Read Story: SEASON 2 EPISODE 54

We remained quiet for the next ten minutes or so as I concentrated on sewing her up. She stopped me early on to request a Tylenol, and then occasionally offered me some advice on how to best approach the medical procedure. I finished it off with some super glue, which Chloe informed me was initially invented as a medical tool. Between the bad sewing job and the adhesive, by the time I was done, Chloe was thoroughly patched and no longer leaking.

“Thanks,” she said as she started to roll onto her left side.

“Here,” I said as I placed a hand on her shoulder to offer support as carefully as I could. I cautiously reached behind her, arranging the parachute material to provide as much support as possible while she settled into place.

When I pulled back onto my haunches, she was settled into place, looking at me from underneath a fringe of dirty blonde hair that threatened to fall into her eyes. I reached up and brushed the wayward strands away, tucking them carefully behind her ear.

“Thanks,” she said, offering me a smile that hit differently than any of the others she’d given me so far. Those rang of amusement. This one, though…

Before I could put too much thought into what it meant, my eyes were distracted by a veritable feast. The light issuing from the Sterno did lovely things as it danced along the curves of her bare abdomen and toned arms. She looked like a fucking badass. Lying on her side, propped on one arm, her hair over her shoulder, while the strap of her bra draped down her arm… she was a vision.

And I was hungry for her.

Which felt wrong. She was injured and covered in blood. It felt wrong to lust after her while she was wounded.

Though I wasn’t sure I was entirely to blame on that score. The way Chloe carried herself, you wouldn’t have thought it bothered her that much. It made sense that Chloe had taken her injury and its care in stride. As I stared at her body, I couldn’t help but notice the collection of scars she had. Having spent last night exploring her body in the dark, I wasn’t able to see visual details, and the sex this morning had been focused on her face as we had a slower, lazy fuck. Now, in the light of the flame, I could see a thin scar running across half her abdomen about three inches above her navel, stretching from the middle of her stomach to disappear around her left side. A similar, but fainter line ran from her chest across her right breast, where it vanished beneath her bra cup. I’d noticed another scar across the right side of her lower back, and now that I could stare at her without her shirt on, I could see not one, but two bullet scars—one in her right side and one just below her left shoulder.

God… the injury tonight must have seemed like a mosquito bite compared to everything else she had endured.

“I saw Tanaka’s kid today,” she said. “Resemblance was pretty good to his old man. He looked pissed.”

“You saw him?” I asked.

“Yeah,” she said with a grimace. “I would’ve taken the bastard out if I’d had a clean shot.”

“Please tell me you aren’t serious. They probably would have caught you if you’d done that.”

“I thought about it. I think there’s a fifty-fifty chance that they’d just leave if I had tagged him. No one there to pay the bills, so no reason to risk dying. Still… I'm not much good to you dead, so it’s probably just as well.”

“Yeah… I'm gonna veto the whole dying thing,” I said.

“You’re the boss,” Chloe said, shrugging a shoulder. Only, it was the bad one, and she winced as she did it.

I grinned. It was nice to see a glimpse of the Chloe I was getting to know peek through the curtain again.

“So, no dying,” she went on, “but I'm headed back out tomorrow.”

“You’re in no condition,” I protested.

“You’re gonna have to drug me to get me to stay, Marcus. Either that or tie me up.”

“Maybe I will,” I said, only half joking.

“If we were back in the mansion, maybe I'd let you, but this isn’t the mansion, and I'm not letting you stop me.”

“What happened to conserving our energy?”

“You didn’t have any concerns about conservation last night,” Chloe said.

I rolled my eyes, “Chloe—”

“Marcus, I know what I’m doing. I counted at least nine more mercs out there. There could be more. We need to thin out the herd more before we get to the point where the cabin is our only option.”

“Nine!? Look what three of them nearly did to you!”

“I’m gonna take a different approach tomorrow,” Chloe said, arching an eyebrow at me.

“What approach?”

“We’ve got a rocket launcher and two more rockets. I’m going to use them.”

I balked.

“At the cabin?” I asked once I recovered.

She nodded.

“Don’t we need the cabin? What about the staff Astrid hired to take care of us? What if they’re still inside?” I asked.

“I'm gonna do it carefully,” she said.

I shook my head in disbelief but refrained from saying anything. What could I say that would convince this woman not to do something she was hell-bent on doing? I was reasonably certain that if it came down to a physical fight, she could still take me out in point zero-two seconds. Besides… she was right. She was the expert, and if she felt like she could shoot a rocket at a cabin without destroying our chance at communicating with the outside world or hitting one of the staff that might potentially be alive inside, who was I to argue? I should shut up and just let the woman do her job.

So, I decided to change the subject.

“Where did you get this?” I asked, pointing to the thin scar across her abdomen. I let my fingertip trace across the barely-there ridge of tissue.

“Razor wire in Yemen,” Chloe said in the same tone she might have used to tell me where she got her morning coffee. The defiant gleam in her eyes was beginning to fade into something softer.

“Hm,” I said, letting my eyes wander over her body. Next, I ran my finger over the bullet scar just above the razor wire injury. “What about this?”

“Upstart warlord in Kenya,” she said, fighting a little smile. Her abs rippled slightly as I ran my fingers over her skin around the old wound. Could she be a little ticklish?

“I’d tell you more, but most of it’s classified,” she concluded.

“Jesus,” I said. “What about this one?” I brushed the bullet hole just below her shoulder with the back of my knuckles.

“Henry,” Chloe said.

Record scratch.

“Psalter?” I asked.

“That’s the one,” she said, unable to hide an amused smile.

“What the fuck?”

“We disagreed on how to solve a problem. He did whatever it took to dissuade me, and he was right.”

“He shot you!?”

“It was years ago,” Chloe said. “Water under the bridge.”

I eyed her for several moments, wondering if I was going to get any more information from her, but when it was clear she wasn’t going to offer it, I started to caress her skin again.

I noticed the rhythm of her breaths began to increase; it was subtle but unmistakable. Her golden brown eyes were fixed on me, the firelight reflecting in them beautifully.

“What about this one?” I asked, brushing my fingers across her upper chest, tracing the faint scar down to the softness of her freckled breast. They hit the fabric of her bra and then moved across the edge of the cup molded to the gentle swell of her chest. Encased in the supportive garment, it was like the softest velvet, with just the slightest resistance from my fingers as they indented her skin.

“An ex,” she said. “He was a Chinese operative.”

My caresses slowed, but didn’t stop—my shock wasn’t nearly as palpable as hearing about the last scar.

“You got duped by a Chinese spy?” My fingers dipped under the bra, the backs of them sliding over her skin until my fingertips grazed a nipple. Chloe’s eyelids twitched as I came in contact with the sensitive bud… the only sign she gave that it had been effective.

“It was more of a Mr. and Mrs. Smith thing,” she said.

“You’ve lived one hell of a life,” I said, placing my palm on her upper breast as my finger continued to explore underneath.

“Yeah,” she said, not making any move to stop me. If anything, I sensed a subtle shift in the way she lay, more pressure against my palm that I hadn’t instigated. I took it as a subtle invitation for me to continue my explorations.