Chapter 3: Admitting You Have A Problem
Damn, that stag looked tempting, but she'd never be able to drag it back to camp alone. Thoughts of it though, had her stomach growling quite audibly. She'd have to tag something fast, or she'd scare off anything worth having. As she crept past the next group of trees, a large gray rabbit loped across the deer path. Charlie slowly raised her crossbow as she knelt to the ground and took careful aim. Just as her finger began to put pressure on the trigger, she felt it. Like she'd been stabbed in the thigh. The arrow flew off to the right as she drew her knife and stabbed through the head of the rattlesnake next to her. Panic welled up inside her and pain seared through her leg. Monroe, she had to get back to Monroe.
She didn't think she'd gone that far from their campsite, but the farther she walked, the more desperate she felt. The leg was swelling and the pain was practically unbearable. She had been dragging the leg behind her for the past hundred feet, but finally collapsed to the ground. She lay there, convinced this was the end, and she pictured Monroe finding her this way, pictured his steel blue eyes and unruly curls as he looked down at her lifeless body. As a tear rolled down her cheek, she knew she had to see him again before she died. She rolled to her stomach and began half crawling, half dragging herself toward the camp. Just over the next rise, she finally saw smoke from the fire.
Her heart squeezed in her chest knowing he was so close and she called to him. Not the name she used, the name that had once caused so much fear and hatred, but the name she called him in her head, the name she avoided using for fear of making him seem like a reality to her, "Bass!"
oOo
He burst through the trees with a gun in one hand and sword in the other, ready to take on who or whatever had her. He was lucky he didn't trip over her. She lay prone on the forest floor, covered in dirt, and barely breathing.
"Charlie! Charlie!" he screamed as he rolled her over, weapons thrown to the ground and forgotten. "What's wrong, where are you hurt?!"
"Leg…snake…" she breathed. Then she smiled, actually smiled at him and passed out.
"Jesus Christ," he mumbled under his breath as he ripped through her jeans and looked at her swollen thigh streaked with red. "Charlotte!" he screamed at her, "don't you leave me. Don't you dare! You wake up, stay with me!"
She moaned and rolled her head to one side, tears running down her face. "Bass," she whispered. She gasped, making him wince, as he sliced through her flesh and drew out the poison. He carried her gently to the bed he'd made for her by the fire and laid her head on his lap. Then he did something he'd no done in 15 years. He prayed.
She was in and out through the night, moaning and mumbling unintelligible words. At one point, he supposed she must have thought she was talking to her mother. She mumbled Miles' name a few times. He held her hand, brushing her hair from her sweat covered brow, and kept repeating the same thing all night, "It' okay, Charlie. I've got you."
Toward dawn, she seemed closer to consciousness. She opened her eyes, and whispered his name, "Bass." He smiled down at her, "I like the sound of that. If you make it through this, Charlotte, you're never allowed to call me Monroe again." She smiled back and her eyes closed. She was breathing more steadily now, and he thought she was finally sleeping peacefully, but she continued to speak.
"Shouldn't have been him," she mumbled. "Should've been you."
"What? What should've been me?" he asked as he continued to stroke her hair.
He could barely hear what she said next, but there was no mistaking her words. "I never wanted Connor….you…..I wanted you."
And with that she finally nodded off. Sebastian Monroe froze. This made no sense, she hated him, he knew she did. He'd counted on it. It was all that kept him sane as he thought of her, she would never want him back. Never. He was safe. But here she was, this beautiful, fierce creature who'd fought by his side. He'd saved her life and she'd saved his right back.
He leaned closer to her, almost touching her round, soft lips with his. "Then we're in trouble, Charlotte Matheson, because I want you, too" he whispered. He closed the remaining distance and faintly brushed her lips with his, breathing in her scent as he did so. In that instant, the world of Sebastian Monroe changed. He knew that for the rest of his life, his heart would never be safe again. He knew it lie with her.