Chapter Twelve
………………………….
Henri
SHE’D KILLED ME.
Stopped my heart and torn it bleeding from my chest.
Slaughtered me with mere words, then passed out and left me alone.
Alone to pick up my pieces.
Alone to realise those pieces were nothing more than ash and blood.
I stood transfixed as she sank into a deep sleep.
My mouth watered as salty droplets glistened on her cheeks. My torn-out heart pounded with so much goddamn pain.
Her name?
A curse.
The nickname she’d given me?
The antidote.
How could both cripple me so?
Why the fuck did a stupid nickname do such agonising things to me?
Hen?
It made me weak-kneed. Rock-hard. Trembling with the savage need to fall on her and kiss her stupid.
All over a ridiculous pet name.
I’d never had one of those.
No one had ever gotten close enough to shorten my already short name.
Her nickname would’ve shaken my world…if she hadn’t told me the origin of hers.
That knowledge tore into my chest with a thousand knives.
I honestly couldn’t function.
I had no idea how to survive knowing I said ‘I love you’ each time I called her Ily.
How did she keep doing this to me?
Rearranging the ground I stood on.
Tipping me over edge after edge until I lost sight of the sky and gave up fighting the fall.
I stood over her, waiting for her to snap out of her coma and start laughing at my expense again.
But she didn’t.
It seemed whatever adrenaline she’d burned through had gone.
I couldn’t help myself.
I hated that I couldn’t help myself.
Sitting back on the bed beside her, I tucked loose sapphire-black hair behind her ear and fought every urge.
Lines bracketed her mouth even in sleep.
Stress etched her forehead as if she couldn’t forget where she was and who was responsible even in her dreams.
She hates me enough to kill herself if I ever got her pregnant…
Fuck, that shouldn’t hurt so much.
I hadn’t even thought of children, yet…just knowing she’d rather die—
My eyes stung.
The urge to retch returned.
Rubbing my thumb through the tracks of salt glimmering on her cheek, I willed myself not to do it.
I begged myself not to do it.
And I cursed myself to a thousand realms of hell as I sucked that droplet off my thumb and shivered at the taste.
I lost all control as I bent over and kissed her exquisitely softly on the cheek. I didn’t care if the cameras watched me. I didn’t care that Victor might have questions. The moment my lips pressed to her tear-damp cheek and her sweet flavour soaked onto my tongue, I shuddered with an agony I’d never felt before.
I couldn’t pinpoint the origin of that despair.
Was it in my heart? My bones? My soul?
Wherever it was, it pushed me further to burn out.
The blackness inside me celebrated, sucking me deeper, deeper.
I reared back and shook my head.
Not yet.
I could succumb to my nightmares soon.
I could sleep…soon.
But first, I needed to erase her bruises.
I couldn’t look at them anymore.
Couldn’t have the reminder that I’d caused this.
Just like I’d caused them on my mother.
I only ever caused pain to those I loved and—
Loved?
I froze.
I don’t love her—
A surge of possession.
A cascade of emotion that siphoned hotly through my veins.
Love…
No.
I couldn’t.
I can’t—
Licking my lips from her salty, sad taste, I gritted my teeth and shoved away every thought.
The bandage around my arm grew wet with fresh blood as I forced shaking hands to finish the job of coating her in the entire tub of arnica.
Her breasts and belly had little circles bleeding outward. Spreading flowers of black, blue, and purple.
She was stunning.
Ruined.
Ily—
I choked on those three little letters, gagging on the three words they represented.
Another trembling panic attack turned my insides into a maelstrom.
Yanking the towel out from under her so she wouldn’t sleep on something damp, I tossed it into the corner before working the bedding down and tucking her in.
I shook as I gathered her wet hair and draped it over the pillow.
I trembled as I stood over her, trying to find other ways to fix what I’d broken.
With a heavy sigh, I moved away and swallowed a groan.
Everything hurt.
Everything throbbed.
Yet nothing could touch the pain she’d caused.
Biting my lip, I glanced at my left side.
The colours had only gotten deeper. The sharp pain she’d mentioned whenever she breathed affected me too. I’d managed to ignore it while killing Kyle. I didn’t have time to focus on it while carrying Peter, but now…all alone, my legs chose that exact moment to buckle.
The dizziness.
The faintness.
I crashed to the floor, bracing myself on my hands and knees as my heart flurried and the sick sensation of not being able to get enough oxygen made the room turn black.
Darkness pounced, not done with me.
I pressed my forehead to the floor as every sin throttled me with violence.
Sickness gushed, but I swallowed it down.
Sweat ran over my skin, soaking into my blood-soaked bandage.
I couldn’t stop the crash.
Couldn’t catch a breath or stop hearing Ily calling me Hen or me telling her I loved her every time I said her damn name.
I love you.
I love you.
Fuck—
Curling my fingers into the dark copper carpet, I willed the episode to pass.
It only grew worse.
Greyness snuck over my vision.
Weakness stole through every bone, and my body tipped with warning.
I had seconds.
Mere seconds and I didn’t want to pass out on the floor.
Staggering to my feet, I turned off the bedside light, then stumbled, shuffled, and fell through the dark to my side of the bed.
I tumbled beside Ily.
I grunted in pain.
Darkness grabbed me and sucked me deep.
* * * * *
“It’s okay, Hen. Truly.” Ily cupped my cheek and pressed her nose to mine. “You can say it. Here…I’ll teach you.” She smiled and gave me the sweetest, softest kiss. “Don’t think about what the words mean, and just say it…I love—”
“I can’t.” I groaned against her lips.
“You won’t, you mean.”
“No…I literally can’t.” Rearing back, I caught her sunshine-shining eyes. “I can’t say I love you when I’m not worthy of love.”
Her face softened. “Don’t you think I should be the judge of that?” Kissing my eyes, my cheeks, my forehead, she whispered, “I see what you are now. You did come for us. You’re going to free us. I know it—”
I choked and shot upright.
The dream shattered, leaving me blinking in a pitch-dark room.
My entire body screeched with discomfort.
I hated that Peter’s words kept haunting me but in Ily’s voice.
“I see what you are now. You did come for us. You’re going to free us. I know it—”
The rush of sickness coated my tongue; I launched out of bed. Wrapping my good arm around my bad ribs, I tried to hold my pain together as I half-ran, half-staggered to the bathroom, and flipped up the lid on the toilet.
My skin flushed with sweat.
I shivered with an icy chill.
I waited to vomit for the second time tonight.
Waited for that familiar curse to remind me all over again that the things I wanted were wrong and toxic and had to be purged.
How strange that my dreams had been full of love and togetherness instead of darkness and screams. How tragic that I’d finally begged for someone to see me, and I couldn’t stomach it when they did.
Breathing hard, the gush of nausea slowly faded.
I backed away from the toilet and crashed against the towel rail.
Ow.
Goddamn ow!
I couldn’t do this anymore.
I didn’t want to exist in so much agony, and I didn’t trust my sleep not to torment me.
I’m done.
Grabbing a white bathrobe off the hook, I lurched toward the exit. Shrugging into it, I ripped open our borrowed bedroom door and looked left and right.
Track lighting glowed above the flagstones. Faint and barely there, it granted just enough illumination to slip into the shadows and close the door behind me.
I wouldn’t be able to lock it, but I took the risk that Victor lived up here, and other guests wouldn’t be stupid enough to trespass.
I needed a book.
A thousand books.
If I could lose myself in their pages, then I could—
“How’s she doing?”
Jesus fucking Christ.
Holding my rabbiting heart, I spun around and groaned as a fresh wave of misery made me sweat. I blinked at the ghostly figure in the dark then swallowed a curse as I snapped, “Your attempt at giving me a heart attack failed.”
“What a pity.” Dr Belford came toward me. She flicked on a switch. The drafty corridor suddenly glowed with soft sconces. “I was just on my way to check on Ily.”
Ily.
I love you.
Shut up.
“She’s asleep.” I sniffed. “Whatever you gave her knocked her out.”
Not before she knocked out my heart.
The doctor sagged with relief. “In that case, I’ll let her rest a little before I disturb her.”
I nodded and did my best to be civil. “Goodnight.”
Before I could turn away, her weary eyes locked on my left arm. Her brows rose as she noticed the pinprick of blood that’d already soaked through the terrycloth dressing gown. “You’re still bleeding.”
“I’m fine.” Pushing off from the wall, I went to head downstairs.
The library would be empty.
I could peruse the shelves, select a thick, brutal story, then bring it back to bed.
I’d sink into someone else’s misfortune for a change.
Only, the corridor flipped upside down, then back to front, and I found myself on my knees again.
Motherfucker.
Soft hands landed between my shoulder blades. “Come with me. I’ll stitch you up and give you something for the light-headedness.”
“I said I’m fine,” I snapped.
Perhaps if I kept saying it, it would come true.
Maybe if I believed it, I could remember how to survive without a bruised girl, a broken heart, and a soul riddled with fucking rot.
I didn’t like people caring about me.
I didn’t know how to act, how to accept it, how to deserve it.
Her temper appeared. “If it were up to me, I’d leave you to bleed out on this icy floor, but…you aren’t the boss, and the man who is the boss would gut me if I refused one of his guests the best medical care I can provide so….” She dropped to her haunches and stared me right in the face. “Get the hell up and come into my room. Hold your tongue while I sew you up, and then you can go back to bed.”
Swooping to her feet, she marched away without waiting for me. Shoving her door wide, she tapped her no-nonsense white sneaker that didn’t look so white anymore. “I’m tired and need to go to bed before a crazy day in a few hours. Now, Master H.”
Cursing under my breath, I obeyed her for reasons unknown.
It took all my strength to climb to my feet; I wobbled as I entered her rooms.
I immediately looked at where I’d placed Peter.
The white sheet-covered table was ominously empty.
I swallowed hard. “Did he…did he die?”
“Who?” Her eyebrows knitted together. “Who died?”
I hated that I’d asked. That I’d shown I cared. “Peter. He’s gone.”
“Ah, yes.” She nodded. “He’s resting in Rose’s room down the hall. I don’t have any other beds available downstairs, and he’s not out of the woods yet. Rose agreed to keep a careful eye on him while I was supposed to catch up on some sleep.” She sighed heavily and marched to her cupboard of tricks. “Seeing as Ily is in the best possible place right now, I suppose that means I only have one more patient to treat, and then I can call quits on this awful, awful day. Now, sit down and let me sew you up so I can go to bloody bed.”
Her attitude made my hackles rise, but…I had no energy to refuse her.
I didn’t take the table, though.
The memory of Peter’s hand bubbling in that bowl of antiseptic made my already delicate stomach extra queasy.
Cutting past the couch and coffee table, I headed toward the small dining table pressed against a window. Pulling out a wooden chair, I sat heavily and looked at the view. This angle focused more on the ocean cliffs and the stars twinkling so far above.
Somewhere down there, Kyle and some other Master were sucked out to sea. Perhaps they’d been found by a shark. Hopefully, Charles had also been gobbled by the tide so all my crimes would go unseen.
Noises echoed behind me as the doctor gathered whatever torture devices she needed, then joined me at the table.
Neither of us spoke as she motioned for me to slip the dressing gown off my injured side. She sucked in a breath as she noticed my colourful ribs, but her hands were steady as she unwrapped my self-administered bandage, then opened a similar packet to the one I’d found in our supplies.
Threading surgical thread through a wickedly sharp needle, her face etched with concentration. Wiping my slashed arm with stingy fluid, she grabbed a head torch from her supplies and jammed it on her head. The light blinded me as she leaned in and studied my wound.
I closed my eyes.
I didn’t want to watch.
Something sharp stabbed me a few times.
Fucking ow again—
“The local anaesthesia should kick in quickly.” Her bedside manner improved a little as she placed the empty syringe I hadn’t noticed back on the table.
After a few moments, she tapped my red-raw skin. “Can you feel anything?”
“Only a thick numbness.”
“Good.” She gave me a tight smile. “Look away if you’re squeamish.”
Could a man who got turned on by blood be squeamish?
I’d never actually tested myself and stubbornly kept my eyes locked on my arm as she shrugged and threaded the needle through the first section.
The way my skin resisted the puncture only to fail and surrender. The strangest slithering sensation as she pulled thread through flesh and then jabbed me all over again.
Yep.
My teeth clamped together as a fresh wave of nausea rushed.
I’m squeamish.
Closing my eyes, I breathed through my nose and did my best to use the same technique I’d done on the beach. I imagined my pain flowing down my legs and into Victor’s castle. I focused on nothing but my breath, in and out, in and out, in and—
“All done.”
“What?” My eyes snapped open. “Already?”
Giving me a strange look, she glanced at the clock. “It’s been twenty minutes.”
“Twenty minutes?”
How was that possible?
I studied the neat gauze stuck over my arm, bumpy with a faint line of black stitches beneath.
Panic filled me to return to Ily.
Ily.
Goddammit, her name corrupted my entire system.
I didn’t know if my heart or my cock reacted the most anymore.
One thing I did know…I would go out of my way to never use her name again.
How could I?
Now that I knew what it meant?
Grabbing the open half of my dressing gown, I went to shrug back into it, but the doctor caught my wrist. “Wait.” Her cool hands landed on my roasting, throbbing side, probing none too gently.
I hissed and flinched but didn’t move away.
Slowly, she leaned back. “I don’t think any of them are broken but they’re heavily bruised. I’ll give you some antibiotics for your arm, just in case, and you can take some arnica tablets with Ily to ease your bruises. I also need you to drink what I’m about to give you to replace everything you lost today. Give one to Ily when she wakes.” Pushing to her feet with a tired groan, she padded toward a small fridge next to her medical cupboard and returned with two bottles of glow-in-the dark blue liquid.
“Electrolytes.” She gave me a half smile, passing me the bottles. “You’ve lost a fair amount of blood, but I think your dizziness is mainly from lack of sustenance and whatever else happened out there today. As long as you drink this and take a few days to rest, your body will make up the blood, and you’ll feel better. If you’re struggling to regulate your body temperature and think you can avoid falling down the stairs, go grab some food from the kitchen. That’ll help too.” Ripping off her latex gloves, she arched her chin at the door. “Now, go away. I’ll pop by in the morning to check on Ily.”
She didn’t speak again as I slipped my no-longer bleeding arm into my gown, lashed the belt tight, then slipped back into the night.