Healing

Rick had fallen asleep against the wall. I sensed he needed the rest and took the opportunity to shower. Blood washed off me in maroon waves, and the deep grooves the ropes had left in my wrists filled in minute by minute. The bumps and bruises, as well as the sore muscles, were well on their way to recovery. Part of the healing was due to my advanced regenerative abilities as a Hecate, but the speed of my cell repair was also thanks to Rick. He'd given me so much blood after my last run in with Bathory, it was still in my system. Now it was time for me to return the favor.

After drying off, and brushing out my hair, I dug in his drawer for a candle, a fat red one I'd seen in there before. I placed it on the side of the sink. Although I couldn't find any matches, I'd learned I didn't need any. Placing my hand behind the candle, I blew across the wick, picturing a flame in my mind. The air curved against my palm, circled the candle top, then ignited, blazing a good three inches before settling into a more even burn.

"You are learning, mi cielo." Rick's eyes were open again.

I straddled his body and lowered myself to a squat over him, not even worrying that I was naked and exposed. I wanted to be at his level to talk to him and there was nothing he hadn't seen before. "I'm not so much learning as remembering. Some things I know from copying into my database. Others just pop into my head when I least expect them."

"You were amazing tonight. Strong. Intelligent."

"I thought you were unconscious."

"I was in and out, but I saw enough."

I sighed. "I got lucky. If Julius hadn't shown up to challenge Bathory, I'd probably be a heart lighter." I rubbed the spot on my chest where the vampire had dug in her nails.

"Judging by the storm you called, I'm not sure you needed Julius at all."

"I couldn't hold it for long."

"Not everyone would have thought to use Soleil as you did, especially after she'd been compromised by the nightmare. How did you know the mud's effect wasn't more than skin deep?"

"I didn't. I just knew I couldn't take them all out on my own and hoped for the best."

He nodded, eyes traveling down the length of my arm as if he'd just noticed I was naked.

"I left the Book of Flesh and Bone with Soleil and Silas. Do you think that was a mistake?"

"No. I've known Soleil for over one hundred years. She'll guard it with her life. And I believe Silas is as trustworthy."

"Me too."

In the silence that followed, the fluorescent bathroom light suddenly became annoying, competing with the gentle glow of the candle. On a whim, I raised a hand and blew a strong breath, willing the lights off. I meant to throw the switch. Instead the bulb exploded in a shower of sparks. "Whoops."

"I never liked that bulb anyway."

I watched him for a second, his gray eyes twinkling crisp and clear in the candlelight, more human than usual. His lips twitched, and I broke into laughter.

"I'm going to clean you up." I nodded toward the full tub and tugged at the bottom edge of his shredded sweater. "This needs to come off."

He obliged, sitting up a little so I could peel it over his head. The shirt snagged on his wounds, dried to the skin with so much blood, and he cried out as I pulled it off.

"I'm sorry," I said. "I'll be more careful."

I removed his shoes and socks, then helped him stand and stripped off his jeans. Slowly, I helped him lower himself into the warm water. He winced as the liquid hit the lacerations. I climbed in behind him so that he was leaning against my chest, his waist between my thighs. The tub was large, but still he had to bend his knees to fit.

With a washcloth, I started with his face, removing the layers of blood, sweat, and what I thought might be tears. He allowed me to do it, didn't even try to pry the cloth from my hands. I was thankful for that. I wanted to do it.

I soaped up the cloth and moved to his right hand, scrubbed each finger, circled his palm, up the inside of his wrist to the elbow and back down his forearm before lowering the trail of lather into the water to rinse away. I started on his other hand.

"There's something I want to say to you," I began. I needed to get this off my chest, to begin with a clean slate.

"I am listening."

"The Book of Light showed me some things about our first lifetime together, the day you became my caretaker. When I go back into my memories, I don't just see what happened, I feel as I did that day. I don't just remember events, I experience them."

He nodded.

"Rick, I think I pressured you into becoming my caretaker. Clearly you didn't know exactly what I was or what committing yourself to me entailed. I trapped you, in a way."

At my coaxing, he leaned forward so I could wash his back. While I did, I waited for his response. One breath, two breaths, the guilt weighed down my chest.

"I knew enough," he finally said. He flopped back down against me as if the effort of sitting was too much for him.

To give us both a moment, I resumed washing his chest, careful around his wounds, and tried to reposition to reach his legs. He felt what I was trying to do and pivoted, settling across the tub from me, so that we were face to face.

"You couldn't have known I would make you my caretaker or how painful it would be," I said.

He swallowed, closed his eyes. "There was not a day in my life with you that I thought you were normal. I call you my sky because I've always considered you above me, something beyond my understanding."

"Hmm. Strange, considering you seem to understand me better than I understand myself most of the time." I started washing his foot, rubbing my thumb over the arch, moving the soapy rag up his ankle and calf.

"After your father and your people were killed, you moved to the colony. One afternoon, I met you behind my parents' barn. You told me your mother had visited you, your real mother, and you tried to explain to me who she was. I didn't believe you. I hushed your words, fearful you would be charged with blasphemy. You showed me. You picked up a stone from the ground and set it on fire in your palm, then in the blink of an eye made that flame fly away, a bright red butterfly."

"I could do that?"

"You did. I knew you were a witch, mi cielo, even if I didn't understand who Hecate was. While I didn't know you were binding me all of those times we were together, and caretaker wasn't a word in my vocabulary, I knew you were different and if anyone in Monk's parish found out, both of us would hang or burn. I accepted that most certain fate because the idea of living without you was...unbearable."

"Do you regret it? Do you wish I would have allowed the candle to burn down?"

"Are you sure about marrying me?"

I locked eyes with him. "As sure as a person can be about a thing."

"I don't regret it."

I washed up his inner thigh. A hiss escaped his lips as I reached the length between his legs. Wounded or not, this part of him was responding normally and a warm current rushed through me at the feel of him through the washcloth. I made sure he was clean, stroking his length, around his base, between his legs, until I was so worked up I could hardly think. I tossed the cloth into the corner of the tub. He groaned at the absence of my hand.

"I need to heal you, first. I don't want to hurt you," I said. Gingerly, I shifted in the warm water until my knees landed on either side of his hips. I leaned forward, exposing the length of my neck. "Bite."

I heard his lips part, felt his breath on my skin, but he didn't strike. "I can't shift yet. I only have my human teeth."

Lowering my lips to his ear, I pressed my pulse point to his mouth. "Bite harder." To demonstrate, I sucked his earlobe between my teeth and bit gently.

He struck, and it was not gentle. Flashbacks of Julius's painful bite messed with my head. But this was not Julius, and Rick desperately needed what my body had to offer. He drank greedily. Swallow after swallow created a rhythm I heard and felt against my naked chest, and then the ultimate reward. The wounds between us began to heal, knitting themselves together from the inside out until nothing was left but stripes of pink flesh.

One last swallow and he lapped over the bite, sealing the wound. My head swam from the loss of blood, but no part of me wanted to give any less than the last drop he needed to take. I knew he'd had enough when he grabbed my backside and lifted me from the tub, wrapping my legs around his hips.

His eyes were still gray, not black like they usually were when we made love. The beast within was distant, at least for now. It didn't matter. This man, supernatural or not, wanted me. It wasn't magic; it was emotion.

He carried me to the bed and lowered me to my back. His hands caressed from my hips to my bottom rib, thumbs teasing along that erogenous length of bone. I placed a palm on his cheek, guiding his face to mine. Mouths melded, tongues stroked. His capable hand made its way to my breast, stroking, kneading, teasing my nipple until it reached for him.

Ever so slowly, he lowered his body to mine, never breaking eye contact as he positioned himself. Somehow, even after all of the times we'd made love, this felt like the first. Maybe because I was emotionally bared. I loved him. He knew it. And he loved me in return. Or maybe it was because we were equals. Both human now, but not quite.

Whatever it was, as his hands stroked up my arms, over my wrists, and meshed with my fingers on either side of my head, he sank into me. The length of him owned me inch by inch, and I gave myself to him fully. In the dim wash of light from the candle in the bathroom, he began to move above me. Gently, ever so gently. This human sex was quiet and soft.

He trailed kisses down my jaw, over my neck, behind my ear. I melted beneath his touch. As his pace quickened, so did mine. A rush of pleasure played out like a storm through my limbs, winds building and lightning striking from that source of heat at my core. I reached up to snare his lips, kissing him deeper as the tension grew. It wasn't enough for me.

I flipped him over on his back, rising above him, allowing the goddess within me to take over. Meeting him thrust for thrust, I lost myself, untamed and reaching to catch the building swell. I came apart, felt him arch and call out as his own pleasure gripped him. Riding out the storm, I eventually found myself again. Shockwaves tipped me forward. I rested my cheek on his chest. After some time, I slipped off him and on to my side. He curled his entire body around mine. Tucking his face into the crook of my neck, he whispered, "I love you."

"I love you, too," I said, and I meant it.

His breath evened out, and I drifted into a much-needed sleep.

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