“You smell good,” he whispers.
“I haven’t showered.”
“Doesn’t matter, you smell good.”
His voice, sensual and warm, mellows me.
Our lips touch and part, touch again. I breathe him in. He moves his face away a little and studies me. I smile. I can’t help it.
“I like you,” I say. “A lot. Even with the whole werewolf thing.”
He smiles back. “I like you too.”
“A lot?”
“Mm-hmm,” he says, leaning in for another kiss. “A wicked lot.”
It doesn’t matter about the snow. It doesn’t matter about the pixies. I could stay here forever, steadied in Nick’s arms, kissing his lips, feeling his warm, scruffy cheek next to mine. All the sorrow and the fear don’t matter at all anymore. That’s it. No melodrama or anything. That’s just it.
Merinthophobia
fear of being bound or tied up
We kiss for a long time, a good long time. I don’t even notice that it’s cold and I forget to be afraid because that’s just how good a kisser he is. His lips move above my lips. My lips ache for the touch of him, the softness of his skin. We keep kissing. My hands wrap themselves in his hair. His hand presses me close into him, as close as I can be against him, and he is solid, strong, amazing. My hands leave his hair and journey down to the sides of his face, still tingling.
“We should keep going,” he says, voice gruff and husky again. I love when his voice sounds like that, deeper than normal. His lips puff out a little more, too. “You’re blushing.”
I pull my lips in against each other like I’m still trying to taste him. I move my snowshoes off of his snowshoes. It’s tricky.
“You’re a good kisser,” I say.
“So are you.”
We walk and walk and walk. We make it out of the driveway and onto the main road, which hasn’t been plowed for a while. It’s got about four inches on it still.
“I was thinking about Ian,” I say, sliding my snowshoes along.
“Great. Just what I want to hear.”
“No, no. I was thinking about how he’ll be sad about this.”
“Oh, poor Mr. Homecoming King.” He teases and bumps me with his hip.
I bump him back. “Mean.”
An eagle shrieks. Still, I miss all the signs. Somehow Nick does too.
Something falls over our heads and Nick snarls, an animal, guttural sound. It terrifies me more than the thing on my head. But I can’t stop the snarl. So I attack whatever is on my hair. I yank at it. My fingers snare into small metal loops. It’s a net. Someone has thrown a net over us.
Nick clutches me, still snarling. His eyes have already turned. His forehead creases.
“Nick?” His name comes out slowly. I’m pushing panic away, trying to will everything to be okay. Like I can.
“Pixies,” he manages to say as he pushes at the net above our heads, all around us. “The net is silver.”
“Silver?”
He shakes his head. All of him shakes as he tries to maintain control.
“Nick!” I shriek at him, terrified.
Hands yank me away from him. They come from behind me and I can’t see what they’re attached to. They hold onto me with iron grips, far too tight, menacing.
I twist against them. “Let go.”
They don’t, they just grab me tighter. It’s like they’re trying to break my ankles. I’m yanked out of the net. They tumble me toward them across the snow. My body slips over one of the metal snowshoes I’ve lost in the confusion. I grab it and throw it backward, trying to hit someone.
There is a lovely, satisfying sound of snowshoe hitting flesh and muscle, but the hands don’t let me go.
I am obviously no longer a pacifist.
My fingers try to grab onto the net. I’m pulled away too quickly, dragged through the snow. Everything is white and flying and painful.
“Nick!”
I claw at the snow, trying to slow down. There’s nothing to hold on to. I kick and kick. The hands clutch my ankles. Flipping my torso over I get one quick glance of their backs. They’re wearing parkas and hats and look normal, like people, but faster. I smash onto my face again and lift up my head just in time to see Nick snarling inside the net. He’s transformed again.
“Nick!” I yell, but snow pours into my mouth. Sharp cold pain smashes through my teeth and into my skull. I cough and try again. “Nick!”
He raises himself up onto four legs and howls, a long, searing cry of anguish and rage.
My heart breaks for him, caught there. I have to help him escape. I have to get free.
I kick again. “Let me go.”
Pain shoots through my head. Fireworks. Explosions. All inside my brain. The white world goes dark and I know what’s about to happen. I’m the one leaving. I am the one gone.
Nyctohylophobia
fear of dark wooded areas or of forests
at night
I wake up in a room that’s vacant, large and cold, with just one air mattress on the floor. My head thrums and I lift my trembling fingers to touch a large lump on the side of my head. Did I hit a rock? Or did someone hit me? And Nick? Where is Nick?
I sit up, pushing my hands against the cold blue air mattress. The world spins and I close my eyes for a second, but think better of it. The walls seem made of concrete, with big rivets in them, bolts that once held something. There’s one door, but it’s large and wooden and shut.
Terror grabs me and doesn’t let go.
I pull myself up to a standing position. My feet touch the cold cement floor.
Jesus. Someone has taken my shoes.
And my coat.
“Nick?” I whisper, kind of hoping for the unhopeable.
But he isn’t here.
The memory of him, howling, stuck beneath the net, hits me in the stomach, spinning pain into me.
“You better not have hurt Nick!” I yell at . . . oh, I don’t know what I’m yelling at.
Striding across the cold concrete until I come to the door, I try it again. “Hey! You better not have hurt my friend!”
I grab the wooden door handle and yank it. No go. I try pushing it. It doesn’t budge. Damn, why am I not stronger? The door has to be barricaded or locked or something on the other side. I step back and run at it with my shoulder, which is not only not helpful, it hurts. It never looks like it hurts when cops do it in movies.