It was nice to hear her say it. “Kind of destroyed your nice normal life, though.” Even if he suspected there had been nothing nice about it. How long had he been wandering that city, a hairsbreadth away from her and unable to help? The idea chilled him right down to his reinforced bones.
She let out a trembling, shaky noise that was perhaps meant to be a laugh. “At least I don’t have to worry about Eddie anymore.”
“Was that his name?” He rubbed at his eyes, wiping away crusted blood and ichor, beginning to believe they were both still alive and their trail was clear for the moment. “I’d forgotten.”
“Yeah.” Jenna sighed, the clear glow of grace quivering as it spread. She was, incredibly, relaxing, as if she found his presence comforting at last. “He was nice in the beginning.”
“They usually are.” He suppressed the thin crimson ribbon of rage in his guts, thinking about what this Eddie had likely done to turn her into such a bruised, uncertain shadow. It would be satisfying to quietly find the fellow and mete out a little justice.
Once she was safe. That was the mission, and by the Principle itself, he was going to complete it.
“Are we going to drive straight through?” She shifted again, fidgeting. A ghost of metallic adrenaline soaked her scent, teasing at his control. “I was trying to figure out where to go.”
You’re smart, lumina. And brave. That bravery in such a fragile vessel shamed him even as it had saved her. “We’ll stop someplace small.” Their pursuers would be expecting them to ride hell-for-leather, and Michael found he didn’t want them to be right about anything, much less their direction and speed. “Less chance of the unclean, they tend to gravitate to urban centers. More prey.”
Her shudder was visible even in the dim glow from the dash. “Great.”
“On the other hand, cities provide cover. It’s just weighing the options, that’s all.” Headlights drenched the inside of the cab for a moment; he focused through the glare and kept the truck at a reasonable seventy. The knocking in the Dodge’s engine was subtle, but it was there. “That time we were unlucky, but we’re close to LA. Once we get to the Eyrie…” Michael couldn’t bring himself to finish the sentence, even if it would comfort her.
His conscience wouldn’t let him.
“I’ll tell them you’re a good guy, and that I want you to stick around.” An eager student reciting her lessons, probably to keep the fear at bay. “Right?”
“I’d like to.” He kept his eyes on the road. Fatigue-fog would be a danger; he needed a couple hours to let grace and the marks knit him back together. If they hadn’t left the hotel room at precisely the right time, they might have been trap-bottled—the Corruptor could have been an advance guard or merely the front-runner of a hungry pack of unclean. “We’ll stop someplace small and rest for a little bit, then go for L.A. All right?”
“Why ask me? I have no clue.” Then, amazingly, she unbuckled her seat belt, slid across the bench, and began digging for the central belt. “Do you, uh, mind if I sit here?”
“Not at all.” I’d like that. Probably too much.
Her hip settled against his. She was still trembling, slight movements communicating to his own muscles. And when she laid her head on his shoulder, the resultant flood of hot, sweet grace from the contact was enough to make a legionnaire drunk.
Michael set his jaw, and began looking for a place to rest.
Not Diminished By Giving
The sign read Highwayman Inn, and the place was a single low building with twelve room-doors marching in tired succession, its parking lot unraveling into gravel at the ends. The stars were out, rivers of jewels crossing the cold, remote desert sky; the air was so dry it tickled the nose, stripped moisture from lip-corners, and made every hair-end crackle with electricity. There was no traffic in this lonely place late at night, though the highway hummed in the near distance. You could see a pair of headlights coming for a long while before they reached you, and Jen liked the thought.
She also liked the thought that there were plenty of exits, though Michael probably knew more about that than she did.
It was the type of place that took cash and asked no questions, and with Michael looking the way he did that was a blessing. She hadn’t realized how battered he was until he stepped into the weak circle of light outside the barred window that housed the office. His shirt was in tatters, his jeans were ripped all the way down his left leg, and the black crust at the edges of flapping cloth was dried blood, not to mention strange amber monster-fluid.
He might not be human, but he bled like one, and now Jen knew human blood looked black at night. She should have been the one going up to the window, but Michael just shook his head. No, he’d said, tight-lipped. You’d be too nice.
She couldn’t quite figure out if that was one of his infrequent jokes, or a statement on her negotiating capabilities.
The full bed in the room was sagging, the carpet was dingy and starred with cigarette holes, but the linens were clean and there were two good towels. The lights worked just fine, too, and seeing the full extent of the damage to her traveling companion turned her cold.
“My God,” she whispered as Michael tossed his duffel onto the bed. How he’d managed to retain it was beyond her; her own suitcase was gone with the wind. “You’re really hurt.”
“Corruptor,” he said, pacing to the window and peering out through the curtains before yanking them shut with quick efficiency. He was moving just the same, a prowling, graceful glide, and he didn’t seem that hurt despite the mess his clothes were in. “Takes a while to heal. I’m fine.”
“You’re not fine.” Her throat was closing up, her arms and legs shook like a gelatin salad, and now that they were stopped all she wanted was to be back in the truck and driving again. “Those need disinfecting, and you need a bandage, and... you came back from being stabbed, but—”
“Looks worse than it is.” He glanced at her before striding to the door again, looking at it like it had offended him. “I just need rest, and so do you. You want to get cleaned up?”
“No, I don’t.” Jen’s hands curled into fists, released. This same unsteady, unhealthy energy had grabbed her right after she’d escaped Eddie and stood in the middle of her new studio apartment, listening to the almost-silence of a large building stuffed with people and shaking with the need to keep running, keep doing, keep going. “I want to get the first aid kit out again and take a look at you.”
He fastened the door’s anemic chain to a loosely drilled bar, and his shoulders relaxed a little. “I can’t get cleaned up until you do, lumina.”
“Michael.” She found herself with hands on hips, drawn up to her full height, and her jaw clenched so hard she had to try twice before she could talk. “Come here.”
He turned with almost military precision, walked silently in his boots—at least those weren’t torn—and halted right in front of her, his hands stiff at his sides. He didn’t look angry, but he was tall, and broad, and there was a certain gleam in his blue eyes she wasn’t sure she could identify.
So she looked at his chest under the ruins of his navy T-shirt. The wounds had closed up, but they were angry red and looked raw. Blood crusted skin over sharp-tiled muscle and clung to curly, golden-tipped hairs. Vivid bruises marched across his ribs and belly, and his arms were so thickly crosshatched he must have been almost cut to ribbons. There was another bruise fading on the left side of his face, yellowgreen at the edges but fresh and deep black at the center, and both his eyes were slightly swollen.
He still said nothing. Jen’s right hand lifted; she touched the most glaring gash on his left arm. He sucked in a breath, and the marks—still visible, and moving purposefully to cluster the damage—seemed to darken.
No, the ones closest to her fingertip were darker, and they yearned towards her touch. “Why do they do that?” It was a ridiculous question, but she couldn’t help herself.
“Grace.” He was hoarse. Maybe the desert was drying him o
ut, too. Or maybe it hurt, and here she was, poking at the wounds. “It…the Principle. It strengthens us. The marks drink from it.”
“Drink from it. Okay.” She pulled her hand away, fascinated as the marks returned to their business. “Like I’m a battery?”
“Not quite.” His Adam’s-apple bobbed as he swallowed. “You won’t run out, though it could burn you from the inside if you aren’t… cared for.”
“Oh.” That sounds unpleasant. At least, the burning part. She wanted to ask about the rest, but he didn’t let her.
“It’s a gift not diminished by the giving, we say.” His jaw set, almost angrily, but the rest of him didn’t look upset. Just tense, his shoulders iron-hard and his hands stiff.
“That’s a nice way of putting it.” It was, after all, what gifts should be, though so many people used the word to mean something you’d better pay back when I decide I want you to. She liked his saying better. “So it helps you heal?”
“Yes.” One clipped, professional syllable.
Well, that was good. Jen looked up, full of more questions, but his chin had dropped and he was leaning forward. She realized what was happening just in time. Most guys mashed your lips against your teeth or tried to shove their tongue past your uvula. Michael’s mouth, however, halted just a whisper away, and the hesitation gave her the opportunity to deflect, step away if she wanted to.
She didn’t. Jen went up on tiptoes, and there was an awkward moment that made it clear he hadn’t done this much. He was a quick learner, though, and his hands cupped her shoulders with exquisite gentleness, holding her steady while her knees and pretty much everything else turned to liquid.
Everything else—the desert, the monsters, the residue of terror lurking under her heart and inside her bones, even the coppery fear-taste left from the wild, careening escape—vanished. There was only Michael, tall but not threatening, solid but not hurtful, his thumbs moving against her shoulders in tiny circling caresses. She almost forgot to breathe, and when he broke away she gasped to find herself separate.
Their foreheads rested together, his feverish-warm like the rest of him. Her fingertips had slipped into his belt loops, and the urge to pull him forward was almost irresistible.
“You don’t have to,” he whispered. “Jenna.”
It almost stung, before she realized he didn’t mean it unkindly. “Do you not want to?” If he said no, she would go find out how cold the shower could be. She’d need it. It had been a long, long time, and even the prospect of embarrassment if he found her unattractive was fading under the assault of sheer, idiot we’re-still-alive hormones.
“That’s not the problem.” He inhaled sharply as she tensed, tugging gently at the ruined denim loops. She wanted him closer. “I’m afraid you’ll regret it.”
Oh, for fuck’s sake. You can’t be any worse than my last lay. A jagged laugh shook her on its way out. “I like you,” she whispered. “And I’m interested, but if you aren’t, that’s okay.”
The mortifying thought that he might not be built, well, like a human male occurred to her a bare fraction of a second before he kissed her again, and by the time the backs of her legs met the side of the bed she’d forgotten it as well as every other blessed thing in the whole wide world, as one of her fellow dancers used to say back before she met Eddie. Marie had been a lot of fun, but they’d lost contact.
But she didn’t have to remember that. She didn’t have to remember anything right now, and it was a relief. Michael tore the remains of his shirt in the hurry to get it over his head, and Jen began to laugh. He did too, a surprised chuckle that sounded nice even when they had a mouthful of each other.
Jen squirmed out of her own jeans, and the tangle of arms and legs was sweetly awkward, reminding her of high school and eager hands too young to know any better, kisses stolen on hot spring days with the sweet smell of cut grass. His mouth turned hungry, a greediness she matched, and Jenna, for the first time in a very long while, stopped worrying.
A Pleasant Ache
He couldn’t say what it was like. Oh, he knew what was to be done, certainly; soldiers everywhere in the world spoke about it incessantly, whether complaining, bragging, or reverentially listing specifics. He’d even suspected it was pleasant, judging by the time mortals devoted to its pursuit, but you could say the same for cigarettes once they had been invented.
But Michael Gabon could not describe even the bare particulars of the act without stopping, lost in confusion.
The closest thing to it was flying, or breathing deep after a battle was won. But there was more—unalloyed tenderness, the hot salt-sweet scent of a pretty woman’s sweat, a shattering of mind and heart at the same moment prolonged until something like soft, longed-for death swallowed him entire, all of it shot through with the singing of the Principle and the consciousness that it was Jenna in his arms, fragile warmth and strength that shamed his in its intensity.
It was another gift that did not diminish when shared, and an invisible buffeting swelled from his naked back to comb the air, twin curved scars ridging from shoulderblade to hip alive with singing ecstasy. Lassitude swamped him, and when he surfaced into conscious thought again he was kissing down her throat, pleasant shudders and twitches flooding his nerves. Best of all was her relaxation, and her fascinating, maddening softness. She demanded further investigation, just as soon as he could catch his breath.
“Shh,” she soothed, fingers kneading, her heels clasped at the small of his back. “It’s all right.”
Everything was. Riverine peace filled him to the brim and he sagged, propped on his elbows and careful not to crush her. He wanted to say something, anything, but the words wouldn’t come. So he worked his way back to her mouth instead, and tried to express at least a small sliver of his gratitude.
He could not bear to slide away, but he did the instant she made a restless movement. A few moments of arranging the covers and he had them both under the blankets, telling himself he’d only done so to keep her warm on a desert night. She didn’t seem to mind; in fact, Jen lay her head on his shoulder and wriggled one of her long, lovely legs over his hips, which caused a pleasant ache at the core of his being.
“Just stay for a minute,” she said, softly. “Please?”
“Of course.” Michael found out his voice would work again, husky-dry with pleasure. “As long as you like.”
“Look at that.” Her fingertips skated up his chest, a pleasurable thrill following as his marks clustered like koi at a pond’s surface, sipping at grace. Laceration and contusion had both vanished, leaving only the thinnest of white lines on mortal-seeming skin that would fade over weeks unless he chose to keep them as reminders. “They’re all better.”
Now he was only hoping he was mortal enough to please her. “Of course.” How could it not be better? He rubbed his chin along her hair, gently, hoping the rasp of stubble wouldn’t scrape her. Under a tang of hotel soap and the fading chemical bitterness of fear, she smelled of brunette spice, honey, and the wonderful warm note of the Principle in sweet flesh. He wanted to bathe in that scent; he took in deep lungfuls, storing it in memory.
Her fingertips played lightly over his chest. “How long are we safe here?”
She was worrying again, after that? “A few hours of rest, then I can drive again.” Maybe it hadn’t been as pleasant for her. Michael had to shelve that thought in a hurry, because naturally it would lead to wanting to do it again, and better this time. “Or we can stay until you’ve slept enough.”
“No. I want to go. As soon as we can.”
That was the safest option, but still, he was torn. She needed more than a few hours of fitful slumber. “We will, then. I’ll wake you.” It wasn’t enough to merely reach the Eyrie. He had to show he’d done his job properly, and hadn’t… taken advantage.
“All right.” Her eyes were already closed. Her mons pressed against his hip, warm and damp, and the thought of what that fluid was made the aching tenderness in his chest even fie
rcer. “Michael?”
“Hm?” He propped a hand under his head, pushing the pillow away. At least the sheets were clean. Her eyes closed, lashes a sooty semicircle against her cheeks; she nestled sweetly against his side.
“Can you turn off the light?” A yawn swallowed the last of the question.
“As soon as I get up,” he said, and listened to her breathing even out. She dropped into slumber without even a grateful murmur, and a single white feather drifted from the ceiling, seesawing lazily, until it found Michael’s feet under the blankets and came to rest.
He stared at it, unblinking, until he was certain she wouldn’t wake. Then, with infinite patience, he untangled himself by fractions, holding his breath every time Jen shifted restlessly. By the time he reached his feet, however, the downy white ship had sailed elsewhere, and he couldn’t find the feather, even peering under the bed’s squeaking metal frame.
Finally, naked in a California hotel room, Michael Gabon shook his head and opened his duffel. He took out his last clean clothes, turned off the light, and headed for the bathroom, carrying both guns with him.
A Lot More Sensitive
“Jenna.” One quiet word, a familiar touch on her bare shoulder, and Jenna lunged into consciousness, her heart in her throat. Michael, freshly shaven and bright-eyed, snatched his hand back as if she’d burned him. The thin drapes were outlined with a gray dawn and a thread of gold showed under the room’s door.
“Are they here?” She didn’t have a headache, but it was the only thing she could think of to say. Her pulse galloped; she clutched the sheet to her chest, pushing herself fully upright.
“Nope.” Michael shook his head, his hand falling to his side. “It’s dawn, you’ve had a few good hours of sleep. We should go, unless you want to rest more.”
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