Chapter 15
When I make it home, it’s to the sight of a thankfully empty driveway, and a house still standing.
I shove myself out of the car and into the house without really seeing where I’m going.
Overwhelmed is an understatement, and I can only be distantly grateful when I see no obvious damage to the house.
Moro gets up when I come in, approaching me with soft whines and a few touches to my hands.
“I’m fine,” I lie, closing my eyes. I reach up with one hand, pressing my palm to my face.
The longer I stand here, the more I feel like I’m going to fall apart.
And that’s not acceptable right now, or preferably ever.
A few more deep breaths don’t do me much good, and I let out a sharp breath as I walk into the end table by my sofa.
“Fuck.” Biting my lip, I toss my phone and keys onto the counter, though the clatter only makes me wince. It also makes me realize my house is too small, too close for me to stay inside right now. I need out , when I thought I needed in.
My fingers scrabble at the sliding door for a few seconds, until I realize I’m being stupid and that I have to unlock it first. A low, derisive scoff leaves me at my stupidity, and finally I manage to yank it back, the glass slides open to hit the frame and bounce back just a little.
But I barely remember to close it before I’m out on the tiny deck that’s only big enough for the small, hardy plants I keep on the wooden railings.
Moro is the first one out onto the grass, but only barely. I’m right behind her and following around the yard, not really caring where we go as long as we’re moving instead of standing still.
I’m okay, I tell myself, and wish I could believe it. I don’t know what has me so worked up, so unwell, this evening, but I can’t help it when I get like this.
Maybe Dr. Radley was worse for me than I thought, or the stress of lying to her finally made me snap for the day. My plans for going to the diner are long-ruined now, and instead of hunger, I just feel the churning of nausea in my gut while I follow Moro.
“I’m fine,” I whisper, my hands twisting together in front of me, barely feeling it when my nails sink into the scar on my palm, and I only belatedly notice tripping over the root of an exposed tree as we walk into the woods. “It’s okay, I’m fine?—”
Moro’s frantic barking edges into my consciousness, but isn’t enough to pull me out of my thoughts.
I keep walking, the bird noise strangely dying out from the trees, instead of increasing, until the canopy of leaves overhead makes it look like the sun is close to setting, instead of dusk being hours away.
But I just need to move. I just need to keep doing stuff, keep making my legs work to keep my mind off of?—
The thing that steps out from behind a tree in front of me isn’t Moro.
It rises on two legs instead of standing on four and surveys me with black eyes set in a hollow, sharp face.
Its appearance is enough to break through my almost dissociation, and my lips fall open in a gasp, though I can’t make a sound as my throat closes in fear, stopping anything that might come out.
“Moro?” I finally breathe, but when I don’t hear her, I turn around, afraid that in my haze, she’s been killed.
If so, then it would be all my fault, and the thought causes my fingers to dig deeper into my palm until I hiss with pain.
But I see her a second later, her eyes trained on the creature, hackles up in a silent snarl and her ruff raised, fur up all along her spine.
Beside her, silent and watchful, is Cairo.
The relief is short-lived when he doesn’t immediately do anything, but when I start to say something, he reaches up and presses a finger to his lips. When I press mine together, he moves forward, Moro coming with him, until he’s standing beside me and looking much better than he did last night.
“You just wander around without thinking. Don’t you, little bird?” he muses. The nickname isn’t new, but something about it makes a part of my brain light up, as if I’m missing something.
“Are you going to?—?”
“Chase him away? No.” He glances down at my hands and makes a noise in his throat before reaching out to pry my hands away from one another. “Though if you bleed out here, he’s going to be a little upset.”
My gaze slides slowly back to the creature standing in front of us in the woods, who stares at me sullenly, like he’s studying me.
It hits me that he doesn’t look exactly like the ones I saw at Bluebone Ridge, though I can’t exactly pinpoint the differences, save for the way he looks just a little bit more human.
“Hi?” I offer, suddenly feeling rude. If Cairo is one of them, then that means they aren’t animals. They’re intelligent, and basically people when they want to be, unless Cairo is different. “Sorry, I umm, almost screamed at you.”
He snorts and rolls his dark eyes to Cairo. “You would,” the thing says, in a low voice that sounds exactly like the man next to me. But Cairo only grimaces back at him. “She’ll break.”
“She didn’t,” Cairo replies. “Now go away before I have to show you my teeth.” There’s a warning in his dark eyes, and he definitely doesn’t seem as exhausted as last night.
When the creature doesn’t move right away, Cairo does just that; lifts his lip a little, to display the edges of his shiny, white fangs.
That does it, though I don’t know how or why. The creature turns and strides away until he’s invisible in the trees, and I can breathe normally. But when I try to tug my hand free of Cairo’s, he doesn’t let me.
“What have you done to yourself?” he scolds, glancing down at the red scratches on my palm that, now that I’m looking as well, make it look like I was trying to tear open my skin. “And how did you not notice him until you nearly walked right into him? Which, by the way, would’ve been unfortunate.”
“For me?” I ask, shaking free to rub my thumb over the marks with a hiss.
“For him,” Cairo corrects. But he pushes my hand away again, then grips my chin and pulls my face up to meet his gaze. “Oh, you’re not doing so well, are you?” he asks while searching my eyes. “I thought I smelled it on you. But I wasn’t sure. You always smell a little anxious.”
His words are all so strange that I have to stand there to let them process. The idea that he can smell when I’m upset or anxious is unnerving, and I can’t help the question that falls from my lips before I can shove the words back in. “Can you smell other moods too?”
Cairo blinks, one brow arching toward his bangs. “Yes,” he answers simply. “Some are easier than others to differentiate, but I’ve had a lot of practice.” Instead of asking more, I simply watch his face, hoping he’ll give something away.
He doesn’t, of course. He’s just as hard to read as he was every time I’ve seen him, and with his attention fixed all on me, I feel more unnerved than certain about his intentions.
“Why are you in my woods?” I murmur at last, searching his face for any tiny clue. “I won’t lie, Cairo. It still feels a little like you’re stalking me.” He just fixes me with that look, and my stomach clenches a little. “Holy shit, are you stalking me?”
The only answer I get is a little shrug, and Moro whines, prompting me to look down. “Ouch!” I gasp when Cairo runs his fingers a little harder over the scar that I’ve been messing with, his nail running along the mark. “What are you doing?”
“The same thing you were doing. Only I’m being nicer about it.” He tugs me closer without explanation, his eyes on mine once more, brows furrowed. “You’re not doing so well,” he says again, his voice soft. But this time, it’s not a question like it was before.
“I’m fine,” I deny, though I still feel like I’m falling apart at the seams. Especially now, with the adrenaline from what we saw out here wearing off.
Thinking of it makes me turn, and I can’t help but look between the trees to see if there are any more of them, or if I can see anything out of the ordinary. “Where did it—he—come from? Why?—?”
Cairo crushes me to his chest suddenly, and my brain goes blank.
All of my thoughts snap right to him and this, as his touch grounds me and brings me back to this moment.
Carefully I reach up, my hands twisting in the long-sleeved t-shirt that hugs his form.
He’s not dressed for late summer when it’s particularly cool out here, but I’m not doing much better in my own lightweight shirt and loose pants.
It’s…nice, I have to admit to myself. Somehow, his being right here and holding me this tightly keeps my mind in the present, instead of overworking itself.
With my grip on his shirt and my nose pressed to his shoulder, it’s easier to focus on things other than the universe and floating above the trees while I just try to go through the motions.
“I have problems, you know,” I find myself murmuring into his shirt.
Cairo snorts. “Join the club, little bird.”
“And I have questions. A lot of them, and if you’re trapping yourself with me—” My words end in a very undignified squawk as I suddenly find myself up off the ground, dangling over his shoulder. “Cairo!” I howl, scrambling for purchase as he walks. “What are you doing?!”
“You’re such a good girl, Moro,” Cairo praises, totally ignoring me. “Even if you did start barking and wanted to rip up the couch today because you were bored without Fern. That’s okay. I’m bored without her too.”
A shudder goes through me, my fingers cold and gripping against his shirt. “How did you know that?” I breathe. “Seriously, are you stalking me? Watching my house? Are you?—”
He pulls me down hard, causing my back to slam against a tree, though he doesn’t let the back of my head come near it.
Cairo tilts his head to look at me, his eyes seeming so dark that he almost has no iris.
“You have so many questions, little bird,” he muses, leaning close to me.
“It’s like you forget I could eat you and barely feel bad about it. ”
“Okay, but…you would feel bad about it. So you won’t.
Right?” I ask, hopeful, nervous, and anxious all at once.
His warmth radiates against me, and when he reaches out to lightly grip my jaw with one hand, I force myself not to flinch.
I want to prove that I’m not afraid of him, or at least die trying.
Cairo rolls his eyes, and before I can blink, I’m back over his shoulder.
My view includes Moro as she walks at his side like a very loyal puppy and his ass in the well-fitted jeans he was wearing last night, still stained with blood.
Well, at least he has a new shirt. Beggars can’t be choosers when they’re thrown over a man’s shoulder, I tell myself, and try not to focus on the iron band of his arm across the backs of my thighs.
I hear his feet on my deck stairs rather than see where we are, and he slides open the door to my small house with a quick, easy motion.
Moro goes in first, like always, and I give a protesting struggle with an irritated groan on my lips.
“My legs aren’t broken.”
“Maybe I like carrying you.”
“Maybe you’re a stalker.”
He sighs at that, and seconds later, Cairo grips the back of my shirt as he pulls me back down.
But he doesn’t let me stand up. Instead, he tosses me onto my sofa, dropping me there on my back so I can see my ceiling.
At least until he leans over me, caging me in with his arms. “You don’t smell right,” he informs me, mouth open as he inhales.
I can still see the tips of his fangs, and before he can walk away, I reach up to grab his hand.
“Why didn’t you look like that at Bluebone Ridge?
” I ask, getting to my feet when he tries to pull away.
“Cairo!” I grab the back of his shirt with my other hand, refusing to let him go.
Even with my heart racing and my brain churning overtime, I refuse to let him walk away. Not when I need to know. “Answer me!”
When he doesn’t answer, I do something stupid. I whirl around in front of him and shove him back, or try to, hoping to surprise him into sitting down so I can have some kind of leverage, some kind of intimidation factor, while I’m on my feet and he isn’t.
Even though he doesn’t appear that muscular, he doesn’t move an inch. But Cairo does snarl, his teeth on display, and I barely get a chance to regret my decision before my back is against the wall, lifted high enough that my feet dangle in the air at least six inches above the ground.
“Because, Fern,” he snaps, his eyes seeming to get darker, pupils expanding like they’ll pull me in and trap me in his gaze.
“Because that night at the sanitarium, I was starving.” He shows me his fangs, all of his teeth sharp like they’ve been filed to points.
“I was so fucking hungry, and I worried that if I didn’t eat, then I wouldn’t be able to protect you.
To save you from them.” He sneers the words, getting closer to my face.
His hand is tight around my throat, keeping me aloft, but when I give a soft noise of anxiety, he presses one thigh between both of mine so I’m no longer dangling from just my neck.
While the support is appreciated, part of my brain can’t help thinking about just where his leg is, and how thin my leggings are.
“I don’t understand,” I breathe, my eyes never leaving his. “What did you do, Cairo?”
He leans forward until his lips brush my jaw and licks against my skin like he can’t quite help himself. “I did what I had to do,” he whispers, in a tone that tells me he doesn’t regret one bit of whatever that is.
“While you ran around looking for an escape and attracting more of my kind to you, I sated my hunger. I tore Esther apart in the lobby while I kept an eye on you.” He licks again, a little bit lower, and I shiver, suddenly regretting pissing him off.
“I was starving , so I ate as much of her as I could. And I don’t regret it, Fern. Not one bit. Even if she didn’t taste half as good as you.”