But Shay, frustrated and on meds, became loud and downright uncooperative. She only wanted to go back to the cabin.
James didn’t have the heart to tell her that her refuge was a burned-out husk. The compromise was a hotel room across the street from the hospital.
Too wired from what the doctor called an atypical reaction to sedatives, Shay had paced the floor of their room until James persuaded her out of her clothes and into the shower. The warm fall of water did the trick. Her heart calmed, her pulse stopped racing, and she began to breathe more easily.
Though she was much too tired to respond, Shay was very aware of James as he bathed her. She absorbed the careful passing of his hands over her body with pleasure. She luxuriated in how tender he was as he shampooed the blood from her hair while keeping the water from soaking the bandage on her brow. The feel of his strong fingers working the washcloth as he soaped her shoulders and back and then her breasts and stomach seemed to smooth out some of the pain of the many scratches.
Too tired to do more than follow his instructions, she braced her hands on his shoulders and balanced first on one foot and then the other on the edge of the tub as he washed her legs. His touch was impersonal but thorough.
They didn’t talk. Yet she was vibrantly alive to the emotions running beneath his surface calm. Fully aware of his tenderness, and of a barely contained anger he didn’t voice but she knew would remain a good while. He had failed to protect her. That was all he’d said to her about the ugly volatile feeling. The misery in his eyes made her want to cry for him. But she wasn’t ready to carry that burden yet. Maybe she wouldn’t need to.
He stopped every so often and just held her for a moment.
He hadn’t undressed. His tee and pants were soaked by the time they were done but she supposed he was letting her know without words that this was not an erotic encounter. He understood she was much too exhausted in body and spirit for that.
She would have to give a statement to the deputy, the state police, and the fire department before she would be allowed to head back to Raleigh. But all that could wait until the morning.
She didn’t need the look on James’s face each time their eyes met to tell her how lucky she was. But she had survived. And nothing was wrong with her that time, sleep, and peace wouldn’t cure.
When he was done washing her, he toweled her down until her skin tingled and quickly ran a comb through her hair as she sat on the commode. He had brought in a medic kit from his cruiser. After checking the bandages on her arm and brow to make certain they were dry, he applied antibiotic and new bandages to the minor cuts and abrasions the emergency room staff had not bothered to dress. She wondered briefly if taking care of Bogart had made him such an efficient groomer, but she was too tired to tease him about that. He produced a tee from his duffel and dressed her in it before tucking her into bed.
Maybe she said thank you. And maybe she went out like a light. What she remembered was that sometime later, he slid into bed beside her. And Bogart, who’d kept watch over the whole bathing routine, slept at the foot of the bed.
She felt safe. Cherished. And happy.
*
“You’re beautiful.”
“I’m a mess. I have a black eye, a bruised chin, and five stitches above my eyebrow.”
“You’re beautiful, anyway.”
James leaned over her and kissed her very lightly, afraid that even the pressure of his lips might be too much for her bruised body.
They were in her bedroom, in her bed. It was late afternoon. She’d slept away most of the day while he’d been in and out.
After her interviews with law enforcement the day before, James had wrapped her up in two blankets, buckled her into his cruiser, and brought her back to Raleigh. She didn’t remember returning to her apartment, or really much of the rest of that day. She slept and ate a little when he pressed her, and slept again. Bogart, who evidently had been put on guard duty, never left his post at the foot of her bed.
This afternoon, she’d awakened to late autumn sunshine slanting in through her blinds and felt, well, close to normal.
James told her everything he had learned from Jaylynn, and what he had pieced together on his hellish drive from Charlotte to Raleigh, and then up to Gaston Lake.
When he was done, she filled in what he couldn’t have known.
Other than to ask for occasional clarification, he listened to the story of her ordeal at the cabin without comment. But the expression on his face told a different story. It was by turns stern, and sympathetic, and more than once she glimpsed his quiet anger surge into a white-hot rage that frightened her. No one had ever been that angry or hurt on her behalf.
When she reached out for him, he pulled away a little. She saw it in his eyes, the emotional retreat, and wondered.