The Awakening Aidan - By Abby Niles Page 0,70
turned back to the cougar. Whatever he thought he saw was no longer there. Maybe he had imagined it. He had a ton of reasons to wish he’d seen something.
When he heard her footsteps again, he focused on the animal, paying special attention to its eyes. The cougar’s ears twitched again. And then…
“Fuck. Me,” he breathed. “He’s in there.”
…
Jaylin froze. “What did you just say?”
“Aidan. He’s there.”
She whirled around to stare at the cougar and saw nothing different. “Why do you think that?”
“It’s you. When you walked in before its ears twitched and I saw the faintest flash of green in its eyes. It just happened again. It was barely there, but I swear I saw it.”
All she saw was the same feral blue that had been watching her for over a week. “Liam, I think we’re all just hoping to see a change.”
Anger reddened his face. “What is this? Some kind of Münchhausen by proxy thing for you? The longer you keep him sick the more attention you get? The poor, devoted woman left behind. You were never devoted to that man no matter how much he loved you, so stop acting like you are now.” He took a menacing step toward her. “He wouldn’t be like this if it wasn’t for you. Every damn bit of this is your fault.”
He inhaled sharply, closing his eyes, then between clenched teeth, he spat, “Fuck.”
With that, Liam spun and stalked out of the room.
As soon as his footsteps faded, she covered her mouth with both hands to stifle a cry. They all blamed her, which shouldn’t be surprising since she blamed herself. But Liam was so wrong. She was devoted to Aidan. The only thing she could truly be blamed for was being too stupid to realize it until it was too late.
That, she’d never argue with.
She turned to study the animal, pinching her lips together to keep the waterworks from starting again. She was all cried out. Her head constantly ached from it, her eyes hurt, and her face felt tight and swollen. Besides, crying wasn’t going to help Aidan. Focusing on Liam’s observation instead of his harsh words would.
Had Liam seen something? It was almost too much to hope for after everything they’d tried. She wanted him to be correct, that they had finally found some kind of direction on how to get Aidan back.
“Aidan, if you just showed yourself to Liam, please show me. I need to know you’re in there. I miss you so much, I feel like I can’t breathe from it.”
The cougar only snarled.
Liam strode back into the room with Trevor close at his heels. “Out.”
She didn’t argue this time, just walked outside the room and waited for them to call her back in. When Trevor did, she entered the room. Neither man turned around. Both sets of shoulders were rigid as they stared at the beast.
“Come closer, Jaylin,” Trevor said. “Let it see you.”
She did as instructed. Trevor’s breathed “I’ll be damned” made her heart pound.
“Be damned what?”
“Aidan senses you.”
Her gaze jerked to the animal. Was he there? Watching her? Her heart thumped faster. Had he been there all along? “I—I don’t understand, Trevor. You’ve said there’s never been any change. Why all of a sudden?”
“It’s probably always been there, Jaylin, but we didn’t notice. All we saw was the aggression toward you. Hell, we’ve kept you from him during all the experiments.” He looked back at the cougar. “Besides, it lasts less than a second. Its eyes are completely back to normal now. See?”
She did see, and hadn’t seen the flash they both saw. She needed to see it!
“We’ve never seen this with anyone else,” Trevor added.
“Just me?”
He held up his hands with a frustrated expression. “Considering how we keep the animal sedated during experiments and how quick the flash is, it’s easy we missed it before now. So I can’t be certain it’s just with you. We need to test this theory. Jaylin, stay in the room. Liam, you leave.”
Liam did. When he walked back in, Jaylin stared at the cougar’s eyes, praying to see what the other two saw. She saw no change.
Trevor worked his mouth. “Interesting. Maybe we should try Britton. Is he around?”
Liam nodded. “He’s down the hall hitting on Pam.”
Jaylin frowned, but she shouldn’t have been surprised. Pam was available, and Britton was totally her type. It just seemed wrong to her that life would continue while Aidan was stuck as this rabid animal.
Trevor walked to the door