Sleeping Beauty and the Lion: A Shifter Fairy Tale Retelling of Sleeping Beauty (A BBW Shifter Fairy Tale Retelling Book 3)

by Sylvia Frost

  She grimaced. “Fine.”

  “I’m going to check Rose’s medicine cabinet. I’ll be right back.”

  She nodded mutely and checked her watch. She was probably ready to fire her security team if they didn’t get here in the next five minutes. I set myself into an empty professional auto-pilot as I wandered to Rose’s medicine cabinet. I knew where the band-aids were already, because I had come to this very room just last night to get a towel before I claimed Rose. Deftly, I grabbed a small carton of bandages out and the tweezers next to them. I forced myself to ignore all the little signs of Rose dotting the bathroom.

  A pile of books was stacked haphazardly by the toilet. A staggering number of creams for her soft skin were scattered by the sink. There were even a few knick-knacks, bookmarks and pieces of jewelry in the shape of moons dangling from corners. I closed the mirror of the medicine cabinet, ready to leave, but then I caught myself staring at my reflection.

  For one moment, I saw myself how Rose must’ve. My shoulders were broad as any human sports hero, my golden eyes were so saturated with color they looked like contacts and my body was a sculpted form of muscle and power designed with only one purpose: protecting her. And I had failed.

  My fist shot out, although by the time it made contact with the mirror, it wasn’t a fist anymore. Claws screed over the glass, sending fissures of cracks across my reflection like thin ice breaking on a pond. The pain was welcome, as sharp, clear shards splintered into my paw. The thrumming of my pulse pushed a number too high to keep track of.

  I need to meditate. I need to calm down. I need to take care of Ms. Briar.

  No, my inner lion purred quietly. You need to take care of yourself.

  All my thoughts dissolved as I sank onto the closed toilet, my elbows pushing her rack of toiletries off the back. It wasn’t just the world I’d spent all these years hiding from. It was myself. But there was no meditating away this suffering. If wanted to find Rose, I had to allow myself to feel pain. I closed my eyes, taking in a deep breath, and felt the hollowness of missing Rose, of everything I’d lost.

  It washed over me like a cold wave, tightening my throat until I couldn’t breathe. I let the shadows close in on the sides of my vision. I let myself remember my father’s voice. My brother’s face. My mother’s smell I let my body ache and acknowledged the pit that had been gaping inside of me since the moment I was put in the cage.

  And only then, echoing in that hollowness, did I feel Rose. I knew where she was. I felt it like a string on the back of my neck, tugging me from far, far away, like a fishing line going into the deep.

  In my other hand, the cardboard box of bandages crinkled between my fingers. Standing, I plucked the thorns of glass from my paw and watched as it slowly morphed back to human.

  Then, at lion speed, I swept back to the bedroom. “I know where she is— ”

  I stopped on the threshold. Ms. Briar wasn’t alone anymore. Standing next to her was a lanky man with a shock of red hair and a green T-shirt that read, “Merrymen Security: Your EL33t Firm.” The logo looked like a jaunty green cap with a red feather in it, done in pixilated video game style.

  But while that hardly screamed professionalism, the shirt wasn’t what made me pause. It was his smell—hot and slightly acrid like the inside of a greenhouse.

  The man halted mid conversation with Ms. Briar and gave a wide, jagged smile. “Hey, the doctor’s here!” He thrust out a hand overdramatically. “Robin Loxley of Merrymen Security, at your service.”

  I didn’t take his hand. He smelled like piss. Fox piss. Rose’s mother’s security firm were shifters. That shouldn’t have been possible. Besides my family, I was, as far as I knew, the only shifter still left alive. There were always rumors of wolves, but foxes and bears were thought to be well and truly gone.

  “Oookaaay,” Robin drawled and lowered his hand. His smile didn’t budge, but I could tell from his narrowed eyes that he smelled who I was, too.

  Good, my inner lion thought, now he knows who’s the bigger predator.

  I smiled, not in the human way, but the lion one, baring both of my canines at him to make my point clear. “I’m not sure you can help us, Robin. I know where Rose is and I’m going to find her. You’d just get in the way.”

  “And tell me, once you find Rose, how are you going to get access the building if it has, say, security codes?”

  Through force of will and sheer endurance, my lion snarled.

  I stayed silent.

  He nodded. “Thought so. You need me.” Smirk still in place he thrust a phone in my direction, waggling it back and forth. “Well, really, you need this.”

  “And what’s that?” Rose’s mother asked.

  “This is why you pay me the boo-koo bucks, my lovely Alycia.” He waggled the phone once more for emphasis. “With this wonderful little tool, I can get us in anywhere.”

  Chapter 20

  ROSE

  Lonan glanced down, sighed, and said, “I understand your frustration, Rose. But you don’t have all the facts right now.”

  He raised the remote and unpaused the T.V. Triumphant orchestra music began to blare from the speakers, and the two logos disappeared into what I expected would be an informational video, but what turned out to be grainy security footage. The orchestra muted, until there was no sound at all.

  “Nothing you could show me would change my mind,” I growled.

  He shook his head. “Just watch Rose.”

  The background of the video was taken up by rows of technical machines: hulking refrigerators, big circular machines that looked like giant drums, and at the far end a computerized microscope that took up half a room. In the foreground was a cage.

  They had kept Daniel in this cage, I realized. This was how he got the scars.

  The bile rose up farther in my throat, and the only reason I didn’t scream at Lonan to let me out was because I was afraid I might throw up.

  One of the men stooped in front of the metal cage. He had something in his hand. Food maybe, or papers. It was hard to tell. But a couple of seconds later he stumbled backward and the cage began to rock. Slowly at first, but then the man waved an arm over his head, signaling someone from off camera.

  Claws pierced through the silver bars. Silver was a relatively soft metal, but one that was deadly to werebeasts. Just touching it would’ve burned Daniel’s skin and made him sick to his stomach. Using his claws to rip through the cage? I couldn’t imagine the pain.

  The man on the screen was jogging backward now, one hand on his walkie talkie, but it was too late. The claw turned into the full body of the lion as Daniel pushed through the cage. With the bars cut, the top half of the cage was collapsing onto the bottom half. The lion pushed back the top, leaping outward.

  I’d seen so many grainy videos of werebeasts before but nothing looked like this. In the fake videos there was always a lot time spent on the transformation. The people who made the special effects could never resist showing off and so would linger on the smoke snaking up around the wolf’s paw, or the face twisting and morphing into a bear’s. But this wasn’t a movie. One moment there was a man with a claw, scratching his way out of hell, the next there was a lion. Roaring out big enough to show all of his fangs.

  It wasn’t a beautiful change like I thought it would be. It was horrible. And that, more than anything else I’d seen in the last twenty-four hours, made me believe that Daniel was telling the truth.

  The lion was on the scientist in less than a heartbeat, his jaws at his throat. Ripping. I was glad for the low definition and the lack of color, because I couldn’t see the blood. But even in low light with the lion and the man nothing more than a pixilated figures, there was no mistaking the way the man flopped to the ground, his head hanging at an unnatural angle.

  Lonan pressed pause.

  I was talking before he could lecture me anymore. “That man died because you were stupid enough to keep a werebeast in a cage.”

  Lonan crossed his
arms, settling farther back into the chair, regarding me stonily. “And the rest of the men and women in the facility?

  “There’s nothing you could do to convince me that this is okay.” I tilted my head at the hospital room and then at my restraints. I would not let him convince himself that he was the good guy here. I wouldn’t!

  “Not even if I told you that, that was your boyfriend.”

  “I’m aware,” I sneered, but kept my voice low and even. Screaming and yelling would just make him feel more vindicated. “Any procedure you do to me will be without my consent. If you’re doing this because you think its best for me, it’s not.”

  “I know,” Lonan said. “But this isn’t just about you, Rose. We’d like to start offering this not just to high-risk cases , but to any girl we see who grows the mark.”

  “They’d never even know they had a mate.” Everywhere except my neck felt suddenly cold, sterile, like his mouthwash.

  He nodded. “That’s right. But right now we haven’t tested it on enough to people to use it except in high-risk cases, like yours. That’s why we waited until after you had completed the bond to collect you. Even if you don’t want it, other girls might.” He bowed his head, like he actually was entreating me. “You’re doing this for them.”

  “No.” I shook my head so violently my neck ached. “I’m not doing this. And if you make me, when I wake up I will sue your sad little self into oblivion. Or are you just going to kill me afterward?”

  His brow crinkled in pity. “Do you really think no one has tried to sue us before? Besides the fact that you’ll have a hell of a time fighting the Department of Defense in court, you won’t have much of a case by the time you wake up.”

  “By the time I wake up?’

  “Here’s what’s going to happen.” He adjusted his watch and stood. “In ten minutes a nurse is going to come and administer a solution of silver intravenously. You’re going to slip into a coma, much like the one you experienced after your car accident. When you wake up, well, if you wake up, there’s a possibility you’ll have minor to severe brain damage. At the very least you’ll suffer significant short term memory loss.”

  “What?” I said, dry-mouthed, even though I’d heard every word perfectly.

  Lonan broke, rolling his eyes, finally fed up with me. “You won’t be able to sue us, Rose, because you won’t remember.”

  Chapter 21

  ROSE

  I needed a plan.

  I’d spent a lot of my life without concrete goals. Instead of “become an editor at Publishing Firm X” I’d chosen “get an English degree, move to New York, and pray a job appears.” Instead of “try and find a boyfriend I actually like by going out and meeting people,” I’d taken the “go out on a date with the first guy who asks me” option. I’d thought if I never wished too hard for any specific thing, I wouldn’t be disappointed when my dreams didn’t come true, but as a result now I was stuck in a nightmare.

  I rolled to my right, surprised by the range of motion I could get with my hands tied to the sides of the bed. My hands weren’t tied in front of me. In Mates of Darkness Naomi had gotten very good at undoing bindings by breaking them over her knees, but my captors were smart enough to tie my arms to the guard rails.

  Captors, Sweet Jesus. This really was happening to me. A paralyzing wave of fear uncoiled from my stomach and slithered up my throat. For the first time I noticed the clock right above the doorway. The red second hand ticked at what had to be a regular interval, but what felt faster and faster.

  Ten minutes. What would I do if I even got my hands free? What was the point?

  I closed my eyes, looking for respite from all the white, sterile surfaces. I tried to remember Daniel’s warm, raspy voice whispering my name, his arms around me, the heat that radiated from his masculine body. But I couldn’t. My imagination couldn’t capture how he made me feel. Not completely. If I kept lying here, doing nothing, that was all he’d ever be. A dream that I’d forget upon waking.

  I couldn’t let that happen. I wouldn’t. Not just because he resembled my fantasies, with his admittedly chiseled body, but the ways he didn’t, like his smile. The tender way he spoke to me. The way he had taken me last night, fierce and wild, just like I’d asked. The way he had run out into the street like a rabid dog, just because he wanted to protect me.

  I opened my eyes, and let out a startled croak of a laugh.

  I loved him.

  Maybe it was just the hormones from the matemark, but wasn’t that all human love was when it came down to it, too? Chemicals and neurons firing. Mine were just a little stronger, but in the end it was still about a choice. I had a choice now. Fight Lonan or give in and let him break the bond.

  God knows, maybe if I fought I wouldn’t win. But, for the first time in my life I wasn’t going to let the complete certainty of failure stop me. I was going to try.

  I stared at the plastic guard rails on either side of me. I was not a small girl, and they looked like could barely keep a toddler contained. I’d been thinking like one of those skinny helpless girls in romance novels, but I wasn’t them. I had the force of my superior mass on my side. It was time I used it.

  First I tried rolling, but I only got halfway there before the the handcuffs on my other hand dragged me back to the center of the bed. I’d needed another plan. If only I had better upper-body strength.

  The one time I had actually used the personal trainer Mamma bought me in an effort to help me “get healthier” he’d said that the only muscle I had that was in fighting shape was my brain, with my legs running a distant second.

  My legs! I kicked my feet like I was in a swimming pool trying to get up a big splash. The sheet fluttered up in response before drifting back down. A slow, uncertain smile tightened my cheeks.

  They hadn’t tied down my legs. Mistake. Or at least I hoped it was. My nose twitched to the right as I sucked in a breath, bringing back my leg until my upper thigh pressed against my elbow.

  “Here goes,” I muttered.

  And then, like a pissed-off frog, my foot shot out toward the plastic guard rail.

  “Agh,” I grunted, as my heel glanced off the plastic. My bed vibrated, but the rail didn’t budge. Christ this always looked so much easier than the movies.

  I shut my eyes to keep any tears from falling. Then I tried again, harder. My ankle twinged in pain from the assault, but the guardrail didn’t give. Outside I heard footsteps, getting faster, even as the ticking of the second hand stayed the same.

  “Jesus, come on!” I pled. I hadn’t been to church in years and wasn’t sure after the whole werebeast thing what I believed anymore, but still.

  Third time was the charm. That was what always happened in fairy-tales wasn’t it? That last-ditch effort that comes through. I took in all the oxygen I could, bracing myself, and tried one last time.

  My bones hummed as I made full-on contact with the guard rail. It gave a little underneath my toes, and for a second I was so sure it was going to work. That it was going to pop off like the plastic packaging on a limited edition action-figure.

  But it didn’t.

  Failure burned in my nose like the scent of the hospital the day Daddy died. I remembered sitting next to him in a bed just like this one, wondering why he wouldn’t wake up. I remembered crying so hard I couldn’t speak when Mamma entered the room. It had been easier to cry than to get angry at the fact that the man who had done this to us would never suffer. That people like him and Lonan got to ignore their own mistakes and build societies founded upon our pain.

  “I don’t care,” I said, and was surprised to find my own voice harsh with tears. They slipped down, staining my cheeks with their hot sting. Thick wet, embarrassing tears burned all the way to my lips. But I deserved to cry.

  “I don’t care!” I yelled, finally letting the anger bubble out of me into a righteous wail. And then, without even thinking about it, I thrashed against the plastic guardrail. My foot pounded against it, as if I coul
d stomp out everyone that had ever hurt me or Mamma or Daniel. As if I could end it all right here, right now.

  And, in a miracle sent from some place I didn’t understand, the fourth time was the charm. The guard rail detached from the bed and skittered to the floor. My hand was still attached to it, but now I had a range of motion. Another kick and I had popped off the other rail too, and I was free and standing up. I let out a subdued whoop of victory.

  My whole heart swelled with joy. I was going to drop-kick the rest of my way out of here. I put aside any worry that they might have guns. I was on a fire.

  Wait! I glanced down at the sheathed replica of Naomi’s sword nestled on my chest. Fire. I was an idiot. If I could get out of this room and then start a fire somewhere else in the facility, I could use that as a distraction to escape. It was a ridiculous idea, but at this point in my life I didn’t need my plans to be perfect, I just needed them to happen.

  I started to the door, steeling myself for whatever was about to come, but then I noticed the clock had stopped. The second hand stalled right before a new minute.

  I grabbed my necklace for comfort, as if it was powerful enough to actually help in any real way.

  Then the lights went off.

  Chapter 22

  DANIEL

  The fluorescents flickered once and then went out. Now the only light in the maintenance hallway of the abandoned hospital came from between the slats of the boarded-up windows. Thanking the gods I could see in the dark, I slipped through the shadows and around the empty laundry carts. My matemark was hot and prickling on the back of my neck. Rose was close. There was only one problem.

  “Did you just turn off the lights, Loxely?” Ms. Briar asked into her Bluetooth ear piece.