Page 58
Cameron
A n electronic chirping sound drew me out of sleep.
Eyes still gummy and almost dried shut with tears, I glanced around the room, trying to figure out what the noise was.
For a moment, I didn’t know where I was, and then I noticed Nate’s arm draped across my body.
The night before came back into full focus, and a deep, almost overwhelming sadness enveloped me.
The warmth of his arm on my skin was like some last bitter broken promise.
As my senses cleared, I realized the chirping was the ringing of my phone. It was still plugged in beside the bed where it had been for the last twenty-four hours. I’d had no need of it in the magical single day I’d spent with Nate.
After snatching it up, I saw Lesley was calling. I didn’t want to talk to her while I was lying beside Nate. The call went to voicemail before I managed to disentangle myself from him.
“What’s wrong?” Nate mumbled blearily, the blankets covering his face.
“Lesley’s calling. Go back to sleep.”
“Mmhm,” he grunted, and rolled back over.
After pulling on a robe, I hurried down the small flight of stairs.
The cabin had come supplied with a pair of men’s and women’s slippers, and I slid my feet into the women’s pair before slipping out the door.
Even in the summer, the Toronto area could be a little chilly in the morning, and today was no exception.
I tugged my robe tighter around me as the phone began to ring again.
“Hello?” I said as I walked to the rear of the cabin.
“Where the hell have you been? I’ve called and texted like a dozen times,” Lesley said.
From her tone, I knew she was pissed. Glancing down at the phone display, I saw notifications for missed calls, texts, and social media messages. Leaving my phone in the cabin all day after sending a cryptic text may not have been the best idea.
“Sorry. I wasn’t near my phone most of yesterday.”
“Are you gonna tell me what the hell that text meant yesterday morning? What’s going on with you and Rick? Really ?”
“I told you, he’s not taking the breakup well.”
“Did he touch you again? Because if he did, I’ll cut his dick off.”
“We, uh, we had another fight, and?—”
“About what?”
“Uh…”
Trying to explain this without telling her anything about shifters was incredibly difficult. I had no idea how Nate had been able to do it with me.
“ Uh ? What the hell does uh mean?” Lesley demanded. “Did he threaten you or something? I don’t give a fuck if his dad wipes his ass with gold-plated toilet paper. You can go to the cops if he’s being a total asshole.” Her sentence was punctuated with a heavy sneeze. “Shit. Sorry.”
“Are you okay? Are you still sick?”
“Yes. I think this is more than a cold. I may actually have the flu. I feel like dog shit. Go on with your story. What exactly happened with you two?”
I wove what I thought was a pretty believable tale of Rick coming to Lesley’s place to work things out, but it turned into another big fight.
I didn’t lie too much. I only left out the brawl in the street, me slugging Rick, calling the cops—oh, and dry-humping Nate in the forest before all that.
Other than that, I was pretty on the nose about what happened.
“Ugh, you really are better off without that guy,” Lesley said when I finished. “Are you working today?”
“I took a few sick days. Need to clear head after all the shit with Rick, you know?”
“You should come over. We can comfort each other, binge-watch something trashy, and gorge ourselves on popcorn and ice cream. It’ll be great.”
I glanced at the time on my phone. Ollie would be there in less than an hour.
“I’m actually not home,” I said. “I’m on my way somewhere. Plus, I don’t want to come over to your place. It’s one of the places Rick will look for me. I don’t want him invading your space.”
“Oh, I’m not at my apartment. I’m at my boyfriend’s place.” She sneezed again, and I heard the honk of a blown nose through the phone. “Sorry about that. Again .”
“If you’re with your boyfriend, then I really wouldn’t want to intrude. I’m sure you guys have plans.”
“Trust me, nothing sexy is happening when I feel this bad. I think the poor guy thought I was gonna finally give up the big A this weekend. He’s disappointed.”
“ The big A ? What?”
“Anal, sweetie. Butt stuff. Follow along.”
“Jeez.” I winced in surprise. “Got it.”
“Yeah. I’ve had a fever for a couple days. I feel like trash. No hanky-panky for a couple days. I’m gonna see if my doctor can call in some antibiotics for me. I’m too worn out to actually go sit in a waiting room.”
Lesley went on talking, but my mind was on something else.
Nate was asleep in the cabin, and I couldn’t help but wonder if he was truly the person who would stick by me through thick and thin.
Hearing Lesley talk about her boyfriend had me trying to picture Nate in the same capacity.
It was difficult. He was such a free spirit and seemed to love the freedom of the road so much.
It made me feel a little bad for hoping he’d stick around for the long haul.
What if I was the one being selfish in trying to make him give up a life he wanted?
The thought hurt, but it made sense in a way.
Could I ask him to give all that up and stay?
A strange bitterness settled over me as I came to terms with things.
Was this more than a fling? I doubted it.
My life had shown me that there were very few people I could actually trust. Standing there at the back of the cabin, staring at the bubbling creek with Lesley’s voice droning in my ear, a hundred new questions filled my mind.
I sniffed the air, my newfound heightened senses picking up something. A sour, sweet musk—the smell of a predator.
My inner wolf yelped in warning a moment before the mangy wolf burst from the forest on the other side of the brook. The feral. I’d never seen him in his wolf form, but I knew this was him. The eyes. That’s what I recognized. Wolf or man, the eyes held that same psychotic mania.
Stumbling backward, I dropped my phone. One of my slippers slid off my feet as I backed away.
I tripped, falling hard on my ass, knocking the breath from my lungs.
I couldn’t cry out for help, couldn’t even get a breath in.
Scrambling back on my elbows, I watched as the wolf leapt over the small creek with ease and stalked toward me.
Fear, like burning acid, flooded through my chest as he peeled his lips back and let out a hungry growl.
My foot slid as I tried to back up even more, and I collapsed onto my back.
As a wolf, I could run faster and fight harder.
I tried to call out to my wolf and shift, but it wasn’t natural yet, and the terror and adrenaline made it impossible to function.
My mind spun in too many directions to concentrate.
I screamed for my inner wolf even as the feral padded forward and straddled me.
When the wolf looked down at me, there was a weird, victorious gleam in its eye as its maw opened wide. I was dead. This was the end. This fucking thing was going to tear my throat out here.
A massive gray wolf slammed into the side of the feral, sending it tumbling away from me.
Nate. Sitting up, I finally managed to suck in a breath.
Nate and the feral rolled in a mass of chaos.
Snapping jaws, kicking feet, claws digging at flesh, yelps of pain, and growls of anger.
Scrambling to my feet, I backed farther away from the fight, putting distance between me and the feral wolf that wanted to tear me limb from limb.
I wanted to help, to jump in and fight the feral with Nate, but I knew that wouldn’t go well. All of this was so new. Without more experience and coaching, I’d only get in the way or get Nate hurt.
Nate yelped and stumbled backward, favoring his foreleg. I gasped when I saw the blood oozing through his gray fur. The feral rounded on him and pounced, its jaws snapping and biting at Nate’s chest and throat. Nate’s good paw barely kept the feral from latching on.
“Come on,” I hissed to myself. “Where are you?”
I kept trying to force myself to shift. I needed to get in there and fight with Nate, help protect him.
I had to save him, but I couldn’t focus.
My fear and panic and worry for Nate made it impossible to shift into my wolf form.
All the coaching and help Nate had given me yesterday seemed to mean nothing now that I was faced with danger.
The feral kicked Nate aside, sending him tumbling toward the creek. In a split second, it was lunging at me. I leapt back as teeth clacked together on empty air where my hand had been a moment before.
In the next instant, Nate was on the feral again, sinking his teeth into its hind leg before the beast could come at me again. The feral howled and yanked its leg, but Nate was stronger.
Nate swung the feral around and slammed it into a tree.
The smaller wolf was no match for Nate’s massive, hulking form.
The spot between the feral’s skull and shoulder crashed into the truck.
A thick snap accompanied the collision as the wolf’s neck broke, and the feral tumbled to the ground in a heap.
A moment later, he shifted back to his human form.
The scraggly bearded mouth hung open, eyes staring sightlessly up at the early morning sky.
With shocked eyes, I stared at him. Stepping forward, I reached out, wanting to make sure he was really dead, but Nate grabbed my arm. I flinched in surprise at finding him human again.
“Why didn’t you shift? Why didn’t you run?” Nate looked panicked. “Are you okay?”
He ran his hands over me, checking for injuries. I was fine. No injuries at all, but Nate was hurt. A big gash ran across his forearm, right through one set of tally mark tattoos.
I gasped. “Your arm.”
“I don’t care about me, Cameron.” He put his hands on my cheeks and looked into my eyes. “Are you all right?”
His reaction was the polar opposite of Rick’s.
Where Rick had been more concerned about my maybe being pregnant with his baby, Nate was wholly and completely concerned with my well-being.
His face was pale with worry and fear. The appearance of the feral and the fact that he’d almost gotten me seemed to have terrified him beyond belief.
This man was better than Rick in every way.
Could I be selfish and ask him to stay with me?
Would he ever forgive me if he did stay and ended up feeling miserable?
I wanted him, but I didn’t know if I could live with that.
He probably didn’t want to stay, anyway.
No one else in my life had. No one other than my mother and brother.
“I don’t know if I’m okay,” I said, my voice trembling.
Nate’s face tensed. “Did he bite you? Are you bleeding?”
I shook my head. “That’s not it. I’m not hurt. Something else might be wrong, though.”
“What?”
“Is it always like this?”
“Like what? What do you mean?”
“This,” I said, waving my hand around, pointing at the dead feral. “Ever since he bit me, it’s been chaos.”
Was that my destiny in life? For this kind of misery to always follow me? If so, that wasn’t something Nate needed. It wasn’t anything anyone needed. He told me he was leaving, and I’d thought I wanted him to stay, but maybe it was better for him to go.
“This isn’t normal,” he said, lowering his voice to try and calm me down. “This whole thing has been a one-in-a-million chance.”
Barely hearing him, I shook my head, my adrenaline and panic making it hard to think straight.
“No,” I mumbled, talking mostly to myself. “This is a big mistake. You don’t deserve this.”
He frowned. “Deserve what? Cameron, you aren’t making any sense.”
“Me,” I said, finally looking into his eyes. “You don’t deserve me, or all this bullshit that follows me everywhere I go.”
Table of Contents
- Page 1
- Page 2
- Page 3
- Page 4
- Page 5
- Page 6
- Page 7
- Page 8
- Page 9
- Page 10
- Page 11
- Page 12
- Page 13
- Page 14
- Page 15
- Page 16
- Page 17
- Page 18
- Page 19
- Page 20
- Page 21
- Page 22
- Page 23
- Page 24
- Page 25
- Page 26
- Page 27
- Page 28
- Page 29
- Page 30
- Page 31
- Page 32
- Page 33
- Page 34
- Page 35
- Page 36
- Page 37
- Page 38
- Page 39
- Page 40
- Page 41
- Page 42
- Page 43
- Page 44
- Page 45
- Page 46
- Page 47
- Page 48
- Page 49
- Page 50
- Page 51
- Page 52
- Page 53
- Page 54
- Page 55
- Page 56
- Page 57
- Page 58 (Reading here)
- Page 59
- Page 60
- Page 61
- Page 62
- Page 63
- Page 64
- Page 65
- Page 66
- Page 67
- Page 68
- Page 69
- Page 70
- Page 71
- Page 72
- Page 73
- Page 74
- Page 75
- Page 76
- Page 77
- Page 78
- Page 79
- Page 80
- Page 81
- Page 82
- Page 83
- Page 84
- Page 85
- Page 86
- Page 87
- Page 88
- Page 89
- Page 90
- Page 91
- Page 92
- Page 93
- Page 94
- Page 95
- Page 96
- Page 97
- Page 98
- Page 99
- Page 100
- Page 101
- Page 102
- Page 103
- Page 104
- Page 105
- Page 106
- Page 107
- Page 108
- Page 109
- Page 110
- Page 111
- Page 112
- Page 113