Bound in Black (20 page)

“How about some breakfast?”

Knowing he wouldn’t answer, I went ahead to the kitchen, quickly lit the stove and scrambled some eggs. We’d not yet tried solid food, but the man needed protein. With the plate of fluffy eggs in hand, I settled on a stool close to him and forked a bite. As I raised the fork toward his mouth, Jude lifted his hand and wrapped it around mine, stopping me in midair. My heart kicked into fifth gear. This was the first time he’d touched me. Oh, I’d touched him often while dressing him or helping him sit up or walk outside, but this was the first time he’d initiated contact.

His gaze was less bleak, less desolate, less empty. The mist didn’t move as quickly behind his eyes. As a matter of fact, the vapor seemed to clear for a moment, though his irises were still dark as pitch. His lips parted on a rusty request. “Let me.”

He slid the fork from my hand and slowly picked up the plate from my lap. I let out a short laugh, a tear sliding down my face. I swiped it away quickly before he thought I’d gone insane. To hear that voice—though broken and hoarse—my heart soared.

“Jude?”

He looked up from his plate, chewing. Okay, he recognized his name. Good.

“Do you know who I am?”

His brow pinched together in concentration, then his gaze roved over my face, down my neck and over my body. As if he’d been caught doing or thinking something naughty, his gaze flicked back to his plate as he stabbed a giant hunk of scrambled eggs. Hearty appetite. Excellent sign.

I thought he wouldn’t answer, but he said, “You are the woman who takes care of me.”

“Yes,” I said with another laugh, unable to contain the glee lighting me up on the inside like a firefly. “I am the woman who takes care of you.” It wasn’t the answer I wanted, but it was enough for now.

I didn’t care that he didn’t know me yet. At least, that was what I told myself. He was healing at a remarkable rate. His stitches were entirely dissolved. The redness of his wounds had lightened to those of someone who’d been healing for months. I wouldn’t doubt if Uriel hadn’t added some of his angel mojo to help him heal even faster than a Dominus Daemonum when he laid hands on him the other day.

Jude finished his plate, set it down and stood, arching his spine and stretching his back. I jumped to my feet, ready to help him if he toppled over. His body stiffened at my swift movement.

“Sorry. I-I just want to help you if you need it.”

He gestured behind me toward the bathroom. He wanted me to move so he could go to the bathroom on his own.

“Oh! Sure. Of course.”

I stepped aside. He walked into the bathroom, favoring his right leg more than the other. George hadn’t found any broken bones, but there must’ve been some injury we couldn’t determine without X-rays. George had refused to take him to a hospital. There would be no way of explaining how he’d become so severely injured without the staff calling the local police and asking questions we couldn’t answer. And he’d heal too fast for a normal human, drawing more questions.

I sat on the stool, my crossed leg bouncing, and waited for him to finish, when something dawned on me. He’d known where the bathroom was. The door had been closed, so he couldn’t see that it was a bathroom from where he was sitting. Did he assume it must be a bathroom? Or did he know it was there because a part of him remembered this place?

A burst of excited butterflies flitted around in my stomach. Instincts told me he remembered.

When he opened the door, he looked through the open doorway into the next room. “May I have some water?” Though still hoarse, his voice sounded smoother than before. No longer stilted or hesitant, he spoke like the man I knew.

“Yes.” I snapped to attention and hurried to the next room. “Of course.”

He followed me. I grabbed a glass from the cabinet and poured water from one of the many jugs of filtered water I’d stocked. He took the glass, leaning on the dining table for support, his dark gaze keen and watching, then he tilted his head back and guzzled. When finished, he handed me the empty glass and asked, “More please.”

I poured another. He drank, and I poured another. I’d been forcing small sips down his throat these past few days as he lay in bed. Now that he was conscious and able, he finally quenched his thirst from the long days in hell, where surely he’d been given nothing to sustain him.

“Um. Are you still hungry?”

He shook his head, scanning the room and taking in his surroundings.

“Do you know this room? I mean, do you remember this room?”

After another shake of the head, he walked to the mantel and picked up a white sheep figurine I’d noticed my first time here. With a creased brow, he lifted the ceramic figurine and said, “It’s from Brodick.”

“Yes,” I said, delighted and trying not to frighten him with my enthusiastic reply. “At least, I think it probably is. You bought it. This is your cottage.”

He’s remembering.

With an expression of deep concentration, he said, “I didn’t buy this cottage.”

“No. You didn’t. You built it. Many years ago.”

He slid his hand across the mantel, his fingers smoothing over the detail of an oak-leaf design at the edge. “I don’t remember.”

Swallowing the lump in my throat, I said, “It’s okay. You will. Would you like to go outside today?”

He set the white sheep back in place next to the black one. With a nod, he turned back to me, studying me with such intensity, it reminded me of the first day I’d met him. Those eyes missed nothing. The gray mist was less than before but still there, swirling in a haze.

“Good,” I said. “Well, let’s get our coats on. I’d like to take you somewhere I think you’ll like.”

And hopefully remember.

Chapter Seventeen

We stepped onto the wooded trail where he’d first taken me during our honeymoon. The same heavy silence pressed down from tall, gnarled trees. Leafless, the branches webbed together, a dusting of snow on the boughs. The wind no longer howled across the island like a fierce beast, but breathed softly, whispering that all was well.

Jude paused at the entrance, a menacing scowl marking his face. I glanced back into the woods, darker than the open air, but sensed no danger. I reached out with my VS, scanning for Flamma with deep concentration. Nothing. What caused the alarm was likely the similarity in appearance to the naked trees in Lethe’s realm. But there, the air was bleak, weighed down by sorrow and regret. Here, the woods were clean, draped in a gentle beauty all their own.

“It’s all right,” I called back to him from several yards within the canopy.

An expression of wonder flickered over the hard planes of his face. His cheeks were still too thin, cutting a sharp angle to a square jaw.

My VS beamed bright white through the line of exposed skin between glove and jacket. “Oh.” My face must be glowing, which would explain this look of awe and fear skittering across his face. Rather than force my VS to behave and dim the illusory glow that appeared any time I used my power, I let it shine. “I’m a Flamma of Light,” I said. The fact that I had to explain something he’d once told me for the first time was ludicrous.

He stepped farther along the trail, closing the distance between us.

I pulled one glove off to show him my hand. “This is my underlight. It shines when I’m seeking danger or using my power in other ways.”
Like destroying a demon prince for what he did to you.

Jude stopped in front of me, lifted his hand hesitantly and glanced at me from under heavy lashes before taking my shaking hand. My palm rested on his. He brushed his thumb over my knuckles, observing closely. My underlight brightened with his touch. My hand trembled more.

“You’re cold,” he said, white air puffing out as he spoke.

“A little,” I admitted.

“You’re shaking.”

“Yes,” I said, my voice as tremulous as my hand.

He started to pull his hand away, but I closed my fingers around his, aching to feel his touch a moment longer, unable to say a word as my breath came out in a white cloud between us and adrenaline shot through my body. Rather than flinch away, his fingers curled slowly, enveloping the back of my hand. I wanted to close my eyes and drown in this moment. Palpable energy sparked between us, sure and strong as it had ever been before Lethe had taken him and scraped away his memory of me.

Somewhere inside, he must know there was nothing to fear from me, that this was natural between us, that we belonged together. His chest rose and fell as quickly as mine, his gaze melting from wary to smoldering, his gaze dropping to my lips. I thought I’d fall down in a faint on the spot when he brushed his thumb once more before dropping my hand, his scowl back in place.

“Shall we walk on?” he asked.

Gathering my wits, which were strewn all over the forest floor, I inhaled a deep breath and turned up the path. “You know, if we’re quiet, we might see some wildlife.”

I heard him, felt him right on my heels, keeping close to me.

“There are red deer in these woods,” he said with conviction.

An aching smile split my face. “Yes.” I glanced over my shoulder to find his gait stronger, his posture taller. “There are. We’ve seen them here before, you and I.”

He didn’t ask me why I used the term “we”, though I could see I’d puzzled him. I didn’t care. I planned to push him as far as I could till Jude surfaced all the way to the top and remembered me, remembered us.

We walked on in silence…comfortable silence, which made my heart swell with hope till I thought it would burst. Our arms brushed once, and he didn’t pull away, only glanced at me. I smiled. Though he didn’t smile in return, his expression had lost the look of fear and anxiety that so often marked his brow.

I wanted to take him to Glenashdale Falls or even to the standing stones on a moor not so far away, which he’d showed me on our honeymoon, but in order to do that, we’d have to sift. And I wasn’t sure how he’d react to that. Did he remember what sifting was? Or would he freak out and jerk loose from my hold while in the Void? Though he’d lost the thick ropes of muscle while in the underworld, he’d not lost all his strength. I couldn’t take the chance of losing him. Not again.

But there was no need. He didn’t appear bored with a walk through the woods. We never saw a deer, but we saw a red-eared squirrel zip from branch to branch above our heads. Mira joined us on our walk back, scaring the squirrels into hiding for good. Jude didn’t seem to mind that either, his dark gaze following her as she swooped to a branch, panned the tops of the trees, then swooped onto another.

By the time we made it back to the cottage, we were both exhausted. Jude lay on top of the quilts and fell asleep on his side, the way he always had before. I couldn’t help but crawl up next to him and drift off as well, content and warm.

An ear-splitting scream jarred me awake. Before I could shoot up into a sitting position, Jude rolled on top of me, straddling my waist, pinning me down with his bulk, his hands wrapped around my throat. Though his eyes were open, he didn’t see me, his face a mask of rage, blood vessels popping out along his temples and forehead, his lips drawn tight over gritted teeth.

“No,” I choked out before he closed my throat for good.

He didn’t hear me. Beating him was useless. His hands were brutal bands, squeezing off the airflow like cinching a sack. Rather than panic, I placed my hands on his cheeks and called my VS. An aura of white filled the darkened room. The sun had fallen while we slept. I pulled a ball of power into my chest and guided it through my arms and hands, sending him a jolt—not to harm, only to push away. The jolt pushed his torso back, lifting his weight from me and his hands from my throat. The Flamma power didn’t hurt him but served to punch him into consciousness. His eyes cleared at once, the misty vapor that had enveloped him draining away like water through a sieve.

The rage transformed to shock, then fear.

“I-I’m so sorry.” He jerked off me and leapt from the bed, pressing his back against the wall, chest heaving.

I coughed and turned on my side, sucking in air. One hand went immediately to my belly as I reached out with my VS to be sure my baby was all right. Reassured with the steady inner pulse that connected me to my child, I pushed into a sitting position.

“It’s okay.” I coughed again, then slid off the bed in front of him. “You were having a nightmare.”

“I hurt you.” He stared at my throat, which surely was ringed with red.

“I’m okay.” I touched my fingers to my neck, the skin already sore and puffy.

He rocked from one foot to another, like a frightened child. “You take care of me…and I hurt you. I could’ve killed you.”

“I wouldn’t have let you,” I said with a smile. “I’m stronger than you think.”

It was true my power was growing by the day. I felt it like a pot percolating to the perfect moment. My awakening drew closer, and I knew exactly when that moment would be. But there was time to worry about that later.

“I’m fine. Really.” I stepped closer.

Then something extraordinary happened. One side of his mouth quirked up into a smile. And my heart, my poor, miserable heart, just fell right off her shelf onto the floor. As I gazed into his smiling face, I thought I’d never break free long enough to pick it up and put it back where it belonged.