6: Monster Lycan?

“Have you never recognised me before?” The mysterious man accepted the towel I gave him while asking me a question. I frowned and shook my head. 

“No.” 

“Nick completely forgot that important thing. I thought he would tell you everything about me.” he took a deep breath. 

I raised my brow. “Did you mention Nick’s name? Do you know my brother Nick? How do you know him?”

The man grinned and showed his rows of white, neat teeth. He let out a long sigh and draped the towel around his neck. 

“Of course, Nick and I have known each other for quite some time,” he said. 

I tried to hide my surprise by averting my eyes and biting my lower lip. I wasn’t sure that Nick had ever introduced this strange guy to me. Nick never told me who his werewolf sidekicks were from other packs. Nick simply recounted how much he was intrigued by a notorious pack from the southern jungle. Nick was infatuated with how much power the ruthless pack had, but during the time he shared his interest Nick never told anyone he had known from the other packs. 

I feel like a fool for being easily deceived by others. Deceived by Jeremy, deceived by Eunice, and deceived by the werewolves who once swore to stand behind me no matter what. 

“I’m not sure Nick ever told me everything about you. I’ll kill you right now if you don’t tell me right now, who are you?” I shot him with a pointy gaze. 

He dropped the towel from his neck onto the table, then pulled the corners of his lips together to form a seductive lopsided smile. I couldn’t guess what the strange man was thinking, but he looked at me seriously. He skinned me from toe to hair. It was creepy. 

I shuddered under his gaze, a moment later the strange man snorted.

“Of course. He won’t tell you about me. Because I’m a monster. What kind of good brother would tell his stupid little sister about monsters, huh? That doesn’t make sense.” 

I rolled my eyes in irritation. “Alright, do you want to go out now? The rain has stopped since a while ago.” 

“Are you trying to kick me out?” The weird man’s eyes bulged, and he gasped. 

“You can’t linger here, you’re not someone I know at all.” I emphasized my reason for kicking him out of here. 

The strange man just rounded his eyes, begging to be allowed to spend the night inside my house. I clucked in annoyance and folded my arms in front of my chest. 

“Are you going to kick me out? It’s already 10:00pm, I haven’t had time to find another rental house yet,” he muttered and looked at his watch. 

I rolled my eyes quickly. “Hey, didn’t you say that you were a monster? If you were a monster, you wouldn’t have a problem with me throwing you out at 10pm.”

“Well, Lilith. Your dad asked me to be here to take care of you. I didn’t have a chance to leave until he said I could,” he said. 

I frowned in disbelief. I stood up steadily and looked at him suspiciously “I don’t believe it. My dad never told me about it. He wouldn’t send anyone to take care of me, no matter what.” 

“Then, what do you want? Just contact your family, and you know I helped them deal with those bastards,” he bluffed putting one of his feet on top of the other. 

I chuckled and walked over to get my mobile phone that was on the nightstand.  I immediately called my mum and I asked her about the creepy guy here, and she said it was true. 

I cried to myself. I couldn’t believe it. Mum told me to be nice to him because he had helped us. 

He smirked at me when I came back with a sullen face. “What did they say to you, Lilith?” 

“What are you talking about. How could they send you here? I don’t have any other side jobs, and I’m poor. You can’t stay here anyway... you’ll eat up my food if you stay here,” I grumbled like crazy. 

The strange man just lay on my sofa and ignored my words. He closed his eyes and made an irritating noise. It seemed like the annoying man was just teasing me to keep saying rude things. 

I folded my arms in front of my chest, my face looked like a desperate wolf at this point, I thought.

“Dude, please. Get out of my sight. I don’t have time to deal with you all night.”

“No.” 

I pouted. “Why are you so annoying, huh? Please get out, or I’ll tell Nick that you’re being mean to me.”

“Just do whatever you want, Babe,” he replied to me, but he never got up or gave the slightest movement. 

“Aren’t you going to get out of here? Should I be rude?” I repeated my words with firmness.

He stood up and gave me that pitiful look. Begging and giving me that typical puppy dog eyes look to ask for permission to spend the night here. 

He promised that tomorrow he could find his own rented house. I gave up and let him stay here for the night. While I was busy with my own activities, I left him on the sofa in the living room.

However, he kept calling me and asking for a warm blanket. My eyes glazed over in exasperation as I rushed to throw the blanket at him.

It was past 7am when I woke up the next morning. It was already late for work, so I shouted and got ready to leave without showering. 

I was stopped by the strange man and ordered to eat the food he had cooked. Despite my desire to refuse, he forced me to do so with the reason that he was grateful to me for allowing him to spend the night here. 

“Missing a day of tedious work is no big deal. There are plenty of annoying humans out there,” he whispered as he began clearing the table behind him.

“That’s an interesting offer, sir, but for a decent meal I need a little cash.”

“It is possible for us to eat well without working as hard as humans do. The wild animals in the forest can be turned into delicious food by me.” I looked at the dish he was holding in for me as he said this.

I looked the other way. I threw my coat on that bed. I looked at the dish in his hand attentively. I thought it was a delicious meal. 

I sighed and nodded my head in agreement. I joined her in eating the food that he had cooked this morning. Meanwhile, I was enjoying my breakfast. The man was always looking at me with a strange look, and suddenly he put a few pieces of vegetables on my plate.

I didn’t really like the pickled kailan leaves because they were a little sour and bitter, so I set them aside in a corner of the plate. 

“I don’t know why Jeremy Brook would betray a truly innocent wolf like you, Lilith.”

I choked and took a glass of water as fast as I could. I’m sure my cheeks are flushed by now. The man sighed and went back to eating his food. 

“Jeremy Brook is a stupid bastard. He left behind an expensive diamond only to be united with a worthless piece of broken glass.” the man said again. 

I was silent but didn’t want to say anything. I wasn’t sure Nick would be willing to reveal such an embarrassing secret to others or even his own closest friend. However, how did this strange man know that Jeremy Brooks betrayed me? 

“How did you find out such an embarrassing thing?” I voiced. 

The man smirked and then lowered his head. A moment later he lifted his head and handed me a large piece of chicken smeared with honey and lemon sauce. He smiled sweetly.

“I’m serious, we haven’t been introduced since last night.” 

“Really?” I pretended not to understand if he felt awkward because of my previous question. 

The man lifted his eyes and shook his head. “Would you like me to introduce myself?”

“That’s better. You described yourself as Nick’s best friend.” I nodded

“And I can fill Jeremy’s shoes if you want.”

“Why are you being so annoying.” I looked the other way, my cheeks heating up because of this weird guy.

He just laughed, stopped chewing. “My name is Tyler Watson. You can call me Tyler.”

“Are you a singer? Your name sounds like a talented Artist.”

“Yes, I am an artist.”

“Interesting. I’ve honestly never heard of a werewolf who’s as artistic as you, Tyler.”

“Really? You’ve never known Katherina Rosemary? Theophile Blanc? They are artistic shifters like me.” 

I frowned because I didn’t understand who the person Tyler was referring to was now. I had never even heard the names of those two shifters from my parents.

Ever since I was a kid, I was only told to focus on myself and my real environment. I never took the time to find out what was going on around me. My parents always told me to memorise a lot of grip techniques, running techniques when attacking enemies, survival techniques when surrounded by monsters, techniques for hunting enemies in the dark forest, techniques for using swords with books given by the elders. 

It all felt monotonous and now I realised that I had wasted a lot of time. 

“Do you have any other activities in the human world?” I asked with some indifference. 

“I just paint and have fun. You’re the one who seems to have become human. You work all day and night, you use strange-smelling perfume and dress so revealingly?” 

“What’s wrong? I’m just disguised as a human, Tyler.” 

“But why? Are you hiding from the Jeremy Brooks threat?” Tyler asked. 

“I don’t know either.” 

“So, why did your parents give you the name Lilith?” Tyler changed our conversation’s subject once more.

“I don’t know. I never spoke to my parents either. They think I’m a demon that comes at night. I was born at night.”

“You’re always putting bad faith in things. Don’t you know that according to ancient Hebrew legend, the first woman God created was Lilith, a woman full of beauty and the ability to enjoy her sexuality. Why don’t you think that your parents named you ‘Lilith’ because they thought that you were beautiful and--” 

“Enough, Tyler. Whatever it is I find it a creepy name.”

“You should be comfortable with the name your parents gave you. It’s precious, Lilith,” Tyler said once more. 

I just mumbled and finished my breakfast that morning. 

I shrugged my shoulders, ignored him. But Tyler continues to keep an eye on me. I don’t know how I feel at this point. I used to feel good and bad at once, because the relationship with Jeremy wasn’t completely broken.

But the sudden presence of Tyler made me feel weird. And why did dad send him to take care of me? Does my dad have other intentions that I don’t understand?

There’s no way Dad’s sending anyone to take care of me here for no valid reason.

“I heard Jeremy left you because he liked your step-cousin, is that true?”

“We don’t need to talk about something unimportant this early, do we?” I rolled my eyes in annoyance because Tyler was delving into my past. 

“Well, that’s true my dear. Talking about rubbish is no fun. You’ve already got me, why should I think about rubbish.”

“Can you stop calling me that. Stop acting like there’s something special between us.”

“No, it doesn’t. I can’t stop calling you sweetheart because Jeremy is a nobody between us.”