Anchor Line (57 page)

             
“Nathan? What are you doing over there? I thought you were staying with me?”

             
Conrad could hear the confusion in her voice.

             
“Answer your door Ads.” Nathan lifted his beer toward the door where Conrad was standing.

             
“What? Why?” She asked.

             
“Trust me.” He said smiling.

Chapter Thirty-Nine

              Addie was confused. What in the hell was going on. Who was at her door and why was Nathan smiling like a Cheshire Cat. She shook her head and walked back inside, not closing the sliding glass door. Walking over to the front door, she didn’t think to look through the peephole before she unlocked it and opened it wide.

             
Seeing Conrad standing there brought everything back. The pain and hurt, the joy and fun. Everything. Her hands came to her mouth as she gasped and felt lightheaded. He swallowed hard as he took a step forward towards her. She instinctively took a step back. She couldn’t believe he was here. Last she heard, he was trying to go back to Bragg.

             
“Addie.” He said softly.

             
She shook her head and dropped her hands to her sides. “Leave.” She whispered. “Please. Leave me alone.”

             
“I can’t.”

             
“I don’t want to get hurt by you again Conrad. I can’t.”

             
“Let me explain Addie, please.” He came inside as Addie retreated down the hallway every step that he made forward. He closed and locked the door.

             
Addie turned and stopped in the living room. Her setup here was very near similar to the one she had in Fort Bragg. Huge open area that you could see the kitchen from everywhere you were. She propped her hip on the wall to the hallway. She spread her hands wide.

             
“Explain away.” She said as she crossed her arms over her chest.

             
Conrad blew out a deep breath. “That first day when you went back, I went to sign in off of leave...”

             
“Yeah, skip that part. I know it already.” Addie said. “Why don’t we just get to the meat and potatoes of things here. Tell me why after you got in from thirty days in the field, you didn’t email me, or message me on Yahoo! or Facebook messenger? Tell me why you could sex-talk it up with your submissive Steph, but couldn’t acknowledge the girl that you had just fucked for the ten days prior to your field problem that you got her emails. All of them!”

             
“I was scared.” Conrad stated.

             
“You were scared?” Addie threw her hands up in the air. “That’s fucking rich! You can go to Iraq and Afghanistan and you can live through some pretty heavy shit, but you are scared of me?”

             
“Yes. I...”

             
“Bullshit!” Addie yelled. “I am throwing out the bullshit flag here Conrad.”

             
Conrad rubbed his hands over his face and when he dropped them, he looked straight in Addie’s eyes.

             
“I fell in love with you. That’s so different than going to war.” He walked toward her.

             
“That is a hard sell.” Addie pursed her lips.

             
              “No, it’s not.” Conrad lifted his hand toward Addie’s face and traced her jawline with a finger. “Did either Nathan or Cal tell you that they cornered me at work? Did they tell you that I was a dick to just about everyone after you left. I had the best platoon leader that anyone has seen in a few years and I scared the shit out of him because I couldn’t figure out how to love you.”

             
“How did you know I was here in Polk?”

             
“The global email system.” He admitted. “When Cal told me that Tracy had told him that you’d blocked me, I was going to write you on the Army’s email system. And when I finally had the balls to do it, your name was gone. I got so fucking drunk that night that I think Cal came and got me and he and Tracy sat there in the bathroom with me as I puked up so much alcohol.”

             
“Yes.” Addie said snidely. “I heard all about how you couldn’t change the bed sheets. Did you sleep on the pillow I slept on, etcetera, etcetera.” She waived her hand between the two of them. “But did you once think of how I felt? No. Did you once while you were sexting it up with your submissive...”

             
“I never kept a submissive.” Conrad corrected.

             
“Oh whatever.” Addie said. “You were sexting her and I could see it. Did you not think that I wouldn’t look at your page to see if maybe I was just some toy for you? Because I feel like it.”

             
“Addie.” Conrad rubbed his hands over his face again. “I’m sorry. I used Steph as a way to gauge how I really felt about you. The last night you were in Italy, I almost told you I loved you.”

             
“Why didn't you?” She asked.

             
“Because...” He shook his head. “I don’t even fucking know.”

             
Addie just looked at him saying nothing.

             
“But I did mean what I said when I told you in Pittsburgh that you are my anchor line Addie.”

             
“Tell me.” She said simply.

             
“Tell you what?” He asked.

             
She shook her head. “You have no clue do you.”

             
“I love you Addie Marshall.” He stepped even closer. “I love you so fucking much.”

             
Addie’s tears came out of nowhere. She wiped her cheek and looked up at him, her arms still crossed over her breasts.

             
“You think that saying you love me is going to make it alright?”

             
Conrad shook his head no. “I hope it does.”

             
He slid his hands up her arms and into her hair and kissed her forehead.

             
“Conrad.” Addie said on a broken whisper.

             
“Tell me.” Conrad said.

             
“I love you Conrad Renner.”

             
“I love you too, Addie Marshall.”

             
Conrad took her by the hand and led her to her bedroom. He took her clothes off and sweetly, gently, and tenderly, he took her. His usual dirty talk was curbed with gentleness. He knew that she needed this. She needed the re-affirmation of his love to make up for him not getting in touch with her. He’d done all the usual things, ate at her pussy, and took her nipples in his mouth, sucking gently, and finally making love. For him it was the first time.

             
For the next four months, Addie and Conrad kept separate apartments across from each other. Conrad maintained that it was for his Post Traumatic Stress from deployments. He wanted to make sure that he could give Addie one hundred and ten percent of him. She said she’d take him with flaws and all, but she understood.

 
           There were times when she would stay with him, but most of the time, he would stay with her. He claimed that it was because she was higher maintenance than he was. But, either way, he kept some uniforms at Addie’s and she kept some clothes at his apartment. Nathan was an ever present face in their lives outside of the bedroom. Still Conrad’s roommate and always teasing them that Conrad should just move into Addie’s apartment because he spent more time there than at his own.

 
           Like any couple though, they had disagreements that they had to work through and then they had to look forward to the ever present field problems and twenty four hour duty that Conrad had to pull. Conrad had showed Addie that he’d gotten rid of any phone numbers from any of his prior submissives. He didn’t want them. It was a bid to show Addie that she was the one woman in his life.

 
           Jim Crisman wasn’t very happy when he’d come into Addie’s office to take her to lunch and saw Conrad standing there kissing her. It was set up that way, but neither of them, nor would Verna say anything. To say that Jim was upset was an understatement considering he and Conrad knew of each other from their old unit in Bragg that they were in.

 
           Nathan’s birthday was finally rolling around and when he finally dropped the bomb on Conrad when and where he wanted to go, needless to say, Conrad was not happy. He’d actually had plans with Addie and he’d had to cancel them. Addie was understanding even if Conrad wasn’t.

            Addie had her stash of chic flicks, her silk jammies that Conrad had bought her and his Steelers blanket. She was all set to stay in and wait for Conrad to come back home from Nathan’s birthday celebration. She was stretched out on the sofa in her living room.

 
           “Say the word Addie, and I won't go. I'll stay and make love to you all night long.” 

 
          Addie searched his eyes uncertain.  “I don't like it, but, I know that Nathan has been around longer than I have.”

 
          “I give a shit about knowing him longer baby, if you don’t' want me to go, I’ll stay.”  He bent down and kissed her gently.

 
          The knocking on the door was more insistent and more than one person now called out from the other side. 

 
           “Renner!”

 
           “Let's go Conrad.”

 
           “I need a lap dance.”

 
           “Go Conrad.”  Addie said softly.  “You need to go with your friends.”

 
           “Fuck that.  I'll stay here.”  He kissed her neck again.  “You do more to me with a kiss than anything at a club.”

 
           The door creaked open a little and Nathan's tentative voice spoke through the hallway.  “Addie? Conrad?  Hey man, you here?”

 
           “Get. The. Fuck. Out. Of here.”  Conrad ground out.  “I'll be out in a fucking minute.” 

 
           Nathan apologized as he closed the door.

 
          “You'd better go.”  Addie said kissing his forehead.

 
          “Be honest with me Addie.  Do you want me to go?” Conrad searched her eyes.

 
           “I trust you babe.”  She said looking back at him. 

 
          He leaned down and kissed her deeply, no teasing, no playing around.  This was a kiss of trust between two lovers. 

 
           “God I love this blue silk on you.”  He smoothed his hand over her breasts and kissed them through the fabric.  “Much better than that satin monstrosity.”  As he got up, he really got an eyeful of Addie's silk chemise and matching short set.  He moaned loudly. 

 
           “I'm going to a strip club when I could be staying home enjoying you.”  He shook his head as he pulled the blanket from the sofa to cover her.  “You need me, I’m right back here in the blink of an eye.”  He pushed her hair behind her ear. 

 
           “I've got your Steelers blanket.”  She said wiggling her eyebrows.  “And when you get home you can ravish me.”  She smiled brightly.

 
           Conrad just shook his head.  “You're killing me.  Right now, you're killing me.  I don't even want to go.”

 
           Addie leaned up and wove both hands through his hair and brought his mouth down to kiss her again. “Go. Have fun.”  She said as she tossed his hair about.

 
           He sighed heavily and got up.  “I'll be back later honey.  Don't wait up.”  With that, he walked out the door to some good natured ribbing from his friends, and Addie heard him lock the deadbolt as she snuggled in Conrad's blanket and started her movie.

Chapter Forty

            After kissing Addie, Conrad really wasn't in the mood to go to a strip club.  He'd promised, and it was the right thing to do, however, he really didn't want to be there.  At one point in time it was his scene.  But since he fell in love with Addie, this just wasn't for him anymore.