Chapter 17
Chapter seventeen
Luna
Iexhale and step onto the porch, lifting the shotgun, the barrel trembling in my hands.
Shadow slips out beside me, his fur warm against my bare leg. Instead of charging ahead like he would with any other intruder, he plants himself between me and the yard. His growling resumes, but absent is his usual aggressive behavior toward male strangers.
My watcher is closer now, standing less than twenty feet away. My lungs seize, forgetting how to draw air, the automatic rhythm of inhale and exhale vanishing.
The wolf mask he’s wearing is some sort of metal that transforms his face into something beautiful and unsettling, all sharp angles and predatory lines.
It covers him from his hairline down to just above his mouth, wrapping around the sides of his head.
Dark shadows obscure his eyes, but their piercing intensity feels like hot coals burning me in the dark.
They hold me captive, and I can’t look away.
The sound rolling from Shadow’s throat turns darker, more threatening. His ears flatten, and the fur on his back bristles.
“Don’t move!”
My voice sounds normal, nothing like the panic eating me alive inside. I’m amazed anything comes out with the terror clawing at my throat. The shotgun shakes in my grasp.
He takes a step closer, and I catch the hint of a smile curving beneath his mask.
Even that slight movement seems calculated and predatory, like a wolf testing the boundaries of wounded prey.
My mouth goes dry, and my skin tightens, pulling against my body until I want to claw it off just to breathe.
The mask gleams in the moonlight, and it’s both fascinating and terrifying. There’s something almost mythical about him—part man, part beast, but wholly dangerous.
Those hidden eyes never leave mine. The intensity of his stare peels away every defense, leaving me exposed. He’s memorizing my terror, cataloging every tremor, every quickened breath.
My finger tenses on the trigger.
“What do you want?” The words come out breathless, betraying my panic.
He closes more of the distance in three silent strides.
The way he moves, like he owns the night, makes my hands quake.
My brain shouts orders—move, retreat, get to safety.
But my body won’t listen. My feet might as well be nailed to the porch.
Shadow launches himself down the stairs, and fear for my wolf finally cuts through my paralysis.
“Shadow, no!” I shout, the click of the shotgun echoing as I cock it.
My watcher holds up one hand, palm facing out, and Shadow, who trusts no one outside of Maren and me, freezes mid-charge. He sits back on his haunches, looking up at the masked figure with something that looks disturbingly like deference.
The masked man examines me with the focus of someone cataloging weaknesses. His gaze peels away every defense I’ve built, burning through my clothes, my skin, and straight into the fear I’m trying so hard to hide.
“Your security is inadequate.” His voice is rough and deep, the sound of it making my skin crawl and burn at the same time.
I blink, thrown by the mundane observation, sputtering, “Ex… Excuse me?”
“No real cameras. Blind spots a child could exploit. I could bypass the lock on your back door in under thirty seconds.” He gestures toward the sanctuary building. “And the medication storage has no alarm system.”
I raise the shotgun higher, my mind racing. How the hell does he know all this?
“Thanks for the security audit.” The words come out sharp. My stomach twists itself into knots beneath the false bravado. “Now tell me who you are and why you’ve been stalking me.”
“You’re beautiful.”
The simple words, spoken with quiet sincerity, send confusion crashing through my fear. My hands tighten on the gun. A red haze of anger clouds my vision, replacing the confusion.
“Are you kidding me?”
He takes another step closer and reaches down to scratch Shadow’s head. My fierce protector grunts and headbutts his hand like an overgrown puppy.
“Really?” I shoot an incredulous look at my traitorous wolf. “I’ve raised you since you were a pup, and you betray me for the first creepy masked guy who comes along?”
Shadow’s tail thumps against the ground once, a gesture that seems almost like an apology, but he doesn’t move from his position.
My eyes return to my watcher.
“I asked you a question.” The words come out thin and reedy, nothing like the authority I was going for. “Why are you watching me? What do you want?”
“You.”
That single word should send me running, bolting into the house. Instead, something deep in my core clenches. Fear and arousal tangle together in my belly like liquid fire, scalding and dangerous.
What the hell?
“I’m not interested.”
My finger tightens on the trigger, and I stand my ground as Shadow abandons his post and returns to my side, positioning his body half in front of me.
“Yes, you are, little doe.” The endearment rolls off his tongue like honey, a warm and seductive sound that infuriates me as my heart pounds in response.
“You were watching me when I released Buttercup?”
I knew I felt eyes on me.
“I’m always watching you, little doe.”
“Don’t call me that.”
“Why not? It suits you. Does are gentle, beautiful creatures.” His voice drops lower, more intimate. “And you’re my perfect prey.”
My heart hammers so hard it hurts, like it’s trying to punch through my chest. I clutch the shotgun tighter, my arms trembling, threatening to give out, as his words wrap around my throat and squeeze the air from my lungs.
“You’re the one leaving those dead bodies, aren’t you?”
“Do you want it to be me?”
“That isn’t what I asked.”
“They were monsters. They got exactly what they deserved.” His voice carries a cold satisfaction and no hint of remorse.
Part of me agrees, though I won’t admit it. The other part is terrified by his casual confirmation.
“But why are you leaving them on my porch?”
“Most of them were in the driveway. And they’re gifts, little doe.”
“I told you not to call me that.”
“And I told you, it suits you.”
Why haven’t I shot him yet?
“You need to leave.” Terror turns my legs to jelly, but I plant my feet and square my shoulders like Grandpa taught me. “And stop dropping corpses on my property. I don’t want your gifts.”
He tilts his head, short tendrils of dark hair falling in loose strands around the mask’s edge as it catches the light at a new angle. The sight of it is hypnotic, but everything about his posture screams danger. My body wants to retreat, but I dig my heels into the wood.
“Your wolf recognizes what I am.” He nods toward Shadow. “Why can’t you?”
I glance down. Shadow is stretched out next to me, at ease, his tail thumping against the porch boards. Everything about him reads comfort and trust, the same way he acts when it’s just me and him. As if he has no worries about this predator being near me.
When I look back up, my watcher has moved closer still.
“Take one more step, and I’ll shoot.”
The words die in my throat, ending in a whimper as he surges forward, striding up the stairs, two at a time. Panic roars in my ears, and training kicks in before thought does. The gun jumps in my grip, and I fire, the blast hammering through my body and rattling my bones.
But he’s faster than me. His hand shoots out, fingers wrapping around steel, jerking the barrel aside. The shot misses him by inches, echoing across the property, and tearing into an aspen tree across the driveway. Smoke curls from the muzzle.
The gun disappears from my grip before I can blink, and I stagger back. It crashes onto the porch swing with enough force to make the chains rattle. His expression turns to stone, and the air around him crackles with the kind of energy that comes before storms break.
I shake so hard my vision fractures, the trembling coming from somewhere deeper than muscle. My feet stumble backward while my heart tries to choke me, hands scrabbling for distance, but he seizes my wrist in an iron grip. An electric shock runs up my arm.
Shadow surges to his feet, fur standing on end, teeth bared as he snarls, a sound that makes the night air tremble. My wolf is back, my protector returning, whatever hold this stranger had on him finally broken.
“Sit!”
The command slices through Shadow’s growl. His body goes slack, and he drops onto his haunches like he’s been trained his whole life to respond to this voice.
The tsk-tsk sounds almost amused, paired with the slow shake of my watcher’s head. He’s too close, but my body has forgotten how to move. I just tried to kill him and failed. Now all the power sits in his hands.
“Naughty little doe.” He lifts his hand to brush his finger down my cheek.
“Don’t touch me.” I jerk my head back and yank at my arm.
He lets go, but his hands find my hips instead, thumbs pressing into my flesh.
His grip burns through the fabric. My palms slam against his chest, pushing with everything I have, shoving against solid muscle. It’s like trying to move a mountain.
“Let me go.”
“If you wanted me gone, you wouldn’t stand at your window every night looking for me.”
He nudges Shadow to the right with his knee, then guides me backward despite my struggles, his grip almost painful until I’m pressed against the front door. His body forms a wall of heat, and my pulse gallops into a wild rhythm, panic and arousal colliding until I can’t tell one from the other.
“Get off me.” I choke on a sob.
My fingers claw at his chest, finding only unyielding muscle beneath the fabric. Everything in me is begging me to push him away. So why do my fingers cling to his shirt like a lifeline?
“You wouldn’t have stripped for me, teasing and tempting me with your body.”
He steps closer, too close. His voice, low and deep, filters through the minute space between us, his breath warming my face. His gaze drifts to the delicate curve of my collarbone, where heat blooms under my skin.