4. Steff

FOUR

STEFF

A friend of a friend had posted on social media that Kris and Kellan were throwing April a welcome home party at the bar. I almost never went online and scrolled through stuff like that, but when I'd seen it, all I could do was think about going to see her. Was that the curse at work? Had Emily's magic somehow gotten me to go online at the exact right time, the fingers of her spell twisting and tying me into the specific shape she'd wanted? Whatever it was, I couldn't get the thought out of my head.

My gut instinct told me it would be crazy to go there. Not only would I have to see her again, but her brothers would be there. Kellan and Kris had been my best friends in high school. They'd introduced me to April. We'd had a bond so tight that sometimes I'd felt like the third brother. That had all been lost when I broke up with April. I'd attempted to contact them the first few months after I left and was met with beratements, accusations, and invitations to go fuck myself. While less severe than leaving April, that had been another heartbreaking moment. Losing friends was like losing a piece of yourself.

An hour had gone by, with me pacing my living room, attempting to talk myself out of it. Along with my own arguments about it being insane to go, my bear was not helping. It kept prodding and urging me toward the car. I couldn't fight it all. There was too much going on inside my head. So, I broke down. By eight o'clock I found myself pulling into the parking lot of the bar.

I sat in my truck, washed in the glow of the lights from the parking lot. The building was the same as it had been when we were kids, but it had a fresh coat of paint in a new color scheme. It had taken considerable effort on my part to stay as far away from this place as I could. That wasn't an easy task in a town this small, but I'd managed it. Now, after all these years, I was sitting outside again. I had a lot of memories here. In the back on Saturday afternoon, at fourteen years old, Kellan, Kris, and I had snuck our first beers. I grinned absently, remembering the way we'd all retched and complained of how awful it tasted before going back for another sip.

Right in this parking lot, I'd kissed April for the first time. A summer night two months after we'd first been introduced. Me, fifteen. Her, a year younger, and so beautiful. There was a hitch in my chest as I remembered the softness of her lips. It had been the greatest kiss of my young life. Now, more than eighteen years later, I couldn't think of another that had ever been that sweet, that pure.

My hand shot up to the keys. I'd made a bad decision. It would be better if I left. The instant before I turned the ignition, the bear growled, and something happened that I'd never experienced. The bear asserted so much control over me that it spoke using my own mouth.

" No, " it growled.

My eyes bulged, and I touched my throat, then my lips. What the fuck? It had been my mouth, my breath, my tongue and lips, but that hadn't been my voice. This really was the spell at work. A cold sweat broke out over my body, and a wave of dizziness swept over me. This was crazy. I couldn't go through with this, but my bear was insistent.

Before I knew it, I'd pulled the keys from the ignition and gotten out of my car. The bar loomed before me, and my feet propelled me toward the door. Pushed by a force I couldn't even try to understand. All I could imagine was Kellan slamming a barstool over my head or Kris kicking me in the nuts. Would April simply ignore me, or worse, verbally eviscerate me? Call me all the most awful things she could think of? I swallowed hard as I pulled the door open and stepped inside.

The party was rocking. I'd never seen this many people in here when I'd been younger. Mr. and Mrs. Knight had let us help out even though we were underage. We weren't allowed to touch any alcohol or even half-empty glasses. All we'd been allowed to do was take out the trash, sweep, mop, and bring out fresh glasses from the dish room. Back then, fifteen or twenty people would have been a busy evening. Tonight, there had to be almost a hundred people in there.

There were too many scents to discern April from the crowd. Sweat, beer, wine, multiple pheromones—I couldn't make heads or tails out of the room. Instead, I scanned the crowd, hoping to see April, and hoping her brothers didn't spot me. It took a few seconds, but I finally spotted April sitting at the bar. My heart ached as soon as I laid eyes on her. She was smiling, her bright white teeth contrasted with her red lipstick. I'd seen that smile dozens of times on billboards and magazines over the years. Those pictures had nothing on the real thing. For the millionth time, I berated myself for doing what I'd done. But that was in the past. All I could do now was focus on the future. The curse called, and I had to answer or die.

I was going to take the first step, but there was another silhouette beside her. A man. He was the one making her laugh. My bear snarled in jealousy. For once, I was able to ignore the beast. There was no way I was able to focus on its jealousy. I was too busy holding back my rage. This son of a bitch? His face? I'd seen it before, that night all those months ago. This was one of the hunters who had accosted us. He'd stepped out of the trees behind Harley's house. He'd tried to shoot Harley. My face warped into a scowl of hatred and anger.

He handed April a folded napkin and turned to leave. My fists were clenched and shaking at my sides. He shouldered past a group of people, and as he headed toward the door, he saw me. Instead of skidding to a stop, or even looking surprised, he kept coming. His eyes locked with mine, and a shit-eating grin spread across his lips.

He nodded and winked at me, before brushing past. "You don't want to make a scene, do you?"

A growl erupted deep within my chest. Before I could follow him into the parking lot, I glanced over my shoulder. April had spotted me. She looked confused and was frowning deeply, a hand to her chest. My anger was too fierce to even try to talk to her now. I needed to find out what this asshole was doing. Dragging my gaze away from her, I spun on my heel and followed the hunter.

The guy was strolling toward his car, twirling his keys on a finger. Easy as you please, like he didn't have a care in the world. Like he hadn't walked past a shifter who wanted to rip him in half.

"Hey," I called out. "What the hell do you think you're doing here?"

The guy stopped and turned his head to look at me. "Here? My job. Which is keeping my eye on you…" he looked me up and down and grimaced, "monsters, until my boss is ready to make his next move."

This confirmed Tate's suspicions. The hunters hadn't been scared off for good. They'd only gone into hiding to plan and wait. How many times had I walked past one of them over the last few months and not realized it? And now one of them was flirting with April. Anger, so hot and brutal like lava, boiled inside me, and it scared me a little.

I stepped forward until our noses were almost touching. "Maybe you need to disappear. Vanish like those shifters you guys killed. What do you think about that?"

Instead of flinching, the asshole's grin spread into a smile. "Big words for a creature like you. I'm protected; you can't touch me. I'm a teacher in town. People know me, and my students like me. If I vanished without a trace, there'd be a lot of questions." He flicked at my shirt like he was brushing away lint. "We've taken steps to ensure our safety. If you do succumb to your baser instincts, and do something stupid, like, I don't know, rip my throat out? My team has plans in place to ensure my death leads right back to your door. To you and your little gang of predators."

I growled at him, clenching and unclenching my hands to keep from grabbing his arms and ripping them from the sockets.

His eyes flicked behind me to the bar and he held his hands up, backing away. "I'm going to enjoy my time in Lilly Valley, I think. Not only do I get to hunt you things, but there might be more exciting things to bide my time with." He nodded, and I glanced over my shoulder to see April watching us.

Before I could say anything, she walked down the steps and came up beside us. "Is everything okay here?"

The hunter moved toward her, getting closer than I liked. My bear tried to release a growl, but I swallowed it back even though it took everything I had not to let the challenging roar escape my lips.

Before I could speak, the hunter put a hand on her lower back and said, "Everything's fine. No worries."

My gaze locked on his hand. Him touching her was almost more than I could stand. A fiercely possessive need to protect her washed over me, and I was sure I looked nearly crazy as I fought against my instincts.

April eyed me warily. "Are you sure?"

She was more concerned for this guy than for me. The way she looked at me like I was some dangerous animal hurt so bad I couldn't even describe it. I had to remind myself that I'd ripped her heart out. Of course she wouldn't trust me. Plus, I was standing here, ready to kill the guy who, apparently, had become her new friend. What would I have thought if the tables were reversed?

The hunter nodded. "Yeah, all good. Simply a little misunderstanding. I need to head out. Give me a call sometime this week?"

April nodded. "Yeah, sure."

The guy turned to leave, but not before giving me another of those cocky winks. I took several deep breaths as I watched him walk away. April was right there, and I had to try to keep my cool. This night was not going as planned.

"How do you know that guy?" I asked when he'd driven away.

"Are you serious right now? Really? You think you have the right to ask me anything ? Much less who I get to associate myself with?"

My mind was still processing the anger and surprise from seeing a hunter here. I shook my head. "I'm just saying, you should, like, I don't know, use better judgment with the men you choose."

"Wow. You know, you're right." She gestured toward me. "You are a prime example of how bad I am at choosing men. Wouldn't want someone to hurt me. Oh, wait, too late."

The words cut me like a razor blade. It was the first thing she'd said to me about the breakup, and I deserved it. I probably deserved worse. A heavy breath exploded out of my mouth, as if she'd landed a physical blow. Before I could respond or apologize, she'd already turned and was walking back to the bar. Staring at her back, I opened my mouth to say something, but no sound came out. Besides, what could I say? The door closed behind her, and I was left standing in the parking lot alone.

I looked around at the darkness. "Well, fuck me, I guess."

With nothing more to be gained at the bar, I walked back to my truck, my head held low like a little boy who'd been scolded by his mom. One thing I did need to do was tell the guys what had happened. They needed to know the hunters were still active in Lilly Valley. Especially Tate—he had Harley and their son Tory to worry about at home.

I dialed Tate's number as I drove home. He'd need to know first, then we'd fill the others in.

"Steff?" Tate answered. "What's wrong?"

I smiled despite my awful mood. Tate had fantastic instincts. He already knew something was wrong without me saying anything.

"Not good news, man. I just ran into a hunter."

"What?" I pulled the phone away from my ear as Tate's voice nearly exploded out of the microphone.

"Yeah. Saw them at Knight's place. The bar. It gets worse. He was flirting with April, the girl I told you guys about. Moving in real close, looked like. Tate, he's the guy we saw out in the woods. He's the one who tried to shoot Harley."

Tate cursed under his breath. "That fucker is back?"

"Yup. I've definitely got the curse. The way I reacted when I saw him with April? I've never been so angry in my life. My bear was, like, frothing at the mouth. Nothing that powerful has ever happened to me before."

"Okay, we need to keep our distance for now. At least until we can figure out who their boss is. They're hoping one of us will snap and attack. If we do that, we'll expose ourselves, which might be their entire plan. Get us to reveal ourselves and use it to show the world we exist. We need to be careful," Tate said.

"Why don't they just do it now? What's with all this waiting around and cloak-and-dagger shit?"

Tate sighed. "I think it has to do with their leader. This person has an agenda and a plan. It looks like nothing will make him deviate from it. The hunters won't move until this guy says so. We've got to keep our heads on a swivel."

"Okay," I said, "I'll be on the lookout. You gonna call the other guys? I'm really not in the mood to talk to anyone else."

"I got it. Go home and rest."

We hung up, and I drove the rest of the way home in a daze. I parked my truck and went inside to jump into the shower. As I let the water run down over my head and across my face, my mind slipped back to memories of April.

We'd been happy together. Yes, we'd basically been kids, but that love hadn't been any less real because we were young. That happiness had turned to pain and then regret. How many years had I thought about what might have been if, on that day, I'd been honest with April and told her everything. How would she have reacted?

She was a human, and I was a bear. Before everything that happened with Tate and Harley, I'd believed we could never have kids. How many years would have gone by without us conceiving while I kept the biggest secret of my life? It would have been dishonest and unfair to April to keep it from her had we stayed together. If I'd told her, would she have accepted me? Or would she have looked at me like a monster? Well, it was too late now. I could never know what she would have said, because I'd been too much of a coward to do it back then. Now, there was only one thing I was certain of. I had to keep her safe from this hunter.