He smiled, and again his long lashes came down over his eyes. "I don't think you're a sociopath, Anita. I think you do what needs doing to protect your pard." He raised that yellow-green gaze to me. "I find that admirable, not something to criticize."
I sighed. "Good that someone approves."
He smiled, and it was that mixture of condescension, happiness, and sorrow, that I'd seen before. A complex smile, that. "The Ulfric means well."
"You know what they say about good intentions, Micah. If he's determined to take himself to hell, fine. But he has no right to drag the rest of us along with him."
"I agree."
It made me tired that Micah agreed with me. I wasn't in love with him. Why couldn't it be Richard who agreed with me? Of course, there was someone else. I needed to get to Jean-Claude while it was still dark.
"I had to put off the shower, first to be a gentleman, and let you go first, then so the noise wouldn't interrupt your phone call. I need to get clean now, if you don't mind."
"I'll give you some privacy." I turned towards the door.
"It wasn't privacy I was asking for, just explaining why I was turning the water on during our conversation." he said.
That turned me around at the door. "What conversation?"
He turned on the shower, testing the water with his hand, adjusting the heat, talking over his shoulder. "I've never felt another Nimir-Ra with the kind of power you put off. It was amazing."
"Glad you enjoyed it, but I've really got to go."
He turned to face me, stepping back into the water, throwing his head back for a second to wet his hair. The water hit his neck and he let out a hissing breath, bending over at the shoulders like it really hurt.
I went back into the room. "Are you alright?"
He nodded and stopped in mid-motion. "I will be."
I was close enough that when he raised his head I could see the water beaded on his face, clinging in thick drops to his lashes. I stood to one side, getting sprayed with just the faintest mist of the water. I got my first good look at the side of his neck. "Shit." I reached through the water to touch his face, turned him slowly so I could see the bite.
He had a perfect imprint of my teeth in the right side of his neck. The wound was still seeping blood, so the circle of toothmarks was filled with crimson. The tanned flesh of his neck was already bruising, dark colors swirling to the surface of his skin.
"God, Micah, I'm sorry."
"Don't be sorry, it is a love bite."
I dropped my hand from his face. "Yeah, right, it looks like I tried to eat your throat out." I frowned. "Why hasn't it started healing?"
"Wounds made by the teeth and claws of another lycanthrope heal slower than most, not as slow as silver, but slower than say, steel."
"I am sorry."
"And I said, don't be sorry."
"The last Ulfric I bit like this--and it wasn't nearly this bad, I didn't even break the skin--he considered it an insult. He said, it meant I considered myself higher in the pack than he was."
"We are not wolves. To the pard a wound on the neck from a Nimir-Ra is a sign that the sex was good."
That made me blush.
"I didn't mean to embarrass you, just to explain that you don't owe me an apology. I enjoyed it."
I blushed harder.
"Together we could do great things for our pard."
I shook my head. "We won't know for sure that I'm going to be Nimir-Ra for a few days. Let's take it slow until then."