Lover Avenged (Black Dagger Brotherhood #7)(59)

NINETEEN




Rehv woke up in his bedroom in the Adirondack Great Camp he used as a safe house. He could tell where he was by the floor-to-ceiling windows, the cheery fire across the way, and the fact that the footboard on the bed had putti carved in the mahogany. What he wasn’t clear on was how many hours had passed since his date with the princess. One? A hundred?

Across the dim room, Trez was sitting in an oxblood club chair, reading in the dim yellow light of a goosenecked lamp.

Rehv cleared his throat. “What book is that?”

The Moor looked up, his almond-shaped eyes focusing with a sharpness Rehv could have done without. “You’re awake.”

“What book?”

“It’s The Shadow Death Lexicon.”

“Light reading. And here I thought you were a Candace Bushnell fan.”

“How’re you feeling?”

“Fine. Great. Perky as shit.” Rehv grunted as he pushed himself up higher on the pillows. In spite of his sable coat, which was wrapped around his naked body, and the quilts and throw blankets and down comforters on top of him, he was still cold as a penguin’s ass, so Trez had obviously hit him with a lot of dopamine. But at least the antivenin had worked, so the wheezing and shortness of breath were gone.

Trez slowly closed the ancient book’s cover. “I’m just getting ready, s’all.”

“For going into the priesthood? I thought the whole king thing was up your alley.”

The Moor put the tome on the low table next to him and rose to his full height. After a full-body stretch, he came over to the bed. “You want food?”

“Yeah. That’d be good.”

“Gimme fifteen.”

As the door shut behind the guy, Rehv fished around and found the sable’s inside pocket. When he took out his phone and checked, there were no messages. No texts.

Ehlena hadn’t reached out and touched him. But then, why would she have?

He stared at the phone and traced the keyboard with his thumb. He had a striking hunger to hear her voice, as if the sound of her could wipe away everything that had happened in that cabin.

As if she could wipe away the past two and a half decades.

Rehv went into his contacts and fired up her number on the screen. She was probably at work, but if he left a message, maybe she’d call him on her break. He hesitated, but then hit send and put the phone up to his ear.

The instant he heard ringing, he got a vivid, vile image of him having sex with the princess, his hips pounding away, the moonlight casting obscene shadows on rough floorboards.

He ended the call on a quick punch, feeling as if his body were coated in shit lotion.

God, there were not enough showers in the world for him to be clean enough to talk to Ehlena. Not enough soap or bleach or steel wool. As he pictured her in her pristine nurse’s uniform, her strawberry blond hair back in a neat ponytail, her white shoes unscuffed, he knew that if he ever touched her he’d stain her for life.

With his numb thumb, he stroked the flat screen of the phone, as if it were her cheek, then let his hand fall down onto the bed. The sight of the brilliant red veins of his arm reminded him of a couple more things he’d done with the princess.

He’d never thought of his body as any particular gift. It was big and muscular, so it was useful, and the opposite sex liked it, which meant it was an asset of sorts. And it functioned all right…well, except for the side effects it kicked out from the dopamine and the allergy to scorpion venom.

But really, who was counting.

Lying in his bed in the near-dark, with his phone in his hand, he saw more hideous scenes of his time with the princess…her blowing him, him bending her over and f*cking her from behind, his mouth working between her thighs. He remembered what it felt like when his cock’s barb engaged and the two of them were locked together.

Then he thought of Ehlena taking his blood pressure…and how she’d stepped away from him.

She was right to do that.

He was wrong to call her.

With deliberate care, he moved his thumb around the buttons and accessed her contact information. He didn’t pause as he erased her out of his phone, and as she disappeared, an unexpected warmth filled his chest—and told him that according to his mother’s side, he’d done the right thing.

He would ask for another nurse the next time he went to the clinic. And, if he saw Ehlena again, he would leave her alone.

Trez came in with a tray of oatmeal, some tea, and some dry toast.

“Yum,” Rehv said without enthusiasm.

“Be a good boy and finish that. Next meal I’ll bring you bacon and eggs.”

As the tray was settled over his legs, Rehv tossed the phone on the fur and picked up a spoon. Abruptly, and for absolutely, positively no reason at all, he said, “You ever been in love, Trez?”

“Nah.” The Moor returned to his chair in the corner, the curved lamp illuminating his handsome, dark face. “I watched iAm give it a try and decided it wasn’t for me.”

“iAm? Get the f*ck out. I didn’t know your brother ever had a chippie.”

“He doesn’t talk about her, and I never met her. But he was miserable for a while in the way only a female can make a guy.”

Rehv swirled around the brown sugar that was sprinkled on the top of his oatmeal. “You think you’ll ever get mated?”