Page 49 of Sinner's Sacrifice

He waited, hoping something would come to him, but finally had to admit defeat to this, at least. “I have no idea what to say that will make you less angry with me.”

She blinked. Then a sliver of a smile tilted up one corner of her mouth. “That is the first thing that makes any sense to me in the last couple of hours.” She shook her head. “I thought you were going to rip that doctor’s head right off his shoulders when he said he had to touch me.”

He didn’t want to remember the blindingly hot rage that came over him at that moment. “I may have thought about it.”

Instead of poking him with her finger, she laid her palm on his chest and patted him a couple of times. “Like I said, he was only doing his job.” She patted him again. “And like I said, I got hurt because I made a mistake, too. I’m paying for it now, but it was still me who screwed up in the first place.”

“I don’t care who screwed up. You are not to get hurt.”

Her expression turned wry. “Getting hurt is part of living. We all have to deal with pain, things going wrong, and shitty stuff in life. I admit today was pretty extreme. I mean, I never planned to confront a serial killer and then nearly get killed myself, but...” she came to a stop then chuckled. “Wow, it sounds so much worse out loud than it did in my head.”

His guts twisted up into more knots. Twisted and twisted until he wasn’t sure he was even breathing anymore.

Sam patted his chest again. “Okay, let’s get me wrapped up. I’ve got something good for that in my first aid stuff.” She walked into her room and bent down to open a large, zippered duffel bag. As soon as she did, she groaned and wrapped her arm around her middle.

Yvgeny was moving before he made the conscious decision to do it. “Sit on the bed,” he said, picking up the duffel and bringing it over to put it on the floor. He crouched next to her and asked, “What does it look like?”

“Um, it’s a roll of white stuff that looks like a cross between fabric and tape. About four inches wide.”

He dug through a layer of large square bandages and found what she described. He pulled out a roll and held it up.

“Yup, that’s it.” She began removing her shirt again. “It’s easy to use since one side of it adheres to the other, kind of like Velcro,” she said as she took her shirt off, leaving her sitting there with only a bra covering her breasts. It wasn’t fancy, rather, simple and beige, but he couldn’t take his eyes off it.

Then the bruise underneath caught his gaze. The color had changed already from the last time he’d seen it. Becoming darker blue and black in some places. It was larger, too.

She stopped talking to watch him with a wary gaze. He’d scared her more than once today and he didn’t like seeing the caution on her face.

He slowly and carefully put his hand on the bruise. When she didn’t wince or complain, he kept it there.

That whole area was hotter than the rest of her skin. Her body was already working to repair itself.

But not as fast as his would. If he’d suffered the same injury, his body would have healed it in minutes. Hers would take weeks.

He’d lived through the Sleeping Sickness. Survived countless battles. Mourned the deaths of many friends and had never felt so helpless as he did now.

“What can I do to help?”

“There should be some single use packets of over-the-counter pain medication in the bag. Grab me a couple of doses, please.”

He found them, pulled them out, and handed them to her.

“A glass of water, please?”

He retreated to his kitchen, took a glass from the cupboard, filled it with water, and returned to the bedroom.

She swallowed her pills with a sip of water, then put the glass down. “I need your help with wrapping my ribs.” She opened the packet and unrolled a couple of feet of the wrap. She scooted to the very edge of the bed, then straightened her posture with a grimace. She put the leading edge of the wrap at the mid-point of her torso, right under her breasts.

She held out the roll of wrap to him.

He took it reluctantly. God damn it, he wanted to help, but he also didn’t want to cause her any further pain. “Will this hurt you?”

Her gaze sharpened on his face, then tilted to one side. “No, I’ll be a little uncomfortable, but that’s unavoidable. The wrap will help support not only my bruised ribs but also help to keep my posture correct and prevent further injury.”

Relief spread through him like a warm tide. “Okay,” he said, moving closer and taking the roll from her hand. “That is acceptable.”

She held the end against her chest while he carefully unrolled the wrap as he went around her body.

“It needs to be tight to do its job,” she said. “Pull it until I say stop.”