Race nodded slowly. “Okay. I just… Like I said before, I don’t want to do anything you’re not ready for. We just met again after nearly twenty years, and you were… If I ever make a move that you’re not comfortable with…”
I silenced him by touching a finger to his lips. “Trust me, you’ll be the first to know. Please don’t worry. I’m good with what happened in the shower. Not just because the bond drove us to it, but because you’re damn sexy and I wanted you. My wanting you at all was further proof that I’m on the mend, okay? But if you keep worrying over whether or not touching me or kissing me or wanting to make love to me is okay, it’s probably just gonna piss me off. I mean, I left home to get away from excessive concern for my well-being. The last person I want it from is you.”
Finally he relaxed. “Alright, I’ve been duly warned. Note to self: Keep your concern to yourself until Juliette asks for it.” He then shot me a lascivious look. “So you think I’m damn sexy, huh?”
I slapped him playfully on the arm and laughed. “Oh shut up and make my breakfast. I’m starving.”
Race grinned. “Yes ma’am.”
After asking where his cups were so I could get myself something drink—Race tried to do that for me, but I reminded him that I was perfectly capable of pouring a glass of orange juice—I went back to the table to watch as he gathered the ingredients for our breakfast. He informed me that he was making his mother’s “famous” breakfast casserole, which consisted of hash browns, eggs, diced red and green peppers, diced onions, ground sausage, and a lot of cheese. As he prepared the food it occurred to me that while he had shown a great amount of concern for me and my comfort level, I’d not really shown any for his.
“Race, are you okay?” I asked. “I mean, with all of this. Me being a weredog, our imprinting on each other, Mark, vampires…”
He paused for a moment as if considering what to say, then glanced at me briefly before returning to mixing the ingredients. “Let me see if I can address all that—in order, which will be simpler. You being a weredog is twofold: One, I wish you didn’t have to be, because being a shapeshifter means you have to be good at being a liar. It’s a hard life to live because you’re essentially living two lives. At least, that’s been my experience.”
I took a sip of my orange juice and nodded. “Yeah, that’s pretty much how it is,” I agreed.
“Two,” he continued, “I’m also glad that you are. You might only have one form but to me you’re still a shapeshifter. So it’s like you said, we’re not all that dissimilar. It’s probably nothing short of a miracle that I’ve somehow managed to go sixteen years without meeting at least a werekind, if not someone else who’s a chimaera like me. Had we not met again, who knows how long it would have been before I found out I’m not alone? You coming back into my life not only showed me I’m not, but I can learn so much from you about what I am.”
Race paused and turned to me with a frown. “Wait, if you got your condition from your mother, how come she didn’t know about me? It’s not like we were never in the same place at the same time.”
He was right. Race had spent countless hours over at our house hanging out with Mark, and both he and his mother had shared dinner with us on many occasions. My family had also occasionally gone down the street to the Covingtons’ house for dinner parties.
“Had she ever met your father, she would have known. It’s rare that a shifter doesn’t pass on the gene, which is why our kind generally eschews casual sex. But having no idea your father was a shifter she didn’t know to look for the signs, and werekind children smell like plain ol’ humans up until the first phase,” I explained. “I imagine the same was true for you.”
Nodding, he turned back to the food. “Actually, there’s another thing about you being a weredog: we have something in common. I can share what I am with you and you can share what you are with me. We can talk about what it’s like to be what we are and not be afraid of scaring each other away.
“As for the imprinting… Honestly, I’m okay with that. Actually, it’s kind of a relief to have my partner in life chosen for me, because now I don’t have to waste my time going through one girl after another hoping to find one I can trust with the truth. You being a shifter as well means you’re already aware of imprinting and shapeshifting, and I don’t have to worry you’re going to freak out and take off because I’m not entirely human.”
I scoffed. “Well, you’re in the minority there. A lot of the kids nowadays get all ‘I hate this, the choice should be mine.’ At least until they imprint themselves. Then they forget why the hell they bothered to hate the idea.”
“It’s obviously one of those things about what I am that I have no control over, so what would be the point in being pissed about it? I think I’d have felt the way I do even had I known about imprinting before it happened to me,” Race replied. “I mean, I get why some people think the choice should be theirs, but knowing the choice has already been made just makes everything so much simpler. You don’t have to go through one dead-end relationship after another. Just wait until it happens for you.”
I had to admit surprise at his outlook, but I was also pleased. Like Mark when Saphrona and I had explained about vampires and shifters to him, Race was absolutely remarkable about taking everything in stride.
“And the part where you’ve imprinted on me?” I pressed.
He looked at me again, this time with a smile on his face. “I don’t know if I can describe what it’s like for a guy to have a stunning, sexy woman for his girl. If I had friends they’d be jealous, and I’d probably be punching their lights out for staring at you more than they should. The fact that my lifemate has turned out to be an old friend is a bonus.”
I felt a flush heat my face, I was so inordinately pleased to hear him describe me that way. Race put the glass baking dish with the mixed veggies, meat, and cheese into the oven and set the timer, then poured himself a glass of juice and joined me at the table. “What do you think about imprinting on me?” he asked, taking a drink of his juice.
I smiled. “Like you said, it’s a bonus that my lifemate happens to be an old friend of mine. I still have to get to know you the same way I would someone I didn’t know, because it has been a long time since we saw one another last, but I don’t feel as intimidated by that as I would if we were strangers. I actually had the biggest crush on you when we were kids. I know exactly when it started, too.”
“Oh really?” he queried with a raised eyebrow. “When was that?”
I took another drink and swallowed before I spoke. “A couple weeks before my ninth birthday. I came home from school one day to find the usual scene—you and Mark in front of the TV playing a game on the Super Nintendo. You looked up at me and smiled, then said to me, ‘Hey sweetie, how was your day?’ Of course, you went right back to the game without waiting for my answer, but it didn’t matter. I suddenly saw you as something other than my brother’s friend. Getting to know you all over again will just add to the image in my memory.”
Race looked down at the glass in his hands for a moment, then cleared his throat and said, “Mark… I’m kinda thinking ‘wow’ about him not only living forever, but the fact that he’s already died at least once and come back from that. It’s freaky. He’s like a vampire without the teeth and the bloodlust.”
“He doesn’t have their strength or speed, either,” I added.
“Okay, but still. It’s a little freaky, but not like I’d disown the guy or anything. Probably wouldn’t disown him even if he was a bloodsucking leech.”
His tone had grown bitter, and it was an attitude with which I could sympathize. “I’m not particularly fond of vampires either, the reason for which you’re well aware,” I said. “The only full vamp I can really tolerate is Lochlan—I admit that I like to exchange sarcasm with him. I’ve met Saphrona’s dad and I have to say that Diarmid’s about as much of a prick as she made him out to be. I mean, the guy’s a world-class snob who fucked and fed on his
flight attendant when we went on that trip to Ireland and he didn’t even stick around to make sure she was okay. Lochlan had to take care of her, make sure she’d recover from the blood loss and all that.”
“Model citizen, that one,” Race commented drily.
It was my turn to look upon him with a frown. “I’m curious about something… All this time you’re the only shapeshifter you’ve ever known, but yet you know about vampires. How did you find out about them?”
His neck flushed and he tilted the orange juice back, downing half the glass. “I, uh… I met this girl once. She smelled…well, weird is the only way I can describe it. I was about nineteen or so at the time. It was a college party I was crashing with some friends of mine, and I walked by her and she had this sweet-yet-gag-inducing smell. I thought at first it was her perfume. She smelled me too, and for a moment I swear it looked like she was about to throw down with me. Then she just smiled and sashayed over and…”
He stopped and looked away from me. An idea of what had followed came to me and I raised an eyebrow. “And what, Race? If you slept with her that night, so what? So you shagged some she-vamp, big deal. Who you were having sex with before I came along is none of my business, as long as you were safe about it. Just keep your eyes and your lips and your hands on me from now on, mister.”
Race’s head snapped around and he grabbed my hand. “Jules, I’m not even interested in other women. Not now that I have you. Not now that I know we were always meant to be together.”
I grinned to show him I’d been kidding, as I knew that our bond alone would hardly allow him to think of other women. “Good. But if that bloodsucking bitch ever comes around tries that shit on you again, I’m gonna rip her fangs out and shove ‘em down her throat.”
Race laughed at that. “Now that’s something I would pay to see.”
I playfully swatted his arm but sobered quickly, as there was something else on my mind I wanted to point out. “Race, between fourteen and nineteen, I could imagine you not meeting any werekind or another shapeshifter, especially since you said you and your mom moved around a lot.”
He frowned over the rim of his glass. “Right,” he said, drawing the word out. “So what?”
“So you’ve known about vampires for more than a decade now,” I said. “And vampires have known about us about as long as we’ve known about them. How come none of the vamps you’ve met in all that time ever told you about werekind?”
“Now that you mention it,” my companion told me, “they probably never said anything because they wanted to keep me to themselves. Hell, it’s probably why they keep shuffling me around—to keep me away from the werekind-populated areas.”
“I don’t understand,” I said, frowning myself. “Why would they be shuffling you around?”
Race looked away from me again, which concerned me—it was the third time he had avoided my gaze during our conversation, and that told me he was hiding something. His keeping secrets when I had shared everything, had bared my soul and forced myself to confront the pain of my attack, it really bothered me a lot. But I would give him the benefit of the doubt—I had to, he was my mate.
I just hoped that he came out with whatever he clearly didn’t want to tell me before it ate him up inside any more than it already was.
“Look, Jules,” he said at last, forcing his eyes back toward me. “You’ve probably already guessed by now that I’ve been working for the vampires in this city. I’ve been doing odd jobs for various bloodsuckers ever since meeting that she-vamp; basically I’m the daytime guy. And a lot of the shit they’ve had me do… Well let’s just say not all of it was legal. And I ain’t proud of that. I know I should tell you everything, every sordid detail—especially after what you’ve shared with me—but I don’t want to lower your opinion of me or make you wish you’d bonded to someone else.”
I shook my head. “Race, like I told you about your relationship with that she-vamp: no matter what you’ve done in the past, that’s where it is—in the past. Obviously you’re still the same person, but maybe our meeting and initiating our bond is an opportunity for you,” I told him.
“What kind of opportunity would that be?”
“An opportunity to start over.”
Five
He looked at me for a long moment, saying nothing, so I went on. “I won’t say that I’m not disappointed you feel you can’t tell me about your life. I want to know everything, the good and the bad, because it will help me to know and understand the man that you’ve become.” I paused for breath and sighed. “I just hope that one day you’re comfortable sharing those things with me, no matter how bad you think they are.”
“I’ve been trying to break things off,” he said, bitterness once again creeping into his voice. “Been sick of doing their daytime wet work for a while now. That’s kinda what you ran into yesterday—I’ve been out of contact with the local coven ever since my car got fucked up on the last job. Merrick was probably sent to track me down and remind me who pays my bills.”
At this point I really didn’t know what else to think or say beyond wanting him to tell me what was going on, so I settled for the old standby platitude: “I’m sure you’ll think of something.”
Race looked doubtful for a moment and then he smiled at me. At the same time the conversation was effectively ended when the timer for the oven went off. He jumped up to pull the dish out of the oven, then grabbed two clean plates out of the dish drainer and served up two generous portions. After he returned to the table, the only sounds for some time were those of our forks tapping the plates. I also praised his mother’s recipe, at which time he told me tater tots could be substituted for the hash browns in a pinch, and it could go from a breakfast dish to a lunch or dinner dish simply by substituting poultry, pork, or hamburger for the sausage. I told him I would have to remember that.
Once breakfast was over, we finally readied to head back to the alley where we’d met. As we were about to walk out the door, Race looked down and noticed for the first time that I didn’t have any shoes on. Not wanting me to walk around barefoot, he jogged back into his room and returned with a pair of slippers.
“Not fashionable or anything, but…”
I chuckled as I took the sippers and put them on my feet. “I’m wearing a sweatsuit that is too big for me—whether or not the too-big slippers match or are fashionable are the least of my concerns.”
Race laughed. “Fair enough.”
After shutting the door behind us and locking it, Race reached for my hand. I looked up at him and smiled, giving his hand a light squeeze. We made our way down from the landing and headed out of the complex, hailing a cab out on the main road. I told the driver to take us to the Motel 6 on Engle Road and he looked at me funny in the rearview, but apparently chose professionalism over curiosity (or confusion) and merely shook his head as he pulled away from the curb.
We endured the ride in contemplative silence, each of us lost in our own thoughts. It seemed the first moment I’d really had to process the last 12 hours or so, and I felt both trepidation and wonder. Had Alana O’Mara known that I would be meeting my mate in just three weeks—had she said “within a year’s time” to be purposely vague? Would having known I’d be running into my destined mate in so little time been a good thing or a bad thing? My guess was somewhere in between. I knew me, and I would have been crazy excited and a jangled mess of nerves all at once, checking out every guy I passed wondering if he was The One. So maybe it had been for the best to not know.
Now that he was in my life, I was still crazy excited and a jangled mess of nerves. Despite my ordeal and the subsequent dislike of men in general, I was actually eager to get to know Race all over again. I was looking forward to building a life with him, of gaining his trust so that he would open up to me, and trusting him with all my hurts and secrets as well. I was hoping to talk to him some more about all the different animal forms he could shift into and what it was like for him to be able to move in so
many different ways, to see through so many different eyes. I could only become a Siberian Husky, of course, but I’d be more than happy to share with him what it was like for me. After I’d gotten used to the fact that I was not a normal girl, I grew to like being able to turn into animal. Becoming a dog was a great way to relieve stress for me because I could run faster, and I could curse up a blue streak without people knowing what I was saying (as all they’d hear was barking, growling, and snarling).
I still had so much more to tell him about werekind history too, and what it told us about chimaera. How according to legend, the chimaera was the Beast Master, or leader of werekind. There hadn’t been a Beast Master in going on three centuries, perhaps a little longer, and that had led all the breeds to take to looking out for their own, whereas before there had been much more interbreed cooperation. Some of the old stories even said that there had been interbreed imprinting, a concept none of my kind could even fathom today.
There was also the fact that I hadn’t quite explained everything about imprinting. I recalled that I had referred to initiating the bond between us, which Race and I had done by looking into one another’s eyes in human form, and that I had more than once spoken of completing the bond. But I hadn’t told him how the latter was done. With vampires, at least according to Saphrona, mates completed their bond and fused their life forces when they experienced a moment of pure dual intimacy, when they were connected on both a physical level (such as when making love) and an emotional/spiritual level at the same time. With my kind such certainly strengthened the bond between a couple, but completing it was a little more complicated than that. Physical and emotional intimacy in human form only applied to the human half of our nature, and the animal half also demanded it’s due. There was a ceremony—a very old and sacred one—that had to be performed to combine the life energies of a werekind pair.
From the Shadows (A Shadow Chronicles Novel) Page 7