“Hey.” I picked up my phone when I saw Evie calling. “I was just thinking about you,” I told her. Thinking about all the things I’m going to do with your body when I finally get you naked beneath me. I didn’t think she’d appreciate knowing those details, though, so I kept them to myself.

  “Good things, I hope,” she said.

  “Always.”

  “You mean pervy things,” she joked, but we both knew she wasn’t far off the mark.

  “Guilty as charged. I think you might have to cuff me and search me.”

  “Oh God,” she said, and I could swear I heard her eyes roll. “The cheesiness never ends. What the hell am I doing with you?”

  “Good question. Don’t answer that, though. Wouldn’t want you to realize the error of your ways and drop me.”

  “Nah, I wouldn’t do that. In fact, look out the window. Or better yet, come outside.”

  “What? Why? Aren’t I supposed to pick you up in about two hours?”

  “Yep, but I have a surprise for you.”

  “Oh, interesting. Coming right out.”

  When I walked out, I actually stopped short at seeing Evie in her uniform standing beside her police car. “Um, are you on duty? I thought today was your day off.”

  “I am off duty,” she said, practically purring. Down, little Eddie, down. “This past month has been great, Eddie, truly. You’ve made me feel special in a way no one else ever has. You made me feel treasured and beautiful, and I have seen firsthand just how much you respect what I do instead of making me feel like the black sheep by being a woman cop. You’ve basically fulfilled some of the fantasies I didn’t even know I had with regards to how I want to be treated by the guy I’m dating. So now it’s time I fulfill one of your fantasies.”

  Oh shit … I knew where this was going, and I was one breeze away from blowing my goddamn load. Not to mention … that sign I was looking for? If this wasn’t it, blinding me with its neon brightness, well then shit, I didn’t know what a sign was.

  “Holy shit,” I mumbled loud enough for Evie to hear. She rewarded me with a sly smile.

  “Well, Eddie. It seems you’ve been a good boy all month. But I hear you’ve just turned bad.” Cue the beginnings of the hottest porno ever, starring yours truly.

  “Oh, yes, very. I think I need a strip search.”

  “Eddie, you really suck at this,” she teased.

  “Oh, I’ll show you sucking, Officer Drew.”

  “Dear Lord,” she said with a laugh. “Come on, Eddie, hurry up before someone sees me. I could get into big trouble doing this,” she admitted, her tone becoming serious.

  “I don’t want you to get in trouble,” I told her. “Just being with you is enough.”

  She smiled. “And that’s exactly why I’m risking it for you.”

  “Where are we going?” I asked as I got into the car. I was tempted to slide into the back seat … you know, really make this fantasy come to life. But I thought that might be pushing it.

  “To my place,” she told me, and like a giddy schoolgirl, I couldn’t fucking wait.

  Evie

  Seducing Eddie like that was wrong. Not the actual seduction part, but the wrongful use of police resources. But desperate times called for desperate measures. And sexual frustration was absolutely a desperate time.

  God, if Nelson knew, he wouldn’t rat me out, but he’d definitely give me so much shit.

  We made it back to my place without much incident, the only exception being Eddie’s lame lines. Secretly, his cheesiness was actually adorable. He should have had absolutely no game, but he had plenty. And I was no exception to falling under his charm. So much so that here I was, breaking the rules to be with him.

  The minute we were behind my closed door, the Eddie of the previous month was gone, and in his place was a completely different person. This Eddie’s eyes were ablaze with unbridled hunger directed at me. This Eddie shed the dorky one-liners and seemed to stand taller with a confidence he exuded whenever he was working. This Eddie pulled me into his arms and kissed me in a way I’d never been kissed, and that was saying something because each time our lips touched, it was magic. But now … it was something even greater like a whole other universe. Stars exploding before our very eyes, galaxies forming, and black holes appearing.

  I felt Eddie’s hand creep into my hair, pulling at the hair tie that kept my hair slicked back and in a tight bun. In one swift motion, my hair pooled down around my shoulders, our lips still locked. But as soon as he felt my hair against his hand, he pulled back. I could feel his eyes on me as I opened mine, and when I did, he was staring longingly at me. “Fuck, Evie, I can’t even describe how beautiful you are. And it’s not just your looks. It’s everything, from how determined you are, to how fierce you are, and how sweet you are. You’re the perfect mixture of badass and vulnerable,” he said with a little smirk, and even though his choice of wording was interesting, I knew he meant every single thing he said.

  “And this, right here, bringing this fantasy to life … God, I don’t even know how to express with words just how much I cherish it, cherish you. So, instead, I’ll show you,” he said as he lifted me, forcing my legs to wrap around his body. He carried me with one arm as he brushed the hair away from my face, his eyes not leaving mine as he took me to the bedroom.

  He set me down on the bed, still fully clothed. “Well, this is absolutely a first, Officer Drew. A fan-fucking-tastic first,” he said with a smirk. “And as much as I’m enjoying watching your eyes half-lidded with lust and your lips parted in anticipation while you wear your uniform, I need to see it on the floor instead.”

  I didn’t know how Eddie could go from cheesy to hot as fuck so quickly, but he made it work.

  “Show me what you got, Officer Drew,” he said with none of his usual teasing and only a pure, raw sensual tone coloring his words.

  I stood slowly, letting the enormity of what was about to happen settle in the air for both of us. “Together,” I commanded, and I knew he loved when I dominated just as much as he loved to be in control.

  And so together, our eyes on each other, we undressed, one button at a time, slipping clothes off, pulling pants down, and underwear off until we were standing in front of each other with our bare bodies on display as if we were art to be enjoyed by the viewer.

  We breathed in and out, our eyes taking in the other for a good long minute before Eddie whispered, “Fuck,” and then dived in. His arms wrapped around me as his lips claimed mine. I gasped out loud from the sensation of his lips on mine. My body was sensitive, heightened. Every stroke of his fingertips sent shocks down my spine and chills through my body.

  And then he followed those fingers with his mouth, his teeth, and his tongue until he’d kissed and licked and nipped at my entire body. My knees were weak, and I could barely stand. He walked me back the two steps to my bed, and I fell gently backward.

  “Eddie, please,” I begged.

  “You don’t know what it does to me to hear you need me like this. You’re so strong, but here and now … Shit, Evie, you’re my dream come true.”

  His words were an aphrodisiac of their own. “Eddie,” I begged again.

  And then his mouth was on me, devouring me, and I moaned as I arched my back. His tongue flicked my clit as his hands held me down, my body attempting to move away because the onslaught of pleasure was almost too much. He continued his glorious assault, adding a finger, then two, and it felt like mere minutes before I was calling out his name as my climax hit me full force.

  “Ride me,” he told me as I was coming down from my high.

  “What?” I asked, still dazed from the force of my climax.

  “Ride me,” he commanded. “Show me what you like. Show me that strength I admire. Show me everything.”

  And so, I did. He climbed on the bed and put a condom on, and I straddled him before I sank down slowly, inch by inch, feeling him as he filled me. I stared down at his face, his expression almost painful as pure bliss overcame me. “Me too,” I whispered, telling him I echoed the same sentiment I knew he was feeling. And then he was all the way in, and I lifted before sinking back down. He groaned in pleasure just as I moaned. His hands found my hips, and he held me as I moved up and down, slowly, then faster, his hips moving up to meet mine until I felt him getting harder. Knowing that was because of me turned me on that much more. I moved up quicker, meeting him thrust for thrust until I threw my head back as I came again, and this time, I felt him come with me.

  I collapsed on his body, spent, and I felt him tracing my spine. I shivered under his gentle touch. “That was … that was something else,” he whispered in my ear.

  “No words,” I responded. I got up and started to head toward the bathroom to clean up.

  “Where are you going?” he asked.

  “To the bathroom.”

  “Not without me,” he said with a sly smile before getting up to follow me.

  “If you come with me, I doubt I’ll get cleaned up.”

  “First off, I believe I already came with you,” he said with a teasing smile. “And second, we’ll get cleaned up. We just might get dirty first.”

  And we did once more in the shower, and then once more in bed before he pulled me to him, and we fell asleep with his arm curled around my body, caging me in. I didn’t mind it. I didn’t mind it one bit.

  Eddie

  “Sorry I’m late,” Benny said as he strolled through the door like he’d just entered his own home. Benny was always comfortable with the people he cared about. He was covered in tattoos, had a mean stare, and was intimidating as fuck, but he had a heart of gold. And if you were in his circle, he had your back every single minute of every single day. That also meant he treated you like family, and family, according to him, didn’t need to knock.

  Mason was already at my place, but we had yet to start watching the game since Benny hadn’t made it yet. We had ordered pizza, though, since we already knew what everyone wanted. It was the same every time we got together to watch football, which was roughly once a month. John was going to join us at halftime, but Chain couldn’t make it.

  “We’ve been waiting for your lagging ass,” Mason told him.

  “Not my fault,” Benny said as he grabbed a beer from the fridge and plopped down on my couch. “Some fucking asshole cop with a stick up his ass pulled me over.”

  “What the hell did you do?” Mason asked.

  “Not a damn fucking thing,” Benny replied with a sneer. “Douchebag took one look at me and decided I was trouble.”

  “Well ...” I responded with a chuckle. Sadly, Benny actually did get stopped more often than the rest of us. He was what a lot of people would call a “thug.” And he looked the part even after a wife and kids, wearing typical clothes of a guy his age, clean shaven, and happy with life, far removed from the days of his illegal ventures. Almost like the cheesy line, “You can take the guy out of the streets, but you can’t take the streets out of the guy.” Benny was the streets, for lack of a better word. People took one look at him, and they immediately judged. Cops were no exception. They saw a “thug” driving a nice car, and they got suspicious. Fucked up, if you asked me, but overall, Benny was used to it. It annoyed him to no end, and he bitched about it each time. But he’d just accepted that it was part of his life.

  “You don’t get a say in this,” Benny told me.

  “Why the hell not?” I responded, a little affronted and one-hundred percent curious.

  “Because you’re biased.”

  “What the hell does that mean?”

  “How long you been seeing Evie now?” he asked by way of response.

  “Three months, but what does that have anything to do with it?” It was actually less, but I sort of consolidated all those pre-dating run-ins, which I counted as foreplay, plus a month of dating before Evie had fulfilled every single one of my fantasies, and then another month of unbelievable dating and sex since then. So roughly three months.

  “Damn, that’s the longest relationship you’ve ever had, huh?” Mason asked.

  “Yeah.”

  “You guys serious?” Benny asked.

  “I guess you could say that. This is the first time I’ve actually wanted to settle down. And I couldn’t imagine it being with anyone else,” I admitted honestly.

  “Well then, that’s why you don’t get a say.”

  “I don’t get it,” I replied, still confused.

  “You can’t bash on cops with us, Eddie,” Mason said.

  “Who the hell said anything about bashing on cops? Why the fuck would we do that?” I asked, getting defensive.

  “That, right there,” Benny said with a smirk.

  “What the fuck are you getting at?” I asked, starting to get ticked off.

  “We always talk shit about cops after I have a run-in, Eddie,” Benny told me calmly. I could hear the truth in his words, but my heart wasn’t hearing it. All I pictured was Evie in her uniform with hateful words being thrown at her. I wasn’t down with that.

  “No, we don’t,” I told him, but I knew it was a lie.

  He just stared at me. I looked at Mason, and he was staring with an eyebrow raised like he was waiting for something to kick in for me. I stared back, silently asking him what the hell was going on.

  “You haven’t even told her yet, have you?” Mason asked after a minute.

  “Mase, man, he hasn’t even realized it himself,” Benny said to him.

  “I’m right fucking here,” I said angrily. “What the hell haven’t I realized?”

  They still didn’t answer, just kept staring at me as if I was the dumbest person on the face of the earth. I didn’t like it, and I was tempted to get up and storm out like a child, but it was my damn house.

  “Jesus Christ, you sure he’s not related to you?” Benny asked Mason. “It’s okay, Eddie,” Benny said, turning back to me. “I had to spell it out for this fucker too with Kat. You love her, Eddie.”

  “Wha-what?” I sputtered. “I don’t love her. It’s too soon.”

  “Who says it’s too soon?” Benny countered. “You think love has a timeline? You think it picks convenient people or convenient times? Look at me, man. Look at Mase. That should tell you love is a fucking fickle bitch, and she doesn’t give a shit about what’s right or wrong or when you should or shouldn’t love. She just creeps in, slams into your heart like a hurricane, and you hold on for dear life, hoping you survive to see the rainbow after the storm. And if you survive? Fuck, Eddie, what a beautiful rainbow it is.”

  I’d heard stories of Benny’s wisdom. I’d even seen it firsthand on countless occasions. But each time was still a shock to the system. He was witty and sarcastic when he was relaxed and having fun. He was protective and loving when Sophie and his kids were around. He was a beast when someone fucked with his “people.” And he was thoughtful and quiet all the other times. But when he had something important to say, the man was worth listening to.

  Basically, all the couples I knew said they were where they were because of Benny.

  I opened my mouth to argue, to tell Benny his words made sense, but they weren’t right for me. And then I shut my mouth quickly, realizing just where my thoughts had taken me.

  I smiled like a damn fool whenever I thought about Evie. I rotated my work schedule coincide my days off with hers. I loved seeing her sleeping in my bed, her chest rising and falling as she slept comfortably, knowing I was there with her even if she was the stronger one. I wanted to tell her about my day and hear about hers. I wanted to send her random texts and funny pictures throughout the day. And I couldn’t imagine not having her in my life.

  “Fuck,” I whispered, the epiphany hitting me slowly at first and then with full force. “I love her.”

  “Now he gets it,” Benny teased, looking at Mason, but I wasn’t truly paying attention to them. I was thinking about what I’d just learned.

  “You going to tell her?” Mason asked, forcing me to look at him.

  “I don’t know,” I answered honestly, still processing the fact that I loved Evie. I well and truly loved her.

  “You know from experience that shit can happen, and we can lose people we love. Don’t wait too long, Eddie,” Mason told me somewhat solemnly. “Don’t let the opportunity to let her know how you feel slip away from you.”

  “You’re right.”

  “Good,” he said with a nod. “Now, no more of this love talk. We have a game to watch.”

  And so we did, but for the rest of the time they were there, my mind was elsewhere … on the woman I loved.

  Evie

  Stumped. That was the only word I could think of to express how I was feeling thanks to Eddie over the past few weeks. Nothing had changed, yet something had, and I couldn’t figure out what was going on. And I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, which was why I was stumped.

  He was acting a little differently, but it wasn’t anything blatantly obvious. I couldn’t even tell you exactly what was different. It was more of a gut instinct, and my instincts hadn’t steered me wrong yet … except with Eddie. My first instinct was that he was an asshole like the rest, but look at us now. We’d come a long way from that first encounter.

  As a woman, we had a sick sense of intuition that let us know when our man was up to something. Add that to my killer cop instincts—yes, I totally said that—and I just knew that Eddie was up to something. I just didn’t know what.

  “You’re insane,” my friend Yasmine told me.

  “He’s cheating,” chimed in Sadie.

  I was getting whiplash from the two of them.

  Yasmine thought I was sabotaging myself. That I was finding trouble where trouble didn’t exist. She was the optimist in the group, thinking love came with Disney songs. Sadie thought all men were pigs, so she just used and abused before they could do it to her—her words, not mine. She said if I thought something was wrong, then something was wrong, and of course, she jumped to the worst conclusion.

 

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