Page 25 of Cold Foot Curse

She pursed her lips against a tremulous smile as she performed the wizardry that Kade had shown her on the coffee machine. She got a little insecure when it didn’t do anything at first, but figured out the little machine was just warming up the water.

She picked a caramel macchiato flavor of creamer, made with something called oat milk, but she was pretty sure oats didn’t have any titties to get the milk out of it, so while her coffee made itself, she did an internet search on oat milk just to make sure it wasn’t something weird before she drank it. It seemed harmless enough.

Plus, when she poured it into her steaming cup and took a sip, it tasted delicious. Way better than the powdered, fat free, sugar free kind Samuel insisted she and Misty consume to ‘keep their figures.’ That had always been weird to her because she was a shifter. It was hard to even gain weight. Likely, Samuel just needed a sense of control over everything. He’d been like that when she’d been reunited with him. Control was his gig.

Kade said he killed Tanner.

“Stop,” she gritted out.

I didn’t say anything, the animal answered.

“I’m not talking to you.”

Then who are you talking to?

How did she explain to her animal that her voice wasn’t the only one she shared her head with? She had her own thoughts, and sometimes she didn’t have the best control over them.

She knew her brother. He was controlling, and mean sometimes, but he wasn’t a murderer. Not like Kade was.

She didn’t know where to sit. There was no assigned seating, like at her other house—

Cage, the animal argued.

“House,” she said aloud, correcting her.

Jess could sit on the couch in the living room, or the loveseat, or the dining table in front of the window. The blinds were open above the kitchen sink, and outside, there wasn’t a cloud in the sky.

It was six in the evening, and she was doing her morning routine. She frowned down at her coffee. This was a bad idea. She would never get back to sleep tonight. But then again, she’d already slept for twenty-one, almost consecutive, hours, so probably she wouldn’t sleep tonight anyway.

With a shrug, Jess took another sip of coffee and noticed a piece of folded paper on the end of the counter, over by the pantry.

No one would get angry with her for turning lights on here and wasting electricity if it was just her, so she turned on the kitchen lights and made her way to the note, a flutter of confusing hope filling her heart with each step she took toward it.

Jess set the coffee down and unfolded the paper. A stack of money fell out. She counted out a hundred dollars in twenties. What the heck? She put the money down and read the note out loud. “Jess, I wanted to give you my number in case you need it. I’m shit at texting people back, but for you, I’ll probably try. Maybe.” She giggled and read on. “There’s a bike in the garage, and a couple of stores right outside the main entrance of the neighborhood. It’s an easy ride. Seriously, if you need anything, I’m just up the mountain. Thanks for trusting me. Just breathe. Kade.” She uttered his signed name quietly.

He'd scribbled his phone number at the bottom, and while she was thinking about it, she went and grabbed her phone, and saved that number, and also the one on Raynah’s note. She had contacts here. It made her feel a little better. Not so alone, and all.

She took his note into the bedroom and re-folded it and then placed it under her locket pouch. She was starting a little pile of treasures.

Just breathe. She smiled, and then nodded, and walked right through the kitchen and to the back door. She pulled it open and on the back porch, she sank right down onto a swinging chair that looked out toward the woods behind the house. There was a fence on two sides, but not at the back, and the view was great.

And she drank her warm coffee right here, swinging lazily, and no one bothered her, or asked her do something for them, or bossed her around, or got her in trouble for something little she hadn’t even realized she was doing wrong. No one was picking apart her every move.

The quiet wasn’t so scary out here where the birds were singing.

She sat out there until her coffee was gone. She sat out there until the sun was setting. She sat out there until her stomach growled to remind her she hadn’t eaten in a long time. She sat out there until her swirling thoughts steadied out.

And then she did something that confused her down to her soul. She tucked her hair behind her ears, lifted her phone, smiled, and took a selfie.

She studied the picture of her. She hadn’t taken a selfie in so long. This was what she looked like now? An unpaired, childless, Crewless thirty-two-year-old broken shifter with facial scars, a smile that didn’t reach her eyes, and a huge question mark for a future?

Feeling hateful toward herself, she did something awful—she sent that picture to Kade with the caption,I don’t remember how to breathe.

It wasn’t until she hitsendthat she freaked out. Why the heck had she done that? Why had she opened this text thread? She’d only been awake for a little while, and she was supposed to heal up and figure out her feelings on everything, and she was being way too vulnerable with a man almost immediately? And not just any man. A man who had wrecked everything. Twice.

She tossed the phone onto the seat of the swinging chair and busied herself with trying to figure out how to turn the firepit on. She couldn’t do it. There was a metal turnkey sticking out of the side of the firepit, but she clearly wasn’t turning it correctly, or maybe it wasn’t hooked up or…or…something. Her eyes were burning. She’d been so stupid to take that dumb picture.

It was getting harder to breathe.

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