He smoothed his hand over her hair. “You were sweating. I heard you moaning, came in to check on you. You were thrashing around on the bed. I debated whether to wake you …”
“I’m glad you did. I need to take a shower.” And brush her teeth. And gargle. She had to get the taste of dry earth out of her mouth.
“Do you want me to come in with you?”
Yes. No. She didn’t want to be alone, but knew she had to do this by herself. She refused to become dependent on Dalton. “I’ll be fine.”
He nodded. “I’ll wait right here for you.”
“I’ll only be a few minutes.” On shaky legs, she slid off the bed, grabbed some clothes and slipped into the bathroom. She turned on the water and while it warmed up, scoured her teeth and used mouth rinse. Feeling immensely better after that, she hurried through her shower, washing off the sweat coating her body. True to his word, Dalton was still in her room when she came out. In fact, he was making her bed.
“I changed the sheets. They were drenched.”
“Thank you. For that, and for hearing me, for waking me.” She turned her head as a low rumble sounded off in the distance, followed by a flash of lightning.
“Storm’s coming,” Dalton said in reply.
She nodded, shivering as goose bumps prickled her skin.
“Let’s go sit in the living room for a while.”
“What time is it?”
“About four A.M.”
She tossed her damp hair over her shoulder. “I’m sorry, Dalton. I don’t sleep much these days.”
“Don’t worry about it. Neither do I. Come on.”
He went into the living room and sat on the sofa. Isabelle hesitated. For some reason she needed the contact of Dalton’s body but felt uncertain asking for it.
Dalton patted the cushion beside him. “Sit with me.”
Relieved, Isabelle curled up next to him and pulled her legs behind her.
“Do you remember the dream?” he asked.
“Yes. This time I forced myself to stay in the here and now, to remember. At first I was floating, like on a cloud or in space. It was wonderful, very freeing. But then I fell, plummeted into a hole or a grave, and dirt came raining down on top of me. I couldn’t crawl out, and more dirt came in, choking me. I couldn’t breathe. I was being buried alive.”
Dalton put his arm around her and drew her closer to him. She didn’t mind that at all, still chilled despite the warmth in the room.
“When it felt like I was dying, I heard their voices.”
“Whose voices?”
“The Sons of Darkness. Tase, the one who was their leader.”
“What did he say?”
“Something about how I belonged to them, and they control everything about me. That even in death, I would be theirs, including my soul. And that’s when you woke me.”
Dalton arched a brow. “That’s pretty intense.”
“Yeah.”
“No wonder you were in bad shape.”
He smoothed his hand down her arm and back up, settling at her nape to massage the tension nestled there. She shivered, but this time it wasn’t from being chilled.
“It’s better now. Thank you for sitting with me.”
He looked down at her. “Are you ready to go back to sleep?”
“No. I’m pretty much done with sleeping for the night.” The thought of closing her eyes again brought about vivid images of being closed in, of dirt pouring on her, of being unable to breathe. She couldn’t sleep anymore. She might not be able to again for a long while. “You can go back to bed if you want to. I’ll be fine out here.”
“So will I.” He shifted so she could slide into the crook of his arm. She felt sheltered there, and he wrapped his arm more securely around her. She drew her knees up to her chest, settled, and finally relaxed. She could almost fall asleep this way, except Dalton kept moving his hand up and down her arm and shoulder, and slid his fingers into her hair to massage her head. The sensations he evoked had her wide awake and wired, her emotions and physical reactions tuned into him completely.
“Are you deliberately trying to provoke a response from me?” she finally asked.
“Huh?” His voice sounded lazy and tired. He even yawned.
“Never mind.”
“What are you talking about?”
She sighed, staring at the darkness through the front window. Normally after a dream like the one she’d just had, the dark would scare her, but sitting in the pitch-black room with Dalton didn’t bother her at all for some reason.
“You’re touching me.”
He didn’t stop, his fingertips gliding over her arm. “Does it bother you?”
“Yes and no. I’m just trying to figure out your intent.”
“I’m relaxing you.”
“I’m fine.”
“True enough. You haven’t gone all demon on me.”
She snorted. “So do I get a cookie?”
“You’re a bit of a smart-ass, Isabelle.”
“So I’ve been told. And you didn’t answer my question.”
“What question?”
Men. Always talking in circles to avoid answering. “Are you trying to provoke the demon?”
“Maybe. The demon is part of who you are. You can’t avoid it forever.”
She shifted, facing him. She could see his face despite the darkened room. There was enough gray light sifting in from the moonlight that she could read his expression. But she couldn’t tell if he was teasing her or he was dead serious. “Won’t waking up the demon part of me alert the Sons of Darkness to our whereabouts?”
“I don’t think so. Because as Georgie said, there’s a part of you that doesn’t want to mix it up with the Sons of Darkness again. You’re doing a fine job of fighting their attempts to find you. I don’t think bringing out your demon side is going to alert them.”
Easy for him to say. He wasn’t having the kinds of nightmares she had, the feeling that the demons came for her every night, took her somewhere, had power over her. She started to pull away, not liking the direction this conversation-or his intent-was heading.
“Don’t.”
Her gaze shot to his. She wished there was more light so she could see his eyes. “Why?”
“We need each other.”
She didn’t understand that. She knew why she needed him-right now he was all she had, a lifeline to grasp on to. Otherwise, she’d be facing this nightmare alone. But why did he need her? “What do you mean?”
He hesitated. “I have to prove to the Realm of Light that there was a damn good reason I ran off with you.”
Things were becoming more clear. “You saved my life that day. You weren’t supposed to, were you?”
“No.”
She didn’t know why it had never dawned on her before. Maybe she hadn’t wanted to think about the possibility to voice it. “You were ordered to kill me, weren’t you?”
“Yes.”
She let that soak in for a second, though for some reason the knowledge didn’t surprise her. She was a demon now. She had become a threat to the Realm. It made perfect sense for them to want her dead. What didn’t make sense was why she still lived. “Why didn’t you?”
“Because for a second that night, when you looked right at me, I saw you. Not the demon. And I saw something in you that I–I saw something in you that was still human. That was worth saving.”
