“Easy,” Jace murmured. “Be careful.” His voice was close. Too close. When I looked up, he was already standing beside the bed, his eyes softened in a way that stole the breath from my lungs. “I’m gonna help you clean up, okay?”
Heat rushed to my face so fast it made me dizzy. “I… I can do it,” I whispered, though even my voice shook at the effort.
“No,” he said gently, kneeling so we were eye-level. “Not with your back like this. You’re hurting.” A beat of silence. Then, quieter, he said, “Let me take care of you. Please?”
My throat tightened. I couldn’t look at him for more than a second. Everything between us felt impossibly tangled—warm and terrifying and much too big to fit inside my head.
He stood and reached out a hand.
I stared at it.
I shouldn’t take it. I shouldn’t want to. After what had just happened—after how easily I had given in—I should’ve felt ashamed, pushing him away, not reaching for him like he was a source of warmth in a cold, dark room.
But my fingers lifted anyway, hesitant and shaking.
Jace wrapped his hand around mine, steady and sure, like he’d been waiting for me to decide.
“Slow,” he murmured. “Just lean on me.”
I did.
Every step hurt, but not because of him. My back, my thighs—my whole body felt fragile, like I’d been hollowed out and left full of sparkly, aching light. Jace stayed pressed to my side, supporting more of my weight than I meant to give him.
When we reached the bathroom, he turned the shower on and let it start to warm. He kept one arm around me the whole time, even when he didn’t need to.
“Sit for me?” he asked, guiding me over to the toilet.
I did, and my legs immediately threatened to give out in relief.
Jace didn’t touch me at first. He crouched in front of me, eyes scanning my face like he was checking if I was still breathing.
“Elior,” he said softly. “You’re safe.”
Something inside me cracked at the word.
Safe.
I didn’t know if I deserved that. I didn’t know if wanting it from him made me a sinner. I didn’t even know if I understood what he meant by it. Everything had felt so jumbled up ever since Father picked up that whip.
My fingers fidgeted in my lap. “Jace… I don’t know how to feel.”
“That’s alright,” he murmured, using a washcloth to wipe off the remnants of his pleasure from my face. “You don’t have to know anything right now. I’m not asking for anything from you. Let me help you wash up, and then you can rest.”
My eyes burned. I blinked hard.
He helped me stand, then guided me under the warm spray of the shower. And although he followed me in, I could tell he was trying his best to not crowd me.
“I need to clean your back first, okay, baby?”
I swallowed and nodded, cheeks hot—not from arousal, but from a confusing mix of vulnerability and trust. It was weird, wanting comfort from the same man who’d… touched me.
He wet the washcloth, lathered it with the bar of soap, and touched it to my uninjured shoulder first—testing my reaction.
“This okay?” he asked.
“Yes,” I breathed. “It’s… it’s okay.”
The cloth moved in slow circles, extra soft on the broken parts of my skin.
