ੈ✩‧₊˚ Countdown: Distract Me From My Pain - Mature - Chapter 4
Mark Meachum meets a mysterious stranger, and she keeps showing up where he is. He suspects his job is a reason for that. But she's a great distraction from his current problems.
Characters: Mark Meachum, Original Female Character, Amber Oliveras, Nathan Blythe, Luke Finau, Keyonte Bell
Warnings/Tags: Het sex, oral sex, explicit sex, unresolved sexual tension, Sexual tension, age difference
Read on AO3 and Tumblr / Masterlist / Chapters: 1 | 2 | 3 | 4
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Chapter 4
It had been over a week since they last saw each other, even though they were talking or texting every day. Mark almost bailed on their plans because his headaches had been more frequent, making work and life in general more difficult. He didn’t want to bring his bad mood to their time together, but he knew Tori would brighten his spirits.
Mark met Tori at the door, holding flowers and smiling. She was dressed in jeans and a Metallica T-shirt, and he quickly realized that this fit her personality better than her fancy work attire.
She took a moment to smell the flowers before wrapping her arms around his neck. “You’re such a sweetheart. I’ve missed that gorgeous face and those sinful lips of yours.”
“Well, here they are, waiting for you,” Mark said, lowering his lips to hers for multiple intensely hot kisses. It seemed like she melted into him, pressing up against him and allowing him to pillage her mouth.
When he released her lips, she smiled and asked, “How’s work? I was surprised you were finally free.”
Mark went to grab a beer for her and said, “Blythe is concerned we’re all burning out, so he’s making us take a mandatory day off this week. Mine is tomorrow. I’m not sure if I remember how to take a day off. What do I do?”
“I can think of things you can do,” she said, swatting him on the ass. “It’s for the best, all that work was making you a dull boy.” She gave him a cheeky smile, then a kiss. “I don’t want you to think I’m only interested in your body, so I bought movies. I could use a vegging out session due to my stress.”
“Work?”
Evasively, she made a noise that implied yes as she turned away. She hated keeping every aspect of her life secret from everyone. It never bothered her before. She desperately needed secrecy at one time. For years after her life was thrown open to everyone against her will, she willingly kept secrets. Eventually, it became a way of life. The few people she dealt with directly back then understood her need for such intense privacy. But everyone pressured her to go to therapy or find someone to confide in. She glanced at Mark. Blythe, who knew her story, casually asked her if she had told Mark about her past, but she changed the subject. He felt she needed to talk about it, but she hadn’t for five years; why would she now? But in the back of her mind, she worried Mark would find out on his own, either on purpose or by accident. She wondered how he’d react.
“Hey, come here,” she said gently. When he was close, she wrapped her arms around his neck, standing on her tiptoes, and gave him a long kiss. “I missed you. How has your week been? Is work okay? You’re not really burning out, I hope?”
Mark shook his head, then squeezed her tightly. “It’s typical. But honestly, I needed this. It’s been a while, and my brain is starting to feel like it’s swimming.”
“Can I help?” she asked, kissing his neck and resting her head on his shoulder.
Mark leaned into her, just absorbing her essence. She already had a calming effect on him. Sometimes he felt like his old self, before the tumor. “Just let me breathe you in for a few minutes. Or an hour.” She smelled so good. Her perfume seemed to change with her clothing or her current attitude because it wasn’t the same scent as before, but smelled just as classy and a little fun, without that high-dollar elegance of her perfume last time. He never really noticed perfume unless it was overwhelming.
After a few minutes, he let her go so that it wouldn’t seem creepy.
“Hey, I have a suggestion. Why don’t you come to my house tomorrow and play on the beach? That would relax you.”
“You’re beach front?” That seemed a bit pricey, but perhaps her family was rich. He should have guessed that based on her car and her expensive clothing, and her perfume.
“No, two blocks over in Laguna, but it’s a nice section of the beach with access for people in my subdivision. Mostly retired people, so the sand stays cleaner. The guy who sold me the house moved to Chicago, so he left behind snorkeling, fishing, and surfing gear. I never got a chance to learn anything, but I’m guessing that you know how.” She chuckled with a shrug. “I have heard there are gnarly swells.”
“Okay, Point Break,” he teased. “I surf, but it’s been years. A little lying on the beach and playing in the water with you would be fun. Will you wear one of those tiny bikinis that show off your ass?” He'd love to surf, but he worried about a headache or dizziness drowning him.
“I own many suits. You’re welcome to choose how much is revealed.” She smiled wickedly. “So, are you beaching with me tomorrow?”
“Absolutely. I thought I’d do some boring things around the house. But your house will be more fun. I have the impression that you make everything fun.” He kissed her until they were both out of breath. Her eyes were lit up with happiness. “I had planned to fire up the grill and make you dinner. I hope you aren’t a vegetarian. I got steaks.”
“I am absolutely a carnivore. What can I do to help?”
Mark grabbed the steaks, and Tori picked up the beer and seasoning. All the sides were premade from the store, so Tori just sat outside, watching him grill. She would glance over at him and think how hot he was. The other day, she told two of her work friends a couple of things about Mark, without mentioning his name, and they both said Mark was too old and it was creepy that he was dating someone young enough to be his daughter. They proceeded to recommend six or seven guys that she should go out with. That was when she realized her friends had no idea the kind of guys she liked, because those guys might be her age, but they were all too boring, arrogant beyond belief, and did nothing to spark her interest. They weren’t even funny, and that was a big requirement. Sitting here watching Mark grill steaks turned her on more than any of those guys.
“Where are you? You’re miles away,” Mark asked, coming closer to her chair. She pulled out her phone and snapped a pic.
Tori stood up and leaned into him. “I wanted a pic of you in that apron. Later, you can wear just the apron,” she whispered.
She felt him flinch, then he quickly turned away. It gave her a bad feeling that she’d done something wrong. Needing to stop overreacting about a flinch, although a flinch was never good, she went inside and grabbed the sides, silverware, plates, and utensils. As she dashed around the kitchen, she saw him through the screen door, holding his head tightly. He leaned on the deck railing, and she could see him glancing around like he wanted to make sure she wasn’t there.
Tori slid out of his view. Okay, so the flinch wasn’t her. It was him. As she ran through what it could be, she looked around for a wall calendar to see if he had doctor appointments. Apparently, he kept his calendar on his phone. She saw some mail. Maybe doctor bills. But she realized how wrong it was to spy on him. She’d ask him and hope for the best.
“Tori? Steaks are done.”
“Coming.” When she came outside, he started to get up to help, but she put half of what she held. “Don’t get up. I got it.” She bent down to kiss him, then pulled back slightly so she could see his eyes. He looked very tired, but she wasn’t sure what to look for, so she just sat down. “Thanks for dinner. It's unreal for me to have a sit-down home-cooked meal.”
“I wasn’t sure what you were doing and if it was related to the task force, so I thought it might be dangerous to be seen together. Sorry, the steaks might be overcooked.” He sounded so down that it was starting to get to her.
“Fine by me as long as it's not mooing. Glad you thought about us being seen. I didn’t. I don’t think I have been...uh…seeing someone while I was undercover.” She thought back to her past assignments and realized she always dumped someone she was dating before she went UC. Her history with men was atrocious: very few guys and mostly self-destructing relationships.
What sounded like a herd of elephants came charging at the deck, and Mark quickly jumped up to close the grill, cursing. Two dogs ran up the stairs and straight for Mark and started jumping all over him. “Guys, come on. Sit! Sit! Great, you can’t even sit. You were obedience school dropouts.” He was losing the battle, so Tori grabbed some fat off the steak and tossed it.
Mark quickly sat down. “Thank you. Every time I grill, I am blessed with an appearance of Frank and Tommy, or whatever ridiculous names my neighbor gave them.” Despite his words, he clearly loved the dogs, judging from his grin. She smiled, seeing him so joyous.
“They’re cute at least,” she said, trying to ignore the cute begging faces. “They’re sitting for me. You must be doing it wrong,” she gloated. She didn’t know dog breeds, but she suspected Frank was a Great Dane. The smaller hyper one was something curly. The two dogs seemed to work out who to beg from, and she got the Great Dane. He was very bold, putting his feet in her lap, and the more Mark tried to stop him, the worse he got. Eventually, he moved to her other side, so she was in between him and Mark, then he lay across her lap. Tori laughed and said it was fine. She actually loved dogs, but couldn’t have one with her work life. Every time she gave them food, Mark fussed about them never leaving now.
“Zeus! Appletini!” Aha, that’s the ridiculous names that Mark avoided using. He rolled his eyes with a long, deep sigh as he stood up slowly. His dread about the neighbor was curious, so Tori couldn’t wait to see her. Just as she turned around, a woman came around the deck. “I should have known they’d come see you. I swear you’re trying to seduce my dogs to get to me, naughty boy.” The woman laughed loudly, one of those laughs that sounded like it was climbing stairs. She had to be sixty at least, most likely older. Her makeup was from the seventies or eighties, pounds of it caked on. To top it off, yellowish-white, extremely big hair. She was also very handsy with Mark, touching his chest, shoulder, and arm a lot. Tori smirked because every time she touched his chest, the woman squeezed his muscles. Mark seemed to be barely tolerating getting felt up. The woman was legit throwing herself at him. Tori had to bite her lip to keep from laughing aloud. Tori almost wanted her to grab Mark’s ass just to see his reaction, but it was annoying. If the roles were reversed, Mark would have been charged with sexual harassment or possibly sexual assault. He seemed more willing to have the dogs climbing all over him for steak than this woman, who was trying him like he was the steak.
“Oh, you have a little friend over. You’re playing hard to get with me, are you?” She walked up the steps, brushing past Mark. She glared at Tori. “Are you his date or his daughter? You’re way too young for my Mark. I’m Adele, by the way.”
She could see in the background that Mark was at a loss. “Nice to meet you. I’m Tori.” She ignored the age comment despite wanting to smart off.
Adele looked her over for a moment, then turned and started speaking quietly but very animated to Mark. Tori couldn’t hear it all, but did hear about her supposedly fake boobs, Adele calling her trashy, and obviously, into dark stuff, judging from her shirt, and how a girl like her might be fun for a night, but he needed to think of his future. Tori wasn’t sure, but she thought Adele also called her a slut. She gave Tori a backward glance, and Tori gave her the most pleasant smile she could manage. She felt like she had failed some test. Mark raised his eyebrows and just shook his head. Finally, he took the dog leashes that Adele had brought and got them fastened onto the dogs.
“Well, we want to finish dinner, so let me help you get the dogs to the gate, and you can head home,” Mark said. Then he managed to finally get Adele off the porch. Tori couldn’t believe an old woman was throwing herself so boldly at him. Even though she felt bad for him, she was glad he wasn’t a jerk to the old woman like a lot of guys would have been.
The food was cold, and the mosquitoes were out, so Tori carried everything inside. Time stretched out to almost twenty minutes. She planned to tease him about being over there having a quicky. Going back out on the deck, she glanced toward the neighbors. Mark was standing beside the fence, resting against it with his head down.
It was obvious this was more than migraines, but he clearly didn’t want to tell her. He was in a lot of pain. After a moment, she jogged down the stairs and over to him.
“Whoa, Tiger. The beer getting to you, too? Let’s get you home before Adele gets even more aggressive with you,” she said quietly, pretending Adele might hear her. Wrapping her arm around his waist, she led him into the house. “Do you want me to heat your food again?”
“Nah, I think I’m full. I need some Tylenol. I’ll be right back.” Once again, he sounded down, almost defeated. She felt so conflicted, wanting to help but sensing he didn’t want that, no, knowing he didn’t want any attention drawn to it. But did he need it anyway?
Trying to kill some time, she put away the food and cleaned up. Fifteen minutes had gone by when she went to the bedroom. Mark was lying on the bed in the darkened room.
Tori climbed onto the bed, and he looked over at her. “I’m sorry. I know I'm not really much fun tonight. If you want to bail, I get it.”
Leaning over, she gave him gentle kisses. “If you and Adele have a secret rendezvous planned, just be honest, I can go. But I kind of want to stay, if you don’t mind.”
Chuckling, he pulled her closer so he could kiss her. “Nah, I figure she's always there. Always… I can spend some time with the trashy dark girl.”
“For the record, my boobs are real.”
“Oh, I know. Believe me, I know.” He ran his hand under her shirt and undid her bra in the back. Tori pulled it off through her sleeves.
Stopping for a moment, she swallowed hard. “Mark, it's obvious that something is wrong. But I can tell you don’t want to talk about it. I would love to help if I can. I won't push you to tell me, but I am here if you want to talk about it.”
“I know. It's just a headache.” Eager to change the subject, he tangled his fingers in her hair and pulled her to him. His kiss was aggressive, and she moaned into his mouth. Pressing her back against the bed, he pulled her shirt up over her boobs and lowered his mouth to suck kisses over them.
When he moved slightly, Tori saw him flinch and felt bad. He clearly was attempting to distract her. She quickly took the aggressor role from him, urging him onto his back. She straddled him as she pulled off her shirt. He pulled her down to kiss him. After a few minutes, he sat up and pulled off his shirt, then wrapped his arms around her waist. She kissed his neck and bit his shoulder as she grinded on him. Eventually, he moaned, “Tori, I need you to fuck me. Now.”
Quickly, she rolled onto her back to remove her jeans and panties. Sitting on her knees, she helped Mark undress. He reached for a condom, but she took it and tossed it on the bed, pushed him to lie down, and she slid down on the bed. She wrapped her hand around his dick, then raised her gaze to his as she licked down the shaft. She didn’t want to torture or tease him like last time and almost immediately took him deep in her mouth. His hand lightly rested on her head as she moved quickly, alternating between light swirls of her tongue and strong sucking, all while moving up and down on him.
“Fuck, that feels so damn good,” he moaned after a while. “But I’m going to come soon if you don’t slow down.” When she took him even deeper, using her hand to stroke the remaining inches, Mark groaned and knotted her hair in his fist. Unable to resist the natural urges of his body, he thrust into her mouth a few times before Tori lay beside his legs, pulling on his hip so eventually he was fucking her mouth.
“Tori, don’t stop now. Your mouth feels so good. Jesus, just like that.” He cried out when she sucked him all the way down. Her nails digging into the flesh on his hip and ass, she pushed him over the edge. He thrust all the way multiple times before he moaned that he was coming.
“Damn, you’re going to be the death of me,” he murmured, lying back, breathing deeply.
Tori took a deep breath and smiled. “But what a way to go.”
“You seem to enjoy it too.” He rubbed his thumb over her lips.
“Sex is about our connection, so we both get pleasure. That is, if we’re doing it right. But blowjobs are about your pleasure. So yes, I do enjoy giving them to you.” She looked at him mischievously.
Mark watched her swing her leg over his and started sucking a hot path on his stomach. Suddenly, she said, “Shit.” Then she jumped off the bed and rushed into the living room. Mark watched in confusion when she then ran into the bathroom with her purse.
Propping himself up on his elbows, “Is everything okay?” He chuckled when he heard her brushing her teeth. Eventually, she ran in and jumped on the bed. He pulled her to him. “You’re both sexy as hell and adorable.” She smiled brightly before kissing him.
“You’re pretty cute yourself,” she whispered. “Now where was I?” She continued kissing him as she straddled him.
“Right there,” he said, lowering his hands to stroke her legs. She drove him crazy in the best way. It was hard to remember how miserable he was half an hour ago, even as his headache was returning.
Their relationship or dating or hooking up or… whatever this was, normally would have sent him running for the hills because he felt so drawn to her, and that made him feel like she had more power than he did. Despite her games before, since their first night together, she hadn’t played games since. She also never seemed to try to gain an advantage over him or string him along. She acted more mature than most of the women he dated, who were twice her age, but she seemed pretty clear about her limits. He had a feeling that if they had a conflict, she wouldn’t back down to please him. But she also didn’t try to start drama over nothing.
Strangely enough, it felt like they were already months into a happy relationship. She made him laugh and smile; she made him hot. In fact, she was the perfect woman he should have met before being diagnosed with a fatal brain tumor. This was karma.
“Now you’re the one who is miles away,” she whispered. She caressed his face gently. “If your head’s hurting again, we can wait.” Mark could see the concern in her eyes and hated it. She moved to lie beside him, propped up on her arm. “What usually helps?”
“Nothing,” he admitted, running his fingers through his hair. “I’m sorry. I know this has to be annoying for you.”
“You have only annoyed me one time,” she replied. When he studied her, she quietly chuckled. “I may have downplayed my reaction to you shooting me. You have never seen me angry. It doesn’t happen much, but it's not pretty. Maybe a bit unhinged, lots of ranting and raving, with some throwing things. When you shot me, I was upset. I kept repeating the same thing over and over again. Even now, two years later, Nathan and two of my co-workers tease me about it.” She started laughing and covered her face.
Mark watched her for a few moments before asking, “Should I be afraid you’re going to get even? What did you say?”
“You know I am pretty young compared to my fellow agents, but I try really hard not to act my age. I failed miserably that day. When they were patching me up, I was silently raging. Another agent was trying to calm me down and said something about it not being a big wound. I just mumbled that I could believe the hot one shot me. It escalated some into my just furiously repeating it. After me ranting about it being the hot one who shot me, one of the other agents who was on the phone with Blythe at the time, asked me ‘just to confirm, you’re not mad that you got shot, but that it was the hot officer who shot you?’ but he was laughing so I grabbed something and threw it at him repeating that I couldn’t believe it was the hot one that shot me.”
Mark chuckled, “You’re making that up.”
“I wish. I never lived it down. I even have a shirt at home that says, ‘I can’t believe the hot one shot me,” that someone gave me on my birthday that year,” she answered with a shrug. “Yup. Nathan even referred to you as the hot one that shot me when he came to me about the task force.”
Mark put his fist to his mouth, trying not to laugh, but it didn’t help. “So, when you said you recognized me the prison, it was a little bit of an understatement, huh? I thought you were angry I caught you with that drive, but you were mad I had shot you previously?” He started laughing with her. “Well, I was sorry I shot you, but now I’m just glad I made a big impression on you.”
“And my former co-workers will never let me live it down,” she pointed out.
“So that’s why you kissed me?”
Tori grew more serious and just looked at him for a minute. It was one of those times when, even though she was smiling, she still looked very vulnerable. “No, I told you why. I knew you’d be great in bed… and you made me smile.” She grew uncomfortable and added, “And don’t think I haven’t noticed how I am always the one admitting my thoughts and feelings. God forbid Mark Meachum confess to having any thoughts or feelings. But I guess it could be as simple as you just wanted to sleep with me.”
Mark went back and forth about how honest to be. “Well, I liked your flirtatiousness, never really giving in. Of course, I wanted to sleep with you. Have you seen you? But… you don’t seem to expect anything from me other than what I give you. It’s nice to know that I’m… enough, I guess? Most women fall for me ‘exactly as I am’ then want to change everything about me ten minutes later.”
She cradled his face and gave him an intense look. Mark caressed her face gently. “I only want to change one thing about you. I wish you weren’t in pain so often. But promise me whatever it is that’s causing it, you won't push me away. Let’s just enjoy whatever this is and only end it if we start to hurt each other.”
“I don’t want to hurt you.”
“Then don't.” She smiled before she kissed him.
Tori found the right mix of things to ease his headache. First, a steamy hot shower, with a nice massage, after that she gave him some hot tea, then massaged his neck again. She alternated with Tylenol and Ibuprofen until he felt human. While watching a movie in bed, they made love. Mark wrapped his arms around her and gave a contented sigh.
Mark felt so much better than a few hours ago. He felt alive now. When the headaches came, the pain made him feel like he was burning through the time he had left. And each day it felt like he had less and less time. And he was less and less. He glanced down at Tori, who had fallen asleep with her head on his chest. He ran his hand down her back and kissed her forehead.
After a few moments, she sleepily murmured, “Stop breathing my air or I’ll bite you.”
