Page 92 of Carnal: The Beast Who Loved Me

She was staring at the window, watching the light show made by the storm, when a soft knock turned her head toward the door. “Yes?”

Charming opened the door a few inches and pantomimed asking to enter. She nodded and scooted over so he could sit on the bed.

She could see that his hair was damp and surmised that he’d gotten caught in the rain then changed to dry clothes.

“How did she take it?” Rosie asked.

“She tried really hard not to cry, but she was doubled over like she was in so much pain.” He shook his head and looked away. “I hated being the messenger.”

Rosie sat up and scooted back against the white French provincial headboard she’d substituted for Carnal’s roughhewn bed. “Should I go to her? Do you think it might help if I was with her?”

Charming looked a little surprised. “You close with Dandy?”

“Yeah. At least I think so. She’s the best friend I’ve ever had.”

“Hey. What about me?”

With a slight rolling of eyes, Rosie said, “The bestfemalefriend. How are your parents?”

“You know, the only difference between today and any other day is that today they’re letting their feelings show more. They’ve been grieving for him every hour of every day since he was taken.” He sighed deeply. “But I didn’t come to talk about Dandy or my parents. I came to talk about Carnal.”

“What about him?” When he hesitated, she prompted, “Charming.”

“I know I warned you off him, but I didn’t know you were… He’s different with you.Reallydifferent. I guess I just wanted to say something about the way he left tonight. Carnal and Crave were closer together in age. They were tight as leggings. Always together and, when they were, a legion wouldn’t take the two of them on.

“Carnal had a really hard time when Crave was taken. He wasn’t anywhere near where it happened. Crave was fighting in a different part of the city with his own crew. The way the Rautt raid, they try to create distractions so that those who aren’t fighting can grab stuff. They’d rather steal from humans than learn to make what they need. Or trade for it.

“For the first year, anytime Crave’s name came up, Carnal would just say, ‘I should have been there,’ and then walk out. That wasn’t right. Not at all. But he took it on himself like it was his fault that Crave… Well, he was in bad shape and we were all worried about him for a long time.

“Anyway, it’s way hard when your family has tohopethat somebody is dead for fear of what’s happening to them if they’re alive. Getting that box, well, we don’t know how to feel. Should we be happy that he’s alive? Or horrified that he’s been living as a Rautt captive all this time? I think this just opened up a big gaping hole in Carnal’s middle. He probably doesn’t have any idea where to begin sorting out his feelings. You know what I mean?”

Rosie nodded, impressed with Charming’s insights, and grateful that he thought to share with her. “You’re a wise man wearing a kid’s body for a disguise.”

He raised an eyebrow. “Hey. This is no kid’s body.” He pointed at himself with two index fingers. “If you weren’t Carnal’s, I’d show you thewisdomof that.” He grinned.

She cocked her head to the side, an unconscious mannerism she’d picked up from the Exiled. “You think I’m Carnal’s?”

Charming laughed quietly. “Everybody thinks you’re Carnal’s, Rosie. Don’t be thinking anybody else will be sniffing you up. You’re his. Oddly enough, and this is the part I wasn’t expecting, I think he’s yours, too. The way he looks at you…” Charming didn’t finish, but let the partial sentence hang in the air. “Okay. I’m heading up. Can you believe this rain?” Rosie looked toward the window. “We get little showers often enough to grow things, but we don’t get torrents like this. Even the wasteland is getting wet and that’s never happened in my whole life! See you tomorrow.”

“Yep.”

He closed the door quietly.

Sometime between worrying about Carnal and listening to the rain pelt the window, she dozed off and had unsettling dreams. In her sleep she saw Carnal standing in the driving rain, soaked to the marrow, just looking up at the sky like he was defying weather to touch him. Then he was standing by her bed, calling her name.

“Rosie.” She turned her head away from the window and toward the door just as a lightning flash outlined Carnal’s form. He was wearing soft weave pants and nothing else. “Permission to touch.”

She looked at the man standing beside her bed for a few heartbeats while she shook away sleep and disturbing dreams, considering the pain evident in Carnal’s voice, all that Charming had said, and her own feelings. His posture made him look lost and, even though she couldn’t make out his features in the darkness, she knew to her bones that he was vulnerable and in anguish. That’s when she realized that Charming was right. Carnal was hers. She wasn’t sure how or when it had happened, but she didn’t care.

She moved over and opened her arms. When Carnal climbed on the bed to lie beside her, she felt his damp hair and wondered if he actually had been standing in the rain, like the vision she’d seen in her dream. When he rested his head on her breast, a feeling of completeness settled over her bringing both peace and purpose. She hadn’t known there was a vacuum waiting to be filled until she felt her heart respond to the simple, but immeasurable pleasure of being needed.

As he settled his head, and slid his heavy arm over her waist, she said, “Are you okay?”

He turned his face toward her neck. “No,” he said, but after a couple of seconds he decided to amend that. “I don’t know. It feels better with you.”

He felt her nod in response. Carnal appreciated that about Rosie. She didn’t feel like she had to fill the air with meaningless words when there was nothing to say.

They lay together in peaceful contentment, listening to the rain, experiencing the warmth and comfort of each other at rest. Carnal felt Rosie’s heartbeat where his right cheek was pressed over her heart. When his left hand skimmed down her body, he felt as well as heard her heartrate speed up. And that was more erotic to him than previous experience.

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