He reached out and touched the side of my face, stroking his thumb over the skin of my cheek. He leaned forward and I froze as he pressed his lips lightly to my forehead.
I sucked in a sharp breath and positively melted from that warm press of his soft lips against my skin. Which was so confusing!
“Thanks for getting involved,” he murmured, and his breath was warm and sent tingles along my scalp and down my back.
God, that felt so nice.
He pushed some of my hair behind my ear and looked me over, while I looked back. We lay like that silent, just taking each other in until a loud knock at my door made us both jump and him wince.
“Oh! Oh, I’m sorry!”
“It’s fine. Groceries,” he grunted, and I reluctantly pushed myself to my feet.
“Rest,” I told him and went to the door to accept the delivery.
There was a lot more than what I thought I ordered, and it had gotten here super fast! I had no idea what I was going to do with all this food, but I had better figure it out.
5
Mace…
I listened to her move, almost whisper quiet, putting things away. She was different here in her home as opposed to how she’d been in the bar. Quiet, reserved, almost tired. It wasn’t a physical tired. It was almost a weariness of the soul. I could relate entirely too well. Mine stemmed from loneliness, hers was something different. How, I just couldn’t put my finger on yet.
It wasn’t a mystery I was in any kind of hurry to unravel. I had time. Nothing but time, really. Prison had done one thing for me; it had instilled an almost superhero-like level of patience. An appreciation that anything and everything could and would come in due time.
I had no desire to go back into the system, and I admit to having similar feelings of frustration as the first time I’d ever been caged or locked up. Except instead of concrete and metal bars, the prison I was in at the moment was a prison of my own body. One of pain, and new limitations imposed by injury.
It rankled me and left me feeling restless with nowhere for that restless energy to go. Add to it, I just couldn’t fucking get comfortable, no matter how hard I tried. My mood was swiftly starting to deteriorate.
“Here.” I startled and looked back over my shoulder where Raven kneeled behind me. She handed me some pain pills and held onto a glass of water.
“Thanks,” I grated, a bit ashamed to admit I needed the drugs.
“You shouldn’t wait so long between doses,” she chided gently, and I sighed after swallowing the pills down.
“Addiction runs in the family,” I told her. “I’d rather not go there.”
“Ah.” She made a sound of understanding, but it sounded like that understanding ran deep, just from that one syllable alone.
“You got an addict or three in your family tree?” I asked, and she smiled and stuttered a bit of a laugh at my bad poetry.
“Something like that,” she confessed.
“Then you know,” I said and grunted turning to settle back down.
“I know,” she said quietly and rose as noiselessly as she’d arrived and departed the room. She was in a nice pair of athletic leggings and an oversize tee with the neck cut out, so it hung artfully off one shoulder, the cotton midriffed so she was modest, all the important bits covered, but damn.
She was lithe, graceful on her feet, and the long shining fall of her light bronze hair begged to have my hands in it. I wanted to revel in her, bring her silky hair to my nose and breathe her in deep. Her scent was something else, too. Rich, deeply herbal, and natural. She was the goddess Persephone, all rich earth and green growing things, and I wanted to know her – but I didn’t know how.
Shit, she didn’t owe me anything, and me? I owed her everything. Everything… She’d saved my ass from being a permanent cripple, or worse – dead. I was well aware of that fact with how deeply everything ached, the bruises feeling like they were bone-fuckin’ deep.
I couldn’t sleep. I didn’t want to, really. Not while she was awake. Instead, I lay with my eyes closed and just listened. Listened to her put things away and listened as she tried to puzzle out where to put some things in her tiny-ass kitchen. I smiled to myself. I’d loaded her up on the non-perishable shit. She’d picked a lot of health food stuff – lentils, quinoa, and oatmeal.
She baked her own bread, at least I thought so. She’d ordered a couple different types of flour and yeast. I wasn’t sure what the difference was between the dry stuff and the nutritional stuff, but she’d gotten both.
She went fairly liberal on the fruits and veg, and I didn’t up her quantities too much with it just being her here. I wouldn’t be here any longer than I needed to be, so there wasn’t much sense going overboard to feed two for too long.
“Mace?”
I jolted lightly; I’d started to drift without meaning to.
“Yeah?” I asked.
“Your friend is here, with clean clothes,” she murmured, and I looked up.
“Hey, Prospect,” I muttered.
“Jesus, you look like shit,” Sauley said, and I knew it was bad but—
“Thanks, bro.” I grunted and sat up.
“Sorry, man. They said it was bad but… I didn’t know what to expect.”
“You could use a bath or a shower,” Raven said gently. “The hot water would help with the stiffness.”
I nodded. “Sounds painful,” I said.
“Probably, but you’ll probably feel better for it. I can help you if you can’t.” She directed that second “you” at Sauley.
“Ahhh—” Sauley looked taken aback.
“Fuck that, I don’t want him seeing me naked,” I said, and Raven laughed.
“That leaves me seeing you naked,” she said dryly,
