by Jamie Craig
They were both still asleep when he returned to the car. The early morning air was surprisingly chilly against his cheek after the heat of the car, and he was hesitant to bring Sara out in the cold. He wanted them both to be warm and comfortable for as long as possible. Working quickly and quietly, he took the few bags they had out of the trunk and brought them to their room. Fortunately, they were able to get something on the ground level.
Josh inspected the room, though he knew it didn’t matter if the place was below par. He wasn’t driving anywhere else that morning. Everybody needed to rest, and the room was just like every other hotel he had ever been in.
Returning to the car, he opened the door and gently touched Cam’s shoulder. “Hey. We’re here. Let’s get her inside.”
Cameron’s eyes opened without even a flutter, as if he’d merely been biding his time until he had to move. His first glance was down at Sara, but soon enough, he nodded and relaxed his hold on her. Josh slid his arms beneath her thin shoulders, lifting her away while Cam climbed out of the car. He led the way to their room, but when they reached the door, he hesitated.
“Key’s in my pocket,” he said.
Cam reached in and took it out, opening the way for them. The soft light from the lamp on the nightstand lit the path to the beds, and he hung back as Josh laid Sara down where the blankets were already drawn.
“We should clean her up,” Cam said as Josh straightened. “She’s going to be pissed if she wakes up and finds out we let her sleep like that.”
Josh nodded, drawing on what remained of his energy to begin undressing her. He tossed the clothes aside, knowing it would be best if they destroyed them, rather than simply throwing them away. It had been difficult to look at her before, but once she was naked, it was nearly impossible. The luscious body that he had worshipped had been replaced with a stick figure, a woman who didn’t have any flesh on her bones.
“I brought some clothes and a first-aid kit,” Josh said, brushing her dirty hair away from her brow.
“Maybe we should put her in the bath,” Cameron suggested. He sat on the opposite side of the bed, picking up Sara’s hand to hold it in his palm. The contrast between hers and Cam’s skin was almost gone; her caramel-colored skin was now sallow from lack of sunlight. “I think she’d like that.”
“Yeah.” If Sara were awake, she’d probably want nothing more than a bath. When would she wake up? Would she ever wake up? What if she didn’t? The stray thought made Josh ill, but he couldn’t abandon the question. It needed to be considered. Needed to be answered. “I’ll fill the tub.”
Cam’s hand caught his arm before he could move to the bathroom. “You’re dead on your feet. Get undressed and get in first, and I’ll bring Sara in. You can hold her while I clean her up.”
Josh would have smiled at the suggestion, but he could only nod, knowing Cam would understand his gratitude. As the tub filled, he stripped out of his filthy clothes with relief, and then lowered himself into the clear, warm water. He closed his eyes for a moment, trying to blink away the gritty feeling behind his lids, and when he opened them again, Cam was standing above him with Sara.
Gently, Cam crouched down, lowering her body so she rested against Josh’s chest. Once upon a time, she would have seen the position as an invitation to play, wriggling against his cock until he was hard against her ass. There were no such antics from her now. Only the ends of her dark hair moved, longer than he remembered with threads of gray visible in the strands, trailing along the surface of the water. Josh had to blink back the sudden sting of tears.
“We need to find someplace with a kitchen soon,” Cam was saying. He knelt at the side of the tub, his hand immersed as he soaked the washcloth. “I can cook all her favorites. That’ll help her get some weight back.”
Cam’s simple suggestion set off a chain reaction for Josh, and suddenly everything they needed to do and should do filled his mind. There were too many things. It was too much. And he didn’t know how to live on the run. He didn’t even know who they were running from, or where they were running to, or what it meant to be safe. They had lives, they had careers, they had a home, and he would happily trade every bit of it to have Sara back, but now he didn’t know how they were going to live.
“I paid for three nights,” Josh said, gently wrapping his arm around her waist. “That should give us enough time to get a plan and figure out our first step. Maybe we can get a place with a short lease instead of another hotel.”
Cam nodded. As he ran the cloth over her stomach, the sandy-colored hair he’d let grow too long the past few months fell over his face, nearly obstructing his profile. But Josh could still see the clear blue eyes, and the lines that had grown more pronounced at their corners. Sara was not the only one who had aged in her absence. The hole she’d left in their lives had weathered them all.
“If I can go back to Delta and get my laptop,” Cam said, “I can work anywhere we find here. That’ll help the money situation. I think there’s just enough still in the savings account to cover us for a couple months before we really have to start worrying.”
Josh nodded. He knew they should discuss all of this, but it was getting harder to form words. Cam would need to go back for more than just his laptop. Josh had packed as much as he could before they went to find Sara, but it wasn’t enough.
Cam ran the washcloth over Sara’s body, and Josh followed him with his hands, rinsing away the soap. He cupped his hands and dribbled water down her arms, her breasts, and her stomach. The work was oddly intense, as though they were performing some sort of rite, some sort of sacrament. They didn’t miss a single inch, working together to gently maneuver her nearly lifeless body. The rise and fall of her chest was a constant comfort to Josh, and he kept pressing his palm against her body, seeking out her pulse.
“I know we shouldn’t.” Cam’s voice was low, barely louder than the lapping water, and he didn’t look up from where he was washing her feet. “But I can’t stop thinking what it would be like to fall asleep in a bed with her between us.” He shook his head. “It’s just been so long…”
“I know.” Tears threatened again, but Josh resisted the oncoming gale. His body wanted to fold in on itself. “But we should give her some space. We don’t…we don’t know…”
“We know she’s alive. And she’s with us. That’s all that matters.” Cam set the cloth away and reached for the complimentary shampoo, but Josh caught a glimpse of how shiny his eyes were before his hair hid them away again. “Anything else, we’ll fix.”
“It might not be that easy, Cameron. She might be injured or damaged beyond…beyond what we can see. We don’t know what they did to her. She could have been…” Josh stopped. The word was too hard to say. It was too hard to think. But he knew he had to think it. They needed to be prepared for any revelation, and they needed to be prepared to help her.
Cam hesitated, then set the shampoo back down. “They wouldn’t have.” His gaze flickered down her body, but it jumped back to meet Josh’s before it went too far. “You don’t really think…?”
Josh hated bringing it up, and he hated the look on Cam’s face. “Do you think there would be anything stopping them? They obviously wanted to hurt her. Or at least, they weren’t too careful about not hurting her.”
“She would’ve fought.”
Josh looked down at the bruises around her wrists and ankles. “I don’t doubt she would have tried. I think we should try to get a doctor to examine her, somehow.”
“No.” The firmness of Cam’s tone surprised him. “A doctor’s going to take one look at Sara and think we had something to do with this. And if we have to explain about her being missing, that blows keeping her safe until we find the bastards responsible.” His hand broke the surface of the water, skimming over her sunken stomach. “I don’t like it, but we have to do this. We know her best. We’ll know if there’s something wrong.”
Josh blanched. “I don’t…I don’t know if I can. I know you’re
right. I know if anybody sees her, we’ll be the number one suspects. But…you’re going to have to do it.”
As soon as he saw Cameron’s hand move downwards, Josh shut his eyes. He couldn’t watch. This was a necessary evil, but Sara had already been violated in so many ways that he hated the fact that they had to add one more indignity to the list. That didn’t mean he didn’t feel every wave of water displaced against his skin as Cam eased her thighs apart, or that he didn’t envision the hands he knew so well exploring Sara in ways that should never have been needed. At least he hadn’t eaten yet. Otherwise, he might be sick.
“I don’t see anything.”
“Okay. Good. That’s good,” Josh muttered. “But I think I’ll talk to her about it…if I get the chance.”
“Yeah.” Cam reached for the shampoo again, dripping water along Josh’s arm. “Sara’s the best one to confirm that for us.”
Josh wet Sara’s hair, soaking the strands before Cam gently massaged the shampoo against her scalp. “Not going to let her go again,” Josh vowed, more to himself than to Cam. “Never again.”
Together, they rinsed her off, but when Cam reached to lift her out of the water, Josh sighed, already wishing he didn’t have to relinquish her, even for a second. He let her go, though, draining the tub as they disappeared to the outer room.
Cam was drying her off when Josh emerged. She looked tiny in the bed, too small to be real. Sara always seemed larger than life in his memories; how could this be the same woman?
“We can take shifts,” Cam said. “I’ll keep an eye on her while you get some sleep, then we can switch over once you’ve gotten some rest.”
Josh collapsed on the other bed without removing the towel from around his waist. He stretched out on his side, unable to look away from Sara. He expected to fall asleep almost immediately, but the world didn’t darken, it blurred. Everything around him began to swim as hot tears covered his face. He opened his mouth to take a deep breath, and that breath turned into a single sob before his entire body began to shake.
He didn’t see Cam move, but within a heartbeat, strong hands were on Josh’s shoulders, pulling him upright and crushing him to Cam’s chest. “I know,” Cam murmured, his lips brushing against Josh’s temple. “I know. But we’ve got her again, focus on that. And she’s going to wake up, and she’s going to laugh at us for overreacting, just you wait.”
Josh shook his head, unable to explain it was the very fact they got her back that prompted the tears. The entire time she was gone, he hoped she was still alive, but he had fully prepared himself to never see her again. Yet here she was, a miracle, an unexpected second chance. He clung to Cam, burying his face in his lover’s neck, knowing he wouldn’t be able to hold back anything. The tears would have to run their course.
They stayed like that, bodies entwined, hearts pounding, until the onslaught began to ebb. It left him drained, his muscles like lead, and Josh couldn’t fight when Cam drew him to his feet.
“I don’t think it would be so bad to stretch out beside her,” he said. “I’ll be awake in case anything happens, and if she wakes up, that makes us the first things she sees.”
Josh only nodded before lowering himself to the mattress. He pulled her against him gently, tucking her into the curve of his body. She didn’t respond at all. He ran his fingertips over her lips, thinking of the thousands of times he had kissed her, and the millions of times he had longed to feel her lips again while she was gone.
When Cam slid onto the other side of the bed, Josh looked up and mouthed, “I love you.”
The corner of his mouth lifted. “I love you, too.” He slid closer until Sara was nestled between them and reached across to run his fingertips down Josh’s arm. “Thank you.”
Lulled by Cam’s touch and Sara’s reassuring warmth, Josh closed his eyes. “For what?”
“For never giving up. For fighting when you could’ve left.” His hand caressed Josh’s cheek. “For finding her for us.”
Josh nuzzled against Cam’s fingers. He didn’t know how to tell him staying and fighting and finding her had been the only thing that gave his life any sort of meaning. But the great thing about Cam was that he knew it, knew without being told. So he smiled and wrapped his hand around Cam’s before allowing himself to drift to sleep.
Chapter 3
Josh sat with his back against the wall, idly rubbing Sara’s shoulder as he watched the two of them sleep. Cam had resisted falling asleep at first, doing everything he could to keep his eyes open after hunger and a heavy bladder roused Josh. But gradually, he closed his eyes and his body naturally sought out Sara’s, until they were spooned around each other like nothing had ever separated them.
He felt refreshed, like a different person, and he didn’t mind being left alone to watch over them. Josh never dreamed he would be trusted as the caregiver to two shapeshifters—especially two shifters as strong, physically and mentally, and overwhelming as Cam and Sara. Normal humans—outsiders in the shifters’ parlance—were not supposed to share a bed, a home or a life with shifters, and there wasn’t anybody who would think what Josh did was right.
Except the three of them. He knew this decision had been the correct one. He knew what his real role in this life was, and that was why losing Sara made everything seem so utterly pointless, drab, without purpose. Pure chance had brought Josh into their world, and it had seemed the cruelest fate that ripped Sara away from him.
It was hard for Josh to believe he even had a real existence prior to meeting Cam and Sara. From the moment he asked Sara if he could interview her for his study, he knew he needed more than just a few answers from her. When he first met her, he had taken himself and his work too seriously, and he had been ridiculously overeager to work with her. Not just because she had been vibrant and captivating. It only took a few days in Delta to ascertain that she hadn’t been raised in the small Utah town. Her experience with outsiders gave her a unique perspective on what it meant to be a shifter, on where she fit in the world, and how she differed from human beings. Josh assumed that she would be more self-aware than other shifters, and thus, easier to talk to.
Of course, that assumption had been wrong in every way. Yes, she was very self-aware, but every shifter Josh ever spoke to demonstrated an equal amount of self-awareness. Shifters weren’t animals. Anybody who spent five minutes in the shifter community would see that right away. But nobody would do such a thing. After earning a degree in anthropology, Josh had shifted gears in his graduate training. Due to his strong interest in researching shifters, he had been forced to switch to zoology. He had also been obligated to spend more time researching in laboratories, far away from anything resembling a shifter. Josh had spent most of his training trying to prove that the prevailing assumptions about shifters had been false, but nobody would listen to him until he had field work under his belt.
So he had applied for grants. It was difficult because universities had very limited funds they would not offer to anybody who wasn’t a full-time tenured professor. And six years before he began his doctorate work, over ninety-five percent of all federal funding to the sciences had been stopped and the private sector had taken over the research and development field. That meant securing a position within one of the giant mega-corporations devoted to everything from developing vaccines to building war machines. That meant convincing his new bosses they stood to gain something from his research. That meant nearly a decade of preparation that culminated in him arriving in Delta, looking for the perfect shifter to match against his proposed study.
And Sara had been beyond perfect. Josh had wanted somebody who had a prominent role in the community. Sara was a popular, widely loved elementary school teacher. He wanted somebody who had met certain measurements of success. A little background research revealed that Sara had chosen to come to Delta, but she had job offers across the country. He had wanted somebody young enough to perform certain physical tests. She had been in her mid-twenties when they met. He wanted s
omebody who was physically fit. Nobody could ever complain about Sara’s body. She was fit. He wanted somebody who showed an aptitude for shifting at an early age. She had shifted as a toddler. He wanted somebody who didn’t mind shifting for him and describing what it was like. Sara was extremely articulate, and would often paint pictures with her words, drawing him into an experience he could never truly know.
But there was one small problem. Scientists were supposed to be objective, unbiased. Scientists were supposed to be able to observe their work from a distance. Scientists needed to be reliable, patient, and above reproach, so their later work could not be called into question. But Josh could not keep that distance when it came to Sara. He wanted to know her every single way a man could know a woman, and later, when she introduced him to Cam, the powerful connection he had with the other man shocked him.
He had spent the last two years living in his memories, holding onto her shadow as tightly as he could because he didn’t know what else to do. He and Cam often spent entire nights swapping stories, sharing fond moments, sharing memories of jokes and laughter, sharing secrets and insights, while passing a bottle of whiskey back and forth. But Josh had his own private stash of memories he never discussed with Cam, and he knew Cam must have his own secrets he clutched jealously to his heart.
It was easy for Josh to slip into one of those memories while he waited for the next part of their future to begin. And it was just like that. Waiting. Hanging on the edge of uncertainty until they woke up. Four years separated him from the memory he visited whenever he needed strength, but it was still as vivid as the day before. More so, in many ways.
How could it not be the most vivid day in his recent memory? It was the day his life changed in every way that mattered.
* * * *
Josh knew frantically hitting the refresh button would not make the message arrive in his inbox any faster, but he couldn’t help himself. He fell into a routine of checking his email, checking out the news, skimming over his favorite blog, and then checking his email again. The whole process took approximately three and a half minutes.