“My God!” She arched back, her eyes closed and her mouth open as she came, her body pulsating around me and sending me into one last insane spasm of pleasure. The orgasm ripped through me, and I spent myself deep within her, grunting with each lingering shudder.
And then, in the wake of our wild coupling, there was nothing but silence between us.
18
Emma
I was still shaking as I stopped my car alongside my trailer in the complete darkness of the late night. When I pulled the keys from the ignition, the quiet around me was nearly deafening. I sat in the driver’s seat, trying to calm myself before I made the dash from the relative safety of the car to the solitude of the trailer.
I smelled of sex, and I could still feel Deacon between my legs. My panties were gone—lost somewhere in his office or possibly destroyed when he’d ripped them from my body. I hadn’t lingered to look for them. As soon as Deacon had pulled out of me and stood up, a mixture of shame, guilt and uncertainty on his face, I’d fixed my dress as best I could and fled his office. I’d stopped momentarily at my own desk to retrieve my purse, and then I’d sprinted for my car, driving home without even thinking about it.
I knew why Deacon had looked ashamed—he had every reason to feel that way, but I had a feeling that his reason why and mine didn’t match up. He was upset at himself for the rough fuck, for the way he’d handled me when we were having sex. I didn’t mind that at all, because I had been completely on-board with the sex and the rough. But what still made me furious was the fact that he’d suspected me of some sort of inappropriate action with Noah.
I could imagine that it might have looked bad at first. If Deacon had come back to his office to apologize for the snappish way he’d acted before he’d walked out, and then he’d found me in the embrace of a hot football player . . . well, that would be enough to make any guy bristle. But for God’s sake, it was Noah. Noah, who was so devoted to his wife that the idea of her pain drove him to tears. Noah, who would’ve willingly cut off his own left testicle if it would have helped Angela recover. Noah, who was devastated because his wife had just told him she thought she was going to die.
And even if it hadn’t been Noah, I would have hoped that Deacon had enough respect for me and knew me well enough to realize that I would never cheat on him. Even if we hadn’t actually defined what was between us in so many words, our actions spoke loud enough for me to be exclusive and to consider myself taken.
No, it hadn’t been the sex that had shaken me up. It had been the anger and accusations that had come before that. I still wasn’t sure how to process those. I needed some space and some time to think.
Once I was finally in the trailer and had managed to turn on a couple of gas lamps, I stripped off my dress and showered, grateful for the day’s supply of solar-heated water. I washed away the smell of Deacon on my skin. And then I wrapped myself in a towel and crawled into bed to sleep, losing the pain and unhappiness of the day in the oblivion of utter exhaustion.
I awoke hours later to the sound of my phone ringing. I had been so deeply asleep that for a long moment, I was disoriented, not sure where I was or what had happened. I reached blindly for the phone where I’d plugged it into the charger, saying hello before I even checked to see who it was.
“Emma?” It was Jenny, her voice anxious and tense. “Where are you?”
“Umm.” I glanced around, blinking. It was light out, so it must be morning. I shifted and felt a smidgeon of residual soreness between my legs. Everything from the night before began to come back to me.
“Are you all right? What’s going on with you?” Jenny sounded worried now, and no wonder. I hadn’t managed to utter a single intelligible word yet.
“I’m fine.” My voice was rusty, and I coughed a little. “Sorry. I was asleep. I’m at my trailer. What’s wrong?”
“Jesus, girl, you scared the hell out of me. I’ve been trying to call you for an hour. I thought maybe you were with Deacon, because he’s been MIA, too. Is he there with you?”
I shook my head as if she could see me. “Uh, no. No, I haven’t seen Deacon since last night when I left the hospital. But it was pretty late, and we were both exhausted. I’m sure he went home. He’s probably sleeping, too.” Deacon was a light sleeper, though, borne of too many on-call nights, or so he’d told me.
“We tried his landline, his cell . . . Mira’s about to send someone over to his house to make sure he’s okay. We just don’t—oh. Okay, Deacon’s here. I see him coming down the hallway now.”
“All right. One mystery solved. But why were you trying to get a hold of us?” I pulled up the towel from last night to cover myself, wincing slightly at its dampness.
Jenny’s sigh warned me that she was not about to share happy news. “It’s Angela. She’s spiked a fever, her breathing is shit, and she’s in a lot of pain.” Jen hesitated. “Emma, I think she’s septic.”
I closed my eyes, a wave of doom rolling over me. “Fuck.Fuck, Jenny. Are you sure?”
“Not sure. We sent out a culture, and we’re running tests—she’s on oxygen, but we haven’t done anything else. She’s—” Jenny’s voice broke. “I think you need to get in here, Emma, as soon as you can.”
I was already standing up. “I just need to put on some clothes. I’ll be there in twenty minutes.”
Without waiting for her to respond, I ended the call and tossed down my phone, scrambling for jeans and a shirt. Slipping on sandals, I scraped my hair back into a tight ponytail, put on deodorant and was out the door in under ten minutes.
Because many residents of Harper Springs worked elsewhere, the backroads could get a little bogged down before nine in the morning on weekdays. Mondays seemed to be worse, so I wasn’t sure what to expect. Still, I managed to navigate around most of the traffic and get to the hospital almost exactly twenty minutes after I’d talked to Jenny. I didn’t bother to stop at my office; I headed straight for Angela’s room.
A small cluster of people stood in the hallway just outside her door. Deacon glanced up at me as I joined them. His face was expressionless, but I saw the hint of despair in his eyes.
Jenny and Mira were with him, both of the women tense. Jenny looked as though she hadn’t slept at all, and I felt a modicum of guilt for my own deep slumber. Mira’s normally professional aura was weighed with sorrow.
“Is there any news?” I wrapped my arms around my middle, holding onto myself. “Any improvement?”
Mira shook her head. “Her blood pressure’s dropping. We’re doing everything we can, but . . .” She pressed her lips together.
