by Sophie Stern
“This should help,” he says, coming over, and he hands me a zippered plastic bag full of ice.
“Thank you.”
“He really did a number on you,” he mutters, and I place the bag on my eye. Immediately, I’m filled with a soothing sensation.
“I’ll live,” I say, but I can tell it was the wrong thing.
“He deserves to have someone beat his ass.”
“What makes you think someone hit me?”
“Do I look stupid to you?”
“No.”
“I know a right hook when I see one.”
I can’t argue with that, so I just sit there quietly for a minute, icing my face.
“What’s your name?”
“Evelyn.” I don’t lie. What’s the point? I get the feeling Micah will know if I am and to be honest, I kind of just want to be truthful for awhile. I lied to my friends, my family members, and my coworkers the entire time I was with Dustin.
Now I’m tired of lying.
Now I just want to be myself, even if it’s only for a little bit.
Even if it’s only for tonight.
“What can I do for you, Evelyn?” Micah says softly, though something tells me he already knows. Jason must have called him because he doesn’t seem at all surprised to see me and he didn’t seem surprised about my eye.
“Jason said I could come here.”
“Did he now?”
“I was hoping I could rent a cabin for the night.”
“You can’t rent a cabin for the night.”
“Oh.” What’s that? The sound of my heart being crushed into a million pieces and splattering on the ground? Sounds about right.
“You can have one for free,” he says.
“What?”
“It’s taken care of. We have a cabin available and it’s all yours.”
“What?”
“Which part don’t you understand, honey?”
“Any of it.”
Why is he being nice to me? I’m a stranger. I’m a broken, injured, weird stranger who wandered onto his porch in the middle of the night. Micah sits next to me on the bed. The mattress dips a little as he joins me, and our legs touch.
We’re both wearing clothes. We’re both wearing lots of clothes. Well, I’m wearing more than him. Still, I shouldn’t react this way to a man’s touch. Not after what happened to me. Not after Dustin.
Only, maybe that’s the problem. I never reacted to Dustin this way. I never felt this spark, this passion. I never felt like my panties were soaked just from him saying “darling” and “honey.” I never felt like I was going to go crazy if I couldn’t hurry up and masturbate.
Micah looks down at me. Even when we’re sitting, he towers over me. To my surprise, he leans down and plants a soft kiss on my forehead.
“I don’t know what happened to you, Evelyn,” he whispers, “but I promise to keep you safe. Let’s get you a cabin, okay?”
“Okay,” I whisper.
Chapter 5
Micah
I go to grab the spare set of keys for Cabin 4, but my hand is shaking so hard that I drop them. The loud noise radiates throughout my small home, but if Evelyn is surprised, she doesn’t show it. I grab the keys off the floor, feeling like an idiot, and open the door.
“After you,” I say. She walks ahead of me and I silently urge myself to get it together. Evelyn is not what I expected tonight. She’s not what I expected ever. When Jason said he needed a place for her to stay, I didn’t expect he had found the most perfect human ever born.
She’s perfect.
There’s no doubt in my mind.
The bruised eye doesn’t bother me. It’ll heal. I still plan on punching the bastard who did it to her and teaching the fucker a lesson, but until then? Until then, I’ll take care of her. Until then, I’ll love her, protect her. I’ll keep her safe because I’ve never felt this need to protect a female the way I’m feeling it today.
“Over here?” Evelyn asks, pointing toward the other cabins.
“Number four,” I tell her, holding the keys up. She nods and starts to walk ahead of me. She shoves her hands in her pockets and her shoulders slump forward as she moves. She’s nervous.
“Hey,” I touch Evelyn’s shoulder, and this time, she flinches. “Sorry,” I quickly say. I drop my hand.
“No, I’m sorry,” she shakes her head. “I’m just jumpy tonight. It’s not you. It’s me. I’m tired. It’s been a long day.”
“You want to talk about it?”
“Not really.”
“Why’s that?”
We start walking, side-by-side, shuffling slowly to Cabin 4. The moon shines down on us and even though Evelyn is obviously, painfully human, I can’t help wishing we could be more. I can’t help hoping there’s a chance she’ll be able to see past me being a bear.
Chances are that she knows about shifters. She’s probably even met a few. These days, you’d have to try pretty hard to find someone who didn’t know about dragons or bears or tigers. Hell, even vampires are coming out in the open more and more, trying to show the world that we’re normal, or at least somewhat normal, people.
You’d have to be pretty secluded to have never heard of shifters, but knowing they exist and being in a relationship with one are two completely different things. Then again, I’m getting ahead of myself. Evelyn is obviously on the run from something: from someone. She’s obviously hurting and scared and alone. The best thing I can do right now is to take care of her, to protect her. The most important thing I can do is to keep her safe.
“Have you ever made a really stupid mistake?” Evelyn asks.
“Plenty,” I say. I don’t even hesitate. About five examples roll through my head, and those are just from the past year.
“Well, I did something stupid,” she speaks quietly. We arrive at the cabin and step up onto the porch. There are two chairs on the small front porch and I motion for Evelyn to sit. I want to come inside with her. Fuck, do I want to come inside. Maybe talking outdoors will help her feel safe, though. If a male did this to her – and I can almost guarantee it was – then she needs to feel like she has an escape. I take the chair in the corner, leaving the one closest to the steps open for her.
“Thank you,” she sits down and crosses her ankles. Evelyn closes her eyes and leans back in the chair. For just a moment, she looks perfectly carefree. Then she opens them again and looks at me.
“Sometimes talking about our mistakes can be therapeutic,” I say.
“Spoken like a true shrink.”
“I’m no shrink, but there’s one who comes to town pretty frequently to offer counseling services. If you’re interested, I can help you set up an appointment.”
“Maybe,” she says nonchalantly. “I appreciate the offer. I’m not sure if I’m ready to talk to anyone yet, though. As you can see,” she motions to her messed up face. “My problems are still pretty recent.”
“If you change your mind, just let me know.”
“If you aren’t a shrink, what are you?
“Me? Nobody special.”
“I find that hard to believe,” she says, her bright eyes widening.
“Is that so?” Is she being playful? I can’t wait to hear what she’s going to say. My ego hasn’t been stroked in a long time, not to mention other parts of my anatomy.
Fuck.
Why did I start thinking about my dick?
I keep adjusting myself, trying to pretend like I’m not still super hard just looking at her, because, well, just looking at her is the best thing that’s ever happened to me.
Evelyn radiates gentleness and kindness. The idea that someone took advantage of her, that someone hurt her, just kills me. It kills me.
“You seem pretty special to me,” she whispers, and then she places her hand on my thigh. If I wasn’t hard before, I’m about to explode now. Part of me wants her to inch her hand up, just a little bit higher. Part of me wants her to take it away so I can regain some semblance
of self-control. Seriously, what is wrong with me? She’s been through hell and all I can do is think about how much I want to carry her inside the cabin, spread her out on the bed, and feast on her beautiful body?
“You’re not so bad yourself,” I manage to say gruffly. My voice comes out deeper than usual, almost bearlike. As much as I want to stay with Evelyn all night, I know I’m going to have to shift when I leave her. I’m going to have to go run. I’m going to have to fish, to hunt, to do something, because my body is aching.
“Yeah, well, you don’t know all the shit I’ve done.” She pulls away and leans back in her chair once more, looking out over the yard.
“What could you have possibly done that’s so bad?”
“I got into a stupid relationship.”
“We’ve all been there.”
“I was especially stupid.”
“What happened?”
I can smell her tears before I see them, and I hate the idea that I’m making Evelyn cry, but she doesn’t move, and I’m worried that if I reach out to her, the moment will end. I want her to talk, so I force myself to stay still, to sit patiently, to wait for what she has to say to me.
“I met Dustin at a work function. It was some sort of holiday party. We were all paired up with random groups of people to play games and he was in my group. We really hit it off and spent the whole night laughing and making jokes.”
“Sounds fun.”
“It was. It was fun. When the party ended, we went out for coffee, and that was it. We kissed that night and it was all over after that. We had this whirlwind romance that I thought was really special. He took me to restaurants and movies and flattered me. I was too excited by the idea that someone might like me to see what was actually happening.”
“What was happening?”
“He proposed really quickly, after just a few weeks. We moved in together. He said it was to save money for the wedding, but it was just a way for him to have more access to my life. He started micromanaging everything I did. He stopped letting me go to family events or parties with my friends. Everything became about him. All of my social activities revolved around him and his job and his friends.”
“You couldn’t have known,” I say softly.
“I should have known. My mom tried to warn me. My dad did, too. They told me something was wrong, that a good man wouldn’t keep me from seeing the people I loved, that a good man wouldn’t keep me hidden away. I should have known.”
“You got away, though, Evelyn. You left. You were brave.”
“He never hit me, not until today. First time, last time.”
“What happened, Evelyn?”
“I told him I didn’t want to get married.”
Chapter 6
Evelyn
It should be a simple thing, marriage. If you want to get married, you should get married. If you don’t, you shouldn’t. For me, my doubts started creeping in over the last month, and finally, I couldn’t ignore them anymore.
Finally, I couldn’t accept that my life was going in a way I hated. I couldn’t accept that I didn’t have any control over anything. Dustin had all the control. Dustin was in charge.
“I decided a couple of days ago that I was done. I just had to get my affairs in order. I planned to stay at a hotel for a couple of days until I could find a new place to live.”
“That’s not a bad idea.”
“I never thought he’d get violent with me.”
“It’s not something you should have to worry about, Evelyn,” Micah whispers, and my heart melts. What is that? Why is he so sweet to me? I’ve been around plenty of nice guys before, but none of them ever made me feel like this. Micah makes me feel like he would scour the world for the last bar of chocolate if I said I wanted some. He makes me feel like he would do anything it took to make me happy, and then he’d do just a little bit more.
He seems like he wants me to be happy.
He seems like he wants what’s best for me.
That’s part of why talking about this is so hard. I don’t think talking about being abused will ever be easy, so I might as well get it all out now while I’m feeling brave.
“He came home from work and I was ready. I had my car packed up with my stuff and I was just waiting to tell him goodbye. I thought I should give him the courtesy of breaking up in person.”
“I’m guessing he didn’t take it well.”
“He accused me of cheating, of lying to him. He said I was a whore. He screamed at me, threw things. Then he hit me. He hit me and I saw fucking stars, Micah. Then I just ran. He was still throwing stuff and I thought, for a second, he was going to kill me.”
Micah reaches for me, but doesn’t touch me. His hand hovers in the air around me for second and I know what he’s thinking. Fuck, I know what he’s thinking.
He doesn’t want to scare me.
He doesn’t want to freak me out.
He doesn’t want me to worry.
I’m done listening to what other people want for me. If my time with Dustin taught me nothing else, it’s that I can’t expect other people to control my happiness. I have to control my own. I can live my life scared, afraid, and trying to please the person I’m with, or I can just be myself. I can just be me. I can go for what I want without being scared.
My engagement fell apart.
My relationships fell apart.
My life fell apart.
Well, I’m done with that. I’m done being scared. The truth is that I was a tough bitch when it came to Dustin. I stood up to him. I told him I didn’t want to marry him. I left. I walked away because he was a horrible person and I finally saw it. It took me longer than it should have and I wasted a lot of time, but I left.
I’m reclaiming my life.
Standing up, I remind myself to be brave. I take a step toward Micah, and his eyes lift to mine. Fuck, those are some gorgeous damn eyes. I’ve never been a fan of brown, but with him, I can’t imagine any other color shining as bright.
I climb into his lap, and I wrap my arms around his neck, and after a brief second of hesitation, Micah wraps his arms around me, too.
“I’m glad you got away, baby,” he murmurs.
“I was really scared he was going to chase me,” I admit.
“That’s why you’re in Honeypot?”
“Yeah.”
“Where are you from?”
“South Claw,” I tell him.
“That’s what? About five hours away?”
“Yeah.”
“You drove all this way?”
“I wanted to get as far as I could.”
“You’re safe now.”
“Thanks, Micah.”
“Let’s get you inside.”
Carefully, tenderly, Micah gets up, carrying me. He walks to the cabin, unlocks the door, and brings me inside. The room is dark, but somehow, he manages to see well enough to carry me to the bed without tripping over anything in the dark. Once I’m seated on the soft mattress, he goes back to the front of the cabin, flips the lights on, and closes the door.
“You should lock it,” I say.
He turns around, looking surprised.
“I want you to stay with me tonight,” I speak before I can back out, before I can decide it’s stupid. My former fiancé hurt me deeply today. Do I really need to be spending the night with another man?
Somehow, though, I can tell Micah is different.
Somehow, I can tell he’s going to keep me safe.
Somehow, I can tell that he’ll protect me, no matter what happens.
“I…I’m not sure if that’s a good idea, Evelyn.” His voice sounds strained, almost pained.
“Why not?” I ask, but my voice comes out in a whine. All of my insecurities come rushing back and for a brief second, I forget about my new bravery mantra. I forget about fierce me and only think about scared me. I forget about staying strong and only think about everything that’s wrong with me.
“Hey,” Micah is suddenly at my s
ide, sitting next to me. His hand is on my face, and I lift my head to him. Before I can chicken out, before I can turn into a complete, shivery mess of emotional needs, I lean up and kiss him.
I press my lips to his, and I kiss Micah.
His body tenses, tightens for a brief second, and he doesn’t move. I know I caught him off-guard. After all, what kind of girl shows up on your front porch in the middle of the night, asks for a place to stay, and then just kisses you? I don’t know what came over me, but I had to kiss him. I had to touch him. I had to feel him.
And now I am.
His lips are soft against mine, but neither one of us moves. We just hold our mouths together for a second, and then Micah starts kissing me.
Fuck, that man can kiss.
He’s strong and possessive and sultry and passionate. His hands are in my hair and his tongue traces my lips before diving back into my mouth. I groan, leaning into his touch, wanting all he has to give, wanting more.
Is this what I’ve been missing?
Is this what kissing can truly be?
The experience is addictive. I just want more and more. I keep taking and taking and drinking from his body. Everything he has to offer, I’m snatching up, and still, I want more.
I want more of Micah.
My hands roam his chest and slide under his shirt. His abs are just as hard as I thought they would be. Fuck. How often does this cutie work out? A lot, I’m guessing. I run my fingers up and down his stomach, making my way up to his nipples, where I start to play with them.
He likes it, I’m guessing, by the way he tightens his grip in my hair. I’ve never had my hair held like this during a kiss. It’s almost a tug, but not quite. It’s just a grip. He’s basically marking me as his, reminding me who I belong to, and I sort of love that.
I sort of love everything about this kiss.
But then, just when I’m about to beg for more, just when I’m about to truly go crazy and climb into his lap once more, he pulls back and he just looks at me.
