Wolf Moon (20 page)

N
ick’s soft snores
filled the room as I stood in front of the window, wrapped in my blanket from
earlier. I’d been unable to fall asleep, so after Nick passed out, I got up and
came to the window. I tried to give in to my fatigue, but everything that happened
earlier kept flashing through my head. Not only could I visualize everything
that had almost happened,
but
I could still feel
Karl’s weight on me, smell his breath, and hear his heavy breathing as he stood
over me. Whenever I closed my eyes, it was even worse.

I
shuddered, pulling my blanket tighter around me as I looked up at the moon. It
seemed bigger than most nights, brightening the night sky. I could still feel
the pull it held over me, but I didn’t feel the urge to give into it. Perhaps
it was because I’d already shifted tonight, or maybe I was still in shock.
Numb.

I tried to take comfort
in the fact that Karl hadn’t succeeded. While this was a relief, unfortunately
it didn’t make me feel like any less of a victim. My emotions swirled around inside
me like a tornado, picking away at any strength I might have had left and
leaving nothing but destruction in its wake.

Outside,
the world appeared calm. Every time my anxiety spiked, I
pulled my blanket to my
nose and inhaled David’s scent greedily, hoping that it would take me back to a
better place. To a time before any of this happened. While my feelings for Nick
had been steadily growing and I trusted him, I needed to be somewhere else.

In the course of one
evening, my strength had been ripped away from me. I was deeply affected by
what almost happened to me. Caught up in my thoughts, I hadn’t even realized
that I was crying.

“Brooke?”
Nick murmured. I turned around to see him propping himself up on his elbows,
his eyes narrowed from sleep. “What are you doing?”

“Couldn’t
sleep,” I replied softly, wiping my eyes as discretely as possible.

He
glanced at the clock and ran his hand down over his face. “Babe, it’s three in
the morning. Did you get
any
sleep?”

I
shrugged, looking down at my feet. “I tried.”

Tossing the comforter
aside, Nick got up and crossed the room to me. He gently cupped my face and
coaxed my eyes to his, and I saw his concern as much as I felt it coursing
through his touch. “You’re crying. Baby,
talk
to me.”

I wiped my tears and
shook my head. “I’m… I…” I stammered before taking a deep breath in through my
nose and exhaling it shakily through my mouth. “
Every time I close my
eyes… The look in his eyes, Nick… It’ll never leave me.”

Nick
wrapped his arms around me and kissed the top of my head. “It’ll take time,” he
said. “But it’ll get easier. You’re so strong, Brooke. Stronger than any woman
I’ve met.”

I
shook my head and pushed out of his hold. “But I wasn’t,” I said, more tears
building and my breath harder to come by. “That’s the problem. I didn’t know
what to do. He cornered me, and instead of fighting him off, I ran. I gave him
the power right from the beginning.”

“Brooke,”
Nick said softly.

“No,
Nick,” I said, cutting him off and brushing past him to sit on the bed. Anger
sparked inside me. I welcomed it, because at least I could feel something in my
emotionally anesthetized state. “I was useless out there.
Absolutely
inferior to him in every way.
He caught me in a moment of vulnerability
just like you said he would, and he reveled in it, taking any and all power I
had away from me. He turned me into something I’d always refused to be: a
victim. Even now—like this—I’m less than what I was before because
I can’t shake how I felt when he…when he…”

Nick’s
posture slumped in defeat; he didn’t know how to fix this any more than I did.

“You
promised I’d be stronger for accepting what I was, but I wasn’t. I was weak,
and Karl took advantage of that.”

Suddenly,
Nick fell to his knees in front of me, taking my hands in his. “Baby, no. You
were
scared
. Your instincts were to
get away and survive.”

“And
I got caught. I wasn’t fast enough or strong enough as a wolf. I took him down
without even
blinking
the other day
in the kitchen, and tonight?” I shuddered, thinking about how bad things could
have gotten if Nick had arrived just a second later. “He forced himself on me
and almost succeeded.”

Nick
refused to buy into my way of thinking, shaking his head vehemently. “Remember
the moose earlier? You knew what to do and you dove in to do it.”

“And
I got caught underneath it,” I reminded him, my right wrist throbbing at the
memory.

“Because
Roxy tripped you. Not because you weren’t confident in what you had to do.”

I
attempted to tune him out, not wanting to hear how strong and confident he
thought I was, because I wasn’t. Not anymore. “Regardless of that
one
moment, Nick, I won’t do it again.”

Nick’s
eyebrows pulled together in confusion. “What do you mean?”

“Shift,”
I stated firmly. “I won’t do it again.”

“You
can’t
not
shift, Brooke. I’ve told
you that,” he argued. “It’s something we have to do in order to maintain
control of both sides. If we just stop…it’ll take control when you least expect
it to. We become volatile, and the wolf takes over completely.” With a sigh,
Nick took my hands again. His tone softened until it was warm and soothing,
almost hypnotic. “It isn’t that you lack strength as a wolf, you just don’t
know how to utilize it. But I can teach you.”

The
wolf inside me stirred, intrigued by his offer, but I suppressed it and
refused to listen to
Nick’s offer. I was resolved in my decision. I would find a way to avoid being
put in a position where I felt helpless again if it was the last thing I did.

A
knock on our bedroom door pulled me from sleep. I wasn’t sure what time I
finally surrendered to exhaustion, but I didn’t feel very rested. I’d been
tossing and turning, still unable to force what Karl had done from my mind long
enough to get a sufficient amount of sleep.

Lying
on my stomach, I felt the bed dip to my left, and when I propped myself up onto
my elbows, I saw Nick climbing out of bed. He looked as weary as I felt, the beginnings
of dark circles starting to show beneath his unusually lackluster eyes. It
wouldn’t have surprised me to learn he’d watched over me while I’d gotten what
little sleep I had.

I
continued to stare at the bed, noticing how the blankets between us had barely
been rumpled; it was the first night I hadn’t fallen asleep in his arms since
we left Scottsdale. Even though we’d grown close over the last couple of weeks,
last night had put a wedge between us that felt insurmountable. It wasn’t his
fault—I knew that—but my brain was so muddled that I couldn’t seem
to extract logic from the murky mess.

“Good
morning,” Miranda said softly, and the smell of bacon and eggs wafted into the
room. “I figured the two of you might want a private breakfast.”

It
smelled delicious, but the idea of eating while my stomach was still in knots
made me nauseous. I kicked the blankets off and walked to the washroom to
splash some cold water on my face in hopes the feeling would pass.

“How is she?”
I heard Miranda whisper, even through the closed bathroom door. I turned on the
water, thinking it would drown them out, but it didn’t work. Maybe, subconsciously,
I didn’t want to tune them out.

“She
hardly slept,” Nick replied raggedly before sighing. “And she won’t talk about
it.”

Leaning
on the counter, I closed my eyes and let the weight of my guilt pull me down. I
wasn’t shutting him out intentionally, and the fact that he felt this way made
my stomach lurch.

“Do
you want the details?” she asked carefully. “If she told you what happened,
would you be able to deal with it without killing him?”

Nick
growled low. “I already know he didn’t finish what he started… And I want to
kill him for even attempting it.”

“Until
Marcus states otherwise, he is still a part of this Pack,” Miranda reminded
him. “You know the rules.”

“
Fuck
the rules,” Nick snarled between
clenched teeth. “He tried to force himself on her, and because of it she
doesn’t feel safe.” He sighed heavily. “And I don’t know if I can ever fix
that.”

“She
just needs time,” Miranda assured him. “Be patient, and let me know if you need
anything else.”

Before
Nick could say anything else, I heard Miranda retreat down the hall. Once Nick
closed the door, I washed my face and brushed my teeth before reemerging. Nick
had set the tray Miranda brought up on the end of the bed, and I eyed it with
disinterest.

“Miranda
brought breakfast.”

I
went back to the bed, crawled under the covers, and pulled my knees to my chest
as I stared blankly at the pattern on the comforter.
“I’m not hungry right
now,” I replied.

“You need to eat.”

Sighing, I
laid
back down on the bed and turned away from Nick and the
door. “Later.”

My entire body still felt
exhausted, but my mind was alert. I longed for the peace that sleep could
bring, but feared the nightmares that I knew would accompany it. I tried to
force it all from my thoughts, instead trying to focus on the happier times of
the past few days and my life back in Scottsdale.

I thought back to how
close Nick and I had gotten, but instead of comforting me, it only made me feel
bad that I’d pushed him away over the last twelve hours. Not that I could be
blamed, and I knew he would never hold me accountable for it. But it had to
hurt him a little. And that, in turn, caused me distress.

Maybe I was moving on too
fast, and this was fate’s way of reminding me.

“Can I get you anything?”
he asked, pulling me from my thoughts.

I shook my head, not
trusting my voice to stay steady enough to say anything.

“Okay. Do you mind if I
go hop in the shower? I’ll lock the bedroom door if you’d like to ensure no one
will bother you.”

I nodded once. “Thank
you.”

The lock slid into place,
and before heading to the shower, Nick laid a hand on my shoulder. I tensed
under his touch, and he recoiled instantly, apologizing. It wasn’t that his
touch was undesirable—I longed for it, to be honest. I just hadn’t invited
the affection, so it startled me. I knew Nick wasn’t trying to force anything
on me, but my brain couldn’t make that distinction just yet. Everything was
still too fresh.

“It’s not you,” I
whispered, my voice and chin quivering. “I just…” I sighed, unsure of how I
could explain this away. The truth was, I couldn’t.

“It’s fine,” Nick assured
me sadly. “I understand. I’ll be right back.”

Nick left me alone, and a
few seconds later, I heard the shower start up. Less than a minute had passed
before my anxiety elevated. I might have been having issues with physical
contact and how to act around him, but I hated being alone even more. The
constant back and forth was maddening.

The bathroom wasn’t far
away, but with Nick in another room, it invited that familiar feeling of
vulnerability from last night when I was alone and Karl found me.

My chest grew tighter
with every breath I struggled to take, and it felt like the room was closing in
around me, suffocating me. My heart pounded so furiously, I could have sworn it
had been replaced with a jackhammer, and it wasn’t until Nick reemerged that
the sensation faded.
But only a little.

Seeing the distress on my
face, he rushed across the room and crawled onto the bed. He clutched the towel
around his waist as he moved next to me, hesitant to reach out for me. Just
having him within reach was enough for me, and the tension in my chest lessened.

He ran a hand over my
hair, eyebrows raised in concern. “What is it?” he asked. “What happened?”