by Lila Felix
“Is that it?”
Her hair was in a braid over her shoulder and she wore a blue dress I’d never seen. The setting sun shone behind her giving her an angelic look.
“What’s its name?” I nodded toward the dress.
She laughed and looked down. “You know what? I forgot to name this one. Thank you for bringing me Sally.”
“You’re welcome.”
Yeah, I was too much of a blister for this place and for her. I turned again, determined not to botch what she had going here, choosing to hope that one day I’d be ready for her to come back to me.
My foot hit the driveway before she spoke again.
“Really? That’s it? You fly halfway around the damned world to give me a cat and then leave? Crown Sterling is an idiot. Tippi said the only reason you came here was to get me back. That was a lame attempt. Try again.”
I smiled, but didn’t face her yet. “You cussed. You lose the bet. I’m calling Tippi.”
“That’s fine. I raised the stakes.”
I felt more than heard her near me and in a blink she was in front of me.
“What’s the deal now?”
“The bet was that I’d win if you came here—that I’d win if you found me.”
I shook my head. “She told me where you were. That’s kind of a forfeit.”
“I know. She’s a sap like that. Tell me why you’re here.”
“I didn’t tell Gina where you were sitting. I mean, I kind of did, but not on purpose. I was looking at you in the stands and she spotted you. I told her not to get near you.”
I was rambling and by the end, she looked angry.
“It was just a few pictures and I’m here now. I’m over it. I may have overreacted.”
It was too much to take, her being in front of me, within reach and not touching her. I took her hand in mine, her free hand, and brought it to my chest. “I quit the team—broke my contract. I don’t even think I like soccer anymore.”
She laughed. “Well, you came to the wrong country. This one won the World Cup this year. Hating soccer is a no go.”
“It’s not wrong if you’re here.”
I wasn’t good at sappiness. I just wasn’t. All I had to offer her were raw truths and honest responses. It was all I had for now.
“What are you going to do?”
I shrugged and rubbed the back of her hand with my thumb. “I don’t know yet. Work a normal job—try to go to school…” She put Sally down and made a step toward me. I hoped she would always take a step toward me when my feet were being stubborn. “There’s lots of things I want to learn to do—like how to love you.”
Tears pooled in the bottoms of her eyes and the sight of it tore me open. This is what I was afraid of—ruining this thing she’d set up so well.
“That’s a good thing since I’m already in love with you.”
I nearly hit my knees.
“You are?”
“I’ve seen you care when people weren’t looking. You held me when I needed you and let go when you thought you were hurting me. You promised to protect me. All those things were hidden underneath who you thought you should be.”
“Crown Sterling sucks.”
She giggled and thumped her forehead against my chest. “Crown Sterling doesn’t love anyone but himself. Crown Sterling only makes deals.”
As gently as I could, I grabbed her face and tilted it so I could see her eyes. “Maybe he can. Maybe he already does. Maybe Crown Sterling would do anything for you.”
“That’s good enough for now.”
There were no plans made that day. It was hard to make plans when you didn’t even know who you were or what you wanted out of life.
But I’d stay by Lyra’s side as long as she’d have me.
“Can Crown Sterling kiss me now?”
That I could do. But she didn’t give me the chance. Before I knew it, she was up on her tiptoes, and her sweet, warm lips were crashing against mine like I was her last lifeline in the world. I reached down and grabbed her hips, lifting her so that she could wrap her legs around my waist. She couldn’t ever be close enough for me. Even pressed against me wasn’t quite close enough. She pulled back and smiled that smile at me.
That was my smile. The one she saved only for me.
Nothing else mattered at that moment in time.
I’d do anything—anything—to deserve Lyra’s love.
THE END
Unraveling Lyra
A Companion Novella
Releases Valentine’s Day 2015
Other Works by Lila Felix
Emerge
Perchance
The Love and Skate Series
Love and Skate
How It Rolls
Down ‘N’ Derby
Caught In A Jam
False Start
The Second Jam (January 9, 2015)
Hoax
AnguiSH
Seeking Havok
Sparrows For Free
Lightning In My Wake
The Bayou Bear Chronicles
Burden
Hearten
Forced Autonomy (A Dystopian Serial)
Keep up with my antics:
www.lilafelix.com
www.lilafelix.blogspot.com
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Acknowledgements:
First to God for blessing me with a supportive family and an imagination that never ends.
To my husband and children: My love and adoration for you never ends and it never will. Keep making me go outside and shutting down the computer.
To the Rink Rats: Y’all keep a girl feeling like a rock star.
To Anne Eliot for listening to my plotting rants and reminding me to stick to the visible goal. Your friendship is invaluable to me.
To Mandy IReadIndie: I bet you never knew that when you sent me Nothing by The Script that I could turn out a whole book based on one song.
To everyone that has supported me constantly:
Ashleigh Russell
Casey Bond
Amber Garza
Jamie Magee
The Hellcats
And now a peek at my paranormal romance, Burden
A Bayou Bear Chronicle
Burden
Hawke
“I need a minute, file out please,” I commanded, sitting back in my tattered leather desk chair, scratching my almost full beard. Rubbing my belly, I tried to scour away the itch of frustration, to no avail.
Frustration was my leech and its teeth penetrated deep.
I really should take better care of myself.
But my appearance reflected my attitude of late, ragged, teetering on the edge of mania. I’d gone too long without a haircut, opting instead for buzzing the sides myself and letting the top grow longer than I’d ever let it before.
“Yes, Alpha,” they all replied, swiftly moving from the cedar paneled office—except River. As more than my beta, my best friend, he always thought himself exempt from most orders, and he was. I frequently needed an ear that felt like it was on my side, and not just because the rules told him he had to be.
My father had been Alpha before me, and his father Alpha before that. Every day I uncovered another piece of the effed up puzzle—the real story of the turmoil my clan was in—the legacy they’d left me. And it seemed while they were excellent Alphas in terms of protecting the lands and growing the clan—they weren’t proficient at financing or piddling things like paying property taxes. They allowed their females no say over anything, which went against everything we were taught as young males. They failed to practice what they preached. Their mates had to grin and bear it. A female probably would’ve pointed out the details that my father and his father ignored. And now, one year after my father died of cancer and my mother followed soon after, I s
tood in a falling apart house, up to my eyeballs in debt with every male and some female clan members working two and three jobs to help out. My clan was crumbling through my claws.
Something has to give.
River was the same age as me, though our appearances aged us considerably. He growled out a sigh and plopped down in one of the huge chairs, built specifically for us, thick and sturdy. He beat his hands on the top of his head to some rhythm. He was deciding how to tell me something.
“Hawke, we can barely handle what we’ve got. Let’s face it, we are up to our muzzles here. Clan members are paying for bills usually taken care of by clan funds. We are working ourselves to the bone. We do what we can, but it’s just not enough. And now the LaFourche Clan Alpha wants to merge? I don’t know, boss.”
I hate when he calls me boss.
“I can’t help it. I have no money left after paying over two hundred thousand dollars in property taxes, insurance, flood insurance and everything else we were up to our asses on. The effing government was about to auction off our land. I have little to nothing left.”
I stood and took the two steps to the window to face the swamp. I could almost hear the fluttering of the catfish’s fins in the murky bayou, the teeth of the nutra rat chattering, and the bowing branches of the Cypress tree in the beginning winds of a Louisiana thunderstorm. The swamp called to me, begging me to allow it to soothe the beast and the stress. I wished it could. But I didn’t even have time to run anymore—I hadn’t shifted in weeks. The neglect of my inner animal made my skin crawl and itch.
Let me out, he pleaded.
He didn’t answer my rhetorical plea for him to further his rebuttal, so I continued my side of the debate, “What else can I do? Have you seen the other clan members? They’re as mature as a newborn cub. If I don’t take over as their Alpha, they’ll scatter to the winds. And with the other clans vying for our land already—they would take over the LaFourche land and be a heartbeat away from our boundaries. I won’t have it.”
He grabbed the arms of the chair and leaned forward, and I could see his reflection in the window.
“Then something has to give. Things are getting out of hand. We respect you, Alpha and will obey anything you ask of us. But the Betas and clan are restless, the males and the females. You know our ways dictate that our inner animal obey an Alpha pair, not just a male. We need the strength of a pair. If you intend to do this, we should be stronger, at least.”
Didn’t I know it? If they were restless for a pair to oversee them—if restless was the word they were using, then I was downright violent with my need for a mate.
The craving almost consumed me.
My bear needed a mate, and I as an Alpha, needed the balance of a female—plus, even with my warmer body temperature; my bed, of late, seemed to grow colder and colder.
But who had time to seek out a mate when the clan was in a spiral of disorganization and failure?
It wasn’t like there was a dating and mating website for bear shifters. If there had been, its mascot would have been that yellow Care Bear with the heart on its stomach. The commercial would have him doing the Care Bear stare or some shit. I hated Care Bears.
Why am I thinking about Care Bears?
I knew he could feel my malcontent over bringing up the issue of a mate, so he relented and moved on.
“There’s another issue, Alpha.”
I turned to my friend with a fake smile, “Oh great, what more?”
“There’s been a report of a black bear, a rogue, in South Dakota. She seems to be part of a grizzly clan, but is not mated. They have seen her working on clan lands and running perimeters on their boundaries at all times of the night.”
I shrugged, “It’s the female’s choice if she wants to keep clan with grizzlies.”
“The thing is—she’s thin—worn. The wolf pack Alpha who reported her says she’s unhealthy. He says he can see her ribs when she shifts and she’s maybe eighteen or nineteen but none of the kids in his pack have ever seen her in school. And they all attend school together up there, shifter and human. He assumes—he assumes she’s being held captive. He sent a formal request that you visit and see for yourself as the Alpha over all bear Alphas.”
I snorted in his direction, “I’m sure the grizzlies would be much obliging.”
“They don’t have a choice. We outrank them. Black bears outrank Grizzlies, you know that. They have no choice but to grant you entrance.”
Of course I knew that. I was just grasping at straws, trying to talk my way out of going to South Dakota for any reason.
“How can I leave now, with the clan in turmoil?”
“It will take us three days. It’s not gonna fall apart in three days. If she is what the wolf says she is, then we have to save her. We protect our own.”
I slammed my fist down on the table, more in frustration with the entire situation than towards my Beta. He jumped anyway, “I know we protect our own. Make the arrangements with the rest of the clan. I want you and Flint on my flank. Three days, no more.”
He didn’t answer with words, simply bowed his head in acknowledgement.
I couldn’t believe this. I was in the middle of a turf struggle, on the verge of taking on a new clan, and trying to calm the mate-craving animal inside me—and there was a lone female in cold South Dakota who’d gotten herself kidnapped and enslaved.
Perfect.
And now enjoy the first chapter of my contemporary romance AnguiSH
Available on all platforms.
“It’s disgusting,” I parroted her; she always got nasal when referring to all things pestiferous. The top items on her list of foul objects: Ground beef, roaches, carpet of any kind, and of late, me—well, my growlery in particular.
“Don’t you sass me Breaker James. I could care less about your detest for my meddling. Get it cleaned up before I show up next week or I will hire a maid myself,” she quipped.
The shudder ripped through me at the thought and she knew it. She couldn’t hire someone—she wouldn’t. Damn her for knowing how to hit below the belt.
“Fine. I’ll take care of it, Mom,” I groaned back at her. It wasn’t that bad. Yes, the dishes were piled up in the sink and something growing a fur coat on one plate in particular—I think it was spaghetti, was being the operative word. And maybe the dust could be seen flying in formation when the sun shone through the splice in the curtains. There was no soap scum ring around the bathtub, but that was because I never took baths, that has to count for something. If I were a regular person, I would keep up with the everyday chores. I would keep up with chores like emptying the dishwasher and washing my clothes.
If I were a regular person, I could actually walk out of this prison—house, it’s a house.
“Test me not Breaker. I will not be moved on this. And I get what you’re going through, I do. But no son of mine will live in filth—period.” She hung up the phone, unwilling to hear my response. I had to clean this place up. I had a week.
I didn’t used to be like this. I was that guy who did the dishes after dinner because my girl had cooked. I spent Saturday mornings cleaning the house and making sure the grass was mowed. I got dressed in the morning and ran—outside. I went to visit my mom and my sisters. I went to school where there was a real classroom and the phrase virtual classroom was unheard of. There were lots of things I used to be and do.
During the week that followed, I did some things, none of which I would call cleaning. I wrote. I journaled. I stayed in chat rooms constantly, my only method of social interaction. I expected a knock at the door telling me I’d been catfished any day now. I studied and worked on classwork. I didn’t clean. In fact, I would say the mess had doubled in volume and stench. I just didn’t care. Why should I? In this chasm, not quite living and not quite dead, no one, except my mother, gave a rat’s ass if my house was clean.
I did do my laundry, mostly because I was out of things to wear. I didn’t wear real clothes anymore. I wore bask
etball shorts and old band and sports t shirts. Who was gonna see me? And my bedroom was clean for the most part. The rest of the house—no one came over, so why would I care if it was presentable? Anyway, she wouldn’t hire a maid. She knows how I feel about—people. I really didn’t mind people one on one but eventually they would want to go out into the world. And that was where my part ended. I never left this house, not even to go to the mailbox. I never went to the grocery store or the park. I didn’t get to hear concerts or leave a lame party early.
It had been two years, three months and nineteen days since the party. Subtract three days spent in the hospital for monitoring and that’s the length of time since I’ve been out of these walls.
I threw a t-shirt on, since Mom would be at the house any minute and tried to scroll excuses through my head, picking the most lucrative options as to why I hadn’t obeyed her request as I tore down the stairs. I plucked ‘I had a ton of schoolwork’ out of the mental pile and decided that was my story.
I heard her car in the driveway; it was the only car which made an appearance in my driveway. I smirked to myself. She was soooo not hiring a maid. I had this in the bag.
She walked in and I hugged her, kissed her cheek and smiled that gooshy sweet grin I knew she loved.
“It smells like a garbage dump in here,” the look of determination on her face terrified me. She was dressed like she was a high level executive, all pencil skirt and pearls even though everyone knew she was a country club rat.
I laughed it off, “Come on, you’re being dramatic.”
She closed her eyes and exhaled, “Breaker, I have to.” She looked down and shook her head.
“No, Mom. I’ll take care of it,” I could feel my innards begin their quaking and quivering at just the thought of a new person in my house. An elephant sat on my chest and the little beating mouse thumped furiously against the weight. God, what if I had a panic attack in front of them and they thought I was a freak?
“No Breaker, I’ll take care of it. This,” she pointed to the kitchen behind me, “is what happens when you take care of things lately. This was not part of the deal. I’m sorry if you don’t like it. Just one more thing to talk to Angela about. Tell her your mother forces you to be hygienic.”