The reality was that it felt like another death for him to face--
"I saw you. Yesterday."
Her voice yanked his head up. What? he mouthed.
"He kept me in that bedroom. I saw you. You came in and went to the bed. You left with a pillow. I was... beside you the whole time you were there."
John's hand lifted to his cheek and she smiled a little. "Yes, I touched your face."
Jesus Christ...
How, he mouthed.
"I'm not sure precisely how he does it. But that was the way he got me in the first place. We were all in that cave where Rehv was being kept in the colony. The symphaths had come in and Lash got me--it happened so damned fast. I was suddenly off my feet, being dragged out, but I couldn't fight and no one could hear me scream. It's like a force field. If you're inside, and you try to breach it, the shock is painful and quick--but it's more than aversion. There's a physicality to the barrier." She lifted her palm and pushed at the air. "A weave. The strange thing is, though, you can have other people in the same space. Like when you came in."
John was dimly aware that his hands hurt for some reason. Glancing down, he saw that he'd cranked them into fists and the pad was digging into his flesh. So was the Bic he'd been writing with.
Flipping to a new page he scribbled, I wish I'd known you were there. I would have done something. I swear I didn't know.
When she read what he wrote, she reached out and put her hand on his forearm. "I know. It's not your fault."
Sure felt like it on his end. To have been right with her and not had a clue that she was--
Oh. Shit.
He wrote fast, then flashed, Did he come back. After we'd been there.
When Xhex shook her head, his heart started beating again. "He drove by, but kept on going."
How did you escape, he signed without thinking.
While he scrambled for a fresh page, she said, "How did I get out?" As he nodded, she laughed. "You know, you're going to have to teach me sign language."
He blinked. Then mouthed, Okay.
"And don't worry. I'm a fast learner." She took a deep breath. "The barrier had been strong enough to keep me in since the moment that he took me. But then you came and left and..." She frowned. "Were you the one who did in that slayer downstairs?"
As his fangs punched out into his mouth, he mouthed, Fuck, yeah.
Her little smile had the edge of a dagger. "Nice job. I heard the whole thing. Anyway, it was after everything went quiet that I knew I had to get out or..."
Die, he thought. Because of what he'd done in that kitchen.
"So I was--"
He held his hand up to stop her, then wrote fast. When he showed her his words, she frowned and then shook her head.
"Oh, of course you wouldn't have done it if you'd known I was in there. But you didn't. And it sounded as if you couldn't help it. Trust me, I'm the last person you need to apologize to for slaughtering one of those bastards."
True, but he still got a case of the cold sweats thinking of how he'd inadvertently endangered her.
She took another long inhale. "So anyway, after you left, it became apparent the barrier was weakening, and when I was able to punch my fist through a window, I knew I had a shot." She lifted one of her hands and looked at the knuckles. "I ended up taking a runner through the doorway. I figured I was going to need the extra force working with me and I was right."
Xhex shifted around in the bed, wincing. "I think that's where I got the tear. On my inside. I got wrenched badly breaking out--it was like pulling my body through concrete that was about set. I hit the hallway wall hard as well."
There was the temptation to believe the bruises he'd seen on her skin were a result of her escape. But he knew Lash. He'd stared into the face of the guy's cruelty enough times to be absolutely sure that she'd been put through a lot at the hands of the enemy.
"That's why I needed to be operated on."
The statement was voiced in a clear and level way. Trouble was, she did not meet his eyes.
John flipped to a new page, wrote six letters in capitals and tacked on a question mark. When he turned the pad around, she barely glanced at the REALLY?
That gunmetal gray stare of hers swung away and locked on the far corner. "It could have been an injury I sustained fighting him. But I hadn't been bleeding internally before I got out, so... there you go."
John exhaled and thought of those scratched and stained walls he'd seen in that room. What he wrote next made him ache.
When she looked at what he'd put on the page, her face grew tight to the point of anonymity. It was as if he were staring at a stranger.
He glanced down at his words: How bad did it get?
He shouldn't have asked, he thought. He'd seen the condition she was in. Had heard her scream in the OR and been right in front of her as she had a nervous breakdown. What more did he need to know?
He was writing up an I'm-sorry when she spoke in a thin trail. "It was... okay. I mean..."
His eyes locked on her profile and he willed her to continue.
She cleared her throat. "I don't believe in fooling myself. Doesn't serve any purpose. I was pretty clear on the fact that if I didn't get out, I was going to die soon." She slowly shook her head back and forth on the white pillow. "I was getting really goddamned weak from lack of blood and the fighting. Thing is, I was okay with the dying part, actually. I still am. Death is nothing but a process, albeit typically a painful one. Once it's over and done with? You're fine because you don't exist and all the bullshit is over."
For some reason, the fact that she was so blase made him anxious and he had to rearrange himself on the little chair to keep from pacing.
"Was it bad?" she murmured. "I'm a fighter by nature. So to some degree it was nothing special. Nothing I couldn't handle. I mean, I'm tight. I lost it in the clinic because I hate medical crap, not because of Lash."
That past of hers, he thought to himself.
"I will tell you this." Her eyes shot back to his and he actually jerked away at the burn in her stare. "What will make it bad? What will make the last three weeks totally unbearable? If I don't kill him. That will be insupportable to me."
The bonded male in him sat up and howled, to the point where he wondered if she knew he wouldn't be able to let her be the one to off the motherfucker: Males protected their females. It was the universal law if you had the c**k and balls.
Plus the idea of her going anywhere near that guy made John mental. Lash had already taken her once. What if he pulled that cloaking shit again?
They weren't going to get a second chance to get her back. No way.
"So," she said. "I showed you mine. Your turn."
Right. Okay.
Now he was the one staring into that far corner. Jesus Christ. Where to start.
He flipped to a fresh page on his pad, put the Bic nib down, and...
Whole lot of nothing came to him. The problem was, there was too much to write, too much to tell her, and wasn't that depressing as shit.
A sharp knock brought both of their heads around.
"Goddamn it," she said under her breath. "Give us a minute!"
The fact that there was someone waiting for an audience on the other side of the door didn't exactly put him in a sharing kind of mood. That, coupled with the communication barrier and his innate cover-it-up tendencies, made his head hum.
"Whoever it is can hang outside all night and all day as far as I'm concerned." She smoothed the blanket over her stomach. "I want to hear what you have to say."
Funny, that was what unlocked him, and he wrote quickly.
It would be easier to show you.
Her brows went in tight together when she read that, and then she nodded. "Okay. When."
Tomorrow night. If you have clearance to go out.
"It's a date." She lifted her hand... and put it lightly on his forearm. "I want you to know--"
The knock that cut her off had them both cursing.
"We need a minute!" she snapped before refocusing on him. "I want you to know... that you can trust me."
John locked eyes with her and was instantly transported to a different plane of existence. Mighta been heaven again. Who the f**k knew or cared. All he knew was that there was only her and him together, the rest of the world drifting away into a fog.
Was it possible to fall in love with someone twice, he wondered dimly.
"What the hell are you doing in there?"
Rehv's voice on the other side of the door broke the moment, but didn't erase it.