Chapter 9
Dial M for ‘Mythical Boyfriend’
Olivia
A week had passed since the storm, and the house had fallen into Vek’s rhythm.
Two mugs waited on the counter every morning—mine, and the chipped one with faded cats that had quietly become his.
The coffeepot hissed like it had opinions, filling the kitchen with the smell of dark roast and something close to peace.
Sprawled under the table, Boone sighed in his sleep.
June Bug sprawled on the rug, paws twitching at whatever ghost she chased in her head.
Down the hall, one particular floorboard gave its familiar groan under Vek’s weight as he walked toward the shower.
That sound had joined the place like it belonged—a heartbeat too big for the frame, but essential to it now.
He’d taken over the guest room, and even though his shoulder was healing clean, I couldn’t picture that room empty again without feeling wrong.
The phone buzzed against the counter, sharp in the quiet.
“Morning, brother of mine,” I said, pinning it between my ear and shoulder while I poured cream into my mug. “You don’t usually call this early. What’s wrong?”
“Nothing yet,” Gunner said. His voice came rough, all gravel and not enough sleep. We hadn’t talked since his birthday stunt on the ridge. “You heard from T-Bone lately?”
A humorless breath slipped out. “Is that a trick question? Haven’t seen him since he borrowed my ladder and never brought it back.”
T-Bone had shown up two days after the storm, swaggering on my porch like always. Vek had been inside, thank God, but that near miss still sat heavy behind my ribs. I got rid of T-Bone fast. The part I couldn’t figure out was how to make that permanent.
Gunner chuckled, but there wasn’t much warmth in it. “You’re better off. He’s been actin’ a damn fool, tellin’ anybody who’ll listen about the beast on the ridge. Tryin’ to rile folks up.”
“Oh, for heaven’s sake.” The creamer hit the counter harder than it needed to. “He’s preachin’ Sasquatch again?”
Even though Gunner and I both knew Vek was real—we’d both been there that first night on the ridge when Vek had made contact—I hadn’t told him about the way Vek had followed me home.
Or about the bullet. Or the barn. Or the guest room.
We were close, but I had no idea how he’d react to “By the way, the legend lives in my house now.” I sure didn’t want half the county stomping into my valley like it was a field trip.
And I certainly wasn’t down for a Redneck Beauty and the Beast remake.
“Louder than ever,” Gunner said. “He’s tryin’ to drag people back up there with him. Says this is his redemption.”
“That man couldn’t redeem a coupon.” The coffee bit sharp, then settled warm in my chest. My mind was already ahead of him. They wouldn’t find Vek on the ridge anymore—but they might discover signs he existed. Tracks. Hair. A broken branch line that pointed downhill. A trail that ended in my yard.
“Yeah, well, he’s convinced somebody’s gonna listen. I told him I was out.” Paper rustled on the other end—his desk, his shift, his life back in the city. “Didn’t take it well.”
“You finally quit babysittin’ him? I’m proud of you,” I said, though the air in the room had started to feel too thin. “You think he’s really heading back up there?”
“Probably. He can’t stand bein’ ordinary. Folks like him talk too loud until somebody gets hurt. Just thought you should know I’m steering clear for a while. He’s wound tight, Liv. Tight enough to snap.”
“Good,” I said, even as something tightened under my sternum. “Let him chase shadows. Maybe he’ll tire himself out.”
Maybe he’ll find a trail. Maybe he’ll follow it. I didn’t say any of that. Thinking it once was bad enough.
“Maybe,” Gunner said. Another shuffle of papers. “You doin’ alright up there?”
“Fine. Fence is mended, dogs are happy, coffee’s strong. What could go wrong?”
“That’s my girl,” he said, softer now. “Keep it that way.”
“I’ll do my best.”
He hesitated. “Call me if you need anything. And if T-Bone starts flappin’ that mouth near you, don’t engage. Let him talk himself dry.”
“Copy that, Sergeant Buzzkill.”
“Always tryin’.”
The line clicked. the kitchen went still again—the soft tick of the cooling pot, Boone’s lazy sigh under the table, the distant rush of the shower cutting off down the hall.
The air tightened, the way it does before a front moves in.
I rubbed the heel of my hand against my chest, where the worry had started to settle like storm pressure.
A floorboard creaked behind me.
Vek filled the doorway, a towel slung around his shoulders.
His fur was still damp where it framed his face and collarbone.
The extra-extra-large jogging pants I’d ordered online hung low on his hips; even so, they were fighting for the right to exist. He made the kitchen look small and fragile just by standing in it.
“Bad voice?” he asked.
“Not bad,” I said, forcing my shoulders to drop. “Just my brother—worried about a friend who’s gettin’ himself in trouble.”
“Trouble,” he repeated slowly. He tasted the word like something he didn’t trust yet. “Means…not good?”
“Exactly.” I nudged the second mug toward him. “Let’s hope he finds some sense.” If I held my breath waiting on that, they’d find me blue on the floor.
Steam drifted up between us. He watched it a moment before he asked, “Your brother—good man?”
“The best kind,” I said. “Loud, stubborn, always right even when he’s not. Runs in the family.”
That pulled a hint of a smile from him. He wrapped his hand around the mug like it was nothing, even though it barely fit. “Coffee,” he said.
“Careful—it’s hot.”
He drank anyway, eyes on me over the rim.
Curiosity lived there now, settled deep.
Not just about the house or the words, but about me.
A seven-foot myth in too-tight sweatpants drinking from a chipped cat mug wasn’t anywhere on my life plan, but somehow he’d started to fit.
The air between us felt charged, but I did my best to push past it.
“Trouble’s a talker,” I said under my breath. “It’ll find its way down the mountain soon enough.”
His gaze slid past me to the kitchen window, where the ridge rose dark against a pale sky. For a moment, he just listened, shoulders gone still in a way that had nothing to do with the house.
“Then we go up,” he said.
I blinked. “Go up where?”
He nodded toward the ridge. “There. I show you. How I live before. How I find food.”
My pulse stuttered. “You mean now?”
“Yes,” he said. “Good day. No storm.” His eyes narrowed slightly, like he was reading the weather in some language I didn’t speak. “You learn.”
The argument lined up in my head—too risky and too far—but the way he said it pressed against all of that. You learn. Not a command. An offer.
My mug landed on the counter with a soft clink. “Fine,” I said. “But if this ends with me face-down in the mud or chased by a bear, I’m hauntin’ you.”
The corner of his mouth lifted. “You try.”
“Lord help me,” I muttered, reaching for my jacket. “You sound like my brother already.”
The word brother caught his attention again. He tilted his head, as if filing it away for later, then crossed to the door. When he opened it, he stepped aside and waited, big hand resting light on the frame.
“Come,” he said. “We go.”
Cool air slipped into the kitchen, carrying the faint, sharp promise of a front still too far off to see. I looked at the open doorway, at him, at the life I’d somehow let inside my house, and stepped through first.
The woods behind my property weren’t strangers to me, but walking into them with Vek at my side made them feel sharpened around the edges—familiar paths carrying a different kind of weight.
He didn’t take the trail. He moved beside it, quiet as a cat, slipping between trees like he’d been carved from the same grain.
Sunlight broke through the canopy in patches across the trails, catching on the broad line of his back.
Boone trotted ahead with the confidence of a dog who believed he led expeditions. June Bug zigzagged between us, convinced she’d discovered every stick that ever existed in the history of creation.
“What exactly are we doing?” I asked, stepping over a slick branch.
He didn’t slow. “Show.”
“Show what?”
He cast me a quick glance—just enough to catch the faint curve at the corner of his mouth. “How I live.”
That shouldn’t have rattled me, but it did. I tried to keep my eyes on the uneven ground instead of on the way sunlight slid across his shoulders. If my mama could see me now.
“You’re not about to chase down a deer in front of me,” I said. “Because I’m not emotionally prepared for that before lunch.”
“Too loud,” he said. “No chase. We watch.”
The word we did something to my balance, but I pushed it away and focused on the trees instead.
“We watch,” I repeated. “And after watching?”
“Catch.”
I shook my head. “Of course. So civilized.”
His gaze dipped to my boots. “Vek. No guns.”
That hit with the kind of accuracy I wished I didn’t admire. Guilt pricked at the edges. “Yeah,” I muttered. “That’s fair. If I shoot another mythical creature this year, I’m just gonna move to Florida and bartend for the snowbirds.”
A low rumble rolled from his chest—a laugh, or the closest thing he had to one.
The deeper we went, the quieter the forest grew. Birds stilled overhead. The air shifted too—lighter but charged, the faint metallic edge that always arrived before a storm thought about gathering itself. Vek noticed first. His ears twitched, his head tilting up.
“Wind changes,” he said.
“Storm coming?”
“Later.” His voice settled low. “Not now.”
It didn’t comfort me as much as I'd hoped. Springs could be ferocious with storms, and I didn’t want to get caught in one.