Beyond The Fangs

Chapter 34

JAEGER

Izzy didn't react like others would have, but I didn't expect she would react the way she did. I

It wasn't pity she was feeling, I knew that. It was something else but I just couldn't figure out exactly what it was. I had been making a big deal out of being an Impurity but Izzy didn't even care that I was one. It didn't change the way she spoke to me or looked at me. It didn't make her want to kill me or run away from me. It didn't make her resent me, but instead, it made her want to hug me. Which was not a reaction I was expecting.

I don't remember the last time I'd received a hug. I wasn't planning on hugging her back but those darn feelings of mine resurfaced and got the best of me. I'd forgotten how comforting and warm hugs were, and how much they made you feel things. Her touch made me feel like I belonged somewhere for once, like I wasn't an outcast, like I was accepted for who I was, the real Jaeger.

When I felt her moving away I wrapped my arms around her and held onto her. I didn't want it to end, not yet. I felt myself melt against the feel of her body. My heart was pounding, harder than it ever had, harder than it ever should. I imagined that Izzy, being as close to me as she was, might feel my heartbeat and notice how fast it was—

I quickly placed my hands on her shoulders and pushed her back, holding her at arm's length. She knew how I felt but she didn't need to know what she did to me as a result of it. I was grateful she'd decided to ignore all that I'd confessed because I'd immediately regretted it and never wanted to speak about it ever again. It was best that way anyway.

"We—we should keep moving now," I told her.

She nodded in agreement, "good idea."

Izzy collected our belongings while I looked for a new shirt to wear and then we exited the house, making our way to our next destination. We spent the first half of the journey walking in silence, but then Izzy decided to break it, and the sound of her voice made my heart accelerate.

"Why didn't you tell me sooner?" Izzy asked.

"What good would that have done?"

"I don't know, maybe I could have held a funeral for myself, prepared for my death or something," she said. "Dug my own grave?"

I couldn't help but laugh, not because what she said was funny, but because I couldn't understand how I found her so alluring at times like this. She was insinuating that since I wasn't a full vampire she was as good as dead which was an insult in itself but I found it amusing.

"You could have told me a long time ago," she said, more serious.

It was still difficult to accept that Izzy didn't mind that I was an Impurity, "you really don't mind what I am?"

"No, I don't mind who you are."

My eyebrows shot up and I stopped walking and stared at her, having suddenly lost the ability to lift my legs. She had just changed my 'what' to a 'who.'

"Your hand, will it be fine?" She asked, knocking me out of my stupor.

I blinked. My hand would be fine, but I probably wouldn't be, not when I had to physically force myself not to do anything I'd regret.

"It should be." I told her in response, "I may not heal fast but infections don't last long once the wound has been cleaned."

"Good, it better heal."

My breath caught, what was she doing to me? "You should stop that," I told her after a short pause.

She swallowed. "Stop what?"

Saying things that make me want to kiss you. "Treating me like a normal person," I said instead.

"Oh Jaeger," she said with a wry smile, placing a hand on my shoulder. "you're far from normal, which is what makes you so interesting." Then she continued walking.

The way she smiled, and the contact of her hand on my shoulder made my heart thunder. 

Stop being pathetic Jaeger, I told myself, stop allowing her to have this kind of effect on you.

She didn't know the power she had over me, that she had me wrapped around her finger, because if she knew, she would take advantage of it. 

Torturing me. 

Testing me. 

Tempting me.