Chapter 1 #2
We stroll past the craft store with knitted scarves, hand-carved miniature squirrels, and a quilt with a wolf on it because this town loves them. The hunting and outdoor store window is filled with camouflage and crossbows. We pass a few people who keep to themselves.
“Let me carry your bag.” Roman holds out a hand, his gaze on my backpack, his fingers curling.
I hesitate at first as it’s everything I own at this point now that I’ve left my Miami apartment behind. Except my muscles are already strained from its weight, so I hand it over. He slings it over one shoulder and keeps walking.
The sidewalk we use turns into grass, which leads us into a park with a rusted swing set. “You’re returning home, then?”
“Yep, but it’s only temporary. I plan to help out Grandma until I work out what I want to do next.”
He lets out a loud, exhaled snort that could mean anything. He’s so strange. “What were you doing in the city?”
“I was an event planner. When a company cuts budgets, those who do the actual work are the first to be axed.” Years of building a career snatched away in minutes.
He nods with barely a smile.
We reach the end of the park where the forest begins. There are no fences or signs, just a wall of trees with a narrow track—worn dirt and pine needles—between two red pines, and Roman steps onto it without pause.
I flip my hood up over my head and follow him in.
The scent of pines and damp earth fills the air. There’s also the cold breath of the creek somewhere off to the left. Woodsmoke, faint, finds us from someone’s chimney, as there are homes peppered through these woods.
We follow the trail that climbs gently up through the pines, and the forest closes over us. Sun falls through the canopy in dusty lines of light. Birds nearby argue with their chirps.
And then… a scent of sweet, spiced cinnamon, and underneath, a slightly burned caramel. It threads around me.
My whole body leans toward the scent, which is in the opposite direction of Roman, as I’m downwind of him, and he smells like worn sneakers.
This is someone else?
Goosebumps litter my arms at the unfamiliar scent.
“You coming?” Roman calls back from where I’ve fallen behind. The scent fades, and I hurry after him.
“Coming.” I run to catch up, but the toe of my boot hooks under a root, because God forbid, if only once, I could walk like a normal person. I catch a low branch to stop myself from falling.
But Roman’s paused, standing still in the middle of the trail. He tilts his head to the side as if listening to something in the woods.
“What is it?” I ask.
“Quiet.”
The forest has grown silent, as have the birds.
A twig snaps somewhere in the forest, and fear cuts through me as my thoughts fly to wolves. I spin on the spot, searching the woods and shadows. There’s nothing there, which is somehow worse.
Then some kind of animal darts between the trunks, farther to our right. Dark fur, long body, and fast.
“Is that a wolf?” I whisper, shivering all over.
“Shh.” Roman’s hand is moving under the hem of his jacket while he keeps scanning the tree line on either side of us. “We’ll take the other path.” He lifts his chin toward the track in the undergrowth to our left.
I stare in that direction, and every inch of me screams no. It’s a narrow passage between the trees, dropping away downhill, crowded by ferns. And it feels wrong. I grew up in these woods and know that the lodge is uphill in the opposite direction.
“No, we’re going away from the lodge. We remain on this trail.”
“Listen, this is the right way, and it’s safer.” His voice flattens before continuing. “The recent storms rerouted everything, including the path.” His hand moves suddenly, grasping my arm, the iron-like grip he uses is tight enough to hurt. Then he tugs me toward that dark path.
Panic spikes in my chest because suddenly I don’t feel safe with him, and I should have trusted my instincts back at the bar.
“Release me!” I twist, dig my heels in the ground, and claw at his grip with my free hand.
“Stop fighting—”
“Let her go,” a male’s voice booms from behind us, half growl, all command. I flinch at the abruptness of his tone.
Roman’s grip spasms on my arm. We both twist around.
And the woods, once silent, now seem to burst with movement.
A blur of movement explodes from the shadowed side of the forest, launching straight toward us. All I see is darkness at first, and I scream, because wolf, wolf, that’s a wolf.
Except it cuts through a flash of sunlight and it’s… a huge fox, russet and black, rocketing past us frantically.
Then a man I don’t recognize comes sprinting out of the trees after it, and everything happens at once.
He’s enormous. Tall, broad, with dark hair. His shirt is ripped, his jeans tight, and he moves with unimaginable speed. Roman drops my backpack and shoves himself in front of me.
“Back off!” Roman barks.
The stranger doesn’t stop, but slams into Roman. “Who the fuck are you?” he snarls.
They clash together in a battle of punches and fury, and Roman’s arm swings back mid-swing, whacking me across the chest and throwing me off my feet.
I cry out as I crash to the ground, the pain throbbing across my body.
The two men are now rolling in the dirt.
Roman, the man who, five seconds ago, was dragging me somewhere dark, is on the bottom.
And my idiot brain is still thinking he’s supposed to get me through the woods.
Help him. Nothing makes sense. Yet I scramble to my feet anyway, grab the huge stranger’s shoulder with both hands, and pull.
It’s like trying to uproot a pine tree.
“Stop!” My foot slides out from under me, causing me to lurch forward, straight into the fight and the stranger.
He twists toward me, growling, his arm snapping around my middle, and everything slows down.
Beautiful hazel-brown eyes are all I see, and his scent wafts over me. It’s the one I had smelled earlier: cinnamon-and-caramel, and the addiction returns when it floods every sense I have. And for an insane second, in the middle of the fight, I almost swoon.
Then everything happens in the same severed heartbeat.
Roman’s fist slams into the stranger’s face.
The huge guy, with me still in his grip, pitches backward, causing me to go with him as his balance is way off from the hit.
He staggers, all while trying to hold himself and me upright.
I’m crying out, my arms flinging upward.
His head snaps toward me just as my hand slams into his face.
A snarl tears from his lips.
And his teeth accidentally sink into the meaty flesh of my palm, tearing through skin. Pain flashes white behind my eyes, causing a fiery pain across my arm. Blood spurts out free from the wound, and an electric sensation lights up my spine.
I scream from the pain as I cradle my hand to my chest.
He wrenches back. “Fuck!” Horror floods those pale eyes aimed in my direction, at my hand, my face. His reaction sends me into panic.
Then Roman shoves me in the shoulder. “Get out of the way.”
I tumble over sideways and fall. The world spins as my head smacks the ground with a thud that turns everything to stars.
Darkness comes in from the edges, and my fear deepens.
Except those eyes remain in my thoughts. Hazel brown, wide with fear.
I grasp on to those all the way down.