From his perch, Cam looked down at her and blinked. He chattered softly—a sound not quite a meow—then dropped his head to rub it against Josh’s chest.
Sara tilted her head. It looked appealing, especially when Josh lifted his hand to begin scratching Cam behind the ears. But his lap looked small, and there would be no avoiding Cam if she attempted to get any closer. There would be the warmth of their bodies, yes, but even as that called to her, it also raised an iota of fear, and she began to back away, her paws awkward as she navigated the soft terrain.
The side of the bed came sooner than she anticipated. Her back paw met open air, and she tumbled over the edge of the mattress.
By the time she hit the floor, she was back in her human form.
Josh was beside her in an instant, giving her his hand to help her to her feet. Cam the cat watched her from the bed inquisitively. The serious look on his face was almost enough to make her smile; she had never seen an expression like that on a cat before.
“What happened?” Josh asked. “Did you hurt yourself?”
“Only my ego.” She rubbed at her bottom. “And maybe my ass. Falling off the bed is not my favorite way to get rug burn.”
“It’s not mine either.” He sat on the edge of the bed, and Cam immediately nudged his arm. “Did Cam startle you?” To Sara’s surprise, Josh scooped him up. Cam did not like to be handled when he shifted, especially when he was so small. But Josh cradled him easily, rubbing his ears. “You have to admit, he’s not very scary like this.”
He wasn’t—hadn’t been. And he was even less so now that she was five feet taller than him. “I lost my concentration,” she said. “I can probably do it again.”
She sat on the floor, unwilling yet to go up onto the bed. There was no room for flight up there, at least, not without falling on her ass again. It also brought her down to the level of Josh’s lap and Cam’s steady eyes, and for a long minute, she gazed at him.
“You never used to like to be petted,” she said to Cam.
He chattered again, his eyes drooping as Josh continued to stroke him. “He’s not always a big fan of it, but after you…when he shifted, we both ended up being pretty lonely. He didn’t have anybody to shift with, and I didn’t want to just pretend there wasn’t an animal roaming through the house. So, we gradually worked out a compromise.”
It wasn’t a concept Sara was familiar with. She had always had shifters around her, always had somebody she trusted to share it with, from her family all the way up to Cam. Until she’d been abducted, the notion of being alone had been a foreign one, especially when she took another form.
Slowly, she stretched out an arm, fingers skimming over the ruff of Cam’s neck. “I never thought about how Cam was coping being alone,” she confessed quietly. “Well, I did in the beginning. Before I stopped trying to think of Delta.”
Cam closed his eyes blissfully as they both petted him. “He wasn’t entirely alone. I helped when I could. People were constantly coming over, and they offered to help in any way they could, but he just sort of shut down without you.”
The coarse hair at her fingertips brought back other, stronger memories than the ones that had driven Sara away. Nights spent under the desert moon, curled into the body heat of his chosen spiritual form, his tongue rough against her skin when he would absentmindedly lick her. Or soaring high above the dry earth only to come diving down at a breakneck speed to land on his outstretched wrist.
Cam had always said she was the most beautiful thing he had ever seen. In any form.
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