LITMIR.BIZ

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that I couldn’t be close and know for certain I could keep my hands off.

      Every show and commercial, no matter the setting, took me into thoughts of Allie. I flipped the torture device off and sprawled back on the chair covering my face.

      After only a few hours in the room, it was a wreck. I straightened it up and folded my one change of clothes. They looked lonely in the drawer. A thin, worn comforter covered the bed, and the pillows were flat under its tucked edge. In amber light, wearing only my T-shirt and a smile, Allie’s form took shape. Her long legs were curled under her as she drew me toward her with her forefinger.

      My blood heated to boiling and the ache in my chest intensified as it traveled south. Trembling, I clenched the chair arms. Cold sweat beaded on my forehead. Muscle and bone grated against each other, initiating the shift. Forcing the thoughts of Allie into the recesses of my mind, I held both sides of my head.

      Go away. You’re not welcome when Allie is close. You’ll hurt her. I won’t allow it. She’s everything to me. All I’ve lived for, for over a hundred years. You cannot be present when she is in the same room. You have your place. It’s in the woods.

      “You know you want me. Why do you fight it?” Allie’s voice was soft and sensual.

      The old habit directed a burn in my joints and tore at my skin.

      With a powerful swipe, I tossed the blankets off the bed and slung the mattresses against the wall.

      Nothing could wipe the intimate thoughts of her from my mind. But the animal would not control me. And I’d be damned if Grace would continue to hold me prisoner from the grave.

      I had to calm down and focus. I could do this. And fantasies might help. I could use them to bring myself to the edge and then pull back. With each fantasy, maybe I could push myself further until I finally had a hold on the animal.

      I pulled the mattress back to the box spring and flopped on the bed. With my trembling hands behind my head, I tried to ease into another fantasy. Controlling my breathing might keep my heart rate down. Keeping my heart rate down might stop the rage from welling inside me.

      I closed my eyes and started another scenario.

      Allie’s golden skin glistened as she stepped from a shower and pulled a white, plush towel around her. She wrung her long brown hair dry in a towel and let it fall in damp waves down her back. Turning to me, she gave me a fetching glance. She smelled as if she’d just stepped from a garden of spring flowers. As she took slow calculated steps, I was frozen in her path. The satin touch of her fingers met the five o’clock shadow on my jaw and pulled my face closer.

      “I need you.” Her soft whisper tantalized my tongue and pulled my mouth to her neckline. My hand slipped under her towel. The animal threw every bit of its force into bending and cracking my bones into his form.

      After a few seconds, my vision righted itself, and when I stretched my hands out, they were no longer human but the paws of a black panther, the shape I normally took when I fed in the wild.

      Strike one.

      In self-pity, I flopped onto my side thinking of every animal I’d love to tear to pieces to fill my hunger.

      About thirty minutes later, I stretched back out to an upright standing human staring with pure frustration at the yellow ceiling.

      And this was supposed to be a nonsmoking room.

      Pacing, Allie had probably worn a rut in the marble floors and had probably stared a hole through the front door of my cottage waiting for signs of me. She’d probably plagued my poor uncle Thomas to insanity with questions as to my whereabouts.

      I made him promise to assure her that I wasn’t gone for good. That it was detrimental to her safety for me to be gone a short time.

      I hadn’t planned any of this through.

      Leaving would upset her. Sure. But she’d understand when I came back, took her in my arms for a long overdue kiss without turning into an animal, and asked her to marry me.

      As it stood, if I didn’t find a way to control my wild instincts, I would have to break her heart. I couldn’t let my curse become hers.

      I’d have to leave for good.

      But what if she left while I was gone? What if she got tired of waiting? What if she thought I had deserted her the way I had before?

      I pulled my phone out and sat up.

      No.

      I tossed it. It bounced off the pillow and over the side of the bed onto the floor.

      If I talked to her, I’d go back.

      Her soft, pleading voice. Her brown eyes with a hint of gold begging me. Her hands wandering my body would send me into the form of an animal that couldn’t be trusted at the initiation of the shift and a few seconds thereafter.

      Deep breaths. In through the nose, out through the mouth. I could do this.

      The same shuddering began. Grating bones and muscles.

      Dammit.

      No matter what, I would not let the thought of her pouty lips and the cute way her face pinched up when I’d said just the right thing to piss her off send me into another change. And I would not dial her number.

      Rolling to the side of the bed, I retrieved the phone and flipped it open. I pulled her name up on my contacts. A candid shot of her on the pool patio with her head slightly bowed as she looked at a book popped up for her profile picture.

      More bone and muscle grating.

      Stop that, dammit.

      Standing on the chair, I unscrewed a vent cover and took it down. Dust bunnies floated down. Spitting and cursing, I put the phone on the other side of the filter. I wiped my hands on my pants, pulled the chair back to its former post, and nodded with satisfaction.

      I’d need to feed soon, but it wouldn’t be safe until nightfall. Maybe if I could get the animal on a schedule, train him in a sense, I might get better control of him during heightened moments of emotion.

      Rolling into the dip of the sagging mattress, I lay back and rested my eyes. On the back of my eyelids, Allie reappeared, beckoning me in another dark setting. Vexed, I clenched my eyes until they hurt.

      The ceiling rattled and through the vent, my phone flashed.

      I jerked up.

      What if something had gone wrong? What if it was Thomas calling to say Allie had left?

      Tangled in the sheets, I fell off the end of the bed, catching my toe on the bed rail. I limped to the chair, and jerked it into place under the vent.

      The pain in my toe sobered me. Screws holding the vent cover in place served a purpose more than fixating on the piece of metal. They kept my sanity intact too. The difficulty of getting to the phone gave me just the right amount of time to rethink calling her.

      I’d feel it in my soul, if something were wrong.

      Thomas knew my room number and would have called me if there was something I needed to be informed of.

      So the call was probably Allie. Mad. Dejected.

      Covering my ears, I sat in the chair, each incessant ring of the phone pulsating in my head. When it finally stopped and told me I had a new voicemail, I sank back.

      Why I hadn’t turned it off before I put it up there?

      Thinking clearly would be touch and go for the next few days or weeks. I couldn’t consider that amount of time, so I focused on today. I had waited over a hundred and twenty years to finally allow myself to touch her. It was just a few days.

      What is wrong with you, man?

      You’re in love.

      No. This is worse.

      It’s finally being reciprocated, and you don’t

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