by Lexy Timms
I leave the kitchen, walking down the corridor as my mind sputters, scrambling to put together my next course of action. What should I do?
“Go back on the couch and rest,” the man behind me says, his voice firmer than before. “Or damn it, I’ll carry you back there myself. I did it before. I can do it again.”
I turn to face him, angry at his bossy tone, placing my hands on my hips. “Are you threatening me?” I’m usually the one who gives the orders. And this...filthy creature thinks he can tell me what to do?
He takes a step forward, towering over me. “And if I am?”
The hard gleam in his eyes sends me a step back, a lump gliding down my throat.
Still, I take a deep breath before lifting a finger. “You know what? I’ll forgive you because I know you’re just concerned and all. Also, I’ll pretend that didn’t happen.”
He opens his mouth to speak but I hold my finger higher. “I’ve rested enough. What I need is to find a way to let someone know what’s happened.”
He sighs.
The next time you rescue someone, Sebastian, make sure she’s a damsel in distress, not a pain in the ass.
I turn around. No one is there. And I could swear I hadn’t seen his lips move. I look at him, eyes narrowing. “Did you just call me a pain in the ass?”
Fuck. She heard me.
“Yes.” I nod. “I heard you. I...”
I step back, my hands over my mouth. I don’t want to believe what I’m thinking.
Holy shit. I can hear the man’s thoughts. My head injury didn’t give me superpowers, did it?
Sebastian crosses his arms over his chest. “I doubt that.”
My arms fall to my sides. “Shit. You can hear my thoughts, too?”
He doesn’t answer but that silence just confirms my suspicion.
“This is insane.”
I pace the living room as I chew a fingernail.
Sebastian follows me, but keeps a careful distance. “Will you please stop pacing the room?”
I stop walking only because I’m tired of pacing. I fold my arms over my chest and narrow my eyes at him. “How long have you been able to hear my thoughts?”
He leans on the side of the shelf. “That’s how I found you. I heard you calling.”
I raise my hands in automatic protest. “But I didn’t...”
Wait a sec. I did call for help. Well, I begged for help. I didn’t think anyone would answer but now that I think back on it...Was it his voice I heard just before I fell unconscious?
Sebastian’s eyebrows furrow. “What?”
It was his voice. I remember, which means I did hear him back then. Or maybe I was just getting disoriented.
“Think something.”
His eyebrows go up. “Excuse me?”
“Think something so I can say for sure if I can really read your mind or I’m just going crazy, like your favorite color.”
“No.”
“Alright, no isn’t really a color. Let me try something else...” What do you prefer? Dog or cat?
Dog.
I grin, pointing a finger at him. “Gotcha.”
The corners of his lips curve down into a scowl.
I wipe the grin off my face as I sit on the edge of the couch.
“Oh, shit. I can’t believe this is happening.” I glance at Sebastian. “Have you always been able to read minds?”
He doesn’t answer.
“Well, not me. If I had, I would have had a few promotions by now, maybe won the lottery, bought my own house, got married...”
I stop, realizing I’m babbling.
“Sorry. I tend to babble I’m nervous.” I take a deep breath. “You’re Sebastian, right?”
“And you’re Clarissa Wagner.”
I snort. “Of course, you’d know since you’ve been reading my mind this whole time, which I must say I find a bit rude...”
“Actually, it’s from your ID.”
He grabs my ID, which is hanging from its strap off a peg on the wall, on his way to the couch. Of course. I’d had the badge shoved in my pocket when the plane went down. I give him a sheepish grin.
He tosses it to me. “You work for a research laboratory?”
“Yes.” I nod.
“What kind of research?”
“Mostly biology.” I stare at the plastic card in my fingers, frowning at the photo where unruly strands of my honey brown hair stick out from the sides, one of my eyes appear slightly smaller than the other and my lipstick looks unevenly applied. “Why do I always end up looking horrible in these ID pictures?”
I tuck a loose strand of hair behind my ear, pausing as I see a bit of blood on it.
I frown. I must look worse now, what with my hair needing a rake and my clothes stained with blood and in tatters. And to think I was judging Sebastian on appearances earlier. Talk about the teapot calling the kettle black.
He sits on the couch beside me. “So, you’re saying you could never read anyone’s mind before?”
I glance at him. “Now, someone’s interested.”
“Just curious.”
I sit back. “No. Like I said, it must be because of my injury.”
I tap my head.
“Speaking of your injury, I should check on that.” He moves closer.
“What?” I sit up, waving my hands. “No, I’m fine. You don’t...”
His eyebrows crease.
“You’re thinking I’m being a pain in the ass again, aren’t you?”
He snorts. “For someone who’s never done this before, you’re learning fast.”
I chuckle. “Finally, a compliment.”
“That wasn’t...”
“Fine.” I move closer to him, closing the gap between us. “Do what you have to do.”
I sit still, gazing into the fire across me as he unwraps the bandages. The strip of gauze starts to fall into a pile on my lap.
I take the end between my fingers. “Thank you, by the way, for saving me.”
“You needed help. I couldn’t ignore that.”
I tap my fingers on my knee. “Are you a doctor, by the way?”
“No. But I know first aid.”
I frown. “Not to insult your first aid skills or anything but didn’t you think I needed a doctor when you found me? Didn’t it occur to you to bring me to the nearest hospital?”
“The nearest hospital is nearly a hundred miles away,” he says, still unraveling the gauze. “I was going to bring you to the hospital as soon as the weather improved if...”
The end of the gauze drops at the same time Sebastian’s jaw does.
My heart stills. “Sebastian?”
“Have you ever had a head injury before?”
“No.”
“A serious injury?”
“Not really. Just some scrapes. Why?”
He doesn’t answer. I get up and head towards the window, examining my reflection in the glass pane as I put my hand on the side of my head, my fingers rubbing against my scalp, which is no longer throbbing in pain.
No bump. No cut.
Strange. I was sure something had hit my head hard.
I take the bandage off my arm, gasping as I find the skin smooth where a gash should have been.
What the hell?
I turn to Sebastian, eyes wide. “What have you done to me?”
Chapter Two
~ Sebastian
“I DIDN’T DO ANYTHING to you, Clarissa,” I say this in front of the locked door to the spare bedroom. I’ve been saying it for a while now and it’s getting old.
As before, all I get are sobs, her thoughts too muddled for me to read.
My fists clench. I have no idea what to do with a crying female. I do know enough to realize that while tearing the door down could solve the problem, it probably won’t. I don’t need that kind of drama.
Finally, I give up. “If you don’t believe me, there’s nothing I can do.” I shrug and walk away. Let her deal. She obviously doesn’t want my help.
&nbs
p; I get out of the cabin, ignoring the wind that has started to swirl around me and the snow is up around my knees as I run to the woods. There, I scoop a ball of snow and hurl it against a tree, the white sphere splattering into countless tiny puddles.
Well Fuck.
I don’t know why the hell Clarissa won’t believe me. OK, so she doesn’t know me. That should soothe my battered ego some, only it doesn’t. My word is sacred, and to not be accepted as such leaves a raw and bitter taste in my mouth. Hell, even if I’d wanted to do something to her, I couldn’t. Primals are bred. Not made.
Leaning against a tree trunk, I glare up at the gray sky, resenting the clouds, resenting the weather that brought her here. I never asked for company.
She’s not a primal. At least, she doesn’t smell like one. In fact, she doesn’t smell like anything I’ve ever known. She’s a unique potpourri. There are some familiar notes, though – that acidic, slightly salty odor that is distinctly human, the scent of flowers, mint, smoke, dog fur.
And in that brief moment before we spoke, the scent of desire.
The mere memory of it lights a fire in my veins, especially those in my crotch.
Desire.
The females of my kind are not gifted with it. Only the alpha male is. If he wants a mate, he takes her and she submits. No questions asked. She does it out of duty, not because she wants to. She just takes, not gives.
And yet, that scent off Clarissa has made me think of all the things she can give me and of all the pleasure I can give her. Nothing has ever been more arousing.
I sink into the snow, willing the icy pile to douse the prickling heat in my body. I gather some of it in both my hands as well, washing my face in it and running my hands through my hair.
I want to take her but I can’t. I don’t even know what she is. She can read my mind and I can read hers as if we were part of the same pack, of the same breed and yet, she clearly feels no urge to submit to me as she would if she was of my pack. Quite the opposite. She defies me. In addition, she heals faster than I ever have and yet, she has no knowledge of that kind of healing until now.
She doesn’t know what she is. And neither do I.
Worse, she thinks I’m responsible for what she is, when all I ever did was save her life.
A pain in the ass, alright.
I turn around, burying my fist into a tree.
It’s not enough to vent out my frustration, though, or the helplessness that I’m feeling for the first time in my life. Only one thing will.
Taking my pants off and tossing it over a branch, I crouch on all fours and suck in a deep breath. Then I start running, the wind whipping my hair back as my feet rise and fall off the snow without a sound.
I can only hope that when I return, Clarissa will have come to her senses.
THE BACK DOOR OF THE cabin flies open as the slippery knob escapes my grasp, a gust of wind pinning it against the wall. I close it behind me as quickly as I can, shoving most of the snow back out. As soon as I do, another gust of wind comes knocking while another rattles the window pane.
The storm has turned nasty now, its temper at its fiercest.
Thank goodness.
I hear Clarissa’s thought along with her sigh of relief. I turn around, finding her standing a few feet away in one of my sweaters, a spoon in her hand and an uncertain smile on her face.
At least, her temper seems to have waned. Her thoughts are no longer a murky sea but a stream, still flowing rapidly but finally back on course.
“For a moment there, I thought you weren’t coming back,” she says out loud, her thoughts practically singing with relief. “The storm has really picked up.”
I brush the snow off my arms. “It has but you shouldn’t have worried.”
“To think you don’t even have a shirt on you. You must be freezing cold.” She puts down the spoon and grabs the lantern from the kitchen table. “I’ll go get the quilt.”
“You don’t...”
But she’s gone, her footsteps and the light from the lantern fading down the corridor.
In the darkness, I walk up to the stove, taking the lid off the pot. Immediately, the fragrance of the rabbit stew assaults my nostrils, making my mouth water.
“I hope you don’t mind,” Clarissa says as she comes back to the room, draping the quilt over my shoulders. “I cooked a meal. Got hungry.”
I step away from the stove, a little wary by her change in attitude. “It smells good.”
She smiles. “Glad you think so. Well, I do know a bit about cooking. Now, you go on to the living room and warm yourself by the fire. I’ll bring the stew.”
I narrow my eyes at her. “Are you ordering me around?”
Clarissa places her hands on her hips. “And if I am?”
The alpha in me gives a low growl. The hungry man silently complies.
I walk to the living room, sitting on the rug in front of the fire. But not too close. The warmth seeps into my skin in seconds.
“Here you go.”
Clarissa hands me a bowl of stew then sits beside me with her own.
As she does, my eyes are drawn to her, feeling like I’m seeing her for the first time. Her light brown hair basks in the firelight, transforming into a sea of gold. Her bluish gray eyes remind me of a winter morning, the kind where you don’t know if the sun will finally shine or if more snow will pour down from the heavens. Her snub nose sits atop a pair of lips that are neither too full nor too thin, the lower lip fuller than the upper.
Conscious of my gaze, she runs her hand through her hair. “I washed all the blood off, didn’t I?”
I nod. There’s no trace of a head injury at all, the skin as unblemished as the day she was born.
I think about asking her what made her change her mind. Why she’d come out of her room when nothing I could say or do had made a difference. But questions of that sort are a danger. I start asking things, then she’ll start asking about me. The tradeoff isn’t worth it. I tear my gaze away, and stare at my stew instead, picking my way carefully around the carrots, eating the rest.
Clarissa blows on her stew and tastes it cautiously. I can almost feel her reaction – it’s too hot for her. We’re too closely attuned. She tilts her head, listening to the wind. “I’m not really an indoor person. I’ve never been. I need to tell you I’m a bit of a claustrophobic. Though strangely enough, I also like cozy spaces and long, tight hugs.”
I shake my head. “I don’t like hugs,” I say without thinking. Why I’m volunteering this, I don’t know.
She chuckles. “Well, it doesn’t take a mind reader to know that.” She mixes her stew around. “Your guest room isn’t cozy at all, though,” she says, answering my unspoken question from before. “It’s stifling. How long has it been empty?”
“You’re its very first occupant,” I confess, realizing that whether I voice what’s on my mind or not she’s going to insist on making conversation.
“Well, that explains it, though I should have guessed. Now that I think about it, it’s surprising you even have a spare bedroom, being antisocial and all.”
I frown, only just biting back the growl that would warn anyone else to back off. “I’m not antisocial. I just haven’t found the right company. There’s a difference.”
She shrugs it off, like it isn’t important. “No need to explain. I know it well.”
She does?
She sighs. “Well, once I could think straight, I couldn’t stand staying in that little room another minute. I just had to get out of there. Then like I said, I got hungry.” She lifts her bowl. “And you know what? I still am. Enough talk. Let’s eat.”
She picks up her spoon and starts eating, stuffing the bits of rabbit meat and vegetables into her mouth and slurping the rich soup. Some of it trickles down her chin and she hastily wipes it off. “What?” she asks me, with an amused grin. “Never seen a hungry woman before?”
I don’t answer, digging into my own bowl of stew. She’s not the only one w
ho’s ravenous.
In minutes, my bowl is empty, not a drop of the stew remaining, my stomach fuller than before. I’d even eaten the damned carrots after all.
“Good?” Clarissa sets her own empty bowl in front of her.
I set mine down as well, nodding. “You’re right. You can cook. And it’s good to share a meal with someone again.”
My thoughts fly back to the last time I did, back at the village. Back when evenings meant sitting around the fire with several members of my pack. I lost myself in the image for a moment, savoring what I could no longer have.
“Wow.” Clarissa’s eyes grow wide. “You sure have a big family.”
I snap the image down, fighting the urge to snap at her as well. I’ve let her into my mind again. I’m out of practice keeping my guard up. It’s my own damn fault she got in. I need to work on that.
“Work on what?” she asks me.
“Nothing,” I tell her, my words terse. Letting her know in tone and body language that she needs to drop this. “You’re right. I did have a big family. End of story.”
Of course she’s not about to let that lie. “What happened?”
“We had our differences.”
“I see.” She leans back against the edge of the couch, her arms folded behind her like a cushion. “Well, a lot of families fail to get along at some point.”
I turn my head to look at her. “What about your family?” I ask to distract her, to get her off of my past and somewhere else. I feel almost guilty about it when I sense a pang of sadness from her, but it lasts only a moment.
“I was raised on a farm,” she says, and it’s her who is choosing her words carefully this time. “No siblings.”
I see the farm, acres of fields and meadows stretching out from every direction, a large house against the horizon and a few trees dotting the landscape.
“It looks nice.”
Clarissa nudges my shoulder. “Hey. Don’t read my mind without my permission.”
“You did it first,” I remind her, maybe a little harsher than necessary.
She sticks out her lower lip. “It’s not like I can control it. I’m new to all this, remember.”
“Neither can I.”
We are at an impasse. She lets out a sigh as she rests her head on the edge of the couch, staring up at the ceiling. “This is so awkward.”
