Change of Heart

look at me, and I grabbed the plate of meat and held out the first piece of venison to him.
    "You came up here to just sit for a minute alone without any noise or anyone talking at you, with orders not to be disturbed, and you fell asleep."
    He finished the first piece, and I fed him the second and third before putting the plate on the bed. It was gone in seconds, easily two pounds of meat. I got up and went to the door and called down for a bowl; seconds later, Russ was there with one.
    "I'm gonna give him tap water now, but you need to bring a lot of bottles up here for when he wakes up later."
    He nodded but didn't leave.
    "What's wrong?"
    "Will he be all right?"
    I cracked the door. "See for yourself."
    "Oh," Russ breathed. "He shifted. Thank God."
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    Change of Heart
    by Mary Calmes
    "He'll be fine," I said gently before I looked back at Logan.
    I was surprised to see him crouch down, flatten his ears against his head, and bare his teeth. "Go. Hurry up with the water."
    "Amazing," Russ breathed out, mesmerized by the sight of his brother in his beast form snarling at him.
    "You should go," I said softly, urgently.
    "Look at him. He has no idea who I am. In that form, as tired as he is, as fatigued, all I am is a threat. You're the only one he recognizes whether he's a man or an animal. All he knows right now is that you belong to him, and I'm standing too close."
    "Yeah, so go, already," I said, shoving him out the door before closing it behind him. "Whole family of idiots except for your mother," I muttered, walking by the bed.
    Logan waited for me, frozen, and when I came back with the bowl, now full of tap water, he tilted his head at me.
    "Russ's bringing you bottled water from downstairs for later, but for now you need to drink all this." When he didn't move, I yelled. "You're an animal. Drink the goddamn water!"
    He bent and drank from the metal bowl. When it was drained, I got up and filled it again. As I watched him lap up the water for the second time, I realized how close to death he had been. When I flicked him on the nose, he pulled back, growling.
    "You fell asleep without eating or drinking. What were you thinking? We're all taught the same thing after the first time we ever change... you make sure your blood sugar is level, you take in a ton of protein, and you hydrate. If you screw 234
    Change of Heart
    by Mary Calmes
    around, you run the risk of coma and death. If nothing else, it's like the worst hangover ever. You know all that, and still you sat in here like an idiot and almost got yourself killed. It's a testament to how strong you are that you were still coherent when I got over here."
    He tried to put his head in my lap, but I pushed him away.
    "By the time you realized you were in trouble, you were too weak to do anything about it," I scolded him. "And everyone thinks you were upset about me, and so it was some broken-hearted reaction to me being gone, but that's bullshit, and we both know it. You fucked up and now, how it looks to everyone, I'm the cause of all the crap that keeps happening to you."
    He leaned toward me, but I flicked him on the nose again.
    When he snarled, I smacked him.
    "Drink the water," I commanded him.
    My order was followed instantly.
    After several minutes of watching him drink and eat, I got up to add more logs to the fire and then turned off all the other lights. I wanted him to sleep.
    "Can you shift halfway?"
    In answer, he became a werepanther, falling back on the bed heavily.
    "Good," I said as I sat down beside him, pulling the comforter up around his shoulders. When I tried to lean back, he took my hand and put it over his heart, pressing it down tight.
    "Reah," he barely got out in his gravel-filled voice, more growl and purr than anything else. "Here, reah."
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    Change of Heart
    by Mary Calmes
    I lived in his heart, and mine felt like it was breaking.
    "You need to sleep," I told him, looking into eyes that had bled gold, no white there at all, just enormous golden pools.
    "Please sleep."
    He shook his head, easing my hand slowly across his chest, my arm with it. He wanted me to lie down with him.
    "I'll stay until you fall asleep."
    His growl was loud as he yanked me down, my head knocking against his chest as one clawed hand cupped my ass and the other wrapped around my wrist. I wasn't going anywhere.
    I lifted my head, and my lips brushed under his chin as I spoke. "Go to sleep."
    The hand on my ass had other ideas. Logan worked the towel up