Hyde, an Urban Fantasy

by Lauren Stewart

  Carter walked in with a question on his face, turning the doorknob on both sides. He studied the door the apartment building’s superintendent had fixed with duct tape.

  “I’m glad to be home, but what happened to the door?” he asked.

  She didn’t answer—she was too busy staring at him. He looked older, tanner, more mature. Since he’d only been gone about three weeks, her perception could have been playing with her mind. But he looked more manly, like someone who could keep her demons at bay. His blond hair was still shorter than she liked it, a requirement of his dream job, the one he could never have. He’d cut his hair before he knew he would never be allowed into the Police Officer Training Program. Until he could prove his epilepsy was under control, he was ineligible. And he was running out of medications he could afford to try.

  So he’d changed course and gone to school aiming for something unsatisfying, but similar. Unfortunately, the Crime Tech Department had nearly the same physical requirements as the police academy, including the bad haircut. Crew cut aside, he was still gorgeous. And the years of physical preparation for his eventual disappointment had made his shoulders broad, his chest hard, and his hips slender. He probably didn’t mind the female attention his physique garnered.

  Six years was a long time to be celibate. It worked for her, but she assumed he found comfort in other women’s arms. Or legs. Or other parts.

  Shaking off the thought, she jumped into his embrace, throwing her arms around him. He dropped his bag and grabbed her before they both fell over.

  “Geez, Eden! It’s good to see you too.” He laughed into her hair and held her tighter than she deserved.

  “I missed you!” Pressed up against him, she felt a spike of heat in her core. That was new, uncomfortable. Could that have changed too? Did she . . . want him?

  Carter carried her to the couch and set her down, then sat down beside her. “I missed you too, babe.”

  With the separation of their bodies, the sensation disappeared. Maybe she’d been wrong—maybe she was just happy to see him in a totally-platonic way. Yeah, that was probably it. “Liar. You were too busy to miss me.”

  “Never.” He pushed a lock of her hair off her cheek, brushed his fingers along her jawline—somehow a motion too intimate for the relationship they shared.

  She didn’t want to push him away, but she couldn’t help scooting back a little and folding her legs in front of her, creating needed space between them. “How’d you have time to get a tan? I would’ve thought they’d keep you in a lab, bent over a microscope the whole time.”

  “What can I say, after three weeks in the Florida Keys? You get tan just walking from microscope to microscope.” He laughed.

  “Well, you look great,” she said, her eyes roaming over him.

  He blushed.

  “So what was it like?” she asked. “Tell me everything, but leave out the boring bits”

  He shrugged. “That doesn’t really leave much to tell. Training. Books. Lectures. Lots of yelling and put-downs for reasons I still don’t understand. Very military-esque. How about you?”

  Her insides froze while she struggled to not let it show on the outside. “Well . . . “

  “You haven’t been sleeping, have you?” Cradling her face in both hands, he ran a thumb under her eye, studying her. “What’s going on?” He always saw right through her.

  Darn it. “Well.” She bit her lip, took his hands from her face and held them. “I kind of started sleepwalking again. I think I’ve been— No, I know I’ve been going outside.”

  He grimaced. “Yikes.”

  She tilted her head back and forth like it was no big deal. “Yeah. I woke up somewhere kinda bad.” Kinda bad, Eden? Really? Is that the best way to describe it?

  “Where?”

  She took a deep breath. “Don’t be mad because it wasn’t deliberate. I was sleepwalking . . . or something like it.” Oh yeah, that was a great set-up.

  His eyes grew and his mouth opened as if he was planning on eventually using it, but had forgotten how.

  Don’t think, just spill. Get it out fast, like ripping off a Band-Aid. “I woke up with a man. I don’t know how. Or why. But somehow I met him”— her heart was now emulating the same rhythm as when she’d actually been in Mitch’s bedroom—“Well, maybe ‘met’ is the wrong word because I didn’t actually meet him now did I? Since I was asleep.” Little smile—a lousy attempt at making this an amusing little anecdote. “In a club. That I don’t remember going to. And it seems we went to his house and . . .” Oh God, please don’t make me say the rest.

  While she’d been speaking, or blabbering, his body had stiffened and pulled away from her. “Is this some kind of joke?”

  Should she have started with a joke? Give him a giggle before dropping the bomb? Dang it. She hid her face behind her hands and noticed the sweat on her palms. “Sadly, no.”

  “You sleep-screwed some guy?”

  Nausea hit her like a ton of bricks. “I believe so, yes,” she whispered.

  “That’s the truth? You were asleep the whole time?”

  She peeked out between her fingers. His expression was that of someone who was desperately trying to believe the unbelievable. Which she could understand—she felt the same way. “Let’s go with ‘not consciously’. But yes, I swear to you. That is the truth.”

  “And he was a stranger?”

  She nodded from behind her hands.

  “Once.”

  “One night. But it seemed like we . . . um . . .” Did he really need a tally of how many condoms they’d actually gone through? Yes, because not telling all the truth was the same as lying. “There was evidence of mult—”

  Carter threw up his hands to stop her. “One night, right?”

  She swallowed, thankful he didn’t want to know every gory detail. “Yes.”

  He sighed and looked away, rubbing his hands together then running them through his hair and resting them behind his head. “Are you alright?”

  Her shoulders dropped with her hands. “You believe me?”

  He nodded. His mouth was still tight as if he was having trouble with it, but really, could she ask him to be totally normal after a confession like that? “Unless you’re a totally different Eden, I believe you. You don’t lie.”

  She stared at him with her mouth slightly open. His reaction was so fast, so perfect, she almost couldn’t believe it was true. “You’re right: I don’t lie, and you, Carter, are magnificent.”

  He smirked. “Be that as it may, I’m never letting you out of my sight again. Got it?”

  “I would expect nothing less.” She tackled him again and held on to the best man she’d ever known, and who she’d never deserve. It was like dreading a dentist appointment for weeks, and then that morning, the receptionist calls you to tell you the doc has to reschedule.

  Although, after hanging up, you realize you now have another few weeks of anxiety.

  She’d tell him about waking up on Mitch’s doorstep later.

  CHAPTER XI

  Jolie cursed when she saw the caller ID. He wasn’t supposed to call her, she was supposed to call him. Now she knew how her boss felt. “Welcome home, Carter.” She stifled a laugh.

  “Eden’s been sleepwalking. Is that supposed to happen?”

  Jolie kept her voice low. The door to Mitch’s office was closed, but she couldn’t take any chances. “No. Did she drink the milk you left for her?”

  “She tossed it because she thought it had gone bad.”

  Probably the serum’s fault. She sighed. “You shouldn’t have left.”

  “Going to the police academy training was part of our arrangement. You set it up, for shit’s sake.” The carrot. All he had to do was keep dosing the girl and he got a free-pass into the police academy. The Clinic provided a new health history and gave him the meds he needed. No records. No fuss. But leaving to do some stupid police scuba-diving course shouldn’t have happened.

  “I did my part,” he g
rumbled.

  “Not if she didn’t drink the milk, you didn’t.”

  “Do you have any idea how long I have been giving her that medicine? I left for a couple weeks—with your okay—and it all goes to hell. You said she would be alright.”

  “She’s fine, isn’t she? Alive and well?”

  “Alive, yes. Well? Not really. She’s freaking out because she doesn’t remember anything. But she woke up in some guy’s bed. Eden wouldn’t do that. She wouldn’t.” His voice was tinged with panic. It was like dealing with a toddler who lost his sippy cup. “Why did she do that? What’s going on, Jolie?”

  “You need to calm down. They don’t know, but are looking into it. They’ll figure it out, don’t worry. But don’t give her anything until they’ve decided what happens next.”

  “I’m worried about her. Maybe I should tell her what’s wrong with her.”

  You have no idea what’s wrong with her, kid. “No, do not do that. She won’t understand. Even if she did, how do you think she’d feel about you lying to her for so long about the”—she stopped herself before she used the correct word with him—“medicine or about your career path. Do you think she’d just forget about it and throw you a party for getting into the police academy?”

  He didn’t respond.

  “Listen. You are helping, okay? We are all trying to figure out what’s happening. But if you tell her about the medicine, she might not take it anymore and then who knows what she’ll do. This is for her own good.” The lies came out so easily. “If her behavior changes again, don’t do anything other than call me. If she wants to leave the apartment, don’t try to stop her. Just call me. Right away. I will take care of her from there. Got it?”

  “I guess so.” His words were eased out of him as he settled back into his necessary denial. He took a breath. “When can I see you?”

  “Soon. Call me if she changes.”

  And I will babysit the bitch.

  § § §

  “Oh, Christ. We agreed that you’d leave me alone. How’d you forget after only a couple of days?” He was kicking her again. Probably enjoying himself too.

  She scooted away from his feet.

  “Oh, right,” he said. “Short-term memory loss. Got it. Next time, at least bring me some breakfast.”

  Ignoring his attitude was becoming almost second nature to her. “Why do I always end up here?”

  “Because you have some serious issues. Ones that I can’t help you with.”

  She got up and followed him to his car, keeping her gaze away from his hips. Which didn’t stop her mouth from watering—he had magnificent shoulders. What the heck? Was she in heat? “Wait up! There has to be a reason why she keeps coming to you. What’s happening to me?”

  “No idea. Leave me alone.”

  “Did you see her last night? How’d I get onto your doorstep?” She wouldn’t cry. She wouldn’t. The last time she’d cried in front of him had given her chills. Worse than the disgust he’d shown at her tears, for a moment, she’d seen misery in his eyes. Not going to happen again. “Please. I don’t know what to do.”

  He stopped without turning. “It’s called ‘somnambulism’. Not common in adults, but it does happen.”

  “This isn’t just sleepwalking. I sleepwalked when I was a teenager, this is more than that. Way more.”

  “Ah, two years out of your teens and look how wise you are.”

  “Five. I’m five years out of my teens.”

  “Pardon my rudeness, I should have guessed. Seeing how well-adjusted you are.”

  She had to walk around him to see his eyes which seemed to be very interested in his feet. “If I don’t figure this out, I’m just going to end up like a newspaper—on your welcome mat every morning . . . Grandpa.” Eye contact. Finally, an insult that bothered him.

  “Did you just call me Grandpa?” He sighed and scrubbed his face with his hands. “Are you schizophrenic? Have anxiety? Migraines? Tourette Syndrome? Depression? Are you on any medications?”

  Eden shook her head in rhythm to his questions. “That’s quite a list. Do you have a lot of experience with sleepwalkers?”

  “None, but I know how to use WebMD.”

  “You looked it up for me?” Wow, the man actually had the ability to be considerate. Though he could certainly use more practice at it.

  “No. For me. Needed to know what kind of stalker I was dealing with. Do you use recreational drugs?”

  “Ne-ver,” she said, cutting the word in two with a machete.

  “Then it’s D.I.D.”

  “D.I.D.? No, I’m not a multiple personality.”

  “Oh, well since you seem to know all of the things you are not, why don’t you use that big brain of yours to figure out what you are.”

  “I can use WebMD too. People with Dissociative Identity Disorder don’t have flashbacks of what their other personalities have done. Nor do they get . . .” Her voice trailed off into nothing with the knowledge there was no way she could tell him without receiving a mountain of ridicule and humiliation in return.

  “Spit it out already. My attention span doesn’t reach full capacity before ten-thirty.”

  She willed him not to laugh. It wouldn’t work, but she willed it anyway. “Nor do they get super-human strength.”

  See? Didn’t work. His laugh reached Cleveland. “So you’re super-human now, are you? Cool. Do you have x-ray vision too? What color’s my underwear?”

  “I’m not talking about x-ray vision.”

  “Obviously not. Or you’d know I don’t wear underwear. You’re a terrible superhero.”

  “Does anyone find you amusing?”

  He grasped his heart. “Ouch. You’re a mean superhero. Fine, tell me all about your incredible powers.”

  “I broke my door down a few nights ago.”

  Blinking, he asked, “Why’d you do that?”

  “To get out. Our door lock is the kind that you have to use a key for both sides and, apparently, while I’m unconscious, I’m not smart enough to look in my purse. After I woke up on your lawn, I went home. The door was in the hallway. A normal person can’t kick in one of those locks. And I don’t—I don’t think I could even pick up that door now.”

  His brow furrowed and he leaned up against the car. At least he was listening, listening intently. “Is your boyfriend alright?”

  “Yes.”

  “Well, where was he?”

  “He was—”

  “Wait, let me guess. He was sleeping, wasn’t he?”

  She clamped her jaw shut and waited for his little rant to be over. It might take a while, because he seemed very amused by her situation.

  “You supposedly ripped a door off its hinges, and he slept through it, right? You guys are a heck of a pair—he sleeps through doors breaking and you sleep through sex. Just with me or with him too?” He quit talking, so she assumed it was finally her turn to speak.

  “We—”

  “No”—he threw his hands out to stop her—“forget I asked. My ego can’t take it. I’ll ask one more time: Do you do drugs?”

  She waited for him to start monologuing again. He looked at her impatiently.

  “Oh, is it my turn now?” she asked. “Are you finally allowing me to speak?”

  “Only if you say something intelligent.”

  “Wow. You are so good at being cruel. I get that you don’t like people, that you don’t like me. But what about you? Do you hate yourself as much as you hate the world?”

  He was still, his face a mask, probably considering which insult to throw at her next. Maybe he’d go low-brow and call her fat. Or say she dresses badly. Nothing had changed. He would never believe anything she said, never be willing to help her.

  “Me or the world?” His grin was sad, bitter. “There’s no comparison.” He pushed himself up and flicked his head to the other side as he opened the car door. “Get in.”

  She flinched. What? No snappy, demeaning comeback? She was sure he hadn’t run out of
insults. “Why?”

  “You want my help? Fine, I’ll help. But it’s a limited time offer, and I make all the rules.”

  “How surprising,” she muttered. But she’d take the deal. What other choice did she have?

  “Get in. And don’t call me Grandpa.”

  “How old are you?” She skittered around the back and jumped in before he could change his mind.

  “Thirty-one.”

  “Hmm . . .” she said, attaching her seatbelt.