by Jamie Craig
The phone resting next to his fingers burst to life, and he grabbed it on the first ring. He knew it was Josh without looking. “Hey. What’s going on?”
Silence filled the line. Then…
“We found a place.” The soft sound of her breathing elicited memories of long-ago nights with her in his arms. “A house.”
Cam’s heart seized. He still felt the same bittersweet relief when he heard her voice or caught a glimpse of her. “A house? That’s great. Do you like it?”
“Yeah.” There was another pause. For a second, he was terrified she would hang up on him. “It kind of reminds me of that place you were renting when we met. Except it smells better. And it has a bigger backyard.”
“It smells better than stale bologna? I find that hard to believe.” He paused a beat, waiting for her to laugh, but she didn’t. “A big backyard sounds nice. It’ll be good to get some sun. How many rooms does it have?”
“I don’t know. Josh knows. Hang on.”
“Wait, Sara. Please. It doesn’t matter.”
Her breathing quickened. Somewhere in the background, a door slammed followed by a man’s muffled voice. More breathing. Cam thought he could listen to it all day if she let him.
“Josh is signing the lease now. I think we’re coming back when we’re done here. Do you…want anything?”
Yes, I want you to come back here and look at me without screaming. I want you to be able to say my name again. I want you to let me make this better. “No, I don’t want anything. Thank you, though.” He wanted to say something else, but he didn’t dare. He didn’t know what would send her running again. “I’m glad you found a place you like, Sara.”
“One less thing to worry about,” she said. “And it’s only one lease. I know that was important to Josh. He doesn’t want us to be separated.”
Cam let out his breath in a long sigh. He knew Josh would fight for him, but there was no guarantee of victory. Especially since both of them would happily do anything she asked. “Thank you. I…that means a lot to both of us.”
“I…I think you’re going to like it here.” Her voice was softer, her words more even. “It really does look like the house on Marshall Street, Cam.”
Cam closed his eyes, savoring the sweet sound of his name on her lips. “There were a lot of good times in that house. Have you had a chance to look at the kitchen?”
“Not yet. Are you the reason Josh is claiming he can cook now?”
Cam couldn’t help but smirk. He remembered dragging Josh into the kitchen and insisting he learn to do something other than peanut butter sandwiches—partially because he was worried about the other man’s health, partially for something to do. They had spent much of the past two years looking for something to do.
“Josh claims he can cook? I guess scrambling eggs and boiling waters counts as cooking, technically. But yeah, I taught him everything he thinks he knows.”
“While I was gone.”
“Yeah,” Cam breathed. “But now maybe I can show him how to make you chile rellenos.”
Sara paused. “It won’t be the same. Nobody does it like you do, Cam.”
“Maybe I can cook something tonight for dinner?” Cam suggested. “If you’re not up to chile rellenos, I can make some Italian wedding soup.”
“No, no, that’s okay,” she said quickly. Too quickly. “My stomach’s actually been bothering me a little bit. But you could make it for Josh.”
“Bothering you?” Cam asked, food forgotten. “Bothering you like how?”
“Just…bothering me. Achy. Like I’m going to be sick. It’s probably just getting used to real food again. It only gets intolerable at night when it doesn’t let me sleep.”
“How long have you been feeling this way?”
“I don’t know, a few days maybe. What does it matter?”
Cam frowned, startled by the question. A stomachache was traditionally one of the signs a shifter had gone too long without changing shape, and Josh had told him earlier that Sara hadn’t shifted once since they rescued her. But then again, maybe she was just adjusting to the food. He didn’t want to worry her yet.
“It…uh…it doesn’t. I’m just concerned about you.” He wanted to speak with her more, but he also wanted to have a conversation that didn’t end in screaming. Maybe if they ended on a good note, she wouldn’t be wary of talking to him again. “Sara, is Josh finished with the lease? If so, I’d like to speak with him.”
“Almost. The Bob guy who owns the house talks a lot. Josh is trying to be polite.” The sounds over the line grew deadened as if she’d covered the phone, but almost as quickly, she returned. “Okay, he’s done. Are you sure you don’t want us to bring you anything for lunch?”
“Oh, you know, a cheeseburger would be great. Thanks.” And I love you, and if I thought you could stand to hear it, I’d never stop saying it.
Cam heard the shuffle of the phone passing from one hand to the other, and then Josh’s familiar voice announce, “We have a house.”
“Yeah, that’s what Sara said. Thanks, by the way.”
“For?”
“Making her talk to me.”
“You guys had a good conversation, it sounded like.”
“Yeah, but I can’t imagine she was too thrilled when you gave her the phone.”
“She wasn’t. Look, technically, it’s ready but if you’d like to come over tomorrow and make things a bit livable…”
“Are you asking or telling?”
“Telling. Sara loves it here, but it could use a good cleaning and airing out. I would do it.”
“I know. I’ll go over there after you guys get back.”
“Hey, are you okay?”
Cam smiled sadly at the concern in Josh’s voice. He didn’t want to tell Josh what it had done to him to hear Sara’s voice. Not because he wanted to keep anything from the other man, but because he knew Josh was trying to be Sara’s emotional center. Josh would never say it, but Cam knew there wasn’t much left over. He was stretching himself too thin as it was. Cam would have to deal with this on his own for now.
“I’m good. I am. Why shouldn’t I be? You found a temporary home for Sara, and she managed to speak to me for more than five minutes without screaming in fear. It’s a banner day.”
“I guess it is. Hey? I love you.”
“Love you, too,” Cam said softly before hanging up.
He dropped the phone and shut down his computer, his attention shifting from searching for clues to making a game plan for the evening. Josh had done his part by finding a place Sara could be happy with. Now it was going to be up to Cam to make it as much of a home as possible before she moved in.
* * * *
The night was like any other in Delta, crisp and clean, lending itself naturally to sniffing out intruders. George Ramsey knew his path like the back of his paw, winding through the streets of his community, always on the alert. It was a precaution taken after Sara Vail had disappeared. If somebody could take their favorite schoolteacher out from under their noses, nobody in Delta was safe. George had done his first midnight patrol a week after she vanished.
There had been rumblings for a while that maybe it wasn’t an intruder. Maybe the threat was a little closer to home. Dr. Joshua Ames wasn’t a shifter, after all, and outsiders weren’t to be trusted, no matter who they were sleeping with. But George had squelched that gossip at every corner. “You don’t live next door to them,” he’d argue. “You don’t see what I do.”
Not that he saw a lot, but what he did was sufficient. Josh was a quiet sort, polite and gracious. But when he was around Cam and Sara, he was almost a different person. He came to life, playful and gregarious with Sara, supportive and outgoing with Cam. And they both worshiped the ground he walked on. George had seen a lot of threesomes in his lifetime, but never one that included an outsider so effortlessly. It was completely infeasible that Josh would ever hurt either of them.
There was still a potential threat, though. Ge
orge had been a Delta resident for too long to just sit back and pretend everything was all right. Even now, two years later.
He detected the new scent when he rounded the corner of his block. George stopped and lifted his head, sniffing at the air as the hackles rose on the back of his neck. Slowly, he resumed his pace, following the delicate tendrils with ears pricked, and when it grew stronger with every step, a sense of dread began to curl in his gut. He noticed the car within several yards. California plates. His head turned.
It was parked in front of Cam’s place.
A dark shadow stood on the porch, and even from a distance, George knew it wasn’t either Cam or Josh. This figure was taller than either man, broad across the shoulders. As George watched, he stepped back from the door and to the side, cupping a hand over his eyes in order to peer into the darkened windows. He wasn’t going to see anything. Cam had been gone for three days now.
George slunk down, skirting the property in order to reach his backyard unseen. After clearing the low wall, he shifted immediately, grabbing the bathrobe he had waiting as he went in his back door. He navigated through the darkness, moving to the front of the house, and glanced out the side window in the living room before exiting through the front. The stranger was stepping back off the porch, looking up at the house as if he still expected somebody to come to the door.
George pocketed his cell phone before flipping on his porch light. The police would be at his fingertips if he needed them now.
“Little late for a visit, don’t you think?” he called out as he stepped outside.
The stranger might have been startled by George’s sudden appearance, but it didn’t stop him from crossing the driveway to the property boundary. “Do you know where Cam is?” the man asked. “Or Josh? Nobody’s answering.”
George’s eyes narrowed as the man approached. “Maybe because it’s the middle of the night.”
His face fell into the circle of illumination cast by the porch light. He was younger than George would have thought, with dark hair and eyes that looked vaguely familiar. “I know,” the man apologized. “But I tried calling ahead to let them know I’d be in town, and I never got an answer.” He stuck out his hand, and George noticed the darker tinge to his skin. “I’m Marco Vail. Sara’s cousin.”
As George accepted the greeting, seeing the family resemblance was easy now that it had been pointed out. There was a shade of Sara’s wide mouth, too.
“Why are you looking for Cam?”
“I was in Salt Lake City visiting friends, and Aunt Rosie asked if I could bring up some stuff for her. Some pictures of Sara and things she’d found that she thought the guys might be interested in.” There was a hint of sadness in his smile. “The longer Sara’s gone, the harder it is for Aunt Rosie to keep her stuff around, I think. She can’t bring herself to throw it away because it means she’s giving up, but she can’t look at it, either. Cam and Josh haven’t gotten to that point yet.”
George nodded in understanding. He’d been inside Cam’s house often enough since Sara’s disappearance to know that she still lived within its walls in one way or another.
“The boys have actually gone away on a well-deserved vacation,” he said. “But if you want, you can leave the stuff with me and I can pass it along.”
Marco brightened. “You’d do that for me?”
“Sure.” He paused. “You should call Cam. I’m sure he’d love to hear from Sara’s family.”
“I told you, I already tried.”
“You don’t have his cell number?” When Marco shook his head, George gestured toward the house. “Bring in whatever you’ve got and I’ll write it down for you. Just promise me you won’t try and make them cut their vacation short. They need this.”
Marco laughed. “Me stop someone from slacking? Never happen.”
* * * *
The van waited outside city limits. Delta residents were too wary these days of outsiders; it was impossible to do much of anything without raising suspicion of some sort. It didn’t help that the type of information Nolan wanted would raise more than a few eyebrows, either.
This was his specialty. Information gathering. It was why he’d launched the entire project in the first place. He knew exactly how to get the strongest results, and even if he didn’t have everything he wanted yet from Sara Vail, he stood by his methodology. They had brought her in, cut her open, conducted test after test after test on her. They’d exposed her to heat, to water, to cold, all in search of the strongest reaction to study.
And they’d found it. By sheer accident, really. When natural stimulation had failed to elevate the subject’s biorhythms to easily monitored levels, he’d manufactured new stimuli. Cameron Koster’s form had been twenty-third on the list. Marco took on his shape, and her heart rate, blood pressure, and adrenaline levels all spiked. It made the most logical sense for them to continue exploiting that. At one point, Marco had raised the question about the psychological effects of forcing her to fight her partner, but Nolan upped his salary and the shifter had shut up.
If he’d had time, he might have explored the implications further. But he wasn’t a psychologist. He was an engineer. In the end, all he cared about was reproducing the shifter ability. That’s what had been sold with the contract, and getting that far had already proven difficult. He didn’t need to add more when shifters weren’t even human.
When the car pulled up behind him, Nolan got out of the passenger seat and walked back to meet it. His dark form cut across the headlights that slashed into the desert night, but his steps didn’t slow until he stood at the driver’s side window.
“Well?” he asked. It was a little disconcerting to see the features of the female shifter he’d been studying mirrored so closely in Marco’s, but Nolan hid his feelings behind a practiced bland mask. He’d seen Marco take on many faces over the past two years. And nobody would question his cover story with this resemblance. “What did you find out?”
“They’re not in town. They convinced their neighbor they were going on vacation.”
Nolan swore under his breath. He knew it had been a wild shot that Ames would bring the girl back to their home, but he had been hoping for at least one thing to go in his favor.
“I did get Cameron Koster’s cell phone number, though,” Marco added. He grinned. “And when the old man wasn’t looking, I copied down the forwarding information Koster left with him.” He pulled a piece of paper out of his breast pocket and held it through the window. “It’s just a PO Box, but it’s a start.”
Nolan took the paper and tucked it away for examination later. “I want you to keep an eye on the town for the next few days. Just to make sure they don’t return. If you see anything out of the ordinary, report in as soon as possible. Otherwise, you’ll hear from me about where we need you next.”
He didn’t look back as he returned to the van. Marco would do as he was told. The creature was motivated by greed, and Nolan’s coffers weren’t empty yet.
And if for some reason he failed to cooperate, well then, Nolan would have at least one shifter to conduct more studies on.
Chapter 9
Cam immediately understood why the house reminded Sara of the one on Marshall Street. It was the same basic bungalow style, though this one was a bit newer and a bit more modern. There were no walls separating the living room, dining room, and kitchen, giving the first floor an open, welcoming look. A small hallway off the kitchen led to the master bedroom—which was his, according to Josh—and a half-bath. The kitchen was decent, though by no means spacious, and the wallpaper was a handsome, blue shade, if a little faded and peeling in spots.
He had come armed with a broom, mop, bucket, and a wide array of soaps and chemicals to get the place into shape. It wasn’t as bad as he had expected, but he could see why Josh wanted him to work there before they officially moved in. He couldn’t help but smile—he had gone through the same thing when he had moved to Marshall Street, though he hadn’t been alone that
time. His family and friends had all chipped in, and they ended up having a big pizza party that night. Enough beer had been involved to nearly nullify all their previous hard work.
The cleaning party was the first good memory of that house, but it wasn’t the only one, and it was far from the best.
The best was the first time Sara had stayed the night.
Cam walked through the house, opening every door and every window until he had fresh air circulating through the rooms and a draft in the hall. The fresh air helped, but Cam hoped to have the house smelling like lemons and freshly baked bread by the time Josh brought Sara over the next morning. He rarely baked—he not only did not have the time, he didn’t enjoy it—but Sara liked fresh bread.
He dusted first, his mind working over the list of things he wanted to accomplish before the next morning. It wasn’t a daunting list, but it would require a night of work. When he started to mop, his mind drifted other places.
Sara had not been impressed with his house on Marshall Street. She only came to love it later. But he had hardly given her the guided tour that first night. He barely had the time and concentration to get her from his front door to his bedroom.
Smiling, he reached into his cooler for a beer and sat down heavily on the blue and white sofa. If he concentrated, he could still hear her laugh—the slightly tipsy, slightly wanton sound always sent a shock down his spine to his toes. When Sara was happy, truly delighted, she had a laugh that would charm the birds.
* * * *
Though the sun had already set, the heat of the day still smothered the earth like a thick blanket. He noticed the difference as soon as he got out of his car, but if it bothered Sara, she didn’t say a word. She was too busy standing on the sidewalk, looking up at the house. The moonlight cast silver streaks over her dark hair and outlined the graceful lines of her bare shoulders, making Cam pause before coming around the car to her side. Maybe it was because he’d lived his entire life in Delta, but he thought he had never seen someone appear so exotic and so natural all at the same time. She was breathtaking. The life she infused in the small town made his heart pound a little bit faster in excitement, as much for the sake of her new students as his own.