Betrayed By You

Ch.8 - How Long Can I Hide?

 I hadn't been at Duval's long before I started feeling less like myself. After the first week the nightmares stayed around, but I had the feeling that if he knew I was still having nightmares two weeks later he'd try and take me to a doctor to get sleeping pills or something or take me to a therapist. That was the last thing I needed, so I put on a mask of sorts and just kept going day to day. I entered records for a shipping and receiving facility so luckily all my job required was me sitting at a computer entering in data and the most beyond that was getting up to do some inventory.

Downside? All I did was sit at a computer and enter data. The less sleep I got the harder it was to focus and enter the information in correctly. I kept worrying that I was making mistakes or that I would eventually make a big mistake and get fired. There weren't many jobs in Orange Pine Valley.

Duval was nothing but supportive when I told him my fears about losing my job. "If it happens, it happens. I'll help you find another one. No matter how hard it gets. And if anything happens you always have a room at my house. I've been thinking about expanding anyway."

"Besides the living room, kitchen, both bathrooms, and your room you still have the basement, guest bedroom, your old room, Devlin's old room, and the den your dad used. Why do you need or want to expand?"

"For the change. Change can be good sometimes."

I thought about that and nodded, staring down at the tea he'd made. If you were with Duval tea was always an option. It honestly surprised me that the man wasn't jittery all the time with as much tea as he drank, but at the same time if you knew him he drank a lot of water. I hadn't known him as well as I thought until I saw him packing his lunchbox for work one night. He'd loaded it down with water bottles. Large ones. He said it was because water helped keep him calm and awake. I tried it and he was right. Water was easy on the body and it allowed you more energy. He probably would have made me drink even more of it than he did if he'd known I was a shifter. I didn't quite know what he was, but he wasn't all human. I didn't know if it had anything to do with who his brother was though. Devlin never had smelled right. Not from day one. Something was seriously wrong with him.