Page 7 of Out of My Flocking Mind

Harrison dropped his gaze to the floor as though thinking. “He won’t target you again.”

“You say that like you know him.”

He shook his head. “I only meant that people who do this typically do whatever they wish and move on. The victim rarely survives, but I have never heard of someone actually returning to the same victim more than once.”

“Which tells me you know exactly what happened.”

“It isn’t your business.”

I poked myself in the temple and winced as soon as I did it. Still sensitive. “Seeing as someone just took a lovely little stroll through my brain, I feel like that makes it my business, don’t you?”

Harrison stood, his actions slow and bored, as though he’d already grown tired of this conversation and me. “No, I don’t, any more than someone who gets splashed by a puddle during a chase still has no business in the chase. If you are awake now, you will recover, so no lasting harm was done. Drink water with salt to help you recover more quickly.” He nodded once, then turned to walk out.

“Wait one minute.” I caught his arm, annoyed by the fact he felt it was okay to walk in here and just drop shit like that. Clearly, he was involved in this nonsense, and now he thought I’d just ignore it all? That I’d pretend it hadn’t happened? “You can’t just leave like that.”

He didn’t turn around fully, instead twisting his neck enough to peer over his shoulder at me. “I believe I can. This is also a poor way of showing thanks. I believe this is the second time I have saved you.”

I opened my mouth to argue, then snapped it shut. He was right, no matter how much it annoyed me. He’d saved me once before, when he’d realized I had hidden in that box as a crow during a council meeting, when he’d snuck me out safely. Now he’d apparently scared off the fucker who had attacked me.

Knowing that didn’t help, though, since I still had no idea who that someone was, or even why it had happened.

“I called someone over to clean up the mess. Your neighbor’s body will be discovered later today and they will rule her death a suicide.”

“Body?” The word hit me hard, the acknowledgment that my neighbor hadn’t survived it.

Why had I, then? Because Harrison had interrupted him, or because of what I was?

Harrison nodded but showed no signs of sympathy, as though he didn’t give a fuck about her death or my feelings on the subject. “Most don’t survive such an attack. Humans never do, and most spirits who survive the initial don’t do so…whole. That you are not a raving madwoman says you did, however.”

“Or maybe it’s harder to see, given how I normally act?” I let out a weak laugh as I released him, shaken to the core by the realization of how close to death I’d been.

He paused, as though considering just how to handle this. Was he thinking about saying something else? Comforting me? I couldn’t imagine that, which was why when he nodded one last time, then walked out, it didn’t shock me.

The opening and closing of the front door echoed up the stairs, telling me Harrison had left. My home, the place I normally loved, where I felt like I could let my guard down, suddenly didn’t feel nearly as comforting as it had before.

My little piece of personal heaven, my den, my nest—it felt trampled upon. Even though that shadow hadn’t come in here, it seemed tainted, like he’d touched it and ruined it all at once. The idea made me sick, made me want to scrub the place top to bottom, but I knew that wouldn’t help.

It didn’t matter how much I did, how I cleaned, how I bleached it all, it wasn’t my home that had gotten dirtied.

That shadow hadn’t put his filthy hands on my home, but on my mind, my past, my memories and my emotions. He’d riffled through them, watching them as though they were his own personal form of entertainment.

I slid to the floor, my body weak and my mind in chaos. I’d always felt like no matter what happened, my mind was my own. It was the only place I could have complete control, the only thing I knew was mine and mine alone, but that shadow?

He’d taken that security and torn it away, he’d slipped into my memories and that fact terrified me.

He’d tainted the one thing that truly mattered to me.

What an asshole.

* * * *

I scraped the butter knife across the toasted bread, smearing the jelly over it all. It was one of those fancy jellies they called fruit spreads with little bits of actual fruit in it, but I could forgive Galen for that.

“You know, sneaking into a werewolf’s house is—”

“Dangerous—I know. The real question is why do you only buy this weird healthy stuff?”

He glanced at the jar then shook his head. “It’s made with no added sugars.”

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