by Jeff Hale
I gazed after her thoughtfully, then shrugged and turned back toward Darien, who was still standing on the edge of the dance floor with a dumfounded look. Kris was just standing up, a bemused and confused expression on her face. I made my way out onto the floor, past Darien and offered Kris an arm, then escorted her back to the booth. It was empty. The young boy, Cody, was nowhere to be seen.
Darien just looked at me in puzzlement. “What the hell just happened?” he asked me, as though I should know the answer.
I leaned against the edge of the booth back and contemplated him for a moment, but it was Kris who answered him and I glanced her way.
“You were a bit of a prick.” She had cut off a slice of the cake and was eating it slowly.
“What?” Darien was taken aback.
Kris just stared at him a moment. “She’s been putting up with a controlling jerk of a stepfather for years,” she said in a matter of fact tone. “You weren’t any better just now.”
Darien finally dropped into the seat next to me and we sat quietly for a few minutes. Kris slid a slice of cake my way and I ate it quickly, smiling a thank you at her.
“I don’t understand,” Darien said, breaking the silence. He declined the piece of cake that Kris put on a plate for him, and feeling that it was his loss, I dragged it my way and began to eat it. It was good cake.
I pointed at him with a frosting smudged fork. “Her beast got loose and had its way with her, what else is there to understand?”
“Is that what happened?” Kris asked. “I mean, Kat and I have danced together before and nothing like this has happened. Oh, we get a guy here or there that likes the whole ‘girls dancing with each other’ thing, but nothing like this. I felt, I dunno, strange tonight, sexy, I guess.” She gave an embarrassed half laugh.
I nodded at her. “Katelyn’s beast will manifest itself more and more, and not necessarily under her control, the closer she gets to shifting for the first time. You were physically touching her when it manifested, so it spilled over to you as well.”
Darien made an exasperated noise. “I understood that, I figured that something like that had happened. What I don’t get is her reaction to me.”
I started to open my mouth and he cut me off.
“Yes, I get it, I was a bit of a jerk.” He saw my pointed look. “Okay, a huge jerk, but I thought she understood, I thought we had…” He broke off, making frustrated motions with his hands.
“You thought what?” I asked. I noted that Kris was watching him closely as well, her piece of cake half eaten in front of her.
He sighed. “Well, I thought I was her boyfriend,” he said softly. He looked almost lost.
“Darien, do you mind if I tell you something?” Kris asked, playing with the remaining cake on her plate with her fork.
“Go ahead, Kris. You’re her best friend, maybe you can tell me what’s going on. I certainly missed something somewhere.” Darien gave her a hopeful look.
“She likes you, Darien, she really does,” Kris began, and I saw him perk up a bit, “but…” she paused, “you’re moving way too fast for her. Sounds cliché, I know, but it’s the truth. She’s never had a real boyfriend before, and while she doesn’t mind the thought of having one, she doesn’t want something more permanent than that yet.”
“But if we both like each other, why not?”
“Because she’s just not ready for it yet, that’s why not.” She took another small bit of her cake. “All you are doing right now is confusing her, and you might end up scaring her away entirely.”
Darien seemed crestfallen but Kris was right. I thought sometimes that Darien forgot just how young Katelyn really was, despite being a legal adult, and how little experience she had with the rest of the world.
“There’s also kinda someone else as well.” Kris gave him a sympathetic look as she said it.
Darien swallowed hard, but I could still see the jealousy flare again. “Who? That kid who was pawing her on the dance floor?”
Kris snorted. “Cody? Hell no. No, it’s this guy she met last winter, he lives in Las Vegas, she went to Prom with him.”
“The guy who ran out on her during Prom?”
“You heard about that?” Kris seemed surprised.
“Kat’s mother mentioned it.” He closed his eyes, took a deep breath, then opened them again. “So she still has feelings for him?”
Kris nodded sadly. “Yeah… but for you, too. Like I said, she’s confused.”
“So who the hell is Cody then?”
She laughed. “She’s going to the Senior Party tomorrow night with Cody, that’s all. He dumped his girlfriend for a chance to date Kat and I think she’s humoring him. I’m the one who invited him tonight, not her. I don’t like him much and I guess some part of me was hoping you’d set him straight.” She frowned. “Just not like how you did though.” She was quiet again as she ate a few more bites of cake. “Darien?”
“Yes?”
“That birthday present, was it from Alex and you both?”
“Yes. Why?”
“I decided what I want from you.”
This was somewhat out of left field considering our topic of conversation, but maybe it would help lighten the mood. “What is it you want, Kris?” I asked.
She looked directly at Darien, licked her lips, and took a breath of courage. “I want you to give her some time, Darien, that’s what I want for my birthday. Give Kat some time to think and figure out what she wants, no pressure from you.”
I had to hide a smile at Kris’s craftiness. Darien started to protest, but I gave him a hard look. “We told her she could have anything, Darien. This is what she wants. Are you going to go back on your word?”
He gave me a scathing glance, but backed down. “No, I’m not.” He exhaled deeply. “Maybe it will be for the best anyway.”
“Maybe,” I agreed. “Anyway, I think the mood’s spoiled for the night unfortunately. I wish your birthday could have been better, Kris.”
She shrugged and laughed. “That’s okay, I’ve had worse, believe me. Don’t suppose I can con you guys out of ride home since Kat took off?”
“Sure,” I told her.
We all stood up, gathered up the rest of the cake and the gift bag, and made our way to the door, pushing through people as the crowd had gotten back into full swing again. As we got to the parking lot and headed for our rental car, I noticed that Katelyn’s car was still in its parking space. I drew attention to it.
“Kris? This is her car, right?”
Kris nodded at me.
“How come it’s still here then?”
“Not sure.” She walked over to it and tried the driver’s side door handle. “It’s still locked.” She peered into the window. “Her purse isn’t in there, doesn’t look like it's been gotten into. And her coat is still in the back.” She straightened up and looked around the parking lot. “Fuck,” she whispered.
“What?” Darien looked around the lot as well.
“I think she took off walking.” Kris made a noise. “She used to do that sometimes when Gary would piss her off, take off walking, to help clear her head.”
“Where would she go?” I asked.
She looked around the parking lot again, out to the street and the other businesses then shook her head. “Absolutely no clue. I’ll try to call her.” She pulled her cell phone from her pants’ pocket and made a call, then frowned and snapped it shut. “She’s not answering.”
Darien had wandered off, back toward the sidewalk leading to the club and was sniffing the air around him. I watched as he did his bloodhound routine, knowing full well that I could do the same, but not wanting to step on his toes. He finally turned back to us.
“She went that direction.” He pointed down the main drag that led toward the city center, then started to head down the sidewalk.
“Darien!” I shouted, and he stopped and looked back at me.
“She’s out there by herself, anything could happen,” he
said.
“I know, mate, but you haring off after her isn’t giving her the time that Kris asked you for and will probably only spook her again.”
He looked like he was going to argue with me, but finally just gave me a nod of assent. “Find her for me? Make sure she’s safe?”
I approached him, looked him in the eye, put a hand on his shoulder. “Of course, Darien, you know I will.” I sniffed the air and caught her scent. “Take Kris home, Darien, I’ll get hold of you when I find her, let you know she’s safe.”
He nodded again and headed back toward the rental car, motioning for Kris to follow him. She gave me a look, one that said ‘thank you’, and a brief nod, then got in the car with Darien and they drove off.
I turned in the direction that Katelyn’s scent was the strongest. Darien had been right; it looked like she had headed back towards the main part of town. She had a good fifteen to twenty minute head start on me and I had no clue how fast she was walking.
This close to changing, she might have started to get some of the preternatural speed that came naturally to all shifters and could be moving faster than normal, while I would have to stay at a fairly slow pace, for me, to not lose track of her. My other worry had to do with how well she might elude me at this point, knowing the city far better than I did, but that also depended upon whether she thought anyone would follow her.
Three long blocks away and I started to lose her scent. The wind had picked up, blowing at a sideways angle to the direction I was headed. I took a moment to test the air in all directions and it seemed as though she had veered to the left at this point. I headed across the street, hoping I was headed in the right direction, especially since the wind was blowing in the direction I was going now, making it even harder to keep hold of her smell.
I was rewarded a couple minutes later as a group of five young men passed me on the sidewalk. They were dressed all in dark colors and baggy pants, and I gave them room as they went by, nodding briefly as they all turned to look at me. I got a few curt nods back and they continued on with their conversation. My ears perked when I heard ‘freaky bitch back in the park’ and while I wasn’t sure I would ever call Katelyn that, I could see how she would come across to a regular human as one, especially if she was in an angry mood.
Half a block later a park opened up to my left. There was a library just past it and what looked like a high school across the street from it. As I took the left into the park her scent picked up again and I traced its strongest point to a swing set where it looked like she had stopped briefly.
Picking out the new trail from where she had left the park was a bit harder, but I finally found it, or at least I hoped I had. It took several minutes of little bits of back tracking to follow the jagged trail she had left that ultimately went back in the direction of the club from the far end of the park, before turning right onto one of the busier streets at this end of town.
At this point it seemed she had stuck to a straight line. The blowing wind made it harder to be certain, but just as I was about to worry that I was going the wrong way, I would catch the faintest whiff of her passing.
I finally found myself at a somewhat busy intersection with a Red Apple on my right, a gas station across the way, some sort of professional building to my left, and a Burger King kitty corner from me, and the scent almost completely obliterated by car exhaust, gasoline, and the smell of food.
I stood there, unsure what to do now and feeling rather dejected and overly worried, when I caught sight of her out of the corner of my eye. I had missed her before, when I had briefly glanced over at the Burger King, but there she was now, sitting in a grassy spot a little ways down and near the sidewalk, partially turned away from me.
I took off across the street, the sudden screech of tires and blare of a horn as the car I stepped in front of hit the brakes making me more aware of my surroundings. My focus had been on Katelyn and getting over to her. I saw her turn at the noise, but wasn’t sure if she saw me since I prudently waited for the cars in the lane closest to the Burger King to pass before I finished my way across the street.
I walked up the sidewalk towards her. She was sitting cross legged, her head down, a milkshake with the lid off in front of her on the grass and an order of French fries balanced on one knee. She was dipping a fry into the shake as I approached and sat down next to her.
“Hey,” I said softly by way of greeting.
She put the shake covered fry into her mouth, chewed and swallowed, before answering, “Hey, yourself.” She picked up another fry, raised her eyes to meet mine. “There are crosswalks for a reason, ya know.”
She ate a few more French fries, still dipping them in the shake, while I sat there in silence watching her. French fries and milkshakes. I wasn’t too sure about that, but I might have to try it someday.
“So, is Darien lurking around here somewhere, too?” She gave a brief glance around, then turned her gaze so that it was fixed on me. “I don’t hear him in my head, but I don’t know what the range on this radar is.”
Her sea-blue eyes still had the heat of anger in them, her skin, normally fairly pale, was still flushed with emotion. Dark eyeliner had smudged down onto her cheeks a little bit, as though she had been crying, and her dark-red hair was disheveled around her face in a way that was uncomfortably becoming to me. She had a small spot of milkshake on her lip that made me want to wipe it off with a fingertip. I didn’t though, I didn’t trust myself to.
I shook my head, as much to get the thoughts out of my head that I shouldn’t be feeling as to answer her question. “I had him take Kris home, but I promised him I’d make sure you were okay.”
Her face fell and she sighed heavily. “Shit. Kris. What a lovely birthday this must have been for her. I was hoping this birthday could be a good one.” She sighed again.
“She said it wasn’t the worst.”
She snorted. “It was supposed to be the best. It sure as hell wasn’t that, either.”
“She called Darien a prick.”
She was in mid drink of her shake when I said that and she coughed abruptly. “She did what?”
“Called him a prick, made him promise to give you some time to sort things out.”
She gave a short bark of laughter. “She does speak her mind. It’s one of the things I love about her, she doesn’t beat around the bush.”
“I’ve noticed that.” I grinned at her.
She must have seen me eyeballing her French fries because she suddenly asked, “Want to try it?” and handed me a few fries.
She pushed the shake, now half gone, in my direction. I took the proffered fries and stuck their ends up to the halfway point in the shake, then stuffed the dripping mess into my mouth, expecting to taste something not necessarily horrid, but not all that great either. I swallowed the mouthful and smiled in surprise.
“You are an evil woman,” I told her.
She laughed again, leaning toward me and reaching out with a finger to wipe at my chin. “I know. Most people think of mixing the two and think yuck. You have milkshake on your chin.” She held the finger near my lips and when I froze, she wiped the shake from her finger onto my lips. “Messy!”
I was pretty sure that she didn’t have a clue as to what she had just done to me, that she was only being playful in a friendly way, maybe as a way for her anger to cool. It had taken all my willpower to not lick that bit of milkshake off her finger when she had offered it, and the touch of her finger against my lips had sent a thrilling tingle through me that had erased all thoughts of my friendship with Darien. As though on cue, my phone began to ring, with the distinctive ringtone that I had set for Darien.
I pulled the phone out of my pocket, grateful for the interruption, and flipped it open to answer it. Darien didn’t even wait for me to say hello.
“Did you find her?” His voice was laced with worry.
“Yes.”
“Is she all right?”
“Yes.”
“
Did she say anything in regards to me?”
“Not really.”
My glance met Katelyn’s and she mouthed “Darien?” at me. I nodded, and she rolled her eyes.
“What do you mean ‘not really’? Not even griping about me?” He sounded affronted.
“Mate, I just found her a few minutes ago, she hasn’t had time to recount to me her top ten ways that Darien aggravates her yet.” I saw Katelyn drop her forehead into her hands and shake her head.
There was a brief silence on his end of the phone before he asked, “Where are you?”
“Where are you?” I countered.
“I just dropped Kris off.”
“You headed back to the motel?”
“No, if you’ll just tell me where you two are, I’ll head over so I can talk to her—”
“No,” I interrupted him. “You promised Kris, so for now you’ll just have to take my word for it that she’s fine and head back to the motel. I’ll take Katelyn back to her car and make sure she gets home safe and I’ll be back there later.”
“Alex! I swear if you don’t tell me—”
I snapped the phone shut on his words, knowing that he’d be pissed at me later when I got back to the motel, but knowing that him showing up hopping mad and worried and getting in Katelyn’s face again would only cause more problems.
She looked stunned that I had hung up on Darien. “He’s gonna kill you, ya know.”
I shrugged. “No he won’t. Be angry, very angry, yes. Beat the crap out of me, maybe. Kill me? Nah.”
“Thank you, for not telling him where I was.” She smiled at me, a shy smile, but I could tell that she was worried. She offered me the last bit of the shake, the fries gone, but I declined it. Shrugging, she stood up and walked over to the nearby garbage can, taking the cup and fry holder with her and dropping them in it.
I stood up too. “Walk back to your car? Or cab?”
She thought a moment and glanced at her watch. It wasn’t all that late yet, Kris’s party having broken up early for obvious reasons. She lifted her face to the sky and took a deep breath before looking back at me.