Page 81 of Grim Tidings

I’d laugh, but I’m too dizzy, my body limp with exhaustion now that the adrenaline has worn off. I let my forehead drop against his chest, right between where my palms are pressed. Where his heart would be beating, if he still had one.

I shiver, left in just the utilitarian black bra I put on this morning. I feel him shift, his chin hooking over my shoulder to peer down my back. He bites out a short, angry-sounding curse, and I rock my head back and forth against his collarbone.

“How does it look?”

“Like you got hit by an SUV in the middle of the street.” He turns his head, the scruff of his cheek brushing against the soft skin of mine. “Give me a second, and I’ll get you fixed up.”

“You don’t have to.” I rub my nose against his collar. He smells so good and I’m so—I’m so tired. “It’ll heal on its own in an hour or two.”

He pauses. “I’m not going to leave you like this, Darcy.”

He’s methodical about his work. Careful. He takes his time as he moves over my back with his hands, fingertips brushing over freshly healed skin, almost as if he’s reassuring himself. By the time he gets to the space between my shoulder blades, I’m almost fully asleep against his chest, my eyes heavy and my skin tingling.

“Darcy,” Gabriel whispers. “Sit up for a second.”

“No.” I burrow my face further against his chest. “Comfortable.”

Gabriel chuckles, his fingers knotting in my hair. “I know, but I need to see your hip.” He urges me backward, and the look on his face is almost as nice as his magic. Soft. Gentle. So, so careful.

I touch the corner of his mouth. Sweep my fingertips up to the crinkles by his eyes. “You’re so pretty,” I tell him.

“Now I know you’re delirious.” Those crinkles deepen. “C’mon. Lie down. We’re almost done.” He brushes some hair out of my face. “Then you can rest, okay?”

“Then I can shower,” I correct. I feel sticky and uncomfortable from the rain and the road and the blood that’s dried along my back. Gabriel could magic it all away for me, but I’d still feel it there. “Want warm water. Want your soap.”

He snorts and guides me down until I’m splayed across his couch. “You can have my soap in a minute.”

“Good, ’cause I’m gonna use it anyway.”

I dutifully flop my legs across the bottom cushions, uncaring that I’m in just my bra and an old pair of jeans. Gabriel hisses when he sees my torso, and I peer down to look. My upper thigh to the bottom of my rib cage is painted in purple and black. A mottled and angry-looking bruise.

I press at the edge of it. “This is how my magic feels sometimes,” I slur, my thoughts as slippery as water. Like soap bubbles. Every time I get close enough to grasp one, it drifts away again.

Gabriel’s palms are glowing gold. The center of his chest beneath his T-shirt, too. “Like what?” he asks, distracted. He’s still studying the mark on my torso like he wants to fight the car that did this to me.

I close my eyes. “Like no matter what I do, it’s spreading. Like I can’t—like I can’t keep it contained.”

Gabriel’s thumb brushes a gentle arc across my hipbone. “Is that what you’ve been trying to do? Keep it contained?”

I think of the very first time I ever used my magic. I ate the berry and received my assignment and disappeared in a whirlwind of smoke and shadow. I had been terrified of what I would find, but it was just a woman around the same age as me. She was sitting alone on the edge of her bed.

“You here for me?” she asked.

I nodded.

“I don’t think I want to die,” she said.

I whispered I know, then held out my hand. She was crying when she pressed her palm to mine, and my magic—my magic poured out of me. Like an oil slick. Like a cup that had been filled to the very brim and knocked over. It was powerful and intoxicating and I—I hated it. Shadows curled around us both, and then we were gone. Standing in a room with towering file cabinets.

I never even knew her name.

“I hate it,” I whisper to Gabriel. “I didn’t ask for it. I never wanted it.”

Gabriel stays quiet.

“I used to lie in that hospital bed and beg for death. But I didn’t realize—” I didn’t realize I would become this. I sniffle. “I just wanted—I wanted the pain to stop, you know?”

“I know.”