38
Cherry came into the room. She'd slipped into a pair of jean shorts, and a white midriff tank top. Her small breasts were pressed against the thin material. I was a little too well-endowed to ever dream of going without a bra, but small or not, in that top she needed a bra. I was a prude.
Her short yellow hair was still damp. She stalked into the room on those long legs, managing to look both slutty casual and unnaturally graceful.
Just watching her walk into the room made me want to move Nathaniel's head out of my lap. Force of will alone kept me from scooting away from him. We weren't doing anything wrong. But it bothered me.
"Your turn," Cherry said. "I'll wait with Nathaniel."
"Is Zane out yet?"
I caught movement in the hall, and it was Zane. He was wearing jean shorts, too, and nothing else. The ever-present nipple ring was the only thing on his pale, thin chest.
"Don't you ever take that thing out of your chest?" I asked.
He smiled. "If I take the ring out, the hole will close up and I'll have to get it pierced all over again. I might get the other nipple pierced, but I don't want to have to redo the first one."
"I thought you liked pain," I said.
He shrugged. "In some situations with naked women, yeah." He touched the ring, pulling on it until the nipple stretched just a little. "The actual piercing hurt like a son of a bitch."
I looked at the slender, too-thin chest, especially the part right next to his right arm. There was a dark area where the shoulder attached to the chest, but that was all.
"Is that all that's left of the bullet wound?" I asked.
Zane nodded and sat down at the foot of the bed, crawling onto the covers so he was beside Nathaniel and far too close to me. "You can touch the wound if you want."
I frowned. "No, thanks." I started to back off the bed on all fours, spilling Nathaniel's head gently to the covers. I stopped myself. Marianne said that Raina fed on my embarrassment, my prudishness, that if I could be more comfortable around small stuff, Raina would lose some of her power over me. Was it true?
I wasn't attracted to Zane. That moment last night had been pure Raina. She seemed to have been attracted to anything that had a pulse and some things that didn't. I gritted my teeth and reached out towards Zane.
He went very still, face suddenly serious, as if he had some clue how much it cost me to reach out to him. I ran my fingertips over the wound. The skin was smooth, shiny like a scar but softer and more pliable. I found myself running my hand over the wound, exploring it. It felt strangely plastic, and at the same time soft, like baby's skin.
"This feels ... cool."
Zane grinned. It reminded me of Jason and that one thought relaxed a tension in my shoulders that I hadn't even known was there.
Cherry came up behind him to slide her hands over his shoulders, massaging them. "I never get over being amazed at how we heal."
I wanted to take my hand back, just because Cherry had touched him, too. I forced myself to keep my hand on the wound, but I'd stopped exploring it, just touching it was all I could manage.
"The muscles can get tight when it's healing," Cherry said. "You get spasms around it, like the body heals too fast for the muscles to keep up."
I took my hand away slowly. I sat on the bed watching Cherry massage Zane's shoulders. Nathaniel nuzzled my leg, rolling his eyes up to me. I didn't move away from him, and he seemed to take that as permission to roll his head onto my thigh. He nestled against me with a contented sigh.
Zane rolled onto his back on the other side of me, not touching me, but watching me. His eyes were very careful.
Cherry stayed kneeling on the foot of the bed, watching my face. They all watched me like I was the center of their world. I'd seen dogs in obedience trials watch their owners that way. In dogs it was a good thing. In people it was unnerving. I didn't have a dog because I didn't feel responsible enough to take care of one. Now I suddenly had three wereleopards, and I knew I wasn't responsible enough for them.
I laid my hand on Nathaniel's warm hair. Zane stretched his full six-foot frame, fingers and toes straining, spine bowing like a big cat.
I laughed. "What am I supposed to do, rub your tummy?"
Everyone laughed, even Nathaniel. I realized with a shock that it was the first time I'd ever heard him laugh. The laughter was young, high-schoolish. Lying naked in my lap with claw marks on his butt, and he was laughing, a full-throated, happy sound.
I was happy to hear it, and nervous. They were trying to make me their home. Because that was what an Ulfric was supposed to be, and a Nimir-ra, or Nimir-raj, for a guy, was the equivalent. Strangely, there didn't seem to be a werewolf equivalent of a queen wolf. Sexism? Or some arcane shit I didn't understand yet? I'd ask Richard later.
"I've got to go take my bath, guys."
"We could help," Zane said. He licked my arm, grimaced. "I like the taste of sweat, but the gravel dust ... "
Nathaniel raised his face enough to lick my other arm. His tongue ran down my arm in a long slow glide. "I don't mind the dust," he said, voice low and soft.
I slid off the bed, calmly, slowly. I did not go yuck, or scream. I was very calm and very relieved to be standing on the floor. The bed had suddenly become crowded. "Thanks, but the bath will be fine. Don't answer any phone but the one by the bed, and don't open the door to anyone but Dr. Patrick."
"Aye, aye, Captain," Zane said.
I slid the Firestar down the front of my jeans and picked up my suitcase from against the wall. I glanced back at the three of them from the doorway. Zane had lain down on the other side of Nathaniel, only propped on his elbow, one hand touching Nathaniel's back. Cherry had curled at the foot of the bed. She was running her hand up and down his thigh. Either the sheet had slid off or she'd moved it so she could touch him. There was nothing sexual on their faces, nothing overt.
They looked like the opening scene for a porno movie to me, but I was sure that when I left the room, nothing would happen. There was no anticipation between them, no eagerness to have me gone so they could be alone. Their eyes still followed me. They touched each other for comfort, not for sex. The discomfort was mine, not theirs.
"I'm sorry I went with Mira," Nathaniel said suddenly.
That stopped me in the doorway. "You're a big boy, Nathaniel. You had every right to find someone. It was just your choice of partners that was bad."
Zane began to rub his hand up and down Nathaniel's back, like you'd pet a dog. Nathaniel lowered his head so his hair slid around him like a veil, hiding his face. "I thought you were going to be my mistress, my top. I thought for a long time that you understood the game. That you were telling me not to have sex with anyone. I was so good. I didn't even touch myself."
I opened my mouth, closed it, opened it, and didn't have a damn thing to say.
"When you finally gave me permission to have sex with you, it could have been straight vanilla. It was the waiting, the build-up, the teasing that would have made it enough."
I found my voice. "I don't know what vanilla means, Nathaniel."
"Straight sex," Zane said, "normal stuff."
I shook my head. "Whatever, I am not playing with you, Nathaniel. I would never do that."
He looked at me sort of sideways as if afraid to look me full in the face. "I know that now. It was this trip that I realized you didn't even know we were playing a game. You aren't teasing me. You don't think about me at all."
That last sounded sort of pitiful, but I couldn't help that. "I keep having to apologize to you, Nathaniel. Half the time I don't even know what I'm apologizing for."
"I don't understand how you can be my Nimir-ra and not be my top, but I know now that you see it as two separate things. Gabriel didn't."
"What is a top?" I asked.
Zane answered for him again. "A dominant to Nathaniel's submissive. A submissive is called a bottom."
Ah. "I am not Gabriel," I said.
Nathaniel laughed, but it wasn't a happy sound. "Would you get mad if I said sometimes I wish you were?"
I just blinked at him. "I'm not mad, Nathaniel, you just puzzle the hell out of me. I know I'm supposed to be taking care of you, but I don't know how to do it." He was like some exotic pet that I'd been given as a gift, but the instructions didn't come in the box.
He lay back down on the pillow, head turned so he could see me. "I went with Mira when I realized you weren't there for me."
"I am there for you, Nathaniel, but not in that way."
"Is this where you tell me we can still be friends?" He laughed, and it was harsh.
"You don't need a friend, Nathaniel, you need a keeper."
"I thought you were going to be my keeper."
I looked at Cherry and Zane. "How about you guys?"
"Nathaniel is the most ... " Cherry hesitated, "the most broken of us. Gabriel and Raina made sure we were all bottoms; it was all we were trained for. They were the tops, always, but ... but Nathaniel ... " She finally shrugged.
I knew what she meant. Nathaniel was the weakest of them. The one who needed the most care.
I set the suitcase down and went to kneel by the bed. I brushed his hair from his face so I could see his eyes. "We'll all be there for you, Nathaniel. We are your pard. Your people. We'll take care of you. I'll take care of you."
Tears filled his eyes. "But you won't fuck me."
I took a deep breath and stood. "No, Nathaniel, I won't fuck you." I shook my head and picked up my suitcase. I'd had all I could take for one afternoon. If Marianne wasn't happy with this little lesson, then screw her. Maybe it wasn't supposed to be sexual, but thanks to the way Gabriel and Raina had treated the wereleopards, sex did keep coming up. I was almost afraid to hear what Marianne's solution to that one would be.