by Jolie Day
“Joel,” Avery repeated. This time, he glanced up at her, his eyes guarded and his lips spread in a thin line. His blue eyes flashed with caution and regret.
“I can explain.”
Before he spoke further, however, there was a knock at the door.
Chapter Nineteen
Elizabeth Harper was carried out on a gurney. The men who held it were dressed in scrubs, but they didn’t look like any paramedics or doctors that Avery had ever seen.
“They’re guardians,” Joel whispered in her ear as she stared at them from her spot at the kitchen counter, wrapped in a heavy wool blanket from the closet. She couldn’t stop shivering, but she didn’t feel cold. Not exactly. All she felt was confusion, really. Confusion that invaded every inch of her body. “They’ll take care of her.”
Avery stayed silent until the “guardians” were gone, the door shutting with an echoing click after them as they carried Mrs. Harper out the door and down the hall. She was silent as Joel walked around the living room, picking up furniture and inspecting all the things that the wolf—his mother—had broken. He was silent as he did this, giving Avery the time and space she needed to process what the hell had just happened.
“Is she a werewolf?” Avery asked, her voice grave and her throat dry. She cleared it as Joel turned to her with calm, caring eyes. “Your mother,” she clarified, as if he might not understand to whom she was referring. “Is she a…a werewolf?”
“No,” Joel answered, simple and concise. “Lycanthropy is different than what we have. Lycans can’t control their transformation. We can.”
“W-we?” Avery choked. “You mean you’re—” And suddenly she couldn’t breathe. And suddenly she couldn’t be near him. Avery practically fell off her stool as Joel took a step towards her. “No!” she exclaimed. “Don’t. Don’t come near me.”
“Avery,” he sighed, taking another step. She hopped to her feet, making her way quickly to the other side of the room. Joel rolled his eyes. “Avery, wait. Just let me…”
“Don’t!” she growled at him, stopping him dead in his tracks as he attempted to make his way towards her again. “Don’t touch me!”
“Okay,” he said, holding up his hands in surrender as he took a few steps back. “Can I just explain then? From here?”
Avery considered him for a long moment, then nodded. “Yes,” she said, finally. “But don’t come near me. Stay right there.” She inched toward the chair in the living room and sat down, facing him. “Explain,” she said.
Joel nodded and pushed his glasses up his nose, taking a seat at the counter stool furthest from her, respecting her wishes. “I,” he started softly, calmly, “am a wolf.”
“How?” Avery asked, her voice barely above a whisper. Her brow was furrowed in a way that made Joel want to reach out and smooth the wrinkle on her forehead before it became a permanent fixture on her otherwise flawless face. But he didn’t; he couldn’t. Because she didn’t want that. She just wanted an explanation.
“I don’t know the exact history,” he admitted. “I’ve probably heard about it a bunch of times when I was a kid, but I…I don’t remember exactly what makes it possible. All I know is that I can change. My entire family can.”
“Into wolves,” Avery said. It wasn’t a question.
“Yeah,” Joel sighed. “Into wolves. Generations and generations of wolves.”
“But you’re not…werewolves?”
“No. Like I said; werewolves are a different species. Lycanthropy is more of a…disease.”
“And what you have isn’t?”
“No. It’s genetic. My mother has it, as you saw. My father didn’t, but it’s…dominant. The gene. It’s like…dimples. If one parent has them, then all the offspring have them, as well. So…”
“You have the gene,” Avery finished for him, frowning.
“Yes,” he said. “I have the gene.”
“So you can…you can turn into a wolf?”
“Yes.” He took a deep breath. “I can turn into a wolf. I am a wolf. It takes more concentration to stay in this form, most days.” He shrugged and scratched the back of his neck. “It’s a lot to take in, I know, but…I’m not dangerous…usually.”
“What about your mother?” Avery asked. “Is she…how much of a danger is she to me? To you?” She motioned to his wrapped forearm, bared by the rips in his shredded shirt. His entire body was clawed up and the suit that he’d been wearing earlier was stretched and hanging off of him in pieces of torn cloth.
“I can handle her,” he said, his voice firm and sure. “This,” he motioned to the ruined suit, “is nothing. I’ve had worse.” Avery’s eyes widened at that, in fear and confusion and something else that Joel couldn’t quite name, but he could see the panic that stiffened her spine and made her hands shake and her face sweat. Her breath began to shorten and she bit her lip, shaking her head. She stood up, then sat back down. Then stood up again.
“This…this can’t be happening,” she breathed, shaking her head. Tears spilled from the corners of her eyes and she began to pace. She walked back and forth across the living room. Back and forth, back and forth, wringing her wrists and biting her lip. Her heart beat an erratic pattern against her ribcage and Joel could hear it as he watched her, his eyes tracking her across the floor.
“This isn’t happening.” The statement was decisive and sure, but Avery didn’t look like she believed it. Her face was unsure and her frown deepened as she shook her head. She squeezed her wrists and kept pacing, never turning fully towards him, though her eye glanced at him from time to time. “This isn’t happening.”
“It’s happening,” Joel said, interrupting her as she opened her mouth to repeat the mantra again. “It’s been happening for a while. Years. I’ve dealt with this for years.”
She paused at that, turning her wide eyes to him. “Years?” she asked. “Is this…this is your mother’s sickness?”
“Yes,” Joel said with a curt nod. “Sort of.”
“Sort of?” she echoed. “What do you mean sort of? What…is this—her sickness or isn’t it?”
“It’s not that simple,” he sighed. “It’s…my mother’s sickness is unique.”
“No kidding,” Avery huffed, resuming her pacing. “And she’s not a werewolf?”
“Again, no,” Joel grunted. “Lycanthropy is viral, but my mother didn’t have it. We checked.”
“How do you check for that?”
“It’s difficult to explain.”
“Well, try,” Avery growled. Joel turned to her with a raised eyebrow and she paused, avoiding his eye. “Please.”
“Really,” Joel said. “I can’t. I’m not even…I’m supposed to be erasing your memory right now.”
Avery paused again, her entire body tensing as she turned to Joel with wide, terrified eyes. “You can do that?” she asked. “You can…erase my memory?”
“Yes,” Joel said, pushing up his glasses again. His ice-blue eyes flashed. “Well, only certain parts of your memory. The wolf parts of your memory, to be specific.”
“The wolf parts?”
“I can make you forget that you ever saw my mother as a wolf. I can make you forget that you were attacked. I can make you forget everything that happened here tonight. All you’ll remember is coming home and taking a nap after work.”
“How do you—”
“I really don’t know. I just know that I can. It’s an ability that I have. One that I have always had. It might be an evolutionary thing; something that we’ve developed the ability to do for survival or whatever. It seems that when humans learn of your…wolf-ness, they’d rather see you dead than let you explain yourself. Weird, huh?” He chuckled, humorlessly. “I used to accidentally go into my wolf form at school and the only reason nobody ever found out about it was because Kara would make them all forget. I just became a biter; a problem child.”
“Must’ve been fun,” she deadpanned.
&nbs
p; “Especially for my mother,” Joel laughed. “I got the ‘don’t bite humans, Joel,’ speech from her a whole bunch growing up.”
“Ironic, isn’t it?” Avery huffed. She’d stopped pacing and was now facing him, head on, though she still refused to meet his eyes. She motioned to the bandage on his arm.
“Oh, you mean this?” Joel sighed and ripped the bandage off of his arm, showing her the nearly fully healed bite mark. Avery gasped and took several steps forward before she remembered herself. She paused behind the couch, her eyes locked on the scar on Joel’s arm. “We heal quickly,” he explained. “Another evolutionary thing, I guess.”
“Do you…get hurt a lot?” Avery asked.
“Wolves? Or just me?” Joel asked.
“Both.”
“Wolves do, yes,” he said. “We have different families, different turfs. My mother comes from kind of an elite line; all wolves until she met my father. There were no Harpers in the clan until he came along and that started…problems.”
“Problems?” Avery furrowed her brow. “What kind of problems?”
“Well, our clan doesn’t take too kindly to…humans.” Avery’s eyes widened. “Not that…not that they hate humans, of course. I mean, how can they. You guys run this world, don’t you? The only way we can really live is to mix in with you. But…not like that; not the way my parents mixed. They didn’t like that.”
“Is that how your father died?” Joel stayed silent, but she could see the way his jaw clenched and she had her answer. “Is that why your mother was here? Because she found out about us?”
“My mother has no issues with humans,” Joel said, with a small grin. “She married one.”
“Then why…?”
Joel took a deep breath. “I don’t know,” he admitted. “I went to see her this morning, before work. She must have…smelled you on me. And with her sickness…she probably sensed that you were a threat. It was a mistake.”
“A mistake that almost caused me my life.”
Joel looked down. “I know,” he said, his voice a bit strained. “That’s why…” he shook his head.
“That’s why what?” Avery asked.
“That’s why I had her sent away. I should have done it a long time ago. Kara wanted me to do it a long time ago. This morning, she actually came into the office and demanded that I have her committed. After she saw the paper; saw us dancing on the front page of the newspaper. She warned me about something like this happening and I…I didn’t believe her. Didn’t trust her to know what she was talking about.” His jaw clenched and he shook his head. “I’m so sorry, Avery; my stupidity almost cost you your life.” He walked towards her and Avery forced herself not to step back. It wasn’t as hard as she thought it might be. Joel reached out, cupping her cheek with one large, scarred hand. “I’m so sorry,” he said.
Avery leaned into his touch and breathed in his scent. “Maybe you should make me forget,” she said, after a long moment.
Joel’s breath was shuddering. “Are you sure?” he asked.
Avery nodded. “If I forget,” she said, “then I won’t be as terrified as I am right now, just touching you. If I forget, then I can kiss you without thinking about the fact that you could kill me at a moment’s notice.”
“I would never—”
“I know,” Avery assured him. “I know that you would never hurt me. I can feel it in the way you hold me, in the way you look at me…I know. But I—”
“You don’t trust me.” It was a statement of fact. He didn’t look as disappointed by that as she thought he might. It was just a fact.
But it wasn’t. “It’s not that I don’t trust you,” Avery insisted. “It’s just that I…I can’t help but be terrified. And I don’t want to be terrified. Not of you.”
“So you think that forgetting it will be better?”
“Why wouldn’t it be?” Avery searched his eyes, her lips turning down in a frown.
Joel swallowed thickly. “Because, eventually, if this…if this works out between us, I’m going to have to tell you again. You’re going to find out and you’re going to panic and you’re just…just be sure of this. Because if I make you forget, then we can’t do this anymore. Because if you want to forget, then there’s no future for us. You will never be ready to handle something like that. So be sure. Either we go forward with this,” he took a deep breath and dropped his hand from her cheek, stepping back, “or everything stops here. I make you forget and we stop this. Our relationship—whatever it is—ends. We go on with our lives and you continue on with your training period. At the end of which, I will offer you a more permanent position. If you choose to take it, then we become colleagues. I will no longer be your boss, but we will never…this can’t happen again.” He took another deep breath. “Do you understand?”
Avery nodded, slowly, backing away from Joel, turning away. She began to pace again, her movements slower this time, a bit…calmer than before. She began to wring her wrists again. Her breathing became a little shallower and she started to mutter. Joel watched her with a stoic expression on his face, his eyes trailing her as she moved back and forth. He watched her for several minutes, before she suddenly paused.
“Will I forget…everything?” she asked. “As in…everything? Saturday? Yesterday?” She took a deep breath. “This morning?”
“Yes,” he said. “I think that’s for the best.”
Avery nodded, her eyes wide, her lips pressed together. She nodded and resumed pacing for another long, agonizing minute.
When she stopped again, her eyes were glistening with stubborn, unshed tears.
“Can I make a request?” she asked.
“Anything,” Joel promised, taking a step towards her.
“Before you make me forget…everything, can we just—can you just make love to me? One last time.” A stray tear escaped the corner of her left eye and Joel reached out, thumbing it away.
“I thought you were terrified of me,” he whispered.
“I am,” Avery admitted, leaning into him again. “But not too much for that.” She took a deep, shuddering breath. “Please.”
Joel considered her for a long moment, watching the shine of tears in her hazel eyes, the quiver of her chin and the way her lips pressed together and her nostrils flared as she tried not to cry. He had seen women cry before—he had made women cry before—but it had never affected him quite like this.
This time, he wanted to do more than comfort her with soothing words and a comforting touch. This time, he wanted to take her into his arms and promise—swear to her—that she would never be sad again. This time, he wanted to be able to keep his promise; to love her and to hold her and to keep her safe.
But that wasn’t what she wanted. She wanted to forget. She wanted to have one last night with him and then never remember any of it, ever again. She didn’t want him—not all of him, at least. She just wanted the night.
And he could give her that.
Joel didn’t answer Avery in words. Instead, he stepped forward and cupped her cheeks in his hands, leaning down to press his lips to hers in a kiss so filled with passion and heat and something that he was too afraid to name, but he swore he felt the earth move beneath their feet as she reached for him in response. Her arms wrapped around his neck and he reached underneath her, pulling her up into his embrace so that her legs wrapped around his waist. Their lips stayed connected as he carried her in the direction of her bed, sweeping the curtain aside and placing her down on the bed.
Avery’s hands scrambled over his torso, nails tearing away at the already ripped shirt. The rags fell to the ground at his feet and her hands reached for the button of his pants as his reached to pull off her sweater. Her hands fell away from him for a moment as she raised her arms, allowing the soft, warm fabric to be tugged off, over her head. She shivered as the cool air of the room hit her skin, making goosebumps rise on her arms. She crossed her arms over her chest, trying to warm herself.
Joel smiled down at her and sat down on the bed, wrapping his arms around her, giving her his warmth as Avery curled against his body. He kissed her forehead. Then her cheek. Then her other cheek. He pressed kisses all over her face, moving down until he reached her lips again. Then further, pressing his open mouth to her neck, her chest. He kissed the space between her breasts, his hands moving around to the back, quickly finding and undoing the clasp of her bra. He kissed from her shoulder down to her fingers as he lowered one strap, then the other. He brought her hands together and kissed each pad of her fingers, one by one, then pressed his lips to the palms of her hands, locking eyes with her.
“You are so beautiful,” he told her, his voice deep and gravelly. “So goddamn beautiful.” He pressed his lips to hers again, helping her to wrap her arms around his neck as he grasped her hips, lifting her enough so that she was now straddling him, her bare breasts pressed to his bare, muscled chest. Joel’s hands ran up and down her back, his fingers playing with the ridges of her spine, his lips teasing her pert nipples as his tongue laving over them, stiffening them and making Avery cry out in ecstasy. Her hands were buried in his hair, her hips grinding into his, coaxing growls from the back of his throat.
He reached down for the button of her pants, undoing it deftly and forcing the zipper down as he plunged his hands into the front, his lips never leaving her breast, smiling around the flesh as she gasped. His fingers stroked through her wetness and Avery whimpered, grinding even harder now, trying to feel the friction against his callused fingers. Joel pulled his hand out and she cried out, her nails digging into his shoulders as her hips tried, instinctively, to follow.
Joel growled again, pushing her off of his lap and holding onto her waist until he was certain that her feet were planted firmly on the floor in front of him. Then he pulled away, leaning back and resting with his hands on the mattress behind him, holding him up. Avery squirmed under his gaze as he swept it up and down her body.