“Yes.”
“Did you get food poisoning or something? You worked through the flu two years ago. I never thought I would see the day you took time off.” He laughed.
I slapped a hand to my face and wished it could’ve been his. “I just want to use a sick day, Calhoun. Can I take it or not?”
“Uh, sure. Okay. I’ll see if I can get someone else to work with Paxton today or put him with someone else or something. We’ll see you tomorrow. Call later if you don’t think you can make it. Feel better.” The disgusting, chipper tone made me want to go in to work just to spite him. Was it really so fucking funny that I’d never taken a day off? I did my best to stay under the radar, but had I gone too far the other direction? People were so confusing.
“Got it,” I grumbled, already itching to hang up. This was tedious at best.
“Oh! One more thing.”
I barely held in a groan. “Yes?”
“You were scheduled to see the shrink today. They want to talk to everyone who worked the shoe store scene. As if we haven’t all seen dead bodies.”
“God knows I have.” I got an evil little thrill out of the way he chuckled warmly because I wasn’t talking about corpses at a crime scene, but I was the only one who knew it.
“Right? We don’t need that junk, but they’re insisting. You’ll have to go the next time you’re in. If you tell them you’re sad but doing well, they usually leave you alone, but if you tell them you’re fine, they’ll schedule you fifty appointments.”
I sighed again but was genuinely grateful for the advice. I always worried about how to play those games. “Thank you. Goodbye.” I hung up while he was still talking because I couldn’t stand to be on the line a minute longer, then stuffed my phone into a back pocket of my jeans.
Frustration dug into me. Ari wasn’t okay. I hated it more than anything because my killer was strong and deadly, and seeing him laid low bothered me. I didn’t like him vulnerable. He was brutal and beautiful and should always be able to protect himself. It was just fucking wrong for him to be hurt bad enough that he could barely move.
I should’ve gone to work today, not that they wouldn’t get along without me, but I was disrupting my routine for him. I paced the hallway for a few more minutes, then went upstairs. Ari was worth a couple of sick days. I would be paid anyway, so it didn’t matter. I pushed open the bedroom door and stared across the room at him. My stomach warmed.
Ari was perfection, lying on his belly. His back was slim, but strong and muscled in all the right ways. His glossy dark hair was a mess, and he had his cheek cradled on his arm, giving him an innocent appearance that was a perfect trap for his victims. I wasn’t sure when he’d pushed aside the pillow. I hissed as I spotted the angry bruise on his lower back, though. I paced closer and mulled over my shocking behavior with him. I hadn’t fucked him last night because he was in a lot of pain, even though I’d wanted to sink my cock into his heat. Instead, I’d cuddled him close and thought about all the ways I wanted to draw and quarter the man who’d thrown him against the stairs. No small person could’ve done it, so if I killed all the big men Derek Uhlig employed, I was bound to get the one who’d hurt him.
I’d lain awake far into the night plotting the murder of every person who had stepped foot in my house.
I brushed back Ari’s soft hair from his face. Yeah, I hadn’t fucked him last night, but I regretted the need to wait. I liked hurting him enough to make his eyelids lower and force sweet moans from him, but I didn’t want to injure him. I smoothed my thumb along his cheek.
No, he was my precious killer, and he deserved some care.
I went downstairs and came back up with a blue cold compress and a dish towel. I laid the thin towel over the bruise, then settled the ice on it. He hissed, reaching back to try to shove the compress away, and I rested my hand on his wrist and stopped his groping.
“It’s too cold,” he said, tone deadly as he cracked an eye to glare at me. I leaned down to put a kiss between his shoulder blades and licked down his spine.
“You will leave the ice where I put it. I made an appointment for you with my doctor. We need to be there in an hour.”
He grunted, and I sat down beside him, though his fingers still wriggled as if he would move the cold compress the first chance he got. I smirked as his hips shifted around and put my hand on the compress so it wouldn’t slip off. He didn’t stop moving, only began to press his hips forward rather than from side to side. Maybe the ice wasn’t the only reason he was restless. Even with all the pain, he seemed to be doing his best to nudge a morning hard-on against the bed, searching for relief, and I wasn’t even sure he was aware he was doing it.
“Does your back feel better?” I asked, pushing down slightly on the compress. I shoved the sheet and blanket farther down the bed so I could slide my fingers along the soft skin on the back of his thigh.
He groaned and dropped his head to the bed. “A little bit. It’s still bad.”
“I called off work.”
He glanced over his shoulder with wide eyes. “Why?”
“To take care of you.” I leaned closer and put a kiss on his shoulder, then dragged my lips down his arm and nipped at the sensitive skin on his tricep.
“Oh.” I loved the sweet little smile that spread across his face. He was grateful to me for rearranging my day, and that made it worth it. His hips continued a sultry slide against the bed, but the gentle, nearly fragile movement wasn’t anything like the way he ground roughly against me when he wanted to get fucked. The pain must be horrible for him not to go after his basic needs.
I rubbed my hand along his side. “I’m going to help you onto your back, and you’ll lie on the ice, do you understand?” I made sure my tone was stern, and he narrowed his eyes at me but nodded. I got the vibe from him I sometimes did when I thought he might decide to slit my throat—even if he would regret it later, he might do it.
“You’re my killer, aren’t you?” I murmured to him.
“Yes, Master.” His lips twitched back toward a smile, but this time it didn’t seem real. I couldn’t quite put my finger on how I knew, but this was a fake expression that would put someone else off.
