by Selena Scott
“What do you mean you more than anyone?” Phoenix asked.
“I was… a notoriously bad shifter,” Jackson said with a wry smile. “I wasn’t in control of my shift at all. I couldn’t shift on command until I was almost forty. And at every full moon, my wolf took over fully. There was almost no human consciousness present. I was a danger to everyone around me. I took to chaining myself in my basement so that I wouldn’t hurt anyone.”
Ida made a sound of distress and Phoenix couldn’t help but agree. His problem was so different from the one that Jackson described that for a moment, Phoenix was almost grateful for what afflicted him. To live a life in fear of his wolf, god, that would be hellish. To hate what he was? No. Unthinkable. Phoenix loved what he was. He loved his wolf. He’d give anything to get it back.
His eyes flicked to Ida. Well, maybe not anything.
The thought was as alarming as it was worrisome and he shoved it away, concentrated again on Jackson.
“It took me a long time to be able to understand the complicated mosaic of emotions that go into shifting properly. It takes a lot of peace. And happiness. And patience. True patience. Not the kind that you can cultivate by bearing down and white-knuckling through your life.”
“Ugh,” Phoenix couldn’t help but groan. That was exactly what he didn’t want to hear. Because wasn’t that exactly what he’d been doing so far? White knuckling his way through recovery? Pushing himself through his physical therapy sessions, just counting down the days until he was officially healed?
Ida and Jackson both laughed at his candid reaction.
“Sorry if that’s not what you wanted to hear,” Jackson said, his eyes again flicking to where Ida and Phoenix held hands. “But to be honest, I think you’re on the right track. I wouldn’t worry too much. Give it a little time, keep going to physical therapy and try to enjoy your life in the meantime.”
Phoenix dragged a hand down his face. “I was really hoping you were going to tell me that I would be able to shift by this full moon. It’s in just a few days and I’m really not sure I can handle the pain of not being able to shift again. The last six full moons were the worst six days of my life.”
There was nothing that could describe the excruciating discomfort of being incapable of shifting on the full moon. It was like every one of his cells was tugging away from the next. It wasn’t pain exactly, but it was terrible nonetheless, like hours and hours of low grade electrocution. His body trembled, fought itself, tugged him in a hundred directions, begging for something he couldn’t give it.
“I don’t think it’s in the cards, brother,” Jackson said with what looked like genuine regret in his eyes. “I’m sorry. But there are some things that you can do.” Jackson turned to Ida. “He’ll need tender love and care. Get him someplace calm. With a bathtub and maybe a separate shower? Switching from temperature extremes should help. Let him soak in the bath and then take a freezing shower and then back in the bath. That kind of thing. Make sure he’s had plenty to eat and drink. And if at all possible, keep him distracted.”
“Okay,” Ida nodded solemnly.
It warmed Phoenix to see how seriously she was taking this, and to know, without a doubt, that she was going to be there with him on the coming terrible night. He hadn’t considered weathering it any differently than he had the last six, alone in a room where he suffered for unending hours. The idea of letting Ida take care of him was one that he warmed to instantly. Even if nothing she did actually eased his discomfort, wouldn’t her presence help on its own?
“Hey, Jacks, I was just wondering— Oh my gosh! I’m so sorry! I didn’t know you had a patient!” The door to the exam room swung open and in walked a beautiful woman with messy blonde hair done up in two high buns. She wore a man’s sweater and bright leggings that matched the blush that swept over her face. “I’ll go.”
“Wait!” Jackson called out. “I want to introduce you. Phoenix, Ida, I’d like you to meet my wife, Kaya.”
“Hi, hi,” she said, leaning forward and briskly shaking both of their hands.
“Remember me talking about that complicated cocktail of peace and happiness that leads to control over your shift?” Jackson asked, a big smile on his face. “Yeah, well, Kaya was the one who showed me the way on that one. So, like I said. Keep living your life, Phoenix. Try to have a good time. Don’t limit yourself. I mean that physical and emotionally.”
***
“Okay, I have the best idea for what we should do for the full moon. Seriously, I’m a genius and you’re going to love it. You’ll more than love it. You’ll flip for it.”
Phoenix tried to picture himself flipping for anything. “Whatever you say.” He eyed Ida as she skipped along through the parking lot, unlocking her car and sliding in right after their appointment with Jackson.
“I think that went well. Don’t you? I have a client this afternoon, but we could probably squeeze in some ice cream first? Interested? Seriously, I an’t get over how approachable Dr. Durant is. I mean, the man is a living legend. A light to all shifter-kind. And there he was, just sitting and chatting with us like it was nothing. I wish he lived in Portland. That way he could be your general practitioner instead of that stooge at the hospital who can barely hold in the willies while he’s dealing with shifters.”
“You found him handsome.”
“The doctor at the hospital?” Ida asked incredulously. “God, no. I mean I’ve only met him once. And I’m not trying to body shame anyone. But no. I was not attracted to that guy in the least.”
“No. Not the doctor at the hospital. Jackson. Dr. Durant. You found him handsome.”
Ida went bright pink. “Maybe! I don’t know.” She slanted a look at Phoenix. “Apparently I have a thing for dark eyes and dark hair.”
He quirked a smile at her, slightly mollified when she put it that way. Phoenix turned to eye himself in the side mirror. “I’m more handsome than he is.”
“You’re certainly prettier than he is. He’s very grumpy looking. You’re a work of art.”
Phoenix was still piecing through whether or not that was a compliment when they pulled into the parking lot of the ice cream shop.
His mind slowly spun with everything he’d just learned in his meeting with Jackson. He got out of the car and followed Ida toward the shop.
Look at him, walking in sneakers, over concrete, into a shop with fluorescent lighting and plastic chairs. Never in a million years would he have thought that this would make him happy.
And it wasn’t this. It wasn’t anything but Ida that was putting that spring in his step. He had to admit it to himself, even if he couldn’t admit it to anyone else yet, he was pretty sure the way that Jackson had looked at Kaya today was the same way that he looked at Ida.
CHAPTER SIXTEEN
Ida wanted -needed- everything to be perfect.
It was the day of the full moon, she and Phoenix had been dating, hooking up, whatever-ing for almost a week now. They’d gotten naked together twice more and his oral skills were pretty much completely devastating at this point. They hadn’t slept over together again, not since that first night.
Now, the moon was set to rise in five hours and Ida was just waiting for Phoenix to come out of his meeting with Diana. From there, they were gonna drive a few hours to pretty much the best place in the entire world.
Phoenix came out of his meeting with Diana, met Ida in the parking lot, and slid into the passenger seat looking pretty pleased with himself. She assumed it had been a productive meeting. She was painfully aware of the fact that had she not drawn all these lines in the sand last week, this car ride would most likely be the moment that he would ask to be her boyfriend, the way he’d said he would.
But the lines had been drawn and Phoenix had been nothing but respectful of them. Even now, he wasn’t bringing it up.
She hesitated to mention it as she got on the highway and raced them away from Portland. Because tonight was the full moon, she’d gotten a hundred thing
s packed up earlier in the day and like she’d said before, she wanted -needed- everything to be perfect. Would asking Phoenix about his meeting with Diana serve to remind him of her rejection? Was it weird not to ask? She worried her lip.
“Ida,” Phoenix’s deep voice said from the other side of the car. “ You know you want to ask.”
She sagged in relief. “Oh, thank God. I wasn’t sure I was allowed to ask!”
“You can ask me anything, anytime. No matter what. And I’ll always tell you the truth.”
For some reason that statement at that particular second had tears pricking behind Ida’s glasses. Keep it together, Ida! Just because Phoenix was kind and honest and beautiful and growly in a sexy/friendly way didn’t mean that she couldn’t keep a lid on her feelings for the guy.
Live in the moment. Life is short. Seize the day. So what if they didn’t have a future? She could still enjoy their time together. Just as long as she didn’t do something monumentally stupid. Like catch feelings for him.
“Okay,” she said, clearing the emotion out of her throat. “How did it go with Diana?”
“She offered me a job,” he said proudly.
“Phoenix!” She pounded the steering wheel with the flat of her hand. “That’s incredible! Congratulations!”
“Yeah. It’s good money, I guess. Full time work. And comes with um…” He snapped his fingers. “Benefits.”
“Holy SMOKES!” Ida laughed maniacally, thrilled to the core for his news. “Only you, Phoenix Wolf, could manage to land a full time job with benefits with zero work experience. What will you be doing for her?”
“Community outreach, I guess.”
Ida burst out laughing, trying to picture it. “We’re gonna have to work on your resting wolf face, I think.”
“Nah,” he gave her a smile he tried to swallow. “She’s not worried about my, uh, grumpiness. She thinks that’ll work in my favor, I guess. She said that she wasn’t looking for a salesman. She wants me to be myself. She wants me to try to find shifters in Portland who haven’t come forward for whatever reason and convince them to come to the center for services. She says that my particular skill set will make me really good at it.”
“Wow.”
“She said I’ll be like an ambassador? Although I didn’t really know what that meant.” He shrugged. “Either way, she said that my aversion to the human world would make me better at this particular job because it’ll make other shifters who are averse to the human world trust me more. And then I can convince them to come to the center for services.”
“Wow!” Ida said, perhaps a touch too brightly. There was something about the way that Phoenix was describing his new role that bothered Ida.
Ida admired Diana greatly. She was a personal hero for sure. But that didn’t mean that Ida was too naive to have observed some personal quirks of Diana’s. For instance, Diana was almost militaristically committed to making sure that the center was wildly successful. Of course, the woman had started it from the ground up and she had major aspirations for her brainchild, Ida didn’t begrudge her that at all. But also… there was occasionally something almost manic in the way Diana pursued success at the center. Ida had wondered before where the heck Diana had gotten the money to start the center in the first place. She’d wondered if maybe Diana was staring down the barrel of some very high interest loans or something like that.
Some small part of Ida bristled at the idea of Phoenix’s gifts being so blatantly commodified. It rang a bell of concern.
But then, she looked over at Phoenix in her front seat, looking nothing but pleased with himself. Proud and relieved and gainfully employed. Getting a job was a huge hurdle for him, and it was one that he’d cleared on his very own. She knew how highly he valued her opinion. She wasn’t going to spoil this moment with reservations.
“That’s just incredible. I’m so, so proud of you.”
He turned to her, his dark eyes boring into her. “You are?”
She nodded.
“Huh,” he grunted, leaning back in his seat.
“What?”
“Nothing,” he said, watching a grove of evergreens pass by their window. “I guess I just never thought that the opinion of a human would mean so much to me.”
Ida burst out laughing. “Oh, Phoenix. Never change.”
“Shit,” he grimaced. “That was rude?”
“Yes,” she affirmed. “But in a lovely way. The way you always are. In a confident, oblivious, endearingly honest sort of way. Like I said, never change. I think you’re perfect.”
The last part of her sentence had slipped out before she’d even registered the words in her own brain.
She felt his eyes on the side of her face, that black gaze, still capable of sending a chill down her back, but for very different reasons than it used to.
I think you’re perfect.
He said nothing and the words hung in the car. Ida put the windows down, even though it was chilly, with the hopes that the wind would whip her words -and the moment- away.
No such luck.
Thankfully, he didn’t comment on her assessment of him, but it didn’t matter, because her brain worked that sentence over and over in her own head.
I think you’re perfect.
It was true, she finally concluded, when she finally got off the highway and started taking back roads through the winding, evergreen lined mountains. She did think he was perfect. She looked at this man and she thought of him as exactly perfect for her.
It was almost a relief to admit it to herself. Because if she thought he was perfect then it was only a matter of time before he revealed a flaw.
Come on, flaws! She cheered inwardly. Gimme something terrible I can cling to so that it’ll be easier when he leaves.
“So, Phoenix,” Ida said, clearing her throat. “What do you think of the gender pay gap?”
Please say that women are less competent and deserve to be paid less, she internally pleaded with him. Make it easy not to love you.
“What’s that?”
“Oh.” She gave him a brief explainer on how much less women made compared to their male counterparts.
He screwed up his face. “That’s ridiculous. And unfair. Dawn is just as competent as Orion or I am. Plus females have to bear children. They should be paid more based on that fact alone.”
“Dammit,” she swore under her breath. Perfect. Perfect. Perfect. “Here we are!” she chirped, covering her feelings as they pulled into the campsite she’d reserved and set up for the night.
Phoenix looked around in surprise when she shut off the car. “But we’re in the woods.”
“Yup.”
“Where’s the dwelling?” He slid out the passenger’s seat, leaving his crutches behind, and turned a circle where he stood, peering around the campsite. “Don’t you need a dwelling?”
“We’re camping!”
She’d kind of expected him to be psyched. I mean, didn’t camping seem like a human pursuit that he might actually enjoy?
He arched an eyebrow at her. “You mean we’re going to light an ill advised fire, make too much noise, ruin the sanctity of the forest, and then leave beer cans when we leave?”
She laughed. “Ah. I didn’t think about the fact that you’ve probably had your fair share of interactions with campers. And no, we’re not going to do any of those things. We’re going to be respectful campers.” She put her hands on her hips bossily. “I thought for sure you’d be excited that I wouldn’t be keeping you boxed into some manmade room somewhere during the full moon.”
He bobbed his head from one side to the other. “I guess that’s something.”
“And look!” She took his hand and tugged him to the far edge of campsite where a thin, waist-high creek raced along. “Cold water.” She took him by the shoulders and pointed him toward another end of the creek where curlicues of steam misted off into the late afternoon shadows. “And hot water. Just like Dr. Durant thought would work.”
&nb
sp; “Huh,” he sniffed the air and wandered over to join her. “A natural hot spring. Good idea.”
She put her hands on her hips again and squinted at him. “I really can’t tell if you’re humoring me or not.”
He shrugged. “Ida, humans who camp are pretty much the most annoying group of people on earth to me. They wear those stupid clothes and hike with sticks and cook horrible smelling food over unnecessary fires. And they sleep in those stupid looking bubble things.”
“Tents!” Ida gushed, refusing to be deflated by his mood. She knew she’d win him over in the end. “I brought one! You know what? I think I’ll set it up now so that we don’t run out of daylight.” She checked her phone. “We have about three hours until moonrise.”
He made a noncommittal noise, and she could feel just how much he was dreading all of this. But bless his heart, he didn’t say a word to discourage her.
He silently helped her set up the tent, keeping his feelings limited to the dark looks he sent at the complicated system of tent poles. He quietly ate the huge sandwich she’d packed for him and drank the water she’d brought as well. He scouted the perimeter of their campsite, deemed it safe enough. It wasn’t until she started unloading all the blankets and pillows from the back of her car that he finally smiled. Apparently he thought that her version of sleeping out was kind of cute. She’d take it.
Half an hour until moonrise, Ida took her cue from his antsy, agitated hands and dancing feet and started stripping her clothes off.
“What are you doing?” he asked her in a low voice.
“You can’t tell?” she asked, looking at him over her shoulder as she stepped out of her dress, folded it up neatly and put it in the back seat of the car. Next came her bra and then her underwear. Last of all, she pulled a couple big fluffy towels out of the back seat and tossed them over her shoulder. She sauntered over to the edge of the hot spring and hung the towel over a trusty branch.
His eyes followed her every tiny movement but Ida purposefully ignored him. She dipped one toe into the hot, clear water and made an intentionally provocative sound in the back of her throat.