Thorns & Oranges

At What Cost?

"Why are you bringing this up now?"

"Because I don't want you pulling this crap again. No more drugs, no more suicide attempts, no more leaving me wondering if the next time I see you will be in a body bag."

I moved his hand away and rolled so I was resting on top of him, my body flat against his with my chin resting on his chest. "Why me?"

His dark eyes were hooded, his emotions hidden from me. "Because I feel the need to protect you and whenever I get that feeling, I never fail. And you are more self-destructive than you should be." He pulled me up the length of his body and now that I was closer, I could see a strange fire in his eyes fueled by an even stranger emotion. "And because I like you. More than I should."

*

When I fell asleep, I was on his chest. When I woke up, I was on my pillow with his head resting on one of my shoulder blades. I stayed still for a few minutes, taking it all in. It registered briefly that I'd slept with another cop. A cop pretending to be a gangster. A gangster that was supposed to take over for my brother. A man who had lied to me from the beginning but I found it didn't really matter. What mattered was what would happen when this was all over. I was certain now I was falling for him, falling hard and fast. There was no safety net, not that there ever was but there was something different about this.

I didn't want to be left behind again.

There was a soft knock on the door accompanied by, "Ms. Elina?"

"Yeah, it's me," I called back softly, trying not to wake Rey up.

I heard her sigh with relief. "I'll put some coffee on."

"Thank you."

She walked off and I felt Rey lift his head. He brushed a kiss across my shoulder blade where a rather personal tattoo only I and the artist understood before he moved to the pillow next to me. "Morning, Oranges." His voice was heavy with sleep and it made my insides do a summersault.

I grunted in response. "I think I want to go back to sleep."

"After the night you had," he chuckled. "I would too."

"It was your night too. I pointed a gun at you."

"You never would've pulled the trigger."

"I did pull the trigger. Or did you miss the loud bang and the charges your friends filed against me?" I turned my head to look at him and opened my eyes. "You blocked all that out, didn't you?"

"You never would've shot me. You're not the type." The fact that he really believed that shinned out of his eyes and it crushed the rebellious part of me that wanted to put him in his place. We were both in such a good mood I didn't want to spoil it

I couldn't help but wonder...

"What now?" My voice was lower with the full weight of my question hanging on those two words.

"What do you mean?"

"Where do we go from here?"

He sighed, moving as close as possible, maybe even covering up part of me. I was afraid of what he was going to say and I even steeled myself up for the worst. Being rejected wasn't the worst thing I'd ever experienced but coming from him—he had the ability to shatter my world into a thousand pieces. I was so worried he would.

"Well, I have to take a piss and then I'm pretty sure I'm going to take you in the shower and then..."

I smiled and kissed him, cutting off his 'and then' speech. "I get it."