CHAPTER 26
Naomi stuck like glue to his side the whole drive back to the ranch. Asher knew his wounds were as severe as they were numerous, but they would have been much worse if he didn’t have some of her Breedmate blood inside him.
As bad as his condition was, that thought kept him grounded as he pushed Ned’s old truck to its limit in order to get Naomi and Penny home and safe as quickly as he could. His own needs could wait. After the night they’d just had—and having come too damned close to losing either one of them—he wasn’t taking any chances.
“Is he gonna be okay?” Penny whispered to Naomi as they arrived at the house. “Can vampires die?”
“Asher’s not going to die.” Naomi cupped the girl’s worried face, but turned a solemn look on him in the low lights of the dashboard. “Not as long as I have something to say about it.”
They headed toward the house, Naomi tucking herself under his arm. He didn’t mistake the concern in her careful steps, nor in the steady pound of her heartbeat. Her love for him buoyed him, as much as her petite body wedged tightly against him propped him up as he hobbled onto the porch.
“You have a dog?” Penny’s eyes lit up the instant she spied Sam waiting to greet them. She had a decent-sized knot on the back of her head from Slater’s assault in the elevator, but all of the day’s traumas seemed fleeting for the girl in the face of the old hound’s eager reception. She raced to the screen door ahead of Asher and Naomi. “Look at him, he’s so cute!”
Even Asher had to admit, if begrudgingly, that the dog was a welcome sight after the hellish past few hours. They stepped inside, Asher leaning heavily on Naomi. His blood dripped in multiple puddles on the floor, making Sam whine and tilt his big head at him in wary curiosity.
Naomi gently cupped the girl’s head with her free hand. “Penny, will you do me a favor? Take Sam into the kitchen over there and see if he needs some food or water while I help Asher clean up.”
“Sure. C’mon, Sam!” She headed off, led by the enthusiastic dog who had never met a stranger.
Asher grunted. “She’s resilient.”
“Most kids are,” Naomi said. “That’s the only way they can survive a lot of the time. Right now, I’m most concerned about you.”
She marshalled him into the bathroom and sat him down on the closed toilet. “Sit still,” she commanded him, turning to search the cabinet for a clean washcloth and towels and a pair of scissors, which she used to cut away his blood-soaked, grime-stained T-shirt.
He let her work, telling himself it was simply for the pleasure of watching her tend him, but the truth was he’d taken a lot of hits. The gunshot wounds hadn’t killed him, but they sure as hell would have slowed him down or dropped him if it hadn’t been for her blood, feeding his body the way no amount of human blood ever could.
“You saved me, Naomi.”
She slanted him a glance and shook her head. “Not yet, I haven’t.”
“Yes, you have. When I stopped on that desert road a few nights ago, I thought I was saving you. But I was wrong. It was you who saved me.”
He couldn’t resist reaching out to stroke her black hair, hooking some of the ebony strands behind her ear so he could see her face and watch those tender, almond eyes gaze at him in such focused attention.
And love.
It humbled him to see that emotion directed at him, to feel it pulsing and alive within his bond to her.
“You need blood, Asher.”
“Yes,” he admitted. “But more than that, I just need you.”
He curved his fingers around her nape and drew her close for his kiss. He could have gone on for hours without letting her go, but the worst of his wounds were still bleeding and the arousal making his heart pound even harder wasn’t helping.
“Drink from me,” she urged him, drawing back and gathering her hair away from her neck. “Take all you need.”
God help him, he didn’t have the will to refuse. He sank his fangs into the soft column of her throat and drank, then drank some more. Her blood rejuvenated him instantly, mending torn flesh and muscle, repairing bullet-shattered bone. The rounds embedded in him were pushed out one by one. They clinked against the bathroom tiles as they fell.
On a shivery sigh, Naomi stroked her fingers in his hair and held him close as he gave himself over to the power of her healing, intoxicating red cells. As his body knit back together, desire roared through him.
He wanted her, but not here. Not like this. When he made love to her next, he wanted to do it slowly, reverently. He wanted to make love to her as his mate.
He groaned and swept his tongue over the twin punctures, sealing them closed.
“I need you,” he whispered against her skin, his voice rough with emotion. “Not just in my blood, Naomi. But in my life forever.”
He pulled back and took her face in his palms, his transformed eyes bathing her milky skin in a warm amber glow. “I love you so much. For a few minutes tonight, I didn’t know if I was ever going to be able to tell you that again. When I saw Slater take you up in that elevator and I wasn’t able to reach you in time . . . fuck. I was so afraid I was going to lose you.”
She shook her head, leaning forward to kiss him. “I love you too, Asher. I never want anything to separate us.”
“Nothing will,” he assured her, then blew out a harsh breath. “I was so damn proud of you tonight. Even though it scared me shitless to see you take Slater on the way you did, I was in awe of you, the fact that you don’t run from any challenge. No matter how much I might wish you would.”
She laughed softly, pressing her forehead to his. “I guess I’m a lot like my mom. It’s strange how much I realize that now. I thought she was weak, but Slater’s confession proved just the opposite. She stood up to him. In the end, she took him on too. And he killed her for it.”
Asher cursed, fury flaring in his gut. “I wanted to make him suffer in his final moments.”
“I know,” she whispered. “I saw what you did . . . with your gift.”
He couldn’t deny it. “That was the first time I ever savored a death. Now, every time I think about what he did to you and to Michael, even to your mother, I’ll remember his horror. I’ll remember his hopelessness and I’ll like it.”
“Asher.” She caressed his cheek, her gaze tender. Then she bent her head and began to kiss the patches of his chest and torso that weren’t riddled with mending wounds.
“You’ve healed me, Naomi. In places you can’t see too. But you’ve also ruined me. I never want to know what it’s like to live a day without you in my life.”
She looked up at him. “I’m not going anywhere. This is home. Right here,” she said, lifting her head to kiss his mouth. “And right here.” She placed a kiss to the base of his throat, then another to the center of his chest, where his heart banged strongly behind his sternum. “And right here.”
Asher smirked. “Keep going. I’m all yours.”
She laughed and stood up, taking his hand as she reached into the shower and turned on the water. “Let’s work on the rest of you first. But I definitely want to come back to that idea.”