on the tub. “I figured your muscles were sore,” he said. “You can’t be comfortable after making that portal for us.”
They were worse than sore. The tension in my body made it difficult to move. I was so stiff, I felt like the Tin Man.
I hobbled to the tub. Ethan poured in bath salts and a small bottle of bubbles. I stripped. Ethan’s eyes roamed up my nude body, but I paid him no attention. I got in the tub, sinking up to my nose. Relief coursed through my bloodstream, and the aching in my muscles ebbed. Finally, a bit of respite from my own body.
Ethan went to leave, but as he put his hand on the doorknob, I said, “You can come in.”
Ethan paused. He waited for a few moments, then removed his shirt. I observed him carefully as he took off his clothes. He didn’t look at all like he did hours before. The broken veins in his face were gone, and so were the bags under his eyes. The bruises and scars that matted his body from the leshane’s influence were no longer there. He appeared to be at his prime. My eyes flickered downward, but only for a moment. He wasn’t aroused, just apprehensive, and I couldn’t take my gaze away from his eyes for long.
Despite us not really being… well, together, being naked in front of each other was the most natural thing in the world. There wasn’t a need to hesitate, only a need to expose and lay bare everything that we’d been holding close to our hearts over these past few months.
Clothes wouldn’t do any good to conceal what we felt. We always had seen each other for who we were, even if there were illusions or lies in the way convincing us otherwise. I’d known he was the Phantom before I wanted to admit it— he’d known I was the White Rose despite what logic told him. What was in our hearts couldn’t hide from the light.
He sat on the edge of the Jacuzzi to remove his prosthetic. Our skin touched as he slid into the tub, and that singular motion made goosebumps rise over my skin. Ethan played with the water, but said nothing. He was waiting for me to make the first move.
I reached for a sponge, then handed it to him. “Can you wash my back?”
I moved my hair aside, and relaxed as he washed the sponge over my skin. It felt so good. In some parts he pressed too hard, and I gasped, but Ethan backed off until he was applying the correct amount of pressure.
“Staying awake?” he asked.
“Uh huh.” My eyes were closing. I didn’t have to do anything but breathe. The weight of trying to save Ethan for months had finally been lifted off my shoulders. A good thing, too, because I couldn’t carry another moment of it.
Ethan put the sponge aside, then wrapped his arms around my front. He leaned back, and I pressed against him as we laid in the tub.
Yeah, this was paradise. Goodnight, we’ll figure out what we are in the morning, because I’m happy where I’m at.
“Do you still want to be with me?” Ethan had to ask. His voice was scared, but not broken.
I did what Delmare suggested, and followed my heart. “Yes. But I want it to work this time,” I started. “I can’t go through this again. It’d kill me.”
“Perhaps we can go back to what we were before,” he said.
That was the wrong answer. “I don’t think we can go back…” I said. “I think we have to start over.”
Ethan mused over that notion. When he was silent for too long, I spoke up. “I can’t shoulder our burdens alone anymore, Ethan,” I said tiredly. “I’ve carried us for too long. My life is difficult enough. I need to be with someone who makes our relationship easy. I can’t fight against my disease, fight against Droga and fight against you, too.”
“I’ll shoulder the battle for you,” he said. “I asked more from you than I ever should’ve.”
“I don’t know what I want from you. But I do know that I don’t want our past,” I continued. “Things need to change if I’m going to be with you.”
Ethan turned me around, then took my hands in his. “I want you to marry me, onawilke. I want to stay by your side and live the rest of my days with you as my wife.”