Chapter 22 Hallum
HALLUM
Iwatched Lualhati closely as she slept, monitoring her for signs of ill-health. I was fairly certain I’d administered her treatments quickly enough to prevent any permanent tissue damage or poisoning, but would not let myself look away yet.
After a while, I removed my oxygen mask.
I had not been in the burning house long.
I was not exhibiting any signs of damage, especially after breathing in some of that nano spray from Elora Station.
I used some of the ambulance’s soothing antiseptic wipes to clean the soot from my face, ears, and arms. As I did so, I took in the damp, filthy state of Lualhati’s dress.
Thank the empire that she’d wet it, and her hair, before trying to get to the door. I had no doubt that the dress would have burned if she hadn’t.
Thinking about it, about all the things that would have happened if I had not gotten here in time, gutted me.
She’d told me to leave her there.
I wanted to wake her up just so I could tell her off for that. Tell her over and over and over again that my bones would be ash before such a thought would have even crossed my mind.
I would have happily left her boots behind, though. I’d finally managed to peel them off of her while she slept, and could happily go the rest of my days without seeing the things again.
But I wouldn’t throw them away. They were some of the only possessions left to her now.
When I felt comfortable enough with her condition to leave her side, I entered the driver’s compartment of the ambulance, taking it from the garage and closer to the house.
I had to make sure that the fire would not spread to the shuldu barn.
I did not think there was much chance of that, as the ground and trees were so waterlogged from melting snow.
Rain began to fall, spattering the ambulance roof, which further convinced me that there would be no damage to the property beyond the house itself.
I landed the ambulance at a safe distance, observing the scene. The house was basically nothing but a blackened husk. Most of the roof was gone, collapsed or burned or both.
As the rain intensified, flickering orange receded. Smoke and steam billowed. And after that, not much happened at all. The fire was out. The smoke had all gone.
The house was a ruin.
There would be no salvaging it. Any of it.
It was no great loss to me since my shuldu were safe. I could rebuild here once the hospital was finished.
But I hated that all of Lualhati’s things were destroyed.
She seemed to live her life cloaked in the comforts of all the things she’d collected over the years, like some kind of little bird that liked to weave all sorts of wondrous things into its nest. She’d brought it all with her into this new world. Because it was important to her.
And now it was gone.
I waited there for some time, making sure the fire was well and truly out. Then, I called Rivven, explaining the situation to him and letting him know we would be spending the night in his saloon. He agreed to this at once, and promised that he and Shiloh would be ready.
He was true to his word. When I carried the drowsy Lualhati inside, they had food, water, and blankets ready.
“I’ve got a big tub of warm water set up in the kitchen, too,” Shiloh said. “If you two want to clean up.”
I thanked her, and she and Rivven both headed through the kitchen and up the stairs to their bedroom. When they were gone, I set Lualhati down to sit beside the large tub.
“Can you please put those out?” she whispered from behind her mask. There were several candles in here. I did as she asked, and thus cloaked the room in darkness. I could still see quite well, of course. But I knew that she couldn’t any longer.
She removed her oxygen mask and set it aside.
“I’d rather you kept that on,” I told her.
“The NanoRescue can help clear carbon monoxide from the blood,” she said tiredly. “And wearing the oxygen mask while I slept certainly helped. I’m out of danger now.”
I wanted to argue with her. But she was a doctor.
And I trusted her.
So I did not push her to return it to her face.
Getting gingerly to her knees, she pulled the straps of her dress down over her arms, then undid its fasteners. She pulled the garment, and the clothing underneath, down her body until it was all piled on the floor around her.
She was naked.
Perhaps she had forgotten how well I could see her like this.
Or perhaps she was simply too tired for modesty.
Whatever the reason, she did not try to hide herself at all from my gaze.
Since she did not seem to care if I stared or not, I looked my fill.
Her body was luscious, generously curved with large breasts and the exquisite roundness of her hips and thighs.
She was perfect.
She was also clumsy. She slipped trying to blindly get into the tub, and I caught her by the waist, slowly lowering her into the water.
“Thank you,” she whispered, leaning back against the side of the tub. “Is there a cloth or anything? I can’t see.”
There was a cloth – several, in fact – as well as towels and soap that Rivven had made. There was also some kind of cleanser and conditioning product from Shiloh, meant for hair.
I dipped a cloth into the water, then rubbed the bar of soap onto it, getting it sudsy. Then, I brought the cloth to her right shoulder, gently drawing it down the elegant line of her arm to her hand.
“Oh!” she gasped. “I didn’t even know you were there!”
“Where else would I be?”
Where else would I be but beside you?
“I can do this myself,” she said, shyness creeping into her voice, like she’d only just now remembered she was naked before me.
“You can’t, actually,” I informed her, beginning to work on her other arm. “Because I’ve got the soapy cloth. And I do not intend to give it up.”
She sighed. “Stubborn.”
“Yes,” I replied. “So save your breath and do not bother arguing.”
She quieted and allowed me to continue. I drew the soaped cloth slowly over her sensitive skin, cleansing away the ash of this night.
Once her arms were clean, I moved to the other side of the tub, taking one foot, then the other, cleaning them before she got too wiggly from being tickled.
I washed her ankles, her calves, massaging the tense muscles there.
I would have done her thighs. Her hips. Her breasts. But these were covered by the water, and I did not think I could manage it without becoming even more aroused. Shamefully, I was already hard. Just from this.
I gave the cloth to her, in case there were any spots she wanted to do herself, then filled a pitcher. I brought it to her hair, soaking the strands anew. I used Shiloh’s products, massaging them into Lualhati’s long tresses, then rinsing them clean.
Just as I was putting the pitcher down, I heard her begin to quietly weep. Perhaps it was finally hitting her now. That everything had burned.
“I am sorry, Lualhati,” I said bitterly, “that none of it was saved.”
“What?!” she sobbed. “Don’t you apologize! This is all my fault! I lit some candles, then fell asleep, and…Oh, God, Hallum. I am so, so sorry!” She covered her face with her hands. “I’ll reimburse you,” she said from beneath her fingers.
“You will do no such thing.”
It would cost me almost nothing but my own time to rebuild. I had access to more than enough lumber here.
“I have to do something!” she cried, ripping her hands away from her teary face.
“You can stop crying, for starters,” I told her, “if those tears are only for my sake.”
She sniffed, then gulped.
“Alright,” she rasped. “What else?”
“If you do not mind staying with me a little longer, you might permit me to live with you in the hospital for the foreseeable future.”
“Of course! Of course I would!”
“Good. Tonight, we will sleep here. Tomorrow, Rivven and I will get the roof on the hospital. We will also need to return to get Bart and Berta at some point. We can examine the damage, and check if any of your things survived.”
“I don’t see how any of it could have,” she said sadly. “Except…”
“Except?”
“Except the ring. The diamond, anyway.”
“And if we do find that ring unblemished among the wreckage,” I asked her, “what will you do with it?”
“I don’t know,” she said with a human shrug. “I hadn’t decided yet.”
She hadn’t decided if she’d forgive him or not. Perhaps I yet had a chance to sway her. It was selfish of me to do it. But it turned out I was capable of great selfishness when it came to her.
“Do not accept it. Do not wear that ring.”
“P-pardon?!”
“Go from this world if you must when it is time.” My jaw hurt. My words hissed between my fangs. “But do not go back to him.”
She blinked wet eyelashes at me. “Why do you care if I go back to him?”
“Because he does not deserve you!” I barely kept it from being a shout. “I do not think that any man alive does deserve you, in all honesty. But of those available, he has to be at the very bottom of the list!”
“Of those available?” She swallowed, and I needed so badly to palm her throat. To feel it happen. “Who else is available, then?”
Me! I wanted to scream it.
“Well, there is Xennet and Dorn…”
“I don’t want Xennet or Dorn. And I don’t want Bryson, either.”
Those words were like salve on a wound.
“I want someone else.”
A terrible, poisonous hope seized me then.
“Who?”
“He’s a big, kind of grumpy guy. Crazy about rules and tidiness.”
The hope grew.
“I thought he had a big stick up his ass the first time we met.”
And the hope promptly deflated. For I had never put such an item up my anus.
“Who the blazes are you talking about?” I asked when I could stand it no longer. “Who would put a stick up his-”
“It’s you, Hallum! Who else could it be?”
“But I do not have the stick.”
“It’s a figure of speech. It just means you’re not the relaxed type.” She took a shaky breath. “I love you, Hallum. I’m in love with you. I was going to tell you tonight when you got home…before…”
“You love me.”
I had to say the words. To make them real.
“I do,” she confirmed.
Confusion, then elation, poured through me.
“How?” I sputtered. “Why?”
“Because you’re a good man, Hallum. You’re tense and tight and gruff and also the kindest man I’ve ever known.
You care deeply for others, even when you try not to show it.
You upended your entire life to help a child who had no one.
You opened your home to me. And you have saved me in so many ways. I love you.”
She licked her lips.
“And I know that you don’t love me back. There’s no expectation here. I just…I had to tell you. So…there. I’m done now.”
“You know that I don’t love you back?”
“Well, yeah. Of course.”
“And you are sure of this?”
Her mouth pinched. “Um. Pretty sure.”
“Well, Doctor Lualhati Ortiz. In this, you are entirely wrong.” I cupped her jaw in my hands. “You are the first, last, only person I have ever loved.”