Sentinel of Heaven (8 page)

After too
short a time of indulgence she shoved the handle of the brush into her back
pocket and pulled out one of the tie-backs, wrapping it firmly around the tail
at the nape of his neck.

Moira stepped
around to the front to look at him; he, to his credit, refrained from making
faces.  Her reaction was mystifying.

She blushed
slow, from the tops of her cheeks up into her hairline, the rouge creeping
downward across her throat and to the very top of her chest.  Her hand
fluttered up to her face, where she bit the curve of her index finger and held
it between her teeth for a long moment before she released it, uttering a groan
that was only half-pain.

“Let me go get
you a mirror,” she said as she fled to the bathroom.  Seconds later she was
returning with her little hand-mirror pressed to her bosom.

She managed a smile,
shyly meeting his eyes.  “This is the difference between a broadsword and a
katana,” she explained, and rotated the mirror to face him.  He studied himself
thoroughly, turning his chin this way and that, meeting his own gaze for a few
moments before inspecting the other details once more.

With his hair
drawn back from his face his profile was sharpened.  The ever-present sense of
power and potential menace was honed, still there but more insidious.  It had
finesse but remained masculine, beyond any doubt.

He shrugged,
then gestured to her: which look did she prefer?

She stammered,
completely nonplussed.  “I... really it depends... I like you with your hair
down – I mean, I like how it looks, of course, but then sometimes – having it
back like that is really...”  She trailed off, turning a shade of red only a
few shades lighter than her shirt.

Leo cocked his
head.  Really
what
?  She lowered her eyes, refusing to answer.

He unfolded
and stood up slowly, taking pity on her.  Moira coughed.

“I'll just
grab a few things and we can go.”

She limped
back into her little bathroom and shut the door, throwing the mirror and brush
back on the counter carelessly.  Shit, girl – you are on the crazy train.  Here
you were two days ago ready to consign yourself to the reality of an asexual
existence not entirely of your own choice. 

And then he
literally fell in your life and ever since you've have to do everything in your
power not to arch your back and present like a cat in heat.  He is one fine looking
man with his hair down… just when you thought you were used to that amount of
sexy you got the brilliant idea to put his hair up and Jesus Christ if that
didn't go and flood your little black knickers...

To give
herself time to cool off she used the toilet, washed her hands, splashed some
water on her face.  She dried off on a hand towel and carried it out with her
to add to the laundry.

Final prep
list: sliding on the black leather belt and stowing her pocket knife in her new
pants, just in case.  Leather wallet, back left pocket.  One of her nicer
jackets, shrugged on to keep the worst of the wind off.  The little organizer
box that held her detergent, softener, and dryer sheets.

Laundry Day,
here the hell we go.

Leo was
standing by the door, his hand extended; he was holding her cane.  She took it
from him gratefully.

Today I might
not even need this little wooden stick... I'll be bringing along a much bigger
weapon.

He held the
door and let her lead him down to the car; she popped open the trunk and stepped
aside as he stowed the bags.

Goddamn –
those black pants weren’t doing her any favors.  With his bare chest and his “tattoo”,
he looked like some gigantic martial artist escaped from a kung-fu movie.   
Never
mind his ass, which is incredible...

She shook her
head and went around to open the passenger door.  After a moment she was able
to find the lever that would push the seat back and she rolled it as far as it
would go.  He nodded at her and brushed past to fold himself down into the car.

Moira stumped
back to the driver’s side and settled into her seat with a sigh.  Leo was
almost sitting in the back seat and still his knees were bent to accommodate
the length of his legs.

“Will this be
okay for a bit?  The ride to town is long.”

He nodded,
folding his massive arms across his chest.

She watched
him skeptically a moment longer.  “You've got them under control, right?  If
they bust out in here without warning we're both going to be in a world of
hurt.”

He waved away
her concerns, indicating his supreme confidence in his magic.

She started
the car and rolled down the windows, thinking he might like a bit of fresh air
blowing in.  He was barely able to fit in the house – how he truly felt about
sitting in this tin can with her she could only imagine but his face remained
impassive.

Then Moira
slowly lowered the gas pedal, hoping the shocks could take his added weight
over the bumps in her dirt road driveway.  She tried to remember the last time
she'd had a passenger with her in the vehicle and had to give up after a moment
or two.  May have been never.

Usually she
drove with the radio on but today with the sun just over the trees and him
stretched out beside her she was content to listen to the breeze.

About halfway
to town a ripple of panic battered through her, so much so that she nearly
turned down the nearest driveway to head back to the house.  You're practically
dressed as a hooker, Moira – maybe a high-priced one but one all the same – and
you're willingly going to enter a room where Chester may be, looking like
this.  Your sanity must have left you during the night.

Leo reached
over with one large hand and covered her shoulder comfortingly.  She glanced at
his face in the rear-view mirror.  His deep blue eyes were calm.

“I wish you
could talk to me,” she said wistfully.  “I know you can't; I know you've got
your reasons.  But when I'm with you I only hear my own voice... gets me to
thinking that maybe you're not real, maybe I've just finally gone nuts.  What
do you think?”

He shook his
head, then took the skin of her upper arm between his thumb and forefinger and
pinched her lightly.

She chuckled. 
“I'm pretty sure I'm not dreaming.  If I was dreaming about bundling an angel
in my car to go do my laundry, I'd consider it very tame indeed.”  She flexed her
fingers on the steering wheel and exhaled slowly.

Let's go
home,
she thought at him. 
Let's go home and curl up in your nest and
I'll read sonnets to you until it's lunch time, then we can make sandwiches and
go sit on the back porch and have a picnic.  And maybe we'll walk among the
trees and you won't talk but I won't mind because I'll get you to hold my hand
in yours and I'll be safe.

I'll
forget the world has Chester in it; I'll forget the world has Erica and my day
job in it.  I'll forget the world outside my four square acres, outside of you. 
I'll forget I've ever had to be brave without you.

And when
the sun goes down we can lay in the tall grass and look up at the stars – or if
it makes you too homesick, you can look up at me instead.  And we can make love
or I can tell you stories like Scheherazade or I can sing to you or I can do
nothing at all other than look at you, if you'll just look at me like you do,
like you are now.

Like this
is the only place you've ever wanted to be.

He rested his
arm on the back of her seat, stroking the hair over her ear lightly.

God, Moira –
you're gonna have bigger problems than Chester shortly...

Main Street
arrived both too soon and too late for her tastes, materializing in a clearing
of the forest of Southern pines. 
Like Brigadoon,
she thought
morosely.

“It's right
here on the main thoroughfare,” she told him, distracted.  “I try to park not
too close but not too far.  Better if I can see through the front window – most
of the time he sits at the desk.”

She got a spot
on the opposite side of the street and down a few yards.  “Shit,” she said.  “It
is
him.  I can see his hair from here.”

Leo reached
over and took her by the chin, turning her from her study of the rear-view
mirror to look up at him.  Her face was apprehensive; her cheeks flushed and
lips were parted, almost panting in anxiety.

He lowered his
gaze to her mouth, then bent and kissed her softly but thoroughly.

When he let
her go she was half-pleased and half-indignant.  “And what the hell was that
about?”

He grinned
wryly and shrugged: got your mind off him, didn't it?  Leo gestured between his
eyes and hers.  Look at me, not him.

Then after a
moment's study he figured out the car door latch and was standing up on the
pavement.

Great
manipulative fool of a seraph,
she grumbled silently.  He waited for her
to open the trunk again, as regally as an emperor.  Standing here, barefoot and
half-naked in front of the old store fronts with their dusty windows and
crumbling painted facades, he looked as exotic and out of place as a tiger
would have.  All the color seemed to fade out of the background and draw into
his flesh.

Leo took the
box of laundry supplies out of her hand and pointed to the laundromat,
obviously intending for her to proceed him.  He grinned that predatory grin at
her, then winked.

Moira felt a
half-smile tug her lips and she let it lead her, swinging her cane around and
striding across the street, the chrome buckles on her shoes clinking softly.

She pushed the
door open and turned to face Chester, who dropped the girly-mag he was reading
under his stool in surprise.

In a
split-second his face changed from dumbfounded to disgustingly pleased.  “Ooooooh,
Moira... baby, you didn't have to go to all the trouble of getting dressed up,
just for me...”

“I didn't do
it for you,” she answered, and as soon as she said the words she knew them for
truth.

The bell on
the front door jingled again and she was stepping aside for Leo to duck into
the building, the two full canvas bags on his back held in one hand.

“Darling,”
Moira said, “you're so sweet to bring all that in for me...”  Leo smiled down
at her; the light in his eyes woke the imp of the perverse.

“I don't
believe you've met Chester,” she continued, and gestured to the man behind the
counter.  “Chester, this is Leo.”

Leo let both
bags fall to the floor with a thud, then reached his now empty palm across the
counter for a hand-shake.  Chester put forward his own without thinking and it
was engulfed, briefly but firmly.  Leo showed all his teeth in what a bystander
might have thought to be a friendly way.

“If you'll
excuse us, Chester?”

The little
man's eyes were so far towards the ceiling they almost looked rolled back in
his head.  “Sure,” he said faintly, unable to stop staring at the colossal
creature towering over him.  “Sure, that's fine.”

Leo bent and
picked up the laundry bags, slinging them over his shoulder again with the same
amount of effort another person might have used for a jacket or a scarf, then
followed Moira to the end of the row of washing machines.

“I like to sit
back here,” she whispered to him.  “I can keep my back to the wall and see the
whole room.”  He nodded to show he had heard.

Now she guided
him through the use of the machines; of separating the laundry into loads, of
pouring detergent and softener, of loading the machines (which he refused to
let her bend to do) and setting the cycle times, pouring in the quarters.

He watched
this last with all evidence of intense focus but she felt his arm snake around
her and his hand come to rest in the hollow of her waist, right above the curve
of her ass.  It was obviously on purpose because he had to lean sideways to
reach that far down, due to their height disparity.  When she looked up in
surprise he was smiling that little smile only for her, flexing his fingers
lightly against the fabric of her jeans.

Mine, he
mouthed.

“Is he
looking?” Moira asked quietly.  Leo's eyes narrowed – what do you think?

She leaned
against Leo and giggled, as if half-embarrassed and half-aroused by his possessiveness. 
So that's how we're going to play it...

With all the
clothes beginning their wash cycle (she didn't have much, and at this hour they
had the laundromat to themselves, not counting the detestable being behind the
counter) Leo squired her to the chairs in the back corner, then leaned back
against the machines comfortably in conversational distance.

These little
plastic chairs were probably too low for him, and he definitely was not sitting
on the floor in here.  Still, she wished he could sit beside her – she missed
the warmth of his body.

He waited
until he caught her gaze again, then pointed at her and touched his ear.  Talk
to me.

“About what?” 
She settled her cane upright between her knees and rested her hands on it.

Leo made a
surprisingly eloquent move with his hands, fingers woven but not touching,
rotating his palms and then spreading his hands apart.

“The car
wreck?” Moira guessed.

He nodded,
then gestured with one hand – beyond that.

“You mean,
what happened after?”

Affirmative.

She glanced past
him to where Chester still goggled at Leo’s broad back, his face pale.  Leo
swept his hand in negation and pointed up behind the shelter of his chest. 
Hanging right over Moira was a huge fish-eye mirror.  He could watch the entire
room without turning his head.

He pointed to
himself, to the mirror again, to her, to his ear.  I watch.  You talk.

Her eyes
narrowed in irritation.  Moira didn't think of the Bible very often but she was
reminded now of a verse from one of the Psalms: “You prepare a feast before me
in the presence of my enemies.”

Being a
classically-trained Southern woman, even if she had never quite managed to be a
Southern “Lady”, Moira knew what a back-handed blow it could be to sit in front
of someone you hated and eat and drink as if you had no concerns whatsoever. 
To do any of the things a human body required that might make a person
physically vulnerable – eating, drinking, grooming, sleeping, sex – in blithe
disinterest of your enemies' presence would be to say to them: “You have no
power to harm me.”

Leo was
pushing her again.  His demeanor invited her: hold discourse about some of the
more awful experiences in your life, here in the house of your attacker, with
him even in the same room – and know he will die before he even touches you.

A rough road,
and a powerful goal.

“Don't think I
don't know what you're doing.  You are too damn clever for me, you mute cherub.”

He smiled and
accepted the compliment graciously, then prompted her to go on with the tale.

“Here's what
the doctors told me when I finally woke up.  The nurse had saved my life by
putting the tourniquet on my left leg, but they'd had a rough time saving the
leg itself.  It was in bad shape from having been torn off and flung across the
road a ways; in the time that I'd been out they were able to harvest skin and
muscle and veins from the back of my thigh to fill it in, but there was still a
gap of about an inch in the tips of the bone; they were held in place by screws
and metal plates until they could grow to meet each other again.  Many of the
nerves were reconnected, although I still can't properly feel my toes on that
foot.”

He nodded, his
eyes narrowed.

“My knee was
blown, almost totally destroyed.  One of the surgeons referred to it as
'mush'.  They did the replacement after I woke up out of the coma.  It's just
surgical plastic though; in a few more years I'll probably need another.

“The scars I
have on my belly were gashes left by the seatbelt – that's the widest one – and
some shrapnel from the door.  I was fortunate there; the docs said if any of
them had gone a half inch deeper I would have been wearing my guts on the
outside.  Same thing going up my left arm.  Probably lucky I didn't lose an
eye.”

Quick flash of
the eyeball laying on the roof-become-floor.  She shook her head;
no, not
me, not mine.

“The
Frankenstein work on my back is from ruptured disc surgery; they removed all of
two discs, parts of two more, and fused two of the vertebral segments
together.  I'll have some huge metal screws in my back until the day I die.

“This isn’t
counting the small shit; numerous little cuts and lacerations, multiple
bruises, whiplash in my neck, dislocated shoulder, my right arm had a
greenstick fracture just over my wrist for shits and giggles apparently – and
the temporary brain-swelling that put me in a coma for the better part of two
weeks.  They kept me pretty heavy drugged for another two weeks because
whenever I woke up I couldn't stop screaming.”

She looked up
at him, embarrassed.  “It was a lot of pain.”

Leo gave her a
sympathetic smile.

“So all told,
it was around a month before I was anything like coherent.  They brought me
around far enough to talk to my designated patient advocate.”