Of Guilt, Sin and Apples - Part Five
Mal, Simon and Kaylee had gone already, apparently to stop on the way to the restaurant at some place Kaylee had wanted to check out - a general store with paint and the like that she wanted for Serenity. They had taken the Mule, leaving the rest of the crew who meant to join them later to walk.
Jayne didn't mind so much - he liked to walk, even in the cold. Maybe especially in the cold. He sure didn't mind getting off Serenity, that was for sure. There was times, out in the black, when he thought he'd go crazy waitin' for dirt to walk on.
When he got to the kitchen, he found Inara and Book in conversation.
Inara turned to him as he walked in. "Jayne," she said. "As it turns out, I've decided not to go tonight - I have some things on the Cortex to catch up on. The Shepherd isn't interested in going either - so that just leaves you and River. Do you mind walking her to the restaurant?"
He shrugged, even though his stomach clenched at the thought. "That brother o'hers is the one that wouldn't want me to walk'er over there. You better ask him."
Inara raised one eyebrow. "Well," she admitted, "Since he's already there, I doubt he'll mind."
Jayne shrugged again. "Whatever," he said, but Inara couldn't help but notice that he bit his lip after he said it. She suppressed a smile.
"It's settled, then," she said. "I'm sure both of you will have a good time."
Jayne shook his head. "I ain't babysittin' her all night," he said. "Once we get there, she'll be their problem." His leg jigged up and down as he leaned back against the kitchen doorway.
Inara smiled. "Well," she said smoothly, "I can see you're ready to go. Let me see if River is ready - I left her in my shuttle. I'll be right back."
As Inara left, Jayne sat at the table with Book. "You get the feelin' that somethin's up?" he asked the preacher.
Book raised both eyebrows. "Like what?" he asked curiously.
Jayne shook his head. "Aw, hell, I don't know. Cap'n has this friend I ain't never heard of that Zoe is so anxious to avoid that she and Wash have abandoned ship... Mal made me go shoppin' with the girls today while Kaylee and the doc worked on some - project. Now they've all gone ahead, 'Nara don't wanna eat out, and you're gonna stay with the ship and read your Bible all night. Somethin' just seems off."
Book thought for a moment, then smiled at the big mercenary. "Jayne," he said reassuringly. "I promise you, no one thinks you hurt that little girl - we all know you wouldn't."
Jayne thought back to his actions on Ariel. The shepherd didn't know him that well, did he?
Book continued. "Don't worry. It promises to be a very quiet walk to the restaurant - didn't you notice how sparsely populated the town is?"
Now that the shepherd mentioned it, Jayne thought, yeah. He kinda had noticed that there wasn't too many folk out on the streets earlier. He just shook his head. "Fits in with the strange goin's on, if you ask me," he said, staring down at his hands on the table.
The preacher grinned. "Jayne," he said, "there are times when all men feel the forces of the universe aligning against them. Sometimes it's a warning. And sometimes...?"
At this, Jayne looked up to see the shepherd's mischievous grin aimed over his shoulder. "Sometimes, it's just paranoia."
Jayne twisted in his seat. In the doorway behind him stood... someone who looked vaguely like the waif who he'd followed around town all day. Inara stood just behind her, beaming like a proud mama.
River smiled shyly, skimming her eyes over the room before they came to rest uncertainly on the big mercenary at the table.
She looked... different. She was wearing a heavy satin cheongsam of classic design, dark purple with lavender flowers at the edge of the high mandarin collar and matching embroidery down the side. The color suited her pale skin and dark eyes. Beneath it, she wore black leggings and stylish, slender boots in deference to the cold.
Jayne found himself thinking that he'd rather see her in boots or barefooted than ever strapped into those torture devices that women thought men wanted to see on their feet. Then he realized what he was thinkin' and shook his head to clear it.
As if he cared what the kid wore on her feet. Or anywhere on her body. He looked past her at Inara, caught her staring at him, and stood abruptly.
"What?" he asked belligerently.
She smiled blandly. "Nothing. I'm just bringing the package. It's up to you to deliver it to the restaurant."
River smiled over her shoulder at Inara, and the older woman impulsively kissed her on the cheek. "You look so lovely, darling," she said quietly. "You could have been a Companion yourself."
Jane shifted from foot to foot, nervous at the prospect of walking with the girl. So he scowled.
"Well, we better git on it if we're plannin' to get that free meal the cap'n promised us," he said sullenly.
River smiled and Inara handed her the new grey coat.
"You do look quite lovely," the shepherd agreed, taking in the sparkle in the girl's eye. "Just take care of Jayne, alright?" he grinned.
River spoke at last as she put on her coat. "He's going to get a puppy."
The preacher just smiled, completely uncomprehending.
The walk was every bit as uncomfortable as he'd thought it was gonna be. He couldn't stop lookin' at her. Even bundled into the long, heavy coat, with the hood pulled up and hands tucked warmly into pockets, she looked - well - pretty. There just weren't no other word for it.
On the one hand, he was extremely grateful that she wasn't yammerin'. On the other, he was itchin' to know. Their boots crunched through the snow in silence for a few minutes, then finally he had to speak.
Turning to her, he said, "Why you gotta keep goin' on about puppies, anyway?"
She looked at him, her eyes mildly shocked. "It's you," she said simply.
He sighed impatiently. "Yeah," he said. "I realize that I was thinkin' about a.. . pup when you come down to the bay that night, but - why you gotta keep bringin' up my private thoughts?"
"Abandonment issues," she said clearly. "The puppy is the symbol. You need a puppy, a puppy with big, brown eyes who will love only you.." she finished with a dreamy look in her eye.
He shook his head. "Got no idea what you're talkin' about, as usual," he muttered.
Her head cocked to the side as she studied him. "You know," she said, her eyes as sane as he'd ever seen them.
Then she looked up to the sky, a look of pure joy on her face. "It's snowing!" she exclaimed. She stopped in her tracks and stuck her tongue out, trying to catch one of the big flakes, while he watched - amused despite himself. When one landed there and instantly melted, her smile faded.
"Each one unique and perfect," she said quietly. "Each one destined for destruction - by a boot, by rising temperatures, by the heat of a laughing girl's tongue. The life of the snowflake is very short."
Despite his intent to never understand a word she said, once again, he did understand. She was saying that life was short, and the end was comin' for everybody. Most folk took this for granted, yet he couldn't help but wonder if she hadn't just figured it out - and the thought made him unaccountably sad. He scowled.
The rest of the walk was conducted in moderate silence, the only sound the quiet shushing of the snow and the crunch of their boots in it. He told himself to keep his eyes to the front, to ignore the slight girl by his side, and he succeeded despite the spicy fragrance washing off her skin in the cold air. Some kinda whore perfume that Inara had sprayed on her, no doubt – and frankly, he didn't like it. Sweet scent was something he associated with women who were paid - not with this girl. No, under that spicy scent, she smelled like something else entirely, something he'd smelled for himself when she'd leaned against him in the cargo bay, crying unashamedly against him.
She smelled like apples. She always had. Maybe that's why he'd bought'em in the first place.
As he pondered this, three men approached them in the street, walking in the other direction. He tore himself away from his thoughts long enough to size'em up. Brothers, he thought at first – then, seeing their identical faces, he straightened.
Gene dupes.
Now, that wasn't something you saw every day, especially considering that cloning humans was illegal as hell. Something about cell degradation, flawed dna, stuff like that. Caused a lot of'em to be freaks and mutants, and just plain crazy. He'd seen a few of'em before, usually on planets further out on the Rim than this. Sometimes folk was so desperate for help or kin that they just ignored the law. It rarely turned out right, though, everybody knew that.
He reached out and took River's thin upper arm in his hand and pulled her close to his side as the clones passed them. He saw how their eyes followed his action, but he nodded politely just the same. No point in bein' rude if they wasn't a threat, he figured. They was three on one.
One of them nodded back, and they all kept walking, going in their opposite directions.
He missed how the girl at his side smiled up at him as he glanced back over his shoulder to see if any of the gene dupes was looking back at them. They tuned the corner and disappeared.
Up ahead, he spotted the restaurant – apparently the only business in the district which did any night business at all. Above the doorway was a neon anchor symbol.
"C'mon," he muttered, still pulling her along. "This's gotta be it." As they neared the door, it opened, and an older Asian woman stepped through, dressed in a flowing kimono. Bowing, she smiled and waved the two of them through the door.
Just inside, another woman offered to take their coats – River gave hers up easily enough, but Jayne preferred to keep his on. It hid the enormous handgun that rode in the small of his back. Even though Mal had assured him that a gun wouldn't be necessary, Jayne felt it was better to have one and not need it than to need it and not have it. Given a choice, he would always have one on him.
He quickly spotted the capt'n, along with Kaylee and the doc at the same time River sighted another unusual sight in the corner of the room – an aquarium. With a delighted smile at him over her shoulder, she rushed to examine it more closely, and more slowly, he followed.
Hell, he thought – it is worth a closer look. Not like he'd seen so many aquariums in his life.
How in the hell violence erupted, Jayne didn't know. One second, he was lookin' at the aquarium in the corner of the room over the top of River's head, the next, bullets was flyin and people was screamin'.
Without thinkin', he grabbed her arm and pulled her between him and the wall, shielding her with his body as he pushed the two of them toward a side door exit. As they pushed through the main room full of panicked people, he glanced back over his shoulder just in time to see Mal fall, a huge chest wound blooming in the middle of his chest.
Then he was distracted by a group of crazy lookin' gene dupes rounding the outside of the building just as he and River exited, all of 'em wavin' guns and lookin' for blood.
What in the blue hell had Mal gotten them into?
Running the other way, he pulled River along, his hand still wrapped around her upper arm. When she hesitated, saying – "The captain -" He just kept movin'.
"Captain's dead, girl," he said, pulling her back in front of him and holding her back against him as he pulled his gun and peered over her head toward the corner at the end of the alley. "We gotta get back to the ship and warn the others."
He felt her head shaking against his chest. "Not dead," she said. "Not dead, but – hurting.."
Jayne didn't doubt her, he was learning better.
"Good, then," he said. "We'll still have to get back to the ship and tell the others – we'll buy him back if we need to."
He began to step out of the alley, and River stopped him. "Not yet," she said quietly. "Wait."
Jayne waited. As he did, he realized that River's new coat had been left behind in the restaurant – and it was snowing.
"Don't worry," she said softly, looking up at him over her shoulder. She grinned like it was Christmas morning, and despite the grim circumstances, Jayne was tempted to grin back. Instead, he scowled at her and looked back up the street.
"Can we go now?" he whispered roughly.
"Not yet."
Then they rode by, two floatercars full of those same yahoos – all gene dupes, it looked like. Three or four different sets.
Jayne ground his teeth as he realized at least a portion of what was going on. The dupes were all ganged up. And Mal's 'friend', the pretty, obviously trouble-prone Peri Callum had called Mal down into the middle of some kinda gang war – worse, one involving crazy clones. Wonderful.
"Alright," River whispered. "Let's go."
Jayne took her hand in his and began to pull her along the street, from shadow to shadow, keeping a lookout behind and in front at all times. After a moment, he realized that she was tugging his sleeve. "What?" he asked, distracted.
"Not back to Serenity," said.
He was concentrating so hard on the possibility of detection that he nearly missed it. "What?" he said again.
"They're waiting there - "
Go-se.
"Alright," Jayne said roughly, "Where, then?"
"Empty buildings all around," she replied, and Jayne realized that it was true. What looked at the center of town to be a prospering community, just a littler further out was nearly empty.
"Expecting to catch us all inside the towers," she said, plainly referring to the service shield around the town. Even Serenity was parked inside the damn thing.
"Gotta get beyond, get out of the trap," she said.
He agreed. Where had he seen the last tower? Down behind the shopping center where they had spent most of the day . Only a few blocks away.
"Can we make it?" he asked her, his eyes already tracking the direction and distance.
"Kaylee, the captain, and... Simon," she answered. "Trapped. Wash and Zoe separate. Shepherd Book on Serenity. We have a chance if we disregard the others."
He glanced at her. "Yeah," he said. "That's what we're gonna have to do – when this stuff all blows over, we can meet back up with'em, or they can find us. I got a tracker on me."
She looked at him over her shoulder, her eyes solemn.
It began to snow in earnest.
The two of them made their silent way across the corner of Artemis City that housed the restaurant they'd been in when the shooting had started, avoiding the gene dupes they encountered on the way. The gangs did seem to be looking for them – why, Jayne had no idea. Ransom? It seemed likely. It wasn't uncommon for small, failing communities like this to develop such strategies to survive.
Even though it was his instinct to take the lead, Jayne found himself following River as often as not. He had to admit, she did have an uncanny ability to know where the gangs were, and knew how to avoid them. He tried not to think about it, though, as he tried not to think of her other talents. Her abilities made him nervous and self-conscious at the best of times – at a time like this, it could drive him crazy and endanger both of them if he allowed himself to think about it.
Instead, he focused on the kinds of things that he might be able to actually affect. The fact that it was freezing outside, for instance, and the stupid girl had left her coat in the restaurant. Hell, her arms was startin' to turn blue.
Finally, he pulled his own coat off as the two of them waited for a Mule to pass on the street, full of clones. As he crouched behind her in the shadows, he wrapped his coat around her from behind. When she looked back at him questioningly, he growled. "Oh don't get all het up about it," he said. "Cap'n would have my hide for new boots if I let ya freeze out here - I'm gonna want it back when I get too cold, anyway. In the meantime, warm up a little."
He couldn't be sure, but he thought he saw her smile as she pulled his coat tighter around herself. As for him, he couldn't understand how such a skinny, tiny thing as her had stood the cold for so long. He was only a minute out of his coat and he was freezing already. Still, a man suffered in silence. And he meant to.
It wasn't long until she led him to the base of the tower he'd seen earlier.
"You think the shield is on?" he whispered.
She looked at him, then cocked her head at the tower and shook her head. "Not yet," she whispered softly. "Net not tightened, the prey in unknown waters still.."
Jayne didn't waste any time doubting. He grabbed her hand and pulled her past the awkward metal structure, toward the freedom of the mostly unoccupied buildings beyond.
Here was where the poorest people had lived, when the city had been thriving. Now it was empty, as far as Jayne could tell, but he didn't want to hole up too close to the tower itself. On the other hand, he didn't want to go too far out, either – just in case there was indigenous wildlife to deal with.
Finally, he settled on a small, prefabricated metal building that sat on the outside edge of what looked to be an abandoned factory of some sort. With the factory workin's around'em he hoped he'd be able to have an undetected fire.
Once inside, Jayne was relieved to see that his own instincts hadn't failed him. He'd landed the two of them in what appeared to be probably an old foreman's shack. Inside, they found a stove that ran on electricity – and there was none, of course – a wood burning stove with no wood, and a small sleeping shelf. A sleeping shelf wasn't much different from Jayne's berth on Serenity – it was literally a shelf inset into the wall. About a yard wide and a yard and a half long, and a ceiling clearance of less than two feet, it was designed to gather body heat and keep it close. It even had an old, moth-eaten sleeping bag still inside of it.
Jayne locked up the door as best he could, and searched for something he could light on fire, for vision if not for heat. The one small window in the side of the shack didn't let in much light.
River stopped him with a light hand on his forearm, instantly recalling in his mind the night in the cargo bay when she had stopped him in his tracks with the very same gesture.
He pulled away. "Gotta find some light," he muttered.
"There's nothing," she said quietly. "No light, no heat."
He huffed. "What, now you can see in the dark as well as bein' a big genius?" he mocked, the cold and the stress getting to him. He couldn't be sure, but he thought he might have seen her smile as she pulled off his coat and handed it to him.
"Share the shelf," she said. "First deal with the environment, then with the enemy. Surrounded by cover."
He thought he understood what she was sayin'. She meant for the two of 'em to huddle up on the sleeping shelf and conserve body heat – deal with the environment. And in the morning, maybe they'd face off with an enemy they could see.
He sighed. It wasn't a bad plan – it just made him mightily uncomfortable.
In the darkness, he felt her small, cold hand wrap around his and tug in the direction of the shelf.
After the slightest hesitation, he followed.
She pushed him in first, and even though it made him a little claustrophobic, Jayne complied, folding his long body into the too-short sleeping accommodation as best he could, his back pressed against the far wall of the shelf, the ceiling of it only a few inches above his face. Then, River curled into the shelf with him, curving her backside into the curve of his body. Without thinking, Jayne opened up the coat he was now wearing and pulled her as far inside of it with him as he could, pulling the edges around her. She pulled up the sleeping bag, which smelled vaguely of rotten food, and sealed the two of them under it inside Jayne's coat.
Her cheek rested on his arm, the crown of her head resting comfortably under his chin. His other arm hovered for a moment, then he wrapped it around her, his gun pointed toward the door of the shack.
Nothin' to it, he thought to himself. Just two folk afraid of freezin' to death is all it is.
He heard her make a small sound, and wondered for just an instant if she was cryin'. Then he realized. She had giggled.
"You better not be readin' my mind," he growled at her, irritated beyond words that he couldn't keep anything private from the brat.
She giggled again. "No," she said. "The mind is not - "
"A book," he finished for her, remembering their very first conversation. "But you gotta come up with somethin' better than tryin' not to look," he said. "Cause folk got a right to their thoughts, even their loud ones." It seemed easier to talk to her suddenly, in this quiet darkness as the two of them began to warm up inside his coat. He ran his hand up and down her bare arm, trying to warm it even more, while trying to ignore the satin smoothness of her skin against his rough palm.
Then he realized she wasn't makin' a sound.
"You hear what I said?" he asked quietly.
After a moment – "Yes," she said. "I understand. The mind is a private place, not given to wanderers in the darkness"
"Uh yeah," he said uncertainly. Then – "You warmin' up?"
Her voice took on that cold tone that he hated. "Body temperature within acceptable parameters."
"Go to sleep, then," he said gruffly. "I'll stay awake awhile and make sure nothin' comes in, but I think I heard the shield go up, so we're probably pretty safe from the dupe gang for now."
"Safe for now," her voice echoed in the darkness. He couldn't be sure if she was agreeing or actually saying that they were safe. He sighed. It didn't matter. He'd stay awake as long as he could, maybe until dawn.
He awoke some time later, River kicking and moaning in his arms. He was a fast waker, it was one of the things which had allowed him to live as long as he had.
"River," he whispered in her ear, leaning forward until her hair was under his cheek. She twisted against his hold, which instinctively tightened, holding her against him in the dark.
"No!" she cried out, her voice breaking. "No! Nooo!! I won't do it!"
"River," he whispered again, his voice rumbling in his chest. He searched his mind in a panic, trying to think of something reassuring to say. Finally, realizing he knew nothing about soft or gentle words, he settled on just her name. "River – River Riveriveriver."
Slowly, she stopped struggling against him, gradually relaxing into his hold.
"That's a good girl," he breathed in her ear.
After a long moment, she stilled in his grasp, then relaxed. "Simon?" she asked uncertainly.
A sharp emotion knifed through him.. Jealousy? Envy?
He brushed it aside for the moment. "No," he whispered, his voice a thread in the darkness. "It's me, Jayne." He breathed for a moment, then asked. "Are you alright?"
After a moment of silence, she said, "All in darkness now"
Jayne had no idea whether or not she was talking about their situation or her state of mind.
"Where are we?" she asked ,childlike, her voice breaking.
Shit.
Jayne had been all in favor of the doc not druggin' the girl, but now he realized the price.
"River," he said quietly. "We're on Artemis.. We went to meet up with the Captain and Kaylee and the doc at a restaurant.. There was some shootin' right after we got there - before we even sat down – do you remember?"
She twisted in his arms and faced him in the dark. He could hardly make out the shape of her face, but he felt her breath, warm on his cheek. One of his hands tangled in her long hair, the other rested against her back, still holding his gun. Through the satin of the dress she wore, he felt her breathing, and she felt suddenly fragile in his arms, as if she might break if he tightened his grip on her.
"..we ran," she said, her voice a thread in the darkness. "In the dark. It was snowing. We were instinct in obscurity, slipping around corners and padding silent-footed through a chiaroscuro world"
Jayne wondered if what she was saying made sense to her.
"Dupe gangs was lookin' for us," he said, trying to ground her in recent events. "We found this place outside the net to spend the night, but there wasn't nothin' to keep warm with, so we decided to share my coat and the sleepin' bag Do you remember that?"
Abruptly, he felt her small, cold hand on his face, tracing first the curve of his cheekbone, then the line of his jaw.
"I remember," she said, dreamily. "You said - Just two folk afraid of freezin' to death is all it is"
He grimaced. If he'd ever had any doubt at all that he was an open book to her, this definitely banished it for him. "No," he said softly, cringing to think what else she might see in his mind. "I didn't say that..."
Her warming hand curved to his cheek, and feeling extremely uncomfortable, Jayne switched his gun to the other hand and reached up to gently remove it, bringing her hand to his shoulder and holding it there.
"Predators," she said softly, "curled together in the dark..."
What did she mean, he wondered.
"Killers of men," she said clearly, answering a question he hadn't phrased. "Unpredictable. Unstable. Cruel. But part of nature, not evil."
His hand absently stroked her hair. "I doubt you've kilt any men, baby girl," he said quietly, his tired voice rumbling in the dark. "You go back to sleep now - dawn can't be far away."
At least he hoped not - most terraformed planets had a night and day cycle roughly the same as that of Earth that Was, but some had long days and longer nights. He wasn't sure about Artemis.
Her voice came to him again. "Darkness for ten hours," she said. "Two hours to go until we see blood."
Her words shot fear through his belly. "We ain't gonna see no blood," he said. "I'm gonna turn on this locator and someone'll come and get us - that's all there is to it."
Her hand pulled from beneath his on his chest, and traced up to the hot column of his throat, where it rested against his pulse for a moment, skin to skin. Then, further into his coat, down over his t-shirted chest, to his side.
"What're you doin' girl?" he asked gruffly.
She shifted suddenly in his arms, lithe as a cat, pushed her thigh between his, then reached down between his legs. Covering the bulge there, she said, "What's this?"
Shocked, he jumped back as far as he could in the smallness of the tiny alcove and reached down to roughly grab her hand and push her away.
"Gorramit, girl!" he nearly shouted. "You done lost your damn mind if you think that we're doin' anything like that!" His hands wrapped over her thin shoulders, and he shook her, holding her as far from him as he could. "That," he said angrily, "is any man's reaction to bein' pushed into bed with a pretty girl. It don't mean nothin'. And don't you go thinkin' it does. You ain't nothin' but a half-grown girl, and I ain't even a boy - I'm a man - a man damn near old enough to be your pa. Don't you ever put your hands on me like that again, you hear?"
She only hung limply in his grip, saying nothing for a long moment. Then he heard her. "I've killed," she said softly. "And I've died. Not a child, hardly human..."
The catch in her voice undid his shock at her bold action. That's all he needed, he thought, was for her to start cryin'.
He sighed, trying to understand her words, his hold on her gentling. "You're havin' a bad night, is all. We'll just... forget this happened, alright?"
Slowly, she relaxed against him, and despite his better judgement, he let her curl against him, her arm wrapped over his side under the coat, her head tucked again under his chin - only now, her breath pulsed over his throat. His raging hard-on stayed in exactly the state it had been in since he had awakened with the gorram girl in his arms, but he held her anyway, waiting for her breathing to slow and steady..
It was gonna be a long few hours.
When he thought she was asleep, he let out a long shuddering sigh. He hadn't counted on anything like.. that happening - had assumed the girl was completely innocent. Even though he tried not to think on it, he couldn't help himself.
All the thoughts he'd been holding back flooded into his mind. The images of her - standing in the darkness in her white shift, her soft, wet cheek against his bare chest. Her, standing barefoot on the catwalks, staring into his eyes. Her in his arms as he ran through the ship, in a fury of panic while she convulsed against him. Her, in Serenity's kitchen, handing him the half-eaten apple, saying mischievously, "Finish my sin." Her in the street, laughing up at him in the snow, telling him he owed her the sin back again, snowflakes caught in her dark hair.
His hold on her tightened as she moaned softly. She had seen bad things, he knew that - had had bad things done to her, too. She might even have done some of the stuff she said, but it was hard to tell. Her words were convoluted and hard for him to understand, and he cursed himself that he couldn't make more sense of her.
And her mind readin'. That was hard to take. Only by the grace of god had she not blurted out something that would get him in real trouble - but he knew eventually she would. Not only that, but he'd done some bad things in his life - ugly things that a girl like her shouldn't be exposed to, not even by accident. What if he got to thinkin' on those things like he sometimes did, and she picked up on it? It wouldn't be good for her, he was pretty sure of that.
And now, this.
She had propositioned him, he was pretty sure of that, even if she was crazy... And even though he hated like hell to admit it, it had excited him. Hell, he was still hard, just layin' here thinkin' about her hands on him - and not just on his pecker, but anywhere on him.
Could he go back to Serenity and act like nothin' had happened? What if she spoke of it? It seemed likely that the crew was startin' to think there was somethin'... unwholesome goin' on with him and the girl. What if something like that really did start up?
He quelled the urge to growl, not wanting to wake the source of his frustration. He told himself it was to keep from havin' to deal with her crazy ways, but the truth was, he wanted her to sleep. Hopefully, she could sleep peaceful- and if she didn't, he would wake her again, no matter how crazy she got.
He'd stay awake until dawn, he knew that for sure this time. Her every small movement, her every breath in his throat, seemed to send fire zipping along his nerve endings, and that wasn't particularly conducive to sleep.
On the one hand, he was miserable... but on the other, he wouldn't trade this moment for anything. Because he was being strong - strong for her... and strength was the one thing he knew for a certainty he was good at.