by Lynn Red
Crag looked at me like I was crazy. “Just saying,” he said. “I don’t know the last time someone made me laugh like that. Anyway, as soon as your friend and my cousin took off, I wanted to—”
“They left?” I interrupted.
He smiled again and nodded. “Uh-huh. They took off to the back of the apartment a little bit ago. Just the two of us,” he said. “I’m just a big, dumb brute of a bear, and you’re a cute little fox, and we’re standing around in someone else’s living room.”
Those deep brown eyes charmed me. I was just helplessly lost, adrift without a hope of getting away. Then I felt his heavy, warm hands on my neck. Burning hot, just the gentle brushing of his fingertips against my skin started a fire in my core.
A second later, those hands slid down just a little.
“Hey!” I said, swatting at him. He kept them right where they were, just underneath my shoulders. “What do you think you’re doing? You haven’t even taken me on a date yet. We can’t do something like this before the first date,” I said.
“I don’t see why not,” Crag said. He flashed a grin. Once again, those eyes just trapped me. “I can tell you want me, and you can probably tell how much I want you. So, what’s wrong with giving in sometimes?”
I stifled a laugh. God I always laugh at the wrong times. “I just, I mean, getting all hot and heavy on the first date is tricky enough. But before it? That’s like a whole new world of—”
I didn’t have time to finish whatever silly joke I was going to make before Crag bent down and his lips enveloped mine. He brushed them along my trembling mouth and along my jaw. The two hands on my shoulders moved to the small of my back.
He pulled me tight, cradling my neck with one of his hands and holding me helpless with the other one. When he went back to my lips, he sucked the bottom one with such gentleness that it surprised me. The hand holding my neck extended until his thumb was on my chin, pulling my mouth open just a little.
“Oh,” I gasped. “Oh my, I don’t know if I’ve ever...”
“Shut up and kiss me,” Crag said. Then he did the work for me. “I saw you in the crowd tonight, and I couldn’t take my eyes off you. Almost got me plastered in that last match. Didn’t you notice?”
He leaned low, sucking a kiss on my neck and then behind my ear.
I had thought that maybe he was looking at me, but I didn’t want to admit it. That was a level of crazy I wasn’t ready to try and handle.
“I... oh wow, that’s incredible,” I breathed as he slid his rough thumb along my jaw, tickling me just a little. “I never do stuff like this. I mean never.”
For a second, Crag pushed my head back with his thumb and stared straight into my eyes. “For something you never do, you’re certainly enjoying it,” he said. “But me either. You just... you’re doing things to me.”
Then he kissed me.
Oh God did he kiss me.
It was deep and hard and relentless from the very first second. His tongue explored mine, slid around the deepest parts of me. He seemed to pull the breath out of my lungs. When he finally left me, I almost hurt with how much I wanted him back.
“I don’t have much time,” he said. “Only got two days. Bus leaves early Sunday morning. Don’t make me miss this. Don’t make me leave without ever knowing what it feels like to see someone, know it feels right and then actually do something about it. I don’t want to regret you.”
I stared at him for a second. For a long, long second, I just watched his face, watched him breath. His chest flexed with every single breath.
And I’ll be damned if deep down inside, I didn’t feel exactly the same way. It wasn’t love – not by a long shot – but I knew exactly what he meant by not wanting to live with the regret. I’d had too many. Too many chances came and went without my jumping on them just because I was nervous or scared or whatever it was that I told myself.
I was nodding.
“I drove,” I said. I still couldn’t believe it was me saying the words, but I heard them coming out of my very own mouth. “But I have to work tomorrow. Millie put me on the schedule for ten, so that means I need to get up by eight or so to get ready, and then—”
Crag kissed me again. It was another hot, deep, intense kiss that filled my whole soul. “Then we have about five hours to make a memory neither of us will ever forget,” he said when he pulled away.
“Oh my God do we ever,” I whispered. “Where have you been all my life?”
“What about your friend?” Crag asked, grinning at what I’d just said. “Will she care?”
Friend, I thought. Henry... oh no, what am I doing? How can I be letting this guy get me all worked up like this? What happened to all that strength and letting-him-chase-you stuff that Henry and I talked about?
I put my hands up, laying them flat on his gorgeous, knee-shakingly perfect chest.
“I can’t do this,” I said.
Crag reached for me like he was going to kiss me again and stopped half-way. “Huh? I didn’t mean to—”
I took a deep breath. “I can’t believe I’m doing this because I’ll be damned if you’re not exactly what I started this morning wanting. But... I just can’t. Not like this.”
Memories of The One Who Got Away hit me like a truck in the chest. I had done so well for the last year to forget. Well, more like The One Who Broke My Heart.
Reid Blaze was a dick. The worst kind of dick.
The kind you can’t say no to, the kind you can’t get over.
He’s the guy who made me swear off bears. It lasted for, oh, until right this second.
“If I did something wrong, I’m sorry,” Crag said.
“It isn’t,” I trailed off, looking at the floor and wishing I hadn’t had that flash of guilt that kept me from letting me go absolutely nuts for once in my life. For a twitchy fox girl, I’m so goddamn reserved sometimes that it gets me all boiling hot inside... but there’s nowhere for the steam to go.
I took a deep breath, looked right into Crag’s big, brown eyes.
“I’m sorry,” I said. “I just... something popped into my head and it’s gonna take a while for it to go away.”
All the while, of course, I was thinking about what Henry and I talked about during the time it took to drink those beers. “Why not let one of them chase you for once? Why are you always the one doing the hunting? Foxes are supposed to be hunted Violet, not the other way around.”
“Look,” he said, grabbing my shoulder. “Really, I didn’t mean to do anything you didn’t want.”
His grabbing my shoulder made me feel more “caught” than “hunted” and it freaked me out a little. I twisted away, but he held on just long enough that I thought it wasn’t going to work.
“Thank you,” I said, not knowing what I was thanking him for. “I... I’m really sorry I did this. I didn’t mean to string you along or make you feel bad or anything else. I’m sure you’re a really great guy and I really like you and hope maybe we can have a nice dinner sometime and get to know each other, and—”
“Tomorrow,” he said. Those eyes were burning right through me. “We’ve got another fight tomorrow about an hour away. I’m not letting you get away from me.”
“What?”
“Tomorrow. You said you wanted a date, and I’m not going to let this chance get away without at least trying to catch you.”
Catch. He said catch. My heart skipped a beat.
“What do you mean, catch?” I asked, hoping he was going to tell me what I wanted to hear.
“You said you liked me, that I was a good guy, and all that stuff?” He gave me a crooked grin that made me wish he had me pinned up against the wall again. “Nod if you’re listening.”
I nodded.
He made another move and I thought – no, I wanted – him to grab me again and make me do whatever he wanted. God that’s so not who I am, but I’m not going to pretend it isn’t what I wanted to be.
“Okay, good. Well, you said all that st
uff, and I think it too. I don’t exactly have the easiest life, and I know it’s not something most people want to share, but Violet?”
His eyes had my stomach all swirly and ridiculous. “Yeah?” I breathed.
“I don’t care what anybody says. Not even you. The first time I saw you, I knew it was you and me. I felt that twinge, that little tug inside my chest.” He stepped back a little, and took a breath. His eyes never left me. “I’m not letting you get away. I’ll chase you to the ends of the earth if I have to. I’m gonna hunt you down and make you mine, little fox.”
My mouth hung open so wide he probably could’ve stuck a beer bottle in it. “Tomorrow?” I squeaked.
“Tomorrow,” he said again. “I’ll let you know where.”
Just then, Henry and Lex came back out from the back. From the look of things, they’d been unpacking boxes, because both of them had a liquor bottle in each hand.
“Everything okay?” Henry asked, setting hers on the bar top.
“We have a date tomorrow,” I said, my mouth moving and my voice sounding like a robot’s beeps and boops, echoed inside my head. “He told me so.”
“Uh... that’s... nice? Very good, girly. Are you drunk?” Henry had a little bit of a nervous twist to her laugh. “Should we be going?”
Crag shrugged, but never took his eyes off me. “See you tomorrow?” he asked, as Henry pulled me toward the door. “I’ll get in touch.”
By the time Henry and I got to the car, my mouth had unfrozen and my brain was dripping out of it in a torrent.
“What happened?” she asked.
I babbled for a second, saying some nonsense about how hot he was and how he was so nice and how he was this and that.
“No, Violet, you’ve done gone nuts. What happened? A date? I thought you were on the prowl for... I dunno, a one-night stand or something, so I set you up with him. You’re going on a date with a pit fighter?”
“I,” I trailed off, shaking my head. “It just kind of happened, it... it felt right to say yes.”
“But, why?” she asked.
I squinted and shook my head. “I... I think I was going to go home with him. Or I mean I was going to take him to my apartment, like tonight I mean.”
“Why didn’t you? That was the whole point.” Henry was a lot more irritated than I thought made any sense. “Now you’re going on a date. With... a pit fighter.”
I shook my head. “I thought of... of him. We were about to leave, and Crag asked me if you would be upset. For some reason, that made a click go off in my brain and I started thinking about Reid.”
“Oh no,” Henry groaned. “How does he keep coming back to haunt you? You’ve been rid of that lice bag for over a year.”
“He didn’t have lice,” I said absently. Henry clicked her tongue against her teeth. “But... I couldn’t get him out of my head. I couldn’t make myself stop thinking about all that horrible stuff he said to me about how I was nervous and awful and how my stomach stuck out and my legs were—”
“Okay, that’s enough,” Henry said. “Sorry for snapping. I’m not mad at you, I’m mad that that arch-asshole managed to come back from the past and ruin a fun night for you.”
I snorted a laugh. “Yeah, I guess,” I said. “It’s better this way though. I gotta work tomorrow. But then I have two days off, so...”
“Oh you naughty fox, you!” Henry said, finally laughing.
Mission accomplished, I thought. Letting the tension ease just a little was all I needed. I took a deep breath and then let it out nice and slow.
“I also thought about what we talked about,” I added.
“What? About you chasing the boys all the time?” Henry asked, pulling into my parking lot.
“To answer what you asked earlier,” I said, grinning, “yeah, I’m going on a date with a pit fighter. A pit fighting bear who’s chasing me.”
-6-
Violet
Morning came early.
Well, duh, yeah of course it did, morning is always early. But three hours after I ran away from Crag and about two and a half since Henry dropped left me at my doorstep, I woke up with a grumbling stomach and a couple starlings outside my window having a fight over half a beetle.
“Why won’t you guys ever use the feeder I have? Why does it always have to be beetles? The black ones stink.” I let out a puff of air and was pretty happy that I didn’t smell any beer on my breath.
That was a good sign I was going to be hangover free. The last thing in the world I need when I’m getting two hours of sleep instead of my normal eight-to-ten is a dull throb in the back of my skull.
I waited for a second to see if either of the birds was going to answer me, but neither did. It’s hard to tell when something on your windowsill is a neighbor, and when it’s actually just a bird.
One of them looked at me, cocked her head to the side and chirped. When I asked if I knew her, she hopped past the larger starling. When he dropped the beetle, presumably to go in for another peck, she grabbed it and flew off.
That’s when it hit me – I hadn’t gone running in way, way too long. Not like jogging. I do that three times a week. I mean skin running.
Hopping out of bed, I twisted back and forth a couple times, then bent over backward almost double. My back gave out a series of delightfully relieving pops.
I pushed open my apartment’s bedroom window. This side of my apartment faced east into the mountain woods that surrounded Jamesburg. I’ve always loved skin-running, even though lately I hadn’t done it very much.
Something about stripping off all my clothes – and as much as I love my pajamas, feeling the wind all over me is twice as good. Running around free with someone else? Three or four times as good. Easily.
Just thinking about it got me to grinning and then of course it made me blush because I’m me. I can wrap my legs around a big, strong bear’s waist, but when I’m alone in my apartment taking my clothes off, I’m easy to embarrass. Makes sense, right?
As soon as that first breeze hit my nose, the first cool whiff of early spring, I immediately forgot all about being embarrassed. Three seconds later, give or take, I was on the ground outside of my window, crouched down.
I closed my eyes. The fur squeezing out of my pores tickled like hell, like it always does. I had a quick roll in the dewy grass, shook out my long, red coat and stretched my back.
Downward dog, I thought, stretching my paws out in front of me and relishing the grass against the pads of my feet. More like downward fox, I guess.
Through the forest I went, off like a shot. As I circled a tree, some cool dirt pushed between my toes. I grabbed a root with my teeth, yanked on it some and took off again.
The deeper I went into the woods, the deeper my thoughts went into my own head.
Why don’t I do this every day? I’d be the calmest fox in the whole state, I thought. And it was true – whenever I ran, things just rolled off my back. I figured things out, it all started making sense.
And then, of course, my thoughts turned to Crag.
How was he the way he was? In those precious few moments we were together I didn’t feel anything but warmth from him. Even in those blissful seconds before I pulled away when he had a handful of my hair and he was ordering me around and...
Just thinking about it started getting me all worked up, which is a really, really bad idea when hopping between rocks over a roaring creek.
I wheeled to a stop, putting on the brakes just as I came to my favorite place in the forest – maybe in the whole world. It isn’t much to look at, but there’s this part of the forest where the trees break away overlooking a creek. On this creek, which kind of meanders, but also has some quicker-moving places where the water swirls around rocks that have been there for who-knows how long.
But, hanging above the creek is this little outcropping of rocks that I like to sit on. Have since I was a little cub. Whenever something bad happened, even the really silly bad stuff that little girls thi
nk is super serious but no one else on earth thinks twice about.
I remember one time that I was out here, running around. It’s funny, but there isn’t a shred of my being that doesn’t remember. It was Tuesday, the eighteenth of March. Two days after my birthday, which I had at the bouncy-house place in the nearest town big enough to have one. I was in third grade, and my heart broke right down the middle.
Chad Pensworth. His parents and my parents were good friends – the sort of friends that adults invite over when they need to spend time with other adults. Anyway, we’d always been around each other. He had the deepest, weirdest looking blue eyes that went just perfectly with his sharp, lupine features.
That boy was the only wolf I ever loved. Anyway, I passed him a note just after lunch. All it said was ‘do you want to be my boyfriend?’ and had a checkbox for yes and one for no.
Just thinking back about it makes me feel a little stupid, but the next time I saw Chad, I was sorta blushing and excited but he walked straight past me.
Turns out, he thought the note came from a different girl who he actually liked.
I was crushed. Like, absolutely, horribly, curl-up-in-a-ball crushed.
First thing I did was run out here and sit on this exact rock.
I scratched the back of my head. Staring down into the meandering creek, I couldn’t help but notice how tired I looked. Even all foxed-out, my eyes didn’t have their normal glitter. Could’ve been how I’d been thinking about Reid the night before... or it could’ve been – and more likely was – that “the night before” had lasted until like four hours before my hindquarters hit the rock.
Some starlings flitted past and chortled at each other. I giggled, thinking about the beetle-stealing starling from my windowsill, and I just jumped.
The second I hit the cool water, I came alive.
Rolling over and over, I dove to the bottom, and wrapped my paws around the rocky bed before pushing back up.
My head broke through the surface of the water and I threw my hair back and forth. Off in the distance, a stick broke and starlings sang. As I sat there, treading water, I noticed a squirrel under a pine picking at the nuts inside a fallen pine cone and watched him for a moment.