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Christine Feehan
pick them up immediately. Small beads of sweat dotted his body, then ran into his eyes to blur his vision as he placed the blade of his knife in the flames.
Opening the wound to allow the infection to run out set his stomach churning. She screamed when he poured the burning antiseptic, nearly coming up off the bed. He hesitated only a moment, leaning his weight across her thighs, and taking a deep breath laid the blade of the knife against her flesh. The odor was sickening. He didn’t hurry, not wanting to make any mistakes, careful to cleanse and repair, before splinting her leg to hold it immobile in order to give it a better chance to heal.
He couldn’t look at her as he cleaned the bedding and packed blankets around her leg to hold her still. She hadn’t moved in a long time, her breathing shallow, her skin clammy. Definitely in shock, Rachael was trembling in reaction. Rio cursed softly. He eased down beside her, stretching out along the bed, drawing her close to him, unable to think of anything else to do.
“Rio?” Rachael didn’t pull away from him, instead burrowed against him like a kitten for comfort. “Thank you for trying to save my leg. I know it was difficult for you.” Her voice was thin. He barely caught the words.
Rio nuzzled the top of her head with his chin, blew at strands of hair caught in the stubble of several days growth. “Try to relax, I can’t give you any more painkiller for a while. Just let me hold you.” His arms tightened with possession. At the same time something was squeezing his heart like a vise. “I’ll tell you a story.”
Her body belonged with his—fit. He curved around her, thigh to thigh, her buttocks pressed against his groin, her head tucked safely against his throat, and she just fit there as if made for him. Her breasts were full and soft and pushed into his arms comfortably. He had lain with her before. Not once, but many times. The memory of her body was etched in his brain, in his nerves and flesh and bone.
He rubbed his cheek in the mass of silky hair. It wasn’t
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all physical. He felt something for her. Came alive around her. “That’s not necessarily a good thing,” he said aloud. “You know that, don’t you?”
Rachael closed her eyes, willing her body to stop shaking, wanting the pain to recede if only for a brief space of time to give her a moment to breathe normally. Rio was an anchor she clung to, the one bit of reality she had. When she closed her eyes, she saw men contorting, fur rippling over their bodies, eyes glowing a fierce yellow-green. In that nightmare world the sound of guns erupted and she felt the shock of a bullet. She looked into those same intelligent eyes and saw pain and madness. And she heard his voice screaming no. That was all. Simply no.
“I need to hear your voice.” Because it drove demons away. It drove the scent of gunpowder and blood from her mind, and she loved the deep caressing timbre of it.
“I don’t know a lot of stories, Rachael. I never had someone telling me bedtime tales.” He winced at the gruff-ness in his voice. It was just that she turned his insides to mush and made it difficult to remember she could have been sent to kill him. He believed in logic, and the way she affected him wasn’t logical.
“I’ll tell you one when I feel better,” she offered.
He closed his eyes. She was like a gift, handed to him. Sent to him in his unrelenting world of violence and mistrust. “All right,” he conceded to please her. “But try to go to sleep. The more you sleep the faster your leg is going to heal.”
Rachael was afraid to go to sleep. Afraid of teeth and claws and the all-encompassing pain. She was afraid she would lose her tenuous hold on reality. As it was, she kept forgetting who Rio was. He felt familiar. She recognized his voice, but she couldn’t remember their life together. When he talked to her, she floated on the sound of his voice. When his hands slid over her hot skin, she felt safe and cherished.