Page 9 of Tempest

The other man’s bushy mustache—the same shade of gray as his thick brows and hair—twitched in amusement, though he was obviously trying not to show it. His light blue eyes were positively twinkling though. “Go ahead and take a seat, son.”

Ore grabbed the back of one of the chairs. “Are you sure I can’t help?”

“No, no, I’ve got it,” the man insisted. He went over and opened the refrigerator door, disappearing from view for a second. “Do you want water, juice, or milk? We don’t have soda, but I could have my grandson get some if you want.”

“Water’s fine,” Ore said, sinking into the wooden chair. His fingers fussed with the edge of the T-shirt he was wearing. It was black with faded lettering he couldn’t really see anymore, but it was soft. And even though it was thin, it made him feel protected.

The man’s face popped back out from behind the fridge door and studied him. “Hmph. I’m going to give you orange juice. You could use the vitamins and electrolytes.”

Ore raised his brows. “Um, okay.”

The man disappeared for a second again before reemerging with a bottle of orange juice.

He studied the man as he moved around, filling two glasses from the bottle, returning it to the fridge, then bringing them over to the table one at a time. Ore was pretty sure he was a black panther—though he wasn’t sure how he knew that or the fact that they were pretty rare.

Picking up his glass, he took a sip of the cold juice and then couldn’t stop himself from chugging down the rest. Goddess, he was parched. The sweetness was also hitting him fast, waking him up a bit more.

“Mhmm,” the older man said knowingly, setting a plate with a roast beef sandwich and some potato chips in front of him. He took Ore’s empty glass right out of his hand and went back over to the fridge, pulling the juice out once more.

Ore barely paid attention, his mouth watering at the scent of meat and cheese hitting him in the face. He wanted to wait for the other man to sit to dig in, but he couldn’t stop himself from snatching it up and taking a huge bite.

Good Goddess.

He’d eaten half of it before his second glass of juice was set in front of him. Embarrassed at his lack of manners, he put his sandwich down and wiped at his mouth with the plain white paper napkin next to his plate. “Sorry.”

“Don’t be,” the cat said firmly. He placed the second plate full of food right next to Ore’s first one. “You need the fuel after the last few days.”

“I’ll make another for myself.”

“No, I’m fine,” he said quickly, horrified at the idea of taking food from this elderly man.

“Nonsense,” he huffed, using his cane to tap on the floor twice in emphasis. He’d left the sandwich makings out on the counter, so Ore wondered if he’d anticipated needing to make more for him.

“I’m sorry,” he said softly, even as he took another bite. “I don’t know why I’m so hungry.”

“You’ve been unconscious for three days,” the man said gently, his kind face sobering.

“Three days?” Ore repeated, nearly dropping the last of his sandwich in his shock. “That’s not… What? Three days?”

He couldn’t wrap his head around it. What had happened to him?

The cat hummed, quickly put together another sandwich, and then brought it over to the table. He lowered himself slowly into the chair opposite Ore with a soft sigh. “You gave us quite the scare.”

Ore started eating his second sandwich, but more slowly, his appetite having nearly disappeared as his mind spun. “I can’t remember anything,” he admitted softly, watching the other man through his lashes.

Those bushy brows rose a millimeter before the man cleared his face and smiled gently once more. “That’s not altogether surprising. You were injured when you got here.”

“Where is here?” he asked, ignoring for a second the fact that he’d been so hurt it had taken him threedaysto heal. He had to have been near death for his healing not to have worked faster than that.

“Silver Oak. Kansas,” the man added when Ore just looked at him in confusion. “You flew into our territory a few days ago, and it set off our coven’s wardings.”

“You have a coven?” Ore asked, surprised. He knew it wasn’t completely uncommon for packs to have a coven of witches living within their territory. He wasn’t surehowhe knew that, but it was there in his mind, even though he couldn’t remember what his parents looked like or if he had siblings.

“We do. It’s not large, and neither is our pack.” He shrugged, taking a large bite of his sandwich and chewing slowly. “We’re all cats. A lot of us have been here for generations, keeping to ourselves and minding our own business.”

He said it without much inflection, but Ore could read between the lines. As a bird, he wouldn’t be welcome to stay. They were an isolationist pack, not interested in growing or diversifying their numbers. For some reason, that made him sad.

He frowned down at the crumbs on his plate. For all he knew, he had a family waiting for him. What did it matter if he couldn’t stay in Kansas?

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