Love Comes In Many Dangerous Forms

I gave them one last smile before I took Jimmy into the kitchen.

“How was your bath sweetie?” I asked him setting him down in his high chair.

“Good,” he answered and then his had a small frown set on his child-like face, “Cassie, I feel hot.”

I frowned and touched his forehead gingerly, and immediately pulled away. I looked down at my hand and saw an angry red mark showing on my pale flesh. It took me only a second to realize that I was burned.

“Jimmy I’ll be right back, could you stay right there for a minute?” I asked him.

“Okay Cassie,” he nodded and played with his fingers.

I went over to the sink and ran cool water over my right hand sighing in relief as the water soothed the burn.

I saw a shadow lurking behind the opened door in the kitchen and quickly turned around with my heart racing.

I bit my lip when I saw Zach enter the room with his head bowed.

“I’m sorry,” he whispered faintly.

“It’s okay,” I told him.

“No it’s not Cassiel,” he brought his head up and gently shook me, “I hurt you, no one has the right to do that.”

I said nothing and he wrapped his arms around me and I returned the favor immediately.

“You can still come with us if you want, I’m not forcing you too,” I offered.

“I’ll go,” he sighed, his cool nose brushed up against my neck, “But I can I ask why your suddenly up and ready to look for Tristan when you’re still injured?”

“Well,” I pulled away from him, “I miss him, a lot. I owe him and this is the least I could do for him. And if anything happens to me, he is the first person I would think of to take over,” I told him honestly.

“Nothing is going to happen to you Cassie. I won’t let anything hurt you,” he promised.

But all I could think about was the eyes that were coated with death, starring at me, proving Zach wrong.

***

(Shane’s P.O.V.)

I smiled as I watched Carly pick some of the flowers off one of the bushes.

“She’s grown up so much,” my mother sighed as she sat down on the snowy ground.

“She has,” I agreed leaning against a nearby tree.

“Tell me more about this Cassiel girl,” my mother insisted.

“Cassiel?” I asked, “Why?”

“She’s very… odd. The way she talks to us, it’s like she cares. And she brought me here so that I could see you, and she helped me with my wounds. That’s not what a normal Human would do.”

“Well, Cassiel isn’t what you call a ‘normal human,’” I explained smiling, “She’s brave, she has saved so many of us, and she doesn’t care who they are or what they look like, she would give up her life just to save one of us.

“She’s smart too. She knows what’s right and what’s wrong, and she knows what to do in a bad situation. She’s the nicest person I have ever met. She’s just… good, I haven’t found one bad thing about her.”

“You care about her,” my mother smiled.

“No I don’t,” I defended myself quickly.

“I don’t mean it in the ‘love’ kind of way, but as the ‘friend’ kind of way,” she explained.

I said nothing, because it felt like if I agreed with her, I would be lying to myself. But, why?