Page 12 of Salvation
A son.
He stumbled, barely able to see, to think, to react.
Todd!Soren called after him, but he kept right on toward the door.
Todd!Sarah pleaded, echoing her mate.
He strode out the front room of the saloon and burst through the doors. Harsh Arizona sunlight hit him like a spotlight, and he was sure he heard destiny’s cruel cackle in the breeze. He bumped into someone and just managed to stammer an apology before rushing across the street. All he could think wasaway. He needed to get away. From fate. From reality. From everything.
God, he’d never felt so tired or so at a loss. All his life, he’d heard the stories about destiny and fate and a greater design. And damn it, he’d believed them. He’d done everything a good bear should do. He served his clan. Put others before himself. He’d toiled. Sacrificed. Respected. But the past year — and especially today — had slowly torn apart that sacred temple in his mind. Maybe there was no such thing as all-powerful fate. Or if there was, fate was a cruel master, not the benign force he’d been suckered into believing in. He’d followed the rules all his life, not for his own reward, but because doing good was right.
But Jesus, was he wrong about that? About everything?
His shoes scuffed over asphalt, then over flagstones, then the cushioned surface of the park’s lush lawn. He’d stomped halfway across the park before pulling up short. Where the hell was he going? Why?
It was like a plug had been pulled. The last scraps of energy, the last breath of fire went out of him, and he sank onto a bench, holding his head in his hands. He concentrated on breathing instead of thinking and on the inch of space between his face and his knees.
A son. Jesus, he had a son.
No, we don’t,his bear mourned.Soren does.
He covered his eyes, trying to erase that thought with something else. A plan. He had to make a plan.
Like what?his bear demanded.
Maybe he’d head back to the woods, shift back into bear form, and stay that way. Forever, preferably. Being a bear was easier because the world boiled down to hot/cold, hungry/full, awake/asleep. Not a lot more. Bears were more about today than yesterday or tomorrow, right?
Deep inside his body, his bear growled in dissent.I feel. I think. I hurt. Doesn’t matter if I’m on two feet or four. That won’t make this ache go away.
He ran his hands into his hair and hung on, just to have something to hang on to.
His head felt like it was going to explode. He clenched his teeth and clawed at his scalp, trying to make it go away. That didn’t work, though. Neither did rocking a little or breathing slower or faster or more evenly. Nothing worked.
Until a featherlight touch warmed his shoulder, and his racing heart slowed down a little bit. The next breath he took didn’t bounce over the previous one. It just slid down his throat, and although the air was dry as a bone in this godforsaken place, it felt good. So he concentrated on that.
The feather moved, making his breathing stretch and slow down, matching the motion on his shoulder. His jaw unlocked, and his fingers retreated from the roots of his hair. Maybe he didn’t have to tear it out today. Maybe things would be okay.
Something shifted by his side, and the only strange thing about it was that it didn’t trigger a thousand alarms in his mind. His brain didn’t ask who or why or what was responsible. It just…relaxed a little bit. The hammering inside his skull eased, replaced by a sound. A faint whisper, like a little tap into his subconscious, and he strained to hear.
“Are you okay?”
He caught it on the second or third time. Something about the voice was familiar, and he looked up.
Emerald eyes. Freckles. A mane of thick, dark hair. Pencil-thin eyebrows, and above them, wispy bangs that didn’t quite cover lines of concern.
A woman. A woman who was familiar, somehow.
Her lips moved again, and he itched for a slow-motion, zoomed-in replay because it was that nice to watch.
Was he okay? Not really. But having her close made things a little more bearable, somehow.
His inner beast started pacing. Sniffing. Maybe even hoping.
“Sure. Fine.” He wasn’t sure if he really heard his own voice or just imagined it in his head. He was too busy watching her lips perk at the corners in a tiny dawn of a smile. Like daybreak in winter when the sun barely peeked over the mountains. When a deep layer of snow covered everything, making the world seem peaceful and soft.
“You sure?” She tilted her head.
He nodded. A cardinal swooped by, and it occurred to him that he couldn’t hear it. A rusty old dump truck bounced down the street, and though he could feel the rattle and screech in his bones, it didn’t register as much more than a faint scratch in his ears. A mom wheeled a baby stroller past, and the child was gesturing and moving its mouth, but he couldn’t hear that, either. Every sound in his universe was switched off, except the voice of the woman beside him.
