The Soldier's Tale Read online

  "How's the pain?" Stick with the doctor questions. That was the way to handle this.

  "You didn't finish the question." Daniel smirked. "Aren't you supposed to add on a scale of one to ten?"

  "On a scale of—"

  "A three. I can handle that with my eyes shut." Daniel opened the chemist's bag to rummage inside. "Not so many drugs now. Perhaps I can even get an erection." Sean's grip on the wheel tightened momentarily. Why the hell would Daniel say something quite so obvious as to allude to his dick? "I'm hungry." Daniel glanced at his watch. "I'm guessing you have other things to do, but the steaks at the Red Lion are good."

  Sean jumped at the chance of more face time with Daniel.

  They didn't do much talking. Instead they made a lot of pleased happy eating sounds. They were halfway through a huge plate of steak and chips when Will found them in the corner. Sean was startled as the man stood at their side, and for a moment, he wondered if he needed a doctor or something. Instead it seemed as if the man was here to speak to Daniel. Then he put two and two together. Will wanted Daniel to be his best man, and God did Will look furious.

  "Where the bloody hell have you been?" he snapped at Daniel, who dipped his head and looked guilty. "You aren't answering your phone, your cell, you weren't at home—"

  "He was with me," Sean interrupted, "at the surgery." He stopped at adding anything about the knee because that was doctor-patient privileged information. Will stopped in his tracks, slumping tiredly in the empty chair next to Daniel and resting a hand on his friend's back.

  "What happened to you, Dan?" he asked carefully, and Daniel looked at him pointedly, before cutting another piece of steak and popping it in his mouth. Sean watched the interaction, saw the indecision on Will's face, and decided they probably needed alone time for a little while. He made excuses for more drink, propping up the bar with his back to them and far enough away to give the illusion of privacy but near enough to actually hear.

  "I went for a walk," he heard Daniel start.

  "A walk?"

  "I hadn't taken my meds and—"

  "Bloody hell, Daniel, you idiot."

  "That's what he said."

  Sean imagined he was the "he" in the conversation.

  "Are you back on them now?"

  "I am, well, different ones, better ones."

  "Okay, and the pain?"

  "Not too bad."

  "Not too bad?" Sean could just imagine the look of incredulity that was probably passing Will's face, and he wasted more time asking Josie, the barmaid, about anything he could come up with.

  "I'm okay, Will, stop fussing." Irritation coloured Daniel's voice, and Sean winced. He hated being fussed over when he was ill so he could sympathise with the soldier.

  "Okay, but I haven't had your answer yet, and I need it."

  "To what?"

  "Damn it, Daniel, I want you to be my best man."

  "No. So you need to find someone else."

  "I don't want anyone else," Will replied with a hiss. It wasn't disappointment he had in his voice, but anger.

  "You can't want my face there."

  "What the hell does your face have to do with this?"

  "Diana won't want her photos ruined."

  "Diana wants—"

  "No." Daniel's voice was determined and low, and then Sean heard the heavy oak door crashing against the wall. Just as quickly it slammed closed. He wanted to turn, but he couldn't. It was a train wreck. The door opened and shut a second time, and finally, he turned. The table in the corner was empty of both men. He sighed and turned back to Josie.

  "Can I have the bill?"

  * * * *

  Will caught up with him quickly, but that was pretty easy considering he was a bloody cripple.

  "Dan, wait." Sighing, Dan did as he was told, waiting for the argument, the shouting, the whole being told he was stupid thing. Damn Will and his clever mind. He came at it from an angle that was guaranteed to mean Daniel couldn't think.

  "Diana knows how much it means for me to have my best friend stand up for me." Will said the words so softly, so carefully, and Daniel waited for a heartbeat before he replied.

  "I'm not the same as I used to be, Will."

  Will sighed and crossed his arms over his chest.

  "Neither am I. Do you think I ever imagined I would fall in love with one of the Cursed?" Will used the village terminology for anyone from the Fitzwarren family, a playground term that Daniel remembered well. "Di—she's everything to me—but if there's one thing I've learned through all the hell the Fitzwarren family goes through, it's that, at the end of the day, family is important."

  "I'm not your family, Will," Daniel tried to explain patiently, but Will just shook his head and placed a hand flat on Daniel's chest.

  "You have been my family since you rescued me from Simon McAllister and his cronies in the craft supply room."

  "We were six, Will."

  "Six and already a bad boy, eh, Dan?"

  Daniel sighed. Maybe he should push through this. Maybe he shouldn't listen to the little voice that told him people would stare and point and comment.

  "How about I think about it?" It was all he could offer at this point, and Will nodded thoughtfully.

  "I want you standing for me, being my best man, two weeks from Saturday. I have your suit all booked. I'll let you think, but I won't leave you alone."

  * * * *

  Daniel was exhausted, closing curtains at four in the afternoon and climbing into bed, his dagger under the pillow and one hand closed around it as he lay on his stomach. The pills he'd taken were the new regime, but he didn't hold out an awful lot of hope they would be any different from the ones he'd previously taken. The doc meant well, but a sincere green-eyed gaze and a sympathetic word or so meant sod all when the night closed in and Daniel was on his own.

  Sleep happened so quickly he didn't have time to toss and turn, and the dreams caught him in their needy grasp way before he had a chance to stop them. The same ones—Belvedere, the knife, the fire. It was horrific, seeing someone burn like that. Flashes of Afghanistan mixed in, his friends dying around him, screaming for his help. Two voices whispered to him, his own and another deeper voice that was sly and insistent.

  "You shouldn't have even tried to disarm under fire." The other voice resonated with accusation, and he wanted to say he'd had no choice.

  "We had civilians there," he responded quickly in his dreams. "We needed a clear path."

  The other voice twisted in a chuckle, derisory, mocking. "You were under fire. You know better. You knew your men had been on duty for seventy-two hours. They needed rest."

  "I was following orders," he screamed back, but the other, the presence of the other, was suffocating.

  "You'll never stand for your friend. You are a scarred, ugly cripple, useless, the man who couldn't save them."

  His conscience never let him rest.

  He rolled onto his back and sat upright, ripped from sleep by his fear and his anger, and for a long while, he concentrated on simply breathing through the emotions.

  Chapter Eight

  The day after, Sean showed up at his front door. Armed with fish and chips from the visiting chip van and a six pack of beer, he waited hopefully as Daniel just stared at him.

  "Thought you could use some food," Sean offered helpfully.

  "Don't you have patients?"

  "Nope." Sean sounded way too cheerful. "Not tonight." He inclined his head. "I'm on call for emergencies."

  "So no beer for you then." Daniel let him stand there stewing, getting an almost perverse pleasure in watching Sean squirm. "And I can't drink on my meds," Daniel pointed out helpfully.

  "One won't hurt." Sean looked around him as if someone might have heard him slip from professionalism. Daniel stood to one side.

  "You'd best come in then, Doc."

  The fish was steamed inside the batter to perfection, the chips chunky and hot, and the vinegar tart on his tongue. He heard the bell
from the van every week, but he could never be bothered to stumble out and buy himself dinner, instead relying on cans and boxes in his own kitchen. That was something that would have to be remedied this time next week now he had a taste of them. He would make himself walk to the van.

  They talked for a long time, about everything and nothing. By unconscious decision, they avoided talk of medical matters pertaining to Daniel, and that worked well.

  "So you kind of implied you were…" Sean hesitated. "You said something about being a single, gay guy." Daniel pulled his upper lip between his teeth and nodded a quick yes. "That must have been hard, being in the Army and all. It was hard enough for me at medical college, and we all know students try anything." There was no earth shattering Are-you-gay, yes-I-am, let's-shag conversation, but the whole gay thing was out there, and maybe Daniel could see something in Sean he hadn't seen before. Understanding.

  "It wasn't hard as such. I just kept my army life and my sex life separate."

  "All the time you were in Afghanistan?"

  "Mostly."

  "I have to tell you that I'm really attracted to you," Sean began seriously, pouting when Daniel snorted out his amusement.

  "I can tell you went to private school, 'I have to tell you—'" he mimicked.

  "Shut up," Sean grumped, waving a hand to silence Daniel, a hand that Daniel caught with his still-nearly-functioning reflexes.

  "Well," he began, teasing in his tone, "I have to tell you that I'm attracted to you too."

  "Oh." Sean looked at him with wide eyes. "That was easy," he finally said.

  "Talking about it is easy. Wait 'til you get past the talking and experience my inferior body image issues." Daniel was joking, but he knew for a fact that the thread of fear he was trying to hide was obvious. Sean leaned forward, his hand cupping the right side of Daniel's face, his other hovering over the scars. He didn't touch them, but he leaned in and kissed Daniel tenderly, a mere touch of lips and then he drew back, his hand finally resting on Daniel's ruined skin.

  "If I got to touch your body, I would feel like the luckiest man in Steeple Westford."

  "What? Even luckier than Mrs Jones who won twenty-three pounds on the lottery and spent an hour on Wednesday telling me how she was going to treat herself?" Daniel wanted to diffuse the tension, had to make a joke of the fact he was hard in his jersey boxers and wanting anything Sean was offering.

  Sean chuckled. "Even more than that."

  * * * *

  It wasn't every night, but over the next week, Sean would arrive on his doorstep, he guessed post-surgery hours, always bringing some kind of food.

  "Do I look like I need fattening up?" Daniel had joked on the third day, after looking at the curry from the Taj Mahal in the next town over. Sean had replied in all seriousness that he needed Daniel to keep his energy levels high for when they finally went past the kissing stage. That served to fluster Daniel way past normal, and it was that he remembered when Sean arrived at his door the next night. He didn't have food. All he had was a grieving expression on his face and an air of palpable sorrow around him. Daniel ushered him in, guiding him to sit, and after ascertaining he wasn't on duty tonight, handed him a beer. He didn't ask stupid questions, just popped the tab on his own beer and waited. He thought he knew what this was about. Will had only just left, carrying news of deterioration in Charlie and Carol's premature baby, a sentence of only a few days to survive. They couldn't tell what was wrong with the little mite, but they knew he was losing the battle to live. Sean was so close to Phil, close to the whole family, and had been asked to be godfather to little Edward. They didn't actually talk about the baby, but Daniel moved back in the corner of the sofa and encouraged Sean to lean close to him. He could be what Sean needed tonight. A friend.

  They fell asleep on the sofa, Sean clutching his mobile phone as if he expected it to ring at any moment. When Daniel woke, he checked Sean's mobile and saw it was a little after two in the morning, and Sean was shifting in his arms.

  "I need to go." Sean protested at Daniel's hold and gestured pointedly up at his mobile. "It's two in the morning" He twisted in Daniel's arms, and Daniel released the hold immediately. He wasn't going to force Sean into staying still if he needed to move.

  "I do all my best work at two in the morning," Daniel said softly. "In the dark you can hide anything, scars, grief…" Sean gazed at him with confusion on his face, and then compelled by something he couldn't identify, Daniel moved in for a gentle kiss, touching his tongue to the seam of Sean's lips and pressing them apart. Daniel finally had Sean kissing him again, with the promise of more.

  Daniel was feeling each inch of available skin as they kissed, pulling back and watching Sean's eyes in the dim half light as he continued the touch. He stopped the travel of his fingers and laced them with Sean's, his thumb tracing patterns on the fleshy part of Sean's palm.

  "Are you okay?" His voice was little more than a husky growl, low and insistent. The last thing he wanted was to take advantage if Sean had things on his mind.

  "No talking, just kissing," Sean murmured, leaning into Daniel's gentle touch, the heat between them building and Sean smiling a soft and somewhat shy smile.

  "Kissing is good." Daniel smirked as Sean settled himself into the kiss and winced as he used a single finger to trace Daniel's lips, the shape of his face, his cheekbones. He curved the path across the scarring, and Daniel reached up to cover Sean's hand with his own.

  "Gorgeous," Sean breathed as Daniel tilted his head into the joined touch, pushing against it gently. Very slowly Daniel slid his hands into the soft silk of Sean's blond hair and encouraged him closer to lay a path of kisses from chin to his cheekbone, then to his lips, applying very little pressure, the slightest breath of a kiss. When he pulled back, Sean chased for the kiss.

  Daniel shook his head, moving to start a new kiss, a soft slide of tongue on Sean's lips, asking permission to explore inside and taste the other man. Holding Sean's face in both hands, he tilted his head and extended the kiss as Sean sparked to life and started to move against him, a squirm of need, an insistent tug on Daniel's shirt. They broke apart only to pull shirts aside, hands touching and exploring as the kisses became more. Daniel wanted to learn every inch of Sean. There was something about him, some pull, some need that only Sean could satisfy.

  It wasn't about looking for completion at this stage. It was about learning and nothing more, the attraction and pull so quick that it almost seemed unreal. Daniel wasn't sure if it was being on the new medication or if it was just Sean, but for the first time in a long time, he was hard and needy. Kissing Sean felt free, like it was the first real choice he'd made for himself since the bomb. He was content to kiss, his hands anchoring at the base of Sean's spine, his fingers slipping beneath the waistband of his faded worn jeans and resting without moving.

  Daniel spread his legs and tilted his hips, pulling and shifting Sean so he leaned against him. Sean whimpered as he was forced to inch that little bit farther forward. It was just enough friction to push them to the edge, but not enough to take them over. It was exquisite, perfect, that single moment that Daniel wanted to last forever.

  The kisses turned from insistent and needy to searching and careful. Sean had slid forward and rested comfortably in Daniel's hold, moving his head to nuzzle warm lips at Daniel's neck. It felt so right, feeling the flutter of Sean's pulse against the tips of searching fingers. He kissed a small trail from the pulse to Sean's ear, little biting kisses with flicks of his clever tongue. This was teasing, just testing this instant connection between them.

  The heat between them, the passion, exploded in a confusion of hands that gripped, teeth that bit and pulled, and mouths that tasted and sucked and marked in a frenzy. Daniel was too far gone to go slow and to take. He pushed past any pain in his knee, rutted and marked Sean in a primal explosion of lust, and Sean answered with ferocity of desire.

  Clothes were pulled and tugged until skin met skin, Sean moving so they could pus
h against each other, hard muscles fighting for dominance. At one point, Sean had control as he weakened Daniel with his hands, reaching down and closing around Daniel's hard, leaking dick, twisting and pulling. His other hand grasped Daniel's long hair almost too hard, pulling him away until their lips were apart. A mask of heat blazed across Sean's face.

  "Gorgeous," Sean repeated again and again. He murmured against Daniel's throat, sucking hard, soothing it with his tongue and then biting again until Daniel was sure of its permanence as Sean's mark.

  Orgasm was building in him, so close. "Slower," he whimpered, contradicting the breathless plea by arching his head back to give Sean free rein to his throat. "We need to…" He tried to stop, but it was too late. He lost it, hot and hard and heavy over Sean's firm hold, Sean following not long after, sliding against the curve of Daniel's hip, falling breathlessly on top of him, his eyes closed, his body limp.

  "I could hold you all night," Daniel whispered gently. Sean burrowed farther into his hold, dropping his fingers to Daniel's hard chest and tracing random patterns.

  Daniel dropped his head back, a familiar exhaustion pulling at the edges of his thoughts, his eyes heavy in the warmth of the room, his body languid with pleasure, and bit by bit, his body relaxed. The dampness in his pants he could handle for a short while. He needed just a few minutes rest. Sean was still drawing letters and random shapes on his chest, the skin-to-skin contact warm. Daniel felt the shift as Sean pulled at a blanket on the back of the sofa and settled it over them both.

  And they slept, the blanket a cocoon of warmth and Sean's body hot against Daniel, the weight of him secure against his chest.

  When the mobile rang as dawn lightened the room, it woke them both with a start, and Sean fumbled to answer, rolling up and off of Daniel and grabbing at jeans as they refused to stay on his hips. He was half smiling when he came off the phone.