The Hunt

Chapter 10

I wake up to a dark and cold room, at least I think it's cold. All I feel right now is heat, due to Clio still laying on top of me and keeping warm. The moment I see her peaceful sleeping face, my heart melts. I gently kiss her forehead before playing with her hair. I can't believe how lucky I am, and it's just now settling in. An ear twitches, and I realize she's looking at me. "Good morning, beautiful." I love it when she blushes. "Good morning, handsome." I kiss her softly and break soon after. I see her smirk, knowing that she's got something in store for me. "Lesson one on how to kiss: tilt your head to make it deeper." She puts her hand behind my head and pulls me back in for another kiss. This time, she turns my head when our lips meet, causing the missing spark from before to ignite. She breaks the kiss and giggles, knowing she's broken me. "Why does that make all the difference?" She blushes and looks away. I know there's something she doesn't want me to know, but there has to be more to this than just tilting your head. I gently stroke her jaw as I pull her to face me once again. I smile reassuringly, trying to comfort her as best I can. "So there's this... energy I have. It makes me intoxicating. Every touch feels ten times better because of it." She gently runs a claw down my jawline while smiling. "It also works for things you do to me. Including kissing me like that." It's starting to all make sense now. "So if I kiss you like that, it causes the same spark in you as it does me?" She nods and giggles. I hear my brother moving around in the other bedroom. "Let's get up, love. I'd love to stay in bed all day, but we do need to do stuff today." She groans and reluctantly moves to let me up. I start to get up when suddenly I'm pinned to the bed with both of my arms above my head. "What's the password?" She playfully growls. I lean up and deeply kiss her. This causes what feels like fire to flow through my veins and makes concentrating nearly impossible. I can tell it's affecting her too as she's struggling to hold herself up. I break the kiss and smirk, knowing that was the right answer. Our eyes meet, the flame orange once again in her eyes like our first night together. "That is not how you get me to let you up. That does the opposite of what you want." She smirks, her eyes intensifying in color. She slowly leans down and whispers in my ear softly. "I'll let you off this time. But next time, you won't be going anywhere." Her gentle breath on my neck and ear is causing shivers to run down my spine. She softly nips my neck, a fang breaking the surface of my skin with ease. I feel the same burning I did with the cuts on our first night. She holds herself up again, locking eyes with me. I can see she's not satisfied with her results. She leans back down to the small hole her fang made. She kisses the spot with the wettest kiss ever, causing more of her "poison" to enter my bloodstream. With that, I can barely think about anything else but her. I can get used to this. She pokes my nose and smiles lovingly. She moves off of me once more, motioning for me to follow. I try to get up, only to have my body betray me and refuse to move. She smirks, knowing that she won. She crawls off the bed and puts on her hoodie and custom pajama pants before picking me up gently and setting me on the floor in front of her. I try to take a step, however, my legs are still jelly and don't let me move at all. I lean back into her and look up, giving her the "I'm trying my best" face. She smiles and lifts me to stand on her feet and then walks us out to the small dining room. I can't believe I thought she was going to kill me. Alex smiles and shakes his head when he sees us. I'm glad someone is amused. "Morning, love birds." "Morning. How'd you sleep?" He shrugs and sets two full coffee mugs on the table. Me and Clio sit down at the bench across from him. "Pretty good. You guys?" I shrug. "We slept great. I need another coffee mug." They both give me a weird look. "Clio, I love you, but you drink all the coffee in one go." My brother gets out another coffee mug and sets it on the table. I take the two mugs and split the contents evenly. I hand her a mug and, as expected, she drinks it all at once. I give my brother a "told you so" look and take a sip of my coffee. "Okay. I need to know. The door. What happened." I point to Clio and sip more coffee. "I don't know how doors work. Besides, it wasn't like you were going to help." She's got me there. I think the door was the least of my worries that night. He looks at the still destroyed door. "Well get dressed because you're going to help fix it." I drink the rest of my coffee quickly and then motion for Clio to let me out. She moves out of the bench and stands up, moving so I can get out myself. I push myself to the end of the bench, praying that I've regained my walking ability. I glance up at her, seeing her smirk. She knows just as well as I do that I can barely walk thanks to her. I slowly stand up on my own, using the table and the back of the bench to balance me if need be. I smirk at Clio and take one step before falling face-first into her soft arms. "You okay?" "Yep. I'm all good." She picks me up and carries me back to the bedroom, carefully putting me down on the bed. I smile and kiss her collarbone as a thank you for carrying me. I can't reach her lips, or else I would've kissed them instead. "Can you get my suitcase, love?" She picks it up and sets it next to me. I reach in and pull out a pair of jeans and a T-shirt and put them on. I slowly slide off the edge of the bed to attempt standing again, nearly falling to the floor when my feet make impact and my knee nearly caves. I slowly take my first step, my knee still wobbly yet holding me up. I slowly walk to the door myself and pause, concentrating on not performing a random gravity check again. I feel the familiar feeling of fur behind me and her whisper. "Let's go, babe."