Page 40 of Bound By Earth (The Nature Hunters Academy 1)

Chapter 12

Tara stepped out of the shower. Her wet clothes still lay in the bathroom floor. She heard a muffled pounding coming from the front door. She hurried out of the bathroom and glanced at her phone.Eleven o’clock.“Who in the bloody hell would be coming over this late?” she muttered. Not to mention it was pouring down something fierce outside. Who would want to be out in that? She quickly threw on her pajamas. Being home alone, Tara knew that answering the door didn’t seem like the smartest move, but the pounding wasn’t going away. In fact, it was gettinglouder.

Tara sent a quick text to Carol to make sure she was okay and rule out that it might be the police at the front door to tell her something awful had happened to her fostermom.

How’s work?

It only tooka minute for a reply to comethrough.

Busy.Youokay?

Tara releasedthe breath she’d been holding, relieved that Carol wasokay.

Yes,ma’am.

Sleep well.See you in themorning.

As quickly asthe relief came, it fled as Tara heard the pounding get even louder. It almost sounded as if the person had resorted to kicking the door in an effort to get someone to answer. Making the decision to open it, Tara figured having someone on the phone with her while she answered it so they could call 911 if something happened would be at least a little smarter than answering it without anyone knowing that something was wrong. Tara picked Shelly’s name from her contacts. Her friend answered on the firstring.

“Please tell me you’re calling because either some fine guy with a name that starts with an E showed up at your house and ravished you and now you want to tell me every delicious detail, or you figured out more about your mutation and now you know yourmission.”

Tara headed toward the front door as she spoke. “Only you would think that could possibly be the reason I was calling, despite the fact that I’ve never even kissed a guy. And you really need to let the mutation thing go. I’m not joining the JusticeLeague.”

“I’ve told you before, T, you lack creativethinking.”

“I’m getting pretty creative about all the ways I’m going to kick your ass if you keep getting on my nerves.” Tara growled as she looked through thepeephole.

She gasped and nearly dropped the phone as she quickly stepped back from the door. The knocking started again, and she jumped and dropped the phone. “Dammit,” she snapped as she quickly reached down and swiped itup.

“What was that?” Tara heard Shelly ask as she put the phone back to her ear. “Was that someone knocking? Who in the fire of Hades is knocking on your door at eleven o’clock atnight?”

“That’s why I called you,” Tarawhispered.

“Why are we whispering?” Shellyasked.

“Because Elias is on the other side of thedoor.”

“What?” Shellyscreeched.

“Shhhh!” Tara hushed her BFFF. “Quit freaking out. It’s making me freakout.”

“Tara, answer the doorplease.”

“OMG.” Shelly sighed. “That accent is just as hot as it was the first time I heardit.”

It was. It really was, Tara mentallyagreed.

“Tara?” Elias called outagain.

“I’m going to answer the door,” she said to Shelly as she reached for thelock.

“Wait,” Shelly said. “Don’t you think you should ask him why he’s at your door solate?”

Tara agreed that would be the smart thing to do, but there was another part of her, apparently the dumber part, that wanted to see him and didn’t really care why he was at the door so late. Something inside of her thirsted for the sight of him, and it was so disturbing that she didn’t even want to consider what it meant. She flipped the lock on the door and pulled itopen.

Elias was standing there, dripping wet. Both hands were resting on either side of the door frame, and his head was hanging forward, causing his dark, wet bangs to partially obscure his face. His grey, long-sleeved shirt clung tightly to his skin, leaving very little to the imagination. Tara swallowed and looked back up to his face. He’d lifted his head and was staring right at her. Aquamarine eyes were drinking her in as if it had been weeks since he’d seen her, rather than merely a day. Elias seemed almost as desperate to see her as she was to see him. That wasn’t normal. It couldn’t be. But it also wasn’t normal that she had a body that couldn’t be injured … yet shedid.

“Tara!” Shelly’s loud voice thundered through the phone, but all Tara could do was stand there staring mutely at the man on herdoorstep.

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