Caught (Mating Run #1)

1. Evan

Chapter one

Evan

E van sat on his worn-out couch, barely registering the flickering images on the television. The glow cast jagged shadows along the walls, making the small cabin feel even more claustrophobic.

Outside, the night was alive with distant howls—some sharp and frantic, others deep and resonant. They echoed through the woods like ghostly battle cries, reverberating in his chest.

His fingers tightened around his knees. The doors were locked. The windows were shut tight. He had no intention of stepping outside until dawn.

The annual werewolf mating run was in full swing.

And his house was right on the edge of the woods.

The town treated the annual hunt like some warped festival—one part tradition, one part spectacle. They gathered in groups, wrapped in thick jackets, boots crunching against frost-covered ground as they made their way to the edge of the woods. Some muttered to themselves. Others simply watched, casting uneasy glances at the volunteers lining up at the boundary.

The tributes.

Humans who had chosen this. Who had signed their names on the agreement, accepted the terms, and would walk willingly into the forest for the night, knowing what waited for them.

Signing up for the run meant financial security for the rest of the year—enough money to lift struggling families out of debt, to pay off medical bills, to survive in a town where opportunities were scarce.

It was the price that werewolves paid to live among them the other eleven months of the year. A bargain struck generations ago.

And yet, despite the compensation, despite the supposed understanding, there was an unspoken truth: no human walked into that forest without fear.

Because once the hunt began, the wolves weren’t your friends and neighbors. They were something else entirely.

They were wild.

And once they chose a mate, there was no going back.

Evan had seen the proof of that himself.

The night had been similar to this one—cold, windless, the sky a canvas of silver and black. Evan had been younger then, too curious for his own good. He should have stayed away from the windows, like his mother had begged him to. Should have drawn the curtains, turned up the volume, drowned out the howls.

Instead, he had secretly pressed his face to his bedroom window, breath fogging the glass.

And he had seen the boy.

He'd come sprinting from the woods, wild-eyed and panting, his body a blur of motion beneath the harsh glow of Evan’s porch light. He couldn’t have been very old—maybe nineteen. Dark hair, lean frame, the kind of face that might have been handsome if it weren’t twisted in sheer, unfiltered panic.

And behind him—

A shadow in the trees.

If you stepped into the woods that night, you were supposed to stay there. Anyone who tried to flee would be met with swift punishment.

But the werewolf that night didn't care about meting out justice. He had something else on his mind.

He moved with a terrifying, unnatural grace, slipping through the moonlight like a living nightmare. He was tall, muscles rolling beneath his skin as he stalked forward. His eyes gleamed, catching the light, locked onto his prey with an intensity that made Evan’s stomach clench.

The escaping tribute's foot caught on something—from his own exhaustion, maybe, or sheer bad luck. He hit the ground hard, a cry tearing from his throat.

And then the werewolf was on him.

It was the only time Evan saw what happened in the woods, normally hidden away and only seen by the night's participants. He'd sucked in a breath, heart hammering so loud he thought it might shatter the windowpane.

He had expected carnage. Expected the beast to tear the boy apart, to maul him like the run's naysayers always claimed they did in hushed whispers and rumors.

But that didn’t happen.

The werewolf loomed over the boy, breathing heavy, a low growl vibrating through its chest. He pressed down, easily pinning the human beneath his weight.

The boy didn’t struggle. His chest heaved, his hands fisting in the dirt, his entire body shuddering with something that wasn’t entirely fear.

The werewolf lowered his head, nosing at the boy’s throat, inhaling deep.

The boy whimpered, but he didn’t fight.

Evan watched, frozen, as the werewolf positioned himself between the boy's thighs. The creature's hips moved forward, a savage thrust that made the boy's body arch. The boy cried out, a distant, muffled sound that sent a shiver down Evan's spine.

He knew he should look away—but he didn't.

The werewolf moved, his hips pistoning in a relentless, animalistic rhythm. The boy's hands clutched at the dirt, his body rocking with each powerful thrust, his cries echoing through the night.

The shadows obscured most of the details, but Evan could see enough.

The boy didn't fight, didn't resist. Instead, his body seemed to move in sync with the werewolf's, his cries of fear turning into something else entirely.

He arched up for more .

Evan had never told anyone what he saw that night.

He hadn’t looked away. He should have. But something in the way the werewolf took him— possessed him—kept Evan frozen in place. His breath hitched at the memory, his fingers curling into the worn fabric of his jeans as if he could ground himself in the present.

Evan had told himself he was imagining it. That terror could twist into strange things when the body was overwhelmed, that it wasn’t pleasure he was seeing. Just… just instinct, just adrenaline. A trick of the moonlight.

But he remembered the wolf’s movements. Strong, controlled, deliberate.

He remembered the heat in his own body, a sickness or a thrill—he still didn’t know which.

And he remembered the way his legs had locked up when the werewolf’s head suddenly lifted, his sharp eyes turning toward the house.

Right at him.

Evan had jerked back so fast he nearly fell, heart hammering, shame burning up his throat like acid. He had no idea how long he stood there, pressed against the bedroom wall, barely breathing. When he’d finally forced himself to look again, the yard was empty.

The boy was gone.

The wolf was gone.

And Evan had been left alone, shaking, with nothing but questions he didn’t dare ask.

Even now, years later, his pulse still jumped at the memory. Every year, when the full moon crested over the trees and the hunt began again, his mind dragged him back to that night. Back to what he’d seen.

What he'd felt.

He shoved a hand through his hair, exhaling sharply. This was why he locked his doors. Why he shut his windows, ignored the townsfolk, ignored the unease curling in his gut.

Because the worst part wasn’t the fear.

It was the part of him that wasn't scared.

As a park ranger, Evan walked those woods every day. Knew every ridge, every gnarled root that could trip up an unsteady step. He knew where the river curved sharp and fast, where the underbrush thickened into near-impenetrable walls of brambles, where the trees leaned so close their branches tangled like fingers laced together.

He knew exactly where he would run if he were ever foolish enough to enter the mating run himself.

It wasn’t a serious thought—just something that occurred to him sometimes, when he stood at the tree line, staring into the dark. A stupid, reckless what if?

Could he make it?

Could he slip through the trees, quiet as a ghost, dodge the hunters in pursuit of his body? Could he find the narrow caves in the rock face, climb the steep cliffs near the old quarry, use the land the way only he could?

Would he be fast enough?

Or would still he be caught, despite everything?

Evan swallowed hard, flexing his hands against the cool air of his cottage. He knew the answer. Of course he did.

He’d seen it firsthand—how werewolves hunted, how they took what they wanted.

Every year, from just beyond his locked door, he heard it. The cries that rang out through the trees, sharp with pain, thick with pleasure. The gasps, the ragged moans, the desperate, needy sounds of humans who should have been running, fighting—but weren’t.

And every year, Evan told himself he would not listen.

He failed.

Always.

Because it wasn’t just curiosity that kept his ears straining into the night.

It was something darker.

Something wrong with him.

Evan gritted his teeth. He didn’t want this. Didn’t want to think about it, didn’t want to feel it, didn’t want the heat pooling low in his gut, twisting through his veins like some shameful sickness.

He was better than this. He’d spent his whole life burying this part of himself, forcing it deeper, pretending it wasn’t there. As far as the world was concerned, he was just a normal, average straight guy—and he wanted to keep it that way.

He wouldn’t let one damned night unravel him.

A slamming knock jolted Evan from his thoughts. The sound echoed through his small living room, urgent and desperate.

"Please, help!" a voice cried out through the door.

A familiar voice. Evan's stomach lurched.