Camp H.O.W.L.

by Bru Baker

  Tate almost hoped Anne Marie said no. He wasn’t in a hurry to hear anything Diann couldn’t say in front of the director. But of course she didn’t.

  Diann waited until the door at the top of the stairs clicked shut before turning back to Tate.

  “You can talk about rules and distance all you want, but the fact of the matter is you two share a deeper connection than a simple Turn bond can account for. For your bond to be this intense without consummation….” She trailed off and offered him a small, apologetic smile. “It’s something out of a fairy tale.”

  Please don’t say it, Tate begged silently. He’d felt the connection to Adrian from the moment he’d walked into Adrian’s hospital room, but he’d ignored it. He didn’t believe in fate. The idea that werewolves had perfect matches out there waiting for them was ludicrous.

  “Turn bonds are just endorphins and neurochemicals,” he said, ignoring the part of him that screamed it wasn’t. “It will fade.”

  “So is love,” Diann snapped. She took a deep breath, and when she addressed him again she was using the same voice he used for recalcitrant patients. “Not all Turn bonds fade. And not all relationships are predatory. You’re thirty-two, Tate. There’s a lot you haven’t seen. Don’t let your fear over what you have seen influence the rest of your life.”

  Tate swallowed hard. He’d grown up the youngest son of an abusive, egotistical Alpha and conditioned to believe that Weres were slaves to their instincts. More wolf than human. Cruel. Every campfire story about Weres gone bad was held up as an example of what they should be like. Even the sweet stories had been co-opted into something dark. Turn bonds that involved devotion at first sight, Weres who were fated to be together—those had been his father’s bread and butter. Tate had spent his entire childhood being trained to believe they were real. That when he came of age, when he came into his wolf, he’d be gifted with moonmates of his own. Plural. Because as the son of the Alpha, that was his due, just as it was his father’s and his brothers’. He’d seen his sisters married off to older, mean-spirited werewolves who their father swore were their moonmates. He’d watched two of his older brothers start families of their own with girls hardly old enough to shift.

  It wasn’t a life he’d ever wanted, and he’d escaped it as soon as he could. And now the carefully constructed world he’d made for himself in the decade since was coming crashing down around his ears.

  Tate’s stomach rolled in disgust. He was more than a bundle of neurotransmitters and hormones, but it was a fight to remind himself of that in Adrian’s presence.

  “I know it’s hard to hear, but it’s the truth,” Diann said gently. “Take him back to your cabin. He’s fine. He just blew through his energy reserves. This has to be an incredible strain on his body. He’ll wake up starving in a few hours.”

  Tate didn’t want Adrian in his cabin, but he also couldn’t bear not to have him close. His instincts were going wild at the mere thought of being separated from Adrian, especially when Adrian was in such a vulnerable state.

  “I’ll come by and check in on him around lunchtime,” Diann said. “He might need an IV for some hydration if he doesn’t wake up and get some water in him.”

  Worry bit at Tate. “Should he be in the infirmary?”

  Diann smirked. “Would you let him be?”

  “If that’s the best place for him, then yes,” Tate answered, staring her down. He didn’t add that he’d be staying there with Adrian if that was the case, but from the way Diann’s smirk grew into a genuinely pleased smile, he didn’t have to.

  “If his condition changes, then it might be. But for now, he’s just exhausted. He’ll sleep better in your cabin than he would in the infirmary.”

  Tate sighed but stopped fighting the inevitable. There was no denying he and Adrian shared a particularly deep Turn bond. Adrian would recover faster surrounded by Tate’s scent and away from other people who he might view as a threat. Everyone would be safer this way, and Tate would be remiss not to weigh the well-being of the campers and staffers as well as Adrian’s and his own.

  “I’m not—this isn’t what you think it is,” Tate said as he gathered Adrian in the blanket and lifted him. “That doesn’t—it isn’t a real thing. You know it’s not.” He fixed Diann with a hard look. She bowed her head slightly. She might not know all the details of his past, but he’d told her enough over the years that she should know pushing the notion of a moonmate bond was a bad idea. “Get him healthy, and we’ll talk about it later,” she said softly.

  There was a finality to her tone that assured Tate the discussion was only being tabled, not dismissed. The only thing he’d accomplish by arguing now would be delaying getting Adrian comfortably installed in Tate’s cabin. That wasn’t something he was wild about doing, but there wasn’t any point putting it off. Besides, Adrian’s dead weight was starting to make Tate’s arms ache.

  “There isn’t anything to talk about,” he said flatly as he juggled his load so his bicep was supporting Adrian’s head and started toward the stairs. “As soon as this damn Turn bond wears off, everything will go back to normal.”

  Diann ran ahead and hit the steps first, not bothering to look over her shoulder at him to make sure he was following as she spoke.

  “It would take me an hour to unpack that statement alone,” she said sweetly. She opened the door at the top of the steps and held it for him.

  Tate angled Adrian so he didn’t risk whacking his head or legs on the doorframe and passed through without comment.

  “And speaking of unpacking—”

  “Which we weren’t,” he muttered, lengthening his stride as he crossed through the infirmary.

  “—Anne Marie has already had Adrian’s things brought to your cabin. Not that he had much. We’ll have to arrange to get him some toiletries and clothes.”

  The jealous monster that had taken up residence in Tate’s chest flared to life. “He can borrow mine.”

  Diann tutted at him reproachfully. “The man needs his own things, Tate. He must have been staying somewhere in Indianapolis. Surely he has a suitcase of things waiting for him there. I’ll have Anne Marie call his Alpha and see if we can figure out how to get his luggage sent here.”

  That tamed Tate’s inner beast. He’d assumed she meant find things to borrow here at the camp. Tate didn’t want Adrian covered in anyone’s scent but his own, and even if he wasn’t feeling so inexplicably possessive, he very much doubted Adrian would want to have someone else’s scent on him.

  Diann had followed him all the way to the infirmary’s door, and he paused there to make eye contact with her.

  “Is this as bad as I think it is?”

  She offered him a small smile. “Who says it’s bad?”

  Diann and Anne Marie had both lost their goddamn minds. How could this be anything but bad? Adrian was a wolfling. He was one of their campers! Any relationship with him was inappropriate, even if Tate put aside his professional reservations, which his body seemed to have done without his consent yesterday. His mind was slowly catching up, but he couldn’t tell if his panic was because of those lingering concerns or because of how quickly this simple Turn bond was morphing into something more.

  “I do,” he said bluntly. “I say it’s bad.”

  Diann shook her head. “Get him home and then take a shower and get some sleep. Things will be clearer after you’ve rested.”

  Tate shouldered open the door and was halfway to his cabin before he realized he hadn’t called her on her use of the word home. It had felt natural to think of his home as Adrian’s too.

  God. He was fucked.

  Chapter Eleven

  ADRIAN’S mouth was so parched his lips were sealed shut. He licked at his mouth with his dry, swollen tongue. Waking up like this was becoming an alarming habit.

  He sat up and rubbed at his eyes, blinked away the haze of sleep as he looked around. He was in a sparsely furnished room, but it wasn’t the one he’d spent last night in for h
is Turn. What had happened? How had he ended up here, and where was here?

  He looked down at the sheets pooled around his waist. The plain white T-shirt he was wearing bagged around the shoulders a bit and was roomy through the chest. When he dared peek under the sheet he saw he was wearing a pair of threadbare red-plaid cotton pajama bottoms that were not his.

  He remembered getting dressed this morning, so something had definitely happened. He glanced around the room to confirm he was alone before he ducked his head and pulled the collar of the shirt up to take a quick, self-conscious sniff. His mouth watered at the clean, comforting scent. Pine needles and wood smoke. This was Tate’s.

  Adrian pushed the sheet back and climbed carefully out of bed. He felt wobbly and tired but more himself than he had in days. The fog that had plagued him seemed to have lifted, and aside from an almost pleasant ache in his muscles and joints, he felt great. Thirstier than he’d ever been in his life and starving, but great.

  The room had an attached bathroom with the door ajar, so he explored that first. He turned on the faucet and ducked his head to drink directly from the tap, gulping down the sweet, cold water until his mouth felt less fuzzy and the ache in his throat had subsided.

  Thirst quenched, Adrian cupped his hands under the stream and splashed his face. A pile of folded towels sat on the counter, so he helped himself to one and dried off his face and neck. He felt human again after the drink and the rinse—which made him chuckle to himself. One thing he’d never be was human. That was going to take some getting used to. Would he still be the black sheep of the family now that he could join the Pack fully?

  God, his family. He needed to call his mother. She and his sister were probably freaking out by now. How long had it been since he woke up in the hospital? He wasn’t sure. One day? Maybe two?

  The hole in his memory nagged at him like a sore tooth. Something had happened, and since he had no memory of it, it probably wasn’t anything good.

  A sharp knock sounded, and he poked his head out of the bathroom in time to see Tate open the bedroom door and peek around it.

  “You’re up,” Tate said, sounding pleased. He preened inside at the approval in Tate’s voice.

  Adrian couldn’t stem the tide of questions that erupted. “What am I doing here? Is this your cabin? What happened? What day is it?”

  Tate held his hands up in a motion of surrender. “One thing at a time. How are you feeling?”

  He opened the door fully and stepped into the room, and the first thing Adrian noticed was that Tate was wearing different clothes from the last time Adrian remembered seeing him.

  “I’m fine,” Adrian said, waving a hand dismissively. “What happened? Why would you be worried about how I was feeling? How long have I been here?”

  Tate crossed the room and opened a cabinet, revealing a miniature fridge like the one in the infirmary’s basement. He took out a bottle of luridly blue liquid and twisted the cap off before handing it to Adrian, who took it reflexively.

  “I’m worried about how you’re feeling because you had a stressful Turn and ended up starting to shift again and passing out before you’d had a chance to build your strength back up.” Tate nodded to the Gatorade in Adrian’s hand. “Drink it or you’ll end up with another IV.”

  “Another IV?” Adrian echoed, looking down at the drink. He took a tentative sip. It was overly sweet, but not too bad. He drank again.

  “It’s Monday. You slept for almost twenty-six hours. You were here for most if it—Diann brought you back to the infirmary to monitor you when you didn’t wake up after twelve hours, but she let you come back here with an IV. It was just to keep you hydrated and get some nutrients into you.”

  Adrian’s stomach growled as if on cue, and he rested a hand over it, embarrassed.

  “That’s a good sign. I’ll have someone bring over some food for you while you get cleaned up. I put some clothes I think will fit you in the dresser, and Diann had a new toothbrush sent over for you. You’re welcome to use any of my things in the bathroom until we can get your stuff from Indy. Your family called the hotel and explained you’d had a medical emergency. They were supposed to pack up your suitcase and ship it yesterday. It should be here soon.”

  As confused and disoriented as he was, Adrian still thrilled a bit at the mention of sharing Tate’s toiletries. This must be his cabin, then. The sheets smelled fresh but didn’t carry Tate’s scent, so it had to be a guest room. He fought down a spike of disappointment. Being with Tate felt right, but not being in Tate’s bed felt wrong in a way Adrian couldn’t explain. His mind still felt muddled and he couldn’t think straight. He needed help.

  “I need to call home,” Adrian said. “Did my phone make it here?”

  Tate nodded toward the top of the dresser, and Adrian saw the familiar white rectangle. “You had your phone on you but no charger. Luckily Harris found one for you in the camp’s lost and found. Anne Marie—the director, you met her, but I’m not sure you’ll remember that—has been giving your Alpha updates, but I’m sure she’ll be relieved to hear from you.”

  Tate backed away toward the door. “I’ll leave you in peace to make your call. Now that you’re up, I have to get back to my classes. Do you think you’ll be okay here? Diann will be over soon to check on you, I’m sure, and Harris or someone else will bring some food from the mess hall for you. I’ll be back in a few hours. There’s a camp directory list in the main room of the cabin. If you need something, you can call Diann or Kenya.”

  Tate’s easy confidence was rapidly disappearing, as was his relaxed smile. Adrian was sure he hadn’t misread Tate’s cheerful happiness at finding him awake, so why was he suddenly desperate to get away?

  “Tate? Did something happen?” Adrian paused, trying to find the right words. “Something… bad? You seem anxious.”

  Tate froze in the doorway. He turned around slowly, guilt creeping over his face. “I’d prefer you talk about it with Kenya. She’ll be your assigned counselor while you’re here.”

  Adrian’s heart quickened. “You said I shifted. Did I hurt someone?”

  “No! No, nothing like that. You didn’t even finish your shift. Your body started but stopped after you passed out.”

  “It’s just—you seem in a hurry to leave. I thought maybe I’d hurt you. I don’t remember how I got here or what I did.”

  Tate closed his eyes for a brief moment and then stepped back into the room and leaned against the door doorframe. “I’ve just had some trouble processing,” Tate said. That clarified nothing, Adrian thought grimly.

  “We have a Turn bond,” Tate continued, “but there’s something more. The connection I feel to you—it’s outside the scope of the regular bond. I don’t know what you’re feeling, but for me, it’s deeper. A normal Turn bond would mean being concerned for your health and having my senses tuned to you so I can make sure you’re safe. This—it’s not just that. And it didn’t go away this morning, like one should. I don’t know what’s going on, but I promise we’re looking into it.”

  Adrian could taste Tate’s anxiety. That must be what he was talking about. Adrian hadn’t ever experienced the Turn bond, so he had nothing to compare this to. But Tate was right; there was more there. His entire body felt like it was tuned-in to Tate’s, and Tate was all he could think about. Right now he should be freaking out about being newly Turned. His biggest concern should be getting on the phone with his Alpha and shoring up that connection, getting reassurance from the leader of his Pack. That instinct was there, but it took a back seat to his concern for Tate. That wasn’t normal.

  “Maybe you should start at the beginning,” Adrian said slowly, still trying to wrap his mind around everything that had changed in the last twenty-four hours. “I remember coming through the Turn and my first shift, and I remember shifting back and spending the rest of the night talking. What happened after breakfast?”

  Tate took a long breath, like he was fortifying himself. “Nothing. Really. You were
exhausted and wrung out from the Turn, and you started to shift. Your body couldn’t handle it, and you passed out. Diann checked you out and said you needed hydration and rest, so she gave you some IV fluids. You woke up about an hour after she pronounced you well enough to stop them.”

  That explained the slight bruise and soreness in his inner elbow. He rubbed at it absently. “Did they sedate me?”

  “No, you slept on your own. Diann said you’d told her you hadn’t been sleeping well lately, and she said it was just exhaustion, plain and simple.”

  Adrian mustered his courage to ask the one question Tate had skirted around. “So why are you so eager to leave, if everything is fine?”

  Tate didn’t answer for a long moment, and Adrian wondered if he was trying to think of a way to sidestep the issue. “The bond,” Tate said finally. “I’m not comfortable with the bond.”

  Adrian wilted. Why would Tate want this kind of bond with him? He’d been honest about that from the start, and obviously nothing had changed. “Right,” he murmured.

  Tate growled and ran a hand through his hair, leaving it sticking up in all directions. “It’s not you—”

  “Oh God,” Adrian interrupted, holding up a hand. “For the love of the moon, don’t feed me the ‘it’s not you, it’s me’ line. You don’t want any kind of bond with me, and you’re saddled with one. And I’m sorry about that, even though there’s nothing I can do about it. But if you respect me at all, don’t give me a weak-ass speech about how I’m not your type or why we’re incompatible. I’m a big boy, Tate. I can handle rejection. Just don’t sugarcoat it, okay? That makes it worse.”

  Tate swallowed visibly and looked away. “We are compatible. That’s the thing. And I’m more attracted to you than I’ve ever been to anyone. That’s the problem. It scares me. I don’t do relationships, and then this happens. It’s a lot to deal with. And I realize what a jackass I sound like right now, okay? I hate that, and it makes it worse. You’re going through a huge, shocking change, and then there’s this wacked-out bond thrown on top of it with a broken, angry guy who doesn’t believe in that kind of mumbo jumbo. You’re the one with the bad luck, and all I can do is make it about me. I’m sorry.”