. I let it ring through to voicemail and try to fall back asleep.

Unfortunately, it lights up again.

I grope for my phone. When I turn my head and see who’s calling, all my complaints are forgotten. I snatch my phone to my ear and sit up in bed. “Hey,” I whisper. “What’s going on?”

“This is Ben Arlon, LifeSource Dispatch. We’ve got a rollover at Red Rock Pass—tight access, bad wind shear. Our primary pilot couldn’t get a stable hover and had to call off. You’re our only certified narrow-landing clearance within range. Can you be wheels up in ten?”

I don’t know Ben personally, but LifeSource keeps my number on file for exactly this. When the terrain’s too tight or the descent too risky, I’m the one they call. Military flight certs mean I can reliably put a bird down where most people wouldn’t even try.

While he explains the details of the situation, I rush around the room in the dark, pulling on clothes with military precision. It doesn’t matter what. Viktor doesn’t stir. Figures. Between the back-to-back games and the alcohol at dinner, he’s out cold—and I don’t have time to explain.

I’m twenty minutes from the heliport, and they’ll have the chopper prepped by the time I get there. Not ideal—but faster than rerouting another pilot from across the valley.

* * *

By the time I land at the scene of the accident, EMTs have already brought out the jaws of life.

My brain does this thing in emergencies where it turns off all unnecessary functions. You know how people talk about how electronics pull power through their cords even when they’re not in use? Emotions are like that, too. In times like this, my brain pulls all the unnecessary plugs and diverts every ounce of my energy, every drop of adrenaline, to make the rest of my body run as smoothly as possible.

As the EMTs load the two little girls into the back of the helicopter, I’m not thinking about how they’re only six and eleven. I’m not wondering about the extent of their injuries. I’m not listening to the words their mother screams as she clambers in after them. Those things matter to someone, but they don’t matter to me. Not yet. I don’t fully process the tractor-trailer’s logo, register the angle at which it crushed the little blue compact car against the guardrail, or gasp at the fact that the smaller vehicle is crushed beyond recognition. The crash happened on one of those twisting, shoulderless stretches carved through the red rock—no clearings, no pull-offs, and the kind of gusty canyon crosswinds that make most pilots wave off the approach. I was the only one within range trained for a touch-and-go landing on uneven terrain.

I’m in survival mode, not for me, but for this family. That means, in a turned-around way that I never expected before I went through training, that I can’t care about them yet. If I let myself think about them, my heart will crack open, and the memory of my final tour and what ended it will come spilling out of every pore of my body, and I will be no good to anyone.

That night. That desert. That young man who looked like my little cousin, bleeding out in my lap while I radioed for a medevac that was ten minutes too far. I can’t go back there. Not while I’m flying this one.

My job now is to focus on the wind, the flight path, and the controls. I need to get these girls to the hospital as fast as possible. Everything else might as well not exist.

An EMT gives me the go-ahead, and we lift off. For the next ten minutes to the trauma center, this is a flight like any other. I don’t break a single protocol, don’t take a single unnecessary risk. I am a machine, and machines don’t have feelings. They’re efficient. They’re controlled.

They get the job done.

At the hospital’s helipad, more EMTs scurry around like ants. I bring us in for a smooth landing. This is my purpose. My job.

I watch with that same level of high-functioning detachment as the little family emerges from the helicopter, the mom under her own power, the girls on stretchers. When I see the first kid, I think, I just helped save those children’s lives. It’s strange how I still don’t feel anything. Maybe later, I’ll feel proud. Happy. Relieved. Right now, I’m still empty.

Then I see the second stretcher. Covered. Still. And I realize I was wrong. I only saved one of them.

The rotors are still spinning, but my body won’t move. I sit in the cockpit, hands frozen on the controls, heart suddenly too loud. And all I can think is—what if it had been Knight? Or my parents? Or Viktor?

What if next time, it is?

That’s when it all comes crashing back down.

* * *

Thanks to my training, I manage to keep my shit together until I’m finally back in my car. The clock reads 3:34 a.m. I haven’t even been awake for two hours, but this day already feels a year long.

“Come on, Knova, you just flew a helicopter,” I tell myself aloud. “You can drive a damn car.” But my hands are shaking so badly that I recognize just how bad an idea that is even before I turn on the engine.

I don’t want to cause another accident like the one that I just left.

That thought drives a wedge through the crack in my armor, and all the emotions I’ve held back come spilling out at once. Within seconds, I’m bent over the steering wheel, clutching it in a stranglehold and sobbing for all I’m worth. I turn on the car engine and jab my finger blindly at the console. There’s no way in hell I’m going to move from this spot, but I need to call someone, and I can’t see my little phone screen through my tears.

The moment the sobs start, there’s no reining them in. It’s like my body’s been waiting for permission. For a pause in duty long enough to break apart. My fingers are white-knuckled on the steering wheel, but I feel like I’m holding on to nothing. To no one. I’m screaming and crying and gagging all at once, and I hate how familiar this feels. How easy it is to slip into the pain like an old flight suit.

The dog tags around my neck are an anchor. A noose. It’s been a long time since my PTSD has been triggered this badly, but I can’t do anything but lean into that despair.

There’s no one left who could make this better. But I don’t want to be alone. Not tonight. My thumb hovers over Knight’s name. But when I hit the screen, it’s not Knight’s voice that answers.

Shit. I must have hit the wrong button.

“Knova?” His voice is slurred with sleep. “Where are you?”

Here’s the thing about having a meltdown that leaves you crying so hard you can’t breathe: there’s no off-switch. I’m still wailing and sobbing, and the car’s speakers pick all that up. Even worse, there’s some reverb on the line, so my own wailing is echoed back to me through Viktor’s end.

It’s the actual fucking worst. I hate myself a little for being this weak, much less letting anyone else see it. Or hear it, I guess. Viktor is only ever supposed to see me when I’m confident, and maybe when I’m pissed, but in the last few days, he’s seen me at my worst again and again. I wish I could go back in time and do the last two hours over, but with a different outcome.

Because the dynamics of our non-relationship have changed.

And there’s no take-backs.

Then I feel like scum, because I’m upset about appearances, about myself and the huge emotions I don’t want to feel, when that woman just lost a child.

“Whoa, hey.” Viktor sobers immediately. “Where are you?”

“At the h-hospital.” I choke on my sobs. “UMC.”

“Okay.” Something thumps in the background. “Oh, shit. Sorry. Are you hurt?”

“N-n-n…” I press my forehead to the steering wheel. “Not me.”

“Some else?”

“A stranger,” I say. “I had to fly… no one else could...”

“Right. Got it. What can I do?”

I let out a whimper that comes right from my broken heart. “I need a ride.”

“I’m coming. Just give me one— ow —dammit, okay, I’m on my way. I’ll be there as soon as I can. Can you share your location so I know where to find your car?”

I make a wordless noise in the affirmative and end the call, then tap through my screen to share my pin with Viktor. When that’s done, I have nothing left to do but remember. I sit hunched in my car, bawling as I remember everything I’ve tried so hard to forget.

There’s a moment—just one—where I think about putting the car in gear and driving. Not home. Just… somewhere. Somewhere I don’t have to feel this anymore. I grip the tags around my neck until they bite into my skin. That’s what pulls me back. Pain is grounding. So is Viktor’s voice, even if I didn’t mean to hear it.

I’m mostly cried out by the time Viktor arrives. He has a blanket with him, which he wraps around my shoulders as he bundles me into his passenger seat. “Need anything from the car?”

I shake my head.

“Okay.” He makes sure I’m buckled in before going around to the driver’s side. He doesn’t ask a single question on the ride back. He supports me on the walk to his door. Clearly, he doesn’t know what to say. I’m just grateful for the silence.

He settles me in a chair at the kitchen table and starts rummaging around in the cabinets. I stare dead-eyed at the tabletop, losing track of time. I’m not sure how long I’ve been sitting there when Viktor slides a mug full of steaming golden tea in front of me.

His silence feels like a gift. Like he’s giving me space to collapse without commentary. I should say something. Thank him. Apologize. But all I do is stare at the wood grain on the table like it holds some kind of answer.

I look up as he pulls back the chair across from me. He’s got a mug of his own, one with the Stanley Cup embossed on the side.

“Chamomile,” he says. The words are accompanied by a sad smile. “I know you like it.”

I reach out for the reassuring warmth of the mug. “How?”

He shrugs. “I saw it at the pool house one time, decided to try it. I sometimes struggle to wind down after games.”

“Oh.” I frown at the tea. “That’s… Thank you.”

“Can you tell me what happened tonight?” he asks. My face must do something weird, because he backpedals at once. “Not the details, I don’t need that, but I just need to know if you’re okay. I mean, you’re not okay -okay, but for all I know, you knifed a guy during a secret two a.m. mafia shakedown, and I’d like to know if his don is coming after me.”

I can tell that he’s trying to lighten the mood with humor, but he’s out of his depth. I smile anyway. “You think Dante called me in for some emergency shady dealings?”

He shrugs again. “It’s not outside the realm of possibility.”

I don’t have it in me to banter, so I skip the jokes and go right for the truth. “I had a life flight tonight. Two kids. One of them, uh. I don’t think she made it.”

Viktor sucks in a breath. “Goddamn. I’m sorry. I didn’t realize you were still flying for LifeSource. You don’t talk about it much.”

“Yeah, ‘cuz it’s a fucking bummer.” I can feel my equilibrium returning. “They only call me if one of their regular pilots can’t make a difficult landing.”

“Maybe tonight is a bummer, but you save people.” Viktor sounds almost awed.

I wave him off. “I help save people. EMTs do the real work. I’m basically a glorified Uber driver of the skies.”

His brow furrows.

“What?” I demand.

“Nothing.” He takes a sip of his tea. I do the same. There’s a sweetness on the finish; he must have added honey.

“Why are you being so nice to me?” I ask him, in part, to change the subject. I shouldn’t be this comforted. I shouldn’t want to crawl into someone else’s warmth and hide. But the tea is warm. Viktor is warm. And for once, I’m not alone with my guilt. I don’t need him acting like I’m some sort of hero for this LifeSource thing. If anything, it’s the opposite. I’m paying penance.

Viktor rolls his eyes. “Believe it or not, some people actually think I’m a nice guy.”

“When you want something, maybe.”

He grimaces, but doesn’t argue.

He’s wrong. I don’t think people see Viktor as a nice guy. They see him as the charming one. The screw-up. The party boy who can’t commit. I know the stories. I helped write them.

But the man sitting across from me right now? He’s the one who got out of bed in the middle of the night, barefoot and worried, just to come scoop me off the pavement. That’s not charm. That’s heart.

“Shit.” I cover my face with both hands and lean my elbows on the table. “I’m sorry. I keep doing that. You’ve been really nice to me during one of the shittier weeks of my life, and I keep lashing out. I’m the asshole.”

“No,” Viktor corrects, “you’re the woman who woke up at two a.m. to try to save a stranger’s life.”

I want to argue. I want to deflect, make a joke, roll my eyes, bite his head off. But I can’t. Because he means it.

And that might be the most terrifying thing about him. He means it.

He sees the worst of me and doesn’t flinch. He stays.

I peek between my fingers at him. His voice lacks that mocking lilt that I know so well, and there’s no hint of teasing in his expression. He’s not trying to make me feel small. He’s being… kind?

“Although you were a little bit of an asshole just now,” he amends.

I let out a snort of laughter. “Screw you.”

“If that would help, you’re more than welcome to do so.” He finishes off his tea. “I’m going back to bed. I think you should, too.”

If he keeps this up, I’m going to get whiplash. “Yeah. Good idea.” I finish my tea, too, and follow him back to the bedroom, still wrapped in the blanket he brought for me.

I don’t want to change again, but I also don’t want to wake up in these clothes. Without really thinking, I toss the blanket onto the bed and strip out of my pants, so that I’m wearing only the shirt and panties I pulled on in the dark. And, of course, the dog tags. Viktor holds the blankets open for me as I crawl in beside him. I turn off the lights and nestle into the bed that he’s already warmed with his body heat.

I need to be close to someone, and after that kiss before we fell asleep, I don’t think Viktor minds my proximity. I snuggle closer and rest my head on his shoulder.

“Is this okay?” My voice is so small in the darkness.

“Of course.” He twists so that he can kiss my forehead without dislodging me. “I like it when you’re here.”

My stupid bottom lip wobbles. “Thank you for coming to get me tonight. I’m sorry that I—”

“Knova.” Viktor takes one of my hands in his. “I promise you that whenever you need me, I’ll come for you. Okay? You do all the heroic shit, and when that’s over, I’ll come rescue you. I don’t know how to do half the things you do, but I can drive the car and make the tea and make sure you have what you need.”

I squeeze my eyes closed. I don’t know how to explain what’s going through my mind, because half the time it makes no sense to me. I’m thinking about Mick and that family tonight and all the ways I’ve let people down.

“What do you need right now?” he asks.

“I just don’t want to think anymore.”

“Okay. I’ve got some melatonin in the bedside drawer. Would that help?”

“I need…”

I know what I need. Or at least, I know what I want, and I’m telling myself it will help.

“Sex would help,” I blurt.

I don’t know what the hell I’m doing. I shouldn’t ask him for anything else. I’m emotionally wrecked. I’m not thinking clearly. I shouldn’t want this—him—like this.

But I’m spiraling and raw, and all I want is to feel something that isn’t pain.

Viktor’s chest stills beneath my head. I don’t think the poor guy’s breathing. I don’t know why he’s so surprised. He’s the one going on about “the wife experience” and rubbing his dick on my leg. He’s clearly interested. Although maybe now that he’s been around to witness one of my low points, he’s decided I’m too much to deal with.

Too much has always been my problem when in my soul, I feel like I’m not nearly enough.

“We don’t have to—” I begin.

“No! No, yeah, we can do that. If you want.” He swallows. “Although I’m not sure how to ask if you’re going to regret this tomorrow without sounding patronizing. You had a rough night, emotionally.”

“Right.” I snuggle closer to his side. “And if you could fuck all those bad feelings away, that would be great. ”

“Wow, that’s direct.” Viktor rolls to face me. But he says it like he’s been waiting years to hear it. Like maybe he wants this as badly as I do. “Is that what you’re into?”

“Being pinned to the mattress while you choke me a little and fuck me until I beg you to stop?” I pretend to think about it. “Not sure, but there’s one way to find out.”

Ever since Dante’s screw-up, I’ve been on the wrong foot with Viktor. It’s nice to know that I still have it in me to leave him speechless.

“Be careful what you wish for,” he says at last. His voice is low and ragged, laced with an undertone of dominance.

“You think I don’t know what I want?” I retort. “Please. Have you met me? I’m telling you what I want. Kissing is nice and all, but I need to be anchored right now. Sensory input helps ground me. Usually, I’d go to the gym and go to town on a punching bag, or lift weights until my arms give out, or ride the stationary bike until I’m too tired to think. Actually, maybe that’s a good idea. There’s a gym down the street, right…?”

I gasp as Viktor rolls on top of me, one arm braced against the mattress. His other hand presses against my neck. It’s gentle. He’s been so gentle all night. “Like this?” he asks.

Yes. Like that. Like I’m not breakable. Like he can see the cracks and still wants to touch me. I’m so used to holding everything in—to being too much, too loud, too hard. But right now? I want him to take all that and devour it.

I scoff, even though my heart is racing. Are we really doing this? I wasn’t lying when I said I wanted this. “Is that all you’ve got?”

Viktor’s hand tightens fractionally. “Better?”

I click my tongue against the roof of my mouth. “It’s like your hand’s got whiskey dick. And here I assumed a manwhore like you knew how to fuck a girl right and proper.”

Viktor’s breath is hot in my ear. “Is this a game? Like, roleplay? Are you mouthing off because you want to rile me up, or are you really mad?”

“It’s the game, Vik. It’s the game we’re always playing. Is it wrong that for one fucking minute I want to feel normal ? Like I haven’t slipped into another dimension?” I lift my head up and bite his ear, hard enough to startle a yelp out of him. “Now, are you going to put me in my place, or what?”

His hips drop against mine, grinding his cock against my pussy, biting my nipples through my top, like he’s finally decided that he’s not going to break me. His fingers tighten on my neck and presses the hard line of his erection between my legs, rubbing against the thin material of my panties.

When he speaks again, his voice is a growl. “You’re such a fucking brat sometimes.” His mouth finds my throat, biting a line up to my jaw like he wants to leave marks. “You keep mouthing off, I’m going to rail you so hard you forget your own name.”

My back arches slightly off the bed, straining toward him. I want this, I want him, I want the kind of lovemaking that leaves bruises. Tomorrow, I want to be so focused on my aching core that I don’t think about anything else. Anything like—

“The harder you fight me, the harder I’m going to fuck you,” Viktor whispers. “Got it?”

We’ve never discussed what sex would look like between us: safe words, boundaries, the sorts of things you’d discuss to lay out a scene in advance. I understand what he’s asking here.

“Give me what I want,” I growl back, “and we’ll have nothing to fight about.”

I gasp when Viktor presses me back into the mattress. His grip is firm but not too rough, exactly the kind of anchor I need. He lowers his lips to my ear. “So mouthy. One of these days, I’m going to put that mouth to better use. I’m going to stuff it so full of my cock that I see its outline along the line of your pretty throat. Oh, yeah, you’re going to look fucking fantastic gagging on my giant dick and dripping my cum from your lips.”

Electricity zaps my core, sending erotic pulses through my pussy simply from the dirty promises falling from his lips.

I moan and let my eyes flutter closed. “I don’t know, Viktor. Seems like you’re all talk to me.”

He shifts, yanking his pajamas down and tugging the crotch of my panties aside. I’m already turned on, but I’m not ready for him. He seems to be aware of that, though, because he repositions one of my legs and presses himself against my entrance. In short, shallow rolls of his hips, he enters me inch by inch.

“Ever heard of foreplay?” I pant.

“I like foreplay,” he replies. “But somebody’s a greedy brat. I want to feel that tight cunt on my cock. I want to feel you yield to me for once without running your mouth.”

I whimper and spread my legs wider, inviting him in. Once he’s an inch or so inside me, he pulls my shirt up, exposing my breasts. His hand never leaves my throat as he enters me slowly, taking his time.

The pressure at my throat doesn’t scare me. It calms me. Reminds me where I am. Who I’m with. It keeps me from floating too far into the places I don’t want to be. The trauma can’t touch me here—not when I’m pinned, possessed, and worshiped.

I would never do something like this with a guy I didn’t implicitly trust. I don’t get off on the idea of being forced, even in a roleplay scenario. What gets me off is the idea that I can trust a guy enough to see this side of me that I can let go and know that he’ll never take things too far. People have always said that I’m a control freak, but that’s only because I want to know that things are getting done right. Yielding to a man that I trust, to a man that I want, is an incredible feeling because it’s so rare.

So as Viktor stuffs his cock inside me, I let go. I surrender. I relax into the sensation of being stretched and filled and fucked by someone who will pound me senseless tonight and, I hope, still see me as an equal tomorrow.

“You look so good with my dick inside you, my little savage,” Viktor croons. He sits back, changing the angle of his hips against mine, but still holding me down. I know he can’t see me well in the darkened room, but there is just enough light from the street below that we can make out each other’s contours.

He pulls halfway out, then thrusts back into me, hard enough to make me cry out.

“You like that, don’t you?” he purrs.

The fight has gone out of me. “Yes,” I say honestly. “Harder.”

Viktor obliges. At first, there’s a blurred line between pleasure and pain with each movement, but the more I relax my muscles, the better it feels, until only pleasure remains. I stop worrying about what sort of sounds I make and, instead, react honestly. I moan when something feels good, or sigh into a slightly gentler touch. It hits me like a blackout. Like lightning behind my eyes. I’m not in a bed anymore—I’m freefalling. My body gives out, clenching so tight around him I see white. I scream his name like it might pull me back from the void.

My orgasm builds until I tighten around him, mewling his name as I come.

Too soon, he pulls out of me, and he shifts up the bed until he’s straddling my belly. The hand that has been around my throat drifts upward, caressing my cheek, until he takes a fistful of my hair. His tug is gentle, but I can still tell what he wants me to do. He pulls just until I tip my head back and our gleaming eyes meet in the near dark. His other fist is on his cock, pumping fast.

I open my mouth and stick out my tongue.

“ Fuck, Knova,” he groans. His face is twisted in concentration, in reverence. Like he’s praying to my body. Like this is what he’s always wanted, and now he’s not sure he deserves it. His fist is frantic on his cock, and when I stick my tongue out, his whole body convulses.

The first spurt of his cum splatters across my breasts and chin; then finally in my open mouth. I roll it in along my tongue before swallowing, tasting the bitter salt of him. And love it. He pumps his dick a few more times until his arms start to shake. As his muscles relax, he tips sideways so he won’t crush me when he drops.

Still lying on my back, I take his hand and trace two fingers through the mess he made of my chest. Then I lift them to my mouth and suck them clean.

“Jesus fucking Christ,” Viktor whispers. “Knova…”

He doesn’t say anything else, just kisses me for all he’s worth, licking his cum from my lips. Like he’s trying to memorize me. Like he’s afraid I’ll vanish in the morning. And for a second, I let myself pretend that I’m his. That he’s mine. That this—whatever this is—could be enough to keep the darkness away.

By the time he gets up a few minutes later, I’m drifting toward sleep. I hear the sound of running water in the bathroom, and then the warm pressure of a damp washcloth against my chest as he cleans me up.

“Are you okay?” he whispers. “Was that… good?”

“It was perfect,” I tell him. I got exactly what I wanted. A stunning orgasm that leaves no room for thoughts.

If he says anything after that, I don’t hear it, because I’m already asleep.