I opened my mouth to respond, but he kissed me briefly in a clear attempt to shut me up.
“You show me you love me every time you take my hand, every time you let me kiss you, and every time you let me in, even when I know it’s extremely difficult for you to do so.”
“I still want to be able to tell you,” I whispered, and he smiled, tugging me into a tight hug and kissing the side of my head.
“You just did, my little hellcat.” He grinned, and I burrowed deeper into his arms, loving how warm and safe I felt with him wrapped around me.
“And guess what? I love you, too.”
Alexa play: The Way That You Were by Sleep Token
We made it to our temporary home, and I shut the door behind us as Gabe made his way upstairs.
He was still a little stiff and sore, and the back of his shirt was caked with blood from his severed wings.
The sight of it made my stomach churn with nausea, and I hung back, frozen in place for a moment, fighting off the feelings of guilt that were plaguing me.
Gabe glanced back at me, frowning.
“None of that, baby. It’s not your fault. Come up to bed,” he demanded softly, and I sighed, slipping my hands into my pockets and following him up the stairs.
I entered George’s bedroom, and Gabe was already peeling off his shirt, discarding it on the ground as he made his way to the bathroom.
“Come shower with me,” he called over his shoulder as I hovered by the bed, still staring at Gabe’s bloody shirt.
Raz was dead. He couldn’t see me anymore. There was no reason I couldn’t strip out of my clothes and join Gabriel in the shower… but still.
Old habits die hard.
I wandered into the attached bathroom to find that Gabriel was already fully naked and pulling back the shower curtain to step into George’s modern-day bathtub. Gabe was too tall for where the shower head had been fixed into the wall, and he winced slightly as the hot stream of water hit his eviscerated back.
He wasn’t bleeding anymore, but the two gashes where his wings used to be were still red and raw.
Wounds created with Aetherium were a bitch to heal, and knowing that Gabriel probably would never fly again broke my fucking heart.
“If you keep looking at me like that, I’m going to develop a complex,” Gabe observed dryly, filling his hands with soap and getting to work scrubbing the patches of dried blood off his abdomen.
“What do you mean?”
“You’re looking at me like… I don’t know. Like you’re disgusted by me or something.”
My blood went cold at his choice of words, and my eyebrows shot to my hairline.
“What? No… no, of course I’m not disgusted by you. If anything, I’m disgusted with myself for allowing this to happen to you. It’s my fault he took your wings. I should have been there.”
Gabe rolled his eyes and ran his hands through his hair, looking incredibly sexy with his wet hair slicked back and streams of hot, soapy water sliding down his perfect abs.
“Enough, Shemhazai. I already told you it’s not your fault. I asked you to stay back. Now get in the fucking shower with me so we can clean each other up and then finally fuck out in the open.”
When I still hesitated, he raised a challenging eyebrow at me.
“Unless youdothink I’m disgusting now that I don’t have my wings…”
I growled at him but started unbuttoning my own bloody shirt.
“Fuck off, asshole, don’t guilt trip me like that.”
He smirked and shrugged. “Demon, remember? Kind of my brand to be an asshole.”
