He gave an Adam grunt, and I heard the soft footfalls that told me he had gone into the bedroom. I opened my eyes and gingerly got off the vanity. My skin wanted to stick so I had to peel myself off. Standing on my feet had been getting more uncomfortable, but sitting on the vanity had been the wrong choice. Hopping down wasn’t pleasant.
Adam missed all of this—as I intended him to. When he came into the bathroom, I was standing on the tile and he was holding one of his silk ties—deep blue with chocolate highlights that were the same color as his eyes.
“Not that one,” I said. “It’s my favorite.”
He lifted it and wrapped it around my eyes anyway. “Mine, too,” he said. Then he put his lips against my ear and whispered, “I like it when you wear my clothes.”
I didn’t object again. There were always dry cleaners.
He picked me up again—this time avoiding both the cut on my back and the sore muscle. He took his time getting from the bathroom to the bed. By the time he set me down on the cool sheets, I had forgotten all about my aches and pains.
It took him a while, but eventually I forgot my own name. I remembered his, though.
Sweaty, panting, and happy, I lay contentedly facedown on the bed while Adam cleaned the mess we’d made. He put ointment on my back and only then untied the tie covering my eyes.
“I think it will survive,” he said, sounding a little surprised.
“Quality pays off,” I murmured.
“You should eat something,” he said.
If I moved, it was going to hurt. Right now nothing hurt at all.
“Go away or come to bed,” I told him.
“I thought it’s supposed to be men who have to sleep after sex,” he complained, but there was a thread of laughter in his voice. I made Adam happy, too.
“I fought a possessed vampire. I get to sleep.”
“Fair enough,” he said, patting my butt. He pulled the sheet and then the blankets over me.
I probably should have worried about the ointment on my back getting on the sheets. But I couldn’t work up the energy.
Adam pulled down the shades to darken the room, then took a shower. I was asleep before he came out of the bathroom. Someone tried to wake me up for dinner but left me alone after I yelled at them. If I dreamed, I didn’t notice.
—
I woke up to a dark room and Adam sleeping beside me. I’d stolen all of the covers and he lay naked, facedown on the bed. I couldn’t help but smile—and it had nothing to do with his hard-muscled body. He could have unrolled me from the covers, but that would have woken me up.
“Frost—”
The memory of Wulfe’s voice made me frown. Why had he wanted to talk about Frost? Frost was dust, Adam and I had killed him between us, but when Frost was walking the earth, he’d had a talent for souls. He’d fed off them.
Adam stirred. I rolled out of the blankets and covered him.
“I’m up,” I whispered. “Go back to sleep. I’m going down to grab some food.”
He grunted and reached out. I touched his hand and leaned over to kiss him. Then I grabbed a set of sweats I kept in the top drawer of my dresser and put them on before leaving the bedroom.
The house was quiet. I could hear even breathing from Jesse’s room. Medea joined me at the top of the stairs, twining around my ankles all the way down to the kitchen. There was a Tupperware container of food obviously portioned for my dinner—spaghetti and salad. The pumpkin pie was on the same shelf with two pieces missing. I gave Medea a meatball in her food dish, then sat down and ate like I hadn’t had food in a week. When I’d finished the dinner I’d been left and a big piece of pie, I went back to the fridge and gathered sandwich makings.
And on my second bite of sandwich, I realized what Wulfe had meant. It was a lot of meaning to get from one word, but I was pretty sure I was right.
My absent gaze fell on the window, and I realized that Tilly, in her favorite guise of a ten-year-old girl complete with long, tangled hair and a dirty shift, was sitting on the picnic table I’d been sitting on when the Harvester had come calling.
Blood chilled, I wondered how long she’d been there.
I was going to start using the curtains in this room at night, I decided. After a second, I changed my mind. Curtains would mean that I couldn’t see what was on the other side of the window.