Beauty Loves the Beast

by Robyn Peterman

  “It’s really okay,” Georgia said weakly, trying to make us feel better.

  Nancy glanced over at me with a hollow expression, and I nodded slowly. I knew what she was going to do, and I was floored. My chest felt tight and old anger burned inside me—almost consuming me. Breathing was difficult and I had to focus to keep from growling. I’d been so wrong to stay away from these people.

  She turned her back to Georgia and lifted her shirt. Caleb turned away with a vicious muttered curse, but I stared at my sister’s back. It was covered with small circular scars—burn marks from cigarettes—at least a hundred. They were faded, but unmistakable. It still killed me to see what they had done to her. Death had been too kind for the fucks who had given birth to us.

  Georgia gasped and shot out of her chair. Lying her cheek against Nancy’s pitted skin, she held my sister tight. The room was eerily silent except for Georgia’s quiet crying.

  “If you’re a monster, I’m one as well,” Nancy said flatly, lowering her shirt, turning and taking Georgia’s hands in hers. “What doesn’t kill you…”

  “Should be killed,” Caleb hissed.

  “I agree,” Nancy said to Caleb. “What was done to Georgia should be avenged.”

  “I’d be delighted to blow them up,” Caleb offered sincerely.

  “They’re mine,” I said through clenched teeth. “I get the honor of tearing them limb from fucking limb.”

  Georgia’s eyes filled as she gazed at the three of us in surprise. She swiped at her tears and gave us a watery smile. “You people are insane. I’ve never felt so included and understood in my life, but they’re mine. They trained me to kill, and I’m going to thank them by showing them exactly what I can do.”

  “Actually, I might have to blow the bastards sky high,” Caleb pointed out. “If Sean can get you two fugitives out of the country that leaves me with the honors. And trust me, it would definitely be an honor.”

  “The idiot has a point,” Nancy said as she prepared the syringes and swabbed both of our arms. “However, I’d just like to add for shits and giggles that I’m outstanding with poison.”

  “And that’s supposed to make me feel calm?” Georgia asked with a wince and a lopsided grin that seemed to delight my sister.

  Nancy nodded and laughed. “Yep. I’m an evil genius and I’m on your side. You want to turn away while I do this?”

  “Umm, no,” Georgia said, shyly glancing over at me. “I want you to sing Edelweiss.”

  “Jesus Hesus Christ,” Caleb shouted. “Can I record this? Please let me record this.”

  “No,” Nancy snapped. “You may not record this, you asshole.”

  Of all the things she could have asked of me, I understood this like no other. I wasn’t a good singer, but that wasn’t the point at all. It was what had saved me, and she was asking me to save her. I knew the request meant far more than helping her at the moment. I also knew I would fail her miserably at some point, but…

  “I will,” I said. “I will sing for you.”

  Her smile melted through the exterior of my cold, dead heart, and I realized I’d felt more alive in the last twelve hours than I had in decades. She was the light to my consuming darkness. I wondered if she realized that the Edelweiss flower was known for its beauty and purity. It was fitting in so many ways.

  And I sang.

  It was simple. It was terrifying. It was right.

  8

  Georgia

  Waiting for the results was excruciating. Carter had gone off with Caleb after they’d taken me to a beautiful guest room to shower and change clothes. Nancy was my size and had loaned me a pretty floral sundress that floated around me, along with some fabulous jeweled sandals. Looking in the mirror, I felt like a girl without a care in the world. My eyes appeared bright and my hair was clean and silky. It was a true luxury and I felt like a princess. All of it was a lie of course, but I wanted to hold on to the fantasy for as long as I could.

  Wearing a spaghetti-strap dress wasn’t something I ever thought I’d do again, but these amazing people had scars of their own and mine didn’t scare or repulse them. The marks on Nancy’s back had horrified me and made me want to hurt the people who had done it to her. They were old scars that I was fairly sure had been burned into her skin by her parents, from the little Carter had shared and Caleb’s reaction. For the first time, I was grateful I’d simply been ignored by my parents. I’d wanted to ask Nancy more but would wait until she chose to tell me.

  However, it really didn’t matter if she ever did. Nancy had made her point. What hadn’t killed her made her stronger. She’d become a doctor—the exact opposite of someone who causes harm.

  If I got out of this shit show alive, would I be able to turn my pain into something good? Could I become something whole or would I forever be broken?

  “You didn’t infect Carter,” Nancy announced, walking into the room and sitting down on the bed.

  Relief made my knees buckle. I dropped onto a chair so I didn’t hit the floor like a sack of potatoes.

  “Are you sure?” I asked, feeling light-headed and wildly grateful for at least one small favor in the enormous mess I’d made.

  She nodded and spread her notes on the bed. “That’s not the way it works. He’d have to be injected like you were. The surgeries and drugs they forced on you are what changed your DNA. Honestly, I’m not sure how you survived it.”

  “I’m not sure it’s a good thing I did,” I muttered as my mind raced with memories of being strapped to a table and begging for my life. Behind my closed eyes, all I could see were needles and blood. My fury at my situation was compounded by the fact that I would give anything to be a normal girl even for just one day.

  My fangs involuntarily dropped and my claws popped out from my fingertips.

  “Oh God no,” I gasped out, turning away and trying to hide my fucked-up deformities.

  “No,” Nancy said harshly. “Don’t hide from me. Ever. This is not your fault. It’s simply a fact and you need to accept it. Relax and visualize what you want to happen right now.”

  Breathing in slowly through my nose and letting the air escape just as slowly through my mouth, I calmed myself. I pictured myself normal—or as normal as someone who was as fucked up as I was could possibly be.

  My fangs retracted, as did my claws.

  That was a first for me. The ability to control my shift felt powerful. Until now, it dominated me. Maybe I could master it… and maybe not. “I shouldn’t exist,” I whispered. “I’m a sin against nature.”

  Nancy moved to where I sat, lifted my chin and forced my eyes to meet hers. “Stop. I can’t say that things happen for a reason because I don’t believe it. There is no way to explain away the horror of what was done to you… or me and my brothers. However, I do believe there’s a reason we survive. Occasionally, we realize what that reason is and sometimes it remains a mystery,” she said with a small smile. “But the silver lining here is that you didn’t infect Carter.”

  “But he was out for three days,” I told her.

  Nodding again, she went back to the bed and studied her findings. “You have traces of poison in your system, Georgia. It’s the same concentration as when Sean evaluated your blood. Your bite put some of that poison into Carter’s bloodstream, but it never would have caused him to turn into a panther. That would take far more than a bite. It could possibly have killed him, but my brother is a tough motherfucker. I’m sure the vaccines he’s had for going overseas to fight helped.”

  “So my bite is poisonous?” I asked, feeling ill.

  “Probably,” she confirmed. “Although I’d hazard a guess, since you’re off the regimen of shots and ointments, you’re losing the poison. Therefore losing the ability to fully shift. But you may always have the claws, fangs and eyes of a panther in extreme situations. Your DNA has been permanently altered.”

  “Are you sure?”

  “About your DNA? Yes. About the poison in your system becoming weaker?
It’s an educated guess from a very overly educated person who happens to be a whiz with poison. Not a hundred percent sure, but that’s doctor speak. As an MD, I’m never allowed to be a hundred percent sure about anything,” Nancy said with a shrug and a laugh. “However, as a human being and the sister of two annoying assholes, one of whom likes you a lot… yeah, I’m sure,” she admitted, and then gave me a sly little grin. “So my advice to you is not to bite Carter again anytime soon, but everything else should be okay. The poison is only passed through your fangs—not other bodily fluids or saliva.”

  I felt the heat crawl up my neck and settle squarely on my face. Mortified didn’t quite cover how I was feeling. How freaking uncomfortable was it to talk to the sister of the man you’d only known for twelve hours about possibly getting intimate with him?

  Very.

  Very uncomfortable.

  “Look, umm… Nancy. I’m not, you know…” I mumbled, wondering if I should insert my foot all the way down my throat and pull it out of my ass or just stop now. Knowing when to call it a day wasn’t one of my stronger points and, to my horror, I kept speaking. “I think your brother is a wonderful guy. I mean, he’s kind of rude and a little weird, but he’s nice, too… and hot. Wait, you don’t want to know that.”

  I slapped my hand to my forehead and tried to drive the horrible conversation back to something more manageable. “I’m not exactly good relationship material with a bounty on my head and all—not to mention the whole fucked-up animal thing. I really wouldn’t be good for him—or anyone.”

  “He’s not good for anyone, either,” she pointed out, amused by my apparent misery. “Seems like a pretty good fit to me.”

  “I’m the reason the government wants him dead,” I reminded her. “Kind of hard to imagine him wanting to be near me at all.”

  “Trust me,” Nancy said with a laugh. “I’ve never seen him like this. He sang for you. Carter Wylde doesn’t do that. Ever. He’s got it bad.”

  “We’ve known each other for less than a day,” I insisted, more for my benefit than hers. I mean, how could this be happening? And was it happening? And if it was, what the hell was it?

  Nancy gathered her paperwork and slipped it back into a thick folder. She stood up and approached me with a small, sad smile on her lips.

  “Tomorrow isn’t guaranteed, Georgia,” she said, looking me straight in the eye. “Timing is rarely right and falling for someone never makes sense. I’ve only known you for a few hours yet I would trust you with my life. Does that make sense? No, it doesn’t. But this is what I know. My brother’s life has been filled with sadness and violence I don’t want to even try to imagine—as has yours. Our upbringing was a fucking real life horror movie. I rarely sleep through the night even now. You make Carter smile. Instead of running when he didn’t like what you said, he punched a wall. You might not realize it, but that was an improvement for him. My brother is a jackass, but he’s not a liar and he can’t fake his emotion. What you see is what you get. Enjoy what you can, while you can. Always. You deserve it, and my brother deserves it.”

  With that, she kissed the top of my head and left the room.

  Oh. My. God. I was just given permission by Carter’s sister to do him—after she saw my claws and fangs. How freaking weird was that? My life had jumped from boring to fucked up to terrifying to flat-out weird. And this new weird was the scariest of all. I wasn’t good for him and he probably wasn’t good for me, but…

  For the first time in my life, I cared about the person I wanted. It was strange and heady and frightening. In fact, I was very sure I was falling for him.

  Fast? Yes.

  Ridiculous? Yes.

  Absolutely true? Yes.

  And that’s when I knew I couldn’t let anything happen between us.

  As much as I wanted to pretend I was normal, I wasn’t. I never would be normal, and who knew what the long-range effects of what the mad scientists had done to me would be? The most loving, mature and responsible thing I could do was to leave him alone. That was going to be harder than hell, but doable.

  We had forty-eight hours here, and then hopefully Sean would be able to get us out of the country. Once we were safe, we would part ways, and Carter could find someone who wasn’t a fucked-up mess like I was. The thought of that made me want to tear the pretty guest room to shreds, but it was the right thing to do.

  I was fine. No. I wasn’t fine. I was dying inside, but that was just too damned bad. It was time to pull up my big girl panties and be selfless. I’d survived being an experiment and living in a cage. I could survive giving up someone I was falling in love with because it was better for him to be without me. Eventually, I would bring him down. I was sure of it.

  Great. Decision made.

  And then he walked into the room and I forgot my fucking name.

  “Did you talk with my sister?” Carter asked.

  He was wearing loose-fitting sweats and a t-shirt that hugged every gorgeous muscle in his broad chest. Tearing my eyes away from his beauty was impossible, so I didn’t even try.

  Nodding my head yes was all I was capable of. If I spoke, I was terrified I’d beg him to take me immediately.

  “I liked what she had to say,” he said, pinning me with a stare. “Did you?”

  Again, I nodded—still didn’t trust my ability to speak.

  “Also spoke to Sean,” Carter went on. “He’s having a little trouble so we might be here a bit longer than forty-eight.”

  “He can’t get us out of the country?” I asked, finding my voice now that we were discussing life and death—his and mine.

  “Not yet, but he will. Sean hates losing even more than I do. However, I can think of a few things we can do to fill the time.”

  “You can?” I asked in a voice that sounded foreign to my own ears. It was breathy and full of need. I was the absolute uncoolest in this sexy little cat-and-mouse game we were playing. I needed to keep to silent communication or I was going to ruin what might be happening here.

  His smile was slow and filled with so much erotic innuendo, I actually laughed. He was every kind of crazy and it was hotter than hell.

  “Would you like a tour of the house?”

  “The house?” I asked, confused. Maybe I’d misread everything. Or maybe he’d changed his mind. I wouldn’t blame him at all and everything would be easier if he had.

  “Wait. Did I say house?” he asked, shaking his head and biting back his grin. “Sorry, my bad. I meant room—my bedroom.”

  “You’re not scared of me?” I asked, pissed that my voice still sounded so girly and breathy.

  “Nope.”

  “You should be,” I warned him.

  “Right back at ya, Georgia from Georgia,” he replied, grabbing my hand and leading me out of the guest room. “I’m the scariest thing you will ever come across.”

  And that’s where this beautiful man was dead wrong. He was Beauty and I was the Beast. I was far scarier than he was, and I always would be.

  9

  Carter

  Georgia was the loveliest being I’d ever laid my eyes on and was definitely too good for the likes of me, but she wanted me. It was mind-boggling. I knew my outside package was pretty, but my insides were as black as death. She’d witnessed it and not run.

  Georgia from Georgia was insane, but then again, I was too.

  Bedding women had always been easy for me. It was the feeling part that was missing. I’d trained myself at an early age to feel nothing. It was the only way to survive. The only two people I’d let myself feel emotion for were my brother and sister… and I’d even stayed away from them for years on end. I was toxic, but this woman made me feel human—alive—not defective.

  It was every kind of selfish to make her mine, knowing it was only temporary. As much as I wanted to be the man for her, I wasn’t. Eventually, I would destroy her. But today? Today was a wrinkle in time—a Climb Every Mountain moment. It was a perfect scenario where I was the Captain and she
was my Maria—the light that made everything clear and beautiful.

  She followed me willingly. Her breathing was unsteady, but so was mine. It was insanity to pursue something that couldn’t last, but I wanted her more than I wanted my next breath. I wanted every broken, sad, hurt and joyous part of a woman I barely knew but felt like I’d known forever. Romantic notions weren’t in my jaded wheelhouse, but today they were.

  Today was ours. It would end like everything always did, but right now I needed to show her—in a way I knew how—what she had done for me.

  Stopping outside of the door to the bedroom my siblings had designated for me, I put my hand under her chin and raised her lavender eyes to mine.

  “We don’t have to do this.”

  “I know,” she said with a small smile pulling at the lips I was dying to kiss. “I’m afraid of hurting you.”

  “Honestly, I don’t care about that,” I told her. “Just keep those chompers to yourself and we’ll be fine.”

  Her laugh rang out and I tried to memorize it. It was everything that was missing from my fucked-up existence.

  “That’s really not funny at all,” she said, narrowing her eyes and trying not to grin. “I mean, that just sounds awful.”

  “We are awful—completely fucking terrible,” I teased her. “Don’t you think two horrible people deserve a little fun?”

  “Is that all this is?” Georgia asked, growing serious.

  Her question took the wind out of my sails. In another world—another time, another place—the answer might be different.

  “It’s okay.” She placed her cool hands on my cheeks and her head on my chest. “It’s better this way. No expectations. I mean, we hardly know each other and tomorrows aren’t guaranteed.”

  Her hair smelled of what I would guess heaven might smell like and her body felt perfect against mine. Closing my eyes, I let myself feel. It was more frightening than all the horrors I’d been through in the last decade, but at the same time it was so simple, so right. I wanted to tell her this was only the beginning, but I would never lie to her. As much as I wanted it to be true, happy endings didn’t happen for people like us. Silently, I thanked Sean for giving us more time. Once we left the safety of my siblings’ fortress, I knew everything would fall to pieces. It always did. But for now…