Minute of Love

Chapter 4

*A/N ... so im really sorry because its been almost half a year since ive uploaded and i promise it wont happen again! I broke my computer and a whole bunch of other stuff was going on but i finally have had the chance to upload so here is the next chapter and i hope you enjoy it! Also im going to be starting a new series in addition to this one and ive been thinking about it alot, im not ending this one at all i just want to go ahead and upload what i have for the other one, and i hope you enjoy that one as well! Thank you for being patient again and i appreciate you all for reading!

*unwelcomed encounters*

Its 6:00 am and i cant sleep, apparently neither can my shadow as i hear him head down the stairs to where i im laying on the couch with the TV on, but the volume is muted.

"Hey", a figure says in the dark.

"Why are you awake Neil?" i whispered.

"I've been thinking i should try to improve my physical health…." he replies.

"Ok…. so why are you awake at 6:00 am?" i repeat.

"Im going jogging" he replies.

I pause and stare at his fully clothed body, "go back to sleep Neil, its early and you are already in enough shape for your age, stay a child for a little longer"

"Im not in good enough shape and im not a child" Neil shot back.

"Neil…" I said as i sat up on the couch, making complete eye contact with the ever changing body before me and i had a very sad realization that everyday he gets older and stronger and there is more and more i dont understand about him, "please go back to sleep" i reply.

"Zalara im heading out" Neil said, as if he ended the conversation, but i didn't like the tone of it.

The second his body passed the couch and headed towards the door i was already blocking his way. "What is with this new determination to get in shape and bulk up?" i ask " What's the rush?" .

He looked me dead in the eyes and said in a voice more masculine than i ever could have imagined from my baby shadow. "I don't know Zalara, you tell me". Then pushed me out of the way with unrecognizable strength and left the house first at a light jog and then his body was out of sight.

" What the hell was up his ass this morning" I thought to myself, and headed to the kitchen to grab a bottle of water from the fridge.

When i opened the fridge the cool air was crisp and cascaded over my body, and the light from the fridge flooded the kitchen.

I closed the door and chugged the bottle of water before heading upstairs to take my shower and get ready.

Taking the quickest shower of my life. I got ready and before i knew it Ellie was already downstairs making breakfast.

I put my hair up in a bun and sat down at the table clothed only in my towel and watched the images on the still muted TV screen.

"Zalara have you seen Neil?" Ellie asked, a little too casually

"He went out for a jog at like 6 can you believe that" I replied, but she didn't respond.

"Dont you think that is strange Ellie?" i asked, now turning to look at her.

"... not really, i mean a while ago, he told me he kept on feeling a very strong male presence, unnaturally close to the house and ever since then, hes been going for extensive jogs or doing intensive work outs with Vic" Ellie replied.

"Huh…" i said quickly losing interest, if Ellie didnt think something was up then neither did I.

"I would appreciate you not getting comfortable with the idea of coming downstairs in improper clothing" Ellie complained.

"Uhuh …." I replied, hearing her completely but pretending not to.

Once i got done sloppily devouring Ellie's five star breakfast she so willingly made for me, i put my dishes in the sink, thanked her for the meal and headed to my room to get dressed.

My room was blazing hot, since i have kept my window shut and locked up ever since that night, but today was too unbearably hot so i opened it up.

I threw on a pair of jean shorts and a flowy green top that complemented my green eyes but contrasted my dark skin beautifully. Id usually wait for Neil before i would head to training but today he was apparently still on his "jog".

I glanced at the clock, 9:28, what jog lasts nearly 3 and a half hours?

As i head downstairs to go out of the door, Neil bust through drenched in sweat with his shirt off, and i have to take a mental check because though this was in fact Neils face, this was not the body that i remembered.

His body was now newly sculpted, with lines and crevices accenting every inch of his torso.

"Wait" he commanded as he darted upstairs

I don't know who he thinks he is talking to, but i'm the older one and i'm not on his time, i'm leaving.

I wasnt even one step out of the door before i heard his feet storming down the stairs, 3 steps at a time and he was right next to me ready to head to training.

" You couldn't wait two seconds Zalara" Neil complained

"You couldn't even seem to wait for one second this morning" I shot back looking him dead in the eye.

He looked down at the ground at first and then looked back up, changing the subject. "Im 6 feet even now" He said smiling childishly.

Honestly to me this was just another fact that he was all too quickly changing and there wasn't anything i could do about it.

"Really?" I reply. Attempting to sound amazed and proud but failing.

He overlooks it as he is solely happy to no longer be talking about the strangeness of this morning. But i wasnt done talking about it.

"So whats up with the three hour long jogs before training?" i ask. But he pretended he didn't hear me, which i knew was a lie because Neil has heard every word i have said to him since day one.

"I said, Whats up with.."

"I heard what you said and you need to learn to mind your own business" Neil shot back.

What. the. hell.

"Excuses me! I was asking a question!" i exclaimed.

"Sorry i didn't mean for it to come out that way… sorry Zalara" he apologized, looking genuinely sorry.

"Whats up with you?" I asked, completely over his mood swings for the day.

"Sorry, im sorry…. I didnt mean to…" He pleaded

"Whatever" i cut him off.

We just reached the front door of the old apartment room where Vics good friend and partner in finding chase victims , Paul was waiting for us.

We opened the door and I waved my hand greeting his wife Sarah who is deaf. Neil waves as well and we head into the main room where Paul is.

Paul says good morning to me and gives Neil a knowing look that Neil returns with a relieved one which i found strange but didn't think much about.

Paul was a jaguar while his wife Sarah was a lioness, so their house was full of a mixture of random knick knacks from both the jungle and here the safari.

He must pick up little things from the jungle when he goes there on his missions and then brings them back for sarah to see.

Paul was much older than vic and had long jet black and grey hair that he kept in a braided bun. His skin was the color of deep brass and his eyes were golden, clearly a very handsome man now , which help to understand how he was able to get his wife sarah who still in her older age looks as majestic as she did in her prime.

Paul has been teaching me since ive been here and has yet to try to help me shift for the first time. I have asked him many times to help me. But he is a firm believer that when it happens, it will happen on its own and the best training i could ever have is if i learn to deal with the first shift myself.

" Are you two ready?" Paul asked us.

" yes" i replied and Neil nodded his head.

"Today, we will work on your ability to decipher whether i'm telling the truth or if i'm telling a lie." He states.

"I will say a series of statements and you need to tell me based off of your senses whether what i say is the truth or a lie" he instructs. "Lets begin"

"I have 14 pairs of assorted weapons underneath the very floorboard i am sitting on top of"

I smelt the air around him "you are lying" i reply

"Correct , I actually have 40" He said with a warning smile.

" In 15 days it will rain in the main part of town but not on the outskirts"

"Thats a lie" Neil replied, not even a second after the statement was spoken.

"Well done" he repled and continued on with many more until he got to the last one.

"Zalara will never be able to shift due to the scars her past has left on her physical body"

The room went silent

Everything went silent

My heart froze for what felt like an eternity

I strained my senses to smell the lie in his blood but found nothing, my eyes started to sting and my blood felt like it was on fire as anger started to reside in my soul.

I tried again .

Straining and straining but nothing, he was telling the truth. I began to raise my eyes to meet his, ready to scream in disbelief as i have wasted all of these years waiting to shift.

Waiting for a sign that would define me, waiting for the only piece i felt i had that was not tainted by my true blood.

My only blood i've ever known. Raina.

I began to stand up ready to give up on it all when Neil declared.

"You're lying" with complete confidence.

I waited for him to say he was incorrect, just so that i had every right to leave and never look back.

The thought that my past,that i lived everyday to erase was still affecting my future crumbled me and i felt my throat tightening as i suppressed the urge to cry.

"Correct" was Pauls reply.

"What?" was all i was able to utter

"He is correct, what i said was a lie" Paul restated.

"That is impossible i smelt your blood and there wasnt a trace of lie in it" I explained.

"The traces left in my blood can easily be blocked with enough training, you have to add in other factors such as the dilations in my eyes, the changes in my stature, things that cannot be controlled with training." He replied.

"What…..?" i replied as if all of the air had been sucked out of my lungs.

I couldnt help but remember the night i decided that my sister whom i lived for was telling the truth about not loving me, and beat myself up for years about how impossible that was but how it had to be true, and this whole time i could have been wrong?

I stood up and was instantly nauseous, my sister. What if all these years my sister was lying and she was still running in the chase. What if she was captured that night and has been subjugated for all of these years? All of these years…. All of these years i could have been wrong.

I ran, full speed out of the apartment and began heaving up everything that could have possibly been in my stomach onto the ground.

I broke out into a cold sweat as waves upon waves of emotions hit me like bricks and the contractions of my stomach made me double over into the grass where i continued puking.

At the point of a near full out anxiety attack, i faintly remember feeling Neil screaming next to me for something , for me to listen or stop screaming, but i couldn't.

My sister, my sister, the very essence of my existence could have been lying that night. She very well could have once again sacrificed her life for mine that night and knew that i was around so blocked herself so i couldn't tell.

Piercing screams erupted from my body and i viciously was shaking, dry heaving and crying my sisters name, for who knew where she was now, or if she was even alive was common that girls who got caught in the chase at first chance take their lives.

At the thought of Raina taking her life i blacked out completely.

I dreamt for what seemed like centuries, recalling all of the features about her that i forced myself to forget.

Her smile, her patience, the texture of her fur, everything replayed like a cd that was constantly being rewinded.

I remembered her scent and the scent of the jungle and, then the bad memories began flooding in.

I remembered the starvation, the solitude, the fear the chase and the never ending running., The well the presence of that male and then the last thought that peirced my brain before i was ripped back into reality but someone pushing a thousand tons of force on my chest repeatedly was the final giggle i heard from her that night.

That giggle.

Was it a warning, a sign, was i once again to stupid to notice the hint,and because of it she had to risk herself?

Neil was kneeling over me pushing my body into the ground intensely with every compression he fired into my chest, Frantic like a madman he continued relentlessly reviving me until my eyes were able to open and hopefully plead to him that he was crushing me.

I began coughing up blood and at the first chance i got took a deep breath in which stung.

I looked around finally realizing my surroundings when Neil scooped me up into the most painful hug, crushing me.

"You stopped breathing" is all he kept on repeating as he rocked me back and forth in his arms as if i was the one, who almost witnessed his death in stead.

I looked up and saw Vic standing with Sarah and Paul as Paul explained to Vic that when i went into my panic attack my body went into shock and my air way closed up and i stopped breathing .

Vic looked at me, then looked to Neil with a look of anguish and Neil growled . Regardless Vic continued to look at him seriously and Neil seemed to shut down as if he lost all hope.

"We need to get her home now" Vic said.

I attempted to stand but couldn't feel anything other than my head pounding and Vic and neil both helped me the entire way home.

When i finally got home Ellie already prepared medicine and a homemade brew she used to make for me when i was in the hospital when the first found me and i dozed to sleep.

I woke up after 84 hours of unbroken sleep to Neil who was sitting in a chair next to my bed wiped out by stress and lack of sleep. I watched his features as he slept and he looked terrible. He slept as if he was in a nightmare but it looked like the only sleep he had gotten since the incident , so i didnt disturb him.

I slid out of the bed and instantly felt disgusting so i headed to the bathroom and turned on the bath water. I left the water on cold because for some odd reason i felt like i wasn't alive and needed something to shock me.

I guess after you don't move for nearly four days you feel a little ….. Dead.

I sat in the freezing water and contemplated the possibility of Raina lying and the possibility of her telling the truth.

I wrestled with the idea until finally i was done crying and thinking about it.

I got out of the bath and shivered wrapping myself in my towel and taking my hair out of the bun, letting it cascade over my body.

I went downstairs quietly, because i didn't want to wake anyone. I wasn't mentally prepared to deal with them all just yet. I opened the fridge and leaned over to get the coldest water bottle which was at the bottom.

" I could get used to that every morning" a deep voice that sounded as if it were crafted by silk purred from the corner of the room and i slapped on the nearest light.

I gasped, holding onto my towel with one hand and my other hand frantically searching for anything to defend me . and then my eyes matched up once again with those beautiful blue ones. And i froze.

"So tell me, just who are you and why are you so impossible to get ahold of?" he asked

I swallowed. My eyes automatically tracing every inch of his body before i could stop myself , slightly lingering over the bulge in his pants before snapping back to his eyes.

As if his eyes couldn't get any brighter , they burned deeper as he spoke " you do that again, and i promise you w will be in a very different situation cat"

"Who are you?" i whispered as the tingling sensation churned through my body.

"The real question is, who are you?" he replied

And right on cue Neil hit the bottom step "Zalara?"