by Skye Jones
At this point, my fantasy came to an abrupt halt. Then what? I had no role here. No job. No family or friends. What should I do all day?
I stopped walking and Louis turned back, his brows raised.
“Are you okay?” he asked.
“If I stay here, what the hell will I do all day? What about my family and friends? I can’t imagine not seeing them again.”
Louis began to walk again and pulled me along with him. “There are lots of jobs that need doing here in the village. Trust me; you won’t be without work for long if you want it. As for your friends and family, you can go visit with them whenever you want. They can come here, too. We need to know in advance, so the pack is aware and no one changes into his or her wolf form during a visit. We simply pretend we’re an eco-village and don’t like visitors much. Brooke’s had people come stay.”
He looked at me and smiled. “You said to me you had a job back home, but not your dream job. What’s your dream role?”
“I’m a fully qualified psychologist.”
Louis tossed his head back and laughed. A carefree sound I relished.
“What’s so funny?”
“Oh, honey. If you stayed, you’d have plenty of work doing your head-doctoring. Our young have major issues during their teenage years. They have to deal with their wolf coming to the fore, along with all the other stuff young people have to cope with. You’d do a lot of good work if you wanted to help them. It ought to stop situations like the fights we have break out every so often.”
Okay. Suddenly the thought of staying and giving this a go didn’t seem so scary. So all-or-nothing. I could come and go, visit with family and they with me. And most important of all, I’d have a role in the community.
“You’ve already been told much of this, but the tincture made you forget.” He squeezed my hand in his. “There’s something you can take which may reverse the effects. Do you want to try it?”
“Yes.”
I didn’t need to be asked twice. I wanted my memories back if possible.
“I want to remember everything between us.”
Louis stopped walking and pulled me into him for a kiss.
Right there, in the woods, with the birds twittering and the rain starting to fall, I felt like I’d finally found my own place in the world.
Chapter Eleven
“This may or may not work.” Marissa placed a plastic glass next to me on the bedside table. “We’ve not tried it in…probably centuries.”
My hand shook as I took the drink from the bedside table. Part of me wanted…needed to remember. Another part wanted to forget all about it and go on with my life as it had been. Before the attack, before Louis, and before I found out wolf shifters were real. The side of me needing to remember it all won out, despite my fear of how memories of the attack would affect me.
Louis sat by the bed, his hand on my other arm. Brooke and Drew were both in the room, and Jake and Adam paced outside. It seemed the whole pack cared whether or not this worked.
As the plastic touched my lips, I paused. “Is it dangerous? If you’ve not tried it in centuries, do you know whether or not it has any serious side effects?”
Marissa looked me directly in the eye and gave an easy nod. “It’s safe. The ingredients are well-used by us in a variety of our medicines, and they have few side effects. The ones they do have are mild. Whether it will work or not is the issue here. Not safety. I’ll even take a drink if you’d like?”
I shook my head. “No need. I just wanted some reassurance.
I tipped the glass back and downed the contents in one go. Ugh. Bitter flavors assaulted my taste buds and I grimaced. “Sorry, but it tastes vile.” I shuddered.
“Here.” Brooke dug into her bag and handed me a tube of mints. “Help yourself.”
I grinned at her and gladly popped a mint into my mouth.
“What now?”
Marissa glanced at Louis and Drew. She tapped her lip and sighed. “Wait five minutes or so, as one of the side effects of one of the herbs can be rapid-onset nausea. If you start to feel sick, we’ll give you something to take it away. After that…you can stay here for observation, or you can go back to Louis’s place and rest up there. We aren’t concerned about physical side effects. More, we’re not sure what the mental and emotional fallout might be.”
“I think I’d prefer to go back with Louis.” As a psychologist, I ought to be able to heal myself, as it were, if I suffered any negative effects.
Back at Louis’s home, I settled on the comfy sofa, while he brewed a cup of tea. Drew and Brooke both bustled about in the kitchen putting food away. Apparently, what they didn’t grow or hunt, they picked up on the occasional trip to the nearest town, made using an off-road vehicle. They’d raided the store cupboard and brought us some chocolate cake and cookies, as well as other treats.
A loud rap on the door made me jump. Louis opened it and Jake walked in. Drew was handsome, but Jake really did outshine even him with his good looks. I preferred Louis to either of them. His face held so much more character, and his eyes never failed to bring me up short.
“How are you feeling?” Jake jerked his chin in my direction.
“Fine. A little sleepy.” Marissa had explained I might become a tad drowsy, but not to worry.
“We need you, Drew. Leaders meeting. Dad wants to actually go out there and see if there are any more empathine we can find. Two being found seems like too much of a coincidence. And they’re both from Edinburgh, so he wants you to start there.”
I didn’t appreciate the way he talked about Brooke and me as if we were things to be collected. Brooke obviously didn’t either, and she blew out an exasperated breath.
“You can’t simply go out there, find empathines, and then bring them back here.” She drummed her fingers on the breakfast bar top.
The layout of the room meant the breakfast bar separated the kitchen area from the living space, while maintaining an open floor plan. I watched the little scene unfolding in front of me with interest. Despite Jake being second in line to Adam, Brooke never kowtowed to him. Perhaps because she was Drew’s mate and he stood to take on the alpha mantel when Adam stepped down. More likely because Brooke didn’t bend to anyone as far as I’d seen. Her strength of character impressed me.
“We aren’t going to go out there and start banging empathines over the head with a club and dragging them back here by their hair,” Jake muttered. “Dad simply wants to see if there are more. If so, we need to ensure a way of keeping this quiet. No one wants the Kikan Myre to find out there’s a resurgence in empathine.”
Kikan Myre? I cast a puzzled glance at Louis.
“It means, roughly translated, the dark creatures. They are those of our kind…and others…who turned away from our agreement of peaceful coexistence with humans.”
“They’re not good, is all you need to know.” Jake cut in.
“You said your kind and others…what others?”
Jake’s lips disappeared into a thin line. “When you are fully a part of our community, you can learn our lore and our beliefs. Look at it logically, though. If shapeshifters exist, then wouldn’t other things you’ve heard about—and always believed to be nothing more than myth?”
As his words hit home, a chill ran down my spine. I’d always been a scaredy cat when it came to tales of ghouls and ghosts and things that go bump in the night.
Louis strode over to me and took my hand in his. “You’re safe here. That’s the most important thing to know. Totally safe.”
Looking at his determined face, I believed him.
I yawned and my jaw cracked.
“Okay, guys.” Brooke clapped her hands at Drew and Jake. “I think it’s time we left these good folk to their privacy. I’ll see you after the meeting, darling.”
She kissed Drew on the lips and came and gave me a peck on the cheek before pulling Louis into a hug.
Jake gave us a salute as he sauntered out into the cool evening air, an
d Drew smiled as he closed the door behind them.
Sudden silence, so quiet it screamed its presence, enveloped us. As if he read my mind, Louis strolled over to the music system.
“How about something relaxing, if I turn the sound right down?”
I nodded and bit back another yawn. Quiet and relaxing sounded good.
As the soft sounds of a harp filled the room, I yawned again and closed my eyes.
*
Pain sliced through me. My face throbbed and I stared in shock at Gregg, who’d just slapped me. He picked up a sharp stick and jabbed it into my thigh. I screamed as burning agony speared my leg. He left the stick poking out of my flesh and torn jeans.
“Are you going to behave?” His foul breath caressed me.
No. No. No.
“Take your hands off her, right now.”
I whipped my head around. Thank God. Louis.
Suddenly I wasn’t lying on the ground, cold and hurt. Instead, I found myself in Louis’s arms. Safe and secure. His scent washed over me, chasing away the vile odor of Gregg. Louis kissed the top of my head and squeezed tighter.
A door opened to reveal a warm kitchen, and two beautiful German Shepherds shot past me. Louis’s dogs. I smiled, but the house in front of me wobbled and wavered and then disappeared.
Gregg stared down at me. His features ruined by the hatred burning clear as day on his face. He shimmered, and his face began to melt like something from a Salvador Dali painting.
Huge creatures surrounded me, all long, hairy limbs and grimacing mouths. I began to scream and scream.
“Hey, baby. Wake up.”
My eyes shot open, and I winced at the awful noise in the room.
“Iz, you’re scaring me. Stop screaming.” Louis leaned close to me and shook me again.
Me? I made that unholy sound? I snapped my mouth shut.
“I had a nightmare.”
“No kidding. Jesus.” He pushed the hair out of his eyes.
Between my breasts, moisture gathered as if I’d run for miles. My body ached and my dry mouth felt stuffed full of tissue.
“I remember.” The words came out dead. Flat.
“The dream?”
I nodded and my eyes filled with tears.
“It’s okay.” Louis pulled me into him, settling back against the pillow and cushioning me as he stroked my back. “You’re safe now. I’m so sorry I was too late to stop him hurting you.”
Oh, no. Louis wasn’t taking the blame for any of it. He’d come back, bleeding and hurt.
“He hurt you.” I squeezed my eyes shut as my memory filled in the gaps with horrifying images of Gregg hitting Louis’s wolf with rocks. One struck his flank and the other hard on his head.
“He hurt you more.”
Debatable. More images flashed in front of my eyes. My head ached and I yearned for a glass of water. I turned to Louis. “Can you fetch me a drink of water?”
He smiled and climbed out of the bed. “Of course.”
Two minutes later, he returned, a glass of ice water in hand. He placed it beside me and made to climb back into bed.
“No.” I held my hand up.
His face fell, and he paused mid-motion.
“I’m sorry, but I need some time alone. I keep getting these flashbacks. All sorts of different things are randomly playing out in my mind’s eye. I need some space.”
“Okay.” He bent and kissed my head. “I’ll be next door reading.”
I drank my water and closed my eyes once more, the headache bad now. More memories came to me. I must have dozed off at one point, because I awoke with a start, gasping. Louis came into the room then to check on me, but he left when I assured him I was okay. I needed him near but couldn’t bear to be touched right then.
Every time I flashed back to Gregg leering at me, pawing at me with his hands, I wanted to throw up. Christ, I’d nearly been raped! Even the thought of Louis touching me became too much to bear.
I tossed aside the duvet and crossed the room to where Louis’s thick cotton robe hung on the wardrobe door. I wrapped it around myself and went to find its owner.
He lay on the sofa, a book in hand and the dogs snoozing on the floor.
“Is there somewhere I can stay, alone, only for a while?”
His brows shot up in alarm. “Why?”
“I just…I need space. I’m sorry.”
“This is the second time you’ve left me.” He swallowed thickly.
“No. I’m not leaving you. I swear. But I need somewhere to be alone. Only for a while.”
“Why?”
“What Gregg did…tried to do… I keep getting waves of panic washing over me. I want to let you hold me so badly, but I’m also kind of really freaked out right now about everything. I think…I think I need space. The thought of us touching right now… I want to, but then it all gets confused with what Gregg did. But I don’t want to talk about it yet, either.”
“I get it.” His face softened. “How long do you want to take?”
“I can’t say.” I hated the desolation stealing across his features, turning handsome into something more akin to haggard.
“I mean, maybe I can just camp out here or something?” I waved my arm around the living room.
“Of course. If you need some time…” Placing the book to one side, he stood. “I’ll get some things and make up the couch.”
I nodded mutely. When he closed the door behind him, I sank onto the floor and hugged both dogs close.
Louis returned to find me still holding the dogs, my face buried in the thick fur of one of their necks.
He threw a duvet onto the sofa and a couple of pillows. I thanked him and made to go sit on it, but he stopped me.
“No, Izzy. You take the bedroom. I’ll sleep here.”
I opened my mouth to argue, but he spoke again. “I insist. Call if you desire anything, but take the time you need.”
Slinking back off to the bedroom, feeling both relieved but also kind of mean, I curled up on the bed and buried my face in the pillow. I spent my time going over everything that had happened to me. Gregg hadn’t raped me, but he’d threatened it. Put his hands on me in anger and rage. He’d hurt me badly. In the immediate aftermath, I’d pushed Louis into making love to me; desperate to get rid of the filth of Gregg’s touch. But now the idea of getting physical scared me. I had no clue how to go about it without seeing Gregg’s face looming over me or hearing his hate-filled words. I wanted to go lie with Louis, but I didn’t want to hurt him by rejecting him if it got too much.
I hardly slept that night. The next day, Brooke popped in with some bagels and a box of herbal tea. Louis had gone to deal with some issue at the edge of the compound, and she said she’d stay with me a while.
“So…what gives?” she asked me around a bite of bagel. “You’re all miserable looking, and Louis has a face as long as his legs. And the dude has really long legs.”
I cracked what felt like my first smile in days, but it slid from my face. I sighed. “I’m scared. I keep remembering the attack. And the idea of trying to make love with Louis…it scares me. It makes no sense because we had sex right after. At my insistence, I hasten to add. But now…I don’t know. What if I can’t? What if I freak out? I keep seeing Gregg towering over me, and it makes me sick.”
“Louis isn’t Gregg and he’d never hurt you. Anyway, sex and being close aren’t the same thing. You don’t need to shut him out completely in order to have a break from the sexy times. I’m sure he’d wait years for you if it’s what you need. But maybe it isn’t what you need?”
“You sound like some cryptic fortune-teller. I don’t want to hurt his feelings.”
She laughed at that. “You already are. You keep coming back to him and then leaving again.”
I bristled at her words. “I haven’t left him.”
“Yeah,” she said softly, “you kind of have. You’ve shut him out for sure. And I get why. I had a horrible experience myself. When that rogue
took me.” She shuddered and her eyes clouded. “Thing is, either you let it ruin your life, or you deal. As far as you, Louis, and being intimate goes, there’s only one way to find out if you can or you can’t. Try. No way will Louis blame you or be angry with you if you need to stop or need more time. Just…don’t keep shutting him out. It’s what he deals with from a lot of the pack every day. Enforcers are always on the outside a little. People fear them as much as they rely on them. Talk to him at least.”
After Brooke left, her words kept rattling around in my head. I hadn’t meant to shut Louis out. I’d simply panicked at the idea of being physical. I decided to talk to him when he came back. In the meantime, I’d work on getting a handle on what happened.
My training came in handy, and I spent the day journaling my feelings and fears. I broke them down, rationalized them. By the end of the day, I’d wrung myself dry.
A soft knock at the bedroom door startled me. I’d been dozing on and off.
“Come in.”
Brooke pushed the door open. “There’s someone here to see you.” She smiled and stood to one side.
The sound of clacking against wood had me looking down. Louis’s wolf walked into the room.
For a moment, I froze, but then I got off the bed and moved toward the great beast. The same magical connection that had danced between us in the woods filled the room. Intense emerald eyes regarded me. I’d learned that Louis was the only shifter in the pack whose eyes didn’t change color when he turned into his wolf form; they merely shone even brighter in his face. I liked that fact, because I loved his gaze on me, and it gave me something familiar to hold on to when he stood there, a huge, scary predator. Focusing on those familiar eyes, I dropped to the floor and wrapped my arms around the magnificent creature’s neck.
Louis in his human form confused me. I wanted him, but I didn’t dare try. His sheer masculinity enticed me, but it also scared me a little once memories of the attack had returned. But Louis in wolf form didn’t cause any of those feelings. Instead, his majestic beast made me feel safe and protected. He wouldn’t demand I talk or explain myself, and I relaxed in the wolf’s presence. It slowly lowered itself, until we both lay on the thick wool rug which covered the wooden floorboards. My arms stayed around its neck, and I began to sob into the thick fur of its ruff.