by J. R. Ward
He heard a noise outside and his eyes shot to the window on the right. But it was just a leaf blowing up against the glass.
“I didn’t mean to make you feel awkward,” she blurted. “I just wanted to…you know, reassure you.”
“Mary, I don’t know what to say.” Because the truth would terrify her. And he’d lied to her enough already.
“Don’t say anything. I probably shouldn’t have brought it up. All I meant was, I’m glad you’re here. As a friend. I really liked that ride in your car. And I like just hanging out. I don’t need more from you, honestly. You’re really good friend material.”
Rhage sucked in a breath. In all his adult life, no female had ever called him a friend. Or valued his company for something other than sex.
In the Old Language, he whispered, “I am barren of words, my female. For no sounds from my mouth are worthy of your hearing.”
“What language is that?”
“The one I was born speaking.”
She tilted her head, considering him. “It’s almost French, but not quite. There’s something Slavic in there. Is it Hungarian or something?”
He nodded. “Basically.”
“What did you say?”
“I like being here with you, too.”
She smiled and put her head down.
As soon as he knew she was out, he unzipped the duffel and double-checked that the guns inside of it were loaded. Then he walked through her house, turning off every light. When it was pitch-dark, his eyes adjusted and his senses heightened even further.
He scanned the woods behind her house. And the meadow to the right. And the big farmhouse in the distance. And the street out front.
He listened, tracking the footfalls of animals across the grass and noting the wind as it brushed against the barn’s wooden clapboards. As the temperature dropped outside, he sifted through the creaks of the house, testing, probing for a break-in. He prowled around, going from room to room, until he thought he was going to explode.
He checked his cell phone. It was on, with the ringer activated. And the thing was receiving a signal.
He cursed. Walked around some more.
The movie ended. He started it over in case she woke up and wanted to know why he was still there. Then he took another trip around the first floor.
When he was back in the living room, he rubbed his brow and felt sweat. Her house was warmer than he was used to, or maybe he was just pumped. Either way, he was hot, so he took off his jacket and put his weapons and the cell phone just inside the duffel bag.
As he rolled up his sleeves, he stood over her and measured her slow, even breaths. She was so small on that couch, smaller still with those strong, gray warrior eyes hidden behind lids and lashes. He sat down next to her and gently shifted her body so she was nestled in the crook of his arm.
Next to his brawn, she was tiny.
She stirred, lifted her head. “Rhage?”
“Go back to sleep,” he whispered, urging her against his chest. “Just let me hold you. That’s all I’m going to do.”
He absorbed her sigh through his skin and closed his eyes as her arm went around his waist, her hand tucking into his side.
Quiet.
Everything was so quiet. Quiet in the house. Quiet out of doors.
He had a stupid impulse to wake her up and reposition her just so he could feel her ease against him once more.
Instead, he focused on her breathing, matching the draw and push of his own lungs to hers.
So…peaceful.
And quiet.
Chapter Twenty
As John Matthew left Moe’s Diner, where he worked as a busboy, he was worried about Mary. She’d missed her Thursday shift at the hotline, which was very unusual, and he hoped she was in tonight. As it was twelve thirty now, she had a half hour left before she took off, so he was sure to catch her. Assuming she’d showed.
Walking as fast as he could, he covered the six dirty blocks to his apartment in about ten minutes. And though the trip home was nothing special, his building was full of fun and games. When he came up to the front doorway, he heard some men arguing with the imprecision of drunks, their insults loose, colorful, and inconsistent. A woman yelled something over pounding music. The seething male response she got back was the kind he associated with folks who were armed.
John shot through the lobby and up the chipped stairs, locking himself in his studio with quick twists of his hands.
His place was small and probably five years away from being condemned. The floors were half linoleum and half carpet, and the two were trading identities. The linoleum was fraying to the point that it was developing a kind of nap, and the rug had stiffened into something close to hardwood.
Windows were opaque with grime, which was actually a good thing, because it meant he didn’t need shades. The shower worked and so did the basin in the bathroom, but the kitchen sink had been clogged since the day he’d moved in. He’d tried to get the thing open with some Drano, but when that didn’t work, he’d decided against getting into the pipes. He didn’t want to know what had been shoved down that throat.
As he always did when he got home on Fridays, he wrenched open a window and looked across the street. The Suicide Prevention Hotline offices were glowing, but Mary wasn’t at the desk she used.
John frowned. Maybe she wasn’t feeling well. She’d seemed really exhausted when he’d gone to her house.
Tomorrow, he decided, he’d ride over to where she lived and check on her.
God, he was so glad he’d finally gotten the courage up to approach her. She was so nice, even nicer in person than over the phone. And the fact that she knew ASL? How was that for fate?
Shutting the window, he went over to the refrigerator and released the bungee cord that kept the door shut. Inside were four six-packs of vanilla Ensure. He took two cans out, then stretched the cord back into place. He figured his apartment was the only one in the building that wasn’t infested with bugs, and it was only because he didn’t keep any real food around. He just couldn’t stomach the stuff.
Sitting down on his mattress, he leaned against the wall. The restaurant had been busy, and his shoulders were aching something awful.
Cautiously sipping from the first can, and hoping his belly gave him a break tonight, he picked up the newest issue of Muscle & Fitness. Which he’d already read twice.
He stared at the cover. The guy on the front was bulging in his tanned skin, a swollen, overstuffed package of biceps, triceps, pecs, and abs. To amplify the he-man look, he had a beautiful girl in a bright yellow bikini wrapped around him like a ribbon.
John had been reading up on weight lifters for years and had saved for months to buy a small iron set. He worked the metal six days a week. And had nothing to show for it. No matter how hard he pumped, or how desperately he wanted to get bigger, he hadn’t put on any muscle.
Part of the problem was his diet. Those Ensures were about all he could handle without getting sick, and they didn’t have a ton of calories in them. The trouble wasn’t just food-related, though. His genetics were a bitch. At the age of twenty-three, he was five feet, six inches tall, 102 pounds. He didn’t need to shave. Had no hair on his body. Had never had an erection.
Unmanly. Weak. Worst of all, unchanging. He’d been this size and this way for the past ten years.
The sameness of his existence wore him down, exhausted him, drained him. He’d lost hope he was ever going to turn into a man, and the acceptance of reality had aged him. He felt ancient in his little body, as if his head didn’t belong stuck atop the rest of him.
But he did get some relief. He loved going to sleep. In his dreams he saw himself fighting and he was strong, he was sure, he was…a man. At night, while his eyes were closed, he was fearsome with a dagger in his hand, a killer who did what he was so very good at for a noble reason. And he wasn’t alone in his work. He had the company of other men like himself, fighters and brothers, loyal to the death.
<
br /> And in his visions, he made love to women, beautiful women who made strange sounds as he entered their bodies. Sometimes there were more than one with him, and he took them hard because they wanted it like that and that was what he wanted, too. His lovers would grab onto his back, scratching at his skin as they shuddered and bucked underneath his crashing hips. With roars of triumph, he would let himself go, his body contracting and spilling into the wet heat they offered him. And after he came, in shocking acts of depravity, he drank their blood and they drank from him and the wild frenzy left white sheets red. Finally, when the needs were spent and the fury and cravings were over, he held them gently and they looked up at him with glowing, adoring eyes. Peace and harmony came and were welcomed as benedictions.
Unfortunately, he kept waking up in the morning.
In real life, he couldn’t hope to defeat or defend anyone, not the way he was built. And he’d never even kissed a woman. Never had the chance. The opposite sex had two reactions to him: The older ones wanted to treat him like a child and the younger ones looked right through him. Both responses hurt, the former for underscoring his weakness, the latter for stealing any hope that he would find someone to care for.
Which was why he wanted a woman. He had this tremendous need to protect, to shelter, to guard. A calling with no conceivable outlet.
Besides, what woman would ever want him? He was so damned scrawny. His jeans hung off of his legs. His shirt pooled in the concave pit that ran between his ribs and his hips. His feet were the size of a ten-year-old boy’s.
John could feel the frustration building in him, but he didn’t know what he was getting upset about. Sure, he liked women. And he wanted to touch them because their skin seemed so delicate and they smelled good. But it wasn’t like he’d ever been aroused, even if he woke up in the middle of one of his dreams. He was a total freak. Suspended somewhere between male and female, neither one nor the other. A hermaphrodite without the odd equipment.
One thing was for sure, though. He definitely wasn’t into men. Enough of them had come after him over the years, pushing money or drugs or threats at him, trying to get him to blow them in bathrooms or cars. He’d always managed to get away, somehow.
Well, always until this past winter. Back in January, one had trapped him at gunpoint in the stairwell of the previous building he’d lived in.
After that, he’d moved and started carrying his own handgun.
He’d also called the Suicide Prevention Hotline.
That had been ten months ago, and he still couldn’t stand the feel of his jeans against his skin. He’d have thrown all four pairs out if he could have afforded to. Instead, he’d burned the ones he’d had on that night and taken to wearing long johns underneath his pants, even in the summer.
So no, he didn’t like men at all.
Maybe that was another reason he responded to women like he did. He knew how they felt, being a target because they had something someone more powerful wanted to take from them.
Not that he was about to bond with someone over his experience or anything. He had no intention of sharing what had happened to him in that stairwell with anybody. He couldn’t imagine telling the tale.
But God, what if a woman asked whether he’d ever been with somebody? He wouldn’t know how to answer that.
A heavy knock hit his door.
John sat up in a rush, reaching under his pillow for his gun. He released the safety with a flick of his finger.
The knocking came again.
Leveling the weapon at the door, he waited for a shoulder to hit the wood and splinter it.
“John?” It was a male voice, low-pitched and powerful. “John, I know you’re in there. My name is Tohr. You met me two nights ago.”
John frowned and then winced as his temples stung. Abruptly, like someone had uncorked a floodgate, he remembered going somewhere underground. And meeting a tall man in leather. With Mary and Bella.
As the memories hit, something stirred even deeper in him. On the level of his dreams. Something old…
“I’ve come to talk to you. Will you let me in?”
With the gun in his hand, John went to the door and opened it, keeping the chain in place. He craned his head up, way up, to meet the man’s navy blue eyes. A word came to mind, one he didn’t understand.
Brother.
“You want to put the safety back on that gun, son?”
John shook his head, caught between the strange memory echo in his head and what was in front of him: a man of death in leather.
“Okay. Just watch where you point it. You don’t look real comfortable handling that thing, and I don’t want the inconvenience of having a hole in me.” The man looked at the chain. “You going to let me in?”
From two doors down, a volley of yelling rose to a crescendo and ended with the sound of breaking glass.
“Come on, son. Little privacy’s a good thing.”
John reached deep into his chest and felt around his instincts for any sense of true danger. He found none, in spite of the fact that the man was big and hard and undoubtedly armed. Someone like him just had to be packing.
John slipped the chain free and stepped back, lowering the gun.
The man shut the door behind him. “You remember meeting me, right?”
John nodded, wondering why his memories had returned in such a rush. And why a splitting headache had come with them.
“And you remember what we talked about. About the training we offer?”
John flipped the weapon’s safety into place. He recalled everything, and the curiosity that had struck him then came back. As well as a fierce yearning.
“So how’d you like to join up and work with us? And before you say you’re not big enough, I know a lot of guys who are your size. In fact, we have a class of males coming in who are just like you.”
Keeping his eyes on the stranger, John put the gun in his back pocket and went over to his bed. He grabbed a pad of paper and a Bic pen, and wrote: I don’t have $.
When he flashed the pad, the man read the words. “You don’t need to worry about that.”
John scribbled, Yeah, I do, and turned the paper around.
“I run the place and I need some help with administrative stuff. You could work the cost off. You know anything about computers?”
John shook his head, feeling like an idiot. All he knew how to do was pick up plates and glasses and wash them. And this guy didn’t need a busboy.
“Well, we got a brother who knows the damn things like the back of his hand. He’ll teach you.” The man smiled a little. “You’ll work. You’ll train. S’all good. And I’ve talked to my shellan. She’d be real happy if you stayed with us while you’re in school.”
John lowered his lids, growing wary. This sounded like a lifeboat in a lot of ways. But how come this guy wanted to save him?
“You want to know why I’m doing this?”
When John nodded, the man took off his coat and unbuttoned the top half of his shirt. He pulled the thing open, exposing his left pectoral.
John’s eyes latched on to the circular scar that was revealed.
As he put his hand on his own chest, sweat broke out across his forehead. He had the oddest sense that something momentous was sliding into place.
“You’re one of us, son. It’s time you came home to your family.”
John stopped breathing, a strange thought shooting through his head: At last, I’ve been found.
But then reality rushed forward, sucking the joy out of his chest.
Miracles just didn’t happen to him. His good luck had dried up before he’d even been aware he’d had any. Or maybe it was more like he’d been bypassed by fortune. Either way, this man in black leather, coming from out of nowhere, offering him an escape hatch from the hellhole he lived in, was too good to be true.
“You want more time to think?”
John shook his head and stepped back, writing, I want to stay here.
The man
frowned when he read the words. “Listen, son, you’re at a dangerous point in your life.”
No shit. He’d invited this guy inside, knowing no one would come if he screamed for help. He felt around for his gun.
“Okay, take it easy. Tell you what. Can you whistle?”
John nodded.
“Here’s a number where you can reach me. You whistle into the phone and I’ll know it’s you.” The guy handed him a little card. “I’ll give you a couple of days. You call if you change your mind. If you don’t, don’t worry about it. You won’t remember a thing.”
John had no idea what to make of that comment, so he just stared at the etched black numbers, getting lost in all the possibilities and improbabilities. When he glanced up again, the man was gone.
God, he hadn’t even heard the door open and shut.
Chapter Twenty-one
Mary shot out of sleep with a complete body spasm.
A deep-throated yell thundered through her living room, shattering the early morning quiet. She bolted upright, but was shoved onto her side again. Then the whole sofa pitched away from the wall.
In the gray light of dawn, she saw Rhage’s duffel. His suit coat.
And realized he’d jumped behind the couch.
“The drapes!” he shouted. “Shut the drapes!”
The pain in his voice cut through her confusion and sent her racing around the room. She covered every window until the only light coming in was through the kitchen’s doorway.
“And that door, too…” His voice cracked. “The one into the other room.”
She shut the thing quickly. It was now utterly dark except for the glow of the TV.
“Does your bathroom have a window in it?” he asked roughly.
“No, no, it doesn’t. Rhage, what’s wrong?” She started to lean over the edge of the sofa.
“Don’t come near me.” The words were strangled. And followed by a juicy curse.
“Are you all right?”
“Just let me…catch my breath. I need you to leave me alone right now.”