"What're you afraid of?"
She almost smiled at the seemingly unrelated question. But she knew him well enough to know he'd gone back to the earlier topic.
"Nothing," she whispered, nestling against him. How could she dare admit the one thing she was most afraid of, now that Brandon Gabriel had re-entered her life? She couldn't bear to think of losing him again – for another ten years – or permanently.
As if he'd read her mind, he took a deep, contented breath that spoke of a secret knowing. "Don't worry, Allie. I'm not gonna…run out on you…leave you alone. Just – make me well, sweetheart."
"Then what?" She couldn't help whispering the words into the darkness, hating herself as soon as the question was spoken.
"Then…I'll make it safe for you again. Clean out Spring Branch."
"Then…you'll move on." Her voice was quiet, tears suddenly stinging her eyes.
"What else?" He gave a brittle laugh. "Can't stay here."
****
Morning. Brandon felt the difference as the shadows of night slipped away, leaving the early gray dawn in their place. Allie was trying to disentangle herself from his bare limbs without waking him. He cracked one swollen eye open and felt her go still beneath him.
God, he'd taken possession of her in the night; appropriated the gentle curves of her body as his own full-length pillow. He realized that he lay on his left side, his right leg shamelessly thrown across her. Her head was nestled on his shoulder, his chin just at the top of her head. His right arm lay across the rise of her breasts, her nipples hardened beneath his forearm, with only the thin layer of cotton separating their skin.
She raised her head slightly, meeting his sleepy appraisal. When she smiled, it was like the rising sun. His heart took a funny tumble.
"Too heavy?" he half-whispered. He started to move, but Allie laid her hand across his bare thigh.
"No, don't move."
"I don't want to…crush you."
She shook her head against him. "You won't. It feels good. Right."
Hard, he wanted to add. He was fully, painfully erect. He'd been wanting her for a long while, he thought, even in his sleep. Longer, even, than that… For the last several years. Never should have left her there alone at The Benevolent Christian Home. Yet, if he'd stayed, he wouldn't have survived. And he'd have been of no use to her dead.
"I know something that would feel better," he teased. "And even more 'right'."
She giggled and rose up the scant inch between them to kiss his whisker-rough cheek.
He gave her a grin and brought his left hand up to touch her face, the laughter slowly fading from his bruised eyes. "Thank you, Allie."
"For what?"
"For sleeping with me." The seriousness came over his swollen expression once more. "You thought it was the morphine talking," he said huskily, "but I meant what I said to you…every bit of it. I'd sell my soul to see that look on Smith's face again when you pulled the trigger."
She looked down. "I wish I'd put that bullet through his heart."
Brandon shook his head. His words came out slow and rough. "No, you don't, Allie. You're no killer. You're like Mother Earth – the life-giver; the nurturer." He raised his right hand to touch her cheek. "I saw that in you even back when we were at the orphanage. You haven't changed."
A shadow flitted across her face, deepening her somber expression. "Sometimes, I wonder."
Brandon gave a low laugh. "That's one thing I can never say, Allie. I never wonder about you. You're steady as a rock."
There was a question Allie had had on her mind for ten years. It could wait no longer. "Where did you go, Bran? When you disappeared? I knew you couldn't stay there – not with Preacher Tolliver so handy with the whip." He didn't reply, and she settled herself back down, her head on his shoulder again. "I wish we had been able to at least say goodbye," she whispered, all the years of the pain of the uncertainty in her words. "I – wondered how you were. Where you were."
He toyed with a strand of her hair, not looking at her. "I was trying to figure out who I was, for the most part."
"And – did you?" She traced a lazy pattern on his forearm. "Figure it out, I mean?"
A quick grin touched his battered lips. "I think so. More than I knew back then, anyhow."
They were both silent a moment, and finally he asked, "And you? I've always felt – I shouldn't've left you there. Not after it was so clear where your sympathies lay," he added wryly. "What happened – after I ran out on you?"