Page 25 of Intrigue
“What the hell happened to you?”
“Just a regular…hmm…fucking…day,” I pant just before she reaches over to take my hand in hers. “I’m sure the cut isn’t deep but it hurts as hell and I’m bleeding out like a goddamn—”
“Cassian is here in the shower, so you better keep your voice down.” She’s stern in the way she says this so I snap out of it and swallow down the pain as best as I can. To be honest, I don’t know why I came here either. All I know for sure is that I’d been consumed with the grave need to be by her side.
“Come here, take a seat. We need to get the bleeding under control.”
She hurries to a cupboard, opens it and brings out her first aid box. I take a seat on a stool by the island and watch her. Even at midnight, Selene oozes sex. She’s dressed in a blue, silky nightdress that falls just over her thighs. I can see the longstretch of legs and creamy skin. I can see the curves of her hips and that perfect, rounded ass. I can almost taste her, a fact that has me freefalling into a daydream where she’s still mine and there’s not a chance in the whole fucking world she’s ever going to look at someone else.
Then she turns and tosses me a clean towel. “Keep that pressed on the wound. Hold it firmly there. We can’t have you bleeding out here.”
I press the towel to the cut and hold. The pain slices through me again and I groan, loudly, head bent low. She puts the box on the island and hurries to stand in front of me.
“Let’s see the cut, Sandro.”
I take off the towel and lean back so she can assess it. Her eyes widen when she does. “What the hell happened? This is bad.”
“I’ve had worse happen.”
“You’re gonna get yourself killed at this rate.”
I shake my head at her, a smile tugging at the corners of my mouth. “What? Don’t tell me you’re starting to care for me.”
She hits my shoulder and I groan, playfully but then wince once I start to feel lightheaded. “You’re lucky I took some courses.”
“Are they going to be enough to save me, huh, doc?”
She sneers. “Don’t be so dramatic. You should have asked that question before you broke into my house with my fiancé in the next room. If he finds you here, you’re gonna be dead for sure.”
“Then, we’ll just have to be careful, right?”
“Tell that to yourself, ass.” She scrubs her hands in the kitchen sink before taking a pair of gloves from the cabinet.
“You really got to be so serious?” I ask, not sure I’m going to be awake much longer.
“They’re rubber gloves and cheap but they’re the best you’ve got right now.” She takes a chair next to where I am and slumps down with a sigh. “Besides, I’m not going to risk you getting an infection in the middle of my kitchen.”
Usually I’d drop some retort but I don’t. When she tugs my shirt upward to get a better view, I hiss out a curse. “You’re killing me here, baby.”
“Don’t distract me, Sandro. I’m sure you don’t want to die right here like this.”
I shut my eyes for a second and almost forget to peel them open. “Ah, wouldn’t it be nice? Dying in your arms would be so fucking worthwhile, Selene.”
She uses gauze to clean off the blood around the cut and I wince, biting down to avoid screaming out. “I don’t have a local anaesthesia here and you’d need one if you’re gonna want this cut stitched—”
“Stitch it!” I growl.
“What? No way. It’s going to hurt like hell. I’m going to be sewing you up—”
“Just do it.”
“Fine!”
She starts the sewing almost immediately and even though I know she’s upset, her hands are careful, the stitches neat. A few minutes of that and she finally looks up at me with a satisfied smile. “You didn’t die, so you can quit being dramatic.”
“It got you to do this for me, didn’t it?”
She slaps a bandage over the stitches and stands to clear the space. With everything back where they should be, she tears off the gloves, stuffs them in the kitchen bin and washes off her hands under the faucet a second time.