Redeem

3- Come Again?

Elena rested her head on the pillow as everyone hurried out of the room, her mind reeling from the doctor's confession of her accident to her realization of her memory loss.

9 months.

Her mind was blank for a timeline of 9 months. She couldn't believe it.

'Okay, think, Elena! Think. What is the last thing you can remember?' She asked herself. She closed her eyes.

She remembered waking up bright and early for her morning jog the day before her first day of senior year of college. She got up, showered, got dressed, prepped her camera, because she loved to take pictures on her jog. Then, she was out the door.

She felt the warm, summer breeze on her skin as she jogged around the block of her apartment complex, the one she shared with Hannah, and then all the way to her favorite spot, the park. She managed to snap a couple of pictures of the trees and of people around her before the hot dog stand caught her eye in her camera lens. She pulled away from her camera and pondered.

Oh, what the heck? She jogged enough to earn her this one little treat, right? She reached the stand and asked the vendor for one hot dog with ketchup and mustard on it and sauerkraut and relish on the side.

"Here you go, miss." The vendor said, sweetly.

"Thank you." She replied, as she handed him two dollars for the hot dog.

She turned around to head home and as soon as she was about to take a bite of her food, she felt a hard body bump into her. The electric shock of the bump made her drop the hot dog and almost made her fall over if two strong arms didn't wrap around her waist to catch her; the exchange almost happening in slow motion.

Her hands rested on his chest to steady herself; their bodies would have been flushed against each other if her camera wasn't around her neck. "Hey, why don't you watch where you're. . ." Her voice trailed off as she looked up, like really high up, at the face of the person. . . or statue of a man, more like, who broke her fall. He had short cropped hair, black as night, golden tan skin, beautiful, big pink lips and. . . bags under his eyes? Very hollow eyes, at that. You can see the pain etched in them but she started to see a light spark through them once again. Was it because of her, perhaps?

He looked tired, worn down, but that didn't make him any less handsome. Slight stubble adorned his jaw. Oh, how she wanted to reach up and lick that jaw. ". . . going." She managed to say, as she took herself out of her trance.

The beautiful man laughed as he looked down at her, bringing life to his once hollowed eyes, their breathing syncing together. "My apologies. But it's not everyday you can say you've been touched by an angel." The low baritone of his voice sounded melodic to her ears and made her stomach do back flips, and her nether regions do. . . other things.

She cackled. "Nice one. Does that line usually work for you?"

He smirked. "I don't know. You tell me, you're the one with your hands still on my chest."

Noticing he no longer had his hands around her waist tightly, she immediately took her hands off of him as if she had been burned by fire and she may as well have been; he was so warm, she didn't want to leave his embrace.

She gasped. Could it be? Her parents told her the signs of finding your mate. Warmth. Electricity. Your wolf instantly connecting with theirs. But sadly, she didn't have a wolf. She was just a human.

He laughed a beautiful laugh at her action. "Hey, let me buy you another one." He gestured to the hot dog on the ground.

She smiled and nodded. "Okay." They made their way back to the hot dog stand.