“I can’t see,” I rasped in a voice that should not be heard before I’d had my coffee.
He made a soft noise under his breath, more curious than alarmed. Warm, calloused hands pulled my own away from my eyes and tipped my face up. This would have been the perfect time to study him, but my contacts were so dry, I wouldn’t have been surprised if they were wrinkled over my eyeballs. So to avoid embarrassment, I kept my eyes and mouth shut. No weird expressions, and no morning breath.
Because his very presence meant I wasn’t dead, right?
“Open your eyes,” he commanded.
Covering my mouth with my hand I said, “I don’t think that’s a good idea. I need contact solution.”
“Ah,” this mystery man said like everything made sense. Well, I was glad one of us understood what was going on. “You don’t need contact solution. You need to take your contacts out. You’ve been restored to a perfect state of health.”
“What?” I dropped my hand, then immediately picked it back up. “I’m confused.”
“Are you? You remember me, do you not?” He left but came right back with something that rustled, most likely a small trash can.
My heart, which had been mostly uninterested up until this point, started to pound in an ‘oh shit, maybe that conversation was real’ kind of way. It beat so fast and so furious, it pounded in my ears.
Did I tell him I remembered him and the agreement he extracted from me? Or did I pretend like my body didn’t vibrate with electricity when he kissed me?
That kiss. Never in my life had I experienced anything like the overwhelming energy running through my body at that moment. My fingers, toes, and even my nose had tingled. Was that normal? Did my mystery hero normally go around giving electric kisses to women in need?
Hell, I wasn’t sure what I wanted the answer to that to be, and that frightened me.
I shivered as the vivid memory replayed itself on a loop behind my eyelids.
“Here,” he shook what I was now sure was a trashcan. “Put your contacts in here, and then we can discuss our deal while you eat breakfast.”
Our deal.
Right.
Aware of his nearness, I pushed myself up in the bed. Yep. A bed. My float away eternity in cloudy nirvana was just a bed. So, what did that make my savior? A shiver tickled up my spine, but I suppressed the shudder as I braced the fingers of one hand around my eye and then hesitated.
“Do you mind not hovering?” Yeah. My voice came out in that craptastic rasp again.
“Hovering?” Amusement seemed to linger in that word. Despite the question, he moved away. The blur of him, but not the sense of him. That last part didn’t make any sense. Not much did. It would have to do. I braced my eye open, then pinched the first contact. It itched abominably as I freed it, and the profound relief had my eye tearing. In a hurry to get the other one out, I nearly poked myself in the eye.
After rubbing them vigorously, I stole a look at my rescuer. He stood a few feet away from the bed, his arms folded and his expression—oh, his face. Even through the sheen of tears, he seemed chiseled from stone. Warm. Living. Breathing. Stone.
His eyes captivated me. Pale blue, they burned with a light like they’d been lit from behind. No wonder he kissed like a god. He looked like one, too. Even as I tried to stop staring, I dragged my gaze down to those luscious lips framed by a silky soft beard.
Definitely soft.
It had tickled my cheeks, even as he lit me up with the first touch of his lips, and he’d tasted like…
“Better?” The question jerked my attention back up to his eyes, and I nodded.
“Yes,” I rasped. “Thank you.” I pushed back the covers, realizing that not only was I tucked into the soft bed with its luxurious covers, I was also dressed in a simple shift, the fabric nearly softer than what I’d been lying in.
A shift.
And I didn’t have anything on beneath it.
“Where are my clothes?”
“Burned,” he said. My host? Savior? You know what, Seth worked. Seth hadn’t moved an inch, even the tip of his head was barely perceptible. Yet as impassive as his gaze seemed, he trapped me every time I met his gaze.
And I really didn’t mind, at all.
He burned my clothes.
Okay.
Wait.
“You burned them?” The rasp gave way to a squeak as I shoved the rest of the way out of the bed. I hit my feet at a stumble and had to catch myself as my legs wobbled a second. “Why did you burn them?”
“They were covered in blood.” Reasonable. Maybe. “They’re also from your old life. You don’t need them anymore. Come.” He jerked his head once before he turned and walked away. “You need to eat.”
I staggered a few steps before I stopped again.
Covered in blood.
Old life.
Our deal.
“Seth?”
A long sigh met my call.
“Yes, Dahlia,” he said. “You died.”
“But…”
He returned to the doorway and stared at me. “This would be easier over food.”
“Tell me.” The panic currently clawing its way through my insides to reach my throat was going to erupt in a scream at any moment. That, or I’d wake up in the hospital with a concussion and the terror of a nightmare.
Please.
“You died,” he said. “I’ve only delayed the inevitable. I’ve taken the pain of it. This…this will not last.”
“You said I’d healed to…” Wait, how had he put it? “Restored to full health? No, a perfect state of health. You said perfect state.”
“I did,” he said with a nod. “I also warned you that it would not last.”
He had.
“I’m dead?”
Most people would have said, “I’m sorry,” or “I understand.” They might have given me a sympathetic look or even a wince. Seth? He shrugged.
“Yes. You’re dead. How many times do you need me to repeat it for you to accept it? I am prepared to say it as many times as necessary. But you need to eat. Now.”
“I’m dead.”
Nope.
I pressed two fingers to my throat. The steady thump of my pulse was right there. Well, the racing hammer of it anyway.
Dead.
Another sigh.
“I’m sorry,” I said automatically. The words were meaningless, and I got it—he was in a hurry. “It’s taking me a minute.”
Another urge chose that moment to strike.
Wheeling abruptly, I searched the room and caught the tile visible through another open door, then staggered toward the bathroom. I moved like I was drunk. Or hadn’t used my legs.
Ever.
Restored to perfect health? Right.
“Where are you going?”
I glanced over my shoulder as I braced a hand against the jamb of the open bathroom door. The opulence inside would need to be swooned over later. “I have to pee.” Then I was inside, and I shut the door.
I was dead, and I had to pee.
A little laugh escaped.
Then another.
How could I need to pee when I was dead?
Can I wake up now?
Nope, apparently, this was my new reality. I wobbled and weaved all the way to the toilet to take care of business. When I finished, I faced myself in the mirror, unsure of what I would see. At first, I squinted, ready to jump back out of the line of sight if it scared me.