Page 18 of Awakened By the Guardian

“You’re Margaret, right? The girl next door who’s been helping my boy.”

She smiled and extended a hand that he engulfed in his own. “That’s me. And I don’t ‘help him out.’ We’re friends.”

“Best friends,” Gary clarified as he wheeled himself forward. “And we’re not done talking.”

She held up her free hand and mimed a puppet. “‘Blah blah blah.’ We’re done.” She turned to his father, feeling nervous relief—or maybe hysteria—bubble up within her. “Is it weird that he wasn’t any less mouthy as a bear? All sorts of whines and whimpers.”

Mr. Baldner jolted. “You saw? You know?”

His reaction surprised her. “Yes. I was here the whole time.”

“You didn’t leave?”

Suddenly, it all came rushing back: Last night’s terror, the way her mind had whited out everything else. She’d seen teeth and claws and hadn’t been able to breathe, much less think. Even now her mind skittered over the details while her skin burned with gooseflesh.

“Whoa there.” Mr. Baldner’s hand tightened around hers while Gary’s caught her on the other side. “Maybe you ought to sit down.”

“Don’t run, Margaret,” Gary said. “Please. I need you here.”

She turned and saw the honesty in his eyes. But how could she help him while half a breath from going insane?

“I would have run if I could,” she confessed. “Last night. When you were a bear, Gary. I was terrified.”

“But you didn’t,” he said.

She snorted. “There was a grizzly in the way.”

“But there was a moment, right?” his father asked. “A second when it all came into focus, when you saw the man instead the bear. Do you remember?”

“When…when he was looking at himself in the mirror and moaning. Like he couldn’t believe what he was seeing.”

“I couldn’t,” Gary said.

“That’s when the magic let go,” Mr. Baldner pronounced. Both Margaret and Gary looked at him, and he pulled up another chair, reversed it, and sat. “Magic doesn’t like to be found.” He held up a hand. “Just stick with me. You’re gonna have questions: How can shifters exist, how can people turn into animals and nobody knew it before now? It’s ’cause magic doesn’t like to be found.”

“Make sense, Dad,” Gary growled—literally. Margaret was distracted for a moment as she realized he’d never spoken with that deep rumble in his chest before last night.

“It doesn’t make sense,” his dad continued. “Never has, never will. Magic is a force that can blind normals to the truth. Even when people do see, it’s a struggle to remember.” He looked directly at Margaret. “You’re something special.”

“I’m—”

“You saw,” Mr. Baldner repeated. “And you didn’t run. His mother could never accept the truth, never truly see. It broke us. She could never see the man in the bear.” He looked at his son. “It’s really something special when a person can.”

Gary’s expression softened, and he squeezed Margaret’s hand. “You don’t have to tell me she’s great, Dad. I already know.”

She held up her hand. They didn’t understand, and they had to stop praising her. “I’ve never been so afraid,” she whispered.

“I’m sorry,” Gary replied. His words were soft, his expression sad. As he could never forgive himself for scaring her.

“The point is, you’re still here,” his father said. “I was a full shifter before I got together with his mother, and I never told her. Not until after the wedding.” He shook his head. “That was wrong—for both of us. When I finally got up the nerve, she couldn’t face it. I don’t blame her.”

Beside Margaret, Gary sat back in his wheelchair. “Is that what happened? I always wondered, and Mom just said ‘Your dad is an animal.’”

“Yup.” Mr. Baldner sighed. “She’s a good woman, just not good for me.”

All three of them were silent for a moment, thinking.

Gary spoke first. “So, you’re like me? Or I’m like you? And we can change into bears.”