All of Me (24 page)

They pulled onto a
side street and then down a dark, rain-soaked alley.  Stella spotted the
cruiser halfway down the alley.  When she opened her door to get out, she heard
Nathan screaming.

“He’s a great
officer and we all have off nights.”  Steve looked at the cruiser, then back at
Stella.  “But good luck.  You’re gonna need it.”

Danny met her
halfway.  He jerked a thumb over his shoulder at Nathan’s thrashing body
bouncing around the back of the cruiser.  “See what I’m saying?  Totally out of
control.”

“Uh, yeah.  I
guess so.”  Stella noticed four officers milling near the cruiser.  “Nobody’s
in there with him?”

“We tried, but
nobody was in the mood to be kicked or head-butted.”  Danny’s lips turned up
slightly.  “At least he isn’t spitting or shitting himself. Yet.”

The four officers
nodded their greetings as she walked up.  When Stella tried to open the
driver’s side door, one put his hand against the door, preventing her.

“You can’t go in
there,” he said in a patronizing tone Stella was in no mood for.  “He’ll hurt
you.  Just talk to him through the window.”

She shoved his arm
out of the way and tried to open it again.  When he did it again, Stella got
pissed.
   “Move your arm or he’s not going to be the only one kicking and screaming,”
she said through gritted teeth.

“Let her go in.
She knows what she’s doing,” Danny said from behind her.

The officer slowly
lowered his arm and stepped aside.  Stella rolled her eyes as she yanked open
the cruiser door. 

She was met by a
hoarse, but still loud, barrage of incoherent rambling.  Nathan was on his
side, face to the back, kicking at one of the back doors.  It was a jarring,
upsetting thing – to say the least – to see Nathan in this kind of shape.  She
knew he prided himself on always being so in control and unflappable.  At least
in front of other people – and especially his colleagues.   

When she made out
her name in the midst of his tirade, Stella pulled the door shut behind her and
positioned herself on her knees in the driver’s seat.  She leaned over and
touched Nathan’s shoulder.  “Nathan.”

He stilled immediately,
but didn’t turn around.  His rambling stopped.

“Nathan…it’s
Stella.  Can you turn around and talk to me?”

“Stella?” he
whispered throatily.

“Yes, I’m here.”

Nathan twisted to
face her – no small feat with his battered hands cuffed behind his back. 

God, he looked
awful.  Bloodshot eyes, flushed face, and a split lip.  And the haunting,
intense way he was staring at her was breaking her heart.

“I’m a little out
of it.”  He blinked a few times, trying to focus on her face.  “Am I dreaming?”

“A little out of
it might be an understatement, Nathan.”  She ran her hand over his head.  “But
you’re not dreaming.  I’m here.  You wanna tell me what’s going on?”

Yeah, yeah, yeah. 
She was weak as hell.  She’d melted.  Fast.  But he was such a mess and he’d
been calling her name. 

I’m only human.

“Stella, I’m
sorry. God, I’m so fucking sorry.”  Nathan kicked at the side door with both
feet.

“Uh-uh.  No more
of that,” she said to him and he stopped.  Stella opened the side door and
found Danny.  “Can you uncuff him, please?  He’s calmer and it’s difficult to
have a conversation with him this way.”

“Ma’am, he’s
drunk.  And pissed off about something,” an older officer said.  “Something
related to you, assuming you’re Stella?”  When she nodded, he shook his head. 
“Yeah, not a good idea.”

“Don’t be
ridiculous.  He won’t hurt me,” Stella replied.  To Danny, she said, “Uncuff
him.  Please.”

Danny tossed her
his keys.  “You’d better do it.  He’s bound to head butt me if I get that
close.  It’s the one on the green ring.”

Stella got back in
and slammed the door behind her. 

“Stella?”

“Hmmm-hmmm?”  She
searched for the green ring on Danny’s janitor-sized key ring.

“I’m sorry, baby. 
So sorry.  Can you ever forgive me?”

Did he just call
her
baby
?  He must have polished off the entire bottle.

“We can talk about
that in a minute.”  Stella climbed over the front seat and landed on Nathan’s
side.  She scooted back a little and tried getting at his wrists.

“You feel so good,
Stella.  So fucking good.”  He squirmed, trying to do God knew what.  “I want
to be inside of you, Stella.  So bad.”  Nathan craned his neck.  “Come here,
baby.  I want to taste you.”

Stella laughed. 
“Oh, Nathan, you are too much.  You’re handcuffed in the backseat of a police
car, drunker than a skunk and all beat up.  There are at least six police
officers standing two feet from us right now, so there’s no lovin’ in your
immediate future.  Sorry.”  She unlocked the handcuffs and pulled them off. 
“Let’s start with getting you upright, okay?”

Stella tossed the
cuffs and the keys over the front seat and pushed Nathan into a semi-upright
position.  She settled in next to him, turning to face him with one leg tucked
beneath her.  “What happened tonight, Nathan?”  His head seemed too heavy for
his neck and it teetered as he tried to focus on her face.  “Danny said you got
drunk and started fighting people.”

“I had to.  To
forget.  I said the worst things to you.”  He  banged his head against the
window.  “So! Fucking! Stupid!  I’m such a fucking asshole!”

Stella grabbed his
chin and turned his face to hers.  “You’re gonna stop that right now or I’ll
leave and let them haul your ass to jail, Nathan.  So stop the hurting yourself
stuff.  Now.”

“I knocked a hole
in your wall.  And I broke your doorframe.  I said horrible shit to you.  I
hurt you.”  His bloodshot eyes searched hers.  “I told you I was a fuck-up, Stella. 
See?  I’m a monster.  Do you see now, Stella?  Do you see now how evil I am? 
You’ve gotta get away from me.  Before I destroy you.”.

Stella scoffed. 
“You’re not a monster or evil or a fuck-up.  You’re guy who has survived a lot
of really bad stuff.  You need to get help to work through it, but you’re
salvageable.”  She smiled.  “Barely.”  Stella pulled him into a hug.  He melted
into her like she usually melted into him.  “And I’m not that easy to destroy,
remember?  I’m kind of a badass.”

When Nathan tried
to push her back onto the seat and get on top of her, Stella laughed
throatily.  She shoved him back upright.  “Not so fast, Don Juan.  I’m not into
exhibitionism, so it’s gonna have to wait until we get home.”

“Home.”  Nathan
stared at her so intensely it brought tears to Stella’s eyes.  “You
are
my home, Stella.  You know that, right?  The only home I’ve ever had. I don’t
know what I would do if I lost you.”

Aaaaaand more
tears. 

“Thank you for
saying that, mio caro.  It means the world to me.  And you know I feel the same
way.”

“I looked those
words up, Stella. 
Mio caro
.  You said them to me the other day too.” 
Nathan searched her eyes.  “You are calling me your darling.” 

“And you are.  My
darling and my sweetheart and my honey and all that stuff,” Stella said.  She
kissed him quickly, laughing when he tried to press her back again. 

Stella climbed
back over the front seat and out of the car.  She tossed Danny the keys and the
cuffs.  “I think he’s good to go now.”

“I’ll drive him
home,” Danny said, clipping his keys to his belt.

“Do you mind
taking us both back to my place?  He really shouldn’t be alone right now.  And
I want to monitor his condition.”

Danny nodded.  “No
problem.”

It took three
officers to extract Nathan from the backseat of the cruiser and put him in the
backseat of Danny’s Jeep Commander.  They thanked the other officers and took
off.

Nathan was snoring
by the time they got onto the expressway. 

Danny shot Stella
a look.  “That was some magic you pulled back there.  He went from a raving
psycho to a harmless little puppy dog in thirty seconds flat.”

“He’s in a lot of
pain.  And he has been for a long time.  But you already know that.”  Stella
glanced at his sleeping form.  “He wants to do the right thing…to be ‘normal’ –
whatever that means.  He just doesn’t know how.  And it’s no big secret why. 
It’s a miracle he’s not a violent criminal instead of the sweet guy he is.”

“So he told you
everything?” Danny asked.  “Even the stuff about his dad?”

“Yeah.  I pushed
him.  And I wouldn’t back down.  I think he felt like a caged animal and he
lashed out.  He told me everything – from his childhood to the stuff he does
now.  Well, yelled it at me, more like it.”

“That must have
been one helluva scene.  He is not a fan of thinking about that stuff, let
alone talking about it.  You must have pushed pretty damn hard.”.

“I did.  Probably
too hard.  But it needed to happen eventually.  He deserves for me to know
everything about him – good and bad.  He needed to know that I could hear the
ugliest stuff and still love him.  Unconditionally.  Which I do.  And maybe now
he’ll be able to accept that.”  Stella tilted her head back and closed her
eyes, suddenly exhausted. 

“He’s one lucky
bastard,” Danny said quietly.

Stella smiled. 
“Don’t be so quick to make that judgment.  I’m a huge pain the ass and I’ve got
my own baggage.  It’s not as violent and ugly as Nathan’s, but it’s still a lot
to deal with.  Like I told him, we’ve all got our shit…some of us just hide it
better than others.”  She yawned.  “But he’s handled my crap like a champ.  I
never thought I’d find someone like him.”  She propped her elbow on the
doorframe and rested her cheek against her palm.  “I’m the lucky one.”

Stella drifted
off. 

Danny spent the
rest of the trip to her house thanking whatever deity actually existed that his
best buddy in the world might actually have a fighting chance after all.

Chapter
Nineteen

“
Jesus
…”

Someone was
jack-hammering his skull. 

Nathan moved.

Bad idea.

His entire body
hurt – from the top of his head to the bottoms of his feet.  Every muscle felt
pulled and every nerve ending felt frayed.

His eyes were
still closed, but he could tell his hands were all messed up.  They felt like
they were twice their normal size and were as stiff as boards.

Shit.

Memories flooded
back, bit by bit. Piece by piece.  He’d left Stella’s house and gone home. 
After running and weight lifting and pacing, he’d gotten into his car, unsure
of where he was heading.  When he ended up at a random bar downtown, Nathan had
stopping thinking and started drinking.

He’d needed to
drown out the horrific way he’d treated Stella…the evil things he’d said to her
and the damage he’d done to her house.  Because last night he’d become the one
thing he’d spent his entire life trying to avoid:

Violent
.

Toward someone who
hadn’t posed him or anyone else physical danger.

His lack of
self-control had been inexcusable.  But instead of going back to Stella and
begging her forgiveness, Nathan became another thing he’d always sworn not to: 
an out of control, drunken asshole.

He remembered some
of it.  The way the bourbon had burned his throat.  Arguing with the bartender
about getting cut off.  Getting physical with other guys at the bar for
god-knew-what-reasons.  The cops showing up.  Getting cuffed and tossed into
the back of a squad car.

Nathan rolled onto
his back and flung his forearm over his eyes. 

I’m probably in
a drunk tank.

Except it was way
too peaceful for that.  There was no blinding light, drunken screaming, or
agonizing sounds of detoxers.  And the softness beneath him was no jailhouse
cot.

He heard a little
soft sigh.  A feminine sigh.  And a warm body curled into his.

The revulsion
slammed into him like a Mack truck.  To the face. 

Oh, my God. 
What have I done?

You got drunk
and fucked a stranger, that’s what, you asshole!

Oh, God…
Stella
…

Nathan cracked his
lids.  Because he had to get the hell out of this woman’s bed.  He didn’t know
when or how he’d ended up here or how he’d even been able to screw this woman,
but needed to leave.  Now. 

Nathan blinked a
bunch of times to clear his blurry vision and pressed his fingers into his
eyes.  When he opened them again, he tried focusing on the ceiling.  Because he
couldn’t look at
her
.  Didn’t want to see her.  Couldn’t handle facing
what he’d done face-to-face. 

But then he
noticed the light fixture in the middle of the ceiling.  It was familiar…a
unique chandelier…with clear and crimson crystals…

Stella’s
chandelier.

Nathan’s head
whipped to the side and, once his brain stopped swimming and his vision
corrected itself, his entire body flooded with relief. 

He was in Stella’s
bed.  With Stella.  Again, he had no idea when or how he’d ended up here.  And
he really hoped this wasn’t some drunken fantasy.

He grabbed her and
yanked her limp, sleeping form to his chest.  Nathan buried his nose in her
coconut and vanilla hair and tried not to be too embarrassed at the wetness
gathering in the vicinity of his eyes.

Thank God.

“
Ooomphf
.” 
Stella was twisting her head all around.  She said something incoherent and
pushed at Nathan’s chest.  He released her just enough for her to turn her
face.  “
Can’t.  Breathe
.”

“Oh, God, Stella,
I’m sorry.”  Nathan released his hold.

Stella laughed
quietly, her eyes still closed.  She nuzzled into Nathan’s chest and he put his
arms back around her.  Much more loosely this time though.  She sighed and fell
back asleep.