Page 80 of Senseless
“I trust you too, you know.” She placed a soft kiss on the bridge of my nose. “I’d love to see you start trusting yourself.”
“It’s not about that.”
“Yes it is, love.” Her mouth skimmed up my face to kiss the scar cutting through my eyelid. “You’re more in control than you realize.”
It was going to happen sooner or later. This leap of faith, this trust I was putting into myself to not harm the woman I loved. I already had a sneaking suspicion that Doc’s colleague would just confirm what he’d already told me. The idea of talking to another doctor was a safety precaution more than anything. I trusted Doc and Mari more than any other medical professional anyway.
Mari believed in me, and she was usually right.
Still, it took a long while and an enormous effort to nod my head and breathe out, “Okay.”
Her grin was brighter than the fire and she kissed me again. “Don’t worry. Just think about that motorcycle you brought back to life.”
“I’m going to think of that and a million other things,” I admitted. “Because I won’t be able to let myself sleep.”
Mari’s lips drifted up to my forehead. “Try to get a little rest for me. I need you sharp tomorrow.”
“I’ll try.” My eyelids did feel heavy. Her uncanny ability to calm me, plus the heat from the fire, started lulling me into relaxation.
Without another word, Mari unzipped the sleeping bag and we both slid inside.
I woke with a start,like I always did. The familiar jolt of panic flashed through me as I looked around to assess the damage I’d surely caused in my sleep.
But there was none.
I was still zipped snugly into the sleeping bag, Mari bundled up against me with her face in my chest.
“Good morning,” she mumbled, jostled awake by all my moving around.
“Morning, sorry to wake you.” I smoothed a hand over her hair, overwhelmed by the sheer relief that she was still here, safe and unharmed. Withme.
“S’okay. We gotta get moving, right?” Mari yawned and groaned as she stretched within the confines of the sleeping bag. “Do you have coffee?”
She was speaking so casually, but this was huge for me. I tilted her mouth to mine, enamored with the taste of her despite the slight dryness to her lips in that moment.
“I did it,” I whispered. “I just…slept. With you right here. Without…usinganything.”
Mari smiled, sleepiness pulling her mouth in an adorable, crooked way. “I knew you would.”
My mouth pressed to hers, tongue licking out to seek more of her taste. “You have no idea what this means,” I choked out with a laugh. “Fuck, I love you so much.”
“I love you so much.” Her fingers rubbed over my beard, which was growing coarse and longer than I preferred, but she seemed to enjoy touching it. “And this means you’ve suffered enough. You’ve worked your ass off to heal, and now it’s paying off.”
“And it’ll be even better once we’re home.” I still had some lingering doubts that all would be well once we stepped into Four Corners, but as long as I had Mari with me, I didn’t care what the outcome with the Steel Demons would be.
“Not much longer.” Mari started unzipping the sleeping bag as she sat up, the furrow of concern returning to her eyebrows. “Although I guess that depends on what we find in Jerriton today.”
“We’ll make it through.” I rolled up behind her, hooking an arm around her waist and dropping a kiss to her shoulder. “We snuck into Blakeworth, after all.”
“Ugh. If one of us has to play slave again, I will scream.”
After coffee and a quick breakfast we hit the road again, or the terrain, rather. We didn’t find a road until the sun was high, and I think we were both grateful for a smoother ride again.
Horus offered no confirming or dissenting advice about our change in direction, but we could see him soaring high above us as we rode. I could only hope the gods were invested in our wellbeing enough to not lead us straight to our deaths. Freyja certainly seemed to be, but Mari only had the sky god with her on this trip to find me. Last night was the first I’d seen Horus offer his sight to anyone but Gunner. I didn’t know it could be done with anyone else, but there was probably plenty I didn’t know about our companion gods.
A few miles outside of the last known border, which had been the Colorado state line, I pulled over to the side of the road and turned to Mari in my seat.
“We’re a couple miles out of Jerriton. Can you see anything through the bird?”
