“Anything else you wanttoknow?”
“Well... there’s the obviousquestion.”
I looked him up and down with my eyes and then made a claw-like gesture with my hands. He raised his eyebrow trying to figure out what I meant, and then he laughed. “Oh, you mean the shifter thing?” I nodded and sat back and waited for him to answer. Every person had their own personal story, and the thing with shifters was you never knew if they were born into it or if they were turned at some point in their life. Unlike vampires who were all turned at some point, shifters always had a uniquestory.
“It happened around the time my parents were killed,” he said. He frowned then, looking back down to his hands. “I don’t remember it, but I was turned when I was young. I managed to escape as a teenager, and that’s when I came toLondon.”
“I’m so sorry, James.” It is hard to imagine what he would’ve gone through at that point, losing his parents and being turned into a shifter at such ayoungage.
“It’s okay, really. I love the lifestyle, and I wouldn’t change anything. Apart from my parents, ofcourse.”
“It must have been awful not having family anymore,” I said. “Even as an adult, I can imagine it’s not easy.” My heart broke for him, and I wished there were something I could say toconsolehim.
He took a sip of his wine and shrugged. He then flashed that gorgeous smile of his and gave my hand a squeeze. “That’s enough about me, let’s hearaboutyou.”
I sighed then. I realized that the conversation would eventually get to this, and I wasn’t exactly sure how much I was willing toshare.
“Well, what would you liketoknow?”
James looked me up and down studiously for a long moment and then looked up into my eyes. I felt a connection with him and I couldn’t quite explain it. I really knew nothing about the guy, but I felt safe when I was around him. Like I no longer had to hide who I was, and I could finallybeme.
“I want to knoweverything.”
14
Imanagedto evade most of his question questions that he threw at me before our dinner came. I answered every question with a response masked as flirtation. It could only go on so long like that, though. He had just asked about the reason I moved to London, when the waitress finally appeared with ourplates.
“Wow, that looks amazing,” I said as she placed the massive steak in front of me. My mouth began to water as my stomach rumbled again, and I looked up at James eagerly as he watched me with curious eyes. He raised his glass to cheers once more, and I took a quick sip of my wine before diving intomymeal.
I was absolutely ravenous, and the sensation of the warm, red meat between my teeth felt amazing. I moaned as I ate. I hadn’t eaten anything so substantial in quite a while, and the pleasure I felt from the meal was overwhelming. Take out Chinese food just didn’t have the same satisfying effect as a high-qualitysteak.
I pretty much devoured the entire thing in one go, and by the time I came to my last bite, I realized I had hardly tasted it at all. I had inhaled it like a starving animal, desperate for the last piece of meat. When I finally took a breath and looked up at James, his eyebrows were raised and I couldn’t tell if he was horrified orimpressed.
“Hungry?” he laughedatme.
I nodded as I dabbed my napkin on the corners of my mouth. “I guess I didn’t realize just how starving I actually was.” I took another sip of wine to wash down the steak, and my stomach rumbled again. I held my hands tight against it to hide my embarrassment, but James had obviously heard it with his superhumanhearing.
The waitress walked by to refill our water glasses and top up our wine, and asked how ourmealswere.
“I think she’ll have another one,” James said amused as he watched me lick my knife. The waitress looked at me shocked for a moment, but then a quick smile spread across her face and she nodded politely. I had to hand it to her, she played the role quite well. Even as a young adult, I couldn’t stand working in restaurants. The forced politeness was just too much for me to handle. She watched me eagerly, waiting for me tospeak.
“Yeah, actually. If it’s not too much trouble. Thank you.” I was slightly embarrassed, but my overwhelming hunger pushed the embarrassment just far enough down the list of feelings on my priority list that I didn’t seem to care enough to politelyrefuse.
James took another bite of his fish and watched me as I picked my fork through the braised beans that were still on my plate. “So, do you only eat meat, or do you eat other things, too?” He laughed as I pushed the vegetables around myplate.
“You know what, James. I’m starting to ask myself the same thing.” The beans were not appetizing in the slightest, and all I could think about was the juicy, freshsteak.
It didn’t take the waitress long to bring my next plate, and my mouth watered again and she placed it in front of me. I offered her the plate with my vegetables to be taken away, and was happy when she did so without saying a word. I should be concerned of what James thought of me, but right at that moment I was solely focused on the meat on myplate.
As I cut into the dark red steak, James took advantage of my silence to ask more questions. “So, what brought you toLondon?”
I closed my eyes and savoured the flavor of the meat as I chewed and swallowed. I felt so content and comfortable, that I wondered why I had even considered holding anything back from him. “I came for work,” I said as I chewed my food. I swallowed and took a sip of wine, and then thought carefully about how much I should tell them. “I was sort of a detective,” I told him. “I came here with colleagues of mine for aninvestigation.”
“And you liked it so much that he decidedtostay?”
I shook my head and took another bite of steak. “Actually, there was an accident and my colleagues disappeared. I stayed because,” I chewed and swallowed my food before continuing, knowing I had to be extra careful with just how much I divulged. As much as I wanted to share my life story with him, as I knew he would sympathize, I didn’t want to get him wrapped up in any of the mess that I was in. “There was an accident and they disappeared, and I stayed so I could get to the bottom of it. To find out what happened. To getclosure.”
James look shocked and put his cutlery down, then he looked at me with concern in his eyes. My heart melted just a little bit, as I’d never been looked at like that before. “So, you’re still hereworking?”
