“Of course,” he said, heart pounding as he strode toward her, not stopping until they nearly touched.
She had to tilt her head way back to look up at him. “I wasn’t rejecting you,” she said earnestly. “I just didn’t want to cause you pain.”
“Knowing you’re suffering pains me more than healing your wounds would.”
She nodded, swallowing. “Would you help me remove my shirt?”
He stayed her hands when she reached for the hem. “Let me close the door.” He didn’t want Marcus to catch a glimpse of her on his way back to the guest room.
When the door was closed and ensured their privacy, he rejoined her and reached for the hem of her T-shirt.
Raising her arms, she winced and bit her lip, holding her breath until he had dragged the shirt over her head and she could lower them again.
Ignoring her bountiful breasts, barely covered in black lace, Roland tossed the shirt aside and examined the pale bruises forming on her chest that she had failed to mention.
“These don’t hurt that much,” she said, following his gaze. “In the front, my arms caught the brunt of it and you healed them when you healed my cuts.”
Remaining silent, he circled behind her so he could view the damage there, then swore foully. A bruise the width of his fist, already livid against her pale, pale skin, crossed her back from lower shoulder blade to shoulder blade. Narrower strips of bruises crisscrossed it. Still others polka-dotted the flesh in between, giving the illusion that she had been beaten, whipped, and stoned all at once.
His gaze dipped down to her bottom and beyond. “Is this all of it?” he asked grimly.
There was the slightest hesitation. “No, I pretty much hurt all over. Except for my hands.”
Reaching around her, he unbuttoned, then unzipped, her jeans.
He heard her heart begin to pound a rapid rhythm as he tucked his thumbs in the sides and drew them down her legs. Her hand came to rest on his shoulder as she stepped out of them and kicked them aside.
Roland knelt there for a moment, fighting down the arousal that had never left him. Her body was all that he had known it would be. Slender. Toned. Muscles causing gentle ripples. Her hips were full, not boyishly skinny like so many actresses’ hips were, and—with her breasts—formed a perfect hourglass. Her bottom was round and firm and, beneath her black bikini panties, probably just as bruised as the rest of her. Had it not been, he might have leaned forward and sunk his teeth in for a love bite.
Roland shook himself and shifted his focus to healing her. Wrapping his hands around one delicate ankle, he summoned the energy within him and felt heat blossom in his palms, then suffuse her skin, mending tissue and withdrawing pain. Up her calf and shin he slowly trailed them, over her knee to her thigh. The higher they climbed, the faster her heart beat.
Stopping just short of the panties, still damp from their love play, he began again at the other ankle. Her skin was velvety smooth, tempting him to linger, feeding the need that still rode him.
When both legs were healed, the pain and blotchy bruising erased, he fingered the top edge of her panties, then peeked at the bottom beneath. She was bruised there, too. Sarah offered no protest as he stood and slipped his hands beneath the scrap of fabric to cup her succulent flesh. He saw her throat work as she swallowed, her eyelids fluttering closed.
Energy sizzled, passed from him into her, imbued her with warmth, then returned to him carrying her pain. Marcus hadn’t lied. Roland barely felt it, an ache he easily dismissed until he worked his way up her back to the place where it looked as if she had been hit with a baseball bat. The skin there wasn’t merely bruised. It was puffy and swollen.
Even the lightest touch made her jump and clench the hands at her sides into fists.
“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I have to touch it to heal you.”
She nodded.
It hurt more to heal this one. He was surprised she had been able to hide it from him and wished she would have let him attend to it earlier and spare her that. As the swelling decreased, the tension in her shoulders eased, pouring out of her like water. After another minute or two, the marks above it were gone as well and the perfection of her narrow back was restored.
Sarah sighed with relief as the last of her discomfort vanished. She thought that was the end of it, that Roland was finished. But just as she started to turn around, he moved closer, pressing his front to her back. His fingers slipped between her arms and her sides. Those large hands flowed over the twitching skin of her stomach and settled low over one hipbone.
A now familiar tingling heat filtered into her as he absorbed the bruise forming there. He nuzzled her ear with his lips as his hands caressed their way up to the ribs on her left side. Once the soreness she had forgotten there was healed, he slid his hands up the sides of her breasts to her chest and shoulders, then very slowly down over her upper arms, which sported quite a few faint bruises, particularly on the left side where her body had slammed into the car door as the Prius had careened to a halt.
By the time the last bruise, cut, or ache was healed, there was very little of her that had gone untouched. It was almost as if Roland were not only healing her, but learning her—every curve, dip, and valley—much as a sculptor would a subject he wished to commit to memory so that he might reproduce it later with clay or stone. It wasn’t sexual (though heat that had nothing to do with his gift lingered long after his hands had moved on). But tender. So tender.
And intense.
When he finished, he surprised her by wrapping his arms around her shoulders, just above her breasts, and resting his cheek atop her hair. Peace filtered through her, as though they had stood like this many times, basking in each other’s nearness.
Reaching up, she lightly grasped the arms crossed over her chest. “Thank you, Roland.”
He nodded, a contented sigh ruffling her bangs. “Sleep with me tonight,” he murmured, so softly she nearly missed it.
With his supernatural hearing, he probably had no difficulty hearing the increase in her pulse rate.
Leaning to one side, she looked up at him over her shoulder.
His eyes found hers, reading the question in them. “Just sleep,” he promised. “I want to be near you.”
And she knew that it was not for the purpose of protection, but because he felt the same pull she did.
“Okay.”
He pressed a light kiss to her temple, then stepped back and dragged his T-shirt over his head.
Sarah swallowed and decided she would forgo the nightgown she had brought with her and sleep in her underwear so she could feel that warm, hard, muscled flesh pressed against her with as little material between them as possible.
They took turns in the bathroom, Sarah first. As she climbed into the bed, she marveled at the soft white sheets and just how big the mattress was. It was comfortable, too, she discovered as she snuggled down against the pillows, wondering why the thought of sharing it with Roland didn’t make her nervous.
Roland emerged from the bathroom, leaving the light on and the door cracked. “The dark curtains prevent sunlight from getting in, so it’s pretty much pitch black in here with the light off. If you rise before me, I don’t want you to trip and hurt yourself.”
“Thank you.”
He doffed his slacks and tossed them onto a chair. Clad only in black boxers, he crossed to the door, muscled thighs rippling with every movement, and flipped the overhead light off.
Sarah was glad the bathroom light was still on so she could watch him approach.
“I always sleep in the buff. Is that all right?”