J.R. Ward the Black Dagger Brotherhood Novels 5-8 - J. R. Ward [713]
Tohrment was behind the wheel, driving steadily and smoothly.
At least she didn’t worry about how they were getting home.
Rehvenge stirred and she immediately focused on him. As his amethyst eyes struggled to open, she shook her head.
“Shh…just lie there.” She stroked his face. “Shh…”
He shifted his shoulders and abruptly winced so hard his neck cracked. Wishing there were more that she could do for him, she retucked the blanket that had been wrapped around him. She’d given him as many painkillers as she dared, as well as antibiotics for the shoulder wounds, but she’d held back on antivenin, as he didn’t appear to have been bitten.
Given the way the princess had been carnaged, apparently those spiders and scorpions stung only on command, and Rehv had been spared that for some reason.
Abruptly, he grunted and strained, his hands pushing into the floor beneath him.
“No, don’t try to sit up.” She gently held his chest down. “Just lie with me here.”
Rehvenge collapsed back against her lap and brought one of his hands forward. As he found her palm, he mumbled, “Why…?”
She had to smile. “You ask that a lot, you know.”
“Why did you come?”
After a moment, she said quietly, “I followed my heart.”
Evidently, that didn’t make him happy. On the contrary, he grimaced as if in pain. “Don’t…deserve…your…”
Ehlena stiffened in alarm as he started bleeding from his eyes. “Rehvenge, stay still for me.” Trying not to panic, she reached for her backpack full of supplies, wondering what kind of medical crisis he was having.
Rehvenge caught her hands. “Just…tears.”
She stared at what appeared to be blood on his cheeks. “Are you sure?” When he nodded, she took a Kleenex out of her parka and dabbed his face carefully. “Don’t cry. Please don’t cry.”
“You shouldn’t…have come for me. You should have…left me there.”
“I told you,” she whispered, wiping away more. “Everyone deserves to be saved. It’s the way I look at the world.” As she met his beautiful, iridescent eyes, they seemed even more magical as they shimmered with their wash of red tears. “It’s the way I look at you.”
His lids squeezed shut, as if he couldn’t bear her compassion.
“You tried to protect me from all this, didn’t you,” she said. “That was what the showdown at ZeroSum was about.” When he nodded, she shrugged. “So why don’t you understand my need to save you, if you did the same for me?”
“Different…I’m a…symphath….”
“You’re not all symphath, though.” She thought of his marking scent. “Are you.”
Rehvenge shook his head reluctantly. “But not enough…vampire…for you.”
The sadness in him welled up, a rain cloud condensing over them both, and as she struggled for words, she touched his face again—and found that his skin was too cold for her liking. Shit…she was losing him in her arms. With every mile that took them closer to safety, his body was giving out on them both, his respiration growing logy, his heart rate slowing.
“Can you do something for me?” she said.
“Please…yes,” he replied roughly, even though his eyes fluttered shut and he started to shiver. As he curled into a tighter ball, she could see his spine jutting through the skin of his back even through the blanket.
“Rehvenge? Wake up.” When he looked at her, the purple in his eyes was that of a bruise, opaque and pained. “Rehvenge, would you please take my vein?”
In a rush, his lids peeled wide as though along with, We’re going to Disneyland!, and, How about some drive-thru for dinner?, what she’d said was the last thing he’d expected to come out of her mouth.
As his lips parted, she stopped him before he spoke. “If you ask me why, I’m going to be forced to give you a time-out.”
A small smile quirked the edge of his mouth, but then was lost. And even though his fangs had dropped