“And some cannot be remedied.”
“I don’t believe that.” Although as a symphath, he was not exactly anyone’s go-to guy on moral shit. Not by a long shot. “Especially when it’s you we’re talking about.”
“I’m no different from anybody else.”
“Look, don’t make me bust out my tone again,” he warned. “You did something for me. I want to do something for you. It’s simple barter and exchange.”
“But I’m going to get another job, and I’ve been making things work for a long time on my own. It happens to be one of my core competencies.”
“I don’t doubt it.” He paused for effect, playing the best card he had. “Here’s the thing though, you can’t leave me with this on my conscience. It’s going to eat me up inside. Your bad choice was the result of mine.”
She laughed softly. “Why does it not surprise me that you know my weakness? And I really appreciate it, but if Havers bends the rules for me, what kind of message does that send out? He and Catya, my supervisor, have already announced it to the rest of the staff. He can’t go back now, nor would I want him to just because you strong-armed him.”
Well, shit, Rehv thought. He’d been planning on manipulating Havers’s mind, but that wouldn’t take care of all the other folks who worked at the clinic, would it.
“Okay, then let me help you until you have your feet back under you.”
“Thank you, but-”
He wanted to curse. “I have an idea. Meet me tonight at my place and we’ll argue about it?”
“Rehv-”
“Excellent. I have to tend to my mother early in the evening, and I have a meeting to go to at midnight. How’s three a.m. sound? Wonderful-I’ll see you then.”
There was a heartbeat of silence and then she chuckled. “You always get what you want, don’t you.”
“Pretty much.”
“Fine. Three o’clock tonight.”
“I’m so happy I changed my tone, aren’t you?”
They both laughed, the tension draining from the connection as if it had been flushed out.
When there was a rustle again, he took it to mean she was lying back down and getting comfortable once more.
“So can I tell you what my father did?” she said abruptly.
“You can tell me that and then explain to me why you didn’t eat more for dinner. And after that we’re going to talk about the last movie you saw and the books you read and what you think about global warming.”
“Really, all that?”
God, he loved her laugh. “Yup. We’re in network, so it’s free. Oh, and I want to know what your favorite color is.”
“Rehvenge…you really don’t want to be alone, do you.” The words were spoken gently and almost absently, as if the thought had snuck out of her mouth.
“Right now…I just want to be with you. That’s all I know.”
“I wouldn’t be ready, either. If my father passed tonight, I wouldn’t be ready to let him go.”
He closed his eyes. “That is…” He had to clear his throat. “That is exactly what I’m feeling. I’m not ready for this.”
“Your father has also…passed. So I know it’s extra hard.”
“Well, yes, he’s dead, although I don’t miss him at all. She was always the one for me. And with her gone…I feel like I just drove up to my home to find someone’s burned it down. I mean, I didn’t see her every night or even every week, but I always had the potential of going over and sitting down and smelling her Chanel No. 5. Of hearing her voice and seeing her across a table. That potential…grounded me, and I didn’t know it until I lost it. Shit…I’m not making sense.”
“No, you totally are. For me it’s the same. My mother’s gone and my father…he’s here but he’s not. So I feel homeless, too. Adrift.”
This was why people got mated, Rehv suddenly thought. Fuck the sex and the social position. If they were smart, they did it to make a house that had no walls and an invisible roof and a floor that no one could walk on-and yet the structure was a shelter no storm could blow down, no match could torch up, no passage of years could degrade.
That was when it hit him. A mated bond like that helped you through shit nights like this.
Bella had found that shelter with her Zsadist. And maybe her older brother needed to follow his sister’s example.
“Well,” Ehlena said awkwardly, “I can answer the question about my favorite color if you like. Might keep things from getting too heavy.”