Page 211 of Lost in the Dark

She fumbled with the tissues I’d given her, sniffling pitifully enough to make my protective instincts roar almost audibly. I cupped her elbow, gently but firmly escorting her to the mausoleum I called home, with only a split-second of hesitation at exposing a human to my unusual living situation. I didn’t want her out in the open, crying, where Tommy might see and try to take advantage or shame her for it. I’d be taking care of him later, one way or another - I was furious, but Cara’s crisis demanded my attention right now.

To her credit, she looked around a moment, confused, but didn’t say a word. Hopefully I just struck her as a down-on-his-luck guy that couldn’t afford rent and didn’t blanch at morbid locations. I had built a pallet-bed with a thin mattress on one of the raised diases that would normally hold a vault, extending it to reach the side wall of the small stone room, roughly ten feet by ten feet in total. Small, but serviceable for a creature like me.

I closed the door and gestured at the bed, indicating she should sit. She perched carefully on the edge, bracing her hands at the sides of her thighs and sniffling softly. “Thanks - I’m not going to get you in trouble, am I? I thought I could handle this, being here, but maybe I should have asked Tommy for a few days after-” she swallowed whatever she’d planned to say, giving a tiny, heart-wrenching sob instead.

My muscles tensed with a need to gather her back into my arms, holding her like I had yesterday. Butshe’dinitiated that, and demon though I was, that was one place I’d feel the same guilt and remorse as a human man would - I knew myself. Instead, I haltingly attempted to talk her through it, even as her grief teased my senses, inviting me to overindulge for the second night in a row.

“Cara - grief - sorrow like this, itlingers. It’s meant to. It’s like plunging your hands into a bowl of honey to grasp something at the bottom. You may get what you’re reaching for in the moment, but you’ll find traces no matter how much you try to swipe it away. You need catharsis.” I needlessly straightened my small stock of novena candles, desperate for an excuse to turn away. I was a solemn creature, unused to the things the woman currently on my bed made me feel - a tickling of nerves and a tightening of the stomach.

Cara huffed a sad laugh, liquid with tears, shuffling back to sit more comfortably.Good, I thought,hopefully my sheets would carry that beautiful scent in her hair, now.Letting her head loll back against the stone wall behind her, she glanced at me with red-rimmed eyes. “I couldn’t afford to bury my sister, Jax. I definitely can’t afford therapy, let alone whatevercatharsisis.” She closed her eyes, her smile fading all too quickly. Her face crumpled - only a moment before she righted herself mentally, but I caught it in the dim of my makeshift home. Again, that silver thread begged me to slip it through my palm - her grief, curling and swaying in the air like an ethereal vine.

I crouched down in front of her before I realized what I was doing, swallowing a groan as her thread of grief slid across my forearm, drawn like a magnet as I cupped her shoulders in my palms. “I - maybe I could help, Cara. Get you out of your head for a while.”

This was dangerous. I knew better.What the hell was I even suggesting?She’d driven all sense out of me, this beautifully sad soul that tangled my better judgment.

My kind weren’t supposed to interact with unaware humans this closely; the powers that be had made us to be woven into the fabric of the living, not to make our own stitches in it. But Cara was an irresistible tapestry, my very own thread of fate, glistening at my fingertips and sheathed in silken grief. When her head tilted up, the spark in her eyes was warmer than my candles had ever been. Was Cara as enchanted with me as I’d become with her?

“Yeah. Yes, Jax. I’d like that. Please.” Her whisper was rough and soft, but simmered with a nervous heat. “Just for a little while.” The murmur was almost lost to my ears, even in the quiet of my makeshift home, more a promise to herself than anything meant for me.

I stood, extending a hand to her and helping her to her feet, tugging her indulgently into my chest in the process. I cradled the back of her head, holding her against me and giving in to an urge to press a soft kiss to her hair. I felt the tension in her shoulders ease as she gave the tiniest sigh against the collar of my coveralls.There, good.

“When was the last time you felt truly unburdened, Cara?” I ran my fingers through her lovely brown hair, taking liberties with her closeness. I knew from our limited experience that she’d back away if it was too much, but I still watched her for discomfort.

Again, that soft huff of a laugh thatdid thingsto me. “I mean, it’s embarrassing, but I guess I’m cuddling with a coworker in a fucking mausoleum, so-” She shrugged, chuckling against my collar again. “It was thisstupidthemed bar night at a club a couple of years ago, whips-and-chains kind of stuff, you know?”

I did know. I knew what she was getting at, and I was thankful for the human convention of boxer briefs, because it was - mostly - concealing what Cara’s revelation did to me. “And what exactly appealed to you?” I traced my fingertips lightly down the back of her neck, between her shoulder blades, stroking up and down.

She shifted with another small sigh, leaning into me further. “There was a guy there with a whip, sort of. Like a mop, though, not like an Indiana Jones one.” She shrugged self-consciously, and I splayed my palm across her lower back, holding her against me as she continued. “They asked for volunteers, and I’d had half a drink to loosen me up by then, so I went up on the stage thing at the front. After they put the blindfold on, they put these soft cuffs on my wrists, and hit my back a few times with the leather thing. Not hard, not really, but I felt it.”

Cara nuzzled her cheek against my chest, closing her eyes. Warmth bloomed in my chest at the trust and vulnerability she was showing me. “And I loved it. I didn’t expect to, it was out of left field, but I was sad when it ended a few minutes later. The guy kept telling me after every hit that I was - I don’t know.” She took a deep breath, letting it out slowly, apparently re-finding her courage. “He said stuff like I was a good girl, and that he was proud of me, and things like that. I guess I needed to hear it. By the time he took the blindfold off and gave me a hug, I felt like I’d had a weeks’ worth of good sleep, stress-wise.”

My breath caught in my throat - if offering to help her was crossing the line, this was burying it deeper than any grave I’d ever dug at New Horizons. “And if you could feel that way again, Cara? Would you ask for it?”

Cara’s answeringmhmwas shy, but it was all I needed to tip the bad decision I had brewing from theory into practice. Oizys forgive me, I needed her more than grief, more than sadness right now, but she still came wrapped in both like a delectable present.

Cara

Everything about whatever I’d just agreed to was probably a bad idea, but I couldn’t find it in me to care. I’d been so cautious, so meticulous when it came to caring for my sister that it felt so good to finallystop worryingabout what came next. Jax held me tightly for a moment, gently guiding me to turn in his arms, putting my back to his chest. He walked me forward a few steps, sliding his hands down my arms.

Jax tucked his chin over my shoulder, the touch of his cheek against my ear sending a shiver down my spine. “Can you take off your shirt for me? You can stay facing the wall, and keep your bra on.”

Well this was elevating quickly. My brain spun wildly, thinking about the need for a birth control conversation, and testing statuses, and all the other things thatshouldcome before a hookup. Jax kissed my temple, smiling against it, his voice warm with humor. “Easy, Cara. You’re practically thinking out loud, and I can feel those shoulders tense. Don’t worry, I’m not going to ravish you.”

Damn.I mean, uh, good.

I nodded and Jax squeezed my shoulders again; I had a fleeting thought that he probably gave incredible massages. “In fact, I’m going to leave you here for a moment while you do that - it’s safe, Tommy doesn’t know about my morbid little clubhouse and he’s likely passed out drunk right now anyway. I’ll be right back.”

He lightly pressed his face into my hair, taking a long, slow inhale, followed by a barely-audible growl of satisfaction before he backed away. “While I’m gone, I want you to put your shirt on the bed, come back here, and hold the edge of that windowsill above you. Can you do that for me, Cara?”

He kept the question light, his hands off of me and away from my body. I turned and looked at him, his arms folded across his chest, expression open. He really would walk away if I said no right now, and that gave me a rush - ironically, it seemed thatIwas the one with all the power in this strange scenario.

“Yes, I can do that.” My heart thudded heavily in my chest, a surge of adrenaline making me almost giddy. If we weren’t going to have sex, what did he plan on doing? Not knowing what came next was novel to me, after so many of the last few years had been on a rigid schedule.

I turned to start undoing the unnecessarily-tiny buttons on my blouse, a piece that was too dressy and stifling for the work I’d been doing today. I wouldn’t make that mistake again. Jax gave another soft growl, pinning me for a moment between the delightfully unyielding muscles of his chest and thighs and the cool, slightly musty stone wall in front of me. “Good girl.”

By the time I’d recovered from literally going weak in the knees, I was alone. The faint scrape and metal creak of the mausoleum doors told me Jax had left quickly. I turned, using the wall for support; I shouldn’t have been surprised he’d unraveled me. I’d given him the damn ammo after all, blurting out one of my favorite memories when we hadn’t even exchanged last names. I certainly wasn’t mad about it, though. In fact, it made me undo the last few buttons more quickly, folding my shirt carefully and placing it on his makeshift bed.

I stepped back to the wall, standing on tiptoe to check for spiders or earwigs on the stone ledge of the tiny ventilation window over my head before I touched it. It was small, only maybe two feet wide and a foot high, but the thankfully insect-free ledge was large enough to comfortably grip, leaving my back exposed. The drag of metal on stone made my breath catch in my throat -Jax was back. I squeezed the window ledge until it left gritty concrete impressions on my palms, my heart lurching at a frantic pace again as I rested my forehead on the cool wall.

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