She opened her eyes and found him looming above her, exactly where she knew he would be. She felt him inside her mind, knew she could find him in a crowd without looking. The very sight of him stole her breath. He was so tall, and he wore power like a second skin No. That wasn’t exactly right. He was power personified. She waited for him to speak, needing to hear his voice. She loved the sound of his voice. It frightened her, her tremendous reaction to him. She had trained herself not to feel anything for anyone, particularly a man. She was convinced Tyler Drake would resurface if she were to show interest in a man.
“Are you feeling any better this evening?” Lucian’s hand brushed her forehead.
Jaxon felt the warmth of his touch like a rush of lava through her body. “You look tired.” She frowned. “Have you been taking care of me nonstop without sleeping?” The thought of having a stranger tend to her while she slept should be disconcerting, yet she didn’t really mind it so much with him. Jaxon studied him. Physically he was beautiful, much like the mythical Greek gods. But his weary eyes had seen far too much, and she was definitely worried that he wasn’t getting enough sleep. She had an unexpected urge to reach up and touch his beard-shadowed jaw.
“I am the one taking care of you, honey.” A faint smile curved his perfectly sculpted mouth. “You do not need to think of anyone else but yourself. Your wounds are healing nicely. Another day and we can return you to the hospital, so your friends can see for themselves that you are alive and recovering. I have reassured them, but they need to see you with their own eyes.”
Lucian controlled human minds easily without giving it much thought. He had done so for many centuries. But this was a little more wearing, controlling so many different humans and at such a distance. He was not ready to relinquish his care of Jaxon to hospital workers until he was certain they would immediately release her to come home. He wanted no blood tests performed on her, and he knew she would be very vulnerable in a hospital should Tyler Drake or any of the enemies she had acquired through her work decide to finish the job someone had clearly started.
“I want to sit up.” She attempted to do so, surprised she still felt so weak.
At once Lucian caught her slight body in his hands and easily lifted her into a sitting position. He carefully tucked the pillows behind her and the blankets around her. She was even paler than usual. “Breathe deeply, and you will not faint.” He made it a decree.
She found herself smiling. “Do you have any idea how bizarre this is? I know this is no hospital. It isn’t even some kind of sanitarium, is it? And you’re no doctor.”
He moved across the room with swift, fluid, totally silent steps. She couldn’t help comparing the way he moved to that of a large jungle cat. There was something menacing about him, yet at the same time something quite sensual. He made her feel secure and safe, yet threatened in a way she had never been before. Which was it? Safe or in danger? If he was such a predator, why wasn’t her inner warning system shrieking at her? She let her breath out slowly, carefully. She felt threatened as a woman, not as a law enforcement officer, she realized.
Lucian turned to face her, the window behind him. Outside, the night was dark and a bit stormy. She could hear rain falling in a steady pattern and wind blowing through the trees, making their branches rake the walls. “I may not be a doctor in the usual sense of the word, but I do heal people. I healed you.”
Again, Jaxon knew it was true. She knew all kinds of things about him. Things she shouldn’t have known. Intimate things. She knew he had traveled the world, every continent, several times. He spoke countless languages. He was wealthy, yet money meant nothing to him except as a means to an end. She knew he had been searching for her for a long, long time.