Miracle - Chapter 22: Chapter 22

Was I dead? I hoped I was dead.
It seemed unlikely, though, given the flashes of intense pain that kept wrenching me out of floaty oblivion. They were coming more frequently now, annoying in their variety. Sometimes dull and achy. Sometimes sharp and burning. A sting, a throb, a grating rasp in the back of my throat.
Well, shit, I had a sore throat. Definitely not dead, then.
Gradually the discomfort started to localize. One of my hands felt tight and swollen, so I tried to move it. All I succeeded in doing was lifting it up a bit, before it dropped uselessly back onto my stomach. That sent a ripple of pain up my chest, leaving my lips as an unhappy moan, pressing my eyelids up. There was a blinding point of light in my peripheral vision, and it stung.
"Connor?"
Ooh, okay. That velvety voice was worth braving the light. I struggled to open my eyes and tried to say his name, but all that came out was a creaky breath.
"Don't try to talk. Your windpipe's bruised."
I frowned. A sharp pain cut across my forehead with the movement, but I still forced my eyes to open.
Ezra's handsome features swam into focus. He was leaning over me, and in spite of the lamp scorching the corner of my eye it was pretty dark in here. I could just barely make out the lines of his cheekbones, the soft curves of his lips. I tried to say his name again.
He shook his head. "Just think it. I can hear you, remember?"
Where are we? Incongruous details were registering a few at a time. The ceiling was white and smooth. I was lying under something light and soft. There was a quiet beeping noise coming from somewhere behind Ezra, an unfamiliar crisp scent lingering in the air like clean laundry.
"A motel."
I turned my head enough that I could see a clear IV bag hanging from a wall sconce above us. There were tubes running down from it, looping up toward my arm. They disappeared under a bunch of bandages.
What's that for?
"Painkillers, and fluids."
Something about the way he said it sent goosebumps up my arms. I frowned again and this time I winced, raising a hand to my forehead. Ezra caught it before I could touch my face.
"I put in a few stitches, you don't want to disturb them."
I let him set my hand down at my side. Ezra, what... I was going to ask what happened, but my brain decided to answer the question for me. It abruptly flooded with memories, like scenes from a horror movie. Tyler's leering face, the stench of the gas station bathroom, the cold, hard ceramic of the sink digging into my pelvis. Glass shattering, blood everywhere, my pants being torn off.
I sucked in air so fast and hard it set me coughing, and I had to sit up in order to get it all out. Ezra's hands snapped out to support my shoulders, but it wasn't enough. I lurched into him, wrapping my arms around his neck. And then I couldn't let go. I clung to him, half gasping and half sobbing.
"Ezra, I..." Shit, that hurts. I can't fucking talk!
He didn't say anything, but his arms went rigid around me. He had a hand on my back and it remained gentle, patting my shoulder blade, while the rest of him felt tense as rock.
My lower back ached. My hipbones hurt, and my butt was throbbing. I was a wreck. Tyler raped me, didn't he? I was glad I didn't have to say it aloud.
"No. No, Connor, he didn't. Breathe."
I pushed away from him. A couple inches was as far as he'd let me go, and I couldn't bring myself to look him in the eyes. He was lying.
I remembered Tyler smacking the welts on my ass. Remembered the sound of him undoing his belt. Remembered how he'd shoved my face against the broken mirror and crushed my hips into the sink. There was no way he hadn't gone through with it. He said... He thought I was giving him bad dreams. He was crazy, Ezra. Not normal Tyler-crazy, but like, actually psychotic. He bit me. He said he would kill me. He said he was going to... To...
Ezra's hand caught the side of my face, his thumb running over a bandage on my cheekbone, and his voice got as dark as I'd ever heard it. "He'll never lay a hand on you again."
I tipped my head back to look up at him. What?
He leaned forward, gently disentangling my arms from around his neck. "That's enough. You need to rest."
And only then did I realize how gray his complexion was. The light in here was crap, but from this angle his skin was frighteningly colorless, his eyes dull and bloodshot. Alarm shot through me. Ezra, you're sick! I tried to raise my unbandaged hand to touch his face, but he wouldn't let me. Instead he reached for the IV bag and turned a dial with his thumb. Warm, fuzzy tingles were suddenly swarming my body, melting the aches and pains into pleasant numbness. My eyelids started drooping again, against my will. That wasn't fair. He was the one who needed to sleep.
My backpack, I thought to him urgently, through the drugged fog. Is it here?
"Yes. Why?"
Just... I was fighting to send him a clear thought, but it was getting harder with every drawn-out heartbeat. There's something. For... for you, to... Need it. Go.
But thanks to the damn IV I couldn't hold onto consciousness anymore. I passed out.
🧬🧬🧬
The next time I woke up, I think it was daylight. At least, there was a murky glow warming the room, through the long beige drapes covering the window. A loud air conditioning unit was creating breeze above my head.
My limbs felt stiff and I stretched, only to regret it as they retaliated with cramps. My burned hand was aching. I could feel my pulse hammering against the backs of my eyeballs. I turned my head, and all my physical discomfort faded into the background at the sight of Ezra lying on the bed next to me. He was asleep, his black eyelashes soft against his cheeks, his lips slightly parted with deep, even breaths. One arm was stretched out my direction, like he was trying to keep tabs on me even in sleep.
God, was he pretty.
As I blinked at him slowly, I could see grains of sugar dusting his mouth. My chest filled with contented warmth. He'd found the cookies. Good. I was glad I'd thought to put them in my backpack before leaving the house. I'd been hoping Mom would give me the chance to sweeten her mood, but this was a far better use for them. Now I wished I'd brought them all.
I didn't know what time it was, or how long we'd been here. I didn't know what it had cost Ezra to arrive when he did, but he had been almost four hours ahead of schedule. When had he left to come get me? Had he even waited until the formula was done? His face was gray and pale. His lips had an almost bluish tinge.
Jesus, how much energy had he used? Enough to propel his motorcycle in midair at hyper speed from Colorado to Prickly Pear. Enough to tear the gas station restroom door off its hinges, and do whatever he'd done to Tyler to get him off me.
He'll never lay a hand on you again. Ominous.
And wickedly comforting.
I wanted to roll onto my side to face him, but my battered innards and the tubes poking out of me refused that plan. So I settled for sweeping my hand out until I could curl my pinky around his. He made a little noise in his sleep, like a growl. And I kept gazing at him until I fell back asleep myself.
🧬🧬🧬
I woke up again. This time the lamp was back on, and Ezra was coming in the door with a paper bag that smelled like fast food. I grunted and tried to sit up. He dropped the bag onto the table next to the bed and came over to help prop me up.
I leaned forward, wincing, and he stuffed a couple extra pillows behind my back.
"Are you hungry?"
Actually, my stomach was feeling sensitive in spite of its mournfully empty state, and I wasn't sure it could handle food. I was more worried, though, about Ezra's pallid coloring as he pushed his hood back. He still looked utterly exhausted.
"You shouldn't be—" Ouch. Talking felt like pushing fire through my throat.
Ezra handed me a drink cup. I was grateful that it was water, not soda. The ice cold liquid felt good going down.
"Slowly," Ezra said, tugging the straw away.
I licked my lips and tried again. "You shouldn't be up. You're depleted, you need sleep."
One eyebrow went up. "Suddenly you're a Nephilim expert?" He pressed a paper-wrapped hamburger into my hand. "Eat."
I didn't really have an appetite, but he'd gone to get food for me so I wasn't going to disappoint him. "Are you gonna eat too?"
In response he held up a second hamburger, and dragged a chair over beside the bed. I noticed that the IV bag was gone, as were the tubes attached to my hand. In fact, the room looked pretty well packed up. My backpack and a black satchel that I assumed was Ezra's were sitting close to the door.
"Are we checking out?" I asked, holding the back of my hand to my mouth so I wouldn't spray crumbs at him. Swallowing was uncomfortable, but I managed it.
"After we eat," he answered. "I know you're still hurting, but do you think you can endure a bike ride? I'll keep it short as I can."
"On your motorcycle?" I asked.
He nodded. "It's all I've got right now."
"Where are we going?" I suddenly paused, the burger halfway to my mouth. Was he planning to take me home? "How long have we been here?"
He swallowed, and took a sip from his own cup. "Two days."
"Days?" I echoed, staring at him. Oh, shit. Mom was going to kill me. I'd disappeared after she'd told me to go home, only to show up days later looking like... well, I hadn't seen myself in a mirror yet, but I was sure it wasn't good. She'd probably figured I was skipping out on my promise to pay that traffic ticket. When I turned up on the doorstep, she might not even let me in.
Or she would, and then make me wish she hadn't.
My heart started pounding, and I set the food down in my lap.
"What is it?" Ezra asked.
I couldn't look away from my partially eaten burger, even though it felt like a greasy lump in my stomach. "Please don't take me back," I said, hating myself for being so pathetic even as I said it. "I don't want to go back there." I felt my chin starting to tremble without my permission, and I bit down on the inside of my lip to stop it. It's not like I could offer a reasonable alternative. Maddy was off at school and Mom was the only family I had. But I'd rather that he drop me off anywhere else... a street corner, a homeless shelter, a freaking stump in the woods.
He cleared his throat slightly. "You're not going back. I should never have left you there so long to begin with."
My head came up with a surge of hope. "Then... I can stay with you?"
He urged my hamburger up to my mouth again. "Just eat, we have to get going."
I took a bite and chewed, watching him do the same. "We're going to your house?" I asked with my mouth full.
The lines of his face tightened and he shook his head, but he didn't elaborate. I decided not to press. The fact that he was keeping me with him was enough for me.
I couldn't finish the whole burger, but he was done before I was. I handed the remainder back to him and went to throw the covers off, but before I could he lowered a plastic bag onto my lap.
"What's this?"
"Clothes," he answered. "Yours were ruined."
I raised the comforter cautiously and found myself naked underneath. Well, I had underwear, but that was all. I felt the back of my neck starting to heat up. Ezra busied himself cleaning up our food trash. Then he seemed to realize that I might need help getting out of bed, and turned around.
"Can you, ah...?"
"I can do it," I assured him hastily. I separated the comforter from the sheet and swung my legs off the bed, dragging the sheet with me. A wave of dizziness hit as I tried to stand up, and Ezra lunged to catch me. I ended up with my full weight plastered along his big, lean body, with only a sheet to cover myself. And to my very great dismay, I felt myself getting hard. I wriggled desperately to regain my balance, which only made the problem worse.
He took firm hold of my shoulders. My cheeks burned as he steadied me back onto my own feet.
"Okay?" he asked.
Yeah. Humiliation had a great way of making the aches and pains in my body seem unimportant. I pulled back, clutching the sheet around my chest. He didn't say anything else, just handed me the bag of clothes. I had to shift my grip on the sheet in order to take it from him. Then I shuffled awkwardly for the bathroom.
When I got inside I closed the door and blew out a breath. Ezra had undressed me. Or maybe he hadn't needed to, since Tyler had done most of the job for him. I'd been beaten and maybe even raped... but apparently that hadn't deterred my horny teen dick from making a fool out of me in front of the guy who'd literally saved my ass.
I stumbled to the sink and leaned over it, which wasn't a good idea because I was immediately met with flashbacks of being forced over the one in the gas station. Well, at least that got rid of the hard-on pretty effectively. I pushed away and backed up until I was against the wall, which felt safer.
In the mirror, my hair was stringy and hanging limp around my face. I had a gauze bandage taped to my forehead and down across one eyebrow, and another one along my right cheek. My ear had a crusted scab where Tyler had bitten me. There was blue and purple bruising around my neck, and some swelling along the bridge of my nose that bled into a dark stain under my left eye. I lowered the sheet slowly, and my abdomen was tie-dyed. Mottled clouds of yellow, green, blue, red, purple. Angry, nearly-black swatches over each hipbone. All the color made the rest of my skin look ghostly white in comparison.
The bandages on my burned hand had been replaced by a patch of gauze that matched my forehead. I turned and twisted over my shoulder. There were some fainter bruises striping my lower back and the backs of my thighs, courtesy of Mom's belt.
I started pulling things out of the bag Ezra had given me. A plain gray t-shirt, jeans, a package of underwear and another of socks, a pair of canvas shoes. Everything in my size, with the tags still attached. At the bottom there were some smaller items: a set of hair elastics, a comb, and a toothbrush. I glanced toward the door, surprised by his thoughtfulness.
I wanted a shower, but he'd said we were in a hurry. I settled for washing my face and splashing water under my arms, over my torso, and around my bruised groin. As I pulled on the clean clothes, huffing painfully, I wondered if what he'd said was true.
Had he really gotten there in time to stop Tyler? Or was he thinking I was better off not knowing the truth?
What was most confounding was that I couldn't tell. Surely if Tyler had done... that, to me, I would know. Right? But besides those dates with Pete, I'd never had a boyfriend. I'd never had sex. So I had no idea what it was supposed to feel like after. Especially two days after. And I was so sore all over. My hips hurt, my back hurt, my guts felt like someone had taken a blender to them.
I couldn't remember anything with specificity. Just flashes of emotional memory, colors and scents and images, all of them so saturated with pain and fear that nothing was definite.
Maybe it didn't matter. If it had happened, there was nothing I could do about it. It was good that I couldn't remember. If that IV had been feeding me more than antibiotics and painkillers, if Ezra had slipped some post-rape prophylactics in too, I didn't want to know. I was safe now. I was alive. That was all that was important, wasn't it?
When I opened the bathroom door, Ezra stood up from his chair by the table. "Ready to go?"
I nodded, moving toward him stiffly. While normally I would have been stoked at the idea of a ride on his bike—one where I was conscious, for once—I wasn't exactly looking forward to it. This was probably going to hurt.
I reached the door, and he produced a brown leather jacket from somewhere inside his satchel. "This is for you."
The leather was incredibly soft in my fingers and I looked it over in awe. This was the real deal, not some plasticky imitation. It was bomber style with a high collar, in a beautiful golden brown color. And it looked exactly my size.
The lining had an unfamiliar texture. Slick, almost like sheet plastic, and cool to the touch. "What is this?"
"Something I've been working on," he answered, shouldering his bag and opening the door. Man, it was bright out. "It's not as effective as the formula, but it blocks pheromones pretty well. And here." He pressed a familiar spray bottle into my hand, full of pink liquid. "Put some of this on too."
So he'd been able to finish making it after all. I followed him out, spritzing my neck and chest as we went. And because he had his back to me, I could go somewhat overboard spraying my groin. After going so long without the protection of the formula, it felt comforting, like he'd handed me an invisibility cloak. The effect was emphasized when I slid my arms into the jacket. It was hot out, but I didn't care. In fact, I might never take this thing off.
His big black motorcycle was parked almost directly in front of our motel room. I dropped the spray into my backpack as he stashed his satchel in a saddlebag. He straddled the bike and handed me a helmet, much smaller than his. He put his own on, and then made sure mine was fastened to his satisfaction before patting the seat behind him. "Climb on."
The bike was huge. It took ab strength I didn't have to get my leg up and over, and by the time I had settled in behind him I was trying not to whimper. But then he took my hand from his waist and wrapped it solidly around his middle. It pulled me up snug against his back, so that my legs were flush along his and I could rest up against him like a mammoth body pillow.
Not bad.
As long as my dick behaved itself, anyway.
He kept hold of my hand as he kicked on the ignition, and didn't let go until I'd put my other arm around him too.
We rolled out of the weedy parking lot, past the run-down sign with 1960's style lettering proclaiming this place the It'll Do Inn. The street we were on definitely had the feel of a tiny town. There were a couple stop signs, but no traffic lights. A gas station, a general store, a mechanic shop. We rode past two blocks of aged buildings and businesses, and that was pretty much the entirety of it. Before we even reached the exit for the highway the rumble of the bike's engine was already making me nauseous. I tightened my grip around Ezra's waist and touched my helmet to his back. I wasn't going to complain, I could do this. He'd said it was only for a little while.
The highway wasn't a big multi-lane interstate. It was more of a back country road, roughly paved and bordered by telephone poles and pastureland. I had no idea where we were. I didn't recognize any of the town names on the occasional green signs we passed. I had wondered if Ezra was going to do the psychic flying-motorcycle thing, but he must have been too depleted because our wheels stayed in contact with the pavement.
The sun on my back was hot, but the air whipping around us made it bearable. I was grateful for the jacket he'd given me, since more than once we rode through a cloud of hovering bugs. Little by little, though, I was feeling sicker with the incessant vibration of my injured insides. The rattling of my skull inside the helmet gave me a headache. After a while it was all I could do to close my eyes and will myself to make it to the next minute, and the next, without puking.
When we pulled into a wayside rest stop, I didn't trust myself to move. Ezra carried me from the bike to a picnic table in the shade. I laid on my back on one of its splintery benches, not caring if it was undignified.
He was gone a few minutes, while I lay there in profound gratitude for the stillness. When he returned, he raised the visor of my helmet.
"Can you sit up?"
I didn't want to, but nodded anyway. He helped me into a sitting position and touched a white pill to my lips. "Open."
"What is it?"
"It will help with the nausea." I wondered how he knew—had he hopped inside my head to find out how I was feeling? Or did I just look as green around the gills as I felt? I let him put the pill in my mouth, then took a few swallows of water from the metal flask he held. I pulled the helmet off, which helped a little with my headache. And then I shouldered out of the jacket, because even though I loved it the heat was making me dizzy.
Ezra reached into the pocket of his hoodie and pulled out a red Jolly Rancher, which he scraped out of its wrapper with his teeth. It was hot out and he was in a sweatshirt, with the hood pulled up over his head like he was trying not to be seen. I was miserable, but had the feeling he wasn't doing so well either.
"Ezra... are we running away?" It was the most reasonable explanation. Neither of us was in shape for traveling, but here we were on the side of a deserted road in the middle of nowhere.
He clicked the candy around in his mouth, looking down at his hands.
"Are you in trouble?" I persisted, touching his arm. "What's happening? What are we doing out here?"
"Waiting for someone," he finally said. "A, uh, friend. He's going to look after you for a while."
Wait, what? He was leaving me?! "No! I want to stay with you."
"You can't. It's not safe."
I felt tears welling up in my eyes, which was infinitely frustrating. Was I really going to cry like a little kid? But desperation was building in my chest. "I won't slow you down anymore, I swear. I'm fine now, see?" I stood up, fighting the woozy tingles that swept up the back of my scalp, and tugged at his arm. "Let's just keep going, huh? Please?"
"Connor." He pulled his arm back a little. "You don't understand. I'm... pretty soon, I won't be able to take care of you. I'm not supposed to be seen by humans."
"Then let's find another motel," I said urgently. "I can take care of you this time. I'll check us in, and get us food and everything. You can hide out and sleep."
"It's too late for that."
Something about the gravity of his tone made my blood run cold. "What do you mean?"
He kept his head down, so I couldn't see his face. Slowly, I sat down next to him again. There was only one thing I could think of that he could be talking about. He'll never lay a hand on you again.
"Ezra, did you... is Tyler dead?"
He exhaled heavily.
Whoa.
I tried not to be happy about it. I mean, Tyler was a douchebag, but this was still bad. "Did someone see it happen?"
This time, he shook his head. Then why was he so worried? Unless... Fuck. Who had been the last one with the bathroom key? Who was known throughout town for being Tyler's favorite plaything?
"They think I did it," I breathed.
"Your people might. Mine are a little more insightful."
"The Nephilim know you were there?" I asked in abject horror. "How?"
"Your pheromone signature was everywhere," he said quietly. "The restroom door was mangled in a way no human could have done. It won't take them long to connect the dots, if they haven't already."
His Reservation meant he wasn't supposed to interact with or even be seen by humans. Killing one had to be an off-the-charts violation. What would the Nephilim do to him for this? Thanks to the Elioud textbook I had a pretty good idea, and it turned my stomach.
He couldn't get caught. But he'd spent the past two days nursing me instead of getting away. He was depleted, and I was burdening him at a time when he was most vulnerable.
Guilt and fear rose up into my throat. "I'm sorry," I whispered. "Oh God, I'm really sorry."
"It's not your fault."
Seriously? It was entirely my fault. If only I'd listened when he warned me about doing all those experiments with the formula. I should have refused Mom's demand to bring the wallet, and simply faced her wrath when she got home. I shouldn't have asked him to come early. Hell, if I just hadn't burned the damn bacon that morning, maybe none of this would have happened.
Now the tears in my eyes weren't self-pitying, they were ashamed. They welled up faster than I could suppress them, and when I blinked one spilled over and stung a cut alongside my nose. I wiped it away quickly, and I guess my emotion bothered him because he turned to me.
"Connor, you didn't do anything wrong."
I sniffed and straightened up a little. I had to stop making this harder for him, effective immediately. "This person coming to get me. Who is he?"
"We call him the Swan."
"Is he Nephilim?"
"No. He's Eljo, like you."
The textbook hadn't mentioned that term, but I'd heard Dr. Sarias use it when he was talking to Ezra about me. I perked up. "Eljo is, like, a male Elioud?"
"Not all Eljo are male," Ezra answered. "They're humans with Elioud genetics, who can't have Nephilim children."
I thought about that. Fertility was so highly prized among the Nephilim that being Eljo couldn't be a good thing. But if there was a word for us, I wasn't alone. If this Swan person was like me, maybe we didn't all end up like Timmy Riker. That was encouraging.
"Connor," Ezra said, and he sounded grave. "Listen. I'm hoping you'll only have to stay with him for a little while. But if he tries to... If he asks you to do anything you don't want, run. Hide, as far from humans and Nephilim as you can get. I'll find you, so do what you must to stay safe."
"You don't trust this guy?" I asked, startled.
"No."
What kind of a friend was that? "Is he dangerous?"
"He can be. He's very powerful."
We sat quietly long enough that guilt started pressing in again. "Are you going to be okay?" He didn't answer, which I had come to learn meant that he didn't know. I sighed and leaned my head against his upper arm. Please, you have to be okay.
After a moment, he put his arm around my shoulders. I turned my face into him and closed my eyes. I was fifteen years old. I wasn't going to cry, damn it. There was nothing I could do for him besides this, and it probably wasn't helpful. Ezra was superhuman, it was doubtful he needed silly mortal comforts like hugs.
Still, we sat like that until a car pulled up. I stirred reluctantly,  not wanting to leave the closeness of Ezra's side. But when I opened my eyes, the sight had my mouth hanging open. Ezra stood up, and I got to my feet next to him and gaped.
That wasn't just a car, it was a 1950's Thunderbird, painted a dazzling white with glittery flecks and chrome that sparkled in the sun. The top was down, and the man behind the wheel was dressed in white too, a linen suit with a shirt that was unbuttoned to mid-chest, displaying copious silvery chest hair.
He was older, maybe in his late sixties, and as he got out of the car I could see he had a bit of a paunch underneath the suit. His hair and tidily trimmed beard were as white as his clothes and car, and when he flashed a broad grin at Ezra, his perfect teeth were whitest of all. His skin looked downright dark in comparison, the kind of deep coppery color that only came from a tanning bed.
But the most startling, distressing thing about this old guy was that he started walking toward us and I instantly—and I mean, like, in under a half second—got the fiercest erection I'd ever had in all my life. It came on so hard and fast I gasped and staggered a little. My mouth went dry and my heart started thrashing wildly. My vision blurred into stars.
Ezra caught my elbow and steadied me, and I was so mortified I pulled away out of pure reflex.
What the actual fuck?
Who was this person?