Page 30 of The Hangman's Rope

She seemed perfectly content just to cuddle close and nothing else. She didn’t make any more moves beyond just clinging to my side in the dark, and I didn’t want to keep her from sleep by asking a bunch of probative questions that may or may not set her back when she’d barely made a single step on this long road ahead of her.

Instead, I lay in the dark and quiet of the room, staring at the spinning ceiling fan, the little currents of air wafting down from it and cooling the fire riding just under the surface of my overheated skin, as the desire pulsed through me with every throbbing heartbeat, echoed in the throbbing pulse of my dick under the now impossibly tight prison of my jeans.

Her breath was warm where it fanned across my chest, stirring the light cover of hair I had curling on it, not enough to be considered some kind of a bear of a man – thank God for that. I’d seen some real hairy fuckers when I was in, and I didn’t know how they did it – especially in the fucking head of that god-forsaken badland of being in-country. Dry heat, humid heat, at some point it was justheatand whether you werebeing parboiled or grilled by the weather it didn’t matter. It was uncomfortable as fuck either way.

Still, there’d been times I’d longed for the feel of the sultry South while I’d been out there in the arid desert doing my thing for Uncle Sam. Where I’d have given anything for a breeze or for the heavy wet blanket feel that made you instantly wet just by stepping out your door without even having enough time for actual sweating to kick in.

I don’t know why I focused on all of that so much except that it took my mind off of the soft, sultry woman, curled into my side, her arm tucked against my body, her other arm across my stomach, as her warm soft breathing deepened, blushing warmth across my body in even intervals only to have it swept away by the cooling currents from the ceiling fan just in time for the next breath to make an impact with me.

It was like Chinese water torture, only teasing and tantalizing in a way that made me feel fucking guilty as hell for enjoying it. Especially given what she’d more than likely at this point, had gone through. She whimpered softly in her sleep which she’d fallen into fairly quicky. I waited for her to try and twist away from me and held my arms slightly out from her to allow her to move in whichever direction she chose, but all she did was scoot closer, wriggling a bit in her dream state and holding onto me tighter.

When I replaced my arms, she almost instantly went slack against me, her breathing taking on an even deeper cadence and I couldn’t stop myself if I wanted to. I turned my face in the dark of the room and blindly pressed my lips at her hairline, letting them linger on her soft, soft, skin and hair for several moments, pursing them in a light press of a kiss, closing my eyes and breathing her in.

Somewhere I’d heard, read, or talked with somebody and they’d mentioned that space smelled like raspberries. It’d stuckwith me. Morphed in my brain, that must be what starlight smelled like; like raspberries with maybe a hint of burned sugar. I don’t know why that’s how it stuck in my brain – but it did and it baffled me that Lorelai smelled very close to what I imagined starlight would smell like… especially given that she’d used my soap and whatnot here in my apartment and I didn’t own raspberry or sugar cookie, or any of that girly fucking shit.

Nor did I really have a lot of women come through here. Certainly, none that stayed more than a night, or that I even maintained any kind of relationship with enough for them to bring or leave anything over here that she could have found and used…

No, whatever this scent was, it was purely Lorelai, and it was faint and alluring. Sweet and yet… unearthly. Like something from the heavens or another plane of existence.

I kissed her forehead one or two more times and she sighed out, relaxing into me totally, and I liked that.

I guess she felt safe with me.

That was good. She was. If only for now. I mean, obviously I couldn’t protect her fromeverything, let alone her nightmares and what went on on the inside – but I could be here, present and accounted for, and for tonight that seemed to be enough.

I’m not sure when I fell asleep, but it had to be sometime in the wee hours, because when I did, it was to the sound of her even cadence of breathing and the blue noise of birds singing in the pre-dawn hours, in that morning blue hour before the sun’s rays started lightening the sky right before her grand appearance on the east horizon.

I jolted awake hard to the sun streaming through the slats of the blinds and Synister standing at the foot of my bed, a tempestuous set to his mouth – eyes unreadable behind his aviators but burning a fucking hole through me none the less.

“Sup, man?” I mumbled groggily and his frown crushed down harder.

“I could ask you the same fuckin’ thing,” he practically growled and he wasn’t even trying to keep it down. Lorelai jolted awake in my arms and gasped, cringing. She pushed off of me and struggled to sit up, her feet sliding against the sheets as she tried to put distance between herself and Syn.

“You’re fine,” he grated at her. “You, I want to talk to. Out here. Now.” He stabbed two fingers at me and jerked about in blocky barely controlled movements, stalking out into the living room his boot falls shuddering the old house’s original wood planks against one another in the worn original flooring.

I let out a breath and scrubbed my face with my free hand. The other perched on Lorelai’s knee, steadying her.

“You’re not in trouble,” I told her with a yawn. “Don’t panic.”

“It seems likeyou’rein trouble,” she said, voice tinged with worry.

I snorted.

“The fuck I am,” I said for her benefit and I got to my feet, body popping in various places. Neck, shoulder, opposite knee, and as I took the few steps across the bedroom’s area rug my feet crackled like Rice Krispies with fresh cold milk poured over them, the little releases of pressure in my foot joints welcome first thing in the morning.

None of it hurt. Just my body settling into shape for the start of the day. The first signs of starting to get older. Some days there was pressure, or a moment of discomfort when the joints first gave, but not today.

I tried to play it cool for Lorelai’s sake as I slipped out of my bedroom, shutting the door behind me and her safely inside away from whatever drama was brewing out here.

I was silently kicking myself for leaving my phone out here – where I’d missed my alarms and probably a shit ton of incoming calls.

The only reason Syn was probably even here to begin with was I hadn’t shown up to work and Grim and no one else could get ahold of me.

“The gates are unlocked, Grim had your back,” Syn said. He had his butt leaned on the arm of my couch; his arms crossed over his chest. The bundle of marked rope in his hand poking out from under his elbow.

“Not what I expected coming over here,” he said.

I swallowed hard, feeling guilty – like a schoolboy caught playing hooky. Like that one time I hadn’t come in from recess in like the first or second grade because I’d been having too much fun and the school had called my parents on me. I tried to keep my smile off my face at the memory. The existential dread of this moment was nothing in comparison to the one I’d felt back then, waiting for my mother or father to arrive at the school.

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