Savage Hearts (Queens & Monsters #3)(50)

Then he stands and leaves me alone, telling me before he goes that he’ll be back as soon as he can.

When he returns that evening, he’s covered in blood.





26





Riley





I don’t notice it at first, because it’s dark outside, there are no lights on inside, and I can’t see more than a few feet in front of my face without my specs. But when he comes into the bedroom and starts lighting the candles that are all over the place, then sits down on the bed beside me, I notice his hands.

“What is that?”

He looks at the dark, rust-colored smear on the back of one hand and tries to wipe it on his coat sleeve. When it doesn’t work, he chooses to simply ignore my question.

“Here. This should be enough to find a match.”

He sets a bulky pillowcase on my lap.

“What’s in this?”

“You’d know if you looked.”

I pull it open and peer inside, surprised by what I find. “There’s like four hundred pairs of eyeglasses in here.”

“You have a flair for exaggeration. Has anyone ever told you that?”

“Yes. My creative writing teacher in college described my aggrandizement of language as incredible.”

“I’m sure it wasn’t a compliment.”

“I got an A in that class.”

“Because he knew if he failed you, you’d have to take the class again. He couldn’t bear to live through that twice. Try the glasses on. I’ll get you something to eat.”

He rises from the bed and goes around the cabin lighting candles while I try on pair after pair, looking for one strong enough. I call out, “Why don’t you have electricity?”

“I do have electricity,” he answers from the next room. “I just don’t like fluorescent lights.”

“So get LED.”

“Don’t like those, either.”

I guess I should count myself lucky that he likes indoor plumbing.

“Oh! I found a pair that works!”

With clear vision, I look around the room in awe.

The walls and floor are made entirely of knotty polished wood the color of honey. Heavy beams run the width of the ceiling. The doors are wood, too, and so is the bed I’m lying in, which looks hand carved. There are several colorful wool blankets on the bed, and a large dark brown fur that I suspect is from a real animal.

A real big animal. Maybe a bear.

The furnishings are simple, rustic, and also have that hand carved feel. There is no computer, television, or clock in the room, but there is a bookcase and a fireplace.

There’s also an enormous stuffed moose head on the wall opposite me, gazing down at me with black glass eyes.

It’s terrifying.

Mal returns to the room, and my terror increases.

“Oh, my god,” I whisper, seeing him.

His face is covered with the same rust-colored splatter and smears that are on his hands. It’s dried now, but I can tell from the way it dripped and ran down his jaw that it was once liquid.

Once-bright-red liquid that has turned dark from exposure to air.

“What?”

“You have blood all over you.”

He reacts to that horrible piece of news as if I’ve just told him my zodiac sign: with total indifference.

He sets a tray on my bedside table, shucks off his heavy wool coat, throws it on a chair, then pulls his black Henley off and tosses that on top of the coat. Then he’s standing there naked from the waist up, and I’m sitting in bed with my mouth hanging open, wondering if maybe I’m suffering from a severe brain injury as well as a gunshot wound.

It’s not possible for a human to be that beautiful.

I blink to clear my vision, but all I see swimming before my eyes are acres of muscular flesh decorated by a constellation of tattoos. His bulk is only surpassed by his height, which is only surpassed by the gut punch of that V thing leading from his washboard abs downward, like a pair of muscle arrows pointing to the goodies in his crotch.

He’s tatted, ripped, and altogether masculine.

Devastated, I look away.

I’ve been blinded. He’s seared my eyeballs. I’ll never be able to see again.

He sits on the edge of the bed and picks up a bowl of steaming liquid from the tray, as if all this is completely natural. As if he walks around half naked with blood on his hands and face every day.

Which, considering his line of work, is a possibility.

“Take a few deep breaths,” he says calmly, stirring a spoon around in the bowl. He knows my brain is malfunctioning.

“I wonder how many times you’ll have to tell me that by the end of this week,” I say weakly, wanting to fan my burning face.

He holds the spoon to my lips and waits for me to piece myself back together. When I finally do, I manage to swallow a delicious spoonful of soup.

My assassin kidnapper’s homemade soup that he’s feeding to me like a baby.

I’ve lost my mind. That’s the only explanation.

“Were you able to rest while I was gone?”

“Some.”

He feeds me another spoonful of soup. “How’s your pain level?”

“Splendiferous.”

“Try again without the sarcasm.”