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Her fingertip slid along his lip, the twisted scar. "You're not pretty, though. Not like you were at one time. I saw pictures of you early on at The Zone."
"Well, fighting takes away some of the prettiness. It was an advantage when it was there, because they tended to underestimate me. Now, not so much."
"No, I imagine not," she said wryly. "You don't seem bothered by that."
"It's just skin. You take it off, what's under..."
A twitch went through his leg, his fingertips. It hit him unexpected, fast, hard, like a scary clown jumping out of his closet and landing full body on him in his small bed, a recurring nightmare he'd had as a child.
He was on his feet and didn't remember bolting from the chair. His throat closed, trapping air, his stomach coiled in a weird panic
as a bunch of images he so-the-fuck-did-not-want invaded his head. Regina, on his father's work table, him using a curved knife to take away the skin in long, ribbonlike strips... Only it wasn't his father. It was him. Marius.
"Hey. No. Easy." She had maneuvered him into the corner behind the potted palms, not a great screen, but one that gave him the illusion of privacy. He slapped a sweaty palm on the cool window, using it to brace himself. His other hand was on her, clenching the lapel of her coat. He sought her eyes out like a drowning man.
She was speaking to him, one hand on his side and the other braced by his on the window, but not hemming him in or holding him. "Breathe, Marius. Come back to me. Right here. We're at the airport. We're going to New Orleans. You're a grown man, Marius. Not a child. He's dead. Look at me. Right now."
He was looking at her, but he knew what she meant. He surfaced from those memories with a gasp, pain spearing through his lungs. Her tone was sharp, but it contained something his subconscious clung to like a flotation device.
"Breathe with me. Nice and even. It's okay. We're right here. After everything you dealt with the other day, it's completely normal you might have a little post-traumatic stress, things dredged up from your childhood. Just breathe through it."
As things leveled, he managed to choke out a response. "I don't like this. I kept this stuff locked out."
"Locked down, not locked out. Big difference. Think how well that strategy worked out. All those healthy relationships you've had; I don't have enough fingers to count them all."
It pulled an unexpected chuckle out of him, grim though it was. When he pressed his temple against the cool glass, wishing he could strip down and put his whole body against it, and then against her, her expression softened, eyes showing pain and concern for him. It made his stomach and chest turn inside out, made it hard to breathe again, for a different reason.
Please don't love me. Please don't.
"People are probably staring at us," he managed.
"Fuck them." She gestured to his arm. "Give me your wrist."
"Any body part you want is yours without asking, Mistress."
"I didn't ask." She shot him a look of mild reproof. "Don't do the charm thing when you're feeling vulnerable. I can tell the difference."
Problem was, the vulnerability he was covering wasn't only the unsettling daymare he'd just experienced, but that he meant what he'd just said.
When he put his wrist in her grasp, she reached in her pocket with her free hand and withdrew the small velvet bag. She shook the contents into his palm.
Seeing what it was enhanced his defenseless feeling. An ID bracelet. The masculine-looking steel links hooked to the top slim rectangular piece, and were embellished with chips of silver to catch the light.
Picking it up from the cup of his hand, she fastened it on his wrist. It was a close fit.
"Look at the back," she ordered. She moved to grip his hand as he complied. The bracelet had enough slack to allow him to tip the rectangular ID part up but not turn it over fully. It wouldn't roll and reveal the back unless he did it manually, as he was doing now. The close fit also meant he'd feel the faint impression of the engraving more easily.
If lost, return to Lady Regina.
"Since we're going to a new place," she said with a trace of humor. "It seemed appropriate. Now read it aloud to me."
She coiled her fingers in the bracelet, tugging.
"If lost, return to Lady Regina," he said, low.
"I'm right here, sweet boy," she said, just as quietly. "So you're not lost. You're found."
Until he wasn't. He locked his gaze on her and whatever she saw there made her tighten her grip.
