25. Silas

Iheard the back door open. It had been three days since Tanner left. Cole and I had gone from angry to worried, especially given how he disappeared after Jessie died and didn't return for nearly six months.

Tanner walked in wearing a pair of sweats. He looked like shit, but the anger had gone.

"You OK?" I asked. I might be furious with him for hurting Eva, but he was still my brother.

He grunted in reply and stalked into the kitchen. I heard the coffee machine grind and steam and then he reappeared with a mug in one hand and a pastry in the other.

"Sick of rabbit?" I smirked and his lip quirked up in a reluctant smile.

"We need to talk," he grunted, swallowing the pastry in two bites.

"Cole is still mad."

"This is about Eva. I think someone is looking for her."

My senses sharpened and my wolf perked up, no longer sleepy. "What did you find?"

"I picked up a scent trail in the forest and followed it to an outlook about a mile from here. The guy stuck around for a while, probably watching the cabin."

Fuck. It had to be the same guy, the one who'd been there the night of the crash. Was it her guardian? If so, he was very persistent, which made no sense. Eva had left him, sure, and he was probably mad about it, but she was 18, so why go to all the trouble of hunting for her in a forest in winter? No human was that insane.

There was something we were missing.

Something important.

I just wasn't sure what.

"We need to find this guy," Tanner said, sipping his coffee. His words were calm enough, but there was an underlying current of violence there, simmering just below the surface.

"And how are we going to do that? He's likely long gone by now."

"I know, but I think he'll be back. I'm going to fix cameras all around the perimeter. If we're lucky, I'll catch him on camera. Then I can run his face through my facial recognition program. Once I have an ID, I will find and end the fucker."

"End who?" Cole asked when he appeared.

"The guy who's hunting Eva."

Cole looked worried.

Tanner explained his plan to Cole. We were all in agreement that dealing with whoever was trying to find Eva was our main priority.