Page 18 of Three
“Red Beard was cool, damn it!” Raymun Redbeard was a king-beyond-the-wall fromGame of Thrones.
“An experiment would be interesting,” Sari mumbles around a chip.
“On Lori? He bites.” I fake gasp, earning a cute growl from Gremlin.
“An experiment will allow us to discover the number of walnuts and amount of time in which Lori can crack them,” Sari clarifies.
Michael is pouring iced tea into four glasses when he utters, “I hope that’s a joke. As a medical examiner, I’ve witnessed unthinkable crap. But I don’t ever,everwant to imagine Lori’s ass doing…anything.”
“Amen.” He bumps my gloved fist when I raise mine to his. I wish I could feel the light touch.
But wishes are like shiny icicles, if they break they can stab you right in the heart.
“And you’d be right! A close up of my arse in action deserves to be live.” Lori waves his hot pink fingernails toward a grimacing Michael and then opens a silver bag, taking out all the things necessary for a mani-pedi.
Through the window wall with its amazing view of downtown Chicago, the late morning sunlight stretches all around the penthouse’s living room. I have to say that Michael did a great job with Raph’s apartment. The deep green carpet in the living room, furryblankets on the sofa, old armchair, and other warm little touches here and there turned it into a home. In opposition to the clinical, psychopathic, almost empty space it had been before. Before Michael, the light blue wall and those three weird paintings—which I believe were made with blood—were the only proof that Raph is indeed human.
Not that my place is any better. I take a chip and drown it in hot salsa before tossing it in my mouth.
“Damn, Reacher, you’ll get smoke coming out of your dick if you keep gulping down that much hot salsa.” And Lori has found a new name to call me. The actor from the tv series is blond but hot, so I can’t complain.
I grab more chips. I can’t taste the corn, just a faint hint of salt and a slight tingle on my tongue from the hot salsa. But I enjoy the crunchy consistency, and I need to eat to survive. Even though most food is the equivalent of polystyrene to my taste buds.
“My dick is always on fire, little Gremlin.”
“All gremlins are little, you knob!” he promptly retorts. “Now take off those fingerless gloves and give me your hands.”
“Hard pass,” I grunt before grabbing another handful of chips. I don’t mind nail polish. It’s the touching part I dislike. I hate that my eyes can see the touch is happening, but I can’t fucking feel anything. It’s another reminder, a visual one, of how fucked up I am—not that I could ever forget that. A light touch is fine, a push, a bump, a brush, but a prolonged one is out of the question.
The physical contact avoidance is more of a habit than anything. It annoys me not to know if I’m being touched.
“I’ll do it.” Sari comes to my aid, placing his hands, fingers spread, on the counter before Lori can say another word. He’s the only one in the room aware of my condition. I know Raph hasn’t said anything to his husband because Michael has questions; I can seethem in his eyes every time he glances at my gloves. But he hesitates. Probably out of some kind of empathetic respect since both our brains decided to defend themselves against those painful years. His dissociative mind made him suffer selective amnesia while mine turned most of my senses numb. I believe Michael’s brain handled things better.
“It’s not the day of your execution, Angel. Relax.” Lori shakes Sari’s rigid arms before placing his hands in a bowl full of water. “Where’s Super Model? I expected to see him here, attached to your hip.”
Sari answers Lori’s question with a shrug and a furtive dart of his eyes.
“Uri is…busy,” Michael replies, sensing Sari’s discomfort, but he’s crap at lying. His face is turned away from Lori, and his blond head is tilted down.
“In other words, Super Model is a mollycoddle tosser, and Angel here told him to sod off.” Lori dries one of Sari’s hands and starts massaging it with cream while I stuff my face with more chips and salsa.
Sari keeps silent, so I decide to change topic. “How come you’re not at work this morning?” Usually, we meet in the evening for his yoga lesson since Lori works during the day.
“I’m off,” he replies.
“To the usual corner?” I tease him.
He flips me off. “I needed a few days,” Lori answers nonchalantly.
“Is Gabe giving you a hard time?” Michael asks him. Lori working for my brother’s law firm is still weird. We never expected our brother to hire Gremlin.
He tsks. “I barely see him. I’m an assistant paralegal in a different department, on a much lower floor.” That explains it a littlebit.
“So, what’s wrong?” Sari asks him, after choosing the milk white nail polish.
“The HR departmentsuggestedI take a couple of days for myself.”
“Why?” I ask slowly. “And you know I can easily discover the reason.”
