Shelter by Tara Shuler Read Free Book Online Page B

slightly. I very slowly moved my hands up his biceps toward his shoulders, and then back behind his neck. He bent forward to rest his head on my shoulder as I put my arms around him. I noticed a long scar on his shoulder, and I kissed it gingerly. He did not push me away. I placed my cheek against the scar and wished with all my heart I could take it away.
    “I’m sorry,” he whimpered.
    “Please don’t apologize,” I begged him. “You have nothing to be sorry for.”
    “I never should have gotten you involved in any of this,” he told me. “You don’t deserve this.”
    “Don’t deserve what?” I gasped.
    “This!” he hissed. “All of this! I’m a mess. I’m worthless and pathetic, and you’re better off without me around. You’ll just leave me like everyone else does. Besides, you deserve better.”
    “No!” I said flatly. “You are not worthless, and I am not going anywhere!”
    “Everyone does,” he said. “My mother, my father, my grandparents. Everyone leaves me.”
    “Did your mother do this to you?” I asked gravely.
    His jaw clenched, but he said nothing. It was all the answer I needed.
    One thing I knew for certain was that I had no intention of leaving him. If you’d told me a month before that I would be falling in love with a human I’d just met who was an emotional wreck, I’d have called you crazy. I always imagined myself being with someone who was strong and protective. Now, I couldn’t see myself anywhere else. Besides, how could I leave him after seeing what his own mother had done to him?
    “I will not leave you,” I said firmly. “I promise.”
    “Swear it,” he said, looking into my eyes with complete seriousness.
    “I swear it with everything I am,” I vowed.
    He swept me into his arms and we held each other close. I laid my head against his strong shoulder, and I could feel the deep scar against my cheek. Again, I wished I could take away all of his pain.
    Looking back, I can see how unusual it was – that I felt myself falling in love with someone so quickly. I never even thought I’d fall in love at all, much less with a human. But the emotion was intense. It was so intense it was indescribable.
    Our tender moment was interrupted by Kai’s phone. His ringtone was “Moonlight Sonata.” I hadn’t heard it before, and it was startling.
    “That’s weird,” he said. “Who would be calling me at this hour?”
    He answered the phone, and then he looked at me. He pushed the phone toward me, looking a little befuddled. I took the phone and answered.
    “Hello?” I asked.
    “Alice, it’s Will,” said my brother. “It’s almost five in the morning. and you have school tomorrow. Should I come pick you up so you can get ready?”
    “Oh, shit,” I said. “I completely forgot about school. How’d you get this number?”
    “Caller ID,” Will replied. “You called me from this number.”
    “I’ll take you home,” offered Kai.
    “You don’t mind?” I asked.
    “Not at all,” he assured me.
    “Okay, thanks,” I said. “Will, my friend is going to bring me home.”
    “Oh, okay,” Will agreed.
    “See you soon,” I told my brother. “Bye.”
    I handed Kai his phone, and my heart sank. I didn’t want to leave him this way. I had no idea when his mother would be coming home or what would happen when she did. I was worried. I’d almost forgotten about his hand, and I took it in mine and looked at it.
    It was red, and the injury was obvious, but it didn’t look nearly as bad as it had a few hours earlier. It looked like it had happened weeks ago. I looked up at him.
    “Your hand,” I said. “It looks a lot better.”
    Kai quickly became self-conscious and pulled his hand away.
    “It wasn’t that bad in the first place.”
    “Yes, it was,” I said. “It looked horrible last night.”
    “It was dark,” he explained. “Maybe it just looked worse than it was.”
    That was a plausible explanation. Or, it would have been if I didn’t have