Chapter 10 #3
A sound escaped her, a choked, broken thing that was half laugh, half sob.
It was the sound of a dam finally breaking.
The last of her formidable control, the wall she had built brick by agonizing brick over a lifetime of solitude, crumbled into dust. “Jae,” she sobbed, his name a ragged prayer on her lips.
She collapsed into him, a desperate, fluid motion that was all surrender.
She slid into his arms, her body fit against his, as if carved from the missing piece of his soul.
Her face buried itself in the crook of his neck, her hot tears spilling onto his skin, each one a scalding drop of all the pain she had refused to let herself feel.
Her hands clutched at his shoulders, her fingers digging into his muscle as if she were afraid he might disappear.
He was content to be her anchor down to his very bones to keep from being swept away by the storm of her own grief.
He wrapped his arms around her, one hand splayed wide across the trembling expanse of her back, the other tangling in the thick silk of her hair, holding her head to his chest. He just held her, his body a solid, unyielding harbor against the tempest of her release.
He could feel her heart hammering against his ribs, a wild, frantic rhythm that slowly, gradually, began to match the steady, reassuring beat of his own.
He pressed his lips to her hair, breathing her in, and just held on.
“This won’t solve anything,” she whispered. “But it feels so damn good.” Her breath was warm against his neck. “When I saw you go down…I lost my mind. Please don’t let me hurt you. I couldn’t bear it.”
He clasped the back of her neck, holding her against him, the small, intimate pressure that said I'm here and I'm paying attention to your body. She closed her eyes for one count. She opened them.
"I've been afraid of myself with you," she said. He held still. "I've been afraid of what I am.” She brushed her cheek with a hard sweep. "When I'm near you, touch you, let you in, I don't know what I am, Jae. I don't know what my body's doing. I don't trust myself with you."
He understood instinctively that she was giving him the largest piece of the truth she had room to give, and that pressing for more would close the door she'd just cracked.
"Okay," he said. Just that. Okay.
She conceded it with a tilt of her head, hoping she believed, for one second, that all of this was real.
He squeezed her hand.
"You can be afraid, and still let me stay close," he said quietly. "The two things aren't in conflict. You don't have to figure out what you are before you let me near you. We can figure it out together."
The orange threads in her irises softened, the predator's edge in them banking down to something quieter, and he watched the smallest possible amount of the wall come down. Not all of it. Not even most of it. A thread. A single thread. Enough.
He lowered his head slowly, giving her every chance to pull away, to turn aside.
Her gaze, now clear of tears and wide with a fragile, breathtaking trust, held his.
He brushed his lips against hers, a soft, questioning pressure, a test. Her lips were warm and salt-stained from her tears, and when they parted on a soft sigh, he deepened the kiss.
He kept this kiss slow. Deep. An exploration, a conversation without words, a silent acknowledgment of every hurt, every fear, every apology they had just shared.
His tongue swept against hers, to comfort, to taste the surrender he had just been given.
He poured all the reassurance he had into it, all the promise of We can figure it out together.
Her hands, which had been clutching at him, relaxed, her fingers sliding up to thread through his hair, holding him close in a quiet, profound intimacy. It was a kiss that sealed their new, fragile truce, a promise that for now, in this room, in this bed, they were enough.
He moved when there was a knock at the door. “That’s food. You stay put. After you’ve had your fill, we’ll find you some clothes,” Lechuza said.
“What?” He lifted the sheet. He was stark naked.
“Yeah, that’s right,” she said, staring at him, those eyes going almost to a glittering gold. “How’s that for restraint?”
His jaw dropped. “Did Killa Saqra Rumi make a fucking joke?” He watched as she took an enormous tray from a woman at the door and a garment bag.
He shifted his weight to sit up. The ache in his ribs sharpened. His body protested the movement, and he gasped.
She set down the tray and bag and rushed back to the bed. She wrapped her arm around him and helped him sit.
“That was no joke, handsome. I’m not wearing a stitch under this flimsy thing.”
This time he choked on his own spit. “Fuck,” he whispered between coughs. “You’re fucking killing me, woman.”
She froze, then relaxed. “Sorry.” She shook her head, walking back to the table, unzipping the garment bag and pulling out men’s clothing. She chose underwear and a pair of soft gray athletic shorts. Coming back, she said, “Do you need help?”
“Only if you let me help you.”
She threw the shorts at him, and he laughed when they hit him in the face. She flounced to the closet and grabbed gorgeous black and gold garments off the hanger, and slipped into the bathroom, but not before blowing him a kiss.