One of his hands slid under the cotton of my shirt, the roughness of his calluses sending shivers through me.
The tingling under my skin intensified, sending a bolt of fear through me.
Elliot’s hands froze.
“You’re okay, Seth,” he said softly.
It felt like my pulse was going to push its way through the veins in my throat.
“Deep breaths,” Elliot murmured. “In, and out. In, and out.”
I closed my eyes, panic and frustration thick in the back of my throat. I wanted this. Wanted Elliot’s hands on me—and in me. But I didn’t have the ability to push down the feral animalistic side of my new-shifter self. It also wanted that—but when it wanted something, it threatened to rip through not only my self-control, but my skin and muscle and bone.
“Stay with me here, baby shifter.” Elliot’s voice was calm, even, controlled. I couldn’t hear any trace of disappointment, although God knew I was feeling enough of it.
I swallowed a couple times, too much saliva in my mouth in response to the lengthening of my teeth.
“Breathe,” Elliot repeated.
A few more deep breaths, and I was back in control, although there was still plenty of fear and frustration to go around. It just wasn’t going to win—well, it wasn’t going to force me into a shift. I was pretty sure it had, in fact, ‘won,’ at least in the sense that it had effectively killed my immediate interest in sexy time.
Elliot’s, too, if the fact that he slowly and gently withdrew his hands from my sides was any indication.
I put my hands on the counter, staring down at them, feeling my pulse in my fingers, staring at the lines on my knuckles, the funny cords of my veins and tendons, the slightly leathery texture of the skin on the backs of my hands. How human they looked.
“Seth.” Elliot’s voice was gentle, but there was an edge there.
I said nothing. I didn’t know whattosay.
“Seth, look at me.”
I didn’t want to. I was too ashamed.
“Seth.” His voice was at once rough and gentle.
I shook my head, my knuckles white from where my fingers pushed into the surface of the counter.
His palm pressed against my spine, soothing rather than arousing. “Seth, it’s okay.”
“I hate it,” I managed, my voice strangled by the mix of emotion and frustration.
“I know,” Elliot replied, the palm on my back moving in a calming circular motion. “It’s normal, at first. You’re still a baby shifter—it’s been what, three months?”
“Three months and a week,” I said.
“Exactly.”
I did turn to look at him, then, and his hand slid from my back. I missed it. “How long is it supposed to take?” I asked him.
“It took me years to get full control of my shifting,” Elliot told me, leaning his hip against the counter on the other side of the sink from me.
“You were also going through puberty,” I pointed out with a grumble.
“True,” he replied. “But it still took years. You can’t expect to have it figured out in only a few months.”
I didn’t look at his face, instead staring down at his bare feet. He’d definitely had work boots on in the basement, and I wondered if he took them off at the top or bottom of the stairs.
“Seth, you’re doing really well,” he said.
