Claimed by a Beast

  Jade Alters

  Contents

  1. Adelaide

  2. Noah

  3. Adelaide

  4. Noah

  5. Adelaide

  6. Noah

  7. Adelaide

  8. Noah

  9. Adelaide

  10. Noah

  11. Adelaide

  12. Noah

  13. Adelaide

  14. Noah

  15. Adelaide

  16. Noah

  17. Adelaide

  18. Noah

  19. Adelaide

  20. Noah

  Afterword

  Also by Jade Alters

  © Copyright 2019 – Starchild Universal Publishers Inc. - All rights reserved.

  It is not legal to reproduce, duplicate, or transmit any part of this document in either electronic means or in printed format. Recording of this publication is strictly prohibited and any storage of this document is not allowed unless with written permission from the publisher except for the use of brief quotations in a book review.

  This book is a work of fiction. Any resemblance to persons, living or dead, or places, events or locations is purely coincidental.

  Created with Vellum

  Adelaide

  Frigid air hit my face as I shoved my way outside.

  Ugh. My damp shirt clung to my icy skin. Still wet. Still sticky too, thanks to the angry passenger that tossed an open Coke can at me because I wouldn’t let her take it on board.

  As if I made the rules.

  At the time, it seemed like too much trouble to change clothes, so now I sported half-frozen Coke on my uniform.

  While the security officer escorted the crazy passenger away, I’d bitten down on my tongue and ignored her tirade of insults. I’d managed not to let a single retort slip out of my mouth, but it had been a close thing. The unruly behavior would only increase. Thanksgiving was four days away and the holidays always made for rowdy passengers.

  My job as a TSA screener wasn’t glamorous, but it was necessary for our country. Sometimes it sucked to be the passengers’ punching bag, but it paid the bills.

  Beside me, two men walked briskly to the row of cars near mine. Those two had gotten off an international flight; I’d watched them get off the plane in person, not over a security camera.

  Their nationality was irrelevant to me, but the fact that each of them carried only a briefcase wasn’t. I’d seen them step off the flight from Qatar. An international flight from Qatar was twenty-three hours, at best. Most of the time, delays put the trip closer to thirty hours. Traveling without luggage was a red flag. A big one.

  We were trained to be aware of everything. I didn’t want to be aware. I wanted to turn my brain off. My shift had ended, and I wanted to go home.

  But it was too late. The men had my attention. After what happened to my brother…well, there wasn’t much I wouldn’t do to prevent that from happening to someone else.

  If these men were terrorists, I wouldn’t let them destroy another family.

  With a sigh, I gave up on trying to talk myself out of it and followed the two men.

  A few miles from my cabin, they turned onto a side road, one clearly labeled for hauling supplies to a lumber camp. Private Property, it said.

  There were no lights on the road, no buildings. I wasn’t law enforcement and trespassing wasn’t on my list of fun activities to do after dark.

  If I called the police, these guys could turn out to be the owners of the lumber camp and then I’d look like a jackass, even though I’d had a reason.

  I’d check the security footage tomorrow and find out where they entered customs. For now, I needed to get to my second job.

  My little cabin was a welcome sight. It wasn’t big, but it was cozy. The porch light glowed a warm amber and the snow sat perfectly atop the cedar log railing.

  As soon as I’d bolted my front door, my phone rang. A photo of my parents at their fortieth anniversary party popped up. My watch said I had three minutes before I was on the clock for my second job.

  “Hi, honey!” My mom’s voice boomed over the phone line. “What are you doing?”

  “Just walking in.” My grimy uniform hit the floor; it could stay there for now. The hotline used voice-only calls instead of video, so I was going to wear pajamas for this shift.

  “There’s an opening here, at Portland International. You might even get a raise. Or a promotion!”

  My mom never stopped campaigning to get me to move closer.

  “I love you, mom, but I have to go.” A clean pair of yoga pants made me feel a million times better. “Tell Lucy and dad I said hello.”

  “Oh,” my mother’s voice dropped. “That job. It’s not…” she trailed off, but I knew what was coming. She asked me this question at least once a week. “It’s not getting to you, right?”

  The words she didn’t say hung in the air. I already lost your brother. I almost lost your sister. Why do you have to dwell on other people’s suffering?

  “It’s important. I’d do it full-time if it paid the bills.” One day in the future, when I was a certified therapist, it would pay the bills.

  “I’m sorry sweetheart,” she said. “You know we don’t want you to feel pressured to help us with the finances. We can manage just fine.”

  They couldn’t manage, not even close, but there was no way I’d ever point that out. “I know mom. I want to.”

  After my brother died, my dad withdrew. My mom existed in a state of false cheeriness interspersed with extreme fretting. Neither of them were realistic about anything anymore. My practical, down-to-earth parents had disappeared forever. And my younger sister, Lucy, who’d been fifteen years old at the time, had coped with drugs and alcohol.

  Finally off the phone, I got settled at my desk. The pajamas were comfy, but I couldn’t lounge on the couch and forget that I was working. With a fresh cup of tea in hand, I logged in.

  Within minutes, I had my first caller of the night. I took a deep breath. This evening shift had to be better than the shitty day I’d already endured.

  Noah

  “Hello,” a woman’s voice said. “You’ve reached Crisis Counseling. I’m Adi. Can you tell me who you are?”

  My back pressed against the bedroom wall until each vertebra dug into the plaster. Each breath stabbed through my chest. I pressed my hand over my face.

  I couldn’t even get my fucking name out.

  “Take your time,” she said.

  For the first time since I got back, that kind of understanding comment didn’t piss me off. If someone from my shifter clan expressed patience or sympathy, I couldn't stand it.

  At least this woman was paid to pity me. I drew in one breath. Then another. I stared at the phone in my hand. “I’m Noah.”

  “Hi, Noah. It’s nice to meet you. Can you tell me a little bit about why you’re calling?” Her voice was low and her tone was even. Listening to her talk would be a much better option than talking about myself. Too bad that wasn’t what we were doing here.

  What the fuck was I going to say? Someone betrayed me. Someone fucking betrayed me, our country, and our squadron. I lost my entire unit. Every single one. They weren’t just my brothers in arms. They were my family—my clan—and the worst goddamn part is that one of them was the rat that sold us out.

  The rat had just been so damn stupid that he ended up getting blown away too.

  I pushed my hands against my eyes as if the pressure would stop the images streaming across them. “Flashbacks.”

  “You’re having flashbacks,” she said. “Are those from recent combat?”

  I pressed my spine harder against the sheetrock. “Yeah.”

  “How long ago?”

  Taking a deep breath was impossible. It was no use. My breathing picked up until I was panting. Fuck. I hadn’t been able to control my mind for weeks, but now I couldn’t control my body either. “Three weeks.”

  “You haven’t been home long.”

  Home. Right. I was home, instead of back in Pakistan, trying to figure out why our mission blew up and went straight to hell.

  Home, in a dump of an apartment because I’d sold my own cabin when I thought I’d be on a year-long deployment.

  I was home on administrative leave, which is the polite way of saying, we don’t fucking trust you with this anymore. My shoulder blades dug into the plaster of the wall. “No. Not long.”

  Now on my feet, I walked to the other side of the room, then back. I’d walked ten-thousand steps in this room today. With each step, my chest got tighter.

  Usually, when I was freaked out, I went out and shot something or I shifted into my bear form. Neither was an option right now. My bear wanted out, but I couldn’t leave the house. A soldier in the middle of a flashback was hard enough to cope with. A bear shifter in a flashback would be impossible.

  “Noah, we don’t have to talk about the flashbacks first,” she said. “We can talk about other things.”

  “We can?” Part of me assumed this was being recorded by my commanding officer. Nothing would surprise me now. The counselor going off-script wasn’t expected.

  “Absolutely,” she said. “Tell me about your favorite movie.”

  She had the sweetest voice. No way could she be a soldier. Not because she was female, but because she still had hope. She might know about trauma, but I’d bet she hadn’t seen war, not up close. I was glad for that.

  “It’s uh...Ghostbusters.”

  “Yeah? I l

ove that one too. Did you watch it as a kid?”

  “Over and over.” Growing up, my shifter clan wasn’t big on television, but my aunt had a small one. Every time Ghostbusters came on, she’d yell for me to come over and she’d give me beef jerky from her secret stash to eat while I cheered on the good guys.

  Becoming one of those good guys had been my goal ever since.

  My chest wasn’t being squeezed as hard. My breathing slowed. “That.” I stopped walking and leaned my head against the wall. “That helped.”

  “I’m glad. If you’re ready, we can go back to the reason you called now. Are you aware of anything in particular that brings them on? Some clients notice certain sounds, smells, or even phrases can cause flashbacks.”

  Yeah, I’ve noticed what brings them on. It’s every fucking second I’m still alive and they aren’t. How’s that for a trigger? Having my commanding officer stonewall me from getting more info wasn’t helping much either.

  “They’re pretty frequent right now.” Frequent as in non-stop.

  “Do you think you could start keeping track of what you’re doing beforehand? Maybe try writing down what you’re doing when one starts. Some survivors find that helpful.”

  I’d have to write down one word: living. That’s what brought them on.

  My throat burned. My vision tunneled. Nothing I did could stop this one from coming. My eyes closed against my will.

  Some of my squad had been shifted when the attack happened. I’d been on sniper duty, so I’d been human that day. We were trained in every elite skill that humans use, including intelligence gathering, decoding, hand-to-hand combat, weapons, and surveillance, and on top of that, we were trained to fight as bears too.

  Without warning, a blast threw me backward. Yellow light flashed over my eyes. Searing heat burned my face. I rolled behind a rock. Grit filled my mouth. Sand scraped against my cheek. My head spun. I pushed myself up but fell flat again.

  Time passed in silence until sound began to flood back in. Screams. Roars. My squad was below me. I had to get to them. I flopped to my back and crawled, inch by inch, for twenty feet. Dust filled the air. Nothing was visible until I was right on top of my squad.

  Dave’s blue eyes were glassy. Blood dripped from his mouth. Josh’s fur was a blur of red. No one moved. I crawled again, on my stomach, from shifter to shifter. No one was breathing.

  My cousin lay on his side, not moving. “Chris!” My voice didn’t work. “Chris,” I croaked out. I shook him. “Come on.” I pressed my head to his chest. No heartbeat.

  Dust clogged my throat, but a tiny sound gave me hope. Jesse. Half-buried under rubble, ten feet away, his heart was still beating. “Jess! Hang on. I’m coming.”

  “Noah?” A female voice called my name. “Noah!”

  The underside of the bed was right in my face. To my right, the phone lay a few feet away on the shag carpet. Fun. I’d had a flashback and crammed myself under the bed...while I was on the phone. I pushed myself out, making the metal frame creak. It was a tight squeeze.

  “I’m here,” I stammered.

  “Oh. I’m glad,” she said. “Did you have one then?”

  “Yeah. They don’t stop.”

  “Okay. Don’t give up, okay? There are so many options. I can get you connected to a counselor you can see in person. We can try medication. A lot of people are having luck with service dogs and therapy dogs.”

  Yeah, right. Meds didn’t work on me, not unless there was an elephant tranq lying around. A dog would be nice until I turned into a bear and scared the piss out of it. Dogs are not a bear’s best friend. A counselor might work if he or she was a shifter.

  “This is good for now,” I said. Her voice was soothing in a way nothing else had been.

  “Yeah, that’s great. You can call this hotline every day,” she said. “You mentioned they’re non-stop. Are you sleeping?”

  “No.” The nightmares were worse than the flashbacks.

  “Do you want to tell me about what happens at night?”

  Her voice calmed my jumbled nerves, but this was stupid. I couldn't tell her anything. Everything was classified.

  And by the way, I’ve had to lock myself in my apartment because if I get really freaked out, I’m not going to harm myself, I’m going to turn into a bear.

  I wasn’t safe to be around. But unlike other headcases, a taser couldn’t take me out. Or a needle. Or even most gunshots.

  How’s that for a hotline call story she could tell her colleagues?

  If I was lucky, she’d probably think I was having delusions.

  I hung up.

  Adelaide

  “Noah?” I tapped my headset. “Noah, are you there?”

  Nothing.

  I checked the call log on the screen. He’d hung up.

  My stomach twisted as I unplugged my headset. Hang-ups happened from time to time. All of the callers were dealing with a lot. Sometimes they got overwhelmed and they hung up. I wasn’t allowed to call back, under any circumstances. If I felt like the caller was a threat to himself or others, I was supposed to contact my supervisor but I couldn’t call back.

  I hadn’t wanted this one to hang up. His panic and misery came through loud and clear over the phone. I usually did a pretty good job of staying empathetic with the callers without letting them affect me personally. But this caller had been different. He’d affected me.

  I really hoped he would find some peace.

  When I woke up the next day, Noah was still on my mind. I was scheduled to work the hotline again that night from seven to ten p.m. Maybe he’d call back during my shift, but for now, I had airport security to focus on.

  Without clearance from my boss, I couldn’t review the footage from last night.

  “Do you have a minute?” I asked, sticking my head inside his office. It was stuffed full of discarded furniture and tangled cords. He waved me in, so I explained that I’d seen two guys leave last night from an international flight and they’d only had small briefcases.

  “Where’d you say they came in from?”

  “Qatar.”

  “And what’d they look like?”

  “Medium height, medium build. Overall they were nondescript, but they did have on suits and they drove straight to a lumber site after dark.”

  “Ethnically, were they Middle Eastern?”

  “Yes,” I said.

  “Jeez.” He smacked his forehead. “Why don’t we just go ahead and write the headline?” He waved his hands above his head as if mimicking a banner in the air. “Are passengers having a Happy Thanksgiving in Maine where the Bangor Airport TSA engages in racial profiling?”

  Damn him. Following my training was the right thing to do. “You know that’s not what’s happening here. I’d have brought this to you if they were red-headed women from Finland.”

  He pointed at himself. “I know that.” He pointed at me. “You know that.” He dropped his arms. “No one else knows that. Nor do they care.”

  My hands went straight to my hips. “We need to do our jobs, without worrying about negative headlines.”

  “Tell that to the big boss then,” he said. “Adelaide, we have an influx of people coming in today. We don’t have time to investigate the people who aren’t even here.” He made a shooing motion with his hands. “Get back to work. Screen the travelers that are here today. I’m sure they’re just greedy businessmen trying to make a buck like the rest of us.”

  “Fine. I really hope that I’m an overly paranoid, suspicious freak who’s spent too much time waiting for someone to do the worst.” I leveled one last look at him. “I really do.”

  I caught the door with my arm before it slammed shut. Mateo was a decent boss when he wasn’t worried about licking his boss’ ass. He could be worse. A lot worse.

  Back at my station, I did slam the nearest safety cone to the ground. Fine. If Mateo didn’t care about criminals entering the country, I did.

 

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