Page 6 of Guarded By a Monster

The scent of warm sugar flooded my nose and I closed my eyes to breathe deep. The sharp sound of metal being ripped heralded the smell I craved being obliterated by something awful. I put my hand over my nose to try to block it out.

Her soft voice made me still. She was looking right at me. I almost panicked, wondering how she could see me. She wasn’t looking at me, but my eye. My one good eye still glowed red in the dark.

I shifted and eased onto my haunches. She expected a small animal, so I tried to look like one. I kept still until she stopped talking. She wrapped her arms around her middle and I wondered if she was cold.

She wasn’t going back inside. She wouldn’t as long as I was still there.

I turned and shuffled away, making as much noise as possible. I heard her deep sigh. Her door opened and closed. And I went back, staying close to a tree in case I needed to use it to shield my eye from view. I needn’t have worried. She never looked toward the trees again.

I waited until the last light clicked off. Ten minutes later, I snuck close to the house, pausing below each window to listen. The one to the far right side was cracked open, and warm sugar once again filled my nose. I could hear her breathing, deep and slow and even.

I took a risk and stood up, wanting to see her one more time. The blinds were closed. Disappointed, I trudged to the back step and considered the stinky glop in the bowl she’d left for me. The raccoons would love it, but I’d have to carry it in my hand. I shuddered, gagged, and quickly dumped it into my palm. I stuck my hand out as far from my body as I could and stuck my nose in the crook of my other elbow.

The raccoons were waiting when I got to their tree. They chittered as I set down the foul-smelling chunks. “Don’t get used to this. I may not go back, or she might tire of feeding me.”

The littlest one patted my leg with its paw before it grabbed a sizeable chunk and scurried away.

I ran the rest of the way home and didn’t bother closing the door before shoving my hand under the tap and scrubbing with the flowery soap Kendal bought for me. Even after washing three times, my palm still smelled awful. I made a mental note to ask Kendal what it was and how to get rid of the odor.

A tiny scrape against the wood floor spun me around. I dropped into a ready crouch and flexed my claws.

“Relax. It’s just me.” Quin stepped out of the shadows and into the small circle of my kitchen light.

My eyes narrowed. “What are you doing here at this time of night?”

“Where were you?”

“Out for a walk.”

He hummed. “Can’t sleep?”

I shook my head. “It’s too quiet.”

Nodding, he said, “Yeah. I can’t either.” He laughed. “Isn’t that funny? We couldn’t wait to leave the lab and all its beeping machines and scientists poking us at all hours and now here we are,”—he spread his hands wide—“free and unable to sleep because it’s too quiet.”

“Kendal says we’ll adjust.”

His hand scrubbed from his forehead to his nose before dropping off. He stared at the ceiling. “Yeah.”

I wanted to be alone, but I wouldn’t turn my brother away. “Do you want to stay?”

I expected him to make a joke. Some smart quip that would make me laugh and mask whatever he was feeling.

Instead, he simply looked at me and nodded. We piled together into my bed and slept. He was gone when I woke up the next morning.

That night, we repeated our actions. I stayed with the woman until she was asleep, then took food that was meant for me to the raccoons.

Quin would join me an hour or two later.

After a week, it was a solid nightly habit. Until the night everything changed.

five

It had been anotherlong day. Sophia still wouldn’t talk to me, I wasn’t any closer to seeing the animal in my backyard, and I was on edge waiting for a detective to call me about the murder.

All I wanted was to get home and soak in a hot tub until my fingers and toes went all pruney.

I dragged myself from the car, pulling my bag over my shoulder. I was digging out my keys when a loud meow chastised me for being late the third time this week. “Okay, hold your britches, Sir, I’m coming.”

---