Mine To Bear (A Paranormal Shifter Romance) (Atonement Book 2) (4 page)

Melissa

She wished he would call, or come visit. It seemed so strange to her. He had been extremely adamant about coming to talk the next day, but then he had never showed up. Since then, no visits, no phone calls, zero contact. It was enough to make Melissa wonder if she had done something wrong. Perhaps it had been the fact that she passed out on him in the hospital. It didn't seem to mix with what she knew of him though, for that to upset him so badly.

Staring out the window, she flinched back in surprise as people walked by. It was only the food delivery men, but every time she saw them, she instinctively panicked. They looked at her rudely, with huge, leering eyes, almost as if they knew her problem and were doing their best to exacerbate the problem.

Dealing with men was proving to be a real struggle for her, no matter how gentle and polite they were. The program she was part of was supposed to help with that, but although she had been there for a week, nothing seemed to have changed. Even the nurses were mystified, she had overheard one of them discussing how she should be making more progress by now.

When it was just her, other patients or the staff, she was fine. But as soon as any roughly adult aged male appeared, her body went into an auto-panic mode, where it shut down her senses and made finding an escape the number one priority. She had gone to classes designed to help her relive and accept the memories, which hadn't done anything.

The worst had been the attempts at helping her overcome her fears directly. The first time, a nurse had decided to see what would happen if she watched some TV with males on it. For several hours, Melissa had sat in front of the screen and admired the rather good looking men on the sports show of some type.

"How is this supposed to help?" She had asked blandly, wondering if they thought she had gone brain dead or something. "This is a guy on a television, I know he's not going to hurt me, because it's a recording."

"We weren't sure how far it extended Melissa," she had replied patronizingly.

"I'm traumatized, not stupid. I'm thinking rationally, I've just developed an instinctual response to any male who looks old enough to hurt me sexually. I can distinguish between those on the TV and those in real life. How hard can this be?"

Her nurse had simply looked at her and then walked out, leaving her to her own devices for the remainder of the day. That had been okay with her, for she couldn't tell them about what was really bothering her either. That fateful night when Edward had rescued her, he had changed, shifting from a gargantuan bear into a human. She was still having a hard time wrapping her mind around that, understanding that such people existed.

What she really wanted, was to see Edward again, and have him confirm that she wasn't going crazy. She wanted to hear his laugh, pinch his arm, and see him transform into his bear. The concept of it was just so
cool
. If he was never going to come visit her though, then she would continue suffering in silence. It wasn't as if she could reach out to him, she had no contact information. She didn't even know his last name!

It was frustrating, having this secret inside of her, something almost eating at her, and not being able to discuss it. When her frustration with the situation ran high, she took it out on her nurses, especially Linda earlier. She made a mental note to apologize to her, so that there wasn't any bad blood between them. The last thing she wanted to do was make enemies here already.

Now if only she could stop trying to run in terror every time a male face leered at her. There had to be some way to fix herself. She had exhausted a lot of the options so far, yet nothing worked.

"Maybe Edward knows somebody who can transform my brain back to normal," she mocked herself aloud, laughing at the silliness of the idea.

Edward.

She sat bolt upright in her chair as she realized what had been bugging her about him, besides what he could do. It was so obvious now, that she wanted to smack herself over the forehead for not seeing it earlier. The proof that she was curable was right there in front of her eyes, and she had missed it.

Edward didn't scare her. She trusted him, somehow. They could talk, they had even made a joke and she had laughed about it at one point. There was something different about him, some sort of effect he had on her. Perhaps it was because he wasn't normal himself, she wondered, something in his body language that told her brain he wasn't a threat.

Whatever it was, nothing was going to happen with her sitting there in the room moping. Gathering her wits about her, she left the room, walking purposefully down the hallway to the receptionist's office. She had no idea how to contact him, but there would definitely be a way to find out. Perhaps the hospital had his name on record because he brought her in. That would make sense, she thought, they wouldn't just take his word that it hadn't been him who had hurt her, so they would need a way to contact him.

"Excuse me, Lucy, can I borrow the phone?" Residents weren't supposed to contact the outside world without authorization. Melissa hoped that if she seemed purposeful and adamant, that she would eventually bull her way into using it.

"What for? Do you have a phone slip?"

"I need to call the hospital where I was at to find something out about my stay. Something has been bugging me and I know they have the answer. It won't be long, I promise."

"Well, I'm not supposed to let you without a slip. But I can't see how calling the hospital where you came from would be an issue, so sure, go ahead."

Lucy slid the phone across the table to her. After a quick internet search, she also provided the number to Melissa, who punched it in quickly.

"Seattle General, how can I direct your call today?"

It took some finagling to find the right department, but eventually she was put on the phone with her nurse, who luckily happened to be working.

"Hello, sweetie?" Melissa had to stifle a laugh at just how stereotypical she was of an old-fashioned nurse.

"Hi, this is Melissa Chapman, you took care of me after I was brought in by a gentleman named Edward. Do you remember?"

"Oh of course dear, I nary forget a face! What can I do for you?"

The receptionist shot Melissa a sharp glance at the name Edward, and then began sorting through her files on the desk as if searching for something. Melissa tried to ignore her, focusing on the nurse.

"Well, I have a question I really need to ask him, something that's been bugging me about where they found me. But would you believe it, I don't even know his last name, let alone have a telephone number for him."

"Hmm, I'm sure it's around here somewhere sweetheart. Give me a moment to check, will you?"

"Of course, thank you so much." She leaned against the wall while the nurse put her on hold. Lucy was still rummaging through the mess that was her desk, as if on a mission.

"Did you lose something, Lucy?"

"Yeah, that guy called for you I think, I have his number here somewhere," she replied nonchalantly as if the fact that someone had called for Melissa didn't matter.

"Is there a reason I wasn't notified of the fact I received a phone call?" Her shoulders felt light as if a weight had been lifted off them, although her eyes narrowed in frustration with the facility. Why wouldn't they tell her someone had been trying to contact her? At least Edward had been true to his word, and had even tracked her down here. That made her feel better, that he hadn't lied to her about coming to see her again.

"Melissa, what is going on?" The voice came from behind her, from Linda, her nurse.

"Trying to get a hold of the hospital to find the number of the man who brought me in. I think he can help me with the process, he was there when I woke up and he can -"

"No, absolutely not!" Linda reached over and hit the release button on the phone, ending her call.

"Hey, what the hell are you doing?" She tried to stop her, but it was too late, the call was ended.

"No outgoing phone calls without a phone slip. You need to come to me to get a phone slip, Melissa, those are the rules here, and they're in place for a very good reason," she continued as Melissa opened her mouth to speak.

"I'm a grown adult Linda, I don't need someone to babysit me. What I need is someone who can understand what's going on in my head. That doesn't seem to be anyone in this place, so I'm trying to reach out to someone who may be able to help."

"It's unlikely that would happen, Melissa, we have some of the best programs in the country here -"

"They don't seem to be doing a lick of good, so let me make the damn phone call to try and figure this out."

"Why don't you come and tell me what it is that's truly bothering you instead?" Linda still stood between Melissa and the phone, not moving an inch. It was getting rather frustrating for her to put up with the talk-down attitude of the staff here, so she let loose.

"What's bothering me is that I was kidnapped by werewolves for three months and then rescued by fucking bears, but nobody in this world will believe me! So I'm trying to contact someone who could help me understand just what the hell it is I saw out there. How hard is that to figure out?"

The nurse and receptionist exchanged glances at her outburst. Though she was yelling at the time, Melissa still caught the subtle gesture from Linda, telling Lucy to do something. Panic set in, that perhaps they were going to ship her off to a psych-ward or something like that. It would be impossible to contact Edward that way, so she subsided.

"Anyways, that's one of the dreams I had a lot until I came here, so I just want to try and sort it out," she mumbled, adding the part about it not being real to the end, which seemed to calm the two of them. She would have to bide her time before trying to get a hold of Edward again. It seemed that despite her being there of her own free will, it wasn't quite as voluntary as it had originally been made out to be.

Sighing, she turned and headed back to her room, thoughts of the tall, muscular bearded man who had saved her running through her mind. Slamming the door behind her, she pleaded for him to come to her.

Edward...

Edward

Edward!

He sat bolt upright, looking around, trying to find the source of the voice. With a start, he realized he had fallen asleep in his office, where it was quiet as always. He must have dreamt the person calling his voice. That made sense he thought, since it had sounded like Melissa, but she was across the city right now, nowhere near him.

Pushing the thought out of his mind, he turned his attention back to the business reports in front of him. He made it to the third line before the words started to blur in front of him, his brain concentrated elsewhere. The night he found Melissa kept playing through his head over and over again. The fear he had seen in her eyes that night struck a chord in him, especially as he recalled how much more carefree she had been when he visited her in the hospital.

Sighing, Edward got up from his desk, leaving the reports until Monday. It was the end of the week and he definitely needed to unwind. As he left the office, he waved goodbye to Jane as the elevator doors closed around him. The metal cage descended to the parking lot, the journey into the dimness a near mimicry of his thoughts.

The connection to Melissa was stronger than he was willing to admit, which scared him. They had barely met, but nonetheless something within her called to him. It wasn't his bear, but something that he and the bear shared that had forged the links of whatever it was he and Melissa had between them.

As he closed the door on his car, his phone spoke up, indicating that he had a new email. Taking thirty seconds to check it, he noted the contents and went to close his phone. As he did, he noticed the email from Jane about the care facility Melissa was in. He stared at the phone for far longer than he had intended, pondering a decision.

Finally, with a sigh, he put the phone down and headed for him. She was there for a good reason, and had yet to reach out to him, so clearly she must be doing well. What good would he be able to add to that? The last thing he wanted to do was halt, or even reverse her healing path. That would have been the old Edward, but now he was trying to end his arrogant ways of the past. This was a perfect example of that change.

The drive through the city seemed to take forever, as he took one back road or shortcut after another, trying to dodge the traffic. Eventually he looked up at a street sign and realized he was slightly off course. That's when the sign appeared.

Turn Right for Placid Cares

He had ended up all the way over near Melissa. The turn was coming up fast, and he had a decision to make. Wrenching the wheel, he made up his mind. This was no time to be prim and proper, something else was at work here. The car practically flew down the road as he followed his gut, trusting that little bit of intuition that had always helped him make excellent business choices. It was about time he had a calling for his personal life as well.

Tires screeched as the car slid to a halt in front of the facility. Edward nearly ran up the steps, his strides long, powerful and practically screaming determination. He was coming to see her, and there would be no arguing. The door nearly blew off its hinges as he barreled inside, making a beeline for the receptionist counter that was directly ahead.

There was a bored looking blond sitting behind the counter, who jumped in her chair as he stopped at the counter, his palms hitting the counter with a loud slap. The nametag on her shirt read 'Lucy' with a small gold smilie-faced sticker on it.

"Can I help you, sir?"

"I'm here to see Melissa. She came in perhaps a week ago from the hospital. Tall, jet black hair, gorgeous curvy figure." His jaw snapped shut at the last line, for it wasn't what he had intended to say. His cheeks flushed mildly in embarrassment, for a recovery facility like this was definitely not the place to act like a man with only one thing on his mind.

The receptionist looked up at him, obviously unimpressed with his last comment. He mentally kicked himself several times, vowing to be better. This was not the time for his old personality to reassert itself. Taking a calming breath, he did his best to look apologetic.

"Do you have an appointment, sir?"

"No, I just need to see her, or speak to her quickly.  It won't take long, I just want to make sure she's okay."

"Sir, I can assure you that she's just fine here."

"Thank you for your assurances ma'am, but I would like to verify that for myself. Also, I had promised her I would come visit her in the hospital, but you folks came and whisked her off so quickly I didn't have the chance. I'm here to keep my promise." He tried to play the faithful card, but it just washed over her like nothing.

"Sorry sir, but without an appointment, I can't let you in."

"Can you at least let her know that I'm here, and then she can come see me? I won't come inside the building, I'll stay right where I am."

"No sir, I'm sorry."

At this point, he noticed another woman approaching the front desk, who looked more officious than the receptionist. This woman's name tag read 'Linda' and she did not appear to be on his side.

"Is there a problem here?" Her tone came off as confrontational right from the get-go, and Edward felt his tempter begin to rear its head.

"Yes, there is a problem. I need to speak to Melissa, but this woman here," he said, jabbing a finger pointedly at Lucy, "won't even notify her of my presence."

"Do you have an appointment, sir?"

"Of course not, and you know that, otherwise we would not be having this argument. Don't play those games with me, I'm not an idiot."

The commotion had gathered a bit of a crowd by this point, and he saw someone pushing their way through to the front. His heart soared when he saw it was Melissa.

"Hi," he started rather lamely, his brain all of a sudden shutting off. He had planned out everything up to this point, but had no idea what to do now.

"Hi, Edward. How very odd of you to be here. I was just trying to call you earlier, but -"

"Melissa, you should go back to your room now please," Linda started to say.

"Linda, I'll do whatever the hell I want. Seriously, I'm old enough to make my own decisions, and you don't own me."

Edward stared in shock at the firmness and authority in Melissa's voice. It was impressive to see someone who had been so abused be so in charge of themselves. She was obviously resilient and ready to heal and move on. All he wanted now was to help her do just that. The thought of doing it so he might see her more didn't even cross his mind, he simply wanted to help.

"How is this place working for you?" He asked her through the stunned silence.

"Honestly I think the first day helped the most, but after that, none of their procedures have helped. I have questions, ones that only you can answer," she replied, her stare burning into him, intimating at their shared secret about his true nature. He nodded once, slowly, to let her know he understood.

"Would you feel comfortable coming for a drive with me to talk about them?"

She smiled at him slightly, obviously understanding his reference, about her being okay in a closed environment with him.

"As long as we can keep the windows down and don't leave the city, I think I'll be okay. You're the only man I seem to be able to be near without freaking out, which is odd. I'm hoping that perhaps we can figure out what it is about you, so that I can reintegrate with society. "

She walked past Linda, who simply shook her head, but didn't make a move to stop her. Edward turned and began to head for the exit, doing his best to stay one step ahead of Melissa. That way, he thought, she would never feel nervous of him being close.

He did open the door to the car for her but allowed her to get in and close it, again to prevent her from feeling closed in by him. She smiled at him and said thank you several times, indicating she understood and appreciated his thoughtfulness.

Pulling away from the curb, they headed out into the suburbs, windows down and enjoying the warm day. Although his bear was growling and straining to be set free, he fought it back, telling himself she wasn't ready for that sort of interaction, and may never be. He needed to be there for her right now, in a non-sexual way. This lead to a long period of silence, where he contemplated both speaking up or turning on the radio. Eventually though, Melissa gathered her thoughts and began to speak.

"Did I actually see you turn into a human from a bear? Or was I so messed up at the time that I hallucinated the entire thing?"

"You saw correctly, there was no dreaming." He kept the answer short and simple, not wanting to interrupt her thought process.

"Are..are you the only one?"

He paused for a moment, wondering how to answer this question. He was far from the only one, there were thousands of other shifters for sure, but they were spread throughout the globe. On the grand scale, it was quite a rare phenomenon, but definitely more common than most normal human's suspected. If she found that out, and decided to speak to someone else about it one day, it might not be a good idea to have that information out there.

"No, not the only one." He decided not to lie, but only to speak for himself, leaving out specific details about any other potential shifter's that may exist. It seemed the best path without lying, and while she looked at him for a long while, evaluating his answer, she didn't question him on it.

"Why were you truly there that day?" They were stopped at a light, and his neck nearly snapped as he whipped his head around to stare at her. The raw emotion and pain in her voice was so clearly evident and now there were tears practically streaming down her face. Thinking back to that day must have brought back some painful emotions, but there were some strong positive emotions attached to it as well. He wasn't sure which ones were bleeding through now.

"The wolves had made a den on Derek's property. We tried to treat with them, to get them to leave peacefully. In return, they chased his wife's vehicle for damn near half an hour one day, almost all the way to his house. That was the last straw." He stopped there, not wanting to go into detail about what they had done to the wolves. It still kept him up some nights, even though it wasn't his first fight with werewolves.

"So the men who took me could also, what was the word you used, shift?"

"Yes, they were wolf shifters, werewolves to be more exact, although, like me, they can control their changes." He frowned, not having meant to give away more details about shifters in general, even if they were the loathed werewolves.

All across shifter society, werewolves always seemed to be the most annoying, ill-tempered and badly behaved of the shifter breeds. They constantly broke the laws, drew attention to themselves and generally were a pain to deal with. Bear's tended to be the businessmen of the shifter world, while wolves were the scumbags, deadbeats and generally less than useful components of society.

They drove for a while longer, without Melissa asking any further questions. The silence wasn't awkward, in fact, it was actually quite relaxing. It had been a long time since he had driven with someone else in the car. When he pulled up to Placid Cares, Melissa hesitated in getting out.

"What's wrong? Are you going to be in trouble for leaving?"

"Oh probably Edward, but that isn't it. It's just -" she stopped, obviously not knowing what to say.

"Is going back there the best thing you could be doing?" He couldn't believe what he was saying, but something was bothering her, and he thought she should talk about it with him now.

"Probably not. But I have nowhere else to go," she said in anguish, doing her best to maintain her composure.

"How can I help?" He wasn't asking if she would like help, he was telling her that it was okay to ask, and to tell him what he could do. She still didn't know about the resources he could bring to bear, but that didn't matter. He wanted to her to ask because she wanted to, not because he was wealthy and could make it happen.

"Edward, I have no family. One friend has reached out to me, but she's in the middle of a nasty divorce and can't help. That's it. I have nothing, nobody. You're basically it, and I don't even know your last name." She didn't turn back to face him, hiding her face and emotions as she spoke, though her voice cracked at least once.

"Desharnais. And if the truth is being told, I have no idea your last name either."

"Chapman," she laughed, which turned into a giggle, and then a gust of laughter as the ridiculousness of that fact washed over her. As he watched, she seemed to shed years and weight off her shoulders as she laughed. Finally, calming down, she turned to face him.

"Edward, I have no right asking this, but is there any way you could help me find a place to stay for awhile? I can't stay here, they treat me like a child, but I'm not sure where else to go." This time her voice didn't crack, no tears were shed, it was someone stating the facts simply and clearly.

"I have some property in the country, where I tend to spend some time. It's quite spacious, lots of room, nobody to interfere. I can switch some staff around so there would only be female housekeepers present. You could stay there for as long as you needed really."

"No no, I couldn't do that, although I really appreciate your offer. I just meant if you knew a place in the city who I could go to, to help get me a job or something."