Moonlit Dangers

Chapter Sixteen

I stood frozen in the shower while I deliberated whether or not to answer Kory. Maybe if I was completely still and silent he would go away? Probably not. Shaking my head, I finally replied.

"Ah, no. No you don't." I said, moving my head under the spray to rinse out my hair. "You need to get out and leave me alone. I don't want to talk to you, and I really don't want to talk to you while I'm taking a shower." I heard him moving around on the other side of the shower curtain, and then I heard him walk back to the door. And then back to the other side of the curtain again. "Are you pacing out there?" I asked, curious.

"Yeah." He replied instantly. I was silent, waiting to see if he said anything else. He didn't leave me waiting for long. "Elle, if you don't want to talk to me, then that's fine. But...can you at least listen to what I have to say?"

I thought about it and then grabbed my conditioner off a shelf before putting some in my hair. "Okay. Talk. You have three minutes, because that's how long my conditioner needs to stay in and after that I'm coming out. And you need to be gone by then, so talk fast." I heard soft rustling, and smiled a little at the thought of him running his hands through his hair.

"I'm worried about you. Whoever that was in the basement earlier, that wasn't you. I know that I trained you to fight and to kill, but I don't want you to turn into me. Yes, I have tortured Lycans in order to gain information to save lives. I have killed them, I have maimed them, caged them, and beat them in order to save lives. And I have loathed it everytime. But you don't have to. You are not officially a Guardian, even though you are stuck with us for a while. Downstairs, I saw you almost transform in front of my eyes. It was like...the light just went out of your eyes for a few minutes, replaced by darkness. And it terrified me. I feel like that is my fault." He stopped and took a ragged breath.

"It's not your fault. Why does it matter?" I said softly, feeling bad for a reason I couldn't name.

"I said for you to simply listen." Kory said archly. "Please, don't interrupt me because it's not going to be easy for me."

"Okay. Sorry." I rinsed my hair out, straining to hear the rest of what he had to say over the sound of the water as it rushed past my ears.

"I know that you have been through a lot in the past few weeks Elle. You've been uprooted from your home, forced to train strenuously, been attacked multiple times, and seen your best friend attacked. But, you haven't lost your optimism, or your kindness, the entire time. Yes, you can be snotty, but not very often." I scowled at the curtain; almost certain he was smiling at it. "Until tonight that is. And I can't help thinking it was because of how I reacted after we had sex. I feel like I am the reason you almost lost it. I'm saddened because I feel like you misunderstood why I reacted the way I did." He paused. "Elle, there is no excuse for how I took you. There was no tenderness, no softly whispered words, and definitely not any romance; All things that I have prided myself on with women in the past. I didn't react like that because I thought us having sex was a mistake. It wasn't, in and of itself. I just haven't ever just disregarded a woman's feelings and preferences like that. I mean, I was trying my best to be honorable around you for so long...then, when I couldn't help but make love to you, I practically attacked you. So, I'm sorry. I'm sorry for hurting you by acting like I didn't want you, and I'm sorry for taking you like some sort of beast. I know that it seems like you don't matter to me. I have said many times that I cannot be with you, but, that doesn't mean that I don't care about you. Because I do. So...please, forgive me." He stopped talking, but I could still hear him breathing quietly. Stunned, I was still trying to catch my breath. I held on to the wall with one hand, my other covering my small smile. He didn't think that we had made a mistake. He didn't think I was a mistake. He wasn't freezing me out. And that was the most I had ever heard him speak; at least when not giving orders.