by Mia Taylor
Cypher suddenly didn’t want any more details.
“I’d go find the girl if you value her life,” Berlin said urgently. “But do not handle Ammon. That’s for the crew.”
He nodded slowly, his heart thumping in anticipation.
He was going to get his wish, his desire to see Chloe again, but what would her reaction be to seeing him?
It didn’t matter; he was sworn to protect her and he had let her down once. He was not going to let it happen again, not when her life was at risk.
“She knows about you then?” Berlin asked, sighing heavily and Cypher looked away guiltily.
“Did she run from you?”
“I’m not sure,” he replied truthfully. “If she did, it wasn’t because of my shifting.”
“You’ll never really know for sure, will you?” Berlin sighed. “Go on now, before Ammon figures out where she is. He’s got months on you and no matter how good she is at hiding, no one can out-run a bear.”
“She’s not hiding,” he replied.
“That’s even worse,” Berlin said gravely and Cypher suddenly realized the magnitude of the threat.
Before he left, he turned back to her.
“Berlin, what’s with the cloak and dagger act?” he asked, gesturing around the forest.
She chuckled.
“Nothing. I just thought it would be fun to meet up like this for old time’s sake.”
He grinned and pulled her into a quick hug.
“It was good seeing you, Ber.”
“You too,” she replied, returning his hug. “Be safe.”
With renewed determination, Cypher turned and fled from the forest toward his car.
He needed to find Chloe and quickly.
Chapter Eleven
Déjà Vu
The bell rang through the hallway and Chloe hurried across the runner with the tray in her hands.
“Here, Dad,” she sighed, setting the coffee and toast on the bed. He peered at her with rheumy eyes, his gaunt face twisted in anger.
“How long does it take to make toast?” he yelled, grabbing his cane to stomp against the floor for effect. “I’ve been trying to get your attention for twenty minutes!”
It had not been twenty minutes as Chloe had barely been out of the room for ten.
“You’re a terrible nurse!” he howled and Chloe bristled, checking her temper.
“Dad, I’m not a nurse!” she snarled back. “They keep quitting because you—”
She stopped talking abruptly.
He’s dying. You can’t talk to him like that. He’s miserable because he’s scared, she chanted to herself. It was becoming her mantra to get her through the day but it wasn’t much helping, not when she was ready to smother him herself.
The nurses quit from his incessant abuse and Chloe was at her wits’ end.
Blaine had not shown his face around the house once since she’d moved back home as if he was grateful to have passed the burden to someone else.
She had begged him for help so much that her brother just eventually blocked her calls, leaving her alone to deal with her surly father.
He’s two months past his expiry date, she thought and more guilt washed over her in a torrent.
She didn’t want him dead, not really. She just wanted some peace and quiet, some reprieve from the berating and cruelty.
Sometimes she just imagined walking out the front door and never going back.
Of course I would never do that, she thought, staring at her father’s emaciated face.
“What are you staring at? You gonna cry?”
“No, Dad,” Chloe sighed. “Do you need anything else?”
“I need a new stomach!” he yelled and Chloe’s head began to pound. Gratefully, she heard the doorbell ringing.
“Oh! Maybe that’s your new nurse!” she said brightly, spinning to address the front door.
“I hope she’s not as stupid as you!”
And I hope she’s the Angel of Death, she quipped silently as she hurried down the winding center staircase.
She threw open the door and stared in surprise.
“Cypher!”
At first, she thought her mind was playing tricks on her as they stood staring at each other, unspeaking after her exclamation.
She studied his attractive face like she was memorizing every detail, every fine hair on his five o’clock shadow, the thickness of his lashes, the fullness of his lips.
“Hello, Chloe,” he finally said, his sonorous voice wrought with longing.
Drunk on an intake of overwhelming emotions, Chloe burst into a round of sobs and flung herself into his arms.
He seemed to be expecting her as she buried her face in his chest and bawled.
Cypher didn’t speak, only stood, stroking her long, unkempt mass of hair until she managed to compose herself and pull her head back.
“Wh-what are you doing here?” she gasped. “I’m sorry—”
“What have I told you about being sorry to me?” he laughed, gently wiping the tears from her face.
“What are you doing here?” she asked again, standing back as if suddenly remembering she shouldn’t be happy to see him.
Even though I’ve never been happier to see anyone in my entire life, she thought.
“Can I come in and talk to you for a minute?” he asked, looking over her shoulder. “It’s important.”
She eyed him uncertainly but she couldn’t deny that she wanted to throw herself back into his arms and weep again.
“Okay,” she agreed, stepping aside to grant him access. “But… um… yeah, it’s okay to come in.”
He looked at her worriedly.
“Are you sick? You’re really pale,” he commented and Chloe was suddenly extremely self-conscious.
“No. I’m fine.”
She led the way to the front parlor where they had hosted her mother’s funeral not even a year earlier and she prayed her father had fallen asleep.
Just give me five minutes with Cypher and then I can deal with whatever else you throw at me.
“Chloe, what are you doing back here?” he asked as they sat on a red settee. “Why did you leave so suddenly and cut me off?”
If you cared so much, why did it take you eight months to come and find me? she wanted to scream back at him but she only shrugged.
“Family emergency,” she replied. “And you had things to do anyway. I didn’t want to hold you back.”
Cypher’s face puckered into an expression of disbelief.
“I never wanted to leave you! You sent me away and cut me off like what we had was nothing!”
A pang of regret sounded in Chloe’s heart and she chewed on the insides of her cheeks to keep a sob from escaping.
“I didn’t want you to leave either,” she confessed, the words escaping in a rush of air. “It was such a weird time and I was so confused. I thought about calling you every day…”
“Why didn’t you? God, Chloe, I literally sat by the phone waiting for you.”
“Did you?”
He blinked.
“When I figured out you needed time, I threw myself into work, trying to forget you, but it’s like you put a spell on me, Chloe. I see you everywhere, I think I hear your voice. Every song we’ve written since we parted that day has been about you.”
Her eyes welled with fresh tears.
“I thought you wrote about me,” she mumbled. “I just couldn’t bring myself to believe it after letting you go.”
“I did write about you and think about you and dream about you. I went to see Holly. She wouldn’t tell me anything except that you didn’t want to see me. I thought in time you would realize that we’re fated to be together but…”
“But you’re here now. What changed?”
He shook his head and stared down at his hands.
“I wouldn’t be here,” he told her earnestly. “I’ve never been the guy to push a woman. If your mind was made up, I couldn’t force you to be with me
but something has happened, Chloe, and you need to come with me.”
She tensed.
“Why? What’s happened?” she asked, fear prickling her heart.
He sighed and shook his black waves.
“Do you remember the night we met? The shifter who I fought?”
“That’s a little difficult to forget. What about him?”
“He’s after us,” he explained. “Both of us.”
Her brow furrowed in confusion.
“Why? That was months ago!”
“He’s been looking for you since that night but we’ve both been gone.”
“What does he want with me?” Chloe cried. “I won’t say anything about him! He must know that!”
“I don’t think he cares. I think he’s accustomed to taking out witnesses where need be.”
The words sent a shiver through her body.
“Who is he? How can he be stopped?”
“There is a way but we need to find him first,” Cypher explained. “In the meantime, I need you to come home with me to California so I can secure you in my house. I have a top-of-the-line security system and I will hire security guards to man the house.”
Chloe stared at him.
“I can’t go with you,” she whispered, thinking of the dying curmudgeon upstairs. “I can’t go anywhere right now.”
“Chloe, I know this sounds ridiculous but I promise you, it’s serious. You’ve seen what he’s capable of when he wants your purse. He’s a hundred times angrier now that he’s been stewing about what happened for eight months. You need protection.”
She shook her head forlornly.
“You don’t understand,” she moaned. “My father is dying. I can’t leave him alone because there’s no one else to take care of him. I have to stay here, Cypher. There is no other way.”
“Your father is dying?” he choked. “Is that why you came back here?”
She nodded.
“I had no choice. My brother basically bailed and left me in charge of his care. My sister doesn’t know about his condition. They told him he had six months but he’s still holding on…”
“That’s why you look exhausted. He’s been running you ragged,” Cypher realized. “Why don’t you hire nurses?”
“They keep quitting because he’s acting like such an ass.”
Inadvertently, a sob escaped her lips but Chloe suddenly realized how much better she felt now that she had unleashed the truth. It felt good to tell someone else what was going on for the first time in months.
She had been so isolated in the house with barely anyone to talk to but a revolving set of PSWs and a man who only screamed and never listened.
“Come here,” Cypher said, drawing her into a hug. “I am so sorry you have been doing this alone all these months but I’m here now and we’re going to make this right.”
“I can’t burden you with this,” Chloe sighed, sniffling. “Why am I always a basket case when you’re around?”
“You’re not a basket case,” he corrected gently. “You are in the arms of someone who wants to help you. If you can’t melt down with me then who can you melt down with?”
“Cypher, how much danger are we in?” she asked seriously, trembling slightly as she remembered the fighting bears.
It had been terrifying and explosive, something she never thought she would ever have to see again.
I won’t have to see it again. I have Cypher to protect me and together we will fight whatever comes our way.
“You are in no danger if you trust me,” he promised her, staring deeply into her eyes. “I won’t let anything happen to you but only if you don’t push me away again.”
She shook her head.
“I swear, I’m not letting you go again. You are the only constant thing in my life.”
The dinging of a bell forced her out of Cypher’s embrace and she groaned slightly.
“What is that?”
“That’s the cowbell,” she sighed. “I’ll be back in a minute. Don’t go anywhere, okay?”
“I can’t promise that. My bladder is full.”
She laughed and leaned down to kiss his lips softly as the ringing of the bell grew more intense and incessant.
“See you in a minute.”
She scurried away toward the stairs, taking them two at a time as she rushed to the top.
There was a slight skip in her step, one that had certainly never been there before.
All these months I’d been wondering where he was and if he’s been thinking about me and he has been. He’s been writing about me and wondering where I was too. What was I thinking shoving him aside? How much easier would the last months have been with him?
They were all moot points now. Cypher was there and what was done was done.
“Who was at the door?” Dennis demanded when she entered the room.
“Cypher Maison.”
Her father’s face twisted into a sneer.
“Oh? He’s back to use and abuse you again?” he snapped. A flash of hot anger bubbled through her mouth.
“The only person who abuses me around here is you, Dad,” she retorted. “And if you keep it up, you’re going to find yourself in that hospice after all.”
He gaped at her in shock and with blinding clarity, Chloe realized that Cypher did so much more for her than just provide emotional support. His mere presence empowered her, gave her the ability to stand up for herself and find her voice.
How did I ever let him go?
“How dare you?” Dennis hissed, struggling to sit up. “I am your father. I paid for your piddly degree in—”
The sound of glass smashing stopped him midsentence and they looked at each other.
“What was that?” Dennis demanded as fear turned Chloe’s bowels to water.
“Stay here!” she ordered, running from her father’s suite toward the hallway.
“Cypher?” she yelled. “Cypher, are you all right?”
To her own ears, her voice sounded hollow as if she was calling from a long tunnel.
At the top landing, she peered into the foyer and listened but she heard nothing.
“Cypher?”
“Chloe, what’s happening?”
“Dad, stay in bed!”
Cautiously, she stepped onto the staircase, padding down the steps.
“Cypher?”
Panic was coloring her words as she struggled to understand why he wasn’t responding.
“Cypher, please answer me.”
As her foot touched the Italian marble floors in the entranceway, she heard a sound which made her blood curdle.
Slowly, she turned and faced the glowering beast towering over her on his hind legs, saliva dripping from his fangs.
She knew the bear for she saw him in her nightmares still.
“You owe me a purse,” he snarled through clenched teeth.
“Cypher!” she screamed but her cries were cut short as a menacing paw swiped forward and knocked her unconscious.
Chapter Twelve
This place is a maze, he thought wryly, ducking through the hallways of the Byler house, looking for a bathroom.
He finally found one at the far end of a dark corridor, leaving Cypher with the idea that there had to have been one closer that he’d overlooked.
As he washed his hands, he paused to look at himself in the mirror and a soft smile touched his lips.
There was a glimmer in his eye, one he hadn’t seen in a long time.
I haven’t seen that since I first met Chloe, he realized, turning off the faucet and drying his hands against a hand towel before turning toward the door.
The crash of glass caught his attention and he threw open the door to the bathroom.
Instantly, he moved toward the back stairs, bolting up the steps in a flash.
Did Mr. Byler fall out of bed? Did Chloe drop something?
He heard muffled voices down the hall but by the time he reached the center corridor, there was no one around.
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Then he heard Chloe’s voice calling out to him.
“Cypher?”
The hairs on the back of his neck rose as he instantly sensed the other bear in the house.
“Cypher?”
He dared not call back to her as he turned and retreated back toward the back stairs, stealing into the shadows.
The scream from Chloe turned his blood to ice in his veins and he flew out the back corridor into the foyer where Ammon was looming over her.
Instantly, Cypher pounced, knocking him off balance.
Cypher shifted in the middle of their wrestle, finding himself pinned beneath the insane bear who seemed hellbent on murder.
“Get off me!” Cypher snarled.
“Not until you’re dead!” Ammon spat back and they continued their death dance, spinning in a mass of coarse fur.
Ammon was stronger than Cypher had given him credit for and he swiped against him, digging his claws into the muscled shoulder of the grizzly.
Ammon released a howl which reverberated off the walls and through the corner of his eye, Cypher could see Chloe lying motionless near the front door.
Ammon roared again, rising on his hind legs to drop his entire weight upon Cypher but he rolled out of the way just as Ammon crashed to the floor.
He leapt on the mad bear’s back, wrapping his arm about Ammon’s throat, and squeezed as the grizzly tried to thrust him off.
But Cypher held fast, fuelled by the fury of seeing Chloe’s broken body laying a few feet away.
He didn’t care that it went against the code; Ammon deserved to die and there was nothing that anyone could do to stop him.
Ammon made horrible gurgling noises as his body began to lose momentum, slowing despite his best efforts to hold himself up, but Cypher was relentless until Ammon finally was still, falling to the floor in a toppling groan of defeat.
Cypher held on a moment longer to ensure he was truly down before dismounting his nemesis and running to Chloe.
“Chloe!” he cried, shaking her, his snout nuzzling her face. “Chloe!”
To his relief, he felt a pulse beneath and his body shifted back into his human form.
He cupped her cheeks in his hands and rocked her gently, barely aware of the front door opening again.
“Come on, Chloe,” he begged quietly. “Come on.”