Prologue
Brett - five years ago
“You don’t have to leave,” my sister said as she reorganized my duffel bag. “Things will cool down.”
I could see the tears trapped behind her eyes. The human wanting to cry, but the Wolf staying strong, keeping her from breaking down. I hated what this was doing to her and a part of me wanted to stay, to tell her that I would never leave and she wouldn't be alone. But I knew that wasn’t possible, not with that Bear mutt living amongst the pack. Her stench was so vile that it was like a noose around my neck, tightening slowly. It was so overbearing that if I stayed here it would kill me.
“I can’t be here anymore, Liv. There is no place for me.”
“What are you talking about? This is your home,” she said, her eyes a golden yellow, a tell-tale sign that her Wolf was right at the surface and angry. “You’re all I have and you’re leaving me. For what? Because you don’t like who Derek mated with?”
“He didn’t mate just anyone. He mated a damn Bear. I’m not living amongst those things.”
“She is half Wolf.”
“That makes it even worse. A Wolf and a Bear making an abomination.”
“Brett, stop being like this. Derek wouldn’t mate with someone who was a bad person. You’ve seen what the Alpha has done. Derek’s family has made so many positive changes. They wouldn’t do anything to hurt the pack.”
“I don’t care. It was all too late. We cannot allow the Bears to come into our home. To accept them, after everything they have done to us. All the Wolves they’ve hurt.”
“That was a long time ago. If Dad managed to forgive them, why can’t you?”
“Because they took away our parents. They left us wide open. Because I spent my whole damn life in hiding.” I punched the wall, the rage in me combusting. I saw the flecks of paint splash into the air as my fist made a perfectly round hole in the wall. I removed my fist and bits of drywall fell at my feet. I looked down at my hand and saw the blood dripping from my knuckles and a small rusty nail dangling from my hand.
“Damn it, Brett. What’s wrong with you?” Liv asked, running out of the room and returning moments later with a first aid kit and a fresh white towel.
“What the fuck is a loose nail doing in there?”
“How the hell am I supposed to know that? Here, bite on that,” Liv said, tossing me the towel.
I caught it with my good hand and put it beside me. “What the fuck do you take me for? I’m pretty sure I can take the sting of some damn alcohol.”
“Suit yourself,” she said, before pouring the liquid mercilessly. I sat there and watched as my sister carefully removed the nail and tended to my wounds. I smiled at how much the whole situation reminded me of my mother. Long, curly, dark brown hair, vibrant golden eyes and a beautiful soul. Liv was all the goodness in the world, just like my mother was before she was taken away from us. “There, it’s all done.”
“Thank you.”
“Brett, can’t we figure something out--like who’s going to take care of you when you fuck up out there?” She asked.
“Me. Who do you think has done it for all these years?”
“I’m pretty sure I’ve had a hand in it. Are you rewriting history?”
Liv rose from her seated position on the floor, the movement so poetic that I knew she was letting the Wolf take hold. That told me that she was having a harder time with this than she was letting on. I hated that she was hurt. She was my kid sister, my partner in crime, the only person in this world that really knew me, all of me.
“Come with me,” I said, cradling my hand.
“No. This is my home. I’m not running away like a damn coward.”
I pulled my duffel bag and put it on my shoulder, taking a look at my sister, her back still turned to me.
“I’m not abandoning you, Liv. I’m just going to live my life. I can’t be here anymore. But as soon as I land where I land, I’ll give you a call.” I stepped closer to her and turned her to face me. “You’re my blood, my only family. You will always have me.”
“I know.” She nodded. “It’s just that I’m going to miss you so much.” She wrapped her arms around my neck and pulled me close to her. “You call me every day, ok? Every single day.”
I nodded my head, kissed the top of hers, and walked out.
Outside, I looked back at the house that had been the center of all my childhood memories, good and bad, turned and walked off to find something new. To find a light before the darkness completely drowned me.
Chapter 1
Shayla - present day
The sharp crack of a branch sent a shudder through my veins.
I stalled, halting the breath in my throat as my eyes scanned the woods. My feet planted firmly, I slowly pulled the shotgun from its resting spot on my shoulder and held it firmly in both hands.
And I waited.
I’d spent the better part of the last three hours hunting a wounded stag through the wood thicket, my patience finally worn thin enough to set my sights on home. But maybe I’d given up too soon, maybe I’d be having venison stew for dinner after all.
My meat reserves were wearing thin. I needed this stag.
And then another crack sent the hairs on the back of my neck bristling. I hunched in the leaves at the base of a giant evergreen, the scent of sap in my plaited hair as I pulled the shotgun’s sight to my eye and scanned the woods again.
Something was out there. Stag or not, I had to be ready.
I squinted when I caught leaves moving fifty yards in the distance, the sun’s late evening rays causing long shadows and many hard-to-see hiding spots for creatures, big and small.
And human.
“What the shit?” I uttered under my breath, sinking myself deeper in the dark shadows of the evergreen branches as one man kicked another into the edge of a small meadow. I emptied my lungs, cramming my eyes closed and pretending I wasn’t seeing what it looked like I was seeing.
Three men, towering over another. The shortest of the three held a pistol, ready to fire at the helpless man on the ground.
Was I about to witness a murder? My heart hammered as I stood without thinking, feet carrying me, deft and quick, over the forest floor. Fallen evergreen needles padded my steps as I reached the edge of the meadow and hunkered, close enough now to hear their shouting voices.
I tightened my grip on my favorite shotgun, glad now I’d brought this one along and not my father’s older, less accurate gun. Before I could second-guess myself, I launched out of the bush and at the men, the sights of my gun already aimed at the hand of the man holding the pistol. I released my finger, the pierce of the shot in the air followed instantly by the howl of the shortest man as he dropped the gun and grabbed his hand, now missing the tip of his pinky finger.
I aimed my gun at the tallest’s throat, ready to take him out if needed. Their eyes rounded, glancing from the man on the ground and back to me, before turning and tearing back off down the trail they’d come from.
“Fucking tourists.” I grumbled as I set my gun against a tree and turned to the man they’d just been threatening to kill. Any outsider in these woods was a tourist as far as I was concerned. I cast my eyes across the broad stretch of the man’s rippled shoulders underneath a torn cotton t-shirt, dripping and damp with sweat. “Whoa, if I’d known you looked like that I don’t think I would have rescued you.” Fear spun through me as I realized he was big enough to turn on me and do some damage. I may have had the gun, but from the look of his long and powerful legs, he could outrun me easily.