by Lewis, Lexi
There were only so many places she could hide in the town, and someone would have seen her, surely. She’d gotten that infernal job, so she had a little money, he knew (and that was going to be nipped right in the fucking bud when she was returned to him), but she couldn’t have gotten far.
“You will regret this, Camilla,” he murmured under his breath as he looked out the window, watching Thomas and Adam and a few other members of the pride head for the tree line. “You will regret it and you will never get this chance again, so I do hope you enjoy your little adventure, my pet.”
Chapter 7: A Feeling of Belonging
Karic had never had so much trouble concentrating before when it came to his job. Usually he was focused and charming, making sure older women and even the men took their medicines on time and followed whatever treatments had been outlined for them. But tonight his mind was thoroughly with the girl he had left in the back office, wondering if she was doing alright, if she was worried about her pride finding her here, and what he would do if they did.
“Are you alright, Karic?” Dr. Dearborn’s voice cut through his thoughts, making him look up in surprise.
“Oh. Yeah. Definitely. Why do you ask?”
She smiled at him mildly. “Because you just filled out Mr. Hampton’s prescription for two hundred and fifty ten milligram tablets instead of the other way around?”
Karic looked down at his pad and then sighed. Yep. He was definitely losing his mind. He tore off the prescription and balled it up, tossing it with impressive accuracy into the nearest trash can.
“Is this about the young lady?” Dr. Dearborn asked him.
His face got hot, and Karic just knew he was blushing. Awesome. “I…don’t know what you mean.”
“Well, Carmen has been informing everyone that there is a pretty young lady asleep in the back office and that she came in with you, so I just assumed.”
Karic couldn’t help but groan at that. He wanted them all to leave Camilla alone, and there was Carmen, sticking her nose where it didn’t belong at all. She’d probably hoped to catch Camilla awake so she could extol his virtues and try to find out what they were to each other and how Camilla felt about him. “If it’s about anything, it’s about how your nurses can’t mind their own business,” he muttered.
Dr. Dearborn cracked a smile. “Yes, they do seem to have a problem with boundaries, don’t they? When I first came and took over here, I was single, and they went out of their way to try and talk me up to every attractive male patient we had, even if they were your age. Of course, then they found out that I wasn’t attracted to men, and that set them back for a good two weeks.”
“And then what happened?”
Her smile grew. “And then Lydia walked in for a physical.”
Lydia was the doctor’s girlfriend, who she had been with for as long as Karic had known her pretty much. He couldn’t help but smile at the thought that the nurses had actually managed to successfully do the matchmaker thing. “Well, I’m pretty sure that’s not going to be the end of this story for me, so I wish they would butt out.”
“It’s only because they care about you, Karic, you know that. We all just want you to be happy.”
“I am happy,” he insisted, wondering why nobody ever believed him when he said that.
The rest of his shift had passed quickly enough, and miracle of miracles, he’d been able to call it a night before midnight rolled around. Apparently it was a quiet night for accidents in the town or something because at eleven p.m. Dr. Dearborn was telling him he was free to go for the night.
“Take your young lady home,” she said with a smile lurking in the corners of her mouth.
“She’s not mine,” he insisted.
“She’s your friend and clearly your responsibility for whatever reason right now. That’s enough to make her yours for the moment.”
Karic just sighed because apparently it literally did not matter what he said to these women. They were going to have their own ideas of what was going on, and they were going to stick to them. So instead of arguing, he went to collect Camilla so they could leave. He was starving, and there were the fixings for the massive sandwiches that were the only thing he really knew how to make back at his house.
He tapped on the door to the back office and then pushed it open when there was no response, peering in to see Camilla curled up on the cot just like Dr. Dearborn had said she was. It felt a little creepy to be watching her sleep like this, but he couldn’t really help it, considering he had to go wake her up.
Her face was peaceful as she slept, one hand curled up next to her face as she lay on her side, and the other hanging over the edge. Karic crept closer and smoothed an errant brown curl out of her face, tucking it behind her ear. “Hey,” he said, shaking her shoulder a bit. “Wake up, sleepy head.”
She groaned and then opened her eyes, peering up at him. “Oh, s’just you,” she said. “What time is it?”
“Yep, just me. No need to alarm or excitement.” Karic checked his watch. “Just after eleven and I’m done for the night. You ready to go?”
Camilla smiled and sat up, rubbing at her eyes in a way that was too damned cute. It made her look younger than she was, but when she stretched, her curves were on display and it was impossible for Karic to forget that she was a woman. “Mm, yes. I didn’t mean to sleep so long, but I guess I was just worn out.”
“Makes sense after all you’ve been through.” He held a hand out to her. “C’mon. Let’s get out of here. I’m making messy sandwiches when we get back to the house.”
She beamed at him but didn’t take his hand, instead sliding off of the couch on her own, putting her weight on her wrapped ankle slowly. “Alright, let’s go,” she said, and the two of them headed out to the car.
It was a clear night, and Karic tipped his head back to look at the stars, breathing in the warm summer air. He glanced over at Camilla to see her looking around at everything.
“This place is really nice when it’s not pouring down rain,” Karic remarked. “Not a lot to see, but it’s friendly and a good place to make a home.”
“Is that why you stay here?”
He nodded. “I like being settled. Dr. Dearborn wants me to go on some grand adventure to be a doctor in New York or something before I get too old to enjoy something like that, but I don’t want that. I’m happy here.”
“Happy is good,” she replied. “How old are you?”
“Twenty-six.”
“So not too old, yet.”
Karic grinned at the teasing tone of her voice. “Older than you, whippersnapper.”
Her laugh was clear and bright, and suddenly Karic couldn’t be in denial anymore. They had known each other for an absurdly short length of time, but he was interested. She made him feel like he had known her for ages, and he’d never had a reaction to anyone that was as strong as this. When he looked over at her again, she was looking back at him, those amber eyes big and open in her pretty face.
“I’d like to find a place like this to end up in,” she said with a little smile. “You’d think that with how I grew up I’d want adventure and to travel and stuff, but really…all I want is somewhere to belong, you know? Where I’m not a tool, but a person and people like me and want me around. That’s all I want.”
“You’ll get it,” Karic told her. “I mean, I can’t see anyone not liking you, no matter where you end up, and there are places like this all over. You just have to find them.”
The conversation stilled for the drive back to the house, the radio providing the only sounds in the car. Camilla was looking out the window as the night zipped past, and Karic focused on the road. It was better to do that than to focus on how good she smelled and how soft her hair and skin looked and how much he wanted to tell her that she could belong here. Even if nothing ever came of the strange attraction he had to her, she would be accepted and wanted here; he was sure of it.
But he couldn’t say that to her. It wouldn’t be fai
r. She needed to get away to feel safe, and as long as her pride was just across the river, that wasn’t going to happen. He could tell from the way her eyes darted to the side every so often that she still wasn’t completely comfortable, and that more than anything kept him quiet until they were back at the house.
He put on more music and went into the kitchen to pull out all the things he had bought for sandwiches: thick sliced ham and thin cut roast beef, lettuce, pickles, chipotle mayo, tomatoes, honey mustard, potato chips.
Camilla was leaning against the opposite counter, one hand pressed over her mouth, seemingly to hold in her giggles as she watched him construct the sandwiches.
“What is so funny?” he demanded as he spread mayo on one half of the thick French bread he had purchased just for this.
“Nothing, nothing. Just…if I were going to imagine the sandwich a werewolf would make, it would definitely be something like this. Messy, sort of every kind of food thrown together on a piece of bread.”
He snorted at her. “And what, you’re too good to eat it because you’re a cat?” he teased.
“Oh, no, I plan to eat one. I’m starving, and it looks good.”
Karic grinned and quickly constructed two sandwiches, plating them and sliding them onto the table along with massive glasses of root beer. “This is my favorite thing to do after a late shift,” he explained. “Just eat way too much food and then pass out in a stupor. Plus, I have the next two days off, so I get to relax and not have to worry about setting an alarm.”
“That does sound nice,” Camilla agreed, turning her sandwich this way and that. “How am I supposed to get this in my mouth?”
“You just have to go for it,” he replied. “Don’t over think it or you’ll never be able to manage.”
“I feel like this sort of thing should come with a warning label,” she said, but she lifted the sandwich and took a large bite, pickles and mayo splatting onto the plate where they had been displaced. “Mm,” Camilla hummed, grinning at him.
“See, I told you.” Karic took his own messy bite and then washed it down with a swig of root beer, sighing happily as he leaned back in the chair. “This is nicer with company,” he said.
Camilla licked mustard from her fingers. “Yeah? I’ve never done anything like this before.”
“You should do it more often,” Karic pointed out. “It’s fun, right?”
“Right.” She smiled at him, and he noticed that she had a smear of mayo right on her cheek that led from the corner of her mouth. His heart beat faster, and he was suddenly seized with the need to lean over and kiss it away. He could imagine that she would taste like root beer, that her lips would be pillowy soft and warm, and that her hair would feel good under his fingers.
She was shorter than him by a good eight or so inches, so she’d have to go up on her toes to kiss him properly if they were standing up, her arms around his neck and those glorious curves pressed against his front. He wondered if she would breathe little sighs into his mouth as they kissed, if she would yield to him or if she would give back as good as she got. If she would let him set her on the counter and slide his hands…
“Uh…Karic?” From the amused tone of Camilla’s voice, this was not the first time she had said his name. “Is there something on my face? Because you’re staring?” Her cheeks were flushed a bit, and Karic wanted it all so desperately. “Um…yeah. You’ve got some mayo, just there.” He pointed to her cheek with a finger that shook.
“Are you alright?” she asked him, brow furrowed.
“Yep. Just um…tired, you know. Long day and all. I…I’m fine.” He would have put his head in his hands if he could.
“Karic,” Camilla said, and her voice was quiet in the kitchen. “I…give me your hand.”
He frowned. “Why?”
“Just…please.”
“Okay,” he said slowly. Karic wiped his fingers on a paper towel and stretched out a hand to her. Her fingers were warm when they touched his, and she clasped his hand in a firm grip and closed her eyes. There was something so familiar about the gesture, and he tried to think of where he had seen this before. “This…you did this when we first met,” he said. “When I found you beside the road.”
“Yes,” she replied. “I did. I had to know.”
“Know what?”
She opened her eyes and looked at him. “If I could trust you. I didn’t know if Paul had people looking for me already or if you were just a friendly person that I could trust, and I had to know.”
“Okay, that makes sense, but…how does this help you know you can trust me?”
There was a look of sadness in those eyes, and Karic didn’t like it. He wanted to pull her to him and wrap her in his arms and blankets and make sure nothing could ever hurt her again. “This…I can sort of…get impressions of people when I touch their hands. Not read their thoughts, really, but see glimpses of what kind of person they are, the things they’ve done. How they feel. I don’t know why I can do it, but that’s why Paul doesn’t want me to leave. He makes me find out people’s secrets and then he uses them against them. That’s why…you shouldn’t feel things for me. Because I have to leave, and it’s not fair for me to know things that you haven’t told me. It’s prying, and I hate it, and I’m sorry.”
Karic was definitely having a hard time wrapping his mind around what she was saying. It wasn’t unheard of for shifters to have other powers to go along with their shifting, but he had never heard of someone being able to do what Camilla was saying she could. He supposed he should have felt like his privacy had been compromised, but really, he could completely understand why she had done it.
Now, he was just embarrassed that she seemed to know how he felt about her without him having to say anything. He didn’t know what to say about any of it, really.
“I’m really sorry,” she said again, and her eyes were so filled with regret. “I…if you want me to leave, you should just say so. I can go. I mean, I’m sure there’s a train I can catch, and I should be leaving anyway so you don’t get dragged any more into this mess than you already have been, you know? Because that’s not fair either, and I’m probably the worst thing that’s ever happened to you, and—”
“You’re not,” Karic said finally, cutting into her stream of babble. “Not by a long shot.”
“But—”
“No. No buts, Camilla. You’re…this is so stupid because we barely even know each other, but I feel like, I feel like I was sleepwalking before, going through the motions, and then you climbed out of a river, and…and now I don’t know how I’m supposed to feel. But I feel something, and you know that now, so I’m not even going to pretend like I don’t anymore. Because I’m not sorry for it. I don’t care what you know about me. I’m an open fucking book to anyone who looks hard enough, and I know you’re not going to use what you know against me. You’re not like that.”
“How do you know?” Camilla asked sharply. “You don’t really know anything about me.”
Karic shook his head. “I know that it hurts you to hurt other people. I know that you hate being afraid and that all you want is to live and be accepted and not be used. I know that you look beautiful in the morning when the sunlight comes in through the window and hits your hair. I know that there are a million things I don’t know about you, and I know that I never believed in that whole mating and imprinting thing before you came along, but now I think that maybe…maybe I was supposed to find you. And I know that sounds insanely stupid, but there it is.”
Deer in the headlights was an understatement for the look of pure gobsmacked shock that was on Camilla’s face. Her eyes were wide, mouth slightly agape, and there was still that streak of mayo on her face. He reached out and wiped it away gently, letting his fingers linger just a bit before he pulled away and wiped his hand, suddenly not hungry anymore.
“I should go to bed,” he said, pushing his chair back from the table and taking the plate over to the drawer where he kept the plastic wrap. No u
se wasting a good sandwich, he guessed, and he wrapped it up and stuck it in the refrigerator. “Um…feel free to use the shower or whatever. I’ll see you in the morning.”
He was halfway out the door when she stopped him. “Wait…Karic, please.”
He stopped, but he didn’t turn around. “Yeah?”
“No one’s ever seen me before. Not just me. They see my power and what I can do for them. Or they see that I look weak or…I don’t know. But you’re different. And I don’t believe in mates or any of that either, but…”
“But?”
“But I think sometimes there are people that you know you’re supposed to be with even if it's just for a short time. People who just fit for whatever reason.”
"So, what are you saying, Camilla?" Karic wanted to know. He didn't want to jump to conclusions and he didn't want to get his hopes up. This didn't change the fact that their situation was a hard one. A ridiculous one when it came to this kind of thing.
Camilla got up from the table, and she looked so nervous, wringing her hands in front of her, but there was also a determined light in those amber eyes. "I'm saying that I feel it, too. Whatever this draw is. It's not just in your heard or whatever, and there's a part of me that wants to..."
"That wants to try?" Karic asked her, tilting his head, and there was no real way to disguise the hope in his voice.
"Yeah," Camilla replied, and she was right up on him now. "At least...while we can, you know? Because I feel like... I feel like if I leave here and have never even tried this with you I'm going to regret it."
Karic tried hard to ignore than pang of longing that seemed destined to always start in his heart when she started talking about leaving. Nothing had changed in that regard, and he knew it. She was still on the run, and he would never ask her to compromise her safety and peace of mind just to try this with him. If it worked, then...there were ways. He could visit. He could try to get the police to look into her pride so that she could come back. He could...he could leave if it came down to it.