Davy Harwood in Transition

  like I'm friends with them anymore. What's wrong with me?"

  As his hand reached for mine, I heard him sigh. "I feel it too."

  "I don't like feeling like this."

  "Your mind is preparing you for what's going to happen. Bad things are going to happen."

  I didn't want to hear him, but he was right. My body had started to shut down. Emotions weren't going to help me anymore. "I don't like being this way. I'm becoming a robot. I don't even care what's going on anymore. When Kates kidnapped Emily, I was so irate. I was hurt by her betrayal, but now she could betray me again and I wouldn't blink. What does that say about me?"

  Roane pulled me to his side and pressed a kiss to my shoulder. He murmured against my skin, "I think it means that we're going to survive. Whatever happens, we're going to survive."

  "I should feel. I don't feel anymore."

  He kissed my forehead with a sense of desperation. "We'll get there. I promise."

  "What about Emily?" I felt him tense beside me, but I had to ask. "I know Pete is my enemy, but she's in love with him. I saw their connection. It's deep, really deep. And she's my roommate. She was a good friend to me."

  He pulled away and stood to cross the room. His voice was distant. "If she's with him, she's with him."

  "What about Kates? She still loves Lucan, you know."

  Roane's eyes pierced mine. I could feel the struggle in him, but he shoved me out. "I'm sorry. I can't lie to you. You're going to lose friends. What do you want me to say?"

  His words whipped me. They stung.

  He added, "I am sorry, Davy, but this is what war is. And we're in one. It started with Lucan and then it began again with the wolves. They'll be coming back. I moved us off my territory so that he would come."

  "What are you saying?"

  "I want the Alpha to come. Then the Roane army will be coming too, and then my brother. We can't survive all of them. Not all of us are even going to survive this first round."

  Something in his voice made me cold. I heard everything he said. He said it before, but it was how he did it now. He was trying to tell me something else. He wanted to prepare me for something. I could feel his regret. It went deep, down to his bones, but he wouldn't let me in. He used to let me in. We wouldn't even have to speak out loud, but now he was a stranger again. It seemed so long ago that we had shared a bed.

  My gut twisted inside. "What aren't you saying to me?"

  Pain flared in his coal eyes, but it was gone quickly. Regret replaced it and then a steel wall slammed over it. He stood upright. "I'm saying to you that you're going to lose some of your friends. I've tried to shelter you from this, but I can't anymore. You're not just a human anymore. You're the reason for all of this and you've been taking a backseat. This is when you stop crying about the war and start becoming a part of it."

  "You haven't wanted me to be a part of it." I couldn't believe him.

  Roane hissed back, "Because you haven't wanted to step up. You've had this 'poor me' attitude the whole time, even before I met you. I felt it in the library that day and I hated it. You act like a victim. That is what’s going to make you a victim."

  My mouth fell open; I couldn't form a single thought. How dare he—how dare—He was right. I couldn't fight it anymore because he was right about everything. I had been feeling sorry for myself this whole time.

  "You stopped transitioning awhile ago." Roane brought me back. His voice was soft now. "Since you came back from wherever you were, you've been ready. You came back ready. You just didn't want to admit it. That's why you've shut down. That's why you can't feel anything and I know that you've been forcing yourself to ignore it. I could feel that from you too. You don't trust your friends anymore. You want to, but you don't. Stop lying to yourself."

  My mouth snapped shut. Each word hurt more than the last. "It's a hard pill to swallow. I hate when things change, especially when I have no control over any of it."

  "That's life." His eyes were hard. "Deal with it."

  It was then that I really looked at him. He snapped me out of my reverie and brought me back to our reality, to the two of us in that room. I was highly aware of how close he stood to me. And that he only had on a pair of unbuttoned slacks. They had fallen low on his hips. His stomach and groin muscles were defined. Each ridge and line stuck out against his body.

  "You've lost weight." My eyes were hungry. I was hungry.

  He sighed and ran a hand through his hair. "The last few months haven't been easy on me."

  "Do you need to feed?"

  Molten heat flared in his eyes. "And become human? I think not, Davy."

  I knew that. Of course, I knew that, but I didn't like it.

  "What?"

  I shook my head. "What if there's a way you could feed from me and not become human? I wanted your brother to become human. Maybe I can control it. You could get power from me."

  "I did get power from when you bit me. I got a lot of it. I still have it in me."

  "You do?"

  He nodded and watched me with a knowing look. I flushed under his perusal. "Sometimes I think you know me better than I know myself."

  "Because I do. I love you, Davy." He crossed the room and cupped the side of my face. "How are you feeling now?"

  "More normal."

  His lips were so close. "You feel better?"

  I nodded. My throat was thick. The need for him flared inside of me. I was becoming blind to everything else. "I need you. When we're not on the same page, I can't handle it. I feel disjointed. I'm strongest when I'm with you."

  He grinned and dipped down. His lips met mine, but stayed still. I closed my eyes. I waited as my heart pounded loudly in my eardrums. Then his lips brushed against me. "I can help you with that."

  Before I had time to respond, he picked me up and threw me on the bed. I shrieked in laughter, but his mouth quickly silenced me. Everything in me hummed in pleasure. His arms went around me. His mouth explored mine. His body demanded everything from me and I gave it to him. As he lifted me higher on the bed and slid inside me, I was blind to anything but him. The world ceased to exist. It was only the two of us.

  And then an hour later I rolled over as Roane lay beside me.

  "Now I feel really connected to you," I drawled and panted for a minute in silence.

  Roane grinned and then groaned as he pressed a quick kiss to my shoulder. He sat up in the next moment. "I'm sorry, but I should go. I have things to do. So do you."

  "I do?" I enjoyed watching him getting ready to protect me.

  He spoke as he began to dress, "I can't take on three enemies without help."

  "You said no powers. They'll know then."

  "They already know. They might not know you're the Immortal, but they know you're the thread holder. Maybe it's time they find out the rest." Roane flashed me a grin before he left.

  Whatever I'd been feeling before was gone. As I dressed and went in search of the kitchen, I couldn't keep myself from grinning. He did that to me and when I finally found it, Kates looked up and laughed. "You've got the Roane Glow again. Lucky."

  Brown smiled and gestured to the table. "They have doughnuts, Davy."

  Indeed they did. The kitchen table was filled with cartons of the frosted pastries along with bowls of fruit. Some bread sat beside boxes of cereal and a dish of pancakes was placed in the middle.

  Pippa gave me a tentative grin. "They have a chef. He made me an omelet."

  Emily was quiet as she sat on a stool by the counter. Kates caught my look and rolled her eyes.

  "Davy?" Gavin brandished a metal spatula in the air. "Give me an order. I'm here to please."

  "You're the chef?"

  He smirked. "I have many skills."

  "Okay," I replied as I scooted onto a stool beside Emily. She stiffened and bowed her head. "Surprise me. Whatever you want."

  "Anything?" His eyes lit up.

  "She just said anything." Kates scowled.

  A heated look pas
sed between the two before he jerked away. I heard the control in his voice as he forced a light tone. "You said anything, Davy. Be warned."

  I watched Kates, but said to him, "It'll be fine. I'm sure."

  She rolled her eyes at me this time, popped a strawberry in her mouth and left the room. Brown watched her go and I saw the same nonjudgmental curiosity from when she'd studied me with Roane before fill her eyes.

  "This is a really nice place, Davy. This is your—" Pippa frowned.

  "Boyfriend's?" Emily supplied. She looked up again.

  My roommate was in love with a werewolf, but she was acting jealous. I thought she was over her crush. "I guess. I've never been here before."

  "Lucas seems to own a lot of places."

  Though Gavin didn't act any differently, I could feel his interest in the conversation. His hands slowed as he opened an egg.

  "Davy."

  "Yeah?" I looked back over. Emily had been studying me. "What?"

  "So you and Lucas are serious?"

  Pippa moved away from the counter, but Brown inched closer. The witch stepped away from the table to round the counter so she was behind me. It was a slow movement, but I knew that Gavin had noticed it. His eyes jerked up once, but went right back to the skillet.

  "Why are you asking me about him?"

  Emily drew back. "I can't ask you some questions? You lied to me about him, remember?"

  "We've gone over this."

  Annoyance flashed over her face, but she cleared it quickly. "I thought you were in love with Adam before. I'm just wondering how serious this is. I don't want you hurt again."

  She was lying. I knew that much, but this sudden loathing shook me. "I thought you cared about me."

  "I do." Emily smiled. "Why do you say that?"

  What could I say without making it worse?

  "A bitch." Pippa jumped as she spoke.

  All eyes turned to her.

  "What did you say?"

  Pippa jerked to the side. She met Emily's gaze. "A bitch. You're being a bitch."

  “Excuse me?"

  The wolf crossed her arms and leaned back on her heels. "You heard me."

  Kates chuckled behind me and Gavin was all eyes. He didn't hide his attention now.

  "I can't believe you. You have some nerve, Pippa! You're the reason we're all here."

  "No, I'm not!" she shouted back. "We're here because of Pete. He didn't like Davy and he could tell there was something different about her. He's the one who went to the Mother Wolf. I've been trying to shield Davy from her. I've been trying to protect her. I wanted to protect all of us."

  "Why? And what's so special about her? I don't understand any of this." The hysteria in Emily's voice was evident.

  Pippa opened her mouth and then clamped it shut. She grabbed the ends of her braids and held on.

  "Well?"

  She pulled harder on her braids. "I don't know what Davy is, but she's something. I could tell right away. But Pete didn't care. He got mad. He didn't see that she's a person and a good one. And she's your roommate. And she cares about you. He didn't stop to think about any of that."

  Emily turned heated eyes to me, but looked back at Pippa. "What are you talking about?!"

  A plate was placed beside me gently and I saw that Gavin had a resigned look in his eyes. Then I saw behind him that Wren and Tracey had filed into the room. They stood in the background waiting for an opening. Something had happened.

  Roane and Bastion came in next. He jerked his head to the side and motioned for me to come. Before I left, I looked back once more. Brown and Kates both saw where I was going, but neither said a word. When I followed Roane out into the hallway, I heard Pippa explode, "Because it's not right! They want to hurt Davy and I know it's never right when someone is going to get hurt."

  Roane reached for my hand and led me into a different room. When the door closed, he didn't say anything for a moment. "The Alpha's coming. He's on his way right now. They're waiting for me to talk to you and then when we go back in, they're going to grab your friends."

  "How do you know he's coming right now?"

  "Gregory called it in. He was on sentry duty last night. We don't have long. They're coming fast."

  "They?"

  Roane nodded. "I wanted him to come alone, but he's not. It's going to be a full fight. Your roommate's boyfriend is bringing twice the number. Forty wolves, plus the Alpha. I'm not going to lie to you. Some of your friends won't make it out alive, especially the female wolf."

  "Pippa?"

  "They see her as a traitor. He's been talking to Emily. He's brainwashed her into thinking you're the enemy and so is the other girl. Emily's no longer Emily anymore."

  "That's not true. She still has feelings for you."

  He sighed again and leaned back on a desk. He braced against the edge, his arm muscles bulging. "Maybe. Maybe not. She feels lied to. She saw us last night. I'm sure she could see how we feel about each other. You've been lying to her since the beginning and she doesn't understand our side. No one's been talking to her to explain it."

  "She should've talked to me."

  "She came to your room last night. I think she heard us talking. I knew she was there, but she left. I should've given it more thought."

  It didn't matter anymore. What was done was done. I swallowed back the pain and asked, "What do I do?"

  "You do what you can." Roane held my face in his hands. He tilted it up so his eyes held mine captive. He'd been guarded before, but now he let me in. The wall lifted and I saw his love. It was clear as day and I had to choke back tears. "I love you, but stay close to me. Okay?"

  My throat was thick with emotion. He wiped some tears from my face. Then he pressed a kiss to my forehead and dipped to meet my lips. I pressed against him.

  Someone rapped on the door with their knuckles. Bastion poked his head inside. "Gregory's here. We've got five minutes."

  Roane straightened and the hunter took over him. He was cold. Ruthless. "Let's go."

  "And her?" Bastion nodded to me.

  "You don't have to protect me. I'll be fine. I promise."

  "Let's go!" Wren shouted from the hallway and then all the vampires sprinted away.

  The kitchen had grown quiet when I went back. Kates straightened from the wall. "What's going on?"

  "The Alpha is here. He brought forty wolves with him."

  Pippa paled. "They're going to kill me."

  Emily looked at her sharply. "Don't be stupid. You'll be fine."

  "She's right, Emily." My voice was strong. "They're going to kill her. They think she's a traitor."

  She flushed. "They're not going to kill her. That's insane, Davy."

  "Yes, they will. She chose to protect me against them. Kates, protect Pippa. She's one of ours. Brown, stay with Gregory."

  She perked up. "I don't know where he is."

  "He came back. We've got three minutes."

  "Davy." Emily looked shaken.