CHAPTER FOUR || HARRIS
“‘Yeah?’ Just like that? Yeah, you knew you were my—” I broke off, so furious with him I didn’t trust myself to speak.
“Mate,” he supplied, his voice going hoarse around the word.
The black-haired wolf was still clutching the white cloth bar rag in his hand, his eyes wide and his expression wooden and unreadable.
But—even though I didn’t know how—I felt him experience a storm of emotions at the sight of me. Disbelief, shock, bewilderment, and maybe even a small amount of guilt. And most of all, a hot surge of desire.
My gaze drifted to his lips, which were parted with surprise.
I could part them with lust, too. I could make him breathe my name like a prayer, like a goddamn invocation.
I could make him beg for me. Longing and lust ignited like fire in my blood—a strange mix of sweet yearning and heat.
Feelings I had never consciously experienced for another man.
“How long did you know?” I demanded, forcing myself to stay put, to ignore the almost magnetic pull between us.
“Look, there are things you don’t understand. It’s not safe to be—”
“How long?”
Reed winced, dropping his gaze. “Since the moment I first laid eyes on you.”
For a long moment, I experienced nothing at all.
Just total emotional blankness. He could have commented on the weather, for all the reaction I had.
But my body responded first, going rigid with anger.
My hands tightened into fists. And then the room narrowed down until it was just him—even if there had been a gun to my head, I couldn’t have described a single thing except the handsome dark-haired wolf watching me with wide eyes.
I began to tremble with fury and something a lot hotter and more raw-edged than that: hurt.
This was confirmation. Reed had known the entire time. Which meant he had been—what?
Watching me from the shadows?
Knowing I was his other half and letting me be alone?
Completely fucking alone, living a kind of half-life where I was yearning for a connection I had no way of understanding, thinking I was going batshit insane the entire time.
Even Cole hadn’t been that cruel. And he hadn’t had even a trace of human emotion until Eli entered the picture. Hell, he used to hunt humans without even a shred of remorse. Granted, they were serial killers—but still. And even he hadn’t toyed with me like that.
I needed to get out of here. The words I wanted to say were burning in the back of my throat, lodged under the weight of my emotional reaction, but they wouldn’t stay that way for long.
I needed to think—to decide how I felt about this—before I ruined everything. And most of all, I needed to get away from him. Reed, who had known all along and hadn’t breathed a single fucking word of it.
“I’m leaving,” I managed to croak out.
Then, without waiting for his reply, I turned and opened the bar door with more force than I meant to and stormed out onto the street.
Only a few people were on the sidewalks. None of them paid me any mind when I bolted out of the bar and down the street, without even thinking about where I was going, only that I had to get away from the wolf.
Strange, how I had been so certain I’d be able to stay calm in his presence. Or, at the very least, to give him a piece of my mind. But I hadn’t been able to do either of those things.
“Harris—wait!”
I heard Reed’s footsteps behind me on the pavement. Even if he hadn’t said anything, even without turning around, I still would have known it was him. I could feel his proximity. Something that had never happened to me before.
More supernatural bullshit I’ve been mixed up in. Lovely.
“Leave me alone.”
“What? No! Are you out of your mind?” Reed demanded, falling into step beside me. Out of the corner of my eye, I caught him casting me a reproachful look—which was rich as hell, coming from him. The bastard. He added, “I’m not leaving things like that!”
I stopped dead in my tracks, forcing him to stop too.
Turning to face him, I said, “Oh, so now you’re interested in making sure things are cool? Now that it’s you who might experience a little fucking emotional discomfort?”
His lips parted with surprise. “I didn’t realize you knew anything was going on. I—I kept my distance.”
Wrong answer, pal.
“Right, because I wouldn’t notice the nightly lucid dreams I’ve been having for three months straight about a Hallmark movie knock-off town I’ve never been to in the Cascade Mountains?
” I let out a laugh containing zero percent humor.
“Or the fact that I could sense you, but I could never actually see you, because you were hiding from me?”
His face fell. “Oh. Right. Well, I guess I should have known you’d be able to feel me.”
“Of course I could feel you! I can feel you right now!”
He cocked his head to the side, his brows drawing together. “You can?”
“Yeah, it’s not just a werewolf thing!”
Reed grabbed me by the lapels and pulled me into the alleyway we were standing in front of. His voice dropped to a furious whisper. “No wolf talk in public! No one here knows about us.”
I glared back at him, trying not to notice the fact that his face was inches from mine. “Fine.”
“Fine,” he shot back, also glaring.
Then I kissed him. I didn’t think about it.
I didn’t let myself worry about the fact that I was livid with him, or that I had never kissed another man.
I didn’t let myself think about him being a werewolf—a supernatural creature I knew nothing about, except what I had learned in movies, most of which was probably wrong—and I sure as hell didn’t let myself think about the fact that this man was my fated mate.
Reed let out a noise of surprise the moment our lips touched. His whole body went tense. For a split second, I thought he’d pull away.
Then, an instant later, he relaxed.
His lips were warm and a strange mix of soft and firm, very different from what I was used to, but the difference sent a thrill of excitement and expectation up my spine.
When my hand cupped his jaw, I could feel the faint brush of stubble.
He tasted like mint and smelled faintly of cedar—probably his bodywash or shampoo.
But underneath that, he smelled like pinewood.
It reminded me sharply of Christmas—back when my mom was still with us and had always insisted we get a real Christmas tree.
I backed him into the wall of the building, deepening the kiss.
My tongue met his and he let out a soft, desperate noise.
I could feel his arousal against me. And my own cock began to grow hard, pressed against him—his simple masculine firmness banishing any lingering doubts from my mind that I might not enjoy being with another man.
When his arms—strong, with lean muscles taut through the fabric of his shirt—wrapped around my back and pulled me in close, I became fully hard.
The world around us stopped existing. It was only him and me.
It wasn’t just that it was another man and it was my first time. It was him. A sense of wholeness, of completeness, swept over me. An inner knowing that he was mine snapped into place.
“What the hell are you doing?” a woman’s voice demanded.
I sprang back from Reed as if he’d suddenly caught fire and snapped around to face the woman standing at the mouth of the alley, staring at us in disbelief. She was in her late twenties, tanned, dressed in jean cutoffs and a pink crop top, with her blonde hair pulled back into a severe ponytail.
“Lacey—um—” Reed cast me a guilty look, his cheeks going red. His lips were swollen and thoroughly kissed—the exact way mine felt. The evidence of his arousal was clear through the bulge in his jeans. “We were, err—”
“I have eyes. I know what you were doing. What I don’t know is why.” Her gaze narrowed in suspicion as it landed on me. “And who the hell are you?”
“Harris,” I said automatically. “I’m—err—” I broke off, not sure who she was, how she knew Reed, or what the hell I was supposed to say. I finished lamely with, “Uh—new in town.”
Lacey arched an eyebrow, her gaze sliding over to Reed. “It’s about time you got your rocks off, but don’t you think that maybe now is a bad time?” She paused. “Also, if you’re out here going to town with some rando in an alleyway, who’s manning the bar?”
Reed let out a long breath, running his fingers through his hair. “Right. That’s a good point.”
Lacey rolled her eyes. “Fine. I’ll go watch the bar. Whenever you’re ready, I have an update from Daniel. About that very important thing we were doing earlier.”
With that, she turned and headed off in the direction of the bar.
When we were alone, Reed said, “You need to leave.”
I whirled to face him, outrage flashing through me. “What?”
He gestured between the two of us. “This, right here? Yeah, no. I can’t do it.”
“Why the fuck not? Because some random woman called you out for kissing me?”
“Actually, I think you kissed me.”
“Answer the damn question! Give me one good reason why I ought to leave.”
“I’ve got responsibilities here, Harris. I can’t let myself get confused about what’s important.”
Anger surged through me again, sharp and hot. I seemed to be having very strange, very intense physiological reactions around him.
“And your fated mate isn’t important?”
Reed grimaced. “You don’t even know what those words mean!”
“I know enough.”
“Go back to Los Angeles, Harris. It’s dangerous here. Something could happen to you.”
“As opposed to when I’m working in the LAPD’s homicide division?” Why the hell was he fighting this? Couldn’t he feel the pull between us? The bond demanding to assert itself? I wasn’t even supernatural and I sure as shit could. “I’m in danger all the time.”
“Not like this, you’re not.” Reed met my gaze and there was a flat determination there that reminded me sharply—and painfully—of Paul. “Look, we found a hiker in the forest this morning. Something killed him.”
“Something. As in—”
“A thing, not a person and not an animal—it was a supernatural creature. That’s why you need to leave. I can’t have you getting caught in the crossfire.”
His meaning sank in. “Wait. There’s a monster in the woods killing people and you guys are what—hunting it?”
Reed nodded. “Exactly. That’s why you need to leave.”
The wolf didn’t understand me at all. Not yet. But he would.
“And you think I’m going to, what? Stand back and let you put yourself in danger?”
He locked eyes with me, as if waiting for the punch line. “But you’re human.”
“Yeah,” I said, staring him down. “I sure as shit am. And you can be stoic and all that bullshit and tell me you kissed me and felt nothing, but I’m not a liar. And I’m not going to let anything happen to my partner. Not again.”
Disbelief flashed through me that I’d said that aloud.
His eyebrows drew together. He opened his mouth to speak—maybe to ask me what the hell I’d meant by that—but there was no way I was explaining Paul to him. I beat him to the punch, cutting him off with, “Get used to me, Reed. I’m not leaving town.”
He studied me. “There’s a monster out there killing people and you’re willing to hang out here because…” He trailed off, seeming almost bewildered. As if he’d forgotten he was supposed to be angrily running me out of town.
“Because if there’s even a chance I could help you, I will. I’m not going to leave you alone to drown in shit. That’s not the kind of man I am.”
He winced. “Yeah, I guess I probably deserved that.”
I snorted. At least he was willing to own up to his bullshit when he was called on it. Maybe this could work after all.
“Look, after I check myself into the ski lodge, I’ll come back to the bar. Do you promise not to wolf out and head into the woods to look for this thing until we’ve had a chance to figure this shit out? I don’t really feel like heading in after you by myself.”
He hesitated for a beat too long, his expression going tight and unhappy. “I need moonlight.”
His words didn’t make sense. “You need—”
“Moonlight. To shift forms. It’s how we do it. I can’t become a wolf during the day.”
I felt my eyebrows draw together. I had seen him in wolf form in a dream two nights ago—a shared dream, where he’d been hiding from me. And yes, I was still salty about that. But I had a hard time picturing him shifting from man into wolf. My brain just wouldn’t compute it.
“Which means I have a couple of hours, then. To convince you to stop being a jackass.”
“And I have a couple of hours to convince you that you’re in over your head.”
“Good luck with that. It’s a nice town. I’m going to stay awhile.”
“You’re infuriating.”
“And you’re an asshole,” I shot back. “Did it ever occur to you that maybe you could have just talked to me like a person? That maybe if you’d just been real with me, I might not have needed to travel a thousand miles to tell you that you’re a dick?”
His expression turned sheepish. Which led me to think, no, he hadn’t considered that possibility.
I narrowed my eyes at him. “I’ll see you in a couple of hours. We’re not done here.”
With that, I turned to go.
Reed called after me, “The ski lodge isn’t open for another six months.”
I turned back around to face him. “I’ll sleep in my car, then.”
He went pale at my words.
And then I somehow knew—in that weird, wordless way I’d known his emotions back in the bar, except somehow even stronger now—he was thinking of all the ways a monster could attack me if I was defenseless in my car.
And how much more likely it was that the monster would come after me if I turned myself into a sitting duck.
Now that I considered it, I wasn’t a fan of that possibility either.
“I can’t believe I’m about to do this,” Reed muttered, his eyebrows pulling together. For an instant he looked so dismayed that I almost—but not quite—felt bad for him.
“Do what?”
“You’re staying with me,” Reed said. “At the commune. You’ll be protected there. At least until you come to your senses and realize the right thing to do is to leave.”
I smiled at him. It wasn’t a nice smile, since my anger with him wasn’t quite gone yet. “Yeah, good luck with that.”