by Honor James
“You didn’t kill your mother,” he told her honestly as they walked toward the bathroom slowly. “No child born can harm its mother. There is neither the will, the intent, nor the ability. Complications, absolutely, but no child is ever to blame for the death of a mother during birth. Have they ever once blamed you? Would he have named you in her honor had he felt you killed her?” he asked quietly.
“No,” she said with a sigh. “They have never once blamed me for anything. They have never once even held me accountable, but from time to time they would all get this look in their eyes when they spoke Mom’s name, and it was one that ached me to my very soul.”
“Remembrance, treasured memories, thoughts of a time you never got to share in,” he said, pushing the door open. Turning the light on, he eased her into the large room. “They don’t blame you, sweetheart. You are the only one that feels guilt about it. They likely feel guilt because they aren’t sure what to say or how to share the memories without you feeling sad and to blame.” Touching her cheek, he leaned in to kiss her forehead. “I’ll be right outside. If you need me just yell and I’ll be right in.”
“Thank you,” she told him with a grin. “See you in a moment. Can you kinda please close your ears?” Otherwise she would never be able to pee. She was a shy pee-er and wouldn’t be able to use the bathroom if she knew that he would be able to hear her. When he closed the door, she made her way to the toilet and, after a time, was finally able to go.
Chapter Six
Washing her hands, she looked at herself in the mirror. “Holy crap, I look like hell.” She shook her head and began to try to tame her hair. Opening the door, she looked to Allister. “Do you think that you can rustle me up a brush and toothbrush?”
“You look perfect,” he told her, holding up the two items plus toothpaste. “I thought you might want to at least brush your teeth. Drugs tend to leave a nasty pasty feeling in your mouth.” He made a face. “Go ahead and brush your teeth. I’ll help you with your hair.”
“I could just kiss you right about now.” She held up the toothbrush and paste and grinned. “And if you are game for it, I totally will after I’ve brushed my teeth.” Oh yes, a kiss from that big man would definitely put a perk in her step.
Smiling slowly, he nodded. “I think I can manage to kiss you senseless for a minute or ten,” he murmured. Leaning against the doorframe, he watched her as she brushed her teeth. Letting his eyes move over her slowly, he grinned when she caught him. “Just enjoying the lovely view. I have to tell you, you have a really cute ass.” Especially with it sticking out of the gown she had on.
Jackie wiggled her ass for him and shot him a look. “You could always give it a good smack if you want to,” she told him happily. “Just sayin’,” she told him with a wink. After finishing with brushing her teeth, she turned to look at him and cocked her eyebrow. “Well, did you wanna give it a good swat? Did you wanna give it a good smack to feel how nice it might feel for you, or would you like to kiss me, or both?”
“I think that I will cup it as I kiss you,” he murmured softly. Moving closer, he set the brush down and pulled her into his arms. Lowering his head, he kissed her gently, sliding his hands down to cup her ass and hold her up against him.
As he pulled her up and against his body, she felt just how hard he was, all over, and whimpered against his lips. She never whimpered. She didn’t make girly sounds like that, but when she moaned she knew that this man was doing that to her. He was making it all right. Healing her fully. When they pulled back from each other, she looked up at him and whispered. “I can’t wait until I’m feeling well enough to take this far farther than we just went.”
“Me as well,” he murmured, brushing his nose to hers. “But only when you are fully healed,” he said quietly. Setting her down on her feet, Allister stared down at her. “We also have to discuss a few things as well, sugar, before we get any further in the relationship. First though, we are going to brush your hair out and get you tucked back into bed so you can hopefully eat something and then sleep some more.”
“Oh, I could eat something,” she told him with a smile. “I really and truly would love to eat something. Something light would be lovely, but anything would be good.” She was hungry now, starving actually. “I think that I’m already starting to feel more myself, more of the drugs pumping out of me, so that’s an excellent thing actually.”
“I’ll get someone to get you something to eat and while we wait, I’ll brush out your hair,” he said with a smile. “Come on,” he encouraged her, grabbing the IV tower and wheeling it along with her, back to the bed. “Climb on up and get comfortable,” he said, heading to the door to request the food for her.
Climbing up into the bed, she ensured that he had plenty of room there with her and smiled. “I want to feel you close. I very much want to get you to holding me because I rather love it.” And she had a feeling she would love having him brushing her hair and pampering her.
Returning to her, he climbed up behind her and shifted so his legs were on either side of her. Pressing a kiss to her neck as he pulled her hair back, he smiled. “If I tug too hard let me know, sweetheart. I really don’t want to hurt you, love.” He only wanted her to know pleasure and happiness.
“I know. Trust me, with the brothers that I have I’m totally not a tender-headed person.” She had grown up rough-and-tumble, completely. “I’m not a very girly person.” Well, except for her hair. “I have a fairly nice rump, I hope, but I have next to no boobs.” Which was why she had been able to pose as a teenaged girl.
“You have a gorgeous ass and you are shaped just as you should be. You are built how you should be for who you are,” he said, brushing another kiss to her neck. Leaning back slightly, he began to work at the ends, slowly moving up her hair. His brother came in with their food and left without a word but with a suspiciously smug little smirk on his lips. He was up to something but keeping it entirely too quiet for the brasher of the two twins.
Finally she leaned back against him and closed her eyes. When the brush began to run smoothly through her hair, she sighed happily and then, “I really like that a lot. Do you think that now we can eat? Please?” And then he could hold her. That would be wonderful.
“Absolutely,” he said, running the brush through her hair a couple more times just to be sure he’d gotten everything and then quickly braided it and put a tie on the end. Flipping the end over her shoulder, he tossed the brush onto the side table and leaned forward to draw the rolling table in to them. “Eat whatever you want and can, sweetness.”
Seeing the spread that was laid out before her, she grinned. “Goodness gravy, you got me a little of everything, didn’t you?” Reaching out, she took one of the cups of soup and lifted it. It wasn’t until that moment she realized she was still a little shaky, but that was fine. She didn’t mind. Taking a sip, she sighed. “That’s nice.” She looked back at him and smiled. “Thank you, Allister, for combing out my hair and braiding it for me.”
“You are welcome,” he said quietly, pressing a kiss to her cheek. Stealing a sandwich, he took a big bite and chewed while she sipped at the soup. Smiling, he brushed back a few stray hairs from her face. “I have to say, I know a lot about you, including your age, but you have a timeless quality that absolutely transcends age, you know.”
Blushing, she leaned into him and sighed, winking at him then. “I really and truly like that,” she told him happily. “I happen to rather adore you as well. I think that you are truly amazing. I love that you are so big.” And that he made her want to be the girl of a twosome. Odd but true. Granted, relationships weren’t something she did, mostly because no one ever made her feel feminine enough for a relationship, but he did.
Chuckling, he slid his arm around her and gave a light squeeze. “I can’t help how big I am. That’s just good old genetics,” he murmured. “But I have to admit I like how tiny you are, though I do worry I might hurt you and not realize it.”
She sn
orted. “Darling, you won’t hurt me. I know very good and well that no matter what you do, you will not hurt me.” She trusted him on that, one hundred and ten percent. “Besides, I don’t break easily.” At all. She was tough and knew it, most times. Sometimes.
“I hope you’re right, sweetness,” he whispered, still worrying about it, nonetheless. He likely always would. “Eat up. You need the nutrients and calories. It will help clear out the drugs, too.” Or at least he hoped it would.
“Agreed.” She was more than ready to get the drugs pushed out of her system, so it would be very good. “Because I’m ready to get out of this hospital. I seriously hate being in a hospital,” she admitted. “So yes, the sooner I’m out of here the better I am.”
“The happier I will be as well,” he told her. Stroking her cheek gently, he leaned in to press a kiss to the corner of her mouth. “Eat please, and then we will lie down so you can rest some more. Hopefully tomorrow they will allow you to leave and we can figure out where we go from here, little one.”
“Sounds good to me.” She would need to make sure to head her father off at the pass so her boss wasn’t demoted to toilet cleaner or something. “Daddy is really seriously pissed at my boss, isn’t he?” She then frowned. “Shit!” Suddenly she thought of what had been bothering her. “The girls that were there, were they saved?”
“Shh,” he murmured, rubbing her arm lightly. “They have all been rescued. Some are here and others are at another hospital. We’re also working on getting the locations of those sold so we can bring them home, too, and prosecute those that purchased them.” He wasn’t getting into what her father was ranting about doing to her boss. Her boss better just hope he never ran into Allister, because he’d bloody well roast the bastard alive.
“Thank God.” Jackie relaxed against him and let out the breath she had been holding. “That makes me feel so much better, to know that they are actually safe.” She wouldn’t be able to live with herself if she had been saved and those poor girls were still held.
“They are safe, love, I promise,” he assured her quietly. “We’ve also managed to contact a number of their family members. Some we haven’t, but only because they were the ones to sell the girls into l’Aurette’s service, so they too will face prosecution and likely hefty jail times. We have records of the transactions,” he explained at her curious look. “We also have all of l’Aurette’s money, so even if he were somehow to escape us”—which was impossible given where he was—“he’d have nothing to use to get away.”
“You guys wrapped up a sting operation that took us months and months to get embroiled in,” she murmured. “I underwent a surgical procedure just so that the implants could be placed because we knew that they would strip me nude. I have a tracker between my toes, the comms unit at my throat, and a device in my ear. Yep, I think that I’m totally jealous of you boys.”
Shrugging, he held her closer to him. “We’re just that good,” he said without bragging in the least. Having undertaken many similar operations, they’d had a lot of practice, so they were really that good. “Eat,” he ordered a little more gruffly. “No more talking until you put some of this food away.”
“Aye-aye, Popeye!” she said and saluted him. Winking at him to show him she was teasing, she continued to drink the soup she had lifted to her lips and moved from that to one of the sandwiches. After putting away one bowl of soup and one sandwich as well as two bottles of water, she was drooping. Yawning, she leaned against him. “I think I’m ready for sleep now.”
Considering how she was leaning against him, practically draped over him, he had to agree. Pushing the table away, he shifted out from behind her and helped her to lie down without getting tangled up in the IV line. Hitting the lights, he joined her and drew her in closer to him. “Then sleep, Jackie. Tomorrow is a whole new day and you need to be rested for it.”
“Tomorrow is going to be a good day.” She yawned and nuzzled her lips against the side of his neck again. When he asked her why, she smiled. “Because I’m getting out of here and either you are going to come home with me or I’m coming home with you, but one way or another I really don’t think I’m ready to give you up yet.”
Completely relieved to hear her say that, he hugged her to him. “I’m never giving you up, sweetheart, not now, tomorrow, or anytime in our future.” She was his, and he’d convince her of it, too, hopefully. Closing his eyes, he rubbed his cheek to her hair. “Sleep, love. We’ll talk tomorrow.”
“I’m totally holding you to that, Allister,” she murmured happily and, curled against him as happy as a kitten, dropped off to sleep.
Chapter Seven
“Oh, you had better believe that you are releasing me today,” Jackie shot back at the young intern. “So get the paperwork ready. AMA all the way if that’s the case, but I’m leaving.” She had her father’s stubbornness sometimes, and now was one of those times. “I want to go home. Since it was just now told to me, from your own lips, that the drugs have cleared my system, I’m leaving. Period.” She paused and then, just because Allister wasn’t in the room, tacked on, “Don’t make me get Al after you. He would fry you up like barbecue and serve you with potato salad.” Well, not really, but it was the first thing that popped into her mind.
Snickering outside the door, Aiden waved over Mac and murmured what he’d just overheard. Stepping back, he smiled at the nurse that came bursting out squeaking away on her seriously rubber-soled shoes, and he shook his head. Sticking his head into the room, he caught Jackie’s eye and gave her two thumbs up and a little golf clap before resuming his post.
Well, that was just plain odd. Tugging the IV free herself, she wrapped it all up so that it didn’t make a mess and dug a bandage from the white cabinet under the TV. With her ass flapping to the wind, she opened the door and looked out. “And just what, pray tell, was the two thumbs up about? You aren’t Al. Who the hell are you?” She had realized that moment that this man looked just like her Allister, down to the same scar on their eyebrows, but this one was not her man.
“Aiden, his twin.” He grinned at her and eyed her up and down. “Does Allister know you’re showing your perky little ass off to the entire Marine Corps?” he asked, his smile growing wider as she whipped the gown shut on her rump. “And I was just applauding you taking nurse Ratchet there down a few notches. Snarky female has been trying to get us all tossed out on our asses since she came on duty, because apparently no one is that important to actually need guards of any sort inside the hospital. Hell, I thought she was going to give your father an aneurysm when they went toe-to-toe. If not for Bulldog, I’m pretty sure he would have broken the golden rule and decked the woman.”
“Yeah, she’s a Class-A power monger, and holy hell, help the ones that dare to take her power from her. She’s one of those people who totally wants to only assert her power, and it’s pissing her off like fucking crazy that there are a bunch of men here who could give a good hairy hot damn what she thinks that she is.” Holding out the hand that wasn’t holding her gown in place, she smiled. “Jackie. Nice to meet you, Aiden. So.” She leaned against the door. “You like to jerk Al’s chain from time to time, too, huh?”
Shaking her hand, he grinned and shrugged. “Now and again,” he said. Glaring at Mac when he snorted, he rolled his eyes. “He is my brother after all, so I get a sick and decidedly twisted pleasure out of yanking his chain. He’s a little stuffy, which often has made me question how we came from the same egg, but there’s no denying it. Of course I am the more handsome.” He smiled at her.
Jackie made a show out of looking at him. Frowning, she said, “Turn around.” At his look, she shrugged. “If I’m supposed to judge who’s the more handsome one, I need to see your ass, too, darlin’, because I have got to tell you…” She shivered, gooseflesh rising as she thought of Allister. “Al has the best ass that has ever been created in life and time.”
Mac sounded like he was having seizures as he muffled his laughs. Narrowing hi
s eyes on her, Aiden eyed her up. “You pinch or smack me, I will reciprocate. You’ve been warned,” he said and turned to show her his ass. “Oh for the love of the Gods, Mac, go away, geez,” he said as the other male bent over double, howling in laughter as he turned back around for the verdict.
“Meh,” Jackie said and held her hand out doing the “so-so” movement. “Sorry, Ai, but I have got to tell you.” She licked her lips. “Al definitely has the best ass ever. He’s also the more handsome of the two of you because his eyes dance in intelligence and yours in mischief. Not that it’s bad, just I really, really love intelligence in a man.”
He punched Mac’s arm hard. The asshole was laughing so hard he was wheezing. He smiled as his friend fell over and didn’t move since he was having a hard time breathing through his laughter. “That’s fine. You’re his bond-mate. You’re biased.” He shook his head. “And he is smart,” he said softly to her, more serious. “But he’s also too serious sometimes,” he said quietly. “You’re his bond-mate, Jackie. Make sure he smiles now and again, will you?”
“Always,” she assured the man. “Mostly because I happen to really love it when he smiles. I love the way he simply lights up and the feeling of joy that all but radiates off of him. Yep, no worries, Ai. I will do everything in my power to make him smile and make him happy.” Leaning against the doorjamb again, she shot back, “So how did you know he had mated with me?” She didn’t know what the fuck she was talking about, but that term “bond-mate” had stuck out like a sore thumb, and she was curious what Aiden would spill since Allister wasn’t giving her jack shit on explaining the intense feelings they shared.
“Uh-huh, darling, I know he hasn’t yet had the talk with you, and since you’ve been in the hospital he hasn’t actually consummated the mating yet. That will come after he gets you alone and is assured in his own mind you are fully healed to his way of thinking,” Aiden told her. “And it’s Aiden, darling. Don’t go giving those of us that actually like our names and respect our parents enough to use them properly nicknames. It’s unnecessary and an insult to our heritage,” he said softly.
