We played four rounds and to my disappointment, I lost every single one of them. I had been playing video games since I was young, born in the Eighties. I remembered the NES and SEGA better than most, small fragments of the dead zone in my memory. Yet Carey stomped me, and hard. My pride took a beating, and each time I lost and she won, she would cheer, jump up and down on the bed, and rub it in.
“I win again! I thought werecats were supposed to be the best supernatural creature! Ha! Humans forever! Got you! Trained by werewolves, you’ll never beat me!” She tossed her head around, brimming with confidence.
“I’ll never beat you? Are you sure?” I smiled slyly. It was time to cheat then. “Start a new game,” I ordered, pointing at the screen. “I think I can take you down next time.”
“Really? Are we doing best out of nine now? You would have to win five in a row to beat me!” She hit start anyway, and when the first mini game came up, I took my chance. Instead of playing the mini game, I dropped my controller and pounced on her, going for her ribs. “NO!”
I was laughing as my fingers danced, tickling her until she screamed, trying to hit me away. She laughed until there were tears in her eyes.
“Stop cheating! HA AH!”
I didn’t relent until the full two minute countdown of the mini game was over and she was breathing hard.
“Well, I didn’t win the game, but neither did you,” I said lightly, going back to my spot on the bed.
“That’s not fair!” she cried out, kicking a foot at me. I caught it, laughing. “My brothers do that!”
“Good for your brothers. You should learn to win better.” I held her leg by the ankle and tickled the bottom of her foot until she screamed again, the laughter bouncing off the walls. When I was done, it was my turn in the game and I wasn’t even paying attention. I was just watching the bright-eyed little girl glare at me.
“My dad says the same thing, but he doesn’t get it either. It’s hard being the winner when all the other players are werewolves. I take my wins where I can get them.” She stuck her tongue out and I kept laughing. Kid had a point, but it was a good time to teach her an important lesson.
“My sister was better than me at everything, too,” I said gently, forgetting the game. “Our parents wanted us both to be doctors. She made it, I didn’t. They wanted us to get scholarships to college with sports. She got them, I didn’t. I understand trying to be good at one thing no one else is. But…you should be nicer when you win. My sister never rubbed it in my face. She encouraged me to get better.” I ruffled her hair. “Understand?”
“Yeah…” She might have understood, but she obviously didn’t want a lesson in the morality of being a gracious winner and good sport. “What sports did you play?”
“Changing the topic on me again. Sneaky.” I pulled her under my arm again and she curled in, giving me that childish, curious look. “I played soccer and softball. I was good, too, but not the best. My parents were proud of me, but I wasn’t her.”
“Do you like your sister? Sometimes, I don’t like my brothers very much…” She frowned. “They’re older than me. A lot older than me. Sometimes I wish I had a brother or sister my age or younger. Someone who would look up to me and let me be the big one.”
“She’s my twin, so it was closer than most, and I did love her, but I didn’t always like her. We weren’t very good twins. It was like she got everything. All the talent, all the ease, while I floundered and screwed up a lot. It was my life, though. I loved it all the same.”
“And now you’re a werecat protecting me. I’m sorry.”
“That’s not your fault, Carey. Don’t ever think that. Werecats, we made this decision, and it’s an honor to keep you out of harm’s way and protect you.” Though I wished it had never came to this. I wished this had never stumbled on my doorstep or ripped her from her life.
“But you’re so sad and it’s my fault! It is!” She crossed her arms, pulling away from me. “This would have never happened to you if my dad didn’t have me.”
“This would have never happened if your father wasn’t betrayed. He sounds like a strong Alpha, and I have full faith that he’s going to fix this and take you home. You just need to relax and wait for that to happen.”
“But you’re sad…”
I closed my eyes for a second, letting that statement sink in as she repeated it. “I am sad. My life is a lonely one, but it’s mine, and that’s something. Even better, Carey, I wasn’t sad playing that game with you. You don’t make me sad. I was already sad when you came to my bar and needed help. If anything, right now, I’m pretty happy, even though this has been so bad. Even though those wolves hurt me.” I wasn’t lying. My sadness had nothing to do with her, nothing at all. She was a bright spot that came out of a dark mini-chapter of my life and hers. “I haven’t talked about my human family in…years. Not since before I came to Texas. Thank you for talking to me about them.”
When she launched herself at me, I opened my arms and accepted the hug, holding her tight. I buried my nose in her hair and inhaled. There was something to be said about Duty and the werecat drive to protect. It forced me to build a deeper bond with Carey than I ever would have. I was willing to take risks and talk to her, make her feel better, and that I never would have done under other circumstances. She belonged to werewolves, but for a moment, my body was her shield and my heart belonged to her.
Tears pricked my eyes. It was sad that death and destruction were needed to give me something in the world to hold on to. And I had to hold on to her.
Chapter Eight
“Lock the door behind me, kiddo,” I ordered, feeling the overbearing call of the full moon. The sun was setting and that meant I had to get going, but I was reluctant to leave Carey by herself all night. We spent all day playing a variety of games on my little Switch, jumping between laughter and tears. It was a roller coaster of emotion, two girls in hiding, each wondering what their life would be like when it was all over. Needless to say, emotions were always high, even when they were good.
“I will, I will!” she whined, stomping over to me and beginning to push. “Now get out of here. I won’t do anything or contact anyone. I think it’s perfectly clear that that’s a stupid idea. I don’t want to spend another night looking for a new place to hide, so just go!”
I groaned, turning to walk out of the room. She was right. The lesson about talking to anyone was perfectly clear now. This time yesterday, we were getting ready for dinner in my apartment. Now we were in a run down motel owned by a fae-human family.
“Be safe and careful. I won’t be more than a five minute run away, I promise.” I didn’t stop walking because she didn’t stop pushing. When I turned around again to look at her, she was in the doorway and I was firmly outside of it.
“Just come back,” she whispered. “I need you.”
“I will.” With a smile, I closed the door for her and stayed there until I heard both locks click into place. The sun was dropping fast, but I had to know she was secure, even though my body was beginning to burn with the need to become a monster.
I stepped back as my brain became more feline and hissed at me, mad that I locked easy prey away. After that, I knew I needed to start running.
Full moons were rough. The call and pressure to change was irresistible, and no matter how hard I tried, I could never overcome it. And I tried. Every full moon, I tried. This time was more important than the others, and I gasped as the Change began to force itself.
I barely made it into the woods behind the motel, yanking my clothes off desperately. As pieces of my clothing fell, my hands became more useless, forced into paws. The sick sound of bones breaking marked every Change, and this one was no exception. It was a slow Change for me, too. I was fighting it as I tried to get everything off.
Once my underwear was on the ground, I dropped to all fours, resisting a scream or snarl as I let the full moon take me away.
I was panting at the end of it, angry, hungry, and out of place. I was a werecat off my home territory, which made my feline edgier than normal, something I could ignore in human form thanks to the distraction that was Carey, but not now. I hissed as I began to sniff the new woods around me, unsure. Needing to find prey, I picked up the faint scent of a doe and took off, silent and powerful.
This was why I wasn’t worried about the werewolves attacking. During a full moon, the animal was mostly in charge and I was pretty much along for the ride, the human part of my soul taking refuge as its partner decided to kill, eat, and run.
It was a strange detachment. I knew there was a doe in front of me. I knew I was hunting it, but it felt like I had no control over the steering wheel. The control would slowly come back as the cat satisfied itself, but not in the beginning. Not right then.
I felt my claws sink into the earth. I felt the powerful muscles twitching under my skin tense. I felt my body crouch. Stalking in the underbrush, I approached, already considering what sort of meal I was about to have. I had skipped having a human dinner because I knew this was coming and the feline was going to gorge herself on the wild raw meat.
I was not even five yards away when its head came up, looking out into the darkness directly at me, but not seeing me. I was downwind, so my scent couldn’t have carried to the doe. It was dark except the light of the moon, barely able to get through the thick canopy over my head. I must have made a heavy step then that drew its attention.
It didn’t matter. It was too late for the doe.
I pounced, silent and fast, taking it down in that single move, I clamped my mouth over its throat, sinking my long saber fangs through the windpipe and jugular, maybe even the carotid artery. It was the perfect kill, something the cat was pleased with as blood filled its mouth and the struggle of the doe ended before it ever really began.
Eating wasn’t pleasant, not for my human side, but necessary. I never begrudged the big cat for taking what it needed and leaving the carcass for the rest of the wild.