Chapter 15

15

Stacey blinked. She took in everything else around her, trying to figure out if she'd just had some sort of wild hallucination. There was no way she just saw two bears on a boat. And there was definitely no way that one of them had suddenly turned into Dylan. She gripped the fence around her yard, noting the way the wood felt under her hand and how the bits of sand that'd made their way into her flip-flops were grinding against the balls of her feet. That sense of grounding and pure reality could make her feel better on all sorts of occasions. She'd even used it when she'd been recovering from her injury back in Newton, when she had nightmares about falling off that ladder or when she woke up thinking she was still in the hospital. Right now, though, she wasn't sure if anything would help.

Dylan, a very human man whose body she knew quite well, stepped out of the water. He'd been watching her ever since he'd left Will's boat, distracted only by the swim back to shore. Stacey's eyes traced over his frame. It, like everything else around her, seemed very real and familiar. So what the hell had she just seen?

"Can I talk to you for a second?" she called. Stacey wasn't sure it was a good idea. Something was obviously happening that she didn't understand. But her earlier visit with him had shown her that she still had such a deep attraction to him, and he felt the same for her. If it hadn't been for that, she might've just gone straight into the house and poured herself a stiff drink. Or maybe she would've called her therapist.

"Of course." He stepped into his yard to snag a towel from the line. His mouth was a hard slash in his face, turned down slightly as he rubbed the water droplets from his torso and hair. "Come on over."

She would've really enjoyed watching that show if it hadn't been for the other, more bizarre one she'd just seen a moment earlier. Her stomach jumped rope with her intestines as she crossed through the gate and into his yard. She pushed out a deep breath, reminding herself that Dylan had shown himself as a safe person to be with. He loved his daughter and had been kind to Stacey's children. He would listen to her explain what she'd seen—or thought she'd seen—and wouldn't criticize her for it. He was a man who relied on the logical root of things, and it would be fine.

Right? Or was that all just as much of a delusion as everything else? Her balance was off as she made her way up onto the patio, as though all the thoughts pinging around her mind were keeping her from walking steadily. She lowered herself into the padded chair next to him, crashing into it much harder than she'd meant to. "Is there a gas leak around here?"

"What?" He draped the towel around his neck and leaned forward.

She closed her eyes firmly for a moment. "I mean, that would at least make some sense, right? If there were a gas leak, this would pan out. That does things to people. Perfectly sane people."

Now it was Dylan's turn to take a deep breath. He reached out, his fingers gentle against her skin as he took her hand. "You're not crazy, if that's what you're worried about."

"You only think that because you didn't see things from my perspective." Stacey gripped his hand, trying to find some basis where she could truly start this conversation and build it up. This felt harder than the most pivotal presentations she'd ever had to make at Martin Marketing. There, she only had to convince a client to buy an ad campaign. Here, she had to convince Dylan that she'd seen something so completely out of this world. "I was just standing at my kitchen sink washing dishes. I looked up, and I saw Will's boat rocking wildly in the water. I don't know much about boats, but I knew that something had to be wrong. I stepped outside, thinking maybe I should get you, but then I realized there were two bears on that boat. Bears, Dylan. Big, black, furry bears like the ones that belong in the woods."

"I know there were," he replied softly, much to her surprise. "And you saw more than just that, didn't you?"

He believed her. Stacey hadn't been entirely sure that she'd believed herself up until this point. The air rushed out of her lungs as the scene replayed in her head, and it took her a moment to get up enough breath to continue. "And then the bears were gone. Or, not gone. They changed. They changed into humans. One of them…changed into you." It still sounded crazy, especially when she said it out loud.

"Stacey." He paused and cleared his throat before continuing. "Wow, this is a really hard thing to tell someone. I never have before because people like me have been fighting for hundreds of years to keep our secret under wraps. But yes, I changed into that bear, and then changed back. I'm a shifter."

She let her eyes glide over his body, studying the hard curve of his strong shoulders, the long lines of his arms, the smattering of dark hair on his chest. "I don't understand. I saw it with my own eyes, but I..."

His dark eyes were wide and worried as he pulled her hand over onto his knee. "I was born this way. I spend most of my time just as you see me right now, but that black bear is always a presence inside me. It's the opposite when the bear form is what you see on the outside. I can control it, too, so I can be whichever I want, whenever I want."

It was a good thing she'd already witnessed this, or she might not believe it. She might think this was just some ploy on his part because he was too chicken to break up with her, or that he needed a one-way trip to the nuthouse. "There's no…reason be hind this? It just is ?" Her brain was searching hard for some practical cause.

"Yes, you could say that. I know it's a lot to take in, and that's precisely why we don't tell anybody." He swallowed as he looked down at their joined hands.

"We?" she asked weakly.

Dylan nodded. "There are shifters all over the world, Stacey. We're not all bears, either. Some of us are lions or wolves, or even other animals. I told you I was born this way, and I meant that quite literally. It's genetic. All the rest of my family is like this, as well."

"Lila." She said the name more than asked it, holding a mental image of Dylan's daughter in her mind and trying to imagine the sweet teenager who'd been so loving with her children as some wild beast.

"And all the rest. Will, too."

Her throat was growing tighter. Hearing him not only admit that what she'd seen was correct but explaining how much more there was behind it all wasn't making her feel any better. With her free hand, she gripped the arm of her chair so tightly that the metal dug into her palm. "The other bear on the boat. "

"Yes. My other brothers, too, but the one you would've seen just now was Will."

Two nearly identical men. Two identical bears. The ratio worked, but the math still didn't quite add up in her head. She'd convinced herself only a moment ago that Dylan was a safe person to come talk to, but that was when she'd expected soothing words about being overstressed or worried. This wasn't at all what she thought would happen. "They—you—were fighting."

This earned another long sigh from Dylan. "Yeah, we were. It was a long time coming. My brother and I have some issues that go way back. I won't bore you with the details, but we've patched things up now. I'm sure it looked scary, but everything is fine."

"Right." Men could fight and then go back to being friends. Apparently that was the same for bears? She looked at him again, this time openly examining his ribs and stomach. "I saw blood, though. Claws and teeth. That was a real fight out there, not just a scuffle."

"These animals inside us aren't the only way that we're different from other people. We also heal incredibly quickly, especially when we're in our animals. What shallow injuries we inflicted on each other out there were almost gone by the time we were on two feet again."

"But…my god." Her lungs ached as she forced them to work. The world was spinning around her. She tipped her head back and tried to focus on the white beadboard that covered the underside of the patio roof. "Elijah was right, wasn't he? When he said that Will's eyes had changed and that there were fangs in his mouth?"

Dylan nodded solemnly. "Yes. My anger toward him over that was genuine. He never should've yelled at Elijah, but I was also infuriated to know that he slipped up. That's not how we do things."

Her mind roved back to those very first days there. They weren't all that long ago, but in some ways, it seemed as though a lifetime had passed since then. "He said there were wolves on the beach, but you're a bear."

"There are a couple of wolves in our clan—in our family. You could say they married in. That's the simplest way to explain it, anyway."

Her heart sank, a rock that plummeted down beneath the ocean waves and sent a puff of dirt up as it reached the bottom. "Oh, my poor boy. He's said so many things since we got here, and I thought they were all just childish fantasies. "

"It's all right." Dylan's voice was as calming as the sound of the ocean as he moved his right hand over so that he held her hand in both of his. "No one can blame you for that. It's what any parent would think. Now that you know the truth, you can talk to him about it."

"Talk to him?" she repeated, hearing her voice rise an octave. Stacey had managed not to screech and scream just yet, but she wasn't sure how much longer that would last. "You want me to tell him this? How can I tell him—or anyone—what you're telling me?"

A sad smile crossed his lips. "Believe it or not, it's actually good to hear you say that. As I mentioned, we've had to protect our secret in order to protect ourselves. We can't risk letting just anyone know about us. The outcome of that is unpredictable only because there are so many ways that humans might choose to hurt us. We have to be careful, and up until a few months ago that included making sure we were living near people we could trust. The Suttons were such people."

"The Suttons?" she echoed. She'd hardly thought of the couple who'd owned her house previously. They would've lived right next door to Dylan, and he'd already told her that the other homes on this part of the beach were owned by his family. Anyone who lived so close would be bound to find out who their neighbors really were sooner or later. "They were safe for you."

"Yes, and I'm asking that you will be, as well. We just want the chance to live our lives for ourselves, to know that we won't be killed because we're different or hauled off to some government lab to be studied. I can promise that we'll be safe for you, as well. We'll never be a threat to you or your family. I know Will made some mistakes, but that's not the norm. You don't owe me anything, Stacey. I can't make you keep this a secret, but I'm asking you to not let this out of your household. It's for the safety of everyone I love." Those dark eyes pleaded with her.

Everyone he loved. There was a whole family of shifters on their little piece of paradise, bears and a few wolves. But also, they weren't just bears and wolves. They were people. Either way, how could she know that this would all work? "What if they don't agree with this?" Stacey gestured vaguely in an attempt to encompass their conversation. "What if they don't want me to know?"

"That's for me to worry about, and I assure you I can handle it. I'm the Alpha of our clan. It means that I'm their leader. I'm the one who makes sure everyone is taken care of, and I also make all the major decisions for us. Just like my bear genetics, it's something I inherited. My father was the Alpha before me, and his before him. In fact, the Brighams have been on this beach for centuries now."

Decades and decades of not-quite-humans. It was so much to digest, and her stomach wasn't quite up for the challenge. This handsome neighbor had made her argue with herself a hundred times, but none of those inner debates had anything to do with his humanity. Now, she had to accept the fact that he wasn't just the sexy guy next door but a leader of shifters.

"Are you okay?"

It was when he spoke that she realized she'd been staring off into the distance for quite some time. "I'm trying to be. I'm not going to say anything, Dylan, but this is going to take some time for me to wrap my head around."

"I know. I expected that." He sounded just as resigned and solemn as she felt jumpy and uncertain.

She slowly stood, testing out her legs before she slipped her hand out of his. "I think I need to go home and…think."

"Of course." He walked her down off the patio, brushing his fingers against her elbow before she turned toward her house. "If you have things you want to ask, if you want to know more, I'm here. I'm not going to be offended. I think it might help us both, actually."

She nodded slowly. Her mind was swirling with questions, but right now, she couldn't force any of them out through her mouth. "I'll see you, Dylan." Feeling like she'd just woken up from a vivid dream, Stacey made her way back through the gate. She'd picked up and moved her household, wanting a change, but this was a much bigger change than she'd ever imagined.