Page 36 of Vallaverse: Twist
“You can.”
“Youcan't,” he argues.
“Don't tell me what I can't do, Lazarus. You're coming home with me as soon as you're released, and I will take care of you.”
He blinks but doesn't look at me. “Why?”
“Because you're mine,” I declare. “You're fucking mine. From now on, I take care of you. I protect you. I love you. You are fucking mine.”
His wide, watery eyes pin me, then he reaches up to touch his shoulder. “You...”
“I did what I needed to do to save you. And before you get all pissy about it, I should have done it a long time ago. If I had, you wouldn't be in a goddamned hospital bed right now, and I wouldn't have spent the past decade in hell.”
“You marked me,” he says wistfully. “You marked me, Brooks. Do you know what this means?”
“Yes,” I say bluntly, cupping his jaw.
He shakes his head but leans into my touch. “You don't understand. She'll come for me. She said she would. She'll send people. You're not safe. She'll—“
I lift my other hand to frame his face, putting just a touch of warm pressure. “Stop. She won't do anything. Not to me and not to you. I won't allow it.”
“You can't protect me from everything, Brooks.”
“Try me,” I snarl, trying desperately to scale back the sudden aggression surging through me at the pure and frantic terror pouring through our bond. “I will protect you, Laz. Never doubt that.”
“Who will protect you?”
I smile and hope the warmth reaches my eyes. “You will, of course.”
“You're crazy.”
“Absolutely.”
***
They let Laz go home four days later. He's getting better little by little every day. He's still sick, but that's to be expected. There was a two-day debate on whether it would be better to fly him home or to drive him back. Both have significant risk. A flight would be shorter, but when Laz gets sick, he getssick. He's nauseous to the point of vomiting and weak to the point of fainting, and he shakes constantly. I know there are other, more private, symptoms that he is experiencing due to his body learning to exist without the presence of the chemicals he's put into it for years, but I'm only focusing on the things I can see and help him with right now. If something terrible were to happen when we're in the air, I would have no choice but to sit and watch it happen until we could land. And then there would be a drive to the nearest hospital. That's unacceptable.
On the other hand, the drive is long. Very long. Several days of travel without stopping at hotels along the way. Laz has mentioned and demonstrated an intense aversion to ever stepping foot into another hotel again. I tried to make a joke about what we'll do when we go on vacations, but it fell flat with both Laz and the nurse who was there for the conversation.
I've left it up to Laz, and he's going to choose the flight. I've already tasked Mrs. Richards with hiring a complete medical staff to be at our mercy, so paying a couple of nurses who know their business to fly with us is nothing. Mrs. Richards also has the authority to sign off on whatever medical equipment he might need, which isn't really anything. What Laz needs more than anything is time and rest. We'll have medications for when he gets too sick to handle it on his own, but that should be short-lived. He just needs time to heal.
The sun is shining hot and bright the day he's released, and the trip from the hospital to the airport is spent with Laz's head in my lap. He couldn't bear the glaring sunshine or watching thecity pass by the window while I ran my fingers through his hair and purred for him the whole way.
After we get boarded and we're waiting for takeoff, Laz grabs my hand. At first I think it's because he's nervous about flying, but that isn't it.
“You're angry,” he says quietly. “I can feel it.”
I nod. I am angry. I might not be acting on it right now, but I am incredibly angry. “Yes.”
“I'm sorry. I don't want to be a burden. I don't want you to feel like you have to take me. We can have it removed. It's okay.”
I turn to him, giving him the full scope of my reaction to what he just had the nerve to say to me. “I would hope that you think more of me than that, Lazarus. I am angry, but if you so much as breathe a word suggesting the removal of my mark ever again, I will handle it poorly. Very poorly. You are not a burden, and even if you were, you aremyburden. I will take care of you because you are mine to take care of. My anger isn't for you.”
“If it isn't about me, then what? Because I don't know how to navigate this feeling. All of these feelings. Mine, yours, a mixture of both. It's too much, and I don't know what to do. How can I help you?”
I take a breath and link our hands together on the armrest. “You're doing it.”
He spends the majority of the flight sleeping, and I spend the whole of it thinking. I will learn to control my emotions a little better. Laz doesn't need my rage complicating his recovery. But I can't stop the anger. I can control it for him, but one thing is absolute.
