by Kate Harre
Crossing the room resolutely until she was standing right in front of him, she looked down at where he sat rigidly in the chair. ‘Because I want so much more than what we have right now.’
Alex lurched clumsily to his feet, side stepped her and bolted to the other side of the room, seeking sanctuary amongst his guitars. ‘Please don’t do this, Annie. I can’t give you what you need,’ he pleaded.
‘Yes, you can. You just have to trust me.’ Her voice was gentle, but there was steel behind it. She walked back across the room towards him.
‘This isn’t about trust,’ he said gruffly, looking like a cornered animal.
Sudden doubt assailed Annie and she rubbed her arm awkwardly, belatedly wishing she hadn’t started this. What if she’d ruined everything? ‘If you’re not attracted to me, just say so and I’ll back off.’
Alex groaned and half lifted a hand helplessly, letting it drop back to his side. ‘How can you think for a second I wouldn’t be attracted to you? But you deserve better than me.’
‘That’s rubbish! I deserve to be with someone who I care about and who cares about me. I deserve to be with you!’
In a quick move that took Annie by surprise, Alex’s hand shot out and grabbed her arm. He spun her around and dragged her over to the shelf beside his chair. Releasing her, he yanked a year book out of a pile of magazines and flicked through it until he found what he was looking for.
‘This is what you deserve,’ he hissed angrily, thrusting the book at her.
On the page filled with photos her gaze was unerringly drawn to the one picture she hadn’t wanted to look at. It was Alex, before the curse had changed his life. He was beautiful; there was no denying that. The gorgeous emerald green eyes she loved so much were framed in a face so perfect it was ridiculous. High cheekbones, a straight, aquiline nose, strong jaw and chin, all encased in smooth, flawless olive brown skin. On the surface he was breath taking. She could see why the loss of such beauty would be so devastating. And yet, this Alex didn’t make her heart skip a beat. It was his mouth, she decided. The full lips, which should have been so attractive, were twisted into a smile that was more of a sneer, a smile that certainly didn’t reach his eyes.
She looked up at her Alex, his scarred face a mask of agony. ‘I don’t like that Alex,’ she said gently, sincerity ringing from every word. ‘He doesn’t look like a nice person. I like my Alex.’
The book fell from his suddenly limp hand and his eyes widened in baffled surprise. Taking advantage of his bemusement, she pushed him backwards until the chair hit his legs and he dropped without his usual grace onto the arm of the chair. Their eyes were now level. She lifted a hand to trace his lips, but right when she didn’t want him to, he shook off his apathy and swatted it gently away.
‘Don’t,’ he whispered, his tormented eyes pleading with her.
‘I’m not going to give up. You can keep fighting me if you want, but I’m going to be a relentless force until you give in.’
‘Stubborn,’ he muttered.
‘Tenacious,’ she countered.
His shoulders slumped and he closed his eyes in defeat. ‘Do what you will, but don’t say I didn’t warn you.’
Annie hated seeing him like this, beaten and broken. She hated even more she’d done it to him. It was a big gamble that she’d be able to restore his pride and his self-worth.
Reaching out her hand, she cupped his cheek, brushing her thumb over the cheekbone. His lips pressed together in recoil, but otherwise he stayed completely still, letting her touch. She traced the scars lightly, learning the rigid texture of each one.
His eyes were still closed, so she leaned forward and pressed her lips feather light to first one eyelid and then the other. He shivered, but she carried on, kissing each scar on his face until finally she reached his lips. Her tongue darted out to trace the firmly closed seam of his mouth and with a startled gasp, his eyes flew open and he flinched back from her touch.
‘You can’t want to…’ His eyes were wide and full of mingled desire and fear.
‘But I do,’ she whispered back, meeting his eyes and letting him see the truth there.
She cupped the back of his head, sliding her fingers into his cropped hair, loving the soft, spiky texture. Looking straight at him, she kissed the corner of his mouth where it was puckered and distorted by scar tissue. He groaned, his lips opening slightly and that was all the invitation she needed. She kissed him properly for the first time, her lips sliding over his, their tongues finally meeting. Suddenly his arms clamped around her, dragging her close until their upper bodies were locked together, his control finally broken. He kissed her back hungrily, like he couldn’t get enough of her.
Annie’s legs felt like jelly and if it hadn’t been for his arms around her, she doubted they would have continued to hold her up. She’d kissed boys before, of course she had, but nothing had ever felt like Alex was making her feel at that moment. It was as if her whole body was fizzing, every sense so full of him it felt like he was part of her. She wanted to cry with joy, thought she was when she tasted the salty tang of tears in their kiss – and then she realised it wasn’t her who was crying. Breaking the kiss, she pulled back slightly so she could see Alex’s face. Silent tears were trickling down his scarred cheeks.
‘I thought no one would ever want to be this close to me again,’ he admitted in a ragged whisper.
‘Oh, Alex.’ She brushed away his tears with her thumbs, swallowing back the lump of emotion in her own throat. He’d shrugged off everything that had happened to him with enormous courage, but this one demonstration that someone truly cared for him, wanted him for who he was, had brought him to his knees. She wanted to tell him everything she was feeling in that moment, but thought it might overwhelm him with too much emotion at once. Instead, she kissed the tip of his nose. ‘I’ve been wanting to get this close for a while now and now that I’m here you’re not going to get rid of me easily.’
He choked back a laugh and then buried his face in her hair, clutching her tightly to him. ‘As if I’d want to,’ came his muffled reply.
Annie wrapped her arms around his broad shoulders, her hands running lightly over his bunched muscles, glorying in the knowledge she didn’t have to hold back anymore and could finally touch him.
Eventually, Alex eased back with a reluctant sigh. ‘We should probably go and do some training.’
‘Really? I can think of several things I’d much rather do than more training,’ she complained.
Smiling, Alex brushed his thumb over her bottom lip. ‘Me too,’ he murmured huskily. ‘But after my embarrassing display of emotion, I’m feeling the need to assert my masculinity, so we’re going to go downstairs and box… maybe even wrestle.’
‘I can also think of quite a few things you can do to assert your masculinity that don’t involve boxing. Although the wrestling sounds promising,’ Annie said with a meaningful look in the direction of his bed.
Alex’s eyes flared. He quickly stood, gripped her hand and tugged her in the direction of the door. ‘We need to get out of the bedroom before I lose all self-control and take you up on that offer.’
‘But why?’ Annie wailed.
In the hallway he stopped and looked down at her, his eyes glowing with true happiness for the first time since she’d met him. His grip on her hand tightened. ‘Today you proved to me just how precious you are and because of that, I don’t want to rush anything with you. I want every step we take together to be special and memorable.’
Annie tilted her head to one side, searching his face. ‘You’re a romantic,’ she noted in wonder.
Alex flushed and looked away. ‘Only with you.’
With a jaunty grin, Annie brought his hand to her lips and kissed his knuckles. ‘I’m crazy about you, Alexander Hamilton.’
His head flew back around, shock and awe crossing his face in quick succession. He opened his mouth to say something, but couldn’t get a word out past the emotion clogging his throat.
Annie’s eyes softened and she smiled sunnily.
Dropping his hand, she started backing down the hallway. ‘Last one to the basement has to do thirty burpees!’ Spinning on her heels, she sprinted for the stairs, taking advantage of Alex’s shocked immobility.
*
‘Tell me about your mother,’ Annie asked quietly.
They were lying on the padded mats in the basement, her head resting on Alex’s stomach. With one hand tucked behind his head, the fingers of his other hand were absently running through her hair, feathering out the mahogany strands. It hadn’t been much of a training session – not that that was his fault. Every time he’d tried to get serious, Annie had distracted him with a kiss. He’d finally given up trying, letting her drag him to the floor.
‘I don’t remember much about her except that she had brown hair and olive skin. She was half Italian, which is where I get my skin colouring from. I also got my eyes from her, but the rest is all my father. I wish I could tell you more, but I was only four when she died.’
‘How did she die?’
‘Cancer,’ he said gruffly. ‘She’d been unwell for some time, I think. She didn’t put much stock in the medical profession. By the time she realised she wasn’t getting better and went to the doctor it had advanced to such a degree there wasn’t much that could be done for her, aside from make her last days comfortable. At least, that’s what Maria told me.’
‘I’m sorry you never got to know her.’
He shrugged, his torso moving underneath her head. ‘I guess you don’t miss what you’ve never known. But when I watch you with your Mum, I wish I’d had something like that.’
Annie reached for his hand and dropped a soft kiss in the centre of his palm. ‘It must have been hard for your Dad.’
‘I think he loved her, but I honestly couldn’t say for sure,’ Alex said wryly. ‘After she died he never spoke of her, at least not to me. He had all her stuff taken away, including all the photos of her – he didn’t leave me a single one to remember her by.’
‘That’s cruel.’
‘I think it’s the only way he knew how to cope with losing her. Then he threw himself into work.’ Alex sighed heavily. ‘I pretty much got raised by a series of nannies and Maria. The typical spoilt little rich boy, given the world but starved of love, who turned out exactly as we always do – shiny and polished on the outside, dead on the inside.’
‘Don’t say that. You’re not dead on the inside.’ Annie turned and shuffled forward, until she was lying half on top of him, her forearms propped on his chest.
Smiling crookedly, he traced her cheekbone with his thumb. ‘I kind of wonder how I would have turned out if Mum had lived.’
‘You would have turned out exactly as you are now… just a little bit sooner,’ she said gently. With the tip of her forefinger she circled the outline of his lips. ‘Don’t you see, Alex. You are who you’re supposed to be, you just got side-tracked along the way. The important thing is that you got there.’
She leaned down, her hair falling in a curtain around their faces, and kissed him lightly, teasingly, her lips barely brushing his.
His hand plunged into the hair at the back of her head, drawing her face down to him.
‘I’m crazy about you too, Princess,’ he murmured against her lips, before crushing his mouth against hers urgently.
Chapter 14
The night was remarkably balmy, a warm breeze causing the leaves to rustle gently. Summer was not too far off. Alex picked his way quietly through the trees, avoiding the public tracks, grateful that he’d only worn a light windbreaker rather than his warmer jacket.
For the past few nights, as soon as it became dark, he’d been roaming the forest looking for the shape shifter. Perhaps it was foolish coming out here by himself, but he needed to get a look at the guy. He wasn’t planning on approaching him, unless it was completely necessary – he just wanted to know if it was Adrian. The thought of Annie hanging out with a killer made his gut churn, so the sooner he found some proof they could take to the Sherriff, the sooner she would be safe.
As he neared the clearing around the lookout, he hauled himself agilely into a tree where he had a good view of the clearing and most of the surrounding forest and settled in to wait. The last few nights had been uneventful, but he figured if he was patient, at some point the guy would come back. In human form or wolf form he didn’t know, although for the sake of identifying him Alex was really hoping for human form.
While he scanned the forest, he let his thoughts wander back to Annie and knew he was grinning stupidly. He still couldn’t believe she’d had the courage to kiss him. There were bruises all over his arms from where he’d pinched himself to make sure it was all real, because it sure as heck felt like a dream. The last few days, he’d felt like he was floating around in a euphoric bubble. Every time she smiled at him or simply looked in his direction, he felt like his heart was going to explode from happiness.
And the craziest thing was, all the hopes and dreams he’d locked away were now tantalisingly within reach. Annie cared about him; she had been the one to push their relationship to the next level. She hadn’t said she loved him yet, but for the first time Alex knew she felt strongly enough about him that eventually he would be able to make her love him. And if she loved him… the curse would be broken.
His face would return to normal. He’d be able to go out in public again. The thought of taking Annie on a real date excited him. He’d take her somewhere where the whole world would be able to see how happy they were together. Somewhere memorable, the kind of place he’d take her back to one day to ask her to marry him. Because he had no doubt in his mind that his feelings for her were permanently engraved in his heart.
With his face returned to normal, he’d be able to follow his dream of becoming a doctor. He and Annie would be able to choose a college that met both their needs. And that was perhaps the dream he held most dearly for the near future, because now that they were together he couldn’t bear the thought of her going off to college without him. He swallowed hard. It was a miracle that she had chosen him over all the other normal guys she could have picked. Now he was hoping for a second miracle – that he could make her love him and break the curse before she left for college.
The breeze carried the sound of a sharp snap. Alex’s head flew in the direction it had come from. Someone was coming up the path. Holding his breath, he pressed back against the trunk of the tree.
*
Annie drove towards Alex’s place at a sedate speed, deliberately drawing out the anticipation of seeing him again. She grinned at her own goofiness. She’d seen him earlier that afternoon for their usual training session – not that the training had lasted for long! She’d taken him by surprise and used a couple of the self-defence moves he’d taught her to flatten him to the padded mat. And since she had him pinned beneath her, well, she simply couldn’t resist taking advantage of their proximity and kissing him.
He wouldn’t be expecting to see her again today, but Jake had taken Karen out for coffee and dessert – no doubt stage one in his campaign to win her back. Annie didn’t see the point in being alone in her house when she could be spending time with Alex. She’d whipped up a quick batch of chocolate chip cookies and was planning on surprising him.
As she approached the entrance to the forest she noticed a car parked there. Slowing right down, she turned in so her headlights could pick up the number plate. It was Adrian’s car. The grin dropped from her face and her stomach twisted. He was in the forest. She wondered if he was alone… and then relaxed slightly. Adrian wasn’t stupid. If he had another victim with him, he wouldn’t have left his car in such an obvious spot. Assuming he was the shape shifter, maybe he was just letting his wolfy self have a run around.
Her hands were shaking slightly as she reversed her car back onto the street. Turning into the Hamilton driveway, she fumbled with the code to open the gates, but eventually they swung open and she breathed a sigh o
f relief as they closed with a clunk behind her. Even without a victim, the thought of the vicious, bloodthirsty wolf roaming the woods was terrifying.
‘Hi, Maria,’ Annie greeted the housekeeper with a warm smile. ‘I made cookies. They’re still warm, if you’d like one with your tea.’
Maria waved her inside, but Annie halted halfway through the door at her first words. ‘Alex isn’t here, Annie.’
‘Where is he?’
‘In the forest; he’s been going every night this week,’ Maria imparted in a tone of doom. ‘I don’t know what he’s doing out there. I tried to talk him out of it, but he won’t listen to me.’
Annie paled, her eyes flying wide in horror. She knew instantly what he was doing out there – looking for proof that Adrian was the shape shifter. Her stomach started churning. If anything happened to Alex…
She thrust the plate of cookies at Maria. ‘I’ve got to find him.’
‘Wait!’ Maria grabbed her arm in a bruising grip. ‘At least let me get you a torch.’
Following her into the kitchen, she waited impatiently while Maria retrieved the torch from the pantry.
‘Should I call the Sherriff?’ Maria asked anxiously, her eyes roving over the strain in Annie’s face.
Annie hesitated. What could they tell Sherriff Denton? Adrian was in the forest. Big deal – there was no proof he was involved in the murders. And if the Sherriff chose to investigate, Alex might be exposed and then fall under suspicion, which he wouldn’t thank her for. ‘No. I’m sure there’s nothing to be concerned about. We’ll be back soon, Maria.’
Annie raced through the forest, the torchlight bobbing in front of her. She headed for the lookout, hoping that was where Adrian would have gone, not even trying to mask her approach. Adrian was her friend and she figured he wouldn’t deliberately hurt her… assuming he was still in human form. Alex would probably kill her for coming after him and usually she wouldn’t have needed to – he was cautious and adept at keeping himself hidden. But when it came to her he was fiercely protective and she knew it bothered him that she was often alone in the Ridge High News office with Adrian. He wanted Adrian caught and Annie was afraid he might not be rational in his pursuit of that outcome.