Anwyn turned her head away from the couch cushions then. She squinted, as if the light hurt. Gideon had been through a couple traumas in his life, and knew how things could seem too bright, too focused. How the body instinctively wanted to draw into darkness and hide. When she tried to speak above a whisper, her voice was hoarse. He noticed she winced as her abraded and cracked lips stretched to form the words. “Yes. I want a bath. Alone.”
Daegan shook his head. “You're too weak,cher . You will need my help.”
“I want to brush my teeth.”
When he reached out to touch her mouth, she recoiled from him like a snake, revulsion on her face. “ Notuntil I brush. Okay?” Her voice broke.
The significance of the abrasions, the cracks at the corners of her lips, came to Gideon then. It made him want to burn something down. Apparently, there was enough in that cauldron to go around. Suppressing it in favor of something else, he moved toward the foot of the couch.
Her violent reaction had startled Daegan, she could tell. Anwyn hated seeing the knowledge that passed through his gaze as both he and Gideon fixated on her mouth. She wanted them near, but she didn't want them to look at her. She'd surveyed herself only once while Daegan was carrying her and nearly retched, terrified by the wreck her attackers had made of her, marks that she didn't think she could bear to carry all her life. Then she'd heard Daegan's soft murmur and remembered she wouldn't have to. She already knew she'd been turned. Barnabus had told her right before he did it.
You'll need my blood to keep from going mad, sweetmeat.He'd purred it, his breath hot on her throat.
You'll come and beg me for it.
In reply, she'd spit on him, told him she'd stake herself first. He'd laughed, but it was mean, angry. He'd speared her flesh like a vicious panther, making it hurt as much as possible as they held her legs open and did other things to her. Her blood had rushed away and the serum rushed in, disorienting her in a way she'd never experienced. She'd been determined not to show any of her fear or terror, but she'd broken then. She hated that moment worst of all.
She thought about burrowing back into the couch, but then someone touched her feet. She looked down.
She had small feet, a size five and a half shoe. They looked even smaller as Gideon placed his callused hand on the one remaining slipper, the one that had valiantly held on to her painted toes. She'd had a French pedicure this week. The white tips were matched by a delicate, tiny white flower painted on the big toes. Chantal worked in a nail and hair salon during the days, and she had done them for Anwyn.
The floppy soft bunny ears slipped through his rough fingers as Gideon withdrew the slipper. His head was down, his profile intent as his hand came back to rest on her bare instep.
When her eyes had opened earlier, she'd seen a mirror image of Gideon's feelings in Daegan's face, bottled under such high pressure. Male rage, so helpless in a situation like this, a desperate need to give her back what had been destroyed. It had been too overwhelming. She'd turned into the couch because she didn't want to see it, couldn't see it.
Men were physical when those they protected were attacked. Their solution involved action. Fixing or punishing. Justice.
Bloody vengeance was the last thing she needed right now, her body still shaking from its encounter with such violence. What she needed was a cocoon of generous, passive emotion to rock in, like a quiet ocean. In that quiet, maybe she could coax her hiding soul from the dark shadows into which it had fled.
Once she did that, she would begin to fix herself. While she might use a man's hand to steady her own as she assembled the pieces, glued the cracks, she would do it.
But she needed a rock on which to stand while she did it. A rock that wouldn't go away no matter what storm blew over it, what waves hit it. A rock that wouldn't demand more if she needed it merely as a place to rest, absorbing such solitude. The rock saying nothing, offering everything, silent and constant.
She'd heard Gideon ask about a woman. If Anwyn had a close female friend, a family member, she was sure Daegan would have called her in an instant. But she didn't. Anwyn had him. And Gideon.When he moved down to her feet, gently took off the slipper, her fractured soul felt a glimmer of cautious relief. They would figure it out. Something in her had known it had to be both of them. She didn't know why; she just knew it. Now she had to hope she was right, because she didn't have the strength to follow any other path. The agony of the bites and larger wounds were subsiding to a dull throbbing, but shock was a bone-deep ache that made it difficult to move her limbs.
Putting the slipper on the floor, Gideon came back to the top side of the couch. He locked gazes with her as he leaned over it, moving slowly, letting her see his intent. He guided her arm up to his shoulder and slid his own under her legs and back.
“I'll hold her if you want to get the nightgown off,” he directed Daegan.
“I'm not taking that thing over your head.” Daegan gave her the quiet warning, but before he could reach for the knife she knew he inevitably carried, Gideon had slipped his arm from beneath her legs and produced one, the blade flipping out in smooth silence. Daegan took it, efficiently cut the front seam of the soft gown.
She was sorry to lose it. It had been one of her favorite “off time” nightgowns. She had a range of lingerie that could make a man lose his mind permanently in his cock, and she loved shopping for it, wearing it. But there was a time each day she was just Anwyn. When she wore jeans and a T-shirt. Or a simple gown like this. In those moments, she was as close to being unguarded, her true self, as she ever was. Thinking about that, she almost drew into herself again. She would have preferred if they'd attacked her while she wore thigh-high boots and corset, rather than when she had no shields raised, nothing to defend her inner self as they'd destroyed everything else.
She was naked now, since her attackers had torn off and taken her panties. She shut her mind to that quickly, because it brought up images she didn't want to face. There were too many shadows flitting through her mind right now as it was, like the shadows that ran across a child's wall when there was a storm outside, because of the trees reaching their clawed arms to the sky. She couldn't dispel them, their sly whispers.
“Anwyn.” Daegan rarely used her name, except in command or anger, and so it drew her attention now.
He'd left the duster wrapped around her and was fastening it in front so she wasn't so exposed. As she watched his long fingers do that, she looked up into his dark eyes. His firm mouth was taut with care for her. His voice, while gruff, had a tender and unexpected patience to it. “Let's focus on this. We'll figure out the rest later.”
Gideon slid the knife back into his front jeans pocket after retracting the blade, continuing to hold her as Daegan slid the gown free, then buttoned the duster. Gideon helped straighten the fabric to make it easier, the two of them working together, hands and forearms brushing. Anwyn pressed her head into Gideon's shoulder, her quivering thigh pressed against Daegan's hip where he now sat on the couch next to her.
Daegan allowed Gideon to carry her this time, leading the way to the bathing area. Typical for a female with the resources to meet her desires, it was almost as big as the seedy hotel room in which Gideon had been staying. There was a separate sink and vanity area, a large Jacuzzi tub capable of holding three or four people, and a separate shower area.
“I'll run the bath. I know what temperature she likes,” Daegan said. They'd both kept their voices low and soothing throughout, which seemed to let Anwyn phase in and out of the conversation as she wished.
Glancing down, Gideon saw she was staring into space. “Mouthwash and toothbrush are on the counter, as well as her water glass,” the vampire added.
Gideon nodded, taking her there. Behind him, the water turned on in the tub with a rushing noise. Not wanting to let her go, and because he was certain she was too weak to stand, he shifted her and dragged the vanity chair over to the sink to sit down on it, keeping her in his lap. She was cold where her face and hands were touching him. He thought that was residual shock, not part of the vampire transition.
However, the heat of the steam was already curling against his back, so he knew they could take care of that part soon. Leaning forward, he pulled the mouthwash, toothpaste and brush closer.
At the sight of them, she came to abrupt life. Bolting upright in his lap with an awkward stiffness, she seized the mouthwash. When her fingers shook too hard to manage the top, he put his hands over hers, helped her do it. Then she wrenched it away from him, tipped her head back and took it straight from the bottle. He steadied her, as well as the edge of the bottle as it quivered, his brow creasing as she swallowed the large draught, rather than spitting it out. He didn't think it could make her sick, but . . .
Catching the counter's edge, she levered herself up off him. He noticed the gash in her shoulder from the stained glass window, felt an additional stab of guilt. Bending over the sink, she put her finger down her throat.
“Anwyn—” But either she was well practiced, or she was already nauseated, because the mint liquid shot back up, along with the contents of the rest of her stomach. Most of what came up was thick bile mixed with the mint green liquid. His own gut turned, knowing what she was trying to sear from her throat and stomach lining.
She tipped the bottle again. A button of the duster had slipped so that it gapped open, showing him torn flesh and a handful of those many bites. At her throat was the one that had turned her. He knew it not only because it was the deepest, the most pronounced, but because he could still see traces of the silver serum that turned a human.
She bent to force herself to vomit again. In this position, she awkwardly straddled his knee, half sitting on it as she curved over the sink. Her loosened hair was swinging into her face, but it didn't stop her. He caught a glimpse of her eyes, wild and filled with tears from the strain. Muttering an oath, he corralled her hair, bringing it back over her shoulders to hold as she retched twice more. She did it until the small bottle of mouthwash was gone.