20. Eva

The cabin was a welcome sight. I shivered with cold and my brain whirred at top speed, trying to make sense of what I'd seen. I'd heard of shifters. People spoke of them in hushed voices, a sort of urban legend where I grew up.

I'd never expected to actually meet a shifter. As far as I knew, they lived in their own communities. The internet had little information about them, except to remind us all that shifters were a protected species. Any unprovoked act of violence against someone who identified as a shifter was a hate crime.

It was laughable. After watching Silas take down the mountain lion, we humans had nothing to be concerned about. Silas was magnificent as a wolf. Huge, way larger than a timber wolf, with a thick, glossy dark gray pelt.

No wonder he was so muscular and buff. Shifters usually were, I'd heard. They had a much denser muscle mass. Then I froze. Cole and Tanner were also a similar body type. Were they also shifters?

God. How dumb was I? Of course they were. The three of them were brothers.

Tanner brushed past as he brought the tree in. I jumped away, and he turned and smirked.

"What's the matter, Little Red Riding Hood? Afraid of the big bad wolf?"

Anger flared at the way he mocked me, and I shoved all my latent fear and anxiety down in a box and locked it. I'd had enough of that bastard thinking he could push me around, making me feel things I didn't want to feel.

"Fuck you!" I gave him a one-fingered salute before stalking off to my bedroom.

The look of surprise on his face cheered me up no end and I smiled to myself as I kicked the door shut behind me. Bet you weren't expecting me to answer back, asshole.

After the events of this afternoon, I needed a moment. Now that the shock of seeing Silas shift had worn off, I realized it didn't matter. He was still Silas. And he'd saved us - me - from the mountain lion. If he'd been a human, the mountain lion could have injured or even killed one of us.

It wasn't like I could blame him for not telling me what he was; what they all were. They probably assumed, rightly, that discovering the truth would frighten me. And it had at first.

Watching a man shift into a monstrous wolf was fucking terrifying. Seeing him turn back into a naked man was…well… It might have been freezing out there, but the cold had had little effect on Silas.

He was…impressive. Not that I'd looked. Much… At least I'd tried not to. But honestly? It had been hard not to. Anyway, I wasn't thinking about that. Nope.

I sighed, wondering if I should grab a shower to warm up, when there was a faint knock on the door.

It was Cole checking up on me. "You OK in there, sweetheart?"

"Yeah. I'll be out in a minute."

"OK, I made hot chocolate. And we have a tree to decorate."

Hot chocolate! It had been years since I'd had it! And it had also been years since I'd decorated a tree.

Something settled deep inside. My whole life had been at the whim of others. First, my father, who had no business being a father. Then, when he finally checked out, I ended up with Brent. He pretended to care when, really, he never cared at all. I was just chattel to him. Someone to abuse whenever he felt the urge.

Maybe if I'd been stronger, I could have escaped sooner. I did try telling a school nurse about the abuse once, but she left and nothing happened. After that, I gave up.

Until the day I decided I couldn't do it anymore.

That version of me had found the strength to leave. Coming here had changed everything. Shown me a different life. One where I was safe, happy, and cared for.

Maybe the guys planned to kick me out once the weather eased up, but that was a problem for another day. I'd deal with it then. For now, I was stuck here. I refused to continue being afraid of my own shadow.

Shifters existed. Yes, I'd never met one before, but they were just people like me. Born that way. Albeit with slightly different biology. Some would argue they were better than humans.

But all that was irrelevant.

The guys had been so kind and nice to me; it was unfair of me to judge them for being different. OK, so I had no issues judging Tanner for acting like a complete dick 99% of the time, but Cole and Silas didn't deserve my ire.

Fuck it. I needed to woman up and get my butt out there. Hiding in here wasn't doing me any favors. It was time to take my life back.

I jumped off the bed, straightened my spine, and headed into the living room to get some answers.