Damian's POV
June and I repeated the pressure-point exercises for five days straight, in the small sliver of time that our schedules overlapped. I didn't push her for any of the class moves beyond the points. She didn't need to have every self-defense move memorized but the more she practiced, the more relaxed she became in her body and she moved with muscle memory.
Even if it left my limbs buzzing with numbness.
The gym's other patrons ignored us, with an occasional smile or wave offered. A cop neighbor had two polar opposite reactions. Most neighbors appreciated the presence, especially if a parked patrol car was involved. However, cops that drew crime to them were very unwelcomed.
For once, June and I behaved ourselves while our bodies grinded and rubbed contact. My concern for June's comfort level and safety outweighed the pleasure I got from her close physical proximity, although we had moments of panting in each other's sweaty faces.
Back in the condo, we fucked like animals. My pride soared with each small improvement my girlfriend showed.
"Baker Row, any progress?" Hernandez prompted me as my knuckles hovered to pound on his open door.
"Slow and painful," I admitted with a sigh. The majority of papers burying my desk involved tracking down victims for that case. "I briefed the NCOs and they provided a lead. I'll check this one out Monday."
NCOs, or Neighborhood Coordinating Officers, were a crucial link between NYPD and the ground-level neighborhood activity. NCOs offered anonymous residents confidentiality in reporting issues of concern that warranted NYPD interventions.
Instead of sitting silent and absorbing the neighborhood-level updates, I pushed back onto the NCOs what Hernandez and I were presented in the Bronx and Baker Row cases. Flashing pictures of the previously and currently detailed MS-13 members, I solicited any and all potential connections within the 34th's boundaries and into the 46th's.
Thanks to this morning's NCO meeting, several hours ago by a glance at my watch, I secured an appointment Monday morning under a disguised career day event at South Bronx High School. And thanks to undercover detectives on Jenks' team, I had a list of specific girls' names to inquire about at that high school.
Sex trafficking wasn't the largest concern in the 34th, drug distribution was, but it was Vice's concern. As long as all the roads and highways remained accessible to distribution, a drug market flowed through them that was too lucrative for the gangs not to participate in. Despite NYPD's best efforts disrupting the supplier chains, narcotics poisoned many of the 34th's neighborhoods.
All those easy cash flow options cogged up and crashed with one joint DEA, FBI, and NYPD's Narcotics Division raid in Bronx. Its spillover into the 34th was very much welcomed, even if short-lived.
"Fifteen arrested." Hernandez sat back in his seat, his head shaking at the alert blowing up his work phone. "Two from Inwood. Unbelievable what they found in the stash house."
My eyebrows lifted. "How much?"
"Two hundred and fifty pounds." Our jaws both dropped as he read off the rap sheet, "Hundred-ten of heroin, fentanyl, molly, and cocaine. Fifty of crystal meth and seventy-five thousand unknown pills."
My mind failed at the mental calculations because, fuck there was no way I was right. "That's... Twenty-two million?"
Fuck. That's noticeable damage.
"Drop in the bucket," he muttered and shuffled the papers aside. Checking his watch, his eyes lifted to mine and he flashed a bright grin. "Time to shine, Damian."
My stomach clenched as hard as my teeth.
"Might want to try harder on your smile." Standing, he grabbed the charcoal gray suit coat hanging on a rack behind his desk. Fitting his arms through it, his eyes dropped to the papers I wrenched in my hands. "Debriefing notes?
"Yeah." I grunted with my response, shaking my head and following Hernandez to the duty that lodged itself as the least favorite part of my job.
"Don't look so glum." His palm patted my shoulder. "I have some good news."
"What could possibly -" I started when both of us stopped at the sight of Officer Bryson.
Except it's not Officer Bryson.
Instead of his normal Patrol uniform, he wore a white dress shirt and pressed gray pants. His blonde hair was still faded short and shone with hair gel. During my visual inspection, Hernandez extended his palm to Bryson. "Welcome aboard, Detective Bryson."
My eyebrows shot up at the promotion I didn't know Bryson had earned. I shot a silent question of why I wasn't included on the interview panel to Hernandez, who ignored me.
Apparently, you can waltz into an interview and charm yourself into Vice.
Bryson palmed his hips, a smug gleam in his eyes showing he remembered my warning to take the interview seriously. Following my superior, I extended one hand, shaking Paul's roughly.
"Congratulations. Let's get you a desk..." Looking over his shoulder, I spotted the open three options. "Pick a station near Cerrato. See if you can get him to say more than two words. Jenks or McDonnell will get you onboard until I return from the press bullshit."
"You got it, boss." Bryson offered a two-finger salute, then headed to the open desk station area.
My eyebrows lifted at my boss, who shrugged.
"Didn't want a conflict of interest," was all he offered as we resumed our walk to the press room. "I'll introduce you to Shirley's new assistant when she starts next week."
"Hold up." I nearly tripped over my own damn feet. "Shirley, my assistant... is getting her own assistant?"
"Her replacement," he corrected and pushed a breath out his nose. "Figured it was easier for Shirley to train her than you."
I bit back my response of how much training overloading my calendar required. Heavier issues weighed on my mind, in particular not presenting myself as a complete asshole to the city of New York.
When Hernandez first warned me to start doing press releases, I didn't know he meant I stood in front of a room packed full of vultures and I was the carcass. Bright, white flashes blinded me one step into the room. My shoulders tensed from the damn hailstorm of insistent, buzzed, heckling questions thrown in my direction. Sweat trickled a path down my spine.
Why the fuck did he think this was a good idea?
My boss himself stood, his shoulder pressed against mine as he introduced me to a room full of soundbite and headline grabbers. His words, which included 'fresh face of Vice,' dimmed under the fingernail-on-chalkboard sound of pens scratched. Upward held phones, capturing every minute reaction only added to the pressure that thudded my pulse in my ears.
"Good afternoon," I croaked and uncurled my prepared notes. My fingers grabbed the worn wood on the podium's edge. Damp from my palms, the paper curled up again, so I pressed it flat and read off each word Officer Dawes meticulously chose for me.
I hated every fucking second.
With scripting reading, I sounded inhuman, robotic, and an imposter. Once I finished the utter bullshit of how excited I was to work on sweeping changes within Vice's Division, I exhaled a loud boom into the microphone. The suit-covered bodies in the room jolted, stunned into silence before the floodgates opened.
"Captain Rivera! Captain Rivera!"
More flashes. More questions. More insistence.
Every hand raised with the insistence of a kid who had to piss.
I pointed to a woman in a black suit; fuck, they all wore black suits. She stood up and pursed her red lips. "Are you satisfied with the new Vice reforms?"
From the back of the room, Officer Dawes shot me an encouraging smile.
My dummy head bobbed. "I'm not going to deny that we don't have more work to do. We do, a lot, but I'm here to state my commitment that I'm dedicated to addressing it to the best of my -"
"Captain Rivera," the woman interrupted me. "So, you're admitting to widespread corruption that's plaguing the Thirty-Fourth?"
Widespread corruption plaguing... What the fuck.
"No." My skin tightened with restraint, despite the vein throbbing in the left side of my neck. "I did not say that."
An insect under a magnifying glass, I gripped the black tie's knot at my neck. Sweat beaded up at my hairline and my pulse thudded in my ears.
Thankfully, Hernandez's hand on my shoulder tapped me out.
For the next, most painful forty-five minutes of my life, I stood next to him. Stiff as a statue with the same projected personality as the flag on his other side, I offered what Dawes described as an 'professionally impassive' expression. Showing no reaction to any question hurled at Hernandez or how he answered it, was exhausting.
Which was a billion times better than me answering the asinine questions, if not obvious.
"That's enough diverged questions for now," Officer Dawes stepped in front of the podium. "Corruption within the bureau remains a top priority for all levels of NYPD's management."
The nightmare experience left me tensed and on edge. My eyes burned and my forehead throbbed with dull threats of a headache. Once home, I pounded my body hard in the gym, until my muscles screamed and raindrops of sweat dripped down my face.
A Saturday shift offered me the luxury of working on the job's aspect I enjoyed most. In a quieter office, I burrowed through Jenks' latest stack. Intel McDonnell collected within Riker's provided unsettling evidence.
Santino had become quite the networking. An uncomfortable feeling grew as I flipped through photos observing him talking with other locked up MS-13 mara leaders.
Including... Rodrigo Lopez and Ramon Samantiego.
Lopez was the mara leader arrested in the Bronx sting. Pulling up a blurry courtyard prison picture, he and Santino chatted like acquaintances meeting for a business lunch.
Samantiego was a silent 'middle' man who wasn't afraid to get his hands dirty. By day, he laid low and worked in a local Bodega. At night, laundered money and coordinated johns' meetups.
Let's not forget about Amaya.
Luiz Amaya, Santino's partner arrested with associations for Baker Row had also been released from Rikers months ago. Since then, Amaya laid a low profile. Jenks' team tracked him down to Virginia over the holidays, which meant nothing in terms of a reformed man. He was sighted within his usual Inwood neighborhood three weeks ago.
Fuck, I should be checking these off the list.
Shuffling out the papers at the bottom of the stack, my teams had done just that. Sixteen names, all suspected MS-13 members or associates of, were cross-referenced with ICE's watchlist. Eight were seen with Santino in Rikers, with a sticky note slapped on the top right corner with Jenks' scribbled impression.
No fucking coincidence.
An itch pricked the back of my neck as the hairs raised. My pulse throbbed behind my eyes, threatening to pop them out their sockets. Standing up, I locked my office. With stiff legs, I walked the scenic route through the open desk area and stopped in the restrooms.
My bladder relieved, hands washed, and face splashed with water, I blinked at myself. The worry lines creased in between my eyebrows were probably permanent. I needed another haircut and my five-o-clock shadow June liked rubbing between her thighs was closer to midnight. Loud pops sounded when I stretched my ear to each shoulder, then rolled my head around.
An unusual, serene silence filled the office on my walk back. Empty before the night shift switch, I frowned at a small, yellow triangle sticking out from under my door. Once I recognized an envelope, my eyes pulled wide and I reached for my phone.
"Dispatch, code ten at thirty-four!" I barked out, my feet scrambling to get the fuck out of the building. The sparse people I collected along the way, who were already leaving, rushed out with me with a collective mindset.
Out. As quick and safe as possible, we had to get out.
My eyes skimmed over the employee attendance report for a manual dismissal for who hadn't signed out. By the time the bomb squad and K9 units arrived, the night shift guards gathered around me. Police tape roped off a two-block radius around the building and I sat on the sidewalk across the street until we were given an all-clear or instructions to go home.
With a sigh, I sank down on the same curb the New Year Eve's car hopped over. Craning my neck, the previously smashed-in metal frame of the drycleaner's store front had been repaired. All the windows were boarded up with plywood. Graffiti tagged most of it with a few colorful messages for NYPD.
"Lovely." Without a coat and an hour past my shift's end, I shivered.
In slow, relaxed movements, the all-Kevlar dressed bomb squad exited the front. A burly guy walked straight to me. "Captain Rivera?"
"Yeah." A shiver trembled down my spine.
"This was all we found." He handed over a manilla envelope. "Dogs didn't detect anything but -"
"I'll make sure Forensics gets it." I turned the same envelope that caused this false alarm in my hands. "Thanks."
His chest heaved and I trailed inside the night shift officers. With the envelope tucked under my armpit, I waited until my office door closed behind me before I opened it.
Over nine years in NYPD, I made enough arrests and busts that jaded enemies sat behind bars. Gang-related assaults were the number one source of violent crime in the 34th. They continued, along with all illegal activities, whether gang leaders operated out of prisons, within the comforts of their safe houses, or fled to other precincts, out to Long Island, across state lines to Hudson, New Jersey, even out of state past our jurisdiction lines.
No one other than who's already behind bars comes to mind though.
A month into our relationship, I told June about Santino's MS-13 connections, how I investigated him when we first met. I broke down when confessing how the fear of her being harmed because of my unapologetic approach to work drove me to push her away. In my fucked-up mindset, a June away from me was a better option for her.
She was right. I was a coward.
At the time, I was so concerned that her mugging happened that I hadn't considered any possibilities of why.
Why stared me right in the face, in the form of four black and white photos inside the envelope. The subject matter alone was a message I received loud and clear, shrinking the walls around me and forcing the air stale.
June and I sat in a cruiser on the 34th's lot, our lips locked, before she ID'd Santino. Us again, sitting across from each other at Patsy's afterward, was the picture behind it.
June and I walking Bullet was third. Her fingers linked in between mine, strands of her hair blowing up behind her. Heads tipped back, we both laughed.
The fourth picture chilled my blood to ice. June walked alone to work. Huddled over, her hands clasping her coat but she smiled with an inside secret.
The same message scrawled in messy black ink on the back of each photo engrained the warning into my brain.
Cesar y desistir.
Cease and desist.
"June," I whispered, grabbing my phone.
How could someone have gotten this close without me knowing?
The span of months across these photos burned into my chest. This wasn't a short-term, single occurrence. It was deliberate, calculated. Only once the location was the precinct.
Getting to June was all I cared about. Her safety and wellbeing were above my own. She had to be safe because...
My world can't exist without her in it.
Abandoning my bike in the lot, I drove a cruiser to SoHo. Fighting the urge to run the sirens, my fingers gripped the wheel. Snail-paced traffic lingered after the closed off streets were reopened. I hurled out one swear word after another until I parked in front of Adam and Vaughn's building.
The elevator wasn't fast enough. My feet weren't fast enough. Nothing was until I saw her.
"June!" My nerves were appeased only when I called her from the hallway and my fist pounded on Adam's apartment door. June's worried face answered it, dressed in her coat with Emma and Ma close behind.
Thank fuck.
My arms mauled June on first sight inside Adam's apartment. I closed my eyes under the hot tears that sprung up and heaved a long breath over her shoulder.
"Damian, what the fuck is wrong?" Understandably, she was confused, but too many curious eyes prompted me to lead them away in silence.
"Bomb scare." I escorted June, Emma, and my tipsy mother downstairs.
Technically, that wasn't a lie and already reported on the news. After I called Hernandez, I texted him a copy of the photos and dumped them off for Forensics to process on Monday.
He was shocked and horrified, cursing up a storm until my ears bled. Once I assured him we were both fine, he asked that I kept the pictures to myself until Forensics examined them. Since he had the security access level, not me, he requested the office security video footage, again for Monday's processing.
"Stay safe this weekend," he warned me once I called him that June was in my possession.
"Thank you, Sir."
I dumped Emma and Ma off at Chris' firehouse, then took June home and parked the cruiser in our condo's spare spot. Refusing to let her out of my sight, we walked Bullet together, where I explained what happened.
"That's..." Relief softened the crease lines in June's expression. Her hand palmed my chest over the thuds muffled by my leather coat. "I thought something happened to you. We saw the bomb threat on TV before you arrived."
"No." My hand clenched around her shoulders as tight as the grip I held on Bullet's leash. "But we're going to have to make some changes, June. I'm sorry but there's no choice."
Her chin dipped down, lowering her gaze and hiding her eyes under her thick lashes. Clueless, Bullet pulled down the sidewalk, intent to shoot up his usual spots. My eyes stayed on June until she offered a small nod.
Fueled by equal parts relief and stress, I fucked her hard that night. The pinch of her nails into my shoulders, the sweat from our bodies gliding together, and her whispered assurances eased my frayed nerves.
We didn't start out with me pounding into her. All I wanted was to hold her, physically feel her presence to soothe the nerves thrumming in my veins.
I led June to the sofa, where my arms curled around her waist and I tugged her down with me. My nose pushed through the cold strands of her hair and skimmed up the warmer, smooth skin of her neck. She trembled, her palms holding onto my shoulders.
The feel of her ass rubbing over my crotch stirred all the usual interest from the prick, but I tugged her to my chest. My heart thundered in my ribcage, my ears. I breathed in the smell of her soap.
"Damian..." Her palm pressed over the painful beats. "Calm down."
"I..." I huffed out a slow breath. "I will. Right now, I need to... hold you. Please."
"Like I need a reason to cuddle." Tucking into me, her cheek pressed into the hard line of my collar bone. I threaded one hand through her hair, stroking down the long, straight strands. My other hand curled around her waist, holding her flush with me.
"Not close enough," she murmured, her fingers dragging trails down my chest and stomach. They lined the edge of my shirt, the cool touch under my navel jolting my hips. "I want to try something."
"Uhh..." My hand paused on the top of her head, brown locks interweaving between my knuckles. Last time June offered that, I ended up with a donut threaded on my dick. Not that I didn't nearly nut myself from flicks of her tongue catching dribbles of chocolate ice. The biting risk held me back.
"Relax, it's not food," she whispered, her lips pressing into my cheek. "Put on a movie."
While I grabbed the remote on the side table, her fingers unbuttoned my pants. "June," I warned her as she slipped off my lap, drawing my pants down with her.
The cooler air tickled my kneecaps. I cleared my throat because normally we got ten minutes into a movie before this happened. "What do you want to watch?"
"The Darkest Hour." Her warm, humid breath whispered over my chest as she leaned over me.
Heat rose beneath my skin from the sight of her thumbs hooking into her pants. Hooded under her lashes, her eyes never left mine. The blackness in her pupils pooled larger as she tugged her pants and underwear down. My eyes followed their drop to her ankles, watching as her feet stepped out before she knelt over me.
A sharp exhale passed out my nose, flaring my nostrils at Winston Churchill bumbling toward accepting fascism during World War 2. With a head tilt, I clicked through our queue of partially watched videos and obliged. "We've attempted this one four times, June."
"And we'll finish." Her lips pressed soft, tickling trails up the side of my neck. "Your jaw's scruffy."
By the swelling interest between my thighs, finishing the movie became less of my concern. I abandoned the remote and squeezed my hands into my two favorite holding spots. My fingers embedded into her warm, smooth skin, kneading with the pads of my fingers. "Damn right we'll finish here but I'm not sure it'll be the movie."
"We will because you need a reminder of humanity's grace during the presence of evil," she whispered into the side of my neck. "And I'm warming your cock while we watch it until you can't take it anymore and fuck me senseless."
The teasing tones she tossed over her shoulder, coupled with her darkening eyes, was more than enough of a challenge. My stiffening cock reminded me of the obvious.
With all June's challenges, even when I lose... I win.
My lips chased the gap between hers, stopping only when they brushed together. "Facing me, you're not watching, June."
"Fair enough." June leaned back, tucked up her knees, and spun around on my thighs. Before I responded, her knees straddled my legs. Heat poured out from between her thighs as she hooked her feet around my shins, exposing herself.
One hand grounded on her hip, my other fingers lowered for a touch but she moved quicker. She lifted up, fished my half-hard cock out of the slit in my boxers, and sank down. Swallowing me with one entrance, heated suction wrapped around my tip. The dip into her wet walls surged my heart faster, pumping blood down to my pelvis. It filled with a heated ache as I expanded inside her.
As if I wasn't rod-stiff and lodged to the hilt inside her, June relaxed her shoulders against my chest. Her body stilled and eyes gazed at the screen.
"Uhh... June?" My hips bucked upward because, fuck, I was sprung ready. Her walls squeezed around me, arousal tickling the head as it pooled inside her.
"Shh!" she swatted my hand off her warm mound, away from the tease of recently smooth skin slicked with her early excitement.
The heated pressure pulsed tiny heartbeats up my shaft. With her hands clamped onto my knees, her head slacked back and met my shoulder. Her neck arched, lifting her chin up. My lips pressed onto her forehead.
"June?" I flexed my hips up so my balls pressed into her ass, nestling between her skin. My eyes rolled closed at the hot, wet, tightening sensations that surrounded my cock and she hadn't moved yet.
Before I met June, the sight of her curvy body and a few rounds of five-knuckle shuffling shot my load at a teenage speed. I wasn't embarrassed by that, maybe by how quickly I came, because June unlocked part of myself that I shut off months prior - interest.
Now together, I waited because tying June's pleasure to my own blew my dick every time. The left of comfort she displayed when she shook, cursed, and moaned through her body-shattering orgasms left me tongue-tied and drooling. Selfishly, my release was always better with my ego fed and balls soaked.
That said, my patience thinned to the point I nudged upward taps into June. She rocked and bounced small lifts on my lap but ignored me. I pinched her hips. My balls twitched and my cock throbbed for friction. Her walls' hot squeezes drew the blood out of my brain.
Let's see if I can distract her too.
June's eyelids lowered the more my hands moved, teasing paths up her inner thighs. A tremble ran down her spine, jiggling her on my cock. This time, she allowed my fingers to thread between her folds, brushing through the wet seam to the sensitive nerves.
Her lips rolled inward at my fingertip's teasing circles but her inside walls swelled and pulsed around me. I lifted my other hand upward, crossed my elbow over her chest, and cupped her shoulder in my palm. My lips found her earlobe, which I sucked in and held her to my chest.
After a few breaths of initial resistance, June slacked pliant against my chest. Her thighs trembled, then opened. When I shifted my hand and pressed two fingers hard, so hard I rubbed over the internal bone, she released a strangled, "Mmmmph," sound.
I rubbed harder, denting the pliant, swollen skin. Her fingernails sank into my knees, the last thread of restraint she clung to. Her lips parted.
"Fuck, this isn't working," she cursed into my ear, my favorite dirty music.
Relief sagged from my shoulders down to my balls when her eyes fluttered closed. A grin split my face when June rocked her hips up and pushed down. Her light movements warmed our contact points, head building between her back and my chest. The shirts we still wore stifled heat between us but I refused to let go. My hips rocked up as hers moved down, moving in slow, languid strokes until I panted into her shoulder. Perspiration tickled the skin at my hairline. My armpits and chest flamed under my shirt.
I pushed harder when a garbled sound choked its way up her throat, her lifts and drops turned uneven, and her walls constricted my movements. Gripping her chest, I continued my external presses into that magical nerve center, even when fluid gushed out of her. With slippery strokes, I plunged harder into her with long, deep thrusts. Warm pressure squeezed my cock as she tightened around me and moved harder in sync.
Once our movements turned into slammed, slapped contact of our skin slammed together rang out. Four thrusts in, June's spine locked up. Her unabashed, pleasure-soaked noises hit my ears in erotic words of encouragment. Each, "Ohhh..." sound she flung in my face surged my movements faster and harder.
I bucked up into her until she bounced on my lap. Fuck, no she bounced off my lap, then slapped herself down with gravity's help. My fingers pushed past her swollen outside, rubbing deep into the pubic bone. I wasn't sure why June preferred that deep push but she once called it her 'on switch.'
And fuck, I wanted my girlfriend on. And on. And on.
My fingers gripped her so tightly that the tips embedded in her skin, surrounded with pink haloes. Sweat soaked through my shirt, suffocating my torso in heat. My breath puffed out and a filthy mix of my grunts passed along my compliments.
"June," I groaned at the rippling skin from her ass smacking my thighs.
The slicked sounds of wetness squelched between us, the tickling sensations rolling over and in between my sacs. Her spine locked up again, grounding her chin to her chest, and her shoulders shuddered. With a softening around my base, her opening fluttered and warm fluid slicked over me.
"Ohhh..." she whispered, not the cry I normally ripped from her lips. Her sigh of relief hit me and the subsequent, "Ahhh..." pulled my balls upward, lengthening me inside her.
Warmth and pressure surged up my shaft, chased by a sagging release of pressing straining my torso muscles as I came. A loud groan vibrated my chest and throat at the slacked letdown, the euphoric relaxation that overcame the pleasure. Tiny throbs of pleasured aftershocks ran up my cock as it receded, twitching while still buried inside her.
My boxers were soaked with our mixed fluids, dripping around our connection point. Wetness coated my balls and thighs. Her entrance fluttered around my base, rushing tingles down my cock as it softened.
Without caring about my lap, she sat in a sticky mess. I pulled my hips back but froze when her internal squeeze matched her hand clutched around my wrist.
"Stay." Her lips parted into a soft, breathless whisper, "This part."
I followed her gaze to the screen, an exchange between Churchill and his wife, Clementine. With a stare straight into his eyes, Clementine said, "You are strong because you are imperfect. You are wise because you have doubts."
Tears beaded up in June's eyes as they looked over her shoulder. Her insides hugged me when my thumbs dragged over her damp lashes. "You too, Damian."
My heart fluttered. Mushy soft but still buried inside her and my boxers soaked, I held her so close my heart beat into her back. Her palms hooked over my forearms as I breathed down the thumps in my ears.