“Turn around,” he said. “You don't need to see the wound.”
“I'm not a child.”
“You just act like one.”
“You—” Kira let out a quiet scream and stormed up to him, snatching the gauze from his hand. “You're the child. I know your games. You won't chase me off by being rude. That doesn't work anymore. Now, hold still.”
She slipped behind him and pried the blood-soaked square from his back. Though he quickly turned around, she already saw the stitches holding together his skin. And the bruising stretching along his back.
Pain tingled down her spine.
Now that he had flipped around, she ended up staring right at the diagonal slash in his chest, the one her hands never forgot the feel of.
The twisted scar carved through his muscled chest like someone once tried to cleave him in two.
“You're making a habit of staring,” he said in an annoyed monotone.
Heat licked her cheeks. “This is the first andonlytime I've ever stared.”
The murmur and raised brows didn't at all amuse her.
“Don't antagonize me because you're mad I won't let you bleed to death alone,” Kira said.
“How many times must I tell you I'm fine?”
“As many times as I must say I'm not staring.”
The scar over his heart kept drawing her eye, though. It was longer than her hand. Her gaze dropped for an instant, stomach hurting.
“The north,” Zayne muttered.
Kira let him see her anguish at the thought of what they did to him. “How did you survive?”
“Interrogations are controlled and precise. I was never going to die.”
Aching pain crept into her bones. That time in Dr. Cooper's tank had only been a taste of how terrible things could get. She glanced at the snake tattoos, seeing them climbing over his shoulders and twisting along his chest, understanding the price of those marks much better than ever. How had Zayne not broken?
Other scars caught her eye. She'd seen some of them before, but now she imagined each wound as fresh and painful. The stitches in his back would become another scar. Except he was taking pure Pixi, so there might not end up being a mark. Horror hit her that there was no telling how many times he'd been hurt. The Pixi Dust strongly minimized scarring.
And those bruises were dark. She'd glimpsed some on his back. Black and deep purple bruising climbed up his sides and littered his chest and stomach. He'd been in a bad fight.
“Don't get hurt anymore.” Her voice sounded small. “I can't stand it.”
For several seconds, they looked at one another until he passed the square bandage to her. “You can help me one time. That's it.”
Her heart softened, and she took it, moving around him to his back. Her face was level with his shoulder blades, close enough to breathe him in. Three years ago, she learned how dangerous that was. There was something about him that drove her wild. A tangible connection she felt throughout her body. Way too thick and overpowering when she stood this near.
Kira loved biology. It was pheromones. That was all. Zayne Riven had some killer pheromones. She was a woman capable of self-control. She wasn't going to be run by a primitive drive inside of her.
Not even if it was much worse now that she knew him.
She plucked a swab and ointment from the basket of medical supplies on the bed, feeling her heart beating in her temples.
“Hurry up,” he said.
“I'm putting medicine on it. Be patient.”
She should be a gentleman and avert her eyes from all this skin and the toned swoop of his lower back into the cut of his hips. Shouldn't look. But she'd never seen anything as wonderful as Zayne's back. Except his eyes. His lips. Then again, what about his arms or chest? Oh, and shoulders, of course. It was really hard to decide what was the most wonderful thing about him when she meant to not even look.
