Colton's Dilemma (Shadow Breeds) (4 page)

“Oh,” she said, blushing and averting her eyes, “sorry.”

“Why on earth would you be sorry for that?  You had nothing to do with it.  I came to terms with it a long time ago,” he said, thinking – yeah, a very long time ago, about eight hundred and sixty-three years ago.

He re-positioned her foot once more and stepped behind the machine, “Hold still again, please,” he said as he pushed the button.  One more beep and then he walked over to the computer.  He sat down and began clicking the mouse.  She leaned up on one elbow to watch what he was doing.  Pretty soon a grey image appeared on the screen.  He moved the image over to a much larger screen and studied it.  Then he did the same with the second image.  “Well, I’ve got good news and bad news,” he said.

“Let’s hear it,” she said.

“Well, there don’t appear to be any breaks, but you’ve got a torn ligament.  We’re going to have to cast that foot.”

“Cast it?  You mean a plaster cast?” she moaned.

He smiled, “No
, I believe a removable boot cast should suffice – as long as you keep it on all the time, except to bathe.  And by all the time, I mean when you’re sleeping too.”

“Oh, I will.  I promise,” she said.

He went and rummaged through a few cabinets and drawers then he walked back to the table carrying a boot and something else.  “I want to put some ointment on that burn,” he said innocently.

“
B,b,burn?  What burn?” she said as her eyes began moving over her body.

He slowed his walk, “You have a burn, on the back of your neck,” he said as he hesitantly stepped up to the table.

Her hands reached behind her, one pulling her hair to the side, the other carefully touching her neck, her fingers tracing the raised skin.  Her eyes went wide as she stared at him, “Oww, ouch, what is that?  Colton?  What the fuck is that?”

“It’s a burn,” he whispered.

“Bullshit,” she spat, “It’s more than just a burn.  There’s a shape, a definite shape to it.  Tell me what it is.”

He squeezed his eyes shut, “You don’t want to know.”

“Damn it Colton.  Tell me what it is.  Please?” she whimpered.

“It’s a wolf paw,” he whispered.

Silence.  Colton was afraid to look at her.  He was afraid of what he might do if he saw the pain in her eyes – he was afraid that he’d want to take her into his arms and try to kiss that pain away.

“Why would somebody do that?” she finally whispered.

“I don’t know,” he lied.  He’d tell her when he felt she was strong enough.

Her hands covered her face and she began to quietly sob.  He instinctively reached for her, cradling her head against his chest.  “I’m afraid,” she sobbed.

“Don’t be.  I’ll protect you,” he whispered.

She looked up at him with tear-stained cheeks, “No.  I’m afraid of remembering.”

He cradled her chin in his hands, “I’ll be right here when you do.  I promise,” he whispered – and he meant every word of it.

She could
tell from the sound of his voice that he meant what he said.  But she was still terrified – terrified that it wouldn’t be enough.

She was silent as he applied the ointment to the
burn, re-wrapped her ankle, placed the boot on her leg and then he went to pick her up. 

“Can’t I walk with this thing on?” she said.

“Not up two flights of stairs.  But from the bed to the bathroom, yes,” he said as he scooped her up.  Secretly she was glad.  She really liked the way it felt in his arms.

As he walked through his bedroom door and towards the newly made bed with the fresh, clean sheets, she stopped him.  “Ummm, bathroom first, please?  I really need to pee,” she smiled.

“Oh, of course,” he stammered as he turned toward the bathroom, “I think I might need to run downstairs to grab toilet paper though.  Oh, never mind, there’s some in here,” he said, thinking ‘thank you Hansen.’

He slowly released her legs when she was near the toilet.  She inhaled with a hiss when her foot made contact with the floor.  Even with the support of the boot, she could still barely stand. 

“Will you be okay?” he said.

“God, I hope so,” she said smiling.

As he walked out and closed the door he looked back at her, “I’ll be right out here.  Holler if you need anything.”

He walked to the edge of the bed and sat down.  He couldn’t remember when the last time was that he’d had a woman in his bed.   There had been women, lots of women, but only one night stands and only in hotel rooms.  The last time a woman had been in his bed had been…..no, don’t even think her name.

The voice in his bathroom thankfully brought him back to the present, “Ummmm, Colton? This is really embarrassing, but I can’t seem to stand up.”

Colton chuckled slightly and walked to the door, “I’m coming in.  Is that okay?”

“I guess it’ll have to be unless I want to spend the night on the toilet.”

Ever the gentleman, when he walked in
, his eyes went straight to the linen closet on the opposite side of the room. He pulled out a towel and then walked with his eyes closed over to her.  He held the towel out as a curtain, but kept his eyes closed.  “Grab onto my forearms,” he said.

She did and in one surprising and incredibly strong move, he pulled her up.  She held tight to one of his arms as she pulled up the baggy sweatpants with her other.  “I’m decent now.  Thanks,” she mumbled.

“Do you want to try walking to the bed?” he asked.

She hesitated with her answer.  She knew she should say yes, but damn it, she liked it when he scooped her up in his arms and held her tight to his chest.  Not only did it feel good, but, man, did he smell amazing – like sex on a lazy afternoon in a field of freshly cut grass, with a stream running through it and a cool breeze blowing from the pine trees, and……what was she supposed to be doing?  Oh yeah, “
Mmmm, I guess I can try to walk,” she whispered, disappointed with herself for not having the guts to beg him to sweep him into her arms.  What was going on with her?  Why did she feel this way when she was around him?  She didn’t even know who she was.  She should only be concerned with figuring that out, right?  A part of her wanted that, wanted that more than anything.  But then there was that other part.  The part that knew what had been done to her, but didn’t want to know the details.  Knowing what had happened was bad enough.  Knowing the details just might drive her insane.  That was something that she definitely didn’t want.  But for some reason none of that mattered when Colton was near her.  Whenever he was around she felt safe, more importantly, whenever he was around she felt
wanted
.

She placed her hand on the counter
, carefully swung the boot leg forward, tried, honestly tried, to put weight on the foot but the intense pain that shot through her body instantly brought tears to her eyes and make her cry out.  In less than a second she was in his arms

He carried her to the bed and was gently setting her down when there was a knock at the door.

“Come,” he said.

Hansen opened the door and the smell of pancakes and syrup and bacon and coffee wafted into the room before he entered.  She licked her lips.  She hadn’t realized how hungry she was until
just then.  Colton took the tray from Hansen and placed it carefully over her legs.  As she began to dig in he started walking towards the door.  She swallowed a big mouthful of food and the panic that wanted to explode out of her, “Where, where are you going?” she mumbled.

He smiled at her, “I just have to grab something.  I’ll be right back
.”

She listened to his footsteps going down the hall and down the stairs.  She could hear muffled voices at the bottom of the stairs, one of which didn’t sound happy.  “Hansen,” she said, smiling and taking another mouthful of food.

“Sir, this is not a good idea, having her here.  You know that, right?” Hansen said.

Colton glanced up the stairs, “Keep your voice down.  I don’t want her to hear you.  Of course I know it’s not a good idea, Hansen.  But what am I
supposed to do?  She doesn’t even know who she is.  Where am I supposed to take her?  I can’t take her home, she doesn’t know where that is.  And I don’t want to take her to the police station because they’ll just send her to a mental hospital for evaluation.  I can’t let her go through that.  And if I did that I wouldn’t be able to find him for her.  And I’m going to find him, Hansen.  I’m going to find him and I’m going to kill him.  I owe her that.”

“Excuse me?  You owe her that?  Why on earth do you feel that you owe her, Sir?  Aren’t you the one who saved her?  Doesn’t she technically owe you?” Hansen said.

Colton looked at Hansen.  How was he supposed to tell him that this woman that he barely knew was the one who had saved him, not the other way around.  Hansen would tell him he was insane.  Hell, even he thought he might have lost it.  But there was something about her.  Something that woke up his heart – a heart that had been dormant for a long, long time – and for that he was grateful.  “For now she’s our guest, Hansen.  Try to remember that,” he said as he walked into his office.  He grabbed his laptop and his American Express card and headed back up the stairs.  When he opened the door it was to a scene that made laugh out loud – ‘Miss’ was in the middle of licking the syrup off of her empty plate.  She gave him a surprised look over the top of the plate then she gave him a sheepish grin, blushing several shades of pink. 

“The syrup is really good,” she mumbled.

“So I gather,” he said, chuckling as he walked to the bed, “Would you like some more?”

She shook her head, “No, I’m full.  But thanks.”

He set the laptop on the edge of the bed then lifted the tray from over her legs and set it on the floor.  Then he picked p the laptop.

“What’s that for?” she asked.

He motioned to the bed, “May I,” he said then he smiled slightly when her heart beat quickened as she nodded.  He sat down next to her and fired up the laptop.  He entered his password and then brought up the internet.  He set the laptop on her legs and then handed her his credit card, “I want you to order anything that you need: clothes, shampoo, female supplies, anything.  I mean it.  Anything at all.  And then when you’re done with that, you can use this to do some research to try to figure out who you are.”

She tried to hand his card back to him, “Colton, I can’t do that.  I can’t take your money,” she whispered.

He stopped her hand by placing his on the back of hers.  He tried not to react but he could tell that she felt the tingle that shot up his arm just like he did.  Amazing.  He took a deep breath and tried to calm his own heart.  “Miss.  Please.  Money is not the issue here.  The issue is that you’re staying here until you can figure out who you are and where you live (or hopefully longer, he thought suddenly, surprising himself) and you’re going to need some things – and I’m going to need my sweatpants back,” he added, grinning.  “Besides, if it feels better, you can consider it a loan and pay me back.  Will that work?”

She dropped her hand back to the bed, “I, I guess,” she mumbled.

“Great,” he said as he stood up.  He grabbed a pen and paper from the nightstand, “Make sure you have it shipped overnight.  I have a post office box in town.  I can send Hansen to pick it up tomorrow.”  He turned to head out the door, “I have a few things to take care of downstairs but I’ll be back up here to check on you this afternoon.  And if you need anything at all – food, drink, a helping hand to the bathroom – just holler.  It’s a big house, but sounds in it really carry,” he said, thinking – no, it’s my vampire hearing that will hear you.

She had to bite her lip to keep herself from asking him to please not leave.  And, truthfully, he really didn’t have anything to take care of downstairs, but he didn’t want to hover – and he didn’t want to tempt himself further.

He carried the tray downstairs and found Hansen, brooding of course, in the kitchen.  He walked to the sink and began rinsing the dishes.  Hansen walked over and tried to move him out of the way, “I can do that, Sir,” he said as his hands tried to push Colton’s out of the way. 

Colton smiled at Hansen, “Relax, Hansen.  Let me do this for a change.  Besides, I need you to sit down and make up a shopping list.  You’ll need to go to
the store tomorrow and stock up on enough food for the two of you.”

Hansen shot him a dirty look, but kept his mouth closed.  Finally he sighed as he sat down at the table, “For how long, Sir?” he said.

“I don’t know, Hansen.  It could be a while.”

Colton could hear Hansen’s jaw muscles clenching.  Finally, Hansen pushed the chair back from the table and stormed to the refrigerator.  As he pulled it open he said, “Fine.  I understand.  I guess I’ll fix the two of us steaks for dinner.”  He stood up and tossed two packages of raw meat onto the counter.  As Hansen tore open the plastic so that he could marinate the steaks, the scent of the raw blood oozing from the fresh meat hit Colton like a sledgehammer, reminding him that it had
now been a few days since he’d fed.  He inhaled sharply and felt his fangs push into his mouth.  He could see that Hansen really wanted to scold him for allowing him to go so long, but Hansen held his tongue.  “It’s almost sunset.  You should go into town for a little while and feed.  I can keep an eye on the girl,” he said.