He was guarding us.
He was guardingme.
I hadn’t imagined the worry when he was patching me up, or the way he’d curled himself atop my body and trembled when I’d fallen. His eyes were still clear of tears, but… the panic had been evident. I tried to push myself up again, and he stood from his chair and came to the edge of the bed. Aubrey’s fingers were warm when they smoothed along my shoulder, but he still pushed me back against the pillows.
“You need to rest.” His voice was firm—not a command, but the tone of someone who was doing his damn best to make sure that the person they’d patched up actually stayed alive. I frowned up at him.
“We should…” I trailed off, my throat dry. When I coughed to clear it, he moved without a word and brought me water. I kept my gaze fixed on him as I brought the canteen to my lips. He was taking care of me.
Aubrey didn’t take care of me.
I didn’t let people take care of me. It was my job to take care of the pack, and I’d never shown a moment’s weakness otherwise. The feeling was almost foreign. It was actually hard to trust, but I drank the water anyway, sputtering slightly at the medicinal taste of it.
“There’s some antibiotics I stole from the Order in there. You were…” Aubrey didn’t look at me, just took the container when I offered it and sat it beside the bed before turning to busy his hands again—I heard the ruffling sound of packaging. “You were really hurt. Youarereally hurt.” He turned to me again and offered up a bowl. The smell that wafted from it was rich, heavy, and damn me if he didn’t help me shift into a sitting position so I could take it and bring the liquid to my lips. The flavor bursting across my tongue made my stomach growl.
“How long have I been out?” The hunger tearing through me spoke of more than a few hours.
“Two days. After I bandaged you up, I wasn’t sure if…” He stopped himself and shrugged. “You needed to rest. I don’t think there are any more raiders around the area, so we should be safe.” Everything he said made sense, but I was still fixated on the way his voice sounded so soft when he spoke, and the concern that was still clearly laced in the cadence of his tone, as much as he tried to hide it.
“I’ve been hurt worse.” I finally managed a sentence without my voice sounding gruff. “I’ll be fine. How’s your shoulder?” He was moving like he wasn’t hurt at all. That should have told me a few days had passed more than my growling stomach.
Aubrey didn’t even glance at his bandage. “It’s fine. Just another scar.” He shrugged it off and let his eyes sweep my torso. “I need to check your stitches after you’re finished eating. Now that you’re awake, I can get more antibiotics into you and maybe we’ll be able to get out of here soon.”
“Aubrey.” He didn’t raise his head to look at me. Instead, he pushed himself off the bed and went back to his chair. It took me a moment to realize what he’d had in his hands when I woke up, what he was carefully putting to the side now. My clothes.
And a needle.
A thread.
He’d patched them up while I slept. From the way the bloodstains were almost gone, it was obvious he’d washed them out too. What in the hell was this tender side to him? Aubrey was angry and prickly—he fought and we fucked and he didn’t open up. The person standing in front of me was like a total stranger. I tried to sit up again, to push myself from the bed so I could make sure it was really him, and he whirled on me.
“Stop that,” he snapped. This time when he came to the bed, he sat beside me and put a hand firmly on my chest to push me down. “We won’t be going anywhere if you pull a stitch before you’re better. I didn’t have much in the way of healing meds.” Aubrey pulled a syringe from the bedside table and held it up. I recognized it as one of the things I’d seen the first night I went through his pack—the medication markedOrder.“And I wanted to make sure you were taking in the antibiotics first, because the last thing we needed was your wounds to heal up over an infection.”
“I’m fine. Maybe you should—” I’d started to lean toward him, to touch the wound on his shoulder again, and a sharp, stabbing sting stopped me. The syringe in his hand was now sticking from my abdomen, and Aubrey’s green eyes were bright as he pressed the plunger down and sent the medication spilling into my body. I knew the Order had shit mixed specially from the scientists they were mercenaries for, things that made you heal a little faster than you could on your own, but I wasn’t sure if I appreciated the fact that he was using it as a way to shut me up.
I honestly didn’t know how I felt about anything that was happening. Aubrey pulled the syringe out and sat it carefully on the table, but when he tried to stand I reached out, tangling my fingers in the shirt I’d given him to wear the day after I’d torn his clothes to shreds.
It was clean too, freshly patched up. My eyes darted to his neck; the collar was still there. From the soft line of blood on the edge of it, it didn’t seem that he’d taken it off when he’d rinsed everything else. Something about that made my chest burn in satisfaction. “Don’t,” I murmured, the demand coming out before I could stop myself.
“Don’t what?” Aubrey’s eyes were wary. Careful. But he didn’t pull against my grip, and I wondered if it was because he didn’t want to go, or because he didn’t want me to try to make him stay.
“Stay.” I said it like I had the strength to stand up and make him listen, but I had a feeling that Aubrey wouldn’t test it and risk me busting a stitch.
“Fuck, you’re needy when you’re hurt,” he sighed, but climbed back onto the bed. When I tugged again, he staredup at me through thick lashes, then followed the insistence of my fingers that brought him down against me.
When I wrapped my arms around him and molded him to my body, he didn’t struggle. He didn’t try to get up again. He just settled.
And if I wasn’t mistaken, some of the tension in his body slowly rolled out of him as he laid his head against my chest over the steady, thrumming beat of my heart.
When I woke this time,Aubrey was still sleeping. He was propped on the bed as though he’d passed out while watching the door. I’d noticed after that first night we were in bed together that he didn’t sleep very well—he talked in low whispers and made little pained sounds, like the past he was trying to escape wanted to claw from his throat and make a confession while he couldn’t keep it hidden.
For the moment, he was sleeping peacefully. The paint that I’d smeared across his face had rubbed off, and he’d made only a half-hearted attempt at reapplying it.
I leaned in close, my eyes drifting to the thin white scar on his lips again. It was what had started all of this—it was the reason I was laid up in bed, why I’d have fresh scars of my own. While a part of me was still furious with him for running the way that he had to begin with, another part was almost grateful for it.
I wouldn’t have seen how his eyes fell apart when I washurt otherwise. That was another scar, though it was one that I couldn’t see, couldn’t touch.
It was one that I still wanted to own. I wanted all the pieces of him I couldn’t see.
