Page 35

Chapter 35

Emmy

M y sleep was broken when I heard Eoghan yelp. I immediately pushed myself up from the bed and looked over at my protector.

The moment I moved out of the way, his nails extended out much like when he first shifted. If I was still cuddled up beside him, my shoulder would have surely been pierced.

I couldn't move fast enough as I murmured. "No, no, no, no."

I pushed away a little too much and was rewarded with my ass bouncing off the ground. I was just glad that the only sound that I heard was the bones crunching and shifting with Eoghan's body.

As I stood up, Eoghan's kneecaps were in reverse, and his body was covered in his ginger fur. I realized he was sound asleep, and he must have been having a night terror. I hoped he would change back, but he didn't.

The thing that surprised me the most was the fact that he was completely passed out the whole time. Shifting always sounded so painful.

There was another cry from him, but it sounded more like a canine whine than a human sound.

As his face transformed into a muzzle, I wanted to comfort him, but I wasn't sure if I should wake him up or let him sleep.

I was still scared shitless, but hearing him whine was heartbreaking.

His paws twitched. The little feet continued to move back and forth as if he was running for his life. The more that he ran in his sleep, the more I realized he was having a night terror.

I was so damn afraid. I didn't know what to do.

For the first time in ages, I wanted to get a drink. But as much as it would calm me in the moment, it would only be a crutch. But damn, didn't it seem like a tasty option?

Then I remembered something that Eoghan said. Mates are supposed to soothe and comfort each other with a touch or a single word. It certainly seemed true when we were humans. So I touched Eoghan.

It always shocked me how coarse his fur was. But much like when he was in human form, my touch seemed to comfort him. His paws stopped twitching and his breathing evened out. Plus, I noticed that touching him pushed my fears away.

Sleep was going to be difficult to come by after that scare. I leaned back on the headboard and hoped that I would also drift off to sleep soon.

When my alarm went off, I cursed. I reached over to silence it and felt that coarse fur. It was all too much.

There was a part of my brain that wanted to search Eoghan's bathroom for DayQuil. It was a spot of hidden alcohol in most people's houses.

But I smacked that evil devil off my shoulder and went straight to the Nespresso machine to make myself a coffee.

As I savored that first sip, my personal furnace wrapped his arms around me. I moaned. "Eoghan."

His beard tickled my ear as he whispered, "I'm sorry. I didn't mean for that to happen."

We both knew that. He shifted in his sleep, and he had no control. But the fact that he even thought about me and how I was afraid of his wolf was one of the sweetest things that he could do.

"Do shifts in your sleep happen a lot?"

He shook his head. "Not too often. I used to have a lot more night terrors, and unfortunately, when I get too stressed out, I shift. If I'm not lucid and stop the shift in time, I go full wolf. One of my biggest fears was where I blow it and shifted against my will. It's one of the reasons I self-medicated so much on the ice. I wanted to be numb, so I didn't do anything stupid."

I frowned, but it made a lot of sense.

"What changed though? I know you hit rock bottom, but how are you controlling your stress now? I don't think we talked about that."

He scratched his beard and looked away. He was having some sort of mental debate about what he was going to say, which meant he was probably going to tell me something that shouldn't exist.

He sighed and pulled out the large chain that dangled on his neck. "Dino whipped this up to help to quiet the senses, and I decided I didn't care if guys thought I was weird for adorning my noise canceling headphones and earplugs. I probably should have done that a lot sooner. It's easier than the alcohol."

Guys liked to wear chains, so I never thought that could be anything more than a necklace.

"Yeah. Most things are easier in the long run."