Page 40 of Hunted By the Headless Horseman
If you weren’t injured, I’d tan your hide.
“Guess I’m very unlucky,” I mumble.
He mutters something that I can’t hear, not even in our bond, before moving into the other room. Returning in short order, Jack has two items in his hands. One is a small container, which he explains is a salve. The other is a recognizable bottle of Tylenol. How interestingly modern, but I don’t question it.
I look up at his pumpkin head, the slitted triangle eyes too menacing for the wondrous soul wearing them. It doesn’t matter that he doesn’t possess a heart. He is the kindest and most beautiful man I’ve ever known. And I’ve known quite a few men. None like him.
I adore him. I…I think I love him.
Maybe I never knew what love truly felt like until I met the Headless Horseman with a hollow heart.
After I take the pills, Jack sets the salve on the bathroom counter to be used soon. As he begins to turn away, I catch hold of his hand, pressing my fingers into the solid leather of his grip.
“Don’t leave. Um, could you…will you join me?” I ask softly, feeling tears rising because of what I’m about to do.
He hesitates, but I tug on his wrist. “Please, Jack?”
16
I would bury him alive
JACK
Iwould never deny her my touch.
I do my best to control myself, but there is no helping my hardening staff. Belle notices, but she doesn’t comment. It is not a moment for that.
I feel her eyes on me. Hear the sharper intake of her breath with every piece of clothing I shed. She must be taking in my host of tattoos. And my scars.
“Jack…” my Belle whispers. “You’re beautiful. Your ink is like flames and filigree and fleur-de-lis.”
Some are my crest filigree and signet,I say, removing the remaining scraps of my clothes. I had hoped this would be under different circumstances, but she needs me on this intimate level. I remove the pumpkin head, setting it carefully on the counter.
Belle winces as I take my place behind her, gently touching her sides, careful to avoid her ribs, which have harvested deep bruises. The blood at her side has stemmed, the cut, blessedly, not deep. The heat of her soft back meets the rigidity of my chest. I give her my strength, my steadfastness.
How is your breathing?I ask, collecting her now-damp curls and reaching for the rose oil soap.
“I can breathe fine, the surface just hurts, mostly when I move.”
Good, you likely have not broken or cracked a rib.
“No, I haven’t. I know what those feel like.”
My hands pause. All my muscles tense, and I welcome her tipping her head back against my shoulder. I imagine rubbing my lips upon the side of her brow. For now, I secure one arm around her upper chest, palm cupping her shoulder, holding her still and steady.
“Mmm, Jack, you’re hard,” she points out the obvious with my manhood throbbing against her backside.
A natural response to holding a beautiful woman in naught but her skin and with our flesh as one.
She rests here. No words are spoken for a few minutes. At one point, I believe she’s fallen asleep until she inhales deeply, touches her lips to my neck, and utters, “I should tell you?—”
You need not tell me anythingyou do not wish to, my Belle.
She sighs deeply. “I want to, Jack. I think…I think I need to. I think it m-might help.” Her voice cracks at the end. “Just don’t hold it against me because I haven’t confessed this to anyone other than Mimi, and I’ll probably cry my way through it all.”
I should bring you out of the bath first and tend to your wound. Please allow me to do this, my beloved Belladonna.
“Okay.”
