i have to go

[bethany]

no more carefree laughter silence ever after
walking through an empty house tears in your eyes

The cold air pushed at the little body of Charlotte Bennett as she made her way along the winding road within the woods. She took comfort in that light breeze, that little touch of nature that reminded her that there were some things past everyone’s control. Pressing her feet harder into the rocks beneath her she wished she could burst into a run, but held herself back to try and make sure that she wasn’t detected. Lottie was always on guard, and she knew that if anyone spotted her she’d have to dispense of them quickly and without fuss. Her eyes glowed red in her face but she chose not to think about it, it was just part of her life. Her eyes used to be a clear bright blue when she was human, before she was turned. Lottie became a vampire not by choice; it had been a last resort. She was left for dead after having her skull bashed in by a man coming out of a bar. Her memory was blurred on the actual details but she could still remember the smash of pain, and then the burning that started about three hours later. Charlotte shivered as she remembered those terrible three days, but then she pushed it back to the recesses of her mind and continued with her walk.

Her eyes flicked over the scenery of forks and she wondered again why she wasn’t just passing the day shopping with Alice, it would have been a lot easier than leaving her alone with her thoughts. She had spent the night reading, hoping the next day would be sunny so she would have an excuse to spend the day with Peter, but no it had been overcast as ever. The thought of spending a complete day with Peter had definitely warmed her, but then the sun decided to not come out. Forgetting these kinds of thoughts she switched her head to thoughts of clothes and once more her face split into a grin. Lottie was a bubbly girl unless you caught her in one of her reflective moments; she had moments of complete madness, then complete silence. Many people compared her to the ocean, wild and turbulent one moment, and then smooth as glass the next. She always laughed at it, but hey it was sort of nice to think about. The ocean was untameable, a little like her really.

Charlotte finally reached a clearing in the wood and sat herself down on a rock, getting a good look over the entire scenery that lay before her. It truly was a beautiful horizon. Her red eyes took everything in, and then settled far out over the ocean, her brain going with her gaze. She lapsed into daydreams of far off places that she was going to see one day, things she was going to do with Peter by her side. The two of them only met through their old coven. A coven that had almost cost Lottie her life again. Thank god Peter had left with her so she’d have lost everything. She breathed out by instinct, even though she didn’t really need it anymore. Breathing was natural to her still, even after all the years that had passed. Lottie was nineteen years of age when she was changed, she had just had one hundred and twenty fifth birthday. A long time. Laughing to herself she tried to hear, pushing what she could pick up on. It was a favourite game of hers, to see how much she could push her heightened senses. Her eyes were amazingly good now; it was time to start work on her ears.

She settled herself completely and she stretched her hearing out, as if trying to encompass the entire world that surrounding her. It wasn't an easy feat but it was helpful to get the practice in. Her mind travelled to her first meeting with Peter even as she thought however. She'd tried to pull him to pieces just the same as she had tried to tear everyone else. He hadn't known, and she was yet to tell him, that that was the first night after her transformation, that was why she had been so angry. The three days of pain had just finished and her nerves were pulled so tight over spikes it had just been her instinct to attack everything in sight. The thirst had been so bad it was clawing at her, yet in his prescence she had settled down, not even Jasper had been able to do that. Her head had been full of pain and blood lust, yet he broke through it to her sensible smile. She grinned despite the nasty connations of the evening. Her first day as a vampire had been a baptism by fire, in both ways.

Once more bringing her concentration back to the centre she forced herself to focus, but then she heard another approach, smelt their scent. Breathing a sigh of relief she found it was one of her kind and not a human. Her eyes had gone black with thirst, she really needed to feed, she wasn't sure she could resist if a human crossed her path, and she didn't want to feed anywhere near forks just incase it bled back to the Cullen's, she refused to comprimise their lives in Forks more than they had already done themselves. She grinned as the other vampire appeared through the trees into her new found clearing.

tag -- peter

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[peter]

i've got to make a play to make my lover stay
so what would an angel say? the devil wants to know

Peter let out a growl of frustration as he stalked through the forest, following Charlotte’s scent. She never stayed where he told her to. From the time he’d first met her she hadn’t been very good with taking orders, it was a part of the reason she’d fought so hard when she was first brought to Maria’s camp; refusing to be controlled and ordered about. She was constantly pushing limits and boundaries, not necessarily intentionally, though she’d been know to be deliberate time and again…no usually it was just out of curiosity and most likely today, boredom. After all, Forks wasn’t exactly known as a particularly exciting place, and the monotony of eternal life was enough to bore anyone as it was. Thank goodness he had Charlotte, otherwise who knew what kind of shenanigans he would have been partaking in to occupy his endless time. He’d found out from Alice that she’d decided to take a walk in the woods.

So here he was, trekking back out the way he’d come, his crimson eyes lifting up to look at the cloudy sky. Forks was permanently cloudy. Since he and Charlotte’s arrival a few days before it had been nothing but murky clouds and drizzle. Peter was lucky, at the moment it wasn’t rainy, though the remnants were definitely there. The grass was beaded with the last clinging drops and his tennis shoe clad feet sunk with each step. He’d been out all afternoon with Jasper, hunting and playing catch up. It had been a while since he’d seen his old friend and they had much to talk about. They’d both ventured out into the woods, Jasper attempting to introduce Peter to his new family’s way of life. They had dubbed their method of feeding ‘vegetarianism’ and while Jasper willingly agreed that animal blood wasn’t nearly as satisfying as human blood, it helped when it came to his power, that at times proved to be quite annoying.

Peter had been so famished he’d agreed to it. He was open-minded after all, he’d try anything once. Charlotte however had been rather unmovable…not that he blamed her. The thought of feeding off animals was rather unappealing when one was so accustomed to their natural food source. He and Jasper had crept up on a small family of elk grazing on the other side of the lake across from the Cullen house. It had only taken them both a matter of seconds to take down one a piece. Peter had broken the neck of the animal quickly, drinking its blood while it was still warm. By the time he was finished he’d decided that there was no way in hell he would ever be a vegetarian. Out of all the blood types he’d ever tasted elk blood had been by far the most fowl tasting thing he’d every had the misfortune of swallowing. How Jasper did it was absolutely beyond him.

A smile crossed Peter’s face as he came to a wide clearing in the center of the woods. Charlotte’s sweet scent was the strongest here and it only took him a moment to spot her, sitting on a rock, her back to him. He licked his lips, crouching low to the ground and creeping toward her with silent steps. She wasn’t easily frightened, in fact most often she heard him before he had a chance to get to her, but he was in the mood to prove a point. One could never be too cautious and one of these days her running off without him was going to get her in trouble. No, he thought, shrugging the possibility away…the very idea of someone attempting to harm Charlotte making him furious. He’d kill anyone who touched her without a second thought. Even Maria if she was brave enough to continue her pursuit of them. It had been a few years since he’d sense someone behind them, but he knew Maria…the woman knew how to hold a grudge and she could wait decades if necessary if it meant her revenge. As far as Maria was concerned Peter was the one who had poisoned Jasper’s mind against her, who’d convinced him to leave her and the old ways behind…which was accurate, but Peter would be damned if he was going to let her get within an inch of Charlotte.

If she wanted to get all scrappy she could deal with him. He’d show her what was what. The last of her assassins had crossed their path while he and Charlotte had been traveling through New Mexico. Peter had made quick work of him, but there would be another. He wasn’t naïve enough to think otherwise. When he was close enough to make a lunge for her he stopped, bending his knees, bracing to leap. A moment later he was in the air, soaring toward her, ready to tackle her from behind.

[bethany]

no more carefree laughter silence ever after
walking through an empty house tears in your eyes

Charlotte bit back a laugh as she smelt the first wave of his scent hit her nose full pelt, it was like a wrecking ball to her senses. She was so very used to it that nothing could mask it unless he rolled around with werewolves for a few days, and the fact she was concentrating extra hard helped. Using her nose and without moving a muscle she pinpointed exactly where he was and once more stopped herself from laughing. She knew he would be annoyed at the way she hadn't stayed where he had told her to, but truly if she was honest, Charlotte never did as she was told. She went with the flow and she moved with the wind, it was a need to just fight the system and fight the way things were laid out and recently it had been getting even worse, ever since she spoke to Alice and found out about Maria.

It always came down to Maria. She was like a brick wall that seemed to spring up on every side of both Charlotte and Peter and little Lottie despised the other woman for it. All Lottie wanted was to live in peace, to stop fighting and merely be happy, but vengenance always followed. Assasins and spies, friends who were not friends, it was like they could never truly escape anything. Maria had just reappeared in her life for what she hoped was the final time, because if Lottie didn't kill her it would never end. She knew it was terrible to think that way, that she had to kill to end it, but it was the only way. She knew Peter would be livid if he found out she was planning to do away with the problem herself. But it had all really started with Alice. Alice Cullen was her best friend in the vampire world save Peter himself, and Lottie owed her mate a debt she had never repaid, because by letting her go he let her be happy, it was time to cash in her response. Maria seemed to believe that Alice had enchanted Jasper some how, and to Charlotte that was the final straw. Alice would never do anything to harm anyone. She was a wonderful person, and she didn't deserve the hassle of some wretch like Maria bothering her and trying to ruin her life. Jasper belonged with Alice. And Charlotte was going to see to it that they remained together, whether she died in the process or not. Lottie had been risen to repay favours that were owed, and that was what she was going to do. She was going to let Jasper be happy.

Charlotte didn't dare think of what Peter would do if she actively went out on a search for Maria, and so Lottie made care not to decide anything so Alice wouldn't see and inform him. As long as she didn't make a definite plan her matching-size brunette wouldn't know her thoughts. She was also cautious to avoid being around Edward, thankfully he seemed tied up with the Bella issue they had gotten themselves into. This was what she could not understand, why they bothered so hard when their vegetarian way just seemed to cause them all problem after problem. The idea of eating animals when there were humans out there killing and hurting other humans was disgusting to Lottie. She might be the person that prevented a rape by taking a foul man's life, or the one who finally despensed justice when the legal system failed. Lottie was very good at keeping up with court cases, and if someone was guilty she could tell, so she went to take justice into her own hands if they weren't locked up. Having been left to die in a street at the hands of a drunken yob and an ashtray she never wanted another family to go through what hers had. She had heard stories of how hard they searched for her, but of course there was no body to find as it had been turned into stone instead of left to decay. Maria had not wanted to waste good flesh after all. Charlotte shivered in response to the name, because it brought back memories she had long since kept hidden. Soon it would end though. Soon it would all be over and she could sleep easy next to her mate. No matter how hard or how fast they ran Maria would always find them somehow, she had to be destroyed.

Charlotte sighed as he seemed to think that she wouldn't sense him coming up behind her. Lottie had been born into a battle field, her instincts were that of a soldier despite the years she had spent on the sidelines just trying to avoid the fight all together. They were still in her from her very make-up, there was no shifting DNA as far as it went, there was no way to change ones set nature once it had been put there. She was a fighter, someone that sat on the sidelines until people she cared for were threatened and then the gloves came off. Even on her first day as a vampire she had managed to outwit the trained Jasper because she was not like everyone else. She'd planted a hard shove to him and off he flew into a tent, everytime Peter told her the story she just wished that she could remember it herself. Those first few days were such a blur, there had just been so much pain, a red haze that she couldn't see through. Only he had been able to break through it for a few moments, just a few to make sure she wasn't destroyed there and then. Even back then he'd been a protective fool. No one could have destroyed her that first day, she had been acting on instinct alone and it was that that would have kept her safe regardless of what he did. Lottie knew it was possible she could have taken out half the army that day before they ever managed to properly destroy her, she was just so angry at them for condemning her to a life of murder and war.

Feeling the shift in the air she knew he had leapt and at the very last second spun and launched herself at him instead, smacking straight into him with the same momentum, which resulted in, as expected, a loud thump and a pile of limbs on the floor. She began to laugh as she grinned cheekily down at him. "Were you trying to jump me Peter?" She asked in a tone you might use to tell off a small child. Her bright black eyes boring into his. Even from where she lay, her tiny body entwined by impact with his much bigger one, she could smell something different and wondered if he had actually gone through with his plan to try animal blood. The idea just made her shiver. "How was your lunch?" She fished casually for information, a slow grin forming as she realised how ridiculous they must look. Lottie was the same size as Alice, a mere doll when stood next to other vampires, and because of this people underestimated her, just like they did her brunette counter part, and this was a terrible mistake to make, never underestimate a blonde with fighting instincts.

ooc -- some of this is borrowed from a post i wrote for alice earlier as i thought it might be relevant to this thread as well.

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[peter]

i've got to make a play to make my lover stay
so what would an angel say? the devil wants to know

The savage beast spots his unsuspecting victim, Peter thought with a smirk, slowly he sneaks through the tall grass… He went on with this internal narration of the scene before him. Charlotte hadn’t moved, nor seemed to notice a thing. Her body was still, her eyes staring out at the open field in front of her. Peter suppressed the laugh that was trying to tickle its way up his throat. He might actually get her this time. He remained low to the ground, crouched down as he walked on the balls of his feet and the tips of his fingers. He was going to get her.

At that moment the wind blew just right, sending a whiff of her scent in his direction. Peter breathed it in deeply. It was the same sweet scent he remembered from the first night he’d met her. For Peter it had been love at first sight…well, after he’d made it passed the initial instinct to rip her throat out. The night Jasper had brought her back to the camp had been interesting. Charlotte had been a newborn, fighting against Jasper’s charges to get free. In a matter of seconds she’d managed to out maneuver both of them, killing one, injuring the other, and even tossing aside Jasper like some sort of discarded rubble. Peter had been forced to intervene, seizing Charlotte just before she had her chance at Maria. Now he regretted that decision. He should have let Lottie have her; at least one of their problems would be solved.

In any event when he’d managed to pull her away from the squabble and look into her eyes he’d known immediately that there was something different about her…at least for him. He wasn’t sure how he knew…it was a strange sensation, like this knowing, this trust, this faith had washed over him. As dangerous as she’d been in that moment, as much as he probably should have ended her existence to protect his ‘coven’, he hadn’t been able to force himself. He had been helpless as soon as he met her face to face and he knew from that moment on that all he would be able to do in regards to Charlotte was protect her. He would give his life for her if it meant her preservation. When Maria had ordered her death, Peter had wedged himself in-between her, his friend and their ‘leader’, ready to fight if necessary.

He was rather lucky it hadn’t come to that; if it had boiled down to a fight between himself and Jasper, as Maria would hide behind anyone she could before she would actually battle, Peter was fairly confident that he would have lost. He hadn’t been a soldier, he wasn’t as skilled in the ways of combat the way Jasper was. His life prior to vampirism had been a simple one, nothing to write home about. In fact he’d been rather bored with it all the night he met Maria at a bar. Peter had been a less than moral man at that time, constantly indulging in his booze-soaking and women to pass the time, in an attempt to cure his apathy for life. When he’d met her and she’d offered him the escape he’d been looking for…well, he’d practically leapt at the opportunity. He’d embraced his damnation like it was a lover and it wasn’t until he had a clear view three days later that he fully came to understand what he’d become, what he’d allowed himself to become.

As he soared through the air toward her he couldn’t help but let that cocky smirk widen into a full-blown smile; that was until she whipped around, leaping up and colliding with him before he had a chance to ‘attack’ her properly. Before he knew it they were on the ground, Lottie laughing at him, thoroughly amused with herself. Clearly she’d known he was there for sometime. He should have expected it. He hadn’t managed to sneak up on her yet in all their years together. While she might have seemed like the petite version of Barbie, Charlotte knew how to defend herself, not that the fact would make Peter worry any less. He was in a permanent state of paranoia 24/7; they’d allowed Maria to get too close, too many times for him to just ease up. He frowned at her laughter, lying on his back and crossing his arms over his chest, his brow furrowing. He knew his lips were pouted involuntarily; he hated being foiled. “Yes.” He replied, sticking his tongue out at her for asking such an obvious question.

Her laughter continued and he rolled his eyes, ignoring her until she’d gotten a hold of herself. “How was your lunch?” He heard her ask and Peter’s lips quirked to the side in amusement, “Wonderful.” He said sarcastically, “In fact I was considering a transition into the vegetarian way of life.” He rolled onto his side, propping his head up with his arm as he looked at her, his blond hair sweeping across his forehead. Even after all these years she was still the most beautiful woman in the world to him. Not even Rosalie’s beauty rivaled Charlotte’s in his heart. She was amazing, even if she never listened to him, “Everything was great until I got back to the house and realized my wife had disappeared.” He tried to give her a look of scolding, but it crumbled after a few seconds. He hated how much he loved her sometimes. He could never stay upset with her.

[bethany]

no more carefree laughter silence ever after
walking through an empty house tears in your eyes

Charlotte was fighting her very nature as she forced down a laugh as best as she could, the peeved off look on his face too much for her to resist for much longer, then she couldn't help it anymore and burst out with it, it had just been too strong for her to fight. The need to laugh at the sheer stupidity of his face, and when he stuck his tongue out it just got even worse. He was such a child sometimes. It was one of the things she loved so much about him, the way he never liked to be beaten at his own game and then when he was the look he got. To Lottie it looked just like the image of a petulant child whom had been told by their mother that they couldn't get sweets. It made her want to switch between hugging him really hard and laughing. Lottie was full of life, despite the fact she had lost hers over one hundred years before that day. The age gap between her and Peter didn't matter, even though he was more than double her age as far as actual years went. He was such an old man yet he still found it in him to act like a child. "I love you Peter," she managed to speak through the last remenants of her laughter, her little body quaking with the last quivers of it. Truthfully calling him a child was pot kettle black, but hey she wasn't in the mood to think logically or self-deprecatingly, she was determined to have fun that day and forget everything else that seemed to be darkening their lives from the outsides.

Her black eyes flicked him casually, those depths so very dark it was alarming. Lottie needed to find a chance to get some blood in her or she was going to go nuts, and no human would be safe. She had been getting better at control, but it still burned at her every minute of the day. But nothing could compare to that first day as a vampire. The day she had just been dragged back by Jasper and two of his little helpers. The red haze had literally covered everything, the need for blood and her ignited temper making her a threat to everyone. She had needed to attack, to feed, to find some way to inflict the pain she was going through on someone else. Her little blonde head tearing others to pieces, her thin body charged into a killing machine. All these images she did not remember but had been told about, and they haunted her. How could she have been so viscous? So cruel? How could she possibly have hurt Peter even in that state? Would she do it again someday? Was her temper even worse now she was a vampire, it had been something she tested, and she wasn't sure she wanted to. The idea of hurting her mate at all was enough to make her shiver, but she knew there was that possibility. She didn't have Peter's calm, she was all fire and impulsive decisions. Trying to tame Lottie was like trying to tame a wild lion, it just couldn't be done and if you finally did manage it would mean she would have lost everything that made her her, her impulsiveness and heat making her what she was.

When he spoke sarcastically she wrinkled her nose in response. She knew he wasn't serious but the blood inside him had a smell that was making her want to wretch. It was just fowl, the very idea was fowl, how could the Cullen's bare it? How had they not gone crazy with the taste of it? Even as she wondered over this her mind moved to Edward and once more she pondered if he truly had gone mad and that was what had led to the pickle the Cullen's had found them in. Her loyalty lay with Jasper over Edward everytime, but she truly did believe that Bella suddenly changing was more her mate's fault than Jasper's. Edward should never have brought a human into a group of starving vampires, it was shere lunacy. Having smelt animal blood herself she knew it couldn't be compared to that of a living breathing human, especially a young one. Edward was to blame, he had lost his brain to all the years of drinking that vial excuse for food and it had led him to where the entire family was, and it was Jasper suffering for it, it didn't make sense or seem fair to Lottie. That was why she was going on a single-minded fight to solve at least one of the problems facing her old friend. "You do that, and I'm leaving, that smell's enough to drive even me away." She said cheekily as she rolled onto her side as well and pushed a hand into her hair, propping it up to hold it away from the floor.

From the position she found herself in she was pleased to see that she had more of an option to study him. Lottie could fully understand why he was the only one that had been able to calm her, because even from that first meeting, when her very head had been fogged with anger and rage, he had been too beautiful to look away from. Everyone seemed to think that Edward was the best looking of the male vampires, but it wasn't true. He was far too boyish for Lottie's taste, he didn't have the lines of experience and fighting that made Peter so savagely attractive. Peter had the face you expected to see in the eighteenth century on some sort of Lord or King, a face etched in fire and honed in hell, a beauty instead of a prettiness. It still amazed her. She snapped out of her reverie just long enough to catch what he said and the look on his face, and she bit back another laugh. Peter found it very hard to be mad at her, she knew that more than anything. His face always crumbled after a few moments, in fact she began to count in her head, and as usual it happened at exactly the same number. "Yeah well maybe you're wife wanted to stretch her legs, you can't keep me cooped up all the time, especially if you're going to be galavanting off with Jasper." If anything had happened to Peter that day when she wasn't there there wouldn't be a force in the world that could stop her, she would just go at the perpetrator like a blonde wreaking ball, the blood bath more than could be imagined by someone that had never seen a vampire fight in pure fury.

ooc -- sorry if there was any confusion over what colour her eyes are at the moment. they're actually meant to be black as this is before the other thread in the woods.

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[peter]

i've got to make a play to make my lover stay
so what would an angel say? the devil wants to know

"I love you, Peter." Her words were like music to his frozen heart and he couldn’t help but soften all the more; any traces of annoyance or soreness at losing vanishing as soon as she uttered those words. “Say it again.” He said with a smile, looking at her perfect face in adoration. She was so beautiful…his angel. He reached toward her, tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. She needed to feed soon; he could tell by the pale shade of her skin and the opaqueness of her eyes. She was running herself down quickly, but they’d have to venture outside of Forks in order to avoid violating the Cullen’s treaty with the Quileute Indian tribe. Seattle was a much safer hunting ground, the people there far more delinquent, the type that Lottie enjoyed ridding the world of. The space between them as they lied in the field was too far away for his liking Peter decided, and so he reached toward her, grabbing her by the hips and tugging her close to him, pinning her against his chest.

“Why’re you so far away?” He asked teasingly, “Is the elk blood that terrible?” He imagined it was. He could hardly bear to swallow it; he could only imagine how bad the smell was. Thankfully it didn’t bother him presently, nothing could be worse than consuming it. He kissed her forehead, knowing she’d most likely push him away in a minute. Not even love was strong enough to endure that kind of stench. Peter smirked; vampire myths were so confused that it was easy to see they were created by mortals for the most part. But one of the few things that the gothic romance novelists had hit home about was the fact that their kind was repelled by strong scents. Garlic was the most commonly mentioned annoyance in the plethora of vampire books. Peter himself hated the smell of garlic with a burning passion as silly as it sounded. But he would have been willing to bet that if those gothic novelists’ had to contend with a sense of smell that was twenty times stronger than that of the average bloodhound…well, there was simply no way they wouldn’t dislike it as well.

He laughed when she wrinkled her nose at his vegetarian comment. "You do that, and I'm leaving, that smell's enough to drive even me away." Peter rolled his eyes, “You wound me, Lottie, you really do.” He pouted his bottom lip at her for emphasis before lifting his left hand to show her the white gold circlet around his wedding ring finger, “You see this?” He asked, “This means you have to support me in all my decisions. I own you.” Yeah right…he could declare it all he wanted, and maybe her heart did belong to him, but in the end he knew that Charlotte belonged to no one…not really. Her love may have held her to him, but he would never ‘own her’. She was like a wild horse, born to run. To ever stifle her would be like cutting off everything that made her who she was, everything he loved about her. She needed her freedom; if he held her too tightly he’d wind up losing her in the end. He knew that.

"Yeah well maybe you're wife wanted to stretch her legs, you can't keep me cooped up all the time, especially if you're going to be gallivanting off with Jasper." Peter flashed his little smirk again, “Jasper challenged me.” He remarked, excusing his actions, “I had to defend my honor.” Peter and Jasper had always had a bit of a healthy competition going between the two of them. Whenever they got together they were reminiscent of Junior High boys, each bringing out the worst in the other, often getting themselves into trouble. So naturally when Jasper had taken a jab at Peter’s fragile pride, saying something along the lines of, ‘you’re just not man enough to feed the way we do’ or something similar…all Peter heard was ‘sissy, sissy, sissy…’ He was forced into action. He had no option. “I didn’t want to, I had to.” He replied aloud, the humor in his tone never leaving.

It was as he said it though that he noticed the distant look in her eyes; like her mind was elsewhere. She’d been teetering back and forth between this sullen look of deep concentration and answering him. Peter let out a little sigh, his brow furrowing. She was thinking about something and that worried him. Lottie so absorbed in thought could be a dangerous thing at times and he was instantly concerned. He licked his lips, clearing his throat unnecessarily to get her attention, “What’re you thinking?” He asked her, his crimson eyes curious and wide with wonder.