Chapter 23
Twenty-Three
When Ciaran woke the next morning, his arms were empty.
He cracked his eyes open, squinting against the glare and found that she had retreated to her side of the bed.
She was on her stomach, but her face was turned his way.
Her eyes were closed. Her long, black eyelashes stark against her pale skin, though there was a touch of color in her cheeks.
Her arms were wrapped around the pillow, her hair a midnight cloud around her.
The covers pooled at her lower back leaving a smooth expanse of creamy pale skin that beckoned him to touch it.
His hand, tingling as if in response to her siren’s call, drifted across the duvet.
The cotton was cool under his fingers, since there had been other matters on his mind last night than turning up the heating. By comparison, her exposed skin was almost feverish, her body churning out a comforting heat that at once seeped into his skin and spread through him.
He skimmed his hand up and over her shoulder to her neck and then down her spine as he drank in the way the light struck onyx sparks in her hair, the way her skin soaked it in so it almost shimmered.
Her limbs were long and lean, though the top of her head barely reached the level of his nose, even when she stood in heels.
Her talented pickpocket’s hands were hidden now under her pillow, but he couldn’t forget the way they had felt on his skin, or buried in his hair.
And those luscious breasts? They too were hidden, but his hands remembered how they filled his palms, each crowned with a nipple that he craved to worship with his mouth.
Her glorious backside was a shapely curve beneath the sheets, but he remembered how it had fit into the curve of his hips, pinning his cock between them.
Jal stirred, roused by his touch, but did not wake fully. She lifted her head, but only to turn it the other way before settling in, and returning to the stillness of sleep.
His hand continued to stroke in slow circles as he inched his way across the space between them.
The mattress dipped gently, and while it felt as wide as an ocean, it was really only a foot.
He did not want to disturb her sleep, but like with his hand, something pulled at him, urging him to move closer, to take her in his arms and never let her go.
When only a few inches separated them, he slid his hand across and over her hip, exerting a slight upward pressure, a request that she roll toward him. After a moment, her arm slid from under the pillow and she rolled onto her side, the curve of her hip emerging from beneath the duvet.
His hand came across her stomach as he tucked his knees behind hers.
He hissed at the friction over his cock, her small movements sending a rush of blood into it.
He pressed a kiss to her shoulder and closed his eyes.
Whatever it was inside him that craved the feel of her settled with a contented purr.
Ciaran had nearly fallen asleep, the jasmine of her hair filling his nose, when she murmured something and shifted against him.
Half-asleep, his mind drifted back to the night before, when she had urged him into a second round with her arse rubbing against his cock.
He adjusted his position, only to slide the arm pinned beneath him under her pillow, his other arm holding her gently but close against him.
The sound that came from her then was a whimper, but not one of pleasure.
It was the last thing he had expected, and he moved his hand across her belly in small circles. But where last night his touch had soothed, now it had the opposite effect. Her whimper became more pained, her movements more forceful, more frantic as she struggled to free herself from his arms.
Ciaran raised himself up on his elbow and looked down.
Her face was no longer peaceful, her eyes were clenched tightly shut, deep furrows creasing the skin between them.
He called her name, but she only shook her head, her hair tangling on the pillow.
Her hands grasped handfuls of the duvet and pulled, not to cover herself, but to drag herself away.
He put his hand on her shoulder and shook gently.
“Jal,” Ciaran pleaded into her ear. “Jal, wake up.”
She didn’t open her eyes, too deeply ensnared in whatever nightmare made her shy away from his touch, and continued to fight, to claw her way to the edge of the bed until she crashed to the floor in a heap.
Ciaran cursed and scrambled across to peer over the edge of the bed, mind racing. What the bloody hell is going on?
Jal sat with her knees drawn up to her chin. Her eyes were open now, and showing entirely too much white around the brilliant green irises. Her gaze darted around as if looking for something, anything, familiar.
“Jal?” he prompted uncertainly.
Her gaze turned his way. A tremor went through him as she seemed to look through him.
A choked sob came out of her throat and she scooted back. “Keep away from me!”
He said her name again, his voice now desperate, almost pleading, but it had no effect. She had to still be dreaming, he told himself, but he didn’t know how to wake her up. Pushing the covers aside, he slid to the ground beside her.
Jal scrambled away until she hit the wall, her wide, staring eyes never leaving the general direction of his face, but not truly seeing him.
“Jal, please, come back to me.”
Her chest rose and fell far too quickly. “Don’t come any closer!”
Ciaran reached out a hand and she lashed out with her foot, kicking it away. He turned the curse that wanted to come out into a grunt and pulled his hand back. A second kick connected with his shin. “Bloody hell!” he cried before he could stop himself.
“Get the fuck away from me, Andy!”
Ciaran froze, his hand hovering in the air between them. So that’s the bastard’s name. He didn’t have time to dwell on that thought. She was still breathing much too fast, her face bone white.
“Jal, love, you have to wake up now.” He reached for her again, his hand visibly trembling. In this moment, he was just as scared as she.
She tried to retreat along the length of the wall, but fetched up against a bookcase, her legs tangled in a blanket that had fallen from the bed sometime in the night.
As if the fight had gone out of her, she sat curled tightly into a ball, her knees pulled up under her chin, her arms wrapped around her head.
It was as if by making herself small, he wouldn’t be able to see her.
Or do any major damage to anything vital, he thought cynically. This Andy must have been one foul bastard.
Ciaran inched his way closer, making soft, soothing noises. Shifting slowly, inch by torturous inch until he was close enough to put a hand on her shoulder, but when his skin met hers, she jolted as if he had built up a static shock getting to her.
She didn’t move for the longest time, and though he couldn’t see her face, something had changed. The muscles under his hand were still tight, but no longer rigid as stone.
He spoke her name in a cautious whisper, and she lifted her head at the sound of his voice. Her eyes at once focused, really focused, on his face.
“Ciaran?” she whispered, still trembling. Then the realization of what had happened hit her, and she started to shake. “Oh God, not again.”
He reached down and untangled her legs, then shook the blanket out and paused half-way to wrapping it around her. A corner of Jal’s mouth lifted as she scooted a little away from the wall to make room, but didn’t fully emerge from the balled-up position.
Ciaran wrapped the blanket around her and gently stroked his hands up and down her arms. The shiver that shook him then reminded him that he too was naked to the cool air of the room, but he didn’t want to crowd her under the blanket, nor was he willing to leave her side just yet, even to put some clothes on.
The endless rotation of council flats with dodgy heating in his early twenties had conditioned him to tolerate cold enough to ignore seeing his breath every time he’d breathed. This was nothing.
Slowly, too slowly for his liking, her muscles started to thaw, her knees came untucked from under her chin.
He continued to rub up and down her arms, chafing whatever warmth he could into her.
As her muscles relaxed, she listed to one side and Ciaran caught her, gathering her into his arms. After a moment, her hands slid around his waist and she melted against him, her shoulders shaking.
When she lifted her head from his shoulder a little while later, he was starting to shiver in earnest, a fine tremor wracking his whole body and threatening to make his teeth chatter.
Her eyes, red and swollen from the tears that stained her cheeks, met his and her face colored even more with shame.
“I’m sorry.” she whispered, barely more than a breath.
He pressed a kiss to her forehead, by way of acceptance, though there was nothing for her to apologize for. “Give me one second,” he told her as he eased her back, releasing her only when he was sure she wouldn’t topple over again.
She nodded and wiped her face with a corner of the blanket.
He could feel her eyes on him as he moved around the room, pulling on a pair of sweatpants, digging a dressing gown out of his closet for her. He crouched beside her and traded the light blanket for a heavier cotton.
She wrapped it around herself and tied the belt, then allowed him to pull her to her feet.
Ciaran eyed the bed for a moment, taking in the rumpled covers, half of which had fallen to the floor.
For the first time, the pillows on both sides of his bed had deep indents, rather than just his side, the other half untouched and cold.
He wasn’t prepared for the rush that came over him at the sight.
His heart thumped hard, seeming to grow a little bigger with each beat, until it filled his chest and threatened to burst free.
“Are you okay?” she asked when they stood there a bit too long.
He looked down at her and smiled crookedly. “Shouldn’t I be asking you that?”
Giving the bed a pass, he ushered her into the living room and tucked her into one of the chairs, walking away only long enough to make tea and carry it back. She accepted the mug without a word, but didn’t drink it immediately, instead clutching it between her hands as if it were a lifeline.
Ciaran went to the wall by the door and adjusted the thermostat.
There was a click, and, almost at once, the room filled with the hiss and creak of the city’s ubiquitous steam system moving through the radiators between the windows.
He stayed where he was and studied her for a long moment as she stared into the depths of the cup.
She was pale, her face drawn and distracted, her eyes still red, but the tremors had eased at least.
Ciaran called her name, his voice gentle. It took her a moment before she lifted her eyes to his. “Who’s Andy?”
Jal blushed again and looked back down. “You’re angry, aren’t you?”
His heart clenched, that her default was to assume the worst. He crossed the room, approaching slowly with his hands loose and at his sides, then knelt at her feet, sitting back on his heels. “Not at you.”
She looked down at him and took a deep breath as if to steady herself, blowing it out on a sigh.
“Andy was my last boyfriend.” She gripped the mug a little tighter.
“We were together for a little over a year. Everything was great at first. He was sweet, and generous. He promised that he could help give me a life where I didn’t need to steal anymore.
I’d been living in a shoebox in Chinatown at the time, and his place in the Bronx seemed like a palace, even if it was in a rough neighborhood. ”
Words seemed to fail her, and she took a sip of tea. “I moved in with him after only dating for a few months.” Her mouth twisted. “That was my first mistake.”
He took a deep breath and blew it hard out his nose, swallowing against the lump in his throat.
“Things were fine at the beginning. But then, I started to see more of the things that he had managed to hide when we lived apart. He worked long hours, and then would go to a bar. He drank more than I thought he did, and it ended with him getting into fights. He got into debt with the wrong people and, for a while, I managed to ignore it all, because he kept it outside the house and the bills still got paid.”
This wasn’t going to end well.
Jal released a shuddering breath, and her voice started to tremble.
“Then, he started to come home drunk, to demand my money to pay his debts to the loan sharks. To demand I sleep with him on command, and when I didn’t, he would beat me, and…
force himself on me.” She trailed off and buried her face in her hand.
Ciaran took the cup from her and set it on the coffee table so he could take her hands in his.
His heart cracked when she clamped down and held on for dear life just to stop the trembling in her fingers.
He wanted to kill the man who took the beautiful and brave woman he knew she was inside and turned her into someone who almost couldn’t bear to be touched.
“Two years ago, when I finally worked up the nerve to leave, he lost it and pushed me down a flight of stairs.” Her voice cracked, the last words barely a whisper. “He almost killed me.”
Ciaran swore under his breath, his earlier fears realized.
His thoughts dissolved into a mass of confusion and anger.
In his mind, any man who would dare lay a finger on a woman was worse than the lowest snake.
Ciaran wondered where this Andy was now, and hoped that he was far, far away for Jal’s sake.