Lawyers In Love: Bittersweet Homecoming (13 page)
Andi grilled him with a look she hoped would convey just how mad she was. “I mean, according to your neurosurgeon, you’ve got more episodes like the one that had you screaming in agony in your future, if you don’t get that cyst removed from your spine. Lots more.”
“Did Rodriguez also remind you that removing the cyst might cause total paraplegia?”
“Yes. You told me too, the day you started to chicken out on meeting Brett. As I recall, you said you wouldn’t have the surgery because you might lose the feelings. What you didn’t mention is that the pain would be getting worse and worse if you didn’t. So bad it might very well make you nonfunctioning as a human being.”
The look on his face made Andi want to comfort and not badger him, but this was too important. She couldn’t bear seeing him writhe in agonizing pain, being unable to do anything to ease his suffering. She clasped his hand, wouldn’t let him pull it away the way he’d seemed to withdraw emotionally the moment she’d come into his hospital room. “Gray. I told you it doesn’t matter if you can’t walk. If we have to find new ways of making love.”
“If I have the surgery I may never be able to fuck you again. Do you understand that?”
“Yes. But I also know there are other ways…damn it, you know you can make me come just by telling me to touch myself. That’s not going to change.” Tears poured down Andi’s cheeks. “I’d rather have mind sex with you than be fucked half to death by anybody else. Fuck you, Gray. I love you, but if you can’t accept my love then we have no business together. No business at all.”
“I don’t know.” He stared at her, apparently not cognizant at the moment that they’d removed his patch in the ER when they undressed him, because he’d never let her see that scar before.
The scar the eye patch covered was ugly—so ugly she understood his desire not to show it to her or anyone else. But it was part of the man she’d come to love. Steeling herself not to give in, she squeezed his hand and focused her gaze on his good eye. “Well, darling, you have exactly eight hours to figure it out, because I told Dr. Rodriguez to schedule your operation…and if you want me, you’re going to sign those consent forms. Incidentally, I had him get hold of Marcy’s ex since I understand the procedure to extract sperm’s not exactly pleasant. If you want me, I’m going to assume you also still want us to have another baby and that you’ll have that procedure done along with the other, while you’re not awake to enjoy it. Give me a kiss now. I’ve got to be in court first thing in the morning.”
Walking out of that hospital room was the hardest thing Andi had ever done. Period. Gray was afraid. Terrified of losing what he thought made him a man. Willing to endure incredible pain to avoid the risk Dr. Rodriguez had said he was taking anyway because that cyst could grow, completely block the spinal cord at some point with the same result the surgery might have.
She wanted to hold him, tell him again it wouldn’t change things…tell him she’d love him no matter what. But she’d said that and more. Now Gray had to figure out for himself what she already knew: sex or not, whether he walked or tooled around the courthouse in a wheelchair all the time, he was one hell of a man. The only man for her, now and forever.
If he couldn’t accept that, then he was less of a man than she thought.
* * * * *
Idiot. It’s not your perfect body that makes you the man I love. Not even your hard, hot cock or the way you move it in my pussy. It’s the looks you give me. The touch of your hands and lips and tongue. The sound of your voice. The love in your expression when you watch our son at play. When will you believe I’m not missing out on anything because you’re not able to pick me up and carry me around or make all the moves you used to?
Could Andi possibly have meant that when she’d snapped it after he balked again this morning at having the surgery? After she left, Gray stared up at the ceiling in a small square room much like all the other small square hospital rooms where he’d spent time during the eleven months following his rescue. Rodriguez would be striding in any minute now, brandishing his multi-page consent form with all its tragic possibilities.
Another cramp wracked his lower body, so bad he had to grit his teeth to keep from crying out in spite of whatever stuff they’d shot him full of to kill the pain. He wouldn’t yell. Instead he’d concentrate on happy memories. Brett laughing with him as they’d played in the pool the other day. The two of them trying to coax Andi into the water…and him succeeding later that night, after Brett had gone to sleep.
Moonlight filtered down through the pool’s screen enclosure, and a pair of citronella torches lent a golden glow of their own as they emitted their familiar bug-repelling fragrance. Warm water lapped against their naked bodies while he sat on the wide, curved step and held her, speaking softly as he might talk to a frightened kid. Gentling her, drawing out the fear she’d held onto for years since she’d apparently had a near miss with drowning.
“Trust me, baby. I won’t let anything bad happen to you.”
Here, in the water, his limitations seemed unimportant, his movement unconfined by braces and the fucked-up nerves that didn’t carry their messages very accurately to his legs. For the first time since he’d come home, Gray felt worthy of the trust that had let her take those three steps down into the water to come into his arms.
“Ready to take it a little deeper?” he said when her breathing slowed and she sighed contentedly in his arms. God, but it felt great to hold her, cradle her slender body against his chest as she floated on the shimmering surface of the water.
“Oh, yes.”
“Relax, then. Hold onto me.” He slid lower, let his feet rest on the bottom before standing with her, letting her legs and ass sink slowly into the water, savoring the feel of her satiny skin slipping along his trunk, over his half-hard cock. His legs no longer felt dead and useless, buoyed up as they were in the still, warm pool. “Put your arms around my waist.” When she did, all thoughts of a
swimming lesson fled Gray’s mind.
“Gray, the moon’s full tonight,” Andi whispered once her feet hit bottom and the water lapped at her pert, pink nipples. “Full the way it was that Friday night on
“Yeah.” Much as he’d done that night, he reached out and cupped her breasts, twisting the nipples until they tightened into rigid buds that invited his lips and tongue. Dropping his head, he nibbled one of the delectable little nubs. “Lie back against the step, honey. The swim lesson can wait. Right now I want to fuck you. Me on top. Moving in you. Taking you. Loving you.”
“Oh, yesss. Fuck me, please.” As though her fear no longer troubled her, she lay back against the step, her head back, red-gold hair framing a face lit by the moon and the flickering torches.
“My pleasure.” He floated over her, braced his feet on the pool’s smooth bottom, and found her slick cunt with his fingers. “Spread your legs for me. Let me into your hot, juicy pussy.”
He sank into her heat, loved the feel of her firm, silky legs wrapped around his waist. Her satin slit warmed his balls and her pussy clenched his cock like a fist. But better. So much better. Bracing his hands on the step where her shoulders lay, he began to move. Slowly. Prolonging the sensation, the feel not only of sex but of power.
Her nipples grazed his chest when he moved. Hard, tight. Arousing him more as they lay in the moonlight, in the warm, still water, fucking at the pace he set. Driving into her sweet sex over and over, gently then harder until she cried out his name and clamped down so hard on him he had no choice but to let loose and come with her.
Yeah, it had felt damn good to be in control again. But Andi hadn’t seemed to enjoy that any more or less than she liked straddling his hips and taking him while he told her what to do. Hell, she’d even gotten off a few times when he hadn’t even touched her. If she could be believed, she’d even climaxed at the sound of his voice.
Maybe he was the only one who thought he was less than a whole man…the only one who believed his manhood was tied up with having functioning gonads and the ability to use them.
“Gray?”
When he looked over to the side of the bed, it wasn’t Rodriguez standing there. Sam Kramer, looking more serious and a hell of a lot better than the skinny redheaded nerd Gray recalled from their high school days, looked down at him. Sam had filled out some, grown some muscles. The carrot-top curls that used to cause him so much teasing had mellowed out to sandy brown and been tamed by the attention of a decent barber. The preppy hairstyle had to have been Marcy’s doing.
“Hi, Sam.” Damn it, Gray didn’t like admitting to an old acquaintance that he needed help to make a kid. Not even when the old acquaintance was a doctor that specialized in fertility problems.
“I understand from Gil Rodriguez that you may need my services.”
Gray tried to squelch the feeling of humiliation that no amount of pain medications could get rid of. “‘Fraid so. I assume you know all about my particular problem.”
“Retrograde ejaculation. You’d be surprised how many men have that particular problem. You know, it doesn’t always happen because of an injury like yours. Since you’re going to be under general anesthesia for your other surgery today, I suggest we go ahead and collect some sperm while you’re asleep. Normally I do the procedure under local, but while it’s not excruciatingly painful, it’s not an experience most of my patients enjoy. What do you say?”
“What are you going to do?” Besides making me feel like a scientific experiment, that is.
The procedure Sam described sounded more suited to being performed in a BDSM torture chamber than a hospital operating room. Probes and electric currents? Gray figured that if he were going to do it, he damn well had better get it taken care of while he was sound asleep. “Are you sure it will work?”
“I’m sure I’ll get some semen. How viable the sperm are, we won’t be able to tell until we get some out and take a look. I’ve had about a seventy percent success rate with sperm obtained by electro-ejaculation. The shorter the time the retrograde ejaculation’s been going on, the better the chance that the procedure will be successful.” As though he were giving a lecture to a medical school class, Sam told him how paraplegics with recent injuries were better candidates for the procedure than ones who had been injured years earlier. “Since your problem is spinal stenosis and not a complete spinal cord injury, I’d say your chances of fathering another child are pretty good. Gil mentioned that you and your wife already have one son.”
“Yes. That was before my injury, though.”
“I know. But it does indicate that you had a decent sperm count to start with, and that she has no fertility problems, or at least had none at the time your first child was conceived. Shall I plan to join you in the OR this afternoon?”
Should he do it? Gray wasn’t even sure he’d go along with the back surgery, but from what Andi had said he had no other viable choice. “How long do you wait—”
“I’ll flash-freeze the sample I take, and when you and Andi decide it’s time to have a baby, I’ll thaw some and inject it high up in her vagina at the optimum time in her cycle. If that doesn’t work, I use more, inject it laparoscopically into a fallopian tube. Finally, if the sperm count’s good enough but she still isn’t pregnant, I’ll do an
in vitro
fertilization.”
“All right. Leave the consent form. I want to read it before I sign.”
What had sounded unpleasant but relative simple when Sam explained it made Gray’s balls shrivel when he read the form. Why? Why had he been the one caught and beaten, turned into a scarred cripple who just might lose what few pleasures he had left to him this afternoon? Gray scribbled his name on the last page, dated it, and was about to set it on the bedside table when Dr. Rodriguez came through the door, another sheaf of papers in hand.
“Can the spiel, Doc. I already know the risks and benefits, you’ve told me often enough. Give me the paper and I’ll sign it. Don’t say a word to Andi. You already told her more than she needs to know.”
“Your decision. That woman loves you, though. Has to, or she wouldn’t be able to look at your face. Two nurses grabbed me on the way in here, each with a brand-new eye patch in hand. Here, put one of them on. Now, before you scare off half the staff.”
Gray reached up when he realized his patch was gone. Hurriedly, he positioned another one over the mass of scars no plastic surgeon could repair. Damn it, he’d found a jewel in his wife. One who wanted him even if he ended up a helpless cripple, who could stand beside him and look at the worst of his scars without running away, screaming in terror. A woman who understood what it meant to love him and loved him anyway. “Go ahead, let her know. You know, she never saw this before this morning.” He gestured toward the patch. “I never take this off except to bathe, and not then if she’s likely to come in. While you’re at it, let Kramer see if he can help me give her another baby.”
Chapter Nine
“Go on, Andi. I know you want to see Gray before his surgery. I’ll finish prepping Craig for the statutory rape trial you’re turning over to him.”
“Thanks. Don’t lose any sleep over me. I’ve got the man I love, and whether he’s in a wheelchair or on his feet doesn’t matter to me. I just want him not to hurt anymore.”
“I can’t believe you can stand there and calmly tell me it doesn’t matter if he can’t fuck you. At least you’ll have a baby to cuddle up to if his operation doesn’t come out right. Sam may be the world’s biggest asshole, but he’s damn good at making babies. For other people, that is.”
Andi had always assumed her colleague was childless because she chose to be—but she had no time to go down that road right now, so she thanked Marcy for her help and gathered up her things. She’d go home, reassure Brett, and get to the hospital before they knocked Gray out. No matter what he decided about the operation and the baby, she’d live with it. The other option—doing as she’d threatened to and leaving him—was too dreadful to consider.