Lover Unveiled (Black Dagger Brotherhood 19)

“I’ll be okay,” she said. “The doctor was really kind to me.”

“I’m glad you’re not hurt—I mean, not seriously hurt. Are you hungry?”

“I don’t know.” Mae laughed in a short rush and looked down at herself. She had some vague memory of changing into fresh clothes. Had she had a quick shower? Maybe. Everything was so hazy. “Can you imagine . . . that I don’t know if I’m hungry?”

She blinked and saw those racks of designer clothes. So she tried to rub the images from her mind by going knuckle on her eyes.

“I called Tallah,” he said.

Dropping her hands, she exhaled in relief. “Thank God. Did you talk to her? She doesn’t know how to get into her voice mail.”

“Yup, I spoke with her. I just told her we were staying here tonight. Nothing else.”

“Was she okay with it?”

“Absolutely.”

“Good.”

As Mae shivered, she pulled half of the duvet over her legs. “I can’t get warm.”

There was a pause. And then Sahvage said, “I can help with that.” When she glanced up at him, he put his hands out. “I’m not suggesting that we—”

With tears glossing her eyes, she extended her arms. She had no voice to reply to him.

As he straightened from his lean and came into the room, she couldn’t believe what she was doing—and it was the most natural thing in the world, too. She’d never had a male in this bed, in any bed, but there was no other answer except yes.

Before Sahvage joined her, he put his hands to the front of his hips, and as she flushed and had to swallow hard—he simply removed his gun holster and placed it close by.

The entire mattress tilted as he sat on its edge, and she moved over to make sure he had enough room. But as he stretched out, she suddenly wasn’t thinking about space. She was thinking about proximity.

His and hers.

Before she thought too much about anything, she curled into him, and his heavy arm pushed under her neck. When she hissed, he froze.

“No, it’s fine,” she murmured. “I just have a bump on my head.”

“From the car accident?”

As she settled in, she said with exhaustion, “I don’t know. It could have been. I don’t remember a lot.”

“How did it happen?” he asked right by her ear.

“The accident?” Mae thought back to the radio report she’d been listening to. “I got distracted and hit the brakes. I was rear-ended—oh, God, she killed that nice man. Who was going to call nine-one-one for me.”

As she moaned, he took one of her hands in his own. “Try not to think about it.”

“I was so scared,” she said as she went deeper into her memories. “In that place. She had a cage—I was in . . . a cage.”

“Mae . . .” Now he sounded like he was in pain.

She lifted her head and looked into his dark blue eyes. “How did you know where to find me?”

“One of the Brothers knew where the brunette was.”

“Did you call them for help?”

“They found me as it turned out.” His brows dropped low. “We went there, to that building downtown—and I can’t explain it. I could scent you in the space, but I couldn’t see you. I walked around and around. I swear it was empty and I left . . . but then, all of a sudden, there was this clanging noise. And when I went back, the door turned into a window, into something that wasn’t there in the, like, normal sense.”

As he cursed under his breath, she put her arm over his rib cage—which was so broad, she felt as if she were trying to embrace a sofa.

“What if I hadn’t heard that sound, you know?” he murmured. “I want to shit my pants every time I think of it.”

“I summoned you.” As both his brows arched in surprise, she nodded. “I used the same spell I used on the Book. At least the one for you worked.”

“So that’s how . . . holy crap.”

There was a period of quiet. And then Sahvage rolled toward her. “You know, she’ll go away if you give her what she wants.”

“I’m sorry, you mean—the brunette?” When he nodded, Mae sat up. “How do you know that?”

“It’s in the nature of those who covet. They acquire. You saw all those clothes.”

Mae pushed her hair out of her face. “You’re saying I should use the Book for Rhoger, and then just give it to her?”

“No, I’m saying to save your own life, you should just let her have it.” When she didn’t respond, Sahvage sat up as well. “Mae, think of where you’ve been. Think of what you’ve just survived—by a stroke of luck.”

Between one blink and the next, she relived waking up in that crate. The panic of being trapped. The way it had felt being pressed up against that wall by the demon’s invisible power.