Chapter Twenty-Two
Helios
“Shower, please.”
Fuck my life. “Roger that.” Not that I hadn’t seen her naked.
I fucking had. Every inch. Beaten to hell, I’d wrapped her in a survival blanket, then carried her the hell out.
“Stay upright a sec.” I kicked the wheelchair out of the way, grabbed some towels, and dumped them on the counter before stepping into her six and steadying her with a firm grasp under her arms. “Not lifting you, but I am taking us to the shower and that plastic seat. You’re gonna stay off that ankle and lean back while I slide us over. You with me?”
Panting, holding her ribs, she nodded.
“Moving on three, two, one.” Supporting her weight, using my thigh against her good leg, I slid her across the tiled floor of the old-ass hospital bathroom.
“Pivoting.” Stepping over the curb, I backed into the shower.
“Lifting your leg.” Using my knee to shove against hers, I got her foot up and over, then she halted me in my tracks.
“Hurts.”
“I know, sweetheart.”
More than her physical pain, her entire body tensed against mine.
Fuck. “Back to bed?”
She took two short breaths. “No.”
“Lowering you to the seat, then.”
“W-wait.”
I held steady, but it wasn’t what she needed. “You’re gonna have to trust me on this.”
“Sitting… hurts.”
“Leaning against me doesn’t?”
“Less,” she panted.
“Copy.” Still holding her, I sat on the plastic seat, vowing to get her out of this place as soon as fucking possible. “Hang tight. Bringing you in.” I lowered her onto my thigh, then reached for the showerhead, ignoring the fact that her bare ass was inches from my dick.
“Helios.”
“What?” Angling the spray toward the wall, I turned the water on to hot.
“You’re dressed.”
“Don’t fucking care.” I was waterproof.
“My casts.”
“Got it covered.” She was so damn short, I could reach her boot without having to bend her leg. “Taking this off. Don’t put your foot down or flex it. Just rest your leg on mine. Copy?”
“Yes.”
I carefully took off the boot, set it outside the shower, then reached for her left arm. “Same thing. Taking the brace off, but don’t bend your wrist.”
“Okay.”
Steam filled the small space as I got her brace off and set it on the counter of the small-ass bathroom. Then I grabbed the handheld showerhead. “Ready?”
“Um.” Her good hand fisted the hospital gown. “This smells.”
She fucking smelled. Like antiseptic and that goddamn sewage pit of a prison cell I’d found her in.
“You want it off?” This was a bad fucking idea, but no way in hell was I letting that male nurse who was back on shift again help her.
I also reasoned that gown was coming off one way or another.
Wet, dry—either way, she wasn’t gonna exfil this shower with it.
She stared at her lap for a beat. “If I leave it on, when it gets wet, it’ll soak your shirt. But if I take it off….”
She’d be buck-ass naked. “Hate to break it to you, woman, but more than my shirt’s about to be wet.
Like I said, don’t fucking care.” Wet clothes didn’t come close to the worst situations I’d been in.
“As far as your gown, on or off, choice is yours. Just know you’re not hanging on to that one.
Before I put you back in bed, you’re getting a clean gown. ”
“I… I want my hair washed.”
“Not a problem.” Never washed a woman’s hair before, but I didn’t think I could fuck hers up any more than it already was.
She glanced over her shoulder without raising her head. “But your shirt.”
“You’re planted on my lap. I’m holding a showerhead, and you’re worried about my fucking shirt?” Did she not get gravity? My boots and pants were gonna take the brunt of this shit show.
She glanced down. “I’m only sitting on one of your legs.”
I took off my shirt and tossed it onto the counter. “Better?”
She looked back. Then her sucked-in breath sounded over the running water, and her expression tanked as she took in my chest. “Oh my God.” She reached for the latest grouping of scars on the right side of my abdomen and whispered, “What happened?”
“GSWs.”
Tears fell as her finger traced over the raised flesh. “When were you shot?”
“Which fucking time?” I held the water over her legs, then grabbed the liquid soap.
A choked sound I never wanted to hear her make again echoed. “Oh, Helios.”
“Old wounds.” Mostly. “Let it go.”
“You didn’t tell me.”
I squirted the soap and washed her legs. “Part of the job. Nothing to tell.”
“Does Ares know?”
I rinsed her legs and feet. “Yeah.”
“Our parents?”
I smirked. “No.” Squirting soap on her good arm, I issued an order. “Subject’s closed.” She didn’t need to hear my war stories.
She finally noticed what I was doing. “You’re washing me?”
“Shower, water, soap. That’s the general idea.” I told myself it was nothing more.
Watching my hand run across her bruised flesh, she didn’t reply at first. Then, “You’re… different.”
I snorted. “You think?” A decade of war left scars, but finding this woman tortured had absolutely fucking fucked with my head. I rinsed her arm. “Lean forward.”
“I can’t.”
“Just your head.” My hand on her nape, I tipped her forward. “Close your eyes.” Without any more warning, I wet her hair.
“Helios?”
I dumped the damn liquid soap that smelled like hospital on her head. “Yeah?”
“I want my gown off.”
Pulling the tie at the back of her neck, I told myself not to fucking look. “Have at it.”
Slow and steady, like the most fucked-up, macabre version of a striptease I’d ever seen, she pulled the gown down her arms. Then she dragged it up her thighs until it was bunched low on her hips in a ball of soaked material covering only her cunt.
Feralyn Alva Grayson, beaten, naked and wet. On my lap.
I washed her hair.
My hands as big as her head, my movements as methodical as cleaning my guns, I massaged her scalp and fucking looked.
Mottled flesh, swollen wrist and ankle, perfect hips, huge tits.
I was going to fucking hell.
And one day, I was gonna take her with me.