Chapter 4 - Harper
I ran out of the Swinging Boot, cursing my damn heels for making me slip off that bar. Everything had been going amazingly —and I had fucked it all up. Adalyn had snagged us a table with two cute guys who had already bought us drinks.
Only by her encouragement, I’d gotten up and danced on the bar.
And then I’d seen him.
The very man I was trying to forget. The very man I should have been moving on from— had moved on from. Until he was right there, watching me like I was the only person in the room. Catching me as if I was a damsel in distress. Well, I wasn’t, and he’d do damn well to remember that.
I ran to the right of the bar, knowing that there was a small park area nearby where I could escape him. This was my island, my home! He didn’t get to ruin this place too. He had already ruined Haystock for me. I had never liked it much there, but ever since he branded me an outcast after breaking my heart and destroying my family’s idea of what my life should have looked like, I had fled there, too. I couldn’t leave another home.
Soon, footsteps broke up the silent, still night, and I tensed, looking up. It was Adalyn, her brows pulled together in concern.
“Harp?”
“I’m fine,” I told her. “You go back in. I’m sorry. It got a bit too crowded in there for me.”
I hadn’t yet told Adalyn the full story: the bartender with the dark, mysterious eyes, the shifter on a motorbike who had upended my heart, plans, and future. She knew there had been a guy and that he was the triplets’ father, but she didn’t know the details. She didn’t know who he was or why he had been in Haystock. I didn’t have it in me to tell her the details now. Not yet.
“It is a warm day.” She nodded, placing her hands on her hips. “Well, when you’re ready, I’ve got a frozen cocktail there with your name on it, okay? Don’t stay out here too long.”
I nodded. Azure Cove was safe, and I was in no danger of remaining several yards away from the bar alone. Adalyn retreated back to the Swinging Boot. I could still go back there with her. I could still grab tonight for all it was worth and make it my own. Yes. Yes, that was exactly what I needed to do.
I sighed and pushed to my feet, preparing to head back in after I combed my fingers through my hair.
“Harper!”
The call of my name broke up the night, and I tensed. Back in the Swinging Boot, I had barely heard his voice as he’d uttered my name. But now… Now, that deep baritone swept through me, and I clenched my teeth against any reaction.
Harper , he’d once groaned in pleasure.
Harper , he’d once pleaded after a fight.
Harper, he’d once greeted with a smirk as if to say we meet again after I had avoided him the day after we met, worried about my choices that went against my parents’ wishes. That had swiftly changed throughout the summer.
But now, hearing his voice brought back all those memories I had worked so hard to keep under lock and key, never to touch or think about again.
“Harper,” he called again. “Harper!”
It occurred to me that he didn’t know the island when he ran past me and the park where I was hiding out. I quietly slipped back towards where I had come from, pressed myself to the wall, and waited until he passed. The darkness concealed me, but when Alex disappeared, I thought I was in the clear. I turned around and slammed right into him.
“You never could hide from me,” he drawled.
It was stupid of me to not consider he was always attuned to my scent. I looked at him close up for the first time in four years, hating how the light cast the perfect shadows across his face to make him look both alluring and dangerous. Half concealing his features, and dramatically accentuating his most prominent features like his mouth, strong brows, and the sharp angles of his face, the shadows worked for him.
I hated it.
I clenched my fist.
“What are you doing here?” I demanded.
“Vacation,” he answered. “What are you doing here?”
“I live here,” I snapped. “And vacation? Really? Or is that another pretense, Arin ?” I used the name he had given me back before he’d revealed his actual reason for being in Haystock.
“ Really ,” he affirmed. In our time apart, he had bulked up even more. Alex had always been strong—something that had always taken my breath away—but now he was bigger, almost menacingly so, and I forced my gaze away.
I despised him, and recalling how handsome and charming he had been years ago would not make me forget what he had done to me.
“Come on, Harper,” he said, brandishing a familiar smirk. “Don’t pretend we’re strangers.”
“I know we’re not,” I muttered, thinking of my beautiful babies at home. Babies whom he would never, ever know about or have access to. “Of all islands, Alex? Of all the goddamn islands in the entire fucking world, you choose this one?”
He scoffed. “Oh, of course—sorry, next time, I’ll run a Harper scanner to make sure you’re not there at any of my vacation spots.”
“Mature, as always,” I snapped. “Well, if you don’t mind, I’m going to go back to my friend, and have a night without you there. How long are you in town for?”
“Indefinitely,” he answered. “Why? Want to make sure we’ll have plenty of time to reconcile, amorcita ?”
“You have some nerve,” I hissed. “Don’t call me that—not when—when that was what you—” I broke off, made a pained sound. He’d always used that damn nickname on me, and I had gone weak every time with the way he rolled the r in such a gorgeous way. “While you’re here, be sure to check out the boat trips on the island, Alex. Some beautiful sites to see around here.” I narrowed my eyes. “I hope your boat sinks on its way back.”
My back was to the wall of the building behind me, and I didn’t realize when he had stepped closer. His chest was inches away from mine. Once upon a time, I put my hands there, always wanting to be in contact with him. Now, my hands wanted to rest there to push him away. I tucked them behind my back instead.
“Ouch, Harper. When did your tongue get so barbed?”
“Oh, I don’t know, Alex. Maybe it was ever since you abandoned me in the middle of the night. Do you think that’s something to do with the lack of warm reception? Sorry if that was what you were hoping for when you saw me, but I have no warmth left for you.”
Pain flickered through his face, but I didn’t care.
“C’mon, you don’t mean that,” he said, his voice dropping.
“Yeah—yeah, I do.”
But as I stared up at me, angry and devastated, I couldn’t ignore how our time apart had hardened his face, which only made him more striking. There was a faint shadow of facial hair on his jawline. Lack of grooming or purposefully growing ? I wanted to ask. Wanted to run my fingers over when it would grow into stubble. I swallowed, fisting my hands tighter.
“Harper, I—”
“Forget it,” I snapped. “Have a good vacation, Alex. If that’s even your real name. Just stay the hell away from me and my—” I almost said babies before I crammed that word back behind my lips. My children were my pride and joy, the best things in my life, and that was why they had to stay a secret from Alex, their biological father.
The fact that the triplets’ birth father was a shifter had never been a secret to me. I found out about Alex’s form the second time I met him. I could only wonder if my children had inherited that gene themselves.
As I glared up into those warm, brown eyes that had once held so much love for me, I forced myself to breathe easy, to let go of the charming man who had swept me off my feet. A man who had once slipped his fingers between mine and asked, how much do you know about wolves and mates ?
Hardening my heart, I shoved past him. “Don’t come near me again.”
I was several steps ahead when he wrapped his fingers around my wrist and yanked me around.
“What, Alex?” I cried. “Leave me alone. You’re good at doing that.”
I could see where my blow had landed, but I had no sympathy for him anymore. I despised him, hated him, for everything he had caused me. I had not loved the future my parents wanted me to have, but I’d at least had security. Alex had caused me shame there, making me an outcast in my home.
“Who am I staying away from?” he asked. “You and…? You stopped yourself.”
“Me and my friend. Don’t think I didn’t notice your buddies back in the bar. Yeah, I remember them, too. Make sure you all stay away from me and my friend. She doesn’t need to be involved in your mess.”
I shook my head and stormed off. Once again, footsteps chased me, and Alex grabbed my arm again.
“Alex—”
“Stop.”
The order was absolute, and I followed it. His voice had a sharp tone—I had only ever heard it once before. During our summer in Haystock, he had been there undercover. We had come across the targets he was hunting, and he had stepped in front of me. Stop . That same command—one that demanded I stay safe, or let him keep me safe.
And just like that time, I stopped.
And I noticed that the air had grown still. Like a held breath. Something waiting in the shadows, waiting to pounce. An eerie calm settled over the night. Usually, Azure Cove was alive with crickets and fireflies, buzzing insects that I complained about, but they comforted everyone by telling them that the legends on this island were long buried in history.
When I looked back at Alex, his eyes weren’t on me. They were in the area. A predator scanning for prey. Or, perhaps, for once, it was prey searching for the threat.
“Can you feel that?” he asked. Then another muttered breath of I knew I was right . “I said when we headed out tonight that something felt off about this place.”
I bit my lip, unwilling to reveal the legends I knew about the island. Not yet. He could find out about it online or at some tourist trap, but not from me. Not when I had never experienced any danger here.
“Okay, first things first,” Adalyn had told me that first week I knew her. “Is that you need to know the Azlore.”
“Azlore?”
“The Azure lore,” she said. “The history of the island.”
I was immediately hooked. I’d majored in history in Haystock, which had been rich with history itself, prompting my career path.
“My Gramma, Greta Lindell, your landlady,” Adalyn continued. “Owns a store of dark magic. Crystals and jewels and wards, but they’re not just for show. They actually do ward off demons.”
“Demons?” I scoffed.
“Demons,” she affirmed. “Yeah, our history is rich, rich. We have our superstitions, and we listen to the air. When it's silent and still, that isn’t good. There hasn’t been any demon activity here in a long time but… Well, we’re always on guard.”
Ever since, I had done my rituals that Adalyn and Greta had showed me. The island had rules and customs, and I had heeded every last one, just in case. I stayed out of the darkest shadows and mainly explored when it was light. I hiked in the early morning in winter before it got dark in the afternoon. I never took the chance of finding something I didn’t want to find, Adalyn’s warnings constantly ringing in my ears.
But now I felt that still, silent air, and I tensed.
“Alex,” I whispered, fear making my voice tremble. He was at my back. My anger abated for a moment, lulled by the hope of safety from him. Dark magic hung in the air. Adalyn always told me that dark magic smelt like burnt asphalt, which was one way to detect it. Alex’s breath caressed the back of my neck.
I turned to him.
But when I turned around it wasn’t Alex that I came face-to-face with.
Instead, a demon with glowing blue eyes and razor-sharp teeth, and a grin, practically ear-to-ear, faced me.
My scream got muffled before I could even register it had built in my throat.