Midnight's Kiss(32)

“What on earth are you doing now?” He sounded as grumpy as a bear with a sore head.

“I’m coming to rescue you, so you might want to dial your rudeness down a notch or two.”

When the lock turned, she opened the door of her cell and walked out.

As Julian watched Melly pick the lock on his cell door, his emotions were almost indescribable. Not only was she alive, which was a miracle all on it’s own, but she also looked relatively unscathed.

The cut on her neck had already crusted over. Her face was smudged with either dirt or bruises, and there were more bruises on the tawny skin of her arms. Something — or someone — had raked her forearm, but it looked like the wounds had scabbed over. That was all the damage he could detect. She even sounded more or less calm.

She had pulled her tangled hair back into a braid. He had almost forgotten how she could do that. Her hair was curly enough that it could stay in a braid without a tie for at least an hour, if it wasn’t disturbed, but when they had been together, he had rarely been able to leave her alone for long enough to let that happen.

The relief that overcame him was more intense than any other emotion he had felt in a very long time. He said hoarsely, “What are you using to pick the locks?”

She spoke around the butt of the flashlight she held between her teeth, and while the words were a bit distorted, they were also easily understandable. “Pieces of a hairpin.”

A rusty, ragged sound came out of him like a cough, making the open wounds all over his body throb. With surprise, he recognized the sound. It was a laugh. “That might be the first mistake Justine has made since she took you.”

Melly glanced at him, large eyes flashing, and then she focused on her work again. “Well, she got most of them, but they weren’t handling me all that gently at the time, and a few slipped into my bra.” She raised her eyebrows, and somehow, despite the flashlight between her teeth, managed to look quite regal. “I chose not to inform them of that fact.”

They had manhandled her. Rage exploded in a supernova, but he didn’t have the reserves to sustain it. As fast as it hit, it dissipated into a dull red glow. “Like I said, stupid of them.”

She finished picking the lock, and pushed the door open while she took the flashlight out of her mouth. “I find it useful when people underestimate me.”

Exhausted and in pain, he closed his eyes to avoid looking at her as she walked toward him. Disheveled as she was, she looked too beautiful, and his insides were in a riotous mess. Gladness, relief and anger — the old anger at Melly, and the new, hot rage at Justine — and something else that lay twisted into a knot deep in his heart. He chose not to examine that last bit too closely.

“Not a mistake I’d ever make with you,” he heard himself saying. “I’d have done a body cavity search.”

“Same old suave Julian. I never know when you’re flirting.” Her reply was acerbic, but her hands were gentle as she touched the wounds on his chest. Her intake of breath was all too audible in the dense silence. When she spoke next, her voice had turned small and tense. “Gods. They didn’t just bite you. They tore at you, and you haven’t healed.”

“Too much blood loss,” he muttered.

“Here.” Something warm and soft nudged his lips. It smelled like her.

He opened his eyes.

She held her wrist to his mouth, her expression warm and concerned. While she was tall for a woman, because of the difference in their heights, she had to stand very close to him to hold her arm up at the correct angle to reach his mouth.

He could feel the heat from her body against his bruised and torn skin, and her scent twined around him in an invisible embrace.

He hadn’t been so physically close to her since the last time they were together. Always afterward, whenever they had to see and interact with each other in public, he had kept at least a few feet of distance between them.

The sight, scent and sensation of her closeness pierced through him, right into the tangled knot lying deep in his heart. Sharp, raw pain flared up, as bewildered and jagged as it had been the day he had been given evidence of her infidelity, incontrovertible evidence that made a lie of every sincere-seeming glance from her, every affectionate gesture or quietly whispered words of love.

Reflexively he jerked his head away.

Silence stretched taut between them, so heavy and complete he could count the beats of her heart.

She said in a tight, brittle voice, “You have to feed, even if it’s from me. If you don’t, you won’t heal. You’ll stay weak, and that won’t get either of us out of here.”

He looked at her. Her expression had turned pinched, and her eyes glittered.