Sheckley, Alyssa - The Better to Hold You.html

by The Better to Hold You (lit)

  “Jesus,” he said, his eyes wide. I instantly recognized the expression in his eyes. It was what Lilliana had always called the “My God you're naked and a goddess” look, and I had nodded and pretended I knew what she was talking about. It was such a wonderful reaction that I didn't have the heart to chide him. I belted the robe.

  “Can you concentrate now?”

  Red turned around. “You're still very naked under that, but—yeah, I can handle it.”

  I sat on the bed, wrapping my arms around my knees. “So what happens now? We wait for the moon to rise?”

  Red sat down beside me. “It's easier when the moon's full, like now, but I'm not a werewolf, so I can change at other times.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Lycanthropy's a virus. What I've got is more, ah, gene tic in nature. I'm Limmikin—a shapeshifter.”

  “I've just accepted the idea that lycanthropy can actually turn people into werewolves—Unwolves—whatever. And now you're telling me there's more supernatural weirdness around?”

  Red threw back his head and laughed, revealing canine teeth sharper than I remembered. “Doc, around these parts, I'm what passes for normal.”

  I felt my eyebrows rising up. “So prove it.”

  “Right here?”

  “Right here. Turn into Red the coyote.”

  Red flushed his splotchy, hectic redhead's blush. “A wolf. A red wolf, not a coyote.”

  “I didn't mean to offend you.”

  “I know I may not be quite as big as some of the timber wolves …”

  “Sorry, I just remembered that in Texas, some red wolves had interbred with the local coyote populations …”

  Now Red narrowed his eyes. “Coyotes are tricksters, Abra. I am not a coyote.”

  “Okay, I believe you.”

  Red stood up so that he was looking down on me and the bed. The look on his face made my breasts tingle and my nipples harden. “A Limmikin doesn't require the moon,” he said, his gaze dropping down to my mouth. “All that's required is that I be naked and in an ecstatic state.”

  THIRTY-ONE

  In a sense, all women are shapeshifters. But even though I'd thought I was pregnant until a short time ago, I had found it hard to imagine myself undergoing the dramatic transformation into moon-bellied hugeness. Picturing myself with an actual baby had been even harder. My mind had accepted it; my gut had not.

  So even though I didn't think Red was lying, I couldn't quite wrap my mind around the image of him turning into a wolf, and imagining myself transforming felt even more outlandish.

  Except that I still had the guilt-blurred memory of Halloween night, the sudden storm of intimacy between us, and the unexpected climax of that intimacy. My mother had always insisted that as a child, I'd had some sort of strongly empathic ability that I'd blocked out when I became a teenager. I would argue that I'd had a very good reason for embracing rationality as my religion, and in any case, doesn't every mother want to believe that her child is special, gifted, magic? Even when she knows she is only the absolutely plain and ordinary daughter of an extraordinarily vivid woman?

  My defense had been to grow up and resolutely not believe in it, any of it—no to my mother's bags of aromatherapy herbs, no to her crystals and runes and astrology charts, no to her psychic dreams and votive candles and hand-painted leather voodoo charms.

  Ye t here was Red, telling me if he just shucked his clothes and, presumably, his inhibitions, he could turn himself into a wolf. And if he could, then presumably, I could, too.

  The one thing I'd wanted more than magic, as a child, had been to be a dog.

  With all these things running through my mind, I couldn't quite sort out what to say when I opened my mouth. But Red seemed to understand. Because he knelt down between my thighs, as if he were about to propose, and waited.

  “What do you need to do?”

  Getting up to sit beside me on the bed, Red reached over to cradle my head between his hands, then raked his fingers through my hair, tugging gently at the hair-band until it came loose and my hair tumbled down my back. That almost familiar sensation his hands induced in me, a kind of mindless sensual relaxation, kicked in and I felt my eyes go heavy-lidded. “I need to take off my shorts. Anyone likely to come in here? Disturb us?”

  I shook my head no. My mouth was kind of dry.

  Red drew in a sharp breath. “Jesus, Abra, you smell … you smell like you want me.”

  I swallowed, with difficulty. “I do, Red. But I'm not going to make love to you.” I couldn't. Not five minutes after believing myself pregnant with another man's child.

  He nodded. “I just need to get a little—you know, reptile-brained. Instinctive. I can do it with the right ritual, or music, but that would take a while. Don't suppose you happen to have any pot?”

  “My mother probably does but I have no idea where.”

  “So it might be quickest if you—if you let me kiss you.”

  “Just a kiss?”

  Red's eyes crinkled with amusement. “Doc, a kiss done right is a pretty powerful thing.”

  “All right then. Just a kiss.” As if I hadn't had my mouth on his penis a month ago.

  Red pulled down his shorts. “One thing, though.”

  “Yes?” I tried to look away, but it was hard. I mean—well, yes, I guess I meant that, too. I hadn't been with many men, and I hadn't really thought much about size before. It wasn't that Red was that much longer than Hunter—it was just that he was, well, thicker. And I couldn't help but wonder how that would feel. I put my thumb and finger around him, trying to measure.

  Red gave a sharp gasp and his eyes closed. “Just … just wanted to mention that …” I moved my fingers slightly, and he moaned. “Wanted to … Jesus, wait, I can't think when you do that …”

  “Yes?” I took my hand away.

  Red swallowed hard and opened his eyes. “In my other state, I might not be as, ah, restrained.”

  I nodded in mock-seriousness. “You think your dog-self is going to try to mount me?”

  I guess the tone of my voice fell somewhat short of diplomatic. Red looked at me with something that was mostly amusement but ever so faintly tinged with annoyance. “Oh, just shut up,” he said, and kissed me.

  At first it wasn't much, just a press of his thin lips to mine, just an angling of his jaw to set his mouth more firmly over my mouth, just his big hands cradling my cheek, my jaw. And then I became aware of his bare chest against my breasts, the red robe must have slipped down off my shoulders, and as I reached for it he took my wrists in his and held them captive, and that one small gesture did me in. I moaned, and the next thing I knew Red was biting his way down the side of my neck, sharp little nips like nothing Hunter had ever done. Red lifted one of my breasts, the skin underneath so sensitive it nearly hurt, and took one of my nipples between his teeth, sending a shock of painful plea sure straight down to my womb.

  I grabbed ineffectually at his hair with my bandaged hands and he pulled his head away. “I thought you said just a kiss.”

  Red grinned, and his eyes were an intent, wolfish yellow. “I lied,” he drawled, and buried his face between my breasts.

  “Stop,” I said, and he opened his mouth wide, engulfing most of one small breast. My thighs fell open, and Red made a strange groaning sound. “Really stop,” I said, and tried bringing my knees together.

  “Little pig, little pig, let me in.” His hands parted my legs.

  “Red. Red!” I was crying now, and he looked up, all humor gone.

  “Doc?”

  He came up until my head was level with his strong chest and pulled me into his embrace. “Ah, Jesus, Doc, I'm sorry. Please, don't cry. I stopped, all right? I stopped.”

  “Red.” I cried his name into his mouth and felt his startle, and then his comprehension. He started kissing me again, and again I could feel that barely restrained wildness in him, sharp teeth leaving faint marks of possession, my heart thudding with fear and excitement. But w
hen his eyes met mine, I could feel the strength of his love for me, holding his hunger in check. This time, as he slipped down my thighs and I started to cry, he understood and held my wrists all the tighter, and I finally let myself go and wailed as he found me with his tongue.

  He did not ask me if I was all right, thank God, and when he closed his teeth on the tender bud of my flesh I lost that tenuous sense of self separate and apart. In the moment when I seized his coarse hair with my damaged hands, in the moment when need became savage and primal and fierce, I threw my head back and howled and howled.

  THIRTY-TWO

  “Okay, so here's the problem—you're not a dog. Or wolf, or coyote, or any other canid form.”

  We were lying in bed, my head on Red's chest, one of my legs thrown over his hip. We were not lovers by Bill Clinton's definition of the word. But we were definitely more than just friends.

  “Well, no.” Red's fingers traced lazy patterns on my back.

  “But you did say that all that was needed …”

  “Was my being naked and in an ecstatic state. But here's the thing, darlin'—that was your ecstatic state.”

  I leaned up on an elbow and planted that elbow in the middle of Red's chest. “But you said—”

  Red had begun kissing the inside of my elbow where it dug into him. “I'm in love with you. I'm part wolf. I want to eat you up.”

  I drew my knees in and sat up. “So why aren't I a wolf then, if I have lycanthropy?”

  Red propped himself up on one elbow. “ ‘Cause the virus kicks in when it reaches a certain level in your bloodstream. If it kicks in—some are predisposed, some aren't. Also, it depends on the moon. And we're not within Northside's borders now—the town tends to have an amplifying effect on certain conditions.”

  “You watch my mother's movies, don't you?”

  “We need to change your bandages now.”

  “Don't change the subject.” But I held out my hands as he gathered the gauze and antibiotic ointment.

  “Well, would you look at that.” We stared at my hands as Red unwrapped the gauze. The skin was a paler shade of pink, the color I'd have expected to see in a burn two weeks old.

  “Can you feel this, Doc?” He ran a finger over my palm.

  I looked at his finger touching my palm. “No.”

  “You're healing this fast because of the virus.”

  I wiggled my fingers, then touched my knuckles. “I still can't feel anything.”

  “Maybe if there was a complete change … Do you want me to try to bring it on?”

  The rush of fear left me feeling almost sick. It wasn't a rational thing. I knew that even as I heard the breath hiss out of my teeth. “I don't know. I don't think I'm ready.”

  Red gave me the kind of look I am used to in dogs: a look of perseverance. “I think you're readier than you know.”

  The fear was gone, leaving something darker and more difficult in its wake. “Oh, Red.” I wondered if I was going to be able to love him back the way he deserved.

  “How about this. Let me change. Then we'll work on changing you.”

  “Fine, do it.”

  Red raised one eyebrow. “This how you talk to all your gentlemen friends?”

  I touched the side of his face. “Sorry. What should I say?”

  He came closer, so close the tip of his nose touched mine. “Say, Hey, I never noticed how incredibly handso—” The phone rang.

  We froze, looked at it. “Don't pick it up, Doc.”

  “What if it's an emergency?”

  I could feel his sigh in my hair. The answering machine clicked on as I sat up. “You have reached Beast Castle, a refuge for abandoned, abused, and unwanted cats and dogs,” said my mother's voice, incongruously sultry and dramatic. “We are currently tending to some of our animal patients. Please leave a message and one of our dedicated volunteers will get back to you shortly.”

  “I am an extremely patient animal,” Red growled, getting up from the bed.

  “Be quiet,” I said.

  “Pagan? I'm calling from the airport to tell you that I'm catching an early flight back.” It was my mother, sounding more than a little stressed.

  Red, moving more quickly than I would have expected, was there to lift the phone to my ear.

  “Mom? It's me. Why are you coming back so soon?”

  “Abra? Where's Pagan?”

  “With her boyfriend. Mom, listen, I don't want you to get alarmed, but I have to tell you—”

  “Wait a moment, they're announcing something—no. Abra, my flight should be in this evening, but they're experiencing some delays. I may be in late.”

  I was looking into Red's eyes as I spoke to my mother. There was a band of dark green, another band of gold. His lashes were tipped with gold, and I traced my finger along the fan of crow's-feet which deepened with his smile.

  “Mom, before you get here, I wanted to tell you what happened. Hunter and I had a—we had an argument.”

  “It's the pregnancy. Hunter can't stand the thought of being tied down to anything. I've always told you that about him—he's an emotional sixteen-year-old. He wants you to be the home that he keeps leaving.”

  As I watched, Red's eyes began to fill with tears of mirth. I realized he could hear every word my mother was saying.

  “Mom, I'm not pregnant. It was a false positive. And I've left Hunter. But there's something else you need to know.”

  “Wait a moment … Christ, another flight's been delayed. Abra, I need to get myself a drink before any more serious talking takes place. I just wanted to inform Pagan that I was coming back, not get into a whole emotional unburdening.” There was a pause while my mother snapped at someone standing too close to her that she was having a private conversation.

  “Abra? Are you there? Listen, I realize that you are the daughter and therefore filled with your own concerns right now, but it would be nice to actually hear you ask me why I'm coming home a week ahead of schedule.”

  I put my hand over Red's mouth to stop his snort of laughter, and he kissed my palm. “I don't need to ask, Mom. You're coming home because Grania broke up with you. She's emotionally immature and you caught her flirting with some other guest. Or spa worker. Male,” I guessed.

  There was a momentary silence. “You think yours is the only drama that counts, don't you, Abra?”

  “No, Mom, that would be you. What I've been trying to tell you for the past ten minutes is that I just burned my hands and—” The phone went dead with a click. Red and I stared at each other.

  “Well,” he said.

  “Meet my mother, the undead queen of psychodrama.”

  “I guess I'd better go fix some coffee. Something tells me that you need it. We can always pick up where we left off a bit later.”

  I didn't know what to say. I'd told him the truth when I'd said I couldn't just sleep with him—well, have sex with him, as I had slept with him. But then, lying on my back a few moments ago, I had rather lost my sense of boundaries. Had he pressed his advantage sooner, I would have said yes. Now that I was no longer aroused, however, I couldn't see myself taking the next step with this strange new man. But I couldn't exactly leave him stranded, either.

  “Forget the coffee. Lie down on your back,” I said.

  “No.”

  “No?”

  Red reached out and touched me on the side of my face. “This time I won't be able to keep control. If you do that for me—I can't promise not to take you. In any form.”

  I stared at him. No man had ever seen me as the kind of woman who would make restraint impossible. “What do you suggest, then?”

  Red scratched the back of his neck, his arm and shoulder muscles bunching. “Well, I do need to prove to you that there's more to me than meets the eye. If it can't be sex …”

  “It can't.”

  “Then it has to be beer and rock and roll.”

  Since beer and rock don't really sit well before eight A.M., we spent the day pilling a few cats, tak
ing a shivering greyhound's temperature, and putting ointment on the fungal Burmese. I noticed that the animals had a strange reaction to Red: At first, a few of the cats hissed and arched, but after a moment all of them became downright affectionate, rubbing against him and purring loudly. Most of the dogs were relaxed after they'd had a chance to sniff him. To my relief, they sniffed his breath, not his rear end. The Akita, never a stable character to begin with, did a little mad barking dance, but Red crouched down and smiled a particularly unfriendly smile, and then the Akita rolled over and writhed.

  “So dogs don't mind the fact that you're an Unwol … Limmikin?”

  “Most don't. I've got a good way with animals, in any case.” As if he were reading my mind, Red added, “You'll still be able to work as a vet, you know. During the time of month when you're transitioning, you'll smell like a cross between a menstruating female and one in estrus. But the animals aren't going to go white-eyed with terror—they'll just try to sniff your crotch a bit more than usual.”

  Something to be grateful for, I supposed. At four o'clock I rested and discovered that in the forty-five minutes I'd been asleep, Red had cleaned out one of the spare guest rooms so it no longer smelled as badly of cat piss and mold. I moved my things in and looked out the window. It was not my childhood bedroom—that was the room Pagan was using. It was the room my father had liked best, overlooking the garden in back.

  Red composed one note for my mother and another for Pagan, explaining about the animals, my hands, and the sleeping arrangements. Red seemed to be assuming that after the upcoming evening of boozy rock and possible shapeshifting, I would want him to leave me back here with my mother. I suppose that was the best way to handle things. My mother could help take care of me until I figured out what to do with the rest of my life. Or maybe I'd turn into an Unwolf and my hands would heal completely. I couldn't really say which outcome seemed more likely. My mother hadn't been much good at taking care of me when I was little, but then, I'd never turned into a hairy monster before, either.