JE deserves the credit for creating the characters below.

Jenny (JenRar), thank you so much for the fast turnaround as the beta on this story.

Dina (aydinbydin) I added in the little scene to give Bobby's temper a small shout out just for you.

Chapter 26 – The Sweet Taste of Defeat

Bobby's POV

I was finishing up the wipe down of my exam table, hoping that would be the last time it was needed today, when I heard boots on the tile floor. I knew my hope had been misplaced, so I turned my head to the door in time to see Hal walk in.

I raised an eyebrow to him as a question about why he was coming to see me. The only person on staff that hated doctors and medical procedures as much as Stephanie was the man in front of me, so I figured this was going to be good.

He had the good sense to look a little embarrassed before confessing, "I know you said limited physical activity with the stitches in my shoulder, but…"

"Damn it, man," I blurted out before I could stop myself. This had been a crappy day almost from the moment I got to the main floor this morning, and I had a feeling it wasn't going to get better.

Les and I were having a morning snack in the breakroom when Vince came in asking if we'd been running through the woods. I had no clue what he was talking about so I waited for him to explain that the scratches on my forearms and Lester's neck looked like something you'd get from moving through underbrush.

Bones came in during Vince's ridiculous question, followed almost immediately by Stephanie, who smiled at us and went over to peruse the muffin selection. Apparently nothing impressed her quickly because she started to drum her fingernails on the countertop instead of picking something up.

Bones, being the fingernail freak he is, watched her and then blurted out, "Hey Steph did you break a nail?" It wasn't until he said it that I could tell there were nine distinct clicks and one more muted thud that he'd obviously picked up on.

She turned around, with her face already wearing her trademark blush of embarrassment from his question, and stammered through a reply that she had broken a nail, but couldn't get a whole sentence out to attempt to explain how it happened. She looked at Les and then me before smiling and then practically running from the room.

Before either of us could get up to follow her, Bones grinned at us and said, "Look at that smile on her, Dudes, you guys totally rock." He wasn't being vulgar, he was just pointing out that he knew how we'd gotten our scratches, and how Stephanie had broken a fingernail, and he was happy for all of us.

Vince seemed totally lost so Bones said, "Man, keep up – those scratches aren't from being in the wild, they're from getting a little wild."

You could see the gears turning in Vince's head as he struggled to keep up with what Bones was saying and then the light bulb over his head came on and a snear came over his face. "You two have been banging Bomber."

That was it, I'd already had a medic call, and a take down gone wrong this morning and hearing Vince use words like that about Stephanie snapped something in me and I leapt from my chair and made it to the table beside ours where Vince was seated in a chair that had been turned around backward. Without even thinking it through, I threw a fist and connected with his jaw in the magic spot that had him falling straight to the floor, completely unconscious.

Lester was at my side in an instant. "Man, overkill much?"

I couldn't even get an entire response out so I just repeated Vince's words, "Banging Bomber?"

Les seemed to think it over for a minute and then his face hardened as he picked up the insult to our woman. "Damn, I can't hit him if he's out cold."

I cracked my neck trying to get the beast that had roared back under control. Bones whistled under his breath and then looked up at us. "You guys go on. I'll get Sleeping Beauty here awake and I'll explain that it was his own big mouth that made his face meet the tile."

I held my fist out to bump Bones' outstretched hand and then walked out wondering what else could go wrong today.

I took a deep breath, not wanting to lose control with Hal the way I had with Vince this morning, but still felt the warning signs that told me my control was hanging on by a thread.

I'd stitched Hal up after a skip managed to cut him with a knife over a month ago. Two weeks after he was cleared for duty, he'd been hurt when his new partner ran into him and knocked him into some sharpened metal sheets. I'd stitched him up again and given him very specific instructions, which he'd promptly disregarded, reopening the wound and making it worse last week.

When I'd patched him up from his own stupidity, I'd told him the next time he did it, I was going to put him back together without numbing him first. Apparently, he was like a pre-schooler, trying to push me to see just how much he could get away with before I snapped and followed through with an appropriate punishment. Unfortunately for him, my patience was long gone, which meant today was that day.

"I'm getting sick and damn tired of putting you back in one piece because you can't keep it together long enough to let your shoulder heal," I tore into him, seeing him wince at my tone.

The problem with yelling at Hal was that he looked like some fresh faced kid from the mid-west, and I felt like I was kicking a puppy every time I raised my voice near him.

I ran my hand over my face to get a grip and managed to soften my voice to say, "Come on over and let me see what you've done."

He followed my directions and jumped on the table, pulling his t-shirt off at the same time. I was surprised to see that around the line of ten neat stitches I'd put in, there was red, angry-looking skin. I saw a little strain on my handiwork, but he hadn't torn them again. Instead, I was convinced he had managed to get an infection.

I put my hand on the skin around the injury and could tell from the warmer temperature that I was right. "How long has it been hurting?"

He shrugged, proving he was really one of us, not willing to admit to a weakness. "It started itching three days ago, so I figured it was just healing. But when it started burning today, I figured you should take a look again."

While he was talking, I filled a needle with an antibiotic, hoping to jumpstart his immune system into fighting this off. I spun around, pinched the skin up, and gave him the injection before he could process what was happening. Half the time I came near Hal with a needle, I had to pick him up off the floor, so I decided to try a sneak attack to see if it helped.

Hal's face stayed focused on where the needle had been for long enough, I worried that the speed with which I'd acted hadn't made any difference. Finally, he looked up at me, blinked a few times, and then said, "Thanks."

I went through the usual routine of putting some ointment on the top and covering it.

While I worked, Hal seemed to find his voice and asked, "Did you learn to do that quick needle work because of Stephanie?"

I knew he was just making conversation because he was a little on edge, but I always bristled when one of the guys mentioned our girl. I had to force myself to relax when I dropped the cotton swab I'd been using to apply the ointment at the sound of Steph's name. Hal and Stephanie got along, so I knew he didn't mean any disrespect by what he'd said.

"No," I finally answered. "She prefers to know exactly what I'm going to do before I do it." In other words, she's got more backbone than you do – but some things shouldn't be said aloud.

I finished him up and sent him on his way with a ten day supply of antibiotics and a command to check in with me every day until I cleared him. Most likely, this would clear up now that it had been treated, but I couldn't risk it getting worse and going unnoticed, indicating a much bigger problem than I anticipated.

After completing the second clean up of the medical suite this evening, I finally made my way up to four and put my key in the door forcefully. My mind was tired, and even though I knew it wasn't Hal's fault that he had an infection, I also recognized that this wound would have been healed and gone by now if he'd followed my initial instructions and taken it easy for a week when he was first sliced open. As if my job wasn't hard enough some days, I had guys going out rogue and making it harder, since I had to clean up the messes they made of their bodies.

I was hit with the sound of laughter when I walked in, and I felt a little of the mental fatigue plaguing me begin to slip away. I listened as Stephanie ended a conversation with whoever had been on the phone and then watched as she walked around the corner in one of my old t-shirts that read, Stop your whining and put a band-aid on it. The little cartoon character had a gaping bullet wound in his stomach; it was gruesome, but for some reason, it always cracked me up.

"Les here?" I asked, wishing my voice didn't sound so harsh and I hadn't spoken to her so abruptly.

"No, he called about half an hour ago and said he and Ram were heading out because they got a tip on a skip they've been after for a while," she explained, not seeming to be put off by my poor attitude.

I pinched the bridge of my nose. It wasn't a big deal, but I really could have used either a sparring partner or some dinner. Tonight was Lester's night to cook, and I knew when duty called we had no choice but to answer, but I wasn't in the mood to fix dinner this evening.

Once I felt like I could control my reactions, I moved to the kitchen and opened the freezer to see what was in there that I could quick thaw and cook so that Steph and I could eat. I heard her footsteps and tried to force myself to relax the way I usually did naturally whenever she was around.

A small hand touched my shoulder, and when I didn't react immediately, it shoved slightly, as though telling me to get out of the way. I stepped to the side and turned to look at her to see why she'd done that.

Without a word of explanation, she closed the freezer door, opened the refrigerator, and pulled out a bowl of freshly made salad. On top was a grilled chicken breast cut into pieces. She held it out to me and explained, "I chopped everything myself, but I'll confess that I took the chicken breast from Ella to be sure it was safe for human consumption."

I took the bowl from her hand and looked at it, wondering why something as simple as a salad meant so much to me right now.

When I looked up, she was holding a small juice glass that had a dark liquid in it. "I did make the dressing myself, but I let my mom talk through it, so I'm pretty sure it's safe enough to eat. All the ingredients came from your food here, so unless it tastes horrible, it shouldn't hurt you."

I smiled at her explanation and took the dressing, liberally dousing the salad with it, not caring if it tasted like shit or not. Stephanie had made it for me, and I was going to eat it no matter what.

My wrist was pulled as she led me to the couch to sit down. Pointing to the spot I usually occupied, she said simply, "Sit. I'll get you some water."

I followed her lead, thinking how strange it was to have someone looking after me. When she returned, she sat beside me and turned so that she could watch me eat. I was surprised by the first bite of my dinner, as the dressing was delicious. Whatever her mother had suggested was good and definitely something I'd eat again.

"This is perfect," I told her, watching her face light up, "Thank you."

She pretended to pick lint off her jeans and then looked at me again. Her eyes narrowed slightly, and I felt as though she was taking in more about me than just my outward appearance.

"You're exhausted," she finally proclaimed.

"Not really – just a little tired," I corrected her. Honestly, it wasn't so much that I needed sleep as much as I needed to rest. There was a fine line of difference, but it made sense to me.

She shook her head and then asked, "Do you want to tell me about your day?" It's like she wanted to give me the chance to talk about it, but she had a suspicion I was going to say no.

"Let's just say, other than my usual work, I spent plenty of time doing stuff that should have been unnecessary if people had just followed my directions the first time," I told her, knowing it didn't explain much, but not really wanting to go into any more than that, either.

I resumed eating my salad, knowing that good nutrition was part of keeping myself sharp. After munching away in silence with Stephanie occasionally touching my shoulder and neck, I set the empty bowl on the coffee table, leaned back onto the cushions, and shut my eyes.

I heard her get up and take the dishes into the kitchen, and then her footsteps took her to the bedroom for a while before she returned. With no warning at all, I felt her legs straddle my waist, and I sat up quickly to see what she was doing.

"Take your shirt off," she instructed in a way that I couldn't help but notice wasn't really a request.

I didn't have anything to lose, so I leaned up, despite her being in my lap, and pulled off the black uniform shirt I'd worn today, discarding it on the floor.

Her warm hands cupped my face when I sat back again, and she looked into my eyes for a long moment before speaking again. "Did you know that my Grandpa Mazur was a barber?" she surprised me by announcing.

"Uh, no, I don't think I'd ever heard that," I answered honestly, always glad to learn new things about the woman captivating my attention so completely.

"Yep. When I was little, I used to love going into his shop on the weekends. The old guys would come in and play cards and gossip like women, waiting for their turn for a shave or a cut. They taught me to play poker and cheat well enough to win," she continued talking, still holding my face in her hands.

"When I got older, Grandpa Mazur paid me to come in and sweep up. And every once in a while, when it was just the two of us, he taught me how to do other useful things, like work with a pair of clippers or properly wash hair."

As she said the last part, she moved one hand to touch the newly cut hair on top of my head. I'd gotten rid of my braids last week, finally tired of the upkeep, and had it sheered down to an eighth of an inch, which laid down softly on my head. At first, Steph had objected, saying she'd miss running her fingers over the braids, but once she saw how soft it was when it was short, she decided this style was good, too.

She continued running her fingers over my scalp. "When I was a senior in high school, he taught me to shave a guy with a straight edge razor. He said the trick was to take your time and use a steady hand with even strokes. I practiced for hours on balloons and popped every single one I attempted to touch with the blade. Finally, Grandpa pulled me over one night after closing and sat in his chair, handing me a newly sharpened razor and a block of shaving soap with a brush. He expected me to put the razor on his face and trusted me not to carve him into little pieces like I had the balloon."

I was completely into her story and realized my hands were resting on her hips with me having no memory of putting them there.

"I begged him to let me keep working on the balloons and not risk hurting him, but he took my hands in his and made me look him in the eye." Stephanie held my gaze with hers to be sure I was paying attention to her next point. "Then he told me that he trusted me completely, and he was positive I wouldn't hurt him.

"My hands were shaking while I added a little water to the block of shaving soap, but I knew that look on his face meant he wasn't going to back down until I'd at least tried it. He reminded me to warm his face first to open the pores and help the hair stand up better, and by the time I finished doing the prep work, my hands were no longer nervous."

Her ability to rise to the occasion had always amazed me, so I wasn't surprised she'd had that skill since she was young.

"The first stroke was the hardest, but Grandpa Mazur sat there perfectly still with his eyes closed until I worked up my courage to do it. When I pulled the straight edge away, I lifted my empty hand to his face, touched where I'd just shaved him, and saw the skin was perfectly smooth and cut free. I cleaned the blade like he'd taught me and set about shaving the rest of his face. When I was done, I washed him down and put a little aftershave on him, feeling like I'd just conquered the world."

When she finished her story, I could see the pride still evident on her face.

"After that, I came in every Saturday and helped Grandpa by shaving all the old guys he didn't have time to. The only time I ever cut somebody was when they refused to sit still. It always pissed me off when their inability to follow directions messed up my handiwork." Her face colored slightly before she added, "Of course, I cut myself plenty being a klutz and mishandling the blade, but the faces I was working on always came out baby bottom smooth."

Then she leaned way over to the side so that I could see what was sitting on the coffee table behind her. There was a bottle of my shaving cream, a straight edge razor I didn't know was in the apartment, a bottle of aftershave, and a small basin of water with a washcloth floating in the top. I knew based on the collection of items that she intended to shave my face. There was a small piece of my brain that was buzzing like a warning alarm that having a very sharp blade on my face and neck being handled by someone other than me was a monumentally bad idea, but when she wrung out the washcloth and began wiping my face, the alarm seemed to go on mute, and soon, I didn't notice it at all.

It was a strange feeling to have someone taking care of me. I wasn't needy by any stretch, but since I spent most every day caring for others, it was a refreshing switch to have the tables turned on me like this. She was trying to give something of herself to me, and in the process, I had to trust her. Despite all the ways this could backfire on me, I decided a band aid or two would be totally worth it to let her know that, like her grandfather, I trusted her completely. By the time she was satisfied with the prep work on my face, my eyes were closed, and I wasn't sure I could open them.

She put her fingertips on my forehead and pushed my head back so that it was resting on the back of the sofa. "Just relax," she instructed, while getting some cream from the can and smearing it on my face.

I could tell from the way she worked it around my mouth and neck that she knew exactly what she was doing, so following her instructions came a lot easier than I'd thought it would.

Then I heard her open the razor and work it up and down a sharpening strip before saying, "Now, if you stay perfectly still, I can do this without any nicks or scrapes, but if you move or talk, then one of us is going to need some patching up."

I opened my eyes to be sure the razor wasn't near my face before saying, "I can be good."

A partial smile came over her face. "Glad to hear it. I'd hate to be the cause of a mark on your perfect skin."

I circled her wrist with my hand to stop her movement and said, "Thank you."

I wanted to say more about how much it meant that she was going out of her way to open up to me, something she still struggled with, and to let her know how it felt to have someone attempting to take care of me instead of the other way around, but I couldn't get any more than those two completely inadequate words out.

She shook her head no and replied, "There's nothing to thank me for. You're letting me use you to relive a good memory from when I was growing up." Then she pulled my fingers from her wrist to let me know she was going to start.

Once my eyes closed again, she leaned down and whispered in my ear, "Besides, I think your gratitude is a little too early. Wait until you see what I have in store for you after the shave, and then you can be thankful if you want."

I heard myself moan, beginning to both understand and want where this was heading.

I felt myself tense up when the blade landed on my skin, but after she made the first pass, I could feel the ease and confidence that she had in what she was doing, and I knew I had nothing to fear. Once I came to that realization, I was able to sit back and enjoy what she was doing. Each pass of the razor seemed to not only take off the growing stubble, but it peeled back a little of the weariness I'd come into the apartment with. By the time she finished, I found I was sad to feel her wiping my face down.

"Check it out," she suggested, lifting my hand from where it had rested again on her hip and placing it on my check.

I moved my hand against the grain, where I usually felt a little pull even after I'd shaved in the morning. I was amazed that there was truly nothing to feel. I'd never been this smooth.

"I know, right?" she prompted. "It's much smoother when you shave this way."

I glanced at her hands to be sure the blade was gone and there was nothing between us, and then I moved with the same speed I'd used earlier to treat Hal, cupping her face, pulling her to me, and kissing her with everything I had in me. I might not have the words to thank her for somehow understanding what I needed and finding a way to meet that need, but I could sure as hell show her with my actions.

She melted into me immediately and made a sound of such contentment to be in my arms that I wanted to take this beyond just a kiss of gratitude. I pulled back and smiled when she literally pouted at me. "I wasn't done kissing you yet," she almost whined, explaining her sour face.

I grabbed the hem of the shirt she was wearing and replied, "No worries. I haven't even begun to kiss you yet."

Her arms went into the air to make the removal of the shirt that much easier, revealing the fact that she was wearing a pair of the boxers we kept around to throw on for lounging but they were rolled up at the top to make them stay in place better.

"You know," I started, looking at her makeshift outfit instead of her bare breasts so that I could keep my ability to talk, "you really should bring over more clothes so that you can be comfortable here."

She grabbed my face, forcing me to look up at her. "If I bring over any more of my stuff, I may as well move in. Rex, my cookie jar, and a third of my in-season clothes are already here. My apartment is basically nothing but storage."

And there it was, hanging out there so that I could finally broach the subject Lester and I had been discussing more and more when it was just the two of us but we had yet to figure out how to make it happen in front of Stephanie without scaring her.

"I can help you pack up everything tomorrow... It's my day off."

I ground my teeth together, forcing myself to stay silent and hoped my jump into the deep end wouldn't make her run screaming that it was too much commitment too soon. In reality, we'd known each other several years, Les and I had been pursuing her for a couple of months, and we'd been officially together for a solid month now. I guess to many people, it was quick, but it felt right to us and we didn't want to wait anymore.

"That's a big step," she warned. "You guys might decide I take up more than my fair share of the closet."

"You can have the whole damn thing as far as we care," I replied, meaning it. "I'd live out of a box if it meant having you here every night."

Stephanie laughed at my confession. "I'm here every night anyway."

"Yes, but there's a part of us that still wonders where you'll be when we come home. I turn the knob and come in unable to relax until I see you in the apartment. I'm always a little worried that during the day, you will have thought everything through and decided dating two guys was more work that you thought it would be, and you will have retreated back to your place to have a little space." I laid it all out there, wondering if she would understand what I was saying.

"I can't promise there won't come a time that I need a little space just for me, but I can tell you that I won't just run away without letting you know first," she said after giving my words some thought.

That seemed like a more than fair compromise.

"Now," she interrupted my thoughts to get me back to where we'd been before I think she'd agreed to move in with us. She hadn't come out and said it in so many words, but she hadn't disagreed when I'd alluded to it, which was enough for me to claim acceptance in my book.

My eyes got a little bigger when she stood up and worked the boxers down her hips, stepping to the side to rid herself of the silk completely.

"My God, you're a beautiful woman," I confessed to her, being struck again with how perfect she was in my eyes.

"Why don't you ditch those pants so that I can get the same kind of view?" she prompted, giving me the space to stand up and strip.

I ditched my clothes and took her hand, intending to lead her to the bedroom, but she stopped, causing me to step back to her to see what was wrong.

"Let's stay out here on the couch," she suggested. "I want to be able to look you in the eye and be chest to chest."

My finger traced the edge of her face at her hairline before I nodded. "Anything for you, Baby."

I sat in the middle of the sofa and watched as she slowly lowered herself so that she was straddling my waist, hovering just over my little soldier, which was impatiently waiting for the order to move.

"Do you know why I wanted to be this way?" she asked, obviously thinking more of my cognitive abilities than was realistic when she was naked in my lap.

"What?" I was proud of myself for managing to say anything, even though I knew it wasn't the most eloquent response.

"Sometimes, this is a nice position because neither of us is really on top. It's more like we're equals – partners in the same experience," she explained. "Plus, with the lights on out here, I can see your face, and you have the most expressive face when you…well…cum."

I smiled at the thought that despite how forward she was being in requesting a position and how far she'd come in accepting her body and not feeling the need to hide it around us, when it came to speaking bluntly about sex, she still seemed to trip over the words if anybody was looking her in the face. It was a trait I found endearing enough that I hoped it never faded.

"We're always partners in the same experience," I pointed out before contradicting her next point, "but as far as being equals, Baby, you hold all the power regardless of how we are positioned when we make love."

Her face reddened slightly before she said, "One day, I want to understand what that means."

"I'll spend a lifetime showing you if you want," I assured her.

That must have been all the conversation she was interested in, because she lifted up, positioned her hips better, and then engulfed me in her wet heat, forcing me to throw my head back against the sofa and clamp my eyes shut, repeating the major bones in the skeleton to hold back my reaction to the sudden entry into her body. I hoped I'd never got used to this feeling.

She forced us to move at a slow pace, not letting me change the tempo or the angle. I fought the lack of control for a moment, and then, just like the surrender she'd demanded when she'd held the razor's edge to my neck, I allowed myself to let go and let her lead me where she wanted to go.

I heard a key in the lock and knew we were hidden from view of anyone coming into the apartment, but I couldn't stop my reaction of wanting to hide Stephanie to protect her from any threat our visitor might pose.

"Shhhh," she murmured, urging me to calm down, apparently understanding it was Lester who was coming home and nothing to interrupt our time together.

When he came around the corner and slowly let his eyes take in the scene we made on the furniture, his whole face transformed. His eyes darkened, his lip went between his teeth, and then he relaxed the grip on his bag so that it fell out of his hand and hit the floor with a resounding thud. "Now this is the kind of welcome home a man could damn well get used to."

I remembered last week when Les had gone through a shitty day and I wasn't around so Stephanie had to help him fight the demon in his head to let go of what he'd endured in the field. He told me about it over beers a couple of days ago, and when he'd described this trick she had of alternating moving over him with clamping down on him with her muscles, I'd nodded as though I understood, because I had enough theoretical knowledge to know what he meant.

But when Lester announced he approved of what we were doing, Stephanie began to use that same technique on me, and I was convinced the head of my dick was going to explode if she didn't stop. It was like being massaged in a deep tissue kind of way. There was no logical explanation for it feeling that good, but I never wanted her to stop.

Then my partner smiled and began to stalk toward the couch, stopping when he was directly behind Stephanie, tilting her head back and kissing her. I loved watching them together; I had from the first moment we'd spent together, and now was no exception.

When he finally pulled back, he locked his eyes on me and said, "Hey, Beautiful, how about you pick up where you guys were when I so rudely interrupted, and I'll give you a hand?"

When he finished speaking, he knelt behind Stephanie, and when she lifted her hips again to thrust down hard against me, Les moved a hand between my legs, grabbing my balls and massaging them every time she lifted up.

I knew at this rate, I'd blow in ninety seconds or less. Stephanie proved herself once again to be an angel when she moved closer to my face and said, "Bobby, I need you to let go. I can't hold back anymore."

With my permission to blow granted, I let the sensation of being surrounded by the people I most loved wash over me, and my orgasm followed. I actually felt my vision fade out momentarily as every nerve ending in my body seemed to scream out in release.

When I began to feel my wits coming back to me, I opened my eyes and looked at Stephanie, who had collapsed against my shoulder, and Lester, who had moved to sit beside us on the couch. I took a deep breath, feeling the need for an increase in oxygen, and Stephanie laughed.

"What's so funny?" I couldn't help but ask, knowing there was nothing remotely humorous about what we'd just shared.

"I practically attacked you," she replied, not even attempting to open her eyes. "If I don't cut that out, you guys are going to put me back on sugar, aren't you?"

"Hell no," Lester quickly assured her.

"You sure you guys can keep up?" she teased, still not showing any signs of moving the rest of her body.

"You leave that to us," I warned her. "I'd up our vitamin intake before I'd start dousing you with more sugar and missing a night like this."

Then she surprised the hell out of me by jumping up like I'd poked her with a cattle prod and grinning at us. "Good, because I'm going to take a shower, and then I'm going to be ready for round two with both of you." She took off into the bathroom, leaving me with an equally shocked Lester watching her fast retreat.

"What the hell was that?" Les asked, still focused on the now empty doorway.

I looked at him for a minute and realized how happy he looked. My chest suddenly felt ten degrees warmer and three inches broader as the love this woman brought to our lives expanded my heart. "That, my man, was a challenge to our very manhood."

He stood up and held out a hand to help me up, as well. "Well, I don't know about you, but I'm feeling the need to protect my manhood's reputation."

I did a quick glance back to the kitchen out of habit to check for anything that needed to be put away and saw a box of Lucky Charms on the top of the fridge.

"What the hell is that?" I repeated his question from earlier while pointing to the box of sugar in the form of a kid's breakfast cereal.

Lester chuckled and shook his head. "Plan B in case she's right about us not being able to keep up."

As much as I wanted to argue, our military training had instilled in us the need to have multiple exit strategies, and based on her renewed energy at the moment, I wouldn't discount the need to occasionally resort to alternate methods of satisfying our little wildcat.

The thought that we might stoop to drugging her with sugar should have bothered me, but something told me that if it was necessary, defeat would never be as sweet as that admission would be.