“This is so unnatural,” she blurted.
“What is?”
She had to turn her torso so that she could look at him properly. And absently, she measured how good his dark skin looked against the white sheets, the contrast making both seem to glow.
Selena tried to find the words. “I feel like there’s this huge … I don’t know, divide or something … between us. It makes no sense. I mean, you’re right here beside me—but there are words that we’re tripping over, subjects we don’t want to talk about. It’s just … well, it sucks. Because right now? This is the good part. I mean, check me out.”
She lifted her free hand and splayed her fingers wide; then wiggled them.
“Mobile and awake is so much better than where I was, right?” When he simply stared at her, she felt like a fool. “I’m sorry, I guess that sounds weird—”
Trez leaned in and kissed her quiet, his lips lingering. “No.” He eased back. “It’s … I know what you mean. It’s not crazy, and you’re right. Now is the good part—”
“You are so hot.”
Trez let out another cough. “Damn, female. What are you like.”
“I told you last night—or, jeez, what time is it? Anyway, I told you before, I’m all about honesty now.”
His lids dropped low. “Being straight up suits me just fine. So lemme ask you, if I were to pick you up and carry you into the shower, would you—”
“Get on my knees again under the hot spray and see if you taste as good as I remember?”
The sound that came out of him was not a cough. But it wasn’t a coherent statement, either. It was part growl, part groan, with a little moan thrown in for good measure, like he was getting ready to beg …
It was pretty much the sexiest thing she had ever heard.
“Is that a yes?” she drawled.
He kissed her again, harder this time. Longer, too. Then he pegged her with eyes that were boiling. “Shit, I’m dying over here—”
As Trez stopped himself again, she got thrown by that word herself. When it came to the two of them, one was, in fact, dying. It was her, not him, though.
“I’m sorry,” he whispered. “I won’t say that ever again.”
“It’s all right.” She forced herself to smile. “Let’s wash our cares away—”
“I’m going to find a cure for this,” he said gravely. “I’m not going to let you lose the fight, Selena. I will literally move heaven and earth to keep you beside me—no divide, nothing but our naked skin … our souls.”
Tears speared into her eyes, and she forced them back, willing them to get gone and stay that way. Reaching up to his handsome face, she brushed her fingertips over his features.
“I love you, Trez.”
“God, I love you, too.”
TWENTY-SEVEN
When Layla woke up, she was lying on her side on a much softer surface than the vestibule’s floor. In a panic, she brought her hand to her belly.
Everything felt the same, the hard swelling, the size it had been—but dearest Virgin Scribe, had she injured the young? She could remember getting out of her car, struggling to walk over to the mansion’s entrance, losing consciousness—
“Young,” she mumbled. “Young okay? Young?”
Instantly, Qhuinn’s blue-and-green stare was right in front of her. “You’re all right—”
As if she cared about herself right now. “Young!”
With a curse, she thought, why had she ever complained about being pregnant? Maybe this was punishment for her having—
“Everything’s okay.” Qhuinn glanced across the room, focusing on someone she couldn’t see. “Fine, just … okay, yeah, fine.”
The relief was so great, tears flooded her eyes. If she had lost their young because she was meeting with Xcor? Because she’d been staring at him while he … did that to his sex?
She never would forgive herself.
With a curse, she wondered why had she asked that male to do those things. It was wrong on so many levels, adding to her guilt when she was already choking on the stuff.
After all, it was so much easier to take the high-road victim role if you were not asking your blackmailer to jerk off.
“Oh, God,” she moaned.
“Are you in pain? Shit, Jane—”
“I’m right here.” The good doctor knelt down beside Qhuinn, looking tired, but alert. “Hi there. We’re glad you’re back. Just so you know, Manny reset your arm. It was broken clean through. We’ve put it in a cast and…”
There was some kind of conversation about her recovery time and when the plaster could come off, but she didn’t pay attention to any of that. Doc Jane and Qhuinn were keeping something from her: Their smiles of reassurance were like photographs of the real thing—perfectly accurate, but flat.