The Black Dagger Brotherhood Novels 5-8

by J. R. Ward

  John was what had saved her from falling back then, too.

  With smooth strength, he carried her back into the recovery room, easing her down on the bed and rehanging her IV bag.

  How’re you feeling? he signed.

  She stared up at him, seeing him for all he was, the fighter and the lover, the lost soul and the leader . . . the bonded male who was nonetheless prepared to let her go.

  “Why’d you do it?” she said through an aching throat. “Back in that alley. Why did you let me kill him?”

  John’s vivid blue eyes locked on hers as he shrugged. I wanted you to have that. It was more important for you to have the . . . closure, I guess it’s called. There’s a lot of shit in this world that never comes back around right and you deserved the satisfaction.

  She laughed a little. “In a weird way . . . it’s the most considerate thing anyone’s ever done for me.”

  A faint blush hit his cheeks, and juxtaposed against his square jaw, it was pretty damned appealing. But then, what part of him wasn’t?

  “So, thank you,” she murmured.

  Well, you know . . . you’re not exactly the kind of female a guy would get flowers for. Sort of limits my options.

  Her smile faded. “I couldn’t have done that without you. You realize that. You made it happen.”

  John shook his head. The mechanics don’t matter. The job got done in the right way, by the right person. That’s all that counts.

  She thought back to him holding Lash down flat, pinning the fucker to the pavement to give her the best shot. Short of putting the bastard on a silver plate and shoving an apple in his mouth, John couldn’t have served her captor up any better.

  He had presented her enemy to her. He’d put her needs before his own.

  And as she thought about all their ups and downs, that was the one constant, wasn’t it. He always put her first.

  Now Xhex was the one shaking her head. “I think you’re wrong. The mechanics were everything . . . are everything.”

  John just shrugged again and glanced at the door he’d brought her in through. Listen, do you want me to get Doc Jane or Ehlena? Do you need food? Help to the loo?

  Annnnnnnnnnnnd there it was again.

  Xhex started laughing . . . and once she lit off, she couldn’t seem to stop, even as her side began to holler and red tears sprang to her eyes. She knew John was looking down at her like she’d lost her mind and she couldn’t blame him. She too heard the high note of hysteria coming out of her mouth . . . and what do you know, not long thereafter, she wasn’t laughing; she was weeping.

  Covering her face with her hands, she just sobbed until she couldn’t breathe, the emotional explosion so great that there was no sucking it up or trying to keep it in. She just fell apart and for once didn’t fight the unraveling.

  When she finally eased into the station at Get-a-grip-ville, she was entirely unsurprised to find a box of Kleenex right in front of her . . . courtesy of John’s hand.

  She snapped a tissue free. And then promptly went back for seconds and thirds: After that show, cleanup was going to take a lot more than one.

  Hell, on that theory, maybe she should just use the sheets on the bed.

  “John . . .” She sniffled as she mopped her eyes, and that, coupled with all the little hearts she was wearing, pretty much sealed the deal on her nancy status. “I have to say something to you. It’s been a long time in coming . . . so long. Too long.”

  He grew so still he didn’t even blink.

  “God, this is hard.” More with the frickin’ sniffles. “You wouldn’t think three little words would be so hard to say.”

  John’s exhale was loud—like someone had punched him in the solar plexus. Funny, she felt the same way. But sometimes, in spite of the waves of nausea and a crushing sense of suffocation, you had to speak what was in your heart.

  “John . . .” She cleared her throat. “I . . .”

  What, he mouthed. Just tell me. Please . . . just say it.

  She straightened her shoulders. “John Matthew . . . I’m such an ass-hat.”

  As he blinked and looked like his mouth was about to unhinge, she sighed. “Guess that’s four words, huh.”

  Well, yes . . . that was four words.

  God, for a second there . . . John forced his head to get back to reality—because only in a fantasy would she ever I-love-you him.

  You’re not an asshole, he signed. Hat, I mean.

  She sniffled some more and the sound was just too fucking adorable. Shit, the sight of her was too adorable. Lying back against the thin pillows, with crumpled tissues all around her, and her face flushed, she seemed so fragile and lovely, almost soft. And he wanted to take her into his arms, but he knew she liked her space.

  Always had.

  “I so am one.” She snatched out another tissue, but instead of using it, she folded the thing into precise squares, halving it and then quartering it, then working some triangles until it was nothing but a tight wedge between her fingers.

  “Can I ask you something?”

  Anything.

  “Can you forgive me?”

  John recoiled. For what?

  “For being a hardheaded, narcissistic, single-minded, emotionally repressed nightmare? And don’t tell me that I’m not.” She sniffed again. “I’m a symphath. I’m good at reading people. Can you ever forgive me?”

  There’s nothing to forgive.

  “You’re so wrong.”

  Then color me used to it. Have you seen the fools I live with?

  She laughed and he loved the sound. “Why have you hung in with me through everything—wait, maybe I know the answer to that one. You can’t choose who you bond with, can you.”

  Her sad voice trailed off.

  As Xhex’s eyes stayed locked on that Kleenex in her hand, she started to unfold what she had done to it, opening up the shapes she’d made from its corners and flat stretches.

  He brought up his hands, getting ready to sign—

  “I love you.” Her gunmetal gray stare lifted to his. “I love you and I’m sorry and thank you.” She laughed in a short, harsh burst. “Check me out, being all ladylike.”

  John’s heart thumped so loudly in his ribs, he nearly glanced out in the hallway to see whether a marching band was going by.

  Xhex’s head eased back onto the pillows. “You’ve always done the right thing by me. I’ve just been too wrapped up in my own drama to be able to accept what’s been in front of me the whole time. That or too much of a wimp to do anything about it.”

  John was having a hard time believing what he was hearing. When you wanted something or someone as badly as he did her, you were liable to translate things wrong—even if they were in your native tongue.

  What about your end game? he signed.

  She took a deep breath. “I think I’d like to change my plans.”

  How? Oh, God, he thought, please say—

  “I’d like you and me to be my end game.” She cleared her throat. “It’s easier to check out. Just do yourself and be done with the whole living-breathing thing. But I’m a fighter, John. Always have been. And if you’ll have me . . . I’d like to fight with you.” She extended her hand to him, palm up. “So what do you say. How’d you like to sign on for a symphath?”

  Fucking. Bingo.

  John grabbed that hand of hers and brought it to his lips, kissing the thing hard. Then he put it over his heart, and as she kept it there, he signed, I thought you’d never ask, you meathead.

  Xhex laughed again and then he was smiling so hard his cheeks felt like they were full of buckshot.

  Gingerly, he gathered her to his chest and held her with care.

  “God, John . . . I don’t want to fuck this up, and I have a bad track record with so much.”

  He pulled back and stroked her silky, curling hair from her face. She looked so damned anxious—which was not how he wanted her to be feeling at a moment like this.

  We’re going to work it
out. Now and in the future.

  “I hope so. Shit, I’ve never told you this, but I had a lover once. . . . It wasn’t like you and me, but it was a relationship beyond just physical stuff. He was a Brother—he was a good male. I didn’t tell him about what I was, which was so not fair. I just didn’t think anything would come of it . . . and I was totally wrong.” She shook her head. “He tried to save me, he tried so damned hard. He ended up going into that colony to get me, and when he found out the truth, he just . . . lost it. Dropped out of the Brotherhood. Disappeared. I don’t even know if he’s still alive. That’s the main reason I’ve fought this . . . thing . . . between you and me. I lost Murhder, and it nearly killed me—and I didn’t feel for him half of what I do for you.”

  This was good, John thought. Not that she’d had to go through all that—Christ, no way. But now their past made even more sense—and it made him trust better where they were now.

  I’m so sorry, but I’m glad you told me. And I’m not whoever that was. We’re going to take it night by night and not look back. We look forward, you and I. We look forward.

  She laughed in a quiet burst. “I think that’s it for revelations, by the way. You know everything I do about myself.”

  Right . . . how to put this, he wondered.

  John lifted his hands and slowly signed, Listen, I don’t know whether you’d be up for this, but there’s a female in this house, Rhage’s shellan? She’s a therapist and I know that some of the Brothers have used her to sort things out. I could introduce you to her? And maybe you could talk with her? She’s very cool and very discreet . . . and maybe it will help you with the past as well as the future.

  Xhex took a deep breath. “You know . . . I’ve been living with buried shit for so long—and look where it’s gotten me. I’m a meathead, but I’m not a moron. Yeah . . . I’d like to meet with her.”

  John leaned in and pressed his lips to hers; then he stretched out beside her. His body was exhausted, but his heart was alive with a joy so pure it was like the sunlight he didn’t get to see anymore: He was a mute-ass motherfucker with a nasty past and a night job that involved fighting evil and slaughtering the undead. And in spite of all that . . . he’d gotten the girl.

  He’d gotten his girl, his true love, his pyrocant.

  Of course, he wasn’t fooling himself. Life with Xhex wasn’t going to be normal on so many levels—good thing he was down with the wild side.

  “John?”

  He whistled an ascending note.

  “I want to get mated to you. Properly mated. Like in front of the king and everyone. I want this to be official.”

  Well . . . didn’t that just make his heart stop.

  As he sat up and looked at her, she smiled. “Jesus, the expression on your face. What? You didn’t think I’d want to be your shellan?”

  Not in a million years.

  She recoiled a little in surprise. “And you were okay with that?”

  It was hard to explain. But what was between them went further than a mating ceremony or a back carving or a witnessed exchange of commitment. He couldn’t put his finger on the why of it . . . but she was his missing puzzle piece, the twelfth in his dozen, the first and the last pages of his book. And at some level that was all he needed.

  All I want is you. However that comes.

  She nodded. “Well, I want the whole deal.”

  He kissed her again, softly, because he didn’t want to hurt her. Then he pulled back and mouthed, I love you. And I’d love to be your hellren.

  She blushed. She actually blushed. And didn’t that make him feel like he was the size of a mountain.

  “Good, then it’s settled.” She put her hand to his face. “We’re going to be mated now.”

  Now? As in . . . now? Xhex . . . you’re having trouble standing.

  She looked him straight in the eye, and when she spoke, her voice ached—God . . . how it ached. “Then you would hold me up, wouldn’t you.”

  He traced over her features with his fingertips. And as he did, for some strange reason, he felt the arms of infinity wrapping around them both, holding them close . . . linking them forever.

  Yes, he mouthed. I would hold you up. I will ever hold you up and hold you dear, lover mine.

  As he fused their mouths, he thought that was his vow to her. Mating ceremony or not . . . that was his vow to his female.

  SEVENTY

  Tragedy struck during a brutal winter storm, and verily, it was not at all like the long labor of the female on her birthing bed. The ruination took naught but the blink of an eye . . . and yet the ramifications changed the course of lives.

  “No!”

  The sound of Tohrment’s shout snapped Darius’s head up from the steaming, slippery newborn in his bare hands. At first, there was no telling what had occurred to cause such alarm. Indeed, there had been much blood during the birthing, but the female had survived the delivery of her offspring unto this world. In fact, Darius was just cutting the cord and going to wrap the young for presentation—

  “No! Oh, no!” Tohrment’s face was ashen as he reached out. “Oh, dearest Virgin Scribe! No!”

  “Whyever are you—”

  At first, Darius could make no sense of what he saw. It appeared . . . that the hilt of Tohrment’s dagger protruded from the sheets covering the female’s still-rounded belly.

  And her pale, now bloodied hands were slowly slipping down from the weapon to land at her sides.

  “She took it!” Tohrment gasped. “From my belt—I . . . It was so fast. . . . I bent down to cover her and . . . she unsheathed the—”

  Darius’s eyes shot to the female’s. Her stare was locked on the fire in the hearth, a single tear easing down her cheek as the life light began to drift out of her.

  Darius knocked over the tub of water by the bed in his scramble to get to her . . . to take out the dagger . . . to save her . . . to . . .

  The wound she had imparted to herself was a mortal one, in light of all she had been through during the birthing . . . and yet Darius could not help himself from fighting to save her.

  “Leave not your daughter!” he said, leaning down with the squirming young. “You have brought forth a healthy babe! Lift thine eyes, lift thine eyes!”

  As the sound of water dripping from the upended bowl seemed loud as a gunshot, no answer came forth from the female.

  Darius felt his mouth moving and had the sense that he was talking—but for some reason, all he could hear was the soft rain of that spilled water while he begged for the female to stay with them . . . for her daughter’s sake, for the hope of the future, for the ties that he and Tohrment were prepared to forge with her so that she was never alone as she sought to raise what she had birthed.

  As he felt something upon his britches, he frowned and glanced down.

  ’Twas not water that fell to the floor. ’Twas blood. Hers.

  “Oh, dearest Virgin Scribe . . .” he whispered.

  Verily, the female had chosen her course and sealed her fate.

  Her last breath was naught but a shudder and then her head listed to the side, her eyes seemingly still locked upon the flames licking at the logs . . . when in fact, she saw nothing and would be sightless e’ermore.

  The wail of the newborn and that forsaken dripping were the only sounds in Darius’s thatched cottage that he could hear. And indeed, it was the young’s plaintive mewling that threw him into action, for there was naught to accomplish about the spilled blood or the life lost. Grabbing the swaddling blanket that had been made for the little one, he carefully wrapped up the wee innocent and held her to his heart.

  Oh, the cruel fate that had brought about this miracle. And now what?

  Tohrment looked up from the bloodied birthing bed and the now cooling body, his eyes burning with horror. “I but turned away for a moment . . . may the Scribe Virgin forgive me . . . but for a moment did I—”

  Darius shook his head. When he went to speak, he had no voice, so he placed h
is palm upon the boy’s shoulder and squeezed to offer comfort. As Tohrment sagged in his own skin, the wailing grew louder.

  The mother was gone. The daughter remained.

  Darius bent down with the new life in his arms, and retracted Tohrment’s dagger from the belly of the female. He put it aside, and then he closed the lids on those eyes and drew up fresh sheeting o’er the face.

  “She will not go unto the Fade,” Tohrment moaned as he put his head in his hands. “She has doomed herself. . . .”

  “She was doomed by the actions of others.” And the greatest sin among them was the cowardice of her father. “She was doomed long afore . . . oh, merciless fate, she was doomed long afore . . . Surely the Scribe Virgin shall look upon her in her death with a favor she was not granted in her life.”

  Oh . . . damned . . . cursed, damned fate . . .

  Even as he railed against so much in his head, Darius took the tiny young closer to the fire, because he was worried about the chill in the air. As the two of them came within the circle of warmth, she opened her mouth and routed about . . . and for lack of a better alternative, he offered his pinkie for her to suckle on.

  With the tragedy still loud as a scream, Darius took in the tiny features and watched as the little one reached out toward the light.

  The eyes were not red. And upon that hand there were five digits, not six. And the jointing of the fingers was normal. Briefly opening the swaddling cloth, he checked the feet and the belly and the little head . . . and found that the abnormal length of feature and limb characteristic of sin-eaters was not represented.

  Darius’s chest roared with pain for the female who had carried this life within her body. She had become a part of both him and Tohrment—and even though she rarely spoke and never smiled, he knew that she had cared for them as well.

  The three of them had been a kind of family.

  And now she had left this wee one behind.

  Darius retucked the blanket and realized that the swaddling cloth was the only way the female had acknowledged her impending birth. Indeed, she herself had made this coverlet that her new daughter was wrapped in. It was the only interest she had taken in the pregnancy . . . likely because she had known this would be the outcome.