Page 19 of Red

He bit at his bottom lip and turned to crawl into bed.

Fecking idiot. “I’ll just go and close things up, shall I? Sure you don’t need anything?”

“I’m good.”

“Right. Be back. Soon.” And I scurried out of the bedroom and into the kitchen, where I spent another long spate of time trying to settle my heart.

He was lost. He was hurt. He was alone. He needed me, and I was selfishly and wholeheartedly living for it.

I couldn’t change it. But I could take a few deep breaths and be the man he needed right now. Just for tonight. And if it meant I got to stay closer to him, longer… surely there was no harm in it, even if I wasn’t the hero he thought I was.

After I put out all the lights and the fire, I slipped back into the bedroom, took off my shirt, and hung it on the back of the door as I closed it. The thick curtains blocked out the moonlight, so only the dull flicker of the fire in the little stove lit the dark room. Red was on his back, his arms on top of the quilt, the rest of him buried beneath it. His eyes were shut.

When I crawled into bed, they snapped open, and he said, “I’m sorry if I’m making it weird. I don’t mean to—I’m not usually much of a flirt. But…”

“No. Me neither. But I can’t seem to help it just now,” I admitted.

“Are you flirting?” he asked, voice rising in something like alarm.

Somehow, it made me burst out laughing. “Yes. Or I—think I’m trying to.”

“You’re terrible at it,” he told me.

“I thought so.” But it only made me laugh harder, and the sensation was like hot sunlight melting a long frost. My sense of inadequacy quieted.

He chuckled too, then groaned and clutched at his side. “Ugh, don’t make me laugh!”

“Sorry; sorry.”

“You’re fucking gorgeous, Jack.”

My breath caught audibly in my throat.

“I’d rather drop dead than make you uncomfortable. And not because I owe you my life, either,” he said.

“No. I’m not—I’m not uncomfortable. I mean, I am, but mostly with myself.”

Red blew out a sigh.

“Not because I don’t—but because I do. I do think you’re—you’re lovely. And I’d like to—but you’re scared. And I want to be safe. That’s the thing I want most, more than—more than I want anything else. Which is saying something.” Because gods, I wanted him. Every inch of me, from my hair down to my toes and back up to my fingernails, wanted to wrap him up and kiss him until I couldn’t breathe. And I hadn’t felt that way in so long, and I hadn’t been this close to anyone in almost as long, as long as I’d been in this forest, and—

“You are safe. I know that, now. I don’t know what the fuck is going on with anything else, but I know you’re safe,” he murmured, then shifted onto his left side to face me.

I doubted he’d still think that if he knew just how indifferent I’d been all these long years, but I hadn’t the heart to challenge him. I rolled onto my right, met his gaze. And we both smiled.

He scooted nearer, wincing at the pain of moving, and buried his face in my neck. I wanted to pull him closer, to wrap my arm around his little waist and hold him as tight as I could. But he was in pain, and I just wanted him to feel better; so instead, I settled a hand on his hip, like I had last night, and slipped my other arm beneath his head. I trailed my fingertips down his spine, the sensation of his skin against mine, of his hot breath on my neck, magic. Magic like what I felt in my fingers and toes when the natural world bent and shaped itself for me.

“I am scared, though,” he murmured.

My heart hammered against my ribs so hard, I was sure he could hear it. “I know.” How could he not be?

After a few moments, he whispered, “I didn’t come here to find Amma and bring her snacks. I came here because I was scared. Long before I ended up in your forest.”

I ran my fingertip up the ridge of his spine and then back down again, wondering at the sensation. “Most people would think this place is scarier than where you came from.”

“Maybe it is. I didn’t come to find this place, though. She’s all I have.”

And then, I thought I understood: She was safe. For me, it was this house, this forest, my axe, my hearth. But before then, for a brief moment in time, it had been Ma Greenwood. And before that, nothing, no one, though I’d ached for it. I recognized the shape of that longing, even if it’d been asleep for as long as the rest of my humanity.