“Tough girl,” Kade murmured, tracking her movement across the bar with a tray of beers for a table of blue-collar boys.
“Yeah. Maybe even tough enough to handle you.” Ethan Changed and lifted off the ground with the flap of his wings. A single black feather floated down and landed on the grass beside Kade. He leaned over and picked it up just to make sure it was real…just to make sure he hadn’t imagined Ethan.
It wouldn’t have been the first time.
You aren’t crazy at all.
The biggest tragedy in his life was that Trina was wrong.
Chapter Seven
“I know you’re out there,” Trina called. Well, she didn’t know know. More like, she was hopeful.
She did feel watched, though. The acre of woods around her little one-bedroom cabin was still and quiet. There were no little animal sounds, no breeze rattling dry leaves, no birds settling in for the night.
Sure, it was three in the morning, but still. Usually there was something awake with her when she got home from late nights closing down the bar. She was still getting used to the hours of The GutShot. Her and her dad, Cooper, had only just bought it six months ago. And she was the main one who managed it since her dad was a pilot and ran shipments in and out of these parts as much as he could.
She shifted the bag of frozen burger patties and hamburger buns into her other hand and scanned the woods one more time. “Hello?”
No answer, nothing moved.
It had been three days since she and Kade had been released from the Darby Precinct. Three days since he’d led her up the stairs and to the parking lot where her dad waited on one side and Ethan on the other. Three days since Kade stopped right in the middle of that parking lot, turned on her, gripped her arms, and said, “I can’t have fragile things.” He’d leaned in like he wanted to kiss her, but paused then released her and walked away without looking back.
That moment haunted her now.
Damn him.
He’d made her pay attention. She’d had her shoulders hunched against the storm of her life, and he’d made her sit up straight and look right at him. He’d made her interested, and it wasn’t just being in heat. She didn’t only want him in bed. She didn’t only want him to take the edge off by fucking for a few minutes. No. She wanted to know everything about him because what he had exposed of himself was raw, gritty, and beautiful.
He was the most interesting man she’d ever met. And the most dangerous because of it.
She missed him—a man she barely knew. She was losing her mind, and she didn’t know what to do about it or how to feel less about him.
Disappointed to her bones that he wasn’t here, she made her way to the front porch but stood stock-still when she saw what was waiting for her right up against the logs of the house. It was a rocking chair painted in distressed teal. Her cabin was all natural wood, no fancy stains, so the rocking chair was the only pop of color out here.
Teal was her favorite.
Chills consuming her arms, she looked out at the woods. It had to be him, right? Kade did this? Or made this?
She sat down gingerly in it and rocked. It was well-made, didn’t creak, was solid as a redwood, and smooth with every movement. She slid her fingertips over a picture carved onto the left arm. It was the outline of a mountain lion, barely visible because it had been painted over.
But when she felt the other arm, there was nothing there, only smooth, painted wood. No way would an artist who made this leave a beautiful piece unbalanced.
She got off the chair and knelt beside it, searching every smooth surface in the porch light. Finding nothing on top, she pushed the chair back and looked underneath. There. On the undercarriage of the seat, there was carved an outline of a wolf howling at the moon.
Holy shit.
Chills rippled up her entire body.
Kade had done this. He’d carved her animal and his onto this chair. And sure, they were separate, but he hadn’t been able to help himself. He’d snuck his animal with hers onto the same piece of furniture.
Trina huffed a breath and sat down on the porch.
Separate.
A hollowness filled her. Emptiness. Loneliness. She and Kade were the same…separate from the world around them.
She was destined to eat alone, be alone, and pretend to be tough and happy for the couples around her. No holding hands with someone who wanted to protect her, no rolling over in the middle of the night to find sanctuary from a bad dream in a man’s arms.
A tear streaked down her face. This gift was a beautiful heartbreak. She’d been so determined to stay strong, but losing a Clan hurt. It hurt and made her scared, made her think that being alone was the safest way to take care of a heart.
So why did hers still hurt so bad?
She’d watched Ten and Kurt fall in love and become king and queen of the New Darby Clan. She’d watched her dad love her mother deeply when she’d been alive. She’d watched all the shifters in this territory pair up and fix each other, but who was here to fix her? A wolf who wouldn’t let himself be close to her.
She deserved better. She deserved nothing at all. She deserved better. She deserved nothing at all.
A sob escaped her and she just…broke down. But pissed at her weakness, Trina blasted her fists against the porch and let a panther scream rip out of her as long and as loud as she could.
And in the distance, very, very far away…a wolf answered her with the most hauntingly beautiful, heart-wrenchingly lonely howl she’d ever heard.
Chapter Eight
Trina clutched her hot mug of coffee and stared at the rocking chair. It was dawn, and she’d come out here to enjoy the cup on her new chair, just to feel close to Kade, but her seat was already taken by a box wrapped in newspaper.
She inhaled deeply but didn’t smell him near.
Bare-footed, Trina padded across the porch to the chair and set the mug on the railing, then opened the present. It was a set of four butter knives. The gently curved blades all matched, but the handles were made from pieces of deer antler. On the end of each was carved an animal. Mountain lion like Trina, Kurt, and her father. A squirrel like Tenlee. A crow like Ethan. And lastly, a wolf. Like Kade.
They’d all been nestled side by side in the box on a piece of velvet, but the mountain lion and wolf were on opposite sides of each other. Separate. Always separate.
She brushed her fingertip against the handle of the wolf knife. They were beautiful. He was giving her little treasures.
The next morning, there was a rough, wooden picture frame with a black and white picture of her behind the bar, leaning over a piece of paper. Had he seen what she’d doodled that day? It had been a wolf. She could almost almost make it out in the picture. On the edge of the frame was an outline of a mountain lion’s face, but the wolf was harder to find on this one. She had to open up the back. A wolf head had been sketched on the back of the picture.
She clutched it to her chest and scanned the woods, but as always, Kade was a ghost. She was falling in love with a ghost.
On the fourth day, there was nothing.
One the fifth day, there was nothing.
On the sixth day…still nothing.
On the seventh day, there was a little carving of a mountain lion, but no wolf.
Something had happened.
Trina got dressed in her favorite teal tank top, pulled her hair back in a ponytail, put her sunglasses on, and hit the road because Kade wasn’t the only one who could stalk. Trina was a good hunter, too.
The roar of her motorcycle echoed through the woods of Corvallis as she wove up the dirt lane toward the address she’d found. Leah owned this place, but as Trina pulled into the clearing, she was stunned by what she saw. It was a mansion, complete with three stories and big white columns around the wraparound porch. The lawn was manicured, and off to the side was Leah in a red polka dot bikini and matching red sunglasses, sipping on a margarita.