3

CHAPTER THREE

Being forced to sleep naked next to a man you know slaughtered his entire family with his bare hands means I'll be lucky if I get more than two hours of sleep.

I'm curled up in a ball feigning sleep when I hear Dayne turn the shower off and brush his teeth before he pushes the door open.

Not that he would have even noticed my pretense since he stepped out of the bathroom, slipped beneath the sheets beside me, naked most likely since I didn't hear him stop to dress, and seconds later he's snoring.

So, I lie there for the longest time, conscious he's gone to sleep and there's no way I can. Not when he's left all the lights on and the curtain is mostly open. With Dayne in the land of Nod, I won't be following anytime soon since I've always needed a fully dark room and dead silence to be able to sleep. I know I have to get up.

Thirty minutes later, when I'm sure he's deep asleep, I make my move.

Getting out means I have to climb over Dayne. Naked, I might add, so I can turn all the lights off, close the curtains, and finally switch off the bedside lamp.

The man couldn't even be bothered to turn off the bathroom light when he'd finished in there so I do what he should have already, making sure to glare extra hard at his sleeping form as I crawl back over him to get to my side of the bed.

For a second, just as I've thrown one leg over him, his breathing changes and I about have a heart attack at the thought he's about to wake with me on top of him.

Freezing, with my hands braced on either side of his head, I stare into his face, willing him to stay asleep. His eyelids flutter as if he's about to open them and I tense, frantically running through a list of excuses as to why I'm straddling him in his sleep.

But then he goes back to snoring, and I can breathe again as I scurry over him and slide beneath the covers with a quiet sigh of relief. Rolling over to face the wall with my back to Dayne, I gratefully close my tired eyes.

Only what feels like two seconds later, I'm woken by something hitting me in the face. Peeling my eyes open, I'm confronted by the sight of dark material.

It's a pair of his sweats and a t-shirt, I realize once I tug the fabric off and try to blink myself awake.

"Get up. We're leaving in ten minutes," Dayne growls before disappearing into the bathroom, leaving me with a brief memory of tanned golden skin, as I struggle to force myself to wake up.

I'm not and never have been a morning person, and with the lack of bright light coming from the window, warning me it's still far too early, I'm in the process of drifting back to sleep again when the bathroom door is shoved open, and the scent of mint and lemon bath wash invades the room.

"Or I can leave you here," Dayne says. "It's up to you."

Nothing is guaranteed to wake me up faster than the threat of being left behind. To die, most likely. That or find myself crawling back to Uncle since I'd have nowhere else to go.

I snatch up a sheet and wind it around me, trying to work out how I can get past him and into the bathroom he's blocking with his body. A naked body that takes everything I have to keep my eyes from.

His gaze goes to the sheet around me and he shakes his head a little as if bemused by me.

Like I said, my shyness about being naked is not the shifter way, so I fully understand why he finds my behavior strange.

"Two minutes," he states, stepping aside and heading for his duffle bag, presumably to dress.

Darting into the bathroom, I realize a shower is out of the question since there's no time. Which leaves me less than a minute to finger brush my teeth, splash water on my face, shove the sweats on, and then we have to leave.

But at least I had a shower last night, so I don't smell.

He, of course, has had a shower and brushed his hair and is looking perfect in a pair of blue jeans, a white v-neck t-shirt, and the same cowboy boots, while I'm looking ridiculous in sweatpants at least two sizes too big for me, a shirt that hits my knees and my hair is a bedraggled, tangled mess.

We've passed two Walmarts and a host of other shopping malls before I summon up the courage to speak, since it doesn't look like he's going to be stopping. If I don't say anything soon, we'll leave all the cities behind us and then it'll be too late.

When he stopped to load up on breakfast several miles back, I tried to speak but all I succeeded in doing was putting myself off the bacon, egg, and sausage burrito he handed over. So instead, I sat there trying to swallow a bite of food that didn't seem to want to go down.

Meanwhile, Dayne inhaled burrito after burrito as we sat in the parking lot, sparing me no more than a cursory glance when the scent of my fear once again made a sudden, and no doubt to him random, appearance.

He probably thought I was crazy since he'd done nothing but hand me a burrito.

Finally, after clearing my throat, I glance over at him. "Um, Dayne." My voice is low, barely audible over the music he has playing.

But it's loud enough for him to hear. "What?"

"I.." I pause to clear my throat again.

"I…"

He shoots me an exasperated glare, still speeding down the road. "Speak up."

"Can you please—"

"I can't hear you."

Maybe if you didn't have the music on so fucking loud, then maybe you would.

"Talis. Do you, or do you not have something to say?" he barks when I go silent.

I feel a tendril of anger stirring.

"Yes," I snap.

Abandoning watching the road, which considering we're on a freaking highway is so dangerous I'm ready to scream, he turns to stare at me.

Fortunately for both of us, it's not even seven yet, early enough in the morning the highway isn't packed full of people on their way to work, and we don't crash and burn in a fireball at the side of the road. Though, given the way Dayne is eyeing me, I wonder if that might not be the better alternative.

Immediately, I lower my eyes and scoot as far away from him as I can.

"What did you say?" his voice is a low rumble of sound. Clearly, he has no problem speaking over the bass and guitar on the radio.

Since I've lost the ability to speak, I say nothing, just shake my head and hope the scent of my fear is enough to spell out loud how I'm feeling.

But instead of reaching over, wrenching my door open, and tossing me out into the path of oncoming traffic which my imagination is all too eager to show me, he flicks the radio off.

We sit in silence for at least two minutes, though it's probably closer to five before my fear recedes enough, I find the courage to speak.

"I, err..." Sensing I'm going to chicken out if I don't just say it, the words spill out of my mouth fast, "…I don't have any clothes so can we stop at a Walmart to get some? It doesn't have to be a lot and I'm not fussy. Maybe just a pair of pants a couple of t-shirts. I, err, I don't need shoes. And I'll… I'll get a job and pay you back. I promise."

I've never had my own money or even a job. The way it's supposed to be is everyone works for the good of the pack, and any money earned by those who do work goes into a communal shared pot which the alpha manages.

I know this can't be wholly true, no matter what my uncle told me because I couldn't help but notice some of the other members of my pack had their own money.

Money enough that they'd go out together and they never needed to ask Uncle for any cash first. Only me.

So, I know things can't be the way Uncle said they were. But I guess in the grand scheme of things, compared to all the other things he did to hurt me, lies were probably the least harmful.

"No shoes, huh?" Dayne asks, his voice mild and his gaze once more on the road. "And what kind of job do you hope to do with no shoes?"

I start thinking, saying the first thing that pops into my head. "I could… maybe I could do waitressing, or work in a shop?"

I risk sneaking a peek over at him, since it's impossible to tell what he's thinking from his expressionless voice. He looks calm, but at the creak of plastic I lower my gaze to his hands on the steering wheel. His fingers are so tight they've gone white, and as if conscious of my attention, his grip loosens.

"I see. And your social security number the employer will ask for. What is it? And a car to get to this job of yours that requires no shoes, what about that?"

I stare at him.

It never crossed my mind I'd need a social security number. But it's so blindingly obvious now, I can't believe the thought never occurred to me. I know I must have one, but I have no memory of anyone telling me what it is because I never expected to ever leave the pack.

There was never any reason to believe I'd have a life outside the pack, and now I begin to understand the other ways my uncle has kept me tied to him.

He knew.

He must have known that if I ever dared to leave, no one would ever hire me, at least no one legal would.

There were a couple of times when one of my old pack would take me to the store to stock up on food, and without Uncle Glynn there, they weren't always as cruel.

Sometimes, they even let me drive back which I used to polish my non-existent driving lessons, which I never took since shifters don't attend public schools.

Since regular humans can't know about us, it's not safe for us to be around hormonal and extremely emotional kids when we are also learning control. All it would take is one out-of-control moment, one shift, and the consequences could be deadly.

Mostly we're home-schooled, though many from my old pack eventually did go to community college. But me? My education stopped when I got my high school diploma and there was no longer any risk of social services turning up wanting to know why I wasn't going to the public school. That and Uncle refused to pay for college for someone who offered so little worth to the pack.

There's no response I can even make to Dayne's questions since if I don't even have shoes, how the hell am I supposed to have a car? So, I let silence be my answer, but clearly, that's not enough for him.

"Talis, your answer. I'm waiting for it," he says, his gaze still fixed ahead.

"I don't have it," I whisper.

Dayne nods as if my answer doesn't surprise him the least. "The way I see it, you have no way to get a job to pay for the clothes I purchase for you. Do you?"

Hearing him say out loud how dependent I am on him for everything, for my very survival makes me sink lower in my seat and stare down into my lap.

Useless. Why am I so useless?

"No." My voice is a thread of sound, so low it's little more than a soft breath.

"So, unless you want to be working under the table jobs somewhere. Which, considering where we're going is close to impossible to find a job like that, I don't see it happening. Do you?"

I say nothing. After all, what can I say? What's the point? We both know the answer to his question. Instead, I shake my head, before turning my attention outside the window as we continue down the highway, slowly leaving the hustle and bustle of city life behind us.

I'm still dressed in one of Dayne's t-shirts and a pair of folded over sweat pants which are much too big for me.

And as I watch, we speed so fast past what looks to be the last shopping mall for a while it's gone in a blur, the area becoming more and more rural.

My eyes burn with unshed tears at the knowledge I have so little.

No, Talis. You don't have little. You have nothing. Absolutely nothing to call your own.

And, in a silence that has become deafening, Dayne reaches out and flicks the radio back on.

Staring out of the window as we pass some of the most beautiful views I've ever seen in my life; all snowy-topped mountains in the distance, bright blue skies, and lush, amber-red trees of Colorado in Fall. I'm too busy fighting back tears to appreciate any of it.