Chapter 19 #2
Relief hit me so hard it almost knocked me on my ass. Even in my shock, I sure as shit wasn’t going to waste this opportunity, especially when the odds were that Esme would wake up with renewed resolve.
Don’t let her, the Bond chimed in.
You know what, it had a point. I wasn’t going to force her into anything—I’d sooner off myself than cross a line she drew. That didn’t mean I couldn’t show her what changing her mind would look like.
“Okay,” I said softly, trying not to spook her.
It took several seconds for me to release her, but eventually I stood and turned toward the door, grabbing the plushest towel of the bunch.
I extended the towel and closed my eyes, turning away.
The sound of the water sloshing as she stood, naked, right in front of me was damn near enough to send me over the edge.
I deserved a fucking award for keeping myself in check, my eyes closed until I felt her nestle into the towel, taking it from me to wrap it around herself.
When I opened my eyes to look at her again, already missing the sight of her after a few moments, I found her looking at me expectantly.
She was trusting me, even if just for tonight. She’d let me take care of her as I saw fit.
You know what, maybe it was a good thing that I hadn’t been awake when she’d been hurt. If I had been there when she—
I had to cut off that line of thinking before I got violent.
If I’d been there, I would have been a lot worse. Seeing her standing in front of me was my only solace.
I wrapped my hands over the tops of her shoulders, if not to feel our Mark underneath my hands.
I led her carefully to the countertop, motioning for her to stay still.
I reached into her things and pulled out the bottles and containers I’d seen her use over the years and set them out in front of her, then reached to the side for her hair brush.
When I pulled back and caught her eyes in the mirror, she was looking at me with a dumbfounded expression. I had to smile at that, at the idea that I wouldn’t have noticed every little thing about her, the Bond be damned.
I reached for the clip that held her hair up, carefully removing it, as I said, “I noticed, Esme.”
Esme’s breath hitched, but she stayed silent. I wouldn’t press. I’d let her act like she was doing me a favor tonight.
I swept the fall of her hair down her back, then got to work gently brushing the strands while she tended to her skin.
I’d once heard her describe her hair as just brown. No part of her was just anything. The way the soft brown had lit up like a crackling fire under the candlelight was evidence enough.
A soft, contented sound left her lips as I moved the brush over her scalp, and my mind went straight to a different way to conjure up that very sound.
When I was finished, I twisted her hair in my hand the way I’d seen her do so many times, trying my mighty best to keep my thoughts straight, and placed the clip back in her hair. I noticed Esme’s eyes starting to close, so I said, “Keep ‘em open, sweetheart. We’re not done.”
She just hummed in assent as I helped her to the lip of the bath, resting on it. I grabbed her lotion, the rich, warm scent of it reminding me of home.
Esme stopped me when she realized my intention, placing a hand on my shoulder.
“Esme,” I said, letting my tone convey exactly what I meant.
She said I could take care of her, and this was part of it.
I needed some way to get my hands on her, to make sure that she wasn’t flinching in pain when I touched her back or her stomach or her hands or any part of her that had been broken and bent under my weight, no matter how long ago.
With a heavy sigh, Esme turned her grip from distancing to steadying, simply using the connection between us to make sure she didn’t fall backwards.
Good.
I slowly worked the lotion into her skin, making sure that every part of her received some sort of attention. Well, not every part, the darker part of my mind reminded me. If I was ever that goddamn lucky, I would be sure to take just as much care.
For now, I focused on massaging the cream into her calves, working my way up her legs. Everything else around me was drowned out, my focus solely on her skin as I watched the lotion absorb.
It wasn’t until a soft gasp left her lips, right as my thumb swept over the inside of her thigh, that I remembered that this was real and not a figment of my imagination.
I moved to her arms, needing something to do other than ask her if it was alright if I’d pushed my hand higher. Luckily for me, running lotion over our Mark was an effective distraction.
I’d always thought the Mark looked terrifying on me, a beast capable of killing you in seconds. At the beginning, my niece and nephew had agreed, flinching away from me if I reached for them with the hand that borne the head of the snake.
On Esme, I suddenly understood why snakes were seen as beautiful, god-like in some parts of Vir.
Though it pained me beyond belief, by the time I moved all the way down both arms, I carefully passed her the lotion. For a moment, she looked down at my hand with an expression of hers I happened to recognize, though I wish I hadn’t.
Disappointment.
The second her fingers closed around the tube of lotion, I pressed up to stand, needing to get out of that room. I didn’t close the door behind me, just so she could see that I wasn’t leaving.
The plush bed and low light suddenly looked far too romantic, as did the silky pajamas that Esme had folded neatly on the edge of the bed. I passed them to her blindly, then moved to turn down the bed.
I turned to her the moment she stepped out of the bathroom, now dressed. She stepped towards me hesitantly, waiting for my next instruction.
“You need to rest.” Esme chuckled in response. Rest was not something we were often afforded. I picked her book off the bedside table, one she’d carried with her for a few weeks but I was pretty sure she hadn’t started. “In you go,” I said, lifting my chin towards the bed.
If either of us acknowledged how different this felt, the moment would be ruined.
“I’ll be back in a second. I better see you in there and comfortable when I get back,” I said, keeping my voice as normal as I could while the Bond was doing its level best to drive me insane.
I kept it together until I closed the door to the bathroom behind me, at which point I promptly fell forward, barely catching myself from breaking my own nose on the stone countertop.
Changing faster than I had in my life, I made it back out of the bathroom with some of my control wrestled back in.
Esme had listened and was sat up with her glasses sat primly on the bridge of her nose and the book open in her lap. Her hair was pushed behind her, leaving only a few short strands falling in front of her shoulders.
An image I’d seen thousands of times, just not when I was expected to lay down right next to her. It was easier to set aside burgeoning thoughts when she was across the room, coldly ignoring me.
“Oh no,” I said, clicking my tongue. “Not comfortable enough.” I pointed my finger down, motioning for her to tuck further under the covers.
Esme simply raised her eyebrows, not a particularly clear expression, but I still somehow knew exactly what she was saying.
A few years ago, she’d taken a rather nasty tumble during a sparring match and had tweaked her neck in a way that never quite healed.
If she looked down for too long, it would start to hurt—not very conducive to reading in bed, which was the definition of rest in her mind.
I held up my finger to signal that she should wait, grabbed my own glasses and book, then got into bed next to her. “Relax,” I said against her ear, then maneuvered her so that her head was elevated by my shoulder.
“Oh,” she said, probably not even realizing she did it.
Thank God she couldn’t see the width of my smile or it might have ruined things.
After that, we slipped into territory that I didn’t think either of us were prepared for. Both too engrossed in what we were both reading and lulled into submission by the Bond’s pleasant humming from our closeness, neither of us could consider what was too far.
I barely noticed when Esme turned into my side, resting her book on my stomach. She didn’t when my hand started making absent-minded passes over her arm.
Neither of us paid any mind when Esme closed her book with one hand, really just letting it fall closed on my stomach, then curled deeper into my side with a long exhale as she settled into sleep.
It wasn’t until later, when I’d been watching the soft rise and fall of her chest, that I came back to myself enough to whisper, “Thank you,” against the crown of her head, and fell asleep in the comfort that she’d bought me enough time to come to my senses.