Lover Mine (Black Dagger Brotherhood #8) - J.R. Ward Page 0,97

black hair. "What would it take . . . to fulfill you?"

It was like watching a train wreck roll out. Blay should have left but 211

he couldn't move; he just had to witness the collision. And naturally, Layla's brilliant blush made her even more beautiful. Then her full, lovely lips parted. Closed. Parted . . . closed again.

"It's okay," Qhuinn whispered. "You don't have to say it out loud. I know what you want."

Blay felt a cold sweat break out over his chest and his hands cranked down on the clothes he'd picked out for himself.

"Who," Qhuinn asked hoarsely. "Who do you want." There was another long pause and then she said one word: "You." Blay stood up. "I'll leave you two."

He was utterly blind as he made for the exit and he snagged his leather jacket on his way on instinct.

As he shut the door, he heard Qhuinn say, "We'll go very slowly. If we're going to do this, we're going to go very slowly." Out in the hall, Blay put some fast distance between himself and his bedroom, and it wasn't until he came up to the double doors that led into the staff wing that he realized he was walking around in a robe. Slipping into the set of stairs that led to the movie theater on the third floor, he changed into his clothes in front of the dormant popcorn machine. The simmering anger deep in his gut was a kind of cancer, eating him up. But it was so baseless. So useless.

Blay stood facing the shelves of DVDs, the titles on the jackets nothing but a visual pattern to his eyes.

What he ended up reaching for wasn't a movie, however. It was a slip of paper from his coat pocket.

212

TWENTY-NINE

As the door to the recovery room shut, Xhex felt like she should say something. Out loud. To Rehvenge. "So. Ah." She pushed at her hair. "How are you--"

He cut off her awkward rambling by striding over to her, that red cane of his jabbing into the tile, his loafers clapping heel-toe, heel-toe. His expression was fierce, his violet eyes burning.

It was enough to give her a complex.

Pulling her sheet up higher, she muttered, "What the hell is wrong with y--"

Rehv swooped down with his long arms and gathered her up against him, tucking her with vital care to his chest. Ducking his head to hers, his voice was deep and grave.

"I never thought I would see you again."

As he shuddered, she lifted her hands up to his torso. After holding herself back for a moment . . . she embraced him as fully as he did her.

"You smell the same," she said roughly, putting her nose right into the collar of his fine silk shirt. "Oh . . . God, you smell the same." The expensive spiced cologne took her back to the days at ZeroSum when it was the four of them: him at the helm, iAm on the books, Trez on operations, her on security.

The scent was the hook that snagged her and pulled her through the keyhole of the abduction, tying her to her past, bridging the horrid span of the last three weeks.

She didn't want the tether, though. It was just going to make her departure harder. Better to be grounded in immediate events and immediate goals.

And then just float away.

Rehv pulled back. "I don't want to wear you out, so I'm not going to stay. But I needed . . . Yeah."

"Yeah."

Together, they held on to each other's arms and as always she felt that commonality between them, their shared half-blood sides latching on as 213

symphaths did with one another.

"You need anything?" he asked. "Food?"

"Doc Jane said nothing solid for another couple hours."

"Okay. Listen, we'll talk about the future--"

"In the future." As she spoke, she projected into her mind an image of them in deep discussion. Which was produced solely to buy him off in the event he was reading her.

Unclear whether he bought it. "I live here now, by the way," he said.

"Where am I exactly?"

"Brotherhood's training center." He frowned. "I thought you'd been here before."

"Not this part. But yeah, I thought that's where they'd taken me. Ehlena was really good to me, by the way. In there." She nodded in the direction of the OR. "And before you ask, I'm going to be fine. Doc Jane said so."

"Good." He gave her hand a squeeze. "I'll go get John."

"Thanks."

At the door, Rehv paused and then shot narrowed amethyst eyes