Page 15 of Rarely Pure and Never Simple
"Got it."
Blaze hauled the car through an illegal U-turn, thudding over the median, and pulled up in front of the diner. For a moment, he thought the shuddering when he turned the car off was engine trouble, but it was Damien's shaking.
That can't be good.
Rather than wait for Damien to start moving, Blaze raced around the hood of the car and opened his door. Still trying to untangle from his blanket, Damien glared at him.
"I won't touch you. But if you need an arm, you take one, all right? No face plants in the parking lot."
The fierce light in Damien's eyes faded, and he nodded as he slid out of the passenger side. Blaze turned and started toward the diner, careful not to glance down or change his expression when Damien took his arm three steps from the car. Such a delicate moment, one that might shatter if he breathed too hard or spoke too loud. Probably because Damien had begun to trust him, like getting a feral cat to come out from under the porch or something.
His musings on trust turned to concern, though, when they got to the front counter, Damien leaning heavily against him. Blaze dared to wrap an arm around him, once again amazed when his gesture was accepted. He tapped up the seating chart at the virtual hostess stand and secured a table in the back corner for them. If Damien had his back to the wall, at least one of his twitches would be negated.
Blaze palmed the table chit from the dispenser and started Damien moving. He kept his feet as they wove through the other tables, jaw clenched tight, but his shaking grew worse.This doesn't look good. If these were symptoms of some issue beyond low blood sugar, Blaze would have to do a quick net search for the nearest medical facility. Several other patrons gave them evil looks, but Blaze couldn't care less. Let them think Damien was strung out on something. At least they'd keep their distance.
He let Damien slide into the half-circle booth first, then followed so he would be on the outside, a buffer between him and any other patrons who might walk past. While Blaze tapped up the table's menu screens, Damien buried his head in his arms.At least he already told me what he wanted.
"How spicy?"
The table muffled the response. "Twelve."
Like the burn, do you? Maybe it'll stop the shivers. "Um, they only go up to ten here."
A tired sigh, and then, "That's fine."
Blaze tapped in the order along with a plate of ginger chicken for himself and a pot of tea. Then he sat back to watch Damien. Clearly suffering, eyes glazed, Damien moved trembling hands over the table, straightening condiment containers, aligning the napkins in their dispenser, and reaching across the narrow space to maneuver Blaze's utensils into regimented parallel lines. The battle to keep any smart-ass remarks to himself nearly gave Blaze fits, but he managed to watch with only a raised eyebrow.
"Sorry," Damien murmured as he moved over on the bench seat to rest his head on crossed arms without disturbing his work. "Sorry."
"Doesn't make a damn bit of difference to me if you need things in straight lines. Stop apologizing for things you can't fucking help."
One eye opened to glare up at him. "I can't really help that, either."
"So tell me to fuck off."
"No."
Blaze chuckled as he pulled their food order out of the conveyor bin at the side of their table.At least he stands up for himself sometimes.
Then he watched in horror as Damien attacked his food like a starved piranha. Blaze was three bites in when Damien started scraping the bottom of his bowl. He ordered his twitchy dinner companion another. A slow flush rose up from Damien's collar, probably from the hell-furnace spices in his food, erasing his gray pallor. Good.
"Okay, we need to talk."
Damien raised his face from his second bowl. Dark eyes settled on him with such weight he almost choked on his words.
Blaze fought the need to take a deep breath and started with, "Is it always gonna be like this? Like today? Passing out? Sick and woozy when you find a trail?"
"Oh. No." Damien took another bite and Blaze narrowed his eyes at the not-really-an-answer. Thankfully, he went on. "Not always. It's, ah, volume and intensity. Too many trails or too much strong emotion attached. Exhausting. You can't make fire forever?"
All right. That makes sense. "Nah. Even I can't do that. It gets harder after the first twenty or thirty fireballs."
Damien nodded, stirring his noodles. "Sorrow. Fear. Anguish. Death. They're all hard. This was both. Too many and too much."
"Got it." Blaze tapped the table with his knuckles. "Next. You've been keeping secrets. You haven't shared a damn thing about this case, you haven't told me what you figured out back there, and you sure as hell haven't told me what your hunches are."
"I thought you were just here to keep me safe."
Blaze drummed his fingers on the table, certain that steam curled from his ears. "I'm not some fucking hired hand. No matter what Dr. Parma told you."
