“Yes, it will.” Uncurling her hands, she let them fall to her sides and did her best to appear normal.

Roland’s jaw clenched as he released her and took a step back. “Don’t make me regret being honest with you, Sarah.”

Clearly he wasn’t buying it. “You said it hurts you when you heal, that you absorb both the wound and the pain.”

“It is fleeting!” he practically shouted. “Do you have any idea how much pain I have suffered over the centuries?”

“Yes, and I don’t want to be the source of any more,” she insisted.

He started to respond, then clamped his lips shut. Silence filled the kitchen as he visibly wrestled with his temper. “Is that the true reason you don’t want me to heal you? Or is there another?”

She frowned. What other reason could there be?

Before she could ask, he turned and strode, fuming, from the room.

Nietzsche, seated beside his now-empty bowl, gave her a condemning look, then began to groom himself.

She was still standing there, unconsciously staring at the cat, when Marcus poked his head in a few minutes later.

He took one look at her face and sighed. “That’s what I thought.” He entered the kitchen, his upper body bare, one hand holding a sheet wrapped around his waist. Pink scars that only hours ago had been open cuts marred the muscles of his chest, abdomen, and arms. “Here’s the thing,” he said. “When you reject Roland’s gift, you’re rejecting him.”

How did he know …?

Dread filled her. “How much did you hear?”

He smiled. “Enough. Sorry about that. Couldn’t help it.”

Heat flooded her face. She had forgotten about their hyper-acute hearing. “I’m not rejecting his gift,” she said, trying not to think about the heavy breathing and moaning he must have heard.

“That probably isn’t how he sees it.” Coming closer, he leaned against the cabinets beside her. “Look, we immortals tend to be a little … sensitive about our gifts. Every one of us has been feared, ostracized, or even abused because of them in the past. And not just by strangers. If you let Roland touch you to bring you pleasure”—her flush deepened—“but don’t let him touch you to heal you with his gift, what else is he supposed to think but that that part of him repels you?”

She threw her hands up. “That I don’t want to hurt him!” Why was that so hard for them to understand?

He snorted. “Sarah, the vampire who transformed Roland didn’t just feed on him, he tortured him. For months.” Roland had left out that part of the story. “In comparison, healing whatever wounds you have would hurt him about as much as removing a splinter. And the pain would be just as fleeting since he’s at full strength and your wounds aren’t life-threatening.”

She eyed him uncertainly, thinking he must be exaggerating the part about it being so painless, but …

Did Roland really think that part of him repelled her?

“Besides,” Marcus added, “healing you will bring him peace. I could feel his concern for you all the way from the guest room and I’m not even an empath.”

She thought about it a moment longer, her back still screaming at her.

When you reject Roland’s gift, you’re rejecting him.

Nodding slowly, she touched Marcus’s arm in a brief gesture of thanks, then left the kitchen.

Steaming water flowed into the whirlpool tub with a dim roar as Roland stood in the bathroom, a packet of herbs forgotten in one hand. Since Sarah had refused to let him heal her, he had intended to run a bath for her that would soothe her aches and bruises. But that may not be necessary now.

Bending, he turned off the tap, tossed the herbs onto the counter, and crossed to the doorway.

Sarah stood in the center of the bedroom, looking uncertain, apologetic, and pained. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean … I don’t want you to think I …” She looked away, brow furrowing, then met his gaze once more. “Would you please heal my back, Roland?”

“Of course,” he said, heart pounding as he strode toward her, not stopping until they nearly touched.

She had to tilt her head way back to look up at him. “I wasn’t rejecting you,” she said earnestly. “I just didn’t want to cause you pain.”

“Knowing you’re suffering pains me more than healing your wounds would.”

She nodded, swallowing. “Would you help me remove my shirt?”

He stayed her hands when she reached for the hem. “Let me close the door.” He didn’t want Marcus to catch a glimpse of her on his way back to the guest room.

When the door was closed and ensured their privacy, he rejoined her and reached for the hem of her T-shirt.

Raising her arms, she winced and bit her lip, holding her breath until he had dragged the shirt over her head and she could lower them again.

Ignoring her bountiful breasts, barely covered in black lace, Roland tossed the shirt aside and examined the pale bruises forming on her chest that she had failed to mention.

“These don’t hurt that much,” she said, following his gaze. “In the front, my arms caught the brunt of it and you healed them when you healed my cuts.”

Remaining silent, he circled behind her so he could view the damage there, then swore foully. A bruise the width of his fist, already livid against her pale, pale skin, crossed her back from lower shoulder blade to shoulder blade. Narrower strips of bruises crisscrossed it. Still others polka-dotted the flesh in between, giving the illusion that she had been beaten, whipped, and stoned all at once.

His gaze dipped down to her bottom and beyond. “Is this all of it?” he asked grimly.

There was the slightest hesitation. “No, I pretty much hurt all over. Except for my hands.”

Reaching around her, he unbuttoned, then unzipped, her jeans.

He heard her heart begin to pound a rapid rhythm as he tucked his thumbs in the sides and drew them down her legs. Her hand came to rest on his shoulder as she stepped out of them and kicked them aside.

Roland knelt there for a moment, fighting down the arousal that had never left him. Her body was all that he had known it would be. Slender. Toned. Muscles causing gentle ripples. Her hips were full, not boyishly skinny like so many actresses’ hips were, and—with her breasts—formed a perfect hourglass. Her bottom was round and firm and, beneath her black bikini panties, probably just as bruised as the rest of her. Had it not been, he might have leaned forward and sunk his teeth in for a love bite.

Roland shook himself and shifted his focus to healing her. Wrapping his hands around one delicate ankle, he summoned the energy within him and felt heat blossom in his palms, then suffuse her skin, mending tissue and withdrawing pain. Up her calf and shin he slowly trailed them, over her knee to her thigh. The higher they climbed, the faster her heart beat.

Stopping just short of the panties, still damp from their love play, he began again at the other ankle. Her skin was velvety smooth, tempting him to linger, feeding the need that still rode him.

When both legs were healed, the pain and blotchy bruising erased, he fingered the top edge of her panties, then peeked at the bottom beneath. She was bruised there, too. Sarah offered no protest as he stood and slipped his hands beneath the scrap of fabric to cup her succulent flesh. He saw her throat work as she swallowed, her eyelids fluttering closed.

Energy sizzled, passed from him into her, imbued her with warmth, then returned to him carrying her pain. Marcus hadn’t lied. Roland barely felt it, an ache he easily dismissed until he worked his way up her back to the place where it looked as if she had been hit with a baseball bat. The skin there wasn’t merely bruised. It was puffy and swollen.

Even the lightest touch made her jump and clench the hands at her sides into fists.

“I’m sorry,” he murmured. “I have to touch it to heal you.”

She nodded.

It hurt more to heal this one. He was surprised she had been able to hide it from him and wished she would have let him attend to it earlier and spare her that. As the swelling decreased, the tension in her shoulders eased, pouring out of her like water. After another minute or two, the marks above it were gone as well and the perfection of her narrow back was restored.

Sarah sighed with relief as the last of her discomfort vanished. She thought that was the end of it, that Roland was finished. But just as she started to turn around, he moved closer, pressing his front to her back. His fingers slipped between her arms and her sides. Those large hands flowed over the twitching skin of her stomach and settled low over one hipbone.

A now familiar tingling heat filtered into her as he absorbed the bruise forming there. He nuzzled her ear with his lips as his hands caressed their way up to the ribs on her left side. Once the soreness she had forgotten there was healed, he slid his hands up the sides of her breasts to her chest and shoulders, then very slowly down over her upper arms, which sported quite a few faint bruises, particularly on the left side where her body had slammed into the car door as the Prius had careened to a halt.

By the time the last bruise, cut, or ache was healed, there was very little of her that had gone untouched. It was almost as if Roland were not only healing her, but learning her—every curve, dip, and valley—much as a sculptor would a subject he wished to commit to memory so that he might reproduce it later with clay or stone. It wasn’t sexual (though heat that had nothing to do with his gift lingered long after his hands had moved on). But tender. So tender.

And intense.

When he finished, he surprised her by wrapping his arms around her shoulders, just above her breasts, and resting his cheek atop her hair. Peace filtered through her, as though they had stood like this many times, basking in each other’s nearness.

Reaching up, she lightly grasped the arms crossed over her chest. “Thank you, Roland.”

He nodded, a contented sigh ruffling her bangs. “Sleep with me tonight,” he murmured, so softly she nearly missed it.

With his supernatural hearing, he probably had no difficulty hearing the increase in her pulse rate.