“Yes I do actually. I can’t seem to reach the flour and sugar. I don’t understand why anyone would put them up so high. Would you mind getting me a large bag of each please?”
“Sure.” The stranger moved forward and she instinctively took a step back. The exposed skin of his neck revealed a very interesting tattoo and she couldn’t resist the urge to ask him about it. Something about the bullet etched into his skin called to the lost memories buried deep within her mind.
“That’s a very interesting tattoo,” she remarked casually.
He handed her the large bags of flour and sugar before his hand lightly touched the skin of his neck. “Thanks.”
“I feel as though I’ve seen it somewhere before.” She stepped forward, her eyes locked on his skin as she tried to remember where exactly she had seen that mark before. She could feel her head beginning to ache with the coming of a headache from the effort she was exerting. “I’m sorry. That was rude of me.”
“It’s no problem really.”
“I’ll let you get back to your shopping. Thanks for helping me out.” She placed the flour and sugar in the basket, smiling widely at the stranger before continuing to move through the store picking up the items she thought she might need to make a cake. The rest of her shopping list was thankfully located on shelves lower to the ground and so she didn’t need to ask for the help of the kind stranger. Her shopping complete, she made her way to the checkout. The same woman who had served her and Sebastian the last time she had come to town was watching her approach and smiling at her.
“Hello Erica.”
“Hello Victoria. Hang on a second. I didn’t tell you my name. How did you know it?”
“It’s a very small town and we don’t get many new people moving in. Everybody knows everybody here.”
So that means this town is filled with busy bodies and gossips? Great, Erica thought as she placed the items she had bought on the conveyor belt.
“Are you planning on making a cake?” Victoria questioned.
“Huh?” The older lady smiled, waving a hand over the items that Erica was planning on buying. “Oh yes, I am. My younger brother and sister are coming to visit and they told me that they want me to make them a cake, so here I am.”
“So how many siblings do you have then Erica?”
“Two.” As far as I’m aware.
“Are they much younger than you then?”
“A fair bit,” she hedged, becoming distinctly uncomfortable with the woman’s questions.
“How old are they?”
I don’t know. “Five.” I think. Well they look about five, she shrugged.
“They’re both five?”
“Yes.” Erica said through gritted teeth. How long does it take to check out some flour? her mind muttered angrily. The more questions Victoria asked, the more frustrated Erica became at her inability to remember her life.
“Twins?”
“Yes.”
“Oh children are adorable at that age and twins…your parents must be run ragged.”
“Excuse me? What’s that supposed to mean?”
“Nothing dear. It’s just that your parents must be getting on in years if they have a daughter of your age and then to have two young kids to look after, it must be hard on them.”
“My parents are dead.”
“Oh dear, I’m terribly sorry. How did they die?”
I have no fucking clue! “Look Victoria, Sebastian and I came here so that I wouldn’t have to deal with the pressure of other people expecting me to remember something. And to be quite honest your questions aren’t helpful in the slightest. I don’t remember anything and I don’t like being reminded of that fact. I know this is a small town and your questions might not bother everyone else, but they bother me. So why don’t you just finish checking out my sugar so I can be on my way?”
“I didn’t know you felt so strongly about my asking questions.”
“Well I do.”
Victoria moved much faster and Erica's items were soon all scanned and paid for. Erica picked up the bag that contained her purchases and left without saying another word to the older lady.
“What was all that about?” The tall stranger that had helped Erica earlier asked Victoria as he handed her the few items he had picked up from the store.
“The poor child has amnesia and apparently she didn’t think my questions were helpful.”
“Amnesia?” he asked, perplexed.
“Yes, she can’t remember anything.”
“Nothing?”
“Apparently she had an accident and all her memories prior to it have gone.”
I knew I recognised her from somewhere, the man thought. She’s the one in those pictures Vincent is distributing. I wonder just what he’ll say when he finds out she has amnesia and I wonder just how severe it is? She didn’t recognise the tattoo. Does that mean she doesn’t remember the monster she is? I’ve got to let Vincent know about this.
Chapter Twenty-Nine
“Stupid woman and her stupid questions. Just who does she think she is?” Erica muttered under her breath as she pulled in to the driveway of her home. “You’d think that she was a member of the Spanish inquisition or something. But no, she’s just plain nosy. I now officially hate nosy people. I don’t know if I hated them before I lost my memories or not and I don’t care.” Jumping out of the car she reached over to the passenger seat and grabbed her shopping before slamming the door loudly behind her. Waking up the path she continued to rant about the inquisitiveness of strangers, one in particular until she reached the front door. Opening it and walking into the living room, she found Sebastian sitting on the sofa, a small piece of wood in one hand and a knife in the other. The wood shrank in size as he hacked away at it with the knife and judging from the wood chips that covered the floor beneath his feet, the wood had once been significantly larger than it was.
His eyes were unfocused as he cut the wood with unseeing eyes. His behaviour was beginning to alarm her. He’d made no move to acknowledge her presence. As he continued to whittle away at the wood, the sharp edge of his blade crept ever closer to his skin, but he didn’t seem to notice or even care that he was centimetres away from hurting himself. Dropping her bag onto the living room table, she called to him hoping that her distraction didn’t end up hurting him.
“Sebastian, what are you doing?”
He stood, turning to face her. “Erica, are you ok?”
“I’m fine, you on the other hand…what the hell did you think you were doing? You could have seriously hurt yourself. You weren’t even looking at that knife and there’s almost no wood left, you could have seriously hurt yourself.”
He looked away, unsure of how to answer her question. The instinct gnawed at him, demanding he tell her the truth, she was his mate and didn’t deserve to be lied to but in her current state, the truth could have been dangerous to her health. How could he explain to her that he had woken to the lingering fragrance of her unique smell and panicked when he found that she wasn’t in the room with him? When he had instinctively sniffed the air upon waking he had been delighted to find Erica's scent so close. Her proximity meant that she must have had another nightmare. Though he didn’t like the idea of her suffering from haunting dreams in the night, he did enjoy the feel of her body pressed closely against his own when she came to join him in his bed. However, when he had woken today her body hadn’t been beside him and a quick scan of his surroundings told him that she wasn’t in the room either. He had immediately sprung from the bed and begun to search the house and when he could find no trace of her, his thoughts had become increasingly murky as his wolf filled his mind with the need to find her and bring her back to him. The note she had left for him to find had been the only reason he hadn’t run from the house to find her. He could understand her desire to be self-sufficient but he couldn’t shake the feeling that something bad would happen to her if she left his sight. In an attempt to calm himself he had decided to do a lit
tle wood sculpting, the activity had always calmed him in the past and he hoped it would do so now. Judging from the concerned look on Erica's face, it hadn’t worked.
“I was a little distracted,” Sebastian hedged, hoping she’d leave it at that.
He should have known better, even though she had lost her memories, Erica was still Erica. “You were more than a little distracted Sebastian. You looked like you were about to cut off your finger.”
It would have grown back, his mind muttered rebelliously, though he knew he couldn’t tell her that.
“What’s the matter?”
He ran a hand through his hair as he tried to diminish his state of agitation. His hair was now decidedly messy, but he felt no less stressed. “I was worried ok?”
“Worried?” she asked puzzled. “About me?”
“Who else would I be worried about? I have no family or friends in this town besides you.” And even if I did you would still be the one who occupied most of my thoughts. He sighed, falling down to sit on the sofa.
“Sebastian you worry too much. All I did was take a drive to town to buy some things for a cake. There was no harm in it.”
“But there could have been sweetheart.”
She moved to sit beside him on the chair. Despite the tense atmosphere she still felt comforted simply being near him and had to resist the urge to rest her head against his warm chest. “What do you mean?”
“You could have got into an accident. Anything could have happened.”
“You’re being pessimistic.”
“No, I’m being conscious of your condition. Erica did you even think that you might not know how to drive? What if your car had crashed and you’d been hurt?”
“I managed to get to town and back just fine so I must have learnt to drive at some point in my life. Yes, I had those exact same thoughts when I first got in the car and couldn’t seem to get it to do what I wanted, but I eventually figured things out. If I really didn’t think I could do it then I wouldn’t have gone.”
“Why did you go without me in the first place? I could have driven you.”
“Yes, you could have Sebastian but that would have defeated the entire point of the trip.”
“And what was the point exactly?”
“Sebastian, I want us to work together. Just because I have a little bit of a memory deficit, it doesn’t mean that I’m completely helpless. If I just let you do everything for me then I feel useless. I have to learn how to do things by myself. Speaking to Dylan and Wyatt reminded me of that.”
“How did speaking to your siblings inspire the need to do things alone? What exactly did they say to you?” I thought they knew that there were certain things that they could and couldn’t say to her. I’m going to have to have a serious talk with those two when I next see them.
“It wasn’t anything that they said, it’s just that speaking to them made me realise how difficult things must be for them. Our parents are dead. I don’t even remember how they died and as far as I’m aware I don’t have any other family. Do I’ve any other family?” She asked for confirmation. Sebastian shook his head telling her that her presumption had been correct. “That means that to those two kids I’m the only parent like figure they have. First our parents died and now I can’t even remember who they are? I don’t know how they’re managing to be so cheerful, but the fact is they’re coming to see me soon. They really want to see me and even if I can’t remember them I have to try and act as though nothing is out of the ordinary. How can I do that if I have to have you do everything for me? It isn’t fair to them and it’s most definitely not fair on you. We have to try and share the burden, that’s what it means to be in a relationship.”
We have to act as though nothing is out of the ordinary? he scoffed. Erica, you’re a wolf, so am I and so are they. The only thing that’s out of the ordinary is you thinking that you’re human. “The world is a dangerous place Erica, it’s only natural that I worry,” he mumbled under his breath.
“You act as though the world is out to get me Sebastian.” She laughed, easily dismissing his misgivings.
Not the world sweetheart, just a small group that would hurt you without a thought and you can’t even remember how to recognise them. Of course I’m concerned for you.
We must protect her, his wolf growled, agitated by the mere thought of Erica being hurt again.
We will, trust me. “You’re not going to change your mind about this are you?”
“If by this you mean be doing things by myself, then no. I’m a grown woman. I’m perfectly capable of going out alone, doing things alone of my own initiative. I want a relationship with you Sebastian, we’re engaged and one day we’ll be husband and wife. I don’t want you acting as though you’re my father and I’m some sort of wayward child. I’m not going to change my mind about this so don’t even ask. There’s no need for you to want to be watching over me every second. It must be exhausting. Besides, you can do things that you want to do as well.”
“Fine,” he sighed. “It’s not illegal for you to go places without me.” Though maybe it should be. Bad things seem to happen to you when I let you out of my sight. The first time I listened to your desire to be alone, hunters captured you. The next time I let you out of my sight, you got shot off a cliff. And if what they say about bad things happening in threes is true then number three should be a real jaw-dropping event.
“Sebastian, it’s not as though I’m going to avoid going places without you. I just want you to be aware of the fact that if I want to go somewhere alone, I will.”
At her last comment, Sebastian began to laugh. It started off small; a low chuckle but soon it became a fully-fledged roar. He clutched his sides as the laughter continued to pour from him, while Erica began to frown at his strange behaviour.
First he almost cuts himself, then he gets all worried about me going out alone and now he’s laughing? What the hell is wrong with him today? “Sebastian, just exactly what are you laughing at? I haven’t said anything that’s funny and neither have you.”
“It’s not anything that you said.”
“Well then what exactly is it?” she snapped, folding her arms over her chest.
His laughter gradually died and Sebastian reached forward, pulling Erica close. The sudden movement was unexpected, but as the warmth from his body began to penetrate hers, Erica felt any ideas about pulling away from him disappear. “You’re so stubborn.” He smiled, gently caressing the long strands of her hair.
“You say that as though it were a good thing. Most people don’t see being stubborn as a desirable trait.”
“Well you make stubborn look very attractive.”
“I still don’t see what’s so funny about me being stubborn,” she groused, nestling closer to him.
“As long as I’ve known you, you’ve been stubborn to a fault. It seems that even though you’ve lost your memories, the fundamental characteristics that make you you are still very much in tact.”
“Am I very different to how I was before I lost my memories?” she asked, her voice saddened.
“Honestly?”
“Yes. I want to know the truth. Don’t sugar coat things for me.”
“There are some things about you that are different now.” For one, you’re much nicer to me and willing to simply be with me like this. “But you essentially are exactly the same person you were when I first met you.”
“Stubborn,” she chuckled against his chest.
“Yes, you’re still very stubborn. You still do things that make me worry.” The very same things that can drive me to anger. “But your determination hasn’t changed. You’re still one of the most warm and kind people I’ve ever met.” Even if that kindness wasn’t exactly directed at me before. “And you’re still willing to put the needs of others before your own. I’ve never met someone as concerned for the well being of others as you. But Erica, I don’t want you to neglect your needs just because you think it might have a negative effect on som
eone else. While you might try and take the needs of others into your decision-making, I will always put your needs and wants before mine and everyone else’s and I will be just as stubborn as you on this matter. I’m not going to change my mind about this.”
“What a pair we make. Mr and Mrs stubborn.”
“You started it,” he laughed. “I’m only being stubborn to compensate for your unwillingness to compromise.”
“Compromise is for wimps and those who don’t know what they really want. If you know what you want in life then there is no need to compromise. Do you know what you want Sebastian?”
Yes, I do. She’s right here in my arms. “Maybe you’re right. I know what I want, so there’s no need to make concessions to anyone else.” Because I’m never going to let you go. He lowered his head, unable to stop himself from kissing her and pulling her body even closer against his. They fit perfectly together like two pieces of a puzzle, destined forever to be side by side. His tongue swept into her mouth and the taste of her exploded on his tongue fuelling his possessive instincts to new heights. Nothing will ever come between us and live.
Chapter Thirty
After their discussion yesterday, Erica and Sebastian had reached a mutual truce; he would try not to worry so much if she tried to stop doing things that would cause him to worry. Sebastian had felt slightly guilty about giving her a promise that he knew he would be unable to keep. With her mind still convinced that she was human, it was simply impossible for him not to worry. Despite this he had given her his word, holding on to the fact that he had only said he would try and try didn’t mean guarantee. The play on words did little to ease his conscience.
He had stayed up late into the night trying to help to help Ryan with some of the more technical aspects of managing some of their clan’s businesses from a distance, but he didn’t think that he had done a very good job. There were some things that people were good at and others that they weren’t. No matter how hard he tried, Ryan and paper work didn’t go well together and they should know, both he and his brother had spend decades trying to improve the relationship before simply giving up. Sebastian enjoyed paperwork and was quite happy to have that responsibility left to him. While it could get very noisy within the clan, everyone knew better than to disrupt the peace and quiet of his office and there was nothing Sebastian enjoyed more than his peace. So he and paperwork had a good relationship. However, he was no longer within the clan and so Ryan had tried his best to pick up the slack and it had taken a large part of the night to explain something that he would have been able to do within the hour.
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