Page 138 of The Bones in the Yard

I swallowed. “Okay,” I repeated.

“Can I have some pants now?” he asked gently.

Since all he’d brought were the jeans in the washer, we put him in a pair of my sweats, which I rolled up so he wouldn’t trip on the legs. We sat on the couch, Taavi with the usual one leg tucked up, so that I could carefully wrap his arm in gauze, then tape.

“Taavi?” I ripped off a strip of tape, then carefully wrapped it around his forearm, careful not to cut off circulation.

“Yeah?”

“Why doesn’t shifting reshape your bones?”

“It does, but not fully. It doesn’t reformthem. It stretches them, or compacts them. But, sadly, it doesn’thealthem.”

“Does it hurt more when you shift?” I ripped off another strip of tape.

He didn’t answer me, which was answer enough.

“You didn’t have to shift to protect me,” I pointed out. Not because I had to assert my masculinity or some stupid dominance shit, but because I never wanted him to get hurt trying to protect my stupid ass. Especially if I didn’t need it.

“We don’t know that,” he replied, calm as I wrapped another strip over his arm, even though what I was doing had to hurt at least a little.

It was annoying that he was right. We didn’t know that. All we knew was that nothing had happened—but if he hadn’t shifted and backed me up, growling and baring his surprisingly long teeth, maybe it would have.

“I’ve gotten myself out of worse,” I pointed out.

“The riot? Or the gun in your face?” he asked, a bit of an edge to his voice.

“Aside from those.”

He sighed. “Val, you’re not a cop anymore.”

“I know. But—”

“You don’t have to confront people like that.”

I almost saidI knowagain. “Actually, yeah, I do.”

Taavi narrowed his mismatched eyes, and I swore I could hear a soft, low growl, but I wasn’t sure.

I sighed, wrapping another strip of tape. “It’s not that IthinkI need to,” I clarified, trying to sound like the reasonable person I probably wasn’t. “I just—do. Call it habit or instinct or a fucking death wish if you want, but I don’t think about it.” I looked up, meeting his gaze. “Any more than you thought about leading that car away from the kids at AAYC.”

His lashes dropped down over his eyes, and he sighed. “I get that,” he murmured, his voice soft and sad.

“But?” I prompted.

“I don’t like it.”

“And I don’t like you getting hit by a truck, either,” I replied. “So here we are.” I finished with the tape, then began to wrap the ace bandage around it for padding and stability.

“Val?” he asked after a few moments of me wrapping.

“Yeah?”

“Are you still gonna make me pizza?”

I laughed. “Yeah, I’ll still make us pizza.”

21

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