The Reluctant Wolf: A Paranormal Romance (Werewolves and Shifters)

by Susan G Charles

  “Yes, I’m okay…. I’ll talk to you in just a few minutes. I love you – be careful,” was all she could get out.

  “I love you too. See you in a minute,” Morgan said as he heard the phone go dead on the other end.

  Chapter 4

  A few nights later Morgan rolled over under the heavy covers and draped his arm over Bailey. She smiled absently and sighed in her sleep. Morgan was a happy man – not one to always say what he felt, words were never his strong suit, he knew he could never put into words exactly what she meant to him if asked by another. She had filled a void in his life that he didn’t even know was there. Best of all, she accepted him for the man he was now, rather than the man his father had tried to make him out to be when he was a young boy. Bailey accepted him at face value and only seemed to see the good in him.

  Bailey had long hoped to have a man who could love her as she was and she tried to do the same, so instead of rejecting a persons weaknesses, she made it her mission to see the good in everyone, including him, instead of focusing on the bad. His father had built up a wall of hatred and loathing in him long ago and Morgan found it hard to allow anyone over it but Bailey seemed to be an excellent climber. He was glad for that.

  His hateful father had found it funny to originally name him Mordred, though he never ever used that name, preferring Morgan instead. Mordred was the mortal opponent of King Arthur and Arthur was his fathers name. The irony was that Mordred and Arthur were always bitter enemies in the stories he had read, where as he, Mordred, aka Morgan, son of Arthur, his fathers name, had only ever wanted his fathers blessing and love.

  His father, a nasty, vile and loveless man, had accused him of causing pain wherever he went. Really though, it was always Arthur who had done such a thing. If there wasn’t any kind of drama happening around him, he was well known to stir the pot until something bad happened. And most of that strife had been aimed at his son Mordred, now known as Morgan. Morgan never really understood why his father hated him so other than the fact that his mother had died in childbirth. Apparently an act Arthur never forgave his son for.

  But as soon as Bailey had found him, he felt she released him from the hatred of an unforgiving father. He felt a weight lifted off of his shoulders. And he felt happy – real happiness, maybe for the first time in his whole life. It was a different kind of feeling but one that he hoped to be able to get used to. She was an exceptional woman with a bad background of her own, so maybe it was meant to be for the two of them to find each other and heal. As far as he was concerned, she would never have to worry again or look over her shoulder to see who might be there.

  He smiled as he thought about the events of the night before. They had both had a stressful week – especially Bailey. And it was his desire to make her feel safe again. Morgan had gone down onto one knee just after a special candle lit dinner at their favorite restaurant and proposed to her. And thankfully she had accepted. He knew he was a lucky man and he would do everything in his power to make her happy and safe. He smiled at the memory.

  He could still see the tears in her eyes but the sparkly diamond ring on her elegant finger now rested on the pillow next to her head. Morgan had no idea what he’d done to deserve a woman like Bailey. She was beautiful, friendly, kind, sweet, and sensible. Morgan thanked his lucky stars for the miracle that was Bailey, then closed his eyes, hugged her a little bit tighter and smiled at the happiness he now felt. He started to fall asleep.

  Suddenly his eyes opened wide as he did his best to see the calendar on the other side of the room. What day of the month was it? Damn it, he couldn’t see the calendar from the bed, so he did his best to silently slide out from underneath the covers, hoping not to wake her. Morgan got up, padded across the large bedroom and crouched over the desk in the corner of the room trying to get a better look at the calendar. Still too dark to read it, he picked it up and held it next to the bedroom window as he slowly moved the curtains allowing a little bit of streetlight in.

  “Damn it,” he said quietly to himself as shivers ran down his spine. With all the drama that had gone on in the past several days both at work and here at home he just realized that the days had gotten away from him – and tomorrow was the first night of full moon!

  “Damn it,” he whispered to himself again – he hated the full moon. Always had hated the full moon – at least as long as he could remember. Basically it was two painful nights long. Ever since he had become an adult, somewhere around the age of thirteen or so, the first night of the moon had not been entirely enough to bring about the curse hibernating inside him, but the second night was a different story. The second night was strong – strong enough to cause him to lose every trace of humanity he had ever known.

  Simply stated, Morgan was a werewolf – a fact that he had not yet shared with Bailey. In his family, the werewolf curse was passed from father to son. In fact, all of his male ancestors were werewolves as far back as he could remember. The change came on with every full moon, especially on the second night. When that happened his blood lust raged with such fervor that he often feared it might tear him apart if he didn’t tear someone else apart first. His entire life he had hated himself for the lives he’d claimed while under the control of the full moon.

  But when Bailey came into his life a few months ago he noticed that things had changed almost immediately. For the first time in his life Morgan found that he could control the blood lust. In fact, strangely enough, on some nights he could even resist the change in part, and sometimes even in full. She was his lucky charm and her love was so strong it allowed him to take control of the beast within him. Of all the things in his life, this was the one change that mattered most to him and proved that she was the perfect woman for him.

  Morgan did his best to hide this single fact from her and so far he had been completely successful. It was simple but so far he always managed to arrange to be out of town for business on the nights of the full moon, carefully using business trips or visiting long lost friends in other cities as an excuse just so he wouldn’t be near her when the change came on. Bailey was trusting and had allowed him the freedom to travel freely as needed so far, and because of all of this he’d been able to hide his curse from her.

  Chapter 5

  Due to his oversight, though, tomorrow and the next night would be a problem. He cursed to himself for not keeping better track of the dates despite all the recent drama. But tonight he worried that he simply wouldn’t have any time to arrange a trip or come up with a credible cover story on such short notice. His other part time job never called on him just out of the blue. Panic ran through his body as he tried to think of any good and believable way out. He knew that he still couldn’t risk her seeing anything. It was way too early in their relationship.

  Over the course of their budding relationship he’d become more and more able to control his transformation. Many nights, in fact, he was able to stay almost completely human. A lay person seeing him in such a transformation now might only notice a slight sharpening of his teeth or maybe an outbreak of extra hair on his back or hands. But, still, that didn’t happen all the times and sometimes he was more wolf than man. He knew he couldn’t risk having her see it.

  Just then Bailey stirred in the bed, stretched her long arms above her head, and yawned. She rolled over, noticed Morgan was missing then pushed herself up on her elbows, and looked sleepily across the room to try and locate him in the dark. Finally she saw him standing next to the window holding the calendar in his hands.

  “Morgan, what are you doing?” she asked, wiping at her eyes and looking at the clock now.

  “Sorry, babe. I didn’t mean to wake you. I was just thinking.”

  Bailey replied, patting the covers, “Come back to bed, honey, it’s lonely here without you.”

  Morgan smiled at her comment and walked back to the bed slowly, carefully sliding in next to her. She wrapped her arms around his body as soon as he got back in.

  “Baby,” he started
, unsure what to say to her next, “I just realized that I have to go out of town for a few days. That’s why I was looking at the calendar.”

  “What for?” she sat up in bed and looked over at him with her big brown eyes.

  “For my part time sales job. With all that had gone on for the last week or so I completely forgot that they were sending me to a sales conference.”

  “Really? On such short notice? But why didn’t you tell me about it?” Bailey asked.

  “I meant to tell you about it – I’ve known about it for a little while, but it just slipped my mind. After your night from hell the other evening and my own blow out at the shelter things have just gotten out of hand… and I forgot. I just forgot… that’s all it was. I’m sorry, but that’s all it was – just a slip of my memory.”

  Morgan’s heart was beating so fast and loud in his chest as he told Bailey the lie he thought she might even hear it. But she had to fall for it – she had to, he wouldn’t know what else to do if she didn’t. She sat quietly in the bed for a moment, frowning as she processed this new information. She looked at him for a moment as if she wanted him to say more. Then she simply asked one question.

  “Okay,” she said eventually, “so how long will you be gone?”

  “Not long at all,” he lied. “Two days and two nights total,” he said, breathing out relieved that she hadn’t flipped out at the short notice. “You won’t even miss me – I’ll be back before you know it, I promise,” he kissed her on the top of her head and hugged her even tighter.

  Bailey didn’t say anything for a few seconds and Morgan began to worry as they lay there quietly. He knew she wasn’t going to sleep – not this easy. And just then she sat up in bed and asked, “I had no idea you were a speaker, Morgan… you’ve never mentioned that to me before? How often have you done it?”

  Morgan tried to laugh it off, “Babe, it’s not a big presentation, really – I’m just helping one of the other salesmen with a promo he’s been working on for weeks. The vice president of the company was supposed to do this and Bob was going to assist – well, something happened to somebody in the VP’s family a few days ago, I think his wife is in the hospital, or maybe his daughter, so now Bob is doing the presentation and I’m assisting him. Really, it’s just an emergency thing. No big deal – just think of me as a burlier Vanna White!”

  She continued to sit there for a few more seconds – Bailey was getting suspicious, he could feel it. Morgan knew he wasn’t a public speaker and so did Bailey. What to do next he wondered to himself. So he tried to distract her with a few kisses on her belly. He continued to kiss her side, her back, her belly, hoping the distraction tactics would work – after a while he was happy to realize that his methods were working – she never asked him another question. Finally, she gave in to him, and they fell asleep an hour or so later in each others arms.

  The next morning came and went as usual – they were both in a good mood and Morgan felt relieved that Bailey hadn’t kept on asking him questions about his last minute trip. By the time the afternoon arrived he carefully went through the motions of packing his bags, taking only what he needed for two days and nights worth of supplies, clothes and assorted sundries, making sure to pack suits also as if he was really going to be doing a business presentation. Once he was done packing his suitcase, he loaded his car, kissed her goodbye and drove off.

  A few miles outside of town he stopped at a convenience store and bought a cooler, some groceries and drinks and a few other things – enough to last him a few days. Next, he loaded up all his food and headed for his usual moon safe dive just south of town and about an hour or so away from the house he shared with Bailey. He looked at his watch just to make sure he was all right time wise. 3:12 PM, he was doing good time wise. By 4:00 PM he was working his was down a winding road deep into the woods. He drove until he found the unmarked trail and then drove on up to a dilapidated old cabin about three miles further on up the hidden trail.

  It was just after 4:20 PM by the time he reached the cabin. No one ever came to this part of the woods except for him and maybe some hunters from time to time. The trees were so thick here that they grew almost on top of each other, and the presence of thick brush and downed trees made it even more difficult to navigate. Morgan had been using this particular deserted cabin for years now for only one thing – to go through the change in.

  It had all the things he needed – it was very far everyone, and even too far for him to hurt anyone if the bloodlust overcame him. There were no farms or anything close and he was truly isolated. And his extra sensitive sense of smell let him know that no other human had been in the area since his last visit so he was completely isolated. He began to feel better already. His secret would be safe for another month.

  Morgan quickly unloaded the car, fixed himself a sandwich, got a beer and then sat on the porch an hour or so later as the sun dropped slowly behind the horizon. Just after 8 PM it was completely dark outside and Morgan’s skin started to itch – he knew it was almost time for the change. Hopefully this month’s transformations would be another easy one.

  Chapter 6

  SNAP!

  Then he heard a limb break and some leaves shifted around from their place of rest outside the cabin. He froze in place instantly and listened intently as his animal instincts kicked into high gear. It wasn’t a second later and then more leaves whispered to him as they were kicked about, another branch snapped… and then another one broke… and then he heard a human’s gasp.

  A human! How could this be? He panicked at the thought as his skin began to throb that unearthly throbbing that let him know it wouldn’t be long now. Why in the world would someone show up here? And now of all times? This cabin was twenty miles or better from everything! And everyone! He had never had a visitor before.

  The timing for an unplanned visit by anyone could not be any worse either. In his transformational state he could easily hurt a visitor. He slowly moved inside and closed the door carefully behind him, hoping that whoever it was out there would think the place was just deserted and would move on. Despite the fact that his car was parked right out front!

  Morgan waited in the shadows as his skin began to itch and throb more and more. Minutes ticked by and felt like hours as he waited, hoping for the intruder to just move on. After about three or four minutes, thinking to himself he was alone again since he had not heard any more movement from outside, he suddenly heard a knock on his back door. He froze like a deer in the headlights.

  “Crap, crap, crap,” he thought to himself, still crouched in the shadows. Just who would be out in the forest this time of the night? Immediately after the first knock he heard another knock, followed by a familiar voice. His heart sank to his stomach, as he collapsed to his knees, sweaty and nauseous, his skin slowly starting to burn from within. It was Bailey.

  “Morgan! Morgan!” she called out to him, “Morgan, I know you’re in there. Let me in right now!”

  He stood up as best he could, feeling as if he were about to be sick and walked to the door. He was sweating profusely, but had cold chills too and felt as if he would surely pass out – he leaned against the back door and closed his eyes, hoping this was all just a bad dream and that when he opened his eyes she would not really be there. But her yelling let him know he was not dreaming.

  “Morgan. What are you doing? Open up right now,” she yelled at him.

  “What are you doing here, babe?” Morgan asked in return, still firmly behind the door, the intensity of the burning sensation inside him was getting stronger and stronger.

  “I followed you because I knew you were lying to me Morgan. But why in the world would you come to a dump like this – and so far out? Are you on drugs or something? Please talk to me.”

  Morgan began to plead to her, “Please baby, just go back home…”

  Just then a blast of pain shot through him like a bolt of lightening – his eyes widened in terror as nausea hit him in larger and larger waves –
he could feel the change coming on. It wouldn’t be long now – and Bailey was standing just on the other side of the door!

  Bailey was crying by now, “I’m not going anywhere, Morgan, until you tell me exactly what you’re doing out here.”

  “Please, baby,” was all he could get out before a new wave of pain hit him straight in the chest. He fell to the floor.

  Everything was quiet on the other side of the door for a few seconds… then the door knob started to turn.

  “Bailey, No!” he screamed, but just then another bolt of pain flew through his body like a flock of birds trying to get away from a predator. He curled on the floor again – sweaty and nauseous, but now in tremendous pain too. So, tonight was going to be very different from the transformations of the past few months he suddenly realized. Tonight might even be a full blown transformation! He was horrified but it was too late!

  Just then the back door swung open, exactly at the instant he changed into a wolf! For an instant she stared, frozen in terror, then she turned and ran to her car like a track star on steroids. She saw the entire transformation – Morgan one moment, big, oversized, hairy wolf the next! The next thing he heard was the squeal of her Jeep’s tires as she sped away. He was still a furry heap on the floor recovering from the final end effects of the change. It would be a few more minutes before he would be able to move around without extreme pain as the wolf.

  Morgan’s thoughts were becoming harder to control and less and less human – he wanted to run after her, to explain what she had just saw – but not looking like this. Plus, Bailey was the last person on earth he wanted to hurt – and in his current state he wasn’t sure whether or not he could control himself. He didn’t want to hurt her. He couldn’t hurt her.

  And then he wasn’t thinking about her at all…