by Joey W. Hill
“Yes, ma’am,” he said slowly, staring at that connection. A sliver of something that might be hope was trying to struggle to the surface, her words shaking things up enough to give it that chance, but the path wasn’t wide enough yet.
“What you mean by a ‘threat’ is you think you can’t give a woman that quick breath,” she continued. “The weak knees that hint that you can overpower and overwhelm her with pleasure. But you can.”
She touched his face, drawing his gaze to hers. “But not if you sit in the dark, caught up by the things you can’t change. No woman wants that kind of bore. But the man who says bugger it, I’m going to find me a gorgeous girl to marry and shag the rest of my life, and talk her into bringing me coffee in the morning, playing up the whole wheelchair thing just to see her running about in cute slacks and skirts, her pretty hair swinging along her back, her smile just for me…”
Tears had filled his eyes, spilled out, and she leaned forward, catching them on her fingertips. “Oh, Sly. I know. I know it’s so very difficult. But I’m not blowing smoke up your arse. I’ve seen men in your same shape and even worse, who put it all back together. Found love and family. And though no one ever wants to hear it when they’re feeling like this, it’s about strength of heart. You can build it up, a day at a time, same way you’re building your muscle strength. Hard and vital, but not impossible. You’re not what you were, but that doesn’t make what you are now worse. Not by a long shot.”
“You’re different from any nurse I’ve ever met. You…” Overcome by it, he stopped. Swallowed. “I can do all that. I know I can. But I’m just so mad, and tired…”
“I know. I know, love.” She stood and put her arms around him, let him bury his face in her bosom and sob, in a way he hadn’t yet. The loss of his legs had to be mourned, in the same stages of grief she’d seen men experience when they lost a mate.
Just as she’d had to mourn the loss of the life she’d expected, in order to set it aside and see the possibilities in what she had now. Wondrous possibilities, as she thought of Alistair’s eyes upon her, the touch of his hands. The way his mind worked. The complicated things their relationship had become, the simple way she felt around him.
She thought of that as she stroked Sly’s back, as she held him. When he seemed to be pulling it back together and on the cusp of feeling embarrassed, she eased away and shifted to grip the handles of his wheelchair. “If you’re up for it, I’m taking you for a spin to another room. Timmy Werther is in need of a playmate for a few hours. There’s only so much back door basketball you can play by yourself. He wants everyone possible to see his appendix bandage. But what he really wants is to pry it off and show the wound to everyone. You can tell him why it’s important to keep that on.”
“Why’s that?” Sly asked, teasing her. “I might take mine off to compare.”
“You won’t do that. Because you know the sooner they heal into scars, the sooner you can impress the ladies with them. Timmy’s not old enough to appreciate the benefits of that, but I expect you can give him other reasons that make equal sense to an eleven-year-old.”
Sly went quiet another moment. Sensing the direction of his thoughts, she put her hand on his shoulder as she wheeled him toward the door. “I’m glad it’s over,” he said. “The war. I don’t want him to…I hope he never has to do what we did.”
“Me too, Sly.” If she’d had the chance to have children, what she’d seen in the war would have planted a seed of terror in her heart that her sons might have to don a uniform and lose their lives—or their souls—in battle.
“But I’m very glad you blokes were willing to do it,” she said quietly, tightening her hand on him. “Timmy’s future, a lot of people’s futures, are brighter because of what you all did. Remember that.”
Even as she knew he’d also remember, in the graveyard hours of the night, the ones that didn’t have a bright future because of what they’d done, what had happened.
They all would.
As she took Sly down the hallway, she left her hand on his shoulder, using the heel of it and the grip on the other handle to push him along, because he hadn’t let her go. Then she sensed something, a heat along her nape, and glanced left.
Alistair was standing at the end of the hall. It startled her to see him there, a tall, handsome man with extraordinarily vibrant eyes and an odd stillness to him. Her vampire, not in his normal milieu, but instead in hers. He still managed to overshadow everything around him, that dense energy of his pushing up against the hallway walls and reaching out to her.
The smile that crossed her face was warm and instantaneous. What are you doing here? I thought you had a meeting.
I did. I got your message.
She remembered sending the thought in her head, waiting for an answer and getting none.
I decided to deliver it in person. Protect you myself and give Nero the night off.
She’d expected him to smile back at her, but he didn’t, so she sent him a quizzical expression. His own was shadowed. Finish with him and then come to me.
All right. She wanted to ask if he was irritated by her being late. She knew the rule he’d set, and he’d been adamant about it, but he could be in her head. She’d asked ahead of time, waited for an answer. Since he’d obviously gotten the message, he could have told her no. But his tone in her mind was hard to read. It gave her a little frisson of uneasiness, truthfully. But now wasn’t the time to try and manage two conversations.
She took Sly into Timmy’s room, aware that Alistair began to walk down the hall, trailing them. As she settled Sly in with Timmy, she suspected he was right outside, leaning against the hallway wall, listening to her talk to the two males, get them acquainted.
She’d made the right call. Timmy took right to Sly and, not having to deal with the awkwardness of his friends and family, their constant worry they might say the wrong thing, Sly relaxed and responded to the boy.
Nina slipped away when Timmy had talked Sly into a game of cards. As she stepped into the hallway, she was surprised not to see Alistair. Frowning, she moved to the stairway exit where he’d been standing. Nothing. Then she realized she might be able to find him another way.
She hadn’t tried it before, but she closed her eyes, focused, looked for that line of awareness that existed between them. There. A smile crossed her face. She could feel him. It warmed her, because she knew he could block that connection if he wished. She pushed open the stairwell door and descended in quick steps.
“Playing hide and seek with me, are you, my lord?” she murmured, as she reached the basement level and came out at the boiler room. Her pulse was already tripping at a more rapid pace as she put her hand to the doorknob and slipped in. He’d never come to see her at work, and she realized now she wished he had. After the steps they’d made together recently, him coming to visit her here felt like an additional endorsement of who she was with him.
She was right, that he could block her awareness when he chose, for as she closed the door behind her, the sense of that connection vanished. She blinked, reaching for the main lights to supplement the dim auxiliaries.
She never found the switch. Instead her wrist was clasped in his strong grip as he pulled her back against his body. His other hand dipped, found its way between her legs and rubbed, a hard stroke. She was damp, because as she’d come down the stairs, thinking of him, her body reacted to the mere thought of his presence, what he might want from her. As a result, when he spoke, she expected sensual teasing.
Not menace.
“Would you have given him this, as well as a look at your breasts, if it helped lift his spirits? Perhaps he’s not the one that needed the reminder that a nurse isn’t a woman paid to have sex with him.”
Anticipation was replaced by shock, quickly followed by anger. She wrested away from him, or tried, and was held in place.
“You’re done working here,” he said flatly. “It obviously detracts from your InhServ training, if you forgot you
rself so decidedly.”
Now he did let her go, and turned toward the door. With another spurt of astonishment, she realized he was planning to leave on that note. Though her senses were still reeling from the abruptness of the accusation, the coldness of it, the utter strangeness of his behavior, she found her voice.
“I forget nothing, my lord,” she said. “But I wonder how far you have to have your head up your arse to be thinking what you’re thinking.”
He stopped and whipped his head around, those blue eyes frost. “Who do you think you’re speaking to?”
“An idiot,” she spat.
His gaze narrowed. “An idiot. Yes, I am. For thinking that allowing you to do this would work.”
“Is there something you needed that I wasn’t providing, my lord? You indicated you didn’t need my attendance until later tonight. Has something changed?”
He took a step toward her. “I told you the rule.”
“Which is why I reached out to you. Are you saying you decided to come all the way here to tell me no, rather than speaking in my head right then, when I could have made my excuses to Tracy and left before you got in a blue over me being late?”
It didn’t make any sense, she realized. She was missing a piece. His jaw worked, showing he was struggling with something, whatever nonsense he was going to say. That was fine. She could say enough for both of them.
“You think because I treat a wounded soldier like a man, remind him he’s a man, that it means I’m disloyal? I’d say unfaithful, but there’s no value on that in your world, is it? You can be with whomever you wish. I am allowed no claim on you, while you have every claim on me, can follow every whim you wish to take with my life. I even have to ask bloody permission to sleep in the same room as you.”
She mimicked him, deepening her voice. ‘I’ll allow you to work as a nurse.’ Her lips curled in a snarl. My life’s calling, as long as it pleases and doesn’t discomfit you. And why does it discomfit you, my lord? I am meeting all the terms you gave me.”
“You were late.”
“We just covered that. I’d say you’re acting like a jealous lover, but that doesn’t make sense. There are servants who indulge with other humans as long as it doesn’t interfere with what their Master or Mistress needs from them.”
His expression hardened. “If their Master or Mistress gives them that permission. You don’t have that permission.”
“I didn’t ask for it, did I? For all the bloody good it didn’t do me, there was one thing the training I received from The Mistress did accomplish. Even the things I’ve learned from you. They’ve made me more comfortable talking to these men about something that matters deeply to them…how desirable they will be to a woman. Being a nurse has given me the experience to do that and still maintain the proper boundaries. Sly did nothing inappropriate and neither did I. I dare you to say otherwise.”
She threw up her chin as his face darkened like thunderclouds. He’d gripped her upper arm, had hauled her up to her toes, but as she threw out the challenge, he said nothing, just stared down at her, his jaw tight.
She took a breath, even as her fists remained just as clenched. It seemed each time they took a step forward, they took two steps back, but she refused to let herself get mired down in that despair. Down that path lay tears, sadness, regrets, yearnings, things that could drain the strength of what she thought they’d shared these past few days. Anger could, too, but anger let her fight off the despair.
“If taking my hand or putting his head on my bosom lets him know that his whole world as he knows it wasn’t lost, I will do that. If you had been fully in my mind, you would have known I used how you make me feel to give me the confidence to handle it the way I thought best. I didn't ask for this life, but I agreed to honor it, and I do so, every day. I don’t bloody well deserve your disrespect.”
Christ, she really didn’t know anything about being an InhServ, or even a vampire’s servant. For any of them to stand fast as she was doing and demand respect, of all things…
But why shouldn’t she? She could have bolted and run. Could have initially refused, never mind what would have happened to her family. She’d done her best to honor her sister’s commitment, done her best to understand what Alistair needed. He had a well-ordered office and a schedule that had improved exponentially thanks to her involvement. They hadn’t yet handled any social events together, but from their time with Anahera and Tane, he knew she’d handle those, giving it a sincere effort. And he’d liked being so deep in her mind, helping her get there.
He liked any moment where he felt like she was all his. She said she couldn’t imagine her vampire master acting like a jealous lover. Well, she didn’t have to imagine it.
He absolutely, fucking was.
I didn’t ask for this life. She was right. They took a step forward and tried to pretend the root of it wasn’t still there, but it was always ready to crawl in and plant the insidious thoughts that had him acting the way he was acting.
He hadn’t focused on her thoughts, only her actions, seen through her eyes, and Sly’s. What had set him off wasn’t the bloke looking down her dress. She’d be surprised by that, he was sure. It was the peace in Sly’s face when she touched his hand, his shoulder. The same kind of peace Alistair had felt when she touched him after the night on the footy field.
For a singular, insane moment, he’d thought of himself as the only recipient of that gift, but he’d just seen it wasn’t custom tailored. It was something she gave freely to any who needed it. Evidence of her bone-deep service-oriented nature, yes, but grounded in a deep well of compassion that didn’t flag, no matter her surroundings or circumstances.
She did deserve respect, whether it was stamped in the damn vampire-servant etiquette handbook or not. It didn’t dissipate the violent aggression in his vampire blood in the slightest, but the logic helped him hammer it down, speak in what he hoped was a reasonable voice. And swallow his pride, another thing he wasn’t all that used to doing.
“You’re right,” he said, and saw the surprise flicker over her face. With a sigh, he moved to a chair that had been left for the maintenance crew and sat down in it. “I tuned in for your moment with Dr. Grant first. It provoked my temper—toward him—and it perhaps made me interpret things incorrectly with your patient.”
“I handled Dr. Grant,” she told him, a cautious assurance, even as she remained in a defensive posture, her color high. She was still angry.
“Yes, you did. I was going to rip his head off,” he said wryly. “But you did me one better. You cut him off at the knees and kicked him in the balls with nothing but your tongue and that steel core of yours. It was a thing of beauty to watch.”
She cleared her throat, now looking uncertain. “Well, I didn’t do it all myself. I did have to intimate I had a terrifying…boyfriend.”
“The man who calls me his,” Alistair corrected. “That’s what you called me. I quite liked that one.” He extended a hand to her. “Come to me, Nina.”
She hesitated, which told him under the anger was hurt. An apology was in order, but vampires didn’t apologize to their human servants. Strewth, it was just the bloody two of them, wasn’t it? Yet he’d been a vampire for three centuries. He knew what was proper and fitting, but what was proper and fitting was not acting like an irrational arse. To find balance, he had to skirt the lines.
“I was jealous,” he said. “I was being a jealous prick, and I said something so unbelievably untrue and hurtful, I’m ashamed of myself. I missed you,” he said simply. “So when I heard your message in my mind, I decided I’d surprise you, answer you in person. Perhaps take you to dinner in town. I got here, found Nero still waiting on you, sent him home. Came to find you.”
“Oh. I’m sorry about being late. I hope…”
“Nina, I told you to come to me. As my servant.”
She swallowed, that delightfully nervous gesture that drew his attention to her lovely throat, her soft lips, and then she wa
s moving. Once in motion, there was no hesitation at all, which tightened his heart in his chest.
But as she started to sink to her knees before him, he stopped her long enough to shrug out of his coat, and put it down so she wouldn’t snag her stockings on the concrete floor. Or have discomfort in her knees. Then he pressed her down on it, though he noted her head remained up and chin set. He touched it.
“It’s true,” he said. “I do consider you mine. I liked, very much, knowing not only that you know it, too, but that you relied upon it to handle that arse.”
She gazed up at him, and there was confusion and hurt still in her brown eyes. “I consider it true, too, Alistair. More every day, in ways that admittedly make me uncomfortable. I’ve no idea where three hundred years will take us, but the way you have made me feel, I consider myself loyal, and faithful, to you alone.”
“In short, I’ve commanded your trust, so is it so much to ask for some modicum of the same in return?” he said, echoing her subconscious thought and caressing her flushing cheek. “You do deserve that respect, sweet nurse. I am new to having a female servant, so you might have to be patient with me. Though use your sharp tongue all you want, because it will be my pleasure to vigorously remind you of the consequences of using it on your Master.”
The flush deepened. He could easily turn this into a sexual moment, but instead he felt a curious compulsion to keep doing just this. Stroke her cheek, her neck, tangle his fingers in her ponytail. Reaching up, she released the clip and let her hair spill over his hand, unimpeded. She knew he liked it loose like that. Turning her face into his touch, she rubbed, closed her eyes. Her hand fell on his, resting on his other knee. Her fingers curled in between his knuckles.
He brought her in closer between his spread knees, until he had his hand clasped in her hair, palming her skull. He liked doing that, too, something about the delicate shape of it, the way the curve of bone fit into his palm, emphasizing the differences in their strengths, at least physically. He’d been telling her the truth about how strong she was. It impressed him deeply, even as it concerned him, because when such a strong will broke, it was a deep, soul-wrenching thing that needed someone just as strong to hold her together. She wanted him to be that strength. Knew he could do it, had done it before, but she wasn’t sure she could rely on it. He’d just underscored that, hadn’t he? He was a daft prick for certain.