Marcos’ brow is still pinched in concern, and he’s staring at me like he’s never seen me before. I frown, noticing how pale his face is beneath the deep brown of his skin.
“Hey,” I whisper, “I’m all right.”
Marcos propels me into my uncle’s house the moment we arrive, and leads me upstairs to one of the guest bedrooms. He and Jes are talking to one another, but they’re going too fast for me to catch anything. They might as well be speaking another language, for all I’m able to understand. I amsotired. Closing the door behind us, he once more tugs the Carhart off, dropping it on the floor before doing the same with my shirt and jeans. When his own shirt follows, I find out that I’m not yet dead enough to not get excited by the sight of him.
“What—” I start, but cut off as he steers me toward the bed and under the blankets.
Marcos sits with his back to the headboard and directs me between his legs until I’m settled back against him the way I’d done when we were camping. My skin tingles where his warm chest is pressed to my back. Wrapping the comforter tight around us, he rests his hand over my heart and rubs. Sighing, I let my weight fall fully on him. This isn’t so bad.
“Nate, are your eyes open?”
I open them. “Yes.”
“Are you warm?”
“I’m fine. This is nice.”
He continues rubbing at my chest. After a few minutes,my skin begins to prick as though someone is stabbing me with tiny needles. It takes another handful of minutes for the brain fog to lift enough that I’m able to figure out what he’s doing.
“If I lose a finger to hypothermia, I’m going to be so mad,” I joke.
“You won’t. Are you feeling better? You’re not slurring so badly anymore.”
I was slurring? “I’m actually colder now than I was before,” I admit.
“Good. Your uncle told me skin-to-skin contact was the best way to warm someone up safely. He said the fact that youweren’tcold was a bad thing.”
“I was fucking freezing last night,” I tell him, and his arms tighten incrementally around me. I’m not feeling quite as tired as I was before, although the return of sensation in my skin is becoming increasingly uncomfortable. It hurts. It hurts so badly that it’s distracting me from what I suspect is a broken rib.
“I know,” he whispers, face turned into my hair. “That damn horse came back to the barn without you. I was terrified.”
“I’m sorry,” I whisper back. “And I’m sorry I missed dinner.”
Marcos gives a strangled huff of laughter, as though he thinks I’m trying to make him feel better by joking around. I’m not joking, though, not even a little bit.
I’m not scared of the dark, or being alone in the wilderness, but even I have to admit it wasn’t an enjoyable night. Out in the woods where the only light comes from the moon, the night can feel oppressive and weighty. The yipping ofcoyotes had sounded sinister and dangerously close. I’d been afraid, freezing cold, and in pain; with nothing else to do to occupy my mind, I’d thought about Marcos all night. I’d thought about the deep, warm brown of his eyes as he’d stood next to my horse and looked up at me with a hand on my leg. I’d thought about the promise I’d made to be home in time for dinner. Yeah, the situation had been scary and my body had hurt, but the broken promise had felt worse than all the rest.
“I’m sorry,” I repeat, just as a light knock is tapped against the door. It opens a second later and Uncle Jes walks in, two steaming bowls of soup in his hands and water bottles tucked under his arms. If he’s surprised or embarrassed by the way Marcos and I are sitting, he doesn’t show it.
“Eat both of these,” he tells me. “And put these under the blanket with you so they’re warmer when you drink them. Warm things only, right now, so we can get that internal temperature up.”
Marcos excavates one of his arms from our blanket cocoon and takes the water bottles. Downstairs, the landline rings. Jes touches my hair briefly, before leaving the room and closing the door gently behind himself once more. Marcos’ hand resumes rubbing my chest.
By the time I drink the bottles of water and eat both bowls of soup, I’m warm and once more struggling to keep my eyes open. Marcos’ skin feels like an inferno against mine, as though he’s my own personal heating pad. I’m desperate for the contact to continue, but I also know he’s likely well beyond his limit for the day.
“Do you want me to move?” I ask him.
“No.”
“Are you sure? I’m warm enough.” He ducks his head and presses his face into my neck.
“No,” he repeats a touch more firmly.
“I hope Annabelle is okay.”
“I hope Annabelle dies,” Marcos replies crossly, making me laugh. I cut off with a gasp, remembering that laughing fucking hurts.
“You need to go to the hospital now that you’re not in danger of hypothermia,” Marcos says immediately.
