Page 25 of Blade

After my nap.

And after my questions were answered.

And after he told me what alternate dimension I’d ended up in.

Yes.

That was a good…we had a good…he was…

CHAPTER 9

HENLEY

It waslike sleeping with a warm bolder on my lap.

Murder kitty made it clear he wanted attention as he’d stretched out over me, but even with naptime over, he still wasn’t moving.

“You’re trying to make a point.” I wasn’t stupid, just a bit confused. “I’m not sure what it is, though.”

Guessing seemed incredibly unhelpful, so I rambled as I went back to petting his back. Giving him attention seemed like a good place to start as I gathered my thoughts. “Alright, I know from the ranger that you’re some kind of shifter and I think you tried to change back to looking human when you were in the truck.”

That hadn’t worked, though.

“I’m going to use words that upset you last time but I think you’re processing things easier now, so hopefully you understand that words can’t hurt you.” Well, in this case they could only hurt emotionally but he couldn’t lash out at them. “The ranger…I really should’ve asked his name.”

Oh well.

“The ranger said that you’ve been trapped in this form for a long time. Do you remember hearing him talk about that?” Lowgrumbles vibrated through him but I waited until he shook his head. “That’s still weird to see but thank you for making your answer clear.”

His cat-like huff made me think he was laughing at me.

“He said you’d been basically magically attacked by a crazy woman.” That might not have been the nicest way to say it but she’d zapped him into this form, so I wasn’t going to worry about being polite. “You somehow ended up not looking quite like yourself.”

Understatement of the year based on what the ranger had said.

“From what I understand you’ve been like this for a long time.” How was I supposed to tell him this? Hearing it from a stranger was one thing but having to explain it was another. “He wanted to call people he thought could help, but after he shot you with the dart, I wasn’t so sure that was a good idea.”

He hadnotshown he was a trustworthy stranger.

Blade’s sneezing kind of snort made me think he agreed.

“He claimed they’d figured out how to fix you but couldn’t find you.” I couldn’t keep talking around it forever. “You’ve been missing for a long time, kitty.”

Something about the words or my tone had him going unnaturally still. I wasn’t sure what to do so I waited until he stood up on all fours and jumped down from the bed.

I hadn’t expected that.

Before I could ask what he was doing, because I was definitely going to ask, he stood up on his hind legs and stretched to see the microwave.

His reflection.

That was dark and probably distorted but I could help with that. “I have a bigger mirror. If you move over to the table I can open the door to the bathroom.”

Yep. He definitely understood what I was saying.

Blade didn’t look happy as he got back down on all fours and moved beside the table, but I was pretty sure that could’ve been about a lot of things. I had to remind myself not to take it personally for God only knew what reason, but it wasn’t easy.

I wanted my new friend to be happy but there was a big ol’ mess of crazy between here and happy.