Bite Marks (The Lycans 5)

But then there was the woman I stared back at right now. I was still Kayla, but I was also something darker, someone who could pretend to not be lost in this world, yet I had no idea where to go or how to get there to ease that wandering ache.

My clothes weren’t modest. They never were when I went into the city, where the danger was close enough you could smell it in the car-exhaust-scented air, feel it from the heat rising from the pavement that had been cooking under the sun all day. No, this Kayla wore revealing strips of fabric with intricately—strategically—placed ribbons.

I lifted my hand and ran my finger along my bottom lip, smearing the redness across the side of my mouth and cheek, a macabre sight that if I imagined hard enough might be what I looked like after I got fucked.

A humorless laugh left me. Fucked. Yeah, something I honestly had no desire to participate in outside of my dreams and fantasies. Right? Something I had no experience with.

I cleaned up my face and headed out of the bedroom, down the hall and stairs, and grabbed my bag that sat on the table in the foyer.

My uncle’s Tudor-style house was surrounded by five acres of wooded land, only two of those acres actually now my own property. The remaining three were part of a wildlife conservation owned by the city. So although it wasn’t technically “mine,” several times a week I did walk through the forest. Even if I wasn’t supposed to.

But I liked to break the rules, going against the “good girl” persona that had always clung to me whether I wanted it to or not.

I opened the front door and left behind everything that wasn’t me.

When my uncle passed away and I found out he left me everything, I hadn’t bothered making it my own. The plates and cups, silverware in the drawers, and cupboards were the same as when he’d been alive, the things he used to eat breakfast, lunch, and dinner with.

I slept here, used its address to get my mail, but it wasn’t my home. It had never felt that way despite how many years I’d lived within these four walls.

And I didn’t think it would ever feel like that.

I’d ordered an Uber twenty minutes ago, and just as I pulled out my phone to check where it was, a flare of headlights flashed before coming closer up the driveway.

I tucked my phone back into my clutch and wrapped my arms around myself, the frigid February weather not as bad as it could be, but given the fact that I was scantily dressed for the club, every inch of bare skin was whipped and assaulted by the chill.

“Hey,” the young woman said as I opened the back door and slipped inside. “Kayla?”

I smiled and gave a nod. “That’s me.”

The woman typed out coordinates in her phone for downtown, and then we were on our way, the glow of the professionally landscaped property disappearing as darkness and trees surrounded us.

Aside from a minute amount of small talk, I was thankful my driver wasn’t very chatty. She would have found out that I was a poor conversationalist.

“Yeah, I’m doing drive-share to get some extra money for summer classes.”

The silence was broken up as she decided that now—five minutes before we arrived at the club—was a good time to tell me about her aspirations.

“Are you in school?” she asked.

I couldn’t see her eyes in the rearview mirror, but I felt her glance at me. “I am. I go to the university in the city.”

“Cool, cool,” she said. “What are you majoring in?”

“Psychology,” I replied absently as I stared out the window. A subject I picked because I wanted to find out what’s wrong with me.

She made a little sound of acknowledgment, but she didn’t delve into any more conversation, thank goodness.

I’m also in therapy, something I do purely to humor myself, to try to find out why I am the way I am, simply to figure out if I was programmed this way, or maybe past trauma—like losing my entire family—short-circuited my brain.

“And you?” I prompted after a few seconds, feeling obligated to ask in return. I always felt out of place when I was one-on-one with another person. Maybe that’s why I hit up the clubs frequently—because when you were surrounded by so many bodies, it was a very intimate experience. You are one among many, but you’re almost invisible despite all the bodies surrounding you.

It was hard to explain, harder to put into words, but yeah, when I was alone or even with a handful of people, it always felt so crowded, so impersonal.

I always wondered if I had some kind of antisocial personality, not something as far gone as being dissociative, but detached enough that I just couldn't connect. I’d had meaningful relationships in school, throughout my life. I’d loved my uncle and connected with him on an emotional level. But even then, I still always felt a little bit out of reach, as if we were standing right in front of each other yet, if I held my hand out, I couldn’t touch him, couldn't really touch anyone.