Page 87 of Justice for Radar

“What? Really?” I asked. “Because I feel like I shouldn’t want anyone to ever get near me with a knife in a sexual context but the thought of Radar doing that? It’s just… It’s really hot,” I confessed.

Faith nodded. “Maybe you should see my therapist,” she said.

“Shit, you sell this place and you should have a decent amount to set aside for a down payment on a new place and the rest could front your therapy bills for a minute,” Hope said.

“We’re all really big advocates on therapy,” Serenity agreed. “After Stoker… he helped me find a therapist and it helped me a lot,” she said and smiled.

“It’s not like you have to see one forever,” Hope said.

“You see one?” I asked.

She snorted.

“Nah, I’m the unhealthiest out of all of us,” she said with a laugh. “My classic response is to just bottle that shit up until I explode and then have Cutter dominate and fuck the shit out of me until I feel like I have a grip.” She shrugged. “Different strokes for different folks,” she said and Serenity busted up laughing.

“You said strokes,” she said and snorted and then for whatever reason the rest of us fell into gales of our own laughter. Probably because we were drunk.

“What else we got to burn?” I asked when we’d settled down.

“Now you’re talkin’,” Hope declared.

* * *

“Mm?”I stirred and heard a masculine chuckle beside me, a warm hand on my back. I sucked in a sharp breath and went to scramble to the other side of the bed away from the stranger but it wasn’t any stranger at all, it was just Radar.

“Shh, shh, shh! Easy, baby! It’s just me,” he said, and I put a hand to my chest and panted.

“Oh, my God! You scared the life out of me!” I cried.

He chuckled and it was a rueful sound, he bowed and shook his head and asked.

“You still drunk?”

I blinked at his silhouette and shook my head stopped when the room swam a bit, and said, “Maybe?” in a querulous voice, knowing that I was in for it with a hangover in the morning – later today? I giggled.

“Oh, yeah. You’re still drunk,” he said, laughing to himself.

“Where didyougo?” I asked and he got up onto the bed and opened his arms so I could cuddle in.

“You smell like a stripper,” I complained.

“Well, I don’t know how a stripper of my persuasion smells—” I smacked his chest lightly and he said, “Ow!” and shrank a bit, but I know he was making it up. I barely tapped him.

“No, like afemalestripper, named Cinnamon or Diamond or something,” I said.

“Oh, no, it was Bunny, actually and she was a Sacred Heart’s club slut,” he said with a shrug. I pushed off of him and leaned way back and asked a little wounded.

“Cheating already, huh?”

His look, what I could make out of it from the light coming through the bedroom door from down the hallway was dead serious, his tone even more serious. “No. Never. Flirt? Yeah, I gotta keep my skills up for you,” he said. “But I’m not interested in anyone else. She came up, started hanging off my shoulder, propositioned me for the night and Atlas took her off my hands for me.”

I stared him in the eyes and he searched my face right back. Finally, he leaned over and clicked on the bedroom light. I winced and closed my eyes, turning my head.

“Oof, babe, now isnotthe time to discuss anything, especially those texts.”

“Texts?” I squeaked.

He chuckled and pulled me to him, and I went… I guess I believed him about the Cinnamon Bunny.

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