Theo's gaze dropped before she even realised it, and her brain short-circuited. Her eyes had betrayed her, but the biggest betrayal came from her thoughts.
My, oh my. He was perfect. And Big.
Her face went bright red, lips parted in pure shock and disbelief right before she spun around so fast she nearly tripped, "For Fuck's sake, don't let your towel drop!"
Zeke was caught off guard by the sudden change in her voice and her overall reaction, "What? Now you're shy?"
Shy. Oh God, she shouldn't have reacted that way. It would give him a very wrong impression about her. Guys don't react this way when something like this happens. They usually glance away or even make jokes about it.
She wanted to turn around and tell him she wasn't shy and he should fuck off, but she couldn't. He had yet to pick it up, and she didn't trust herself not to stare again.
Zeke's brow furrowed, watching as she climbed into her bed and lay back, facing the wall. Something about the new guy's reaction didn't sit right with him. From the looks of it, it might be his first time seeing another man's junk, but he was still way too flustered. In fact, he looked like he had been caught doing something he shouldn't have.
Zeke walked back to his side of the room and threw on some pants, then he also lay on his bed, eyes firmly on the ceiling and his expression hardened.
At the other end, Theo squeezed her eyes shut, screaming at herself in her head. Her chest felt tight in a way she didn't like, and she couldn't stop thinking of what just happened.
Not just his towel dropping, but everything else.
The proximity, the slight brushes.
Eventually, she fell asleep again.
It was sometimes around 2:00am when she woke up. She heard a gentle thud by the window, but as the sleep vanished more, she realised it wasn't thuds, but low growls.
Zeke was standing by the window, the silver light from the moon exposing the sweat and shadows clinging to his skin. Both hands were gripping the bar, and his head was lowered but his lips kept moving soundlessly.
She watched his muscles twitch, like he wasn't in control of himself.
What the hell?
"Zeke?" She whispered, sitting up as slowly as she could so as not to startle him.
Did he sleepwalk? Was he having a nightmare?
"Zeke?" She tried again as she stood up, and began tiptoeing close to him
His muscles jerked again, and his body arched back as a tremor ran through him. He was probably having a nightmare.
"G..get out of my head!" His whisper suddenly became loud, "S..stop! Stop it!"
She was with him in the blink of an eye, "Zeke, it's just a dream. Wake up," She said, and reached out to tap his shoulders.
Big Mistake.
The moment she came in contact with him, his gaze snapped up and stared dead into hers, and she saw a horrific molten orange in his eyes. The veins around his arm turned black, like someone had just injected ink into them.
A low growl rumbled from his throat, and it was not the normal werewolf growls she was used to. It was twisted, filled with pain and had chills running down her spine.
Then, he snatched her wrist from his shoulders in a vice grip.
The moment he held her, the world around her spun. The room seemed to fade into nothing, and her heart hammered inside her chest as she found herself standing in the darkness.
Cold, metallic air was the stench she inhaled. She was in...a lab? She heard chains clattering and clicking somewhere in the distance, where she found Zeke, a younger version of him, lying and strapped to a table viciously, with a shadowy figure standing in front of him.
Zeke looked up at the figure, and she saw fear in his eyes. She saw hatred and she saw a murderous look. The figure moved, and pressed his palm over Zeke's naked chest...and Zeke groaned almost immediately as the same black veins began spreading once again from his chest to other parts of him.
He screamed so hard she thought her bones would split, and her eardrums would burst.
Theodora jolted away, only to find Zeke still standing there, hands still clamped around her wrist tightly.
"Zeke, stop! Let go of me!"
She knew that wouldn't work. Not after whatever she's just seen. He was far too deep into the nightmare to wake up by just that, and his grip on her wrist only grew worse by the second.
But it didn't stop her from trying, "Zeke! Stop!" She pulled again and could hear her bones beginning to grind. At this point, he was gonna snap her wrist bone if she didn't do something.
She would have to knock him out.
But it was too late.
She heard the sound of her bone being brushed, and white-hot pain seared through her arm. She hit back the pain that came with it, but tears still gathered around her eyes.
*Seraphina!!* Theo groaned, *Do something. Please, do something!*
*Knock him out!*
Theo cried, *I don't want to add to his pain. I can't...,*
*Goddamnit!*
Her pendant suddenly flared with crimson light, so bright through her shirt that it blinded her and engulfed the room in its light for just a moment. It burst with a static spark, just enough to make Zeke release her wrist and stumble backwards.
He gasped for air, breathing harshly just as the orange gleam in his eyes disappeared, and his familiar dark eyes returned.
He was finally awake.
None of them moved for a few seconds. Theodora clutched her broken wrist, still biting back the pain.
Sweat rolled down his temples as he stared at her, her expression, then his gaze fell to the pendant on her chest, which still had that faint red glow, and then he looked down at her broken wrist.
"What did I...,"
"You were dreaming," She cut him off, her voice hoarse from pain. It wasn't just the physical pain but the mental one of what she had unintentionally seen through him.
"That thing....," He looked up to her chest, "It keeps me from...,"
"Don't!" She trembled, half from pain and half from adrenaline, "Just don't!"
He opened his mouth then closed it again, his jaw clenching.
She lay back down on the bed, still cradling her arm. Seraphina was panting inside of her from exhaustion - whatever that pendant had just done, really knocked into the three of them.
And since Seraphina was mentally shocked and exhausted, it would take a longer time for her wrist to heal.
She heard Zeke walking back to his bed, and the weird silence between them stretched.
No one said anything for a while.
Then,
"Rule number three," She repeated softly to him, "Whatever happens in this room, stays in this room, right?