Chapter 2
“Noooo. What? No, no, no. Stop.”
Aiden bolted upright in bed. He stilled for a second, waiting.
“Let me go.” Jamie’s muffled voice chilled him.
A nightmare. Jamie was having another nightmare. He rubbed a hand down his face. The bad dreams had been occurring frequently ever since he’d returned to his human form with the help of their friends. Aiden wished he could help him, but it seemed he was no good at it.
“Go to him, you dolt. Comfort him,” a deep voice echoed inside Aiden’s head.
Aiden had grown up believing he was a defective shifter. His inner beast, a phoenix, had been completely dormant his entire life. After moving from Providence, Rhode Island to Grey Lake, New Hampshire and discovering his best friend in the entire world, Jamie, was alive and safe, it was as if his phoenix had woken from hibernation. Maybe it was something about Grey Lake and Jamie that allowed his phoenix to emerge. It had taken getting used to for sure – sort of like having a split personality. The phoenix remained physically dormant but had become an increasingly active observer in Aiden’s human body. When the creature spoke to Aiden, he usually meant business.
“What? What do you mean?” Jamie yelled from the adjacent room. “Don’t hurt me,” he whimpered.
Aiden’s chest burned. He felt so useless. “I don’t know how to comfort him. I don’t want to wake him up. He needs his sleep. He’s been through so much.”
“Mate hurting. You should be with him. Go to him NOW!”
Aiden flinched at his other half’s words. Mate. He didn’t deserve Jamie as a mate. Jamie was the best this world had to offer, and Aiden felt lacking in so many areas of his life. He was a coward. He wasn’t brave like the man in the next room. He hadn’t gone after Jamie when he went missing. He thought Jamie had moved on to a new job like the texts and emails he received stated. He had no idea that Jamie had been taken by men on the orders of Aiden’s own father. He’d been kidnapped and held in a cage and Aiden had no idea; he was simply living his life ignorant of the pain of the most important person in his life. He should have searched and searched and never stopped until he found him. And worse, he was too afraid to let Jamie know how he really felt about him. He was too afraid of the risks. And Aiden hated himself for all of this.
“Go to him!” his beast insisted.
Knowing the monster inside him wouldn’t settle until he at least checked on the man, he flung the blankets off and climbed out of bed. He shuffled silently out of his room, right next door to where Jamie slept fitfully.
The door to Jamie’s bedroom was slightly ajar. Aiden could see him thrashing in the queen-sized bed, mumbling something about cats. Aiden opened the door and crept closer.
Jamie was soaked in sweat, his white T-shirt drenched. His light blondish-brown hair was all askew. He looked adorable.
“Stop staring and help him!” the phoenix ordered.
“Hey, hey, it’s OK.” Aiden kept his voice low. He moved over to the side of the bed and took a seat on the edge. Jamie, lying on his side, murmured nonsensically, but did not wake.
Aiden then placed a hand on Jamie’s shoulder and shook him gently. His thick muscles were tense. “Hey, hey, you’re safe. It’s OK.” He squeezed Jamie’s shoulder.
“No, no, no. Just leave me. Too weak,” Jamie moaned, eyes still shut, tears leaking from the edges.
Oh God! Aiden felt as if his heart was being shredded into pieces. He gathered himself once more and rubbed Jamie’s shoulder. “Jamie, it’s Aiden! You’re safe. Wake up!”
He startled, sitting up, and sucked in a loud breath. “Wha—what!” His eyes snapped open, the bright icy blue of his wolf. He wiped at the wetness on his cheeks. “Aiden.” He smiled and closed his eyes. “I’m safe.” When he opened them, they were the dark blue of his human side. His body visibly relaxed as he looked around the bedroom. His smile slowly morphed into a frown. Turning back to Aiden, he spoke in hushed tones. “What’s going on? Why’re you up?”
“You don’t remember?” Aiden asked.
Jamie shook his head, but then winced. “Did I wake you up? I’m sorry.”
“Don’t be sorry. You were having a nightmare,” Aiden said. “You’re entitled.” This guy was killing him. After all that he’d been through, Jamie was apologizing to him ?
“It’s weird that I woke you up, though. You’re usually such a deep sleeper.”
Aiden huffed a laugh and shook his head. “Nah, not really.”
Jamie’s face brightened. “Don’t you remember the fire alarm incident in college?”
Aiden chucked. “Yeah, yeah. You carried my near comatose body out to safety. I still can’t believe you did that.” He shook his head, remembering a more innocent time when the two were roommates while undergrads.
“I had to. You wouldn’t wake up. I didn’t want you to burn to death.” He paused, frowning. “Although, if I’d known you were truly a phoenix shifter and couldn’t be burned to death, I’d have left you there and saved my back some pain.” He waggled his eyebrows.
Aiden rolled his eyes. “We don’t know if that’s true. I still haven’t shifted. I may never be able to.”
“Nah, I think you will. You’re getting closer. On the prior topic, though… Must I remind you that you also slept like the dead back in the cottage? When I was still stuck in my wolf form, I slept in the bed with you. You sir”—he pointed to Aiden—“slept like a teenager every night.” He nodded his head toward the small cottage out back behind Tessa’s farmhouse. They’d stayed there prior to Tessa leaving for the cave for her transition about a month ago. As a full phoenix shifter at the end of her five-century long life, she was undergoing a magical transformation into a new human body.
“I think it must be you,” Aiden said.
“What?” Jamie’s cheeks above his neat light brown beard grew pink.
“Maybe I only sleep like the dead when I know you’re around to carry me like a fireman to safety,” Aiden said, giving a sheepish smile.
Jamie hmphed and rubbed a hand through his hair. “Very funny. Well, we’re both up. Is it time to head in yet?”
The two of them were working with Aiden’s sister, Iris, at Tessa’s Treats, the best bakery in Grey Lake. Aiden was functioning as a baker and cook while Jamie helped serve customers and kept the books. It was a far cry from their past lives when they both worked for Aiden’s father in high-end property development, but it was good honest work that made people happy. The fact that Aiden got to spend his days with his two favorite people in the world was an added bonus. Besides, after knowing what his bastard of a father did to Jamie, he never wanted to be associated with anything that reminded him of the man. All they needed was proof to put his father away for good.
“We need to kill him,” his phoenix said.
Aiden was totally on board with that, but there was no way he could. He still had no powers. “How? We’re useless. We can’t breathe fire. We can’t fly.”
“We’re not useless. I’m getting stronger every day. You just wait. That man will pay.”
Aiden looked at his watch and nodded. “It’s a little earlier than usual to head in, but why not. Time to get the good people of Grey Lake fed.” He clambered off the bed and held a hand out to Jamie.
Jamie reached out to take Aiden’s hand but stopped short, his eyes going wide. “Wait a sec, wait. I almost forgot something. My dream. I remembered how I escaped. From the lab, I mean. Someone helped me.”
“What?”
Jamie nodded rapidly. “Yeah, after all this time. It came to me in my dream. It was a cat.”