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I don’t bother to acknowledge him. I don’t even nod. I just get started, working the soft fabric of the grey sweatpants down over his hips. It’s hard, because he keeps twitching and threatening to thrash, but with effort I get them rolled all the way down and whisked away from his ankles. I know he wouldn’t like it, but right now I don’t give a damn, and I take off his leather glove, too. I consider taking off the splint, but worry in his condition he’ll damage his bones even more than they already are, and decide that the small amount of heat he might lose from the skin around that wrist isn’t worth worsening the fracture.
I’m just setting the sweatpants and leather glove aside when Curse strides swiftly back into the room from the bathroom, his hands laden with sopping wet cloths. I don’t wait for instructions, instantly running to him and taking some of the wet cloths out of his hands. We go to work side by side, me hauling myself up onto the bed between Elio’s legs, running the cool cloths along his thighs and abdomen, Curse up higher, near his head.
The instant the wet cloths come into contact with his skin Elio hisses, then moans, writhing as if to get away.
“It’s alright, a chuisle mo chroí,” I whisper. “Just stay still for us now, love.”
Curse doesn’t say anything, but somewhere in Elio’s burning brain, he must know his younger brother is there. Because his wild eyes suddenly lock on Curse’s face.
“Have to get her out,” he croaks frantically. With shocking strength, his good hand shoots up and locks onto Curse’s shoulder. “Fire. Got… to get her now.”
“It’s alright,” Curse says, voice low. “Mamma’s not in danger anymore.”
“Not Mamma,” Elio moans. I’ve never heard him sound so desperate. “Deirdre.”
Curse’s gaze sears to mine. His voice is clipped, almost like he expects me to argue with him, or run away. “He needs you.”
He heard everything I said to Valentina. About how I don’t plan on marrying his brother, how I feel trapped by the person he’s most loyal to in this world. He thinks I’m going to abandon his brother now, right when Elio needs me most.
Yeah, well. He doesn’t know me very well.
I sling myself over one of Elio’s taut thighs, straddling it and trying to keep him still with my weight. If it weren’t for his injuries, I’d move up further, straddle his waist or even his chest. But this will work for now. I lean forward, run trembling fingers up his chest until I’m cupping his face once more.
“Elio. Elio, I’m here. Everything is going to be alright.”
I don’t expect him to hear me, but I guess some part of him does. His hand falls away from Curse’s shoulder, dead weight thudding to the mattress beside him.
His dark eyes are glazed, but they seize on mine with savage power.
“Songbird,” he pants. “You have to go. Have to…”
“I’m alright, Elio. Mo chroí. I’m safe. And so are you. The doctor is coming. Just try to be still.”
His face twists in agony.
“I can’t,” he whispers, and on the next words, his voice breaks. He looks younger than I’ve ever seen him. “I can’t reach you.”
I don’t notice I’m crying until hot drips fall onto my own hands.
But strangely, my voice comes out steady when I speak next. “Then I’ll just have to reach you instead.”
I lean down to him, my hair creating a curtain around us, and I press my mouth to his.
There’s nothing controlled about it. The kiss is a messy one. There’s terror and tenderness in the searching slide of our mouths. Desperation and desire. Elio’s lips part instantly, and he groans into me, his movements weak but frantic, spiked with feverish adrenaline.
But it seems to be working. I think he really knows I’m here now. One by one, I feel his muscles unlock beneath me, until his whole frame is trembling now instead of furiously tense.
I lose all sense of time and space. Lose my awareness of anyone else around us. There’s only Elio, the man who needs me so fucking badly, the monster only I can tame. I feel like I’m melting into him, like the borders between our bodies are wavering, turning soft and transparent like liquid.
I would have stayed there longer, locked in that starving and soothing embrace, if not for the stern, accented voice calling into the room, “Everybody back!”
I break the kiss, feeling like I break my heart as I do it. But I have to make room. That voice is Doctor Morelli’s.
I pull away from Elio, straightening where I’m sitting on his upper thigh and preparing to scramble off the bed. But at the sudden distance between us, Elio bucks in revolt, making a sound that reminds me of an animal in a cage.
“Don’t move,” Curse says quietly to me. “If you get off him now he’s going to lose his fucking shit.”
Doctor Morelli sends everything on Elio’s bedside table crashing to the ground so he can slam open his case. He doesn’t say anything else, I guess not caring that I’m on Elio’s leg so long as he can do what he needs to do. His eyes flash behind his glasses, his face is drawn tight.
