My throat tightens as I continue my perusal.
Whip marks across his ribs. Long, thin lines of mangled flesh that crisscross and overlap. Layered by years if not location. A knife injury on his shoulder. Bullet wounds spattered all over.
A burn scar sits on the upper curve of his hip. From heated metal or maybe just directed fire? I can’t tell.
I trace my palm over it, checking the texture. It’s flat, despite the colors of his skin not lining up. Without the arctic blue eyes glaring from under his hair, he looks younger. Using just a bit of imagination, I can almost picture him as a child.
Eight years old, orphaned, and taken in by a monster who glimpsed potential. Who saw a boy already broken and decided to break him further, reshaping him into a useful tool.
Roman.
Max didn’t have the nurturing presence of someone like Dimitri to help him grow.
But now he has me.
The cut on his forehead still bleeds, sluggish but steady. I should clean it before infection sets in.
I shove to my feet and head for the kitchen sink to retrieve one of our many first aid kits. Grabbing a large basin, I fill it with hot water. On my way back to the couch, I snatch a washcloth from the bathroom.
Before anything else, he needs to be cleaned up. There’s no telling what he might have gotten covered in while dealing with the chimney and years of buildup.
After setting everything up on the coffee table beside the couch, I dunk the cloth. In the amber and gold firelight, I start to wipe him down.
Shadows dance across Max’s unconscious form, lending him a peaceful appearance. I almost feel like I’m tending to a stranger.
I only know him as Mad Max. The man underneath’s vulnerable. Exposed.
It feels…wrong to interact with him so intimately while he’s asleep.
Focus, Nika. You’ve got a job to do.
Once he’s clean, I open the med kit and pull on a pair of gloves. I cleanse the wound and wince when Max shifts in his sleep. I don’t want to hurt him, but this needs done. When finished, I retrieve a suture kit and swap gloves.
Reaching his forehead requires me to half lay myself on him, which of course reminds me of what we did today. How he felt. The woodsy smell of him as I coiled myself around him and claimed what I wanted…
Mind on the work. You’re stitching his face, and he doesn’t need any new scars.
Small, precise, focused stitches.
That’s what matters in this moment. Not thoughts that get my hands shaking.
I tie off the last stitch and cut the thread, then inspect my work. It’s good. Neat. It’ll only leave a faint scar. Not like the ones littering the rest of his body.
I can’t do much, but… I do have silicone gel and patches for his old burns.
Packing all the supplies back into the kit, I return it to the kitchen and head to the bathroom for another.
I wrap his ankle and use liniment for his bruises.
Then, unable to help myself, I spread hyaluronic acid on his discolored skin and cover the wind burns with aloe lotion.
Dimitri would do the same for me. I don’t know much about pampering someone, but I know I always felt warm and cared for after Dima patched up my injuries.
Maybe Max will feel the same.
By the time I finish, the fire’s low again.
I add a few more logs and fetch a thick quilted blanket from the linen closet. Draping the soft material over Max’s body, I tuck it around his shoulders.
