by T. S. Joyce
She wanted to strangle whoever had dared come into this land and caused trouble. Already, Georgia was falling in love with this place, and a fierce protectiveness had infiltrated her over the last week. She scanned the trail behind the deer and tried to put together where it had run from. She knelt down and touched a smear of dried blood on a broken sapling. Splintered branches and trampled, dry grass helped piece together what had happened. An hour of hiking, and she found an abandoned campsite. The makeshift fire pit held only charred logs and cold ash, and she could make out stake holes in the ground where they must’ve set up a tent. Weekenders probably, gone back to their day jobs yesterday. She’d have to keep an eye on this corner of Damon’s land come Friday and see if she couldn’t get lucky and catch them coming back.
She bet Jason could scare the piss out of the poachers.
Georgia drew up short and laughed at how daft she was. Her stupid mind could bring any thought back around to him. Over the past week, she’d thought about him a ridiculous amount. In fact, it was downright embarrassing how obsessed she’d become, thinking about who he was and where he came from. She’d even researched his crew on the Internet to find out more about him. Creed, the dark-headed alpha, and Matt were easy to stalk, but Jason hadn’t any social media pages and hadn’t offered any information about himself on Cora Wright’s Web site. He was as much a ghost as the crazy-eyed phantom who’d given her that ominous warning last week.
A chill brushed up her spine just thinking about the apparition in these woods with her. Georgia picked up her pace and gave a sigh of relief when she spotted her ATV where she’d left it. She turned the engine and sped off toward the ranger station.
Everything in her wanted to see Jason again. Also to apologize for her reaction to him invading her space like he had. She’d enjoyed being close to him and now understood why he’d covered her scream with his hand after the research she’d done taught her about bear shifters’ oversensitive hearing. It had probably been an instinctive reaction driven by his rattling eardrums.
But the ghost—or whatever that thing had been—kept her firmly planted on this side of the mountain.
Chapter Four
“He’ll be back,” Creed said, leaning forward, his elbows on his knees as he wrung his hands.
Jason wished he felt as confident as Creed sounded, but Clinton hadn’t come back in two days. He’d left a note taped to his front door when he’d left in the middle of the night.
Don’t want no mate.
Short and to the point, but it was insane how much those four little words had thrown the Gray Backs into chaos. They were down a man on the landing where they stripped logs and loaded them for delivery to the saw mill in Saratoga, but that wasn’t the worst part of all this. The worst part was the imbalance in the crew now. The Gray Backs were a crew of messed-up misfits, and they’d all made the mistake of taking their progress over the past two years for granted. But with Clinton gone, and all of them scrambling with their inner animals to reestablish the pecking order, it was obvious just how far they’d come. They’d been this close to B-team level, but now with Clinton gone, they were put back to C-team.
Jason picked his sack lunch off the ground and dug out a sandwich. Creed sat in the metal chair beside him under the shade of the giant lodgepole pine near the landing. Matt sat in the chair next to his alpha, and beside Jason, the last remaining chair was open. Or it would’ve been if Tessa wasn’t sitting in it. The other Gray Backs couldn’t see her, though. Usually, they just sat on top of her, unbeknownst to them, and she would spit hoodoo curses on them that she’d learned from her family. Bayou bears were nothing to mess with, and Tessa was just as flippant now with curses as she had been when she was alive. Now he couldn’t even recall what he ever saw in her.
Jason bit into his sandwich as Tessa said, “If I was Clinton, I would’ve done the same thing. Look at this crew. Pathetic batch of limp-dicked pussy bears. Clinton was the smartest out of all of you.”
Jason shook his head and turned away from her. He wasn’t good for much, but he could ignore the shit out of the she-demon to his right. He’d learned how to over the years so he could appear sane. His gaze landed on Easton, who stood across from him with his arms crossed as he chomped a bite of apple.
“You want to sit down, man?” Jason offered, gesturing to the chair Tessa sat in.
Easton shook his head. “Hell no. I’m fine.”
Jason frowned and looked at Tessa, who was now glaring at Easton with a thoughtful look in her eyes. Jason dragged his attention back to Easton just in time to see the crazy bruin slide his lightened eyes to where Tessa sat, then away.
What the fuck?
Jason straightened his spine. “Can you see her?”
Easton wouldn’t look at him anymore.
“What are you talking about?” Creed asked. “See who?”
Jason stood so fast his lunch fell out of his lap and onto the ground. “Answer me! Can you see her?”
“I don’t see nothin’!” Easton roared. He stepped forward and flipped Tessa’s chair so hard it landed with a crash into the brush behind them.
Jason hesitated a moment as he watched Tessa disappear in a cloud of smoke, then he ran after Easton who was already halfway to his truck.
“Easton!” Creed yelled. “We aren’t done working yet. Get back here!”
“Dude, you can see Tessa? Why the fuck didn’t you tell me?”
Easton stomped right past the dirt parking area and into the trees. Jason jogged to catch up and yanked his shoulder.
Easton turned on him with a snarl, his eyes completely inhuman. “Yeah, I can see that thing. She’s your fault.”
“Oh, here we go. You, too?” Jason got this shit all the time from Tessa, and now Easton? Everything was his fault, yeah yeah. He turned to leave. Didn’t matter if Easton saw her or not. He was just as crazy as Jason was, so it wasn’t really a victory to find out she wasn’t just something he made up out of guilt.
“You want to know why I dragged my trailer into the woods when I first came here?”
“Yeah, because Matt pissed you off,” Jason snapped, rounding on him.
“No, I did it to get away from you and the shit you brought with you. You know why I didn’t tell you I could see her? Because she didn’t know! And now she does, so I get to be haunted like you, asshole. I dragged my trailer into the woods to get away from you.”
Jason drew up short, shocked. “You know about ghosts then? What do I do about her?”
“I don’t know nothin’, Jason. I can’t help you. I got my own shit to deal with, obviously. My own ghosts. That demon bitch is your problem, not mine.”
“Except that’s not how this is supposed to work, Easton! We’re a crew, and you let me think I was the only one who could see her for two years.”
“It’s not my fault. Not my fault! And now you’ve screwed me.” Easton’s yell turned into a snarl, and he hunched into himself.
“Aw, seriously?” Jason muttered as a giant silver grizzly burst from Easton’s skin. There he was, that psycho sonofabitch. Beaston couldn’t go one friggin’ day without bleeding him.
“Easton!” Creed yelled from behind them, voice cracking with power. It wasn’t any good, though. Easton wasn’t here anymore. Only the out of control, blood-thirsty animal in his middle.
Jason yelled a curse as he let his bear rip through his skin. The word tapered to a roar as Easton charged.
Easton mad was a wrecking ball—a relentless, unfeeling, death-bringer.
Jason lurched onto his hind legs and caught Easton’s impact in the chest. With a snarl, he threw him to the ground and slashed at him with his four-inch claws. Easton latched onto the underneath of his front leg and ripped his flesh. Pain was bright and red, everywhere, but he couldn’t stop. Beaston wasn’t affected by pain, so Jason couldn’t be either if he wanted to live. Seconds dragged for an eternity as Easton bowled him over and sank his teeth into his neck. It was hard to breath. Fuck, he was
going for his windpipe. Jason scrambled, slashing and maiming in desperation. The sound of tearing skin and the smell of iron was overwhelming. Jason raked his claws against Easton’s face as a last ditch effort to save his throat, but Easton wasn’t letting go.
And then his weight and those damned canines were gone. Beaston was being dragged off by a massive, scarred-up red grizzly. Matt.
Furious, Jason shrank back into his human skin with a grunt at the blinding pain. Blood poured from his neck and arm. Pit pat, pit pat across the leaves, staining the ground crimson.
“Change back!” Creed roared as Matt shoved off Easton’s limp body.
Easton’s Change was immediate, and painful looking. The forced ones always were.
“Fuck, man!” Jason yelled. “I was asking you for help. That’s all.” He stood and swayed as warmth streamed down his chest. “I wasn’t challenging you!”
Easton scrambled up, clawed and bloody. “We aren’t friends.”
“Yes, we are!”
Easton’s hard eyes faltered, then looked uncertain as he glanced from face to face. He dragged his fiery green eyes back to Jason, shook his head, and said softly, “We aren’t.”
Jason jacked up his eyebrows and leveled him with an honest look. “We are. I was just asking for help. I didn’t mean to put you on her radar. I was just trying to figure out a way to get her to leave me alone.”
Anger rippled across Easton’s face as he looked at something over Jason’s shoulder. When Jason turned, Tessa was there, wiggling her fingers at Easton with an empty smile.
With a growl, Easton turned and disappeared into the woods.
“Let him go,” Creed said when the red bear moved to follow. “He’ll be no use on the landing today.” Creed sighed heavily and looked troubled as he swung his attention to Jason. “I think it’s time you tell me what’s really going on.”
Chapter Five
Georgia was looking forward to the meeting with Damon Daye and his daughter, Diem. This was the first job she’d ever taken where she didn’t work with a partner, and it sure did get lonely out here by herself. She was independent by nature, but at night especially, she wished she had someone to talk to about her day.
Moving around so much made it hard to keep friends, so she’d quickly learned not to get too attached to anyone. But even if she was only giving Damon the breakdown of what she’d found this week, at least she was talking out loud to another person and not to herself.
The ranger tower was actually a treehouse Damon had contracted one of the bear shifters who lived around here to build. It was high in the canopy on the side of a mountain where she could see for miles in front of her. It was a simple setup with a ladder that led to a small porch. Inside was a one room station with a desk that housed the phone and maps of the area. And against one wall was a sturdy cot where she slept at night. Cooking was done over the fire down below, and there was no plumbing, but every few days, a drum of fresh water showed up at the base of her tree, delivered while she was out and about in the woods. She even had her very own outhouse. She didn’t mind rustic living and had forgone conveniences over the years. Her mom hadn’t understood her fascination with keeping peace and property management, but Georgia felt at home in the woods. Her soul was happiest away from the masses. She’d stopped trying to figure out what that said about her long ago. Still, the loneliness did creep in, and lately, it felt like there’d been a cloud hanging over her head when she was usually bright and chipper. She couldn’t understand it. She would always love the challenge of outdoor living and depending only on herself, but in recent days, all she could think about was how nice it would be to talk to Jason again. Bear shifters seemed marginally less scary when she wasn’t near them.
With a steadying breath, Georgia studied herself in the mirror. Freckles, blue eyes with gold middles, and curly hair, all gifts from her father. Gifts she hated. Genetic presents that reminded her every day that she was the daughter of a broken man. She ripped her eyes away from her reflection and wished she could hold her own gaze better. If she were tougher, she could get over everything that had tainted her life in Big Canoe. She could call her mother and not feel like she’d let her down. She could visit her dad in prison and tell him she forgave him. Not for him, but for the health of her own soul. Instead, she told herself she was strong, over and over, in hopes that someday it would be true.
She hurried to put on eyeliner and lip gloss, then fluffed her long curls. She’d worn them down today. After she visited Damon and Diem, she was going to find her bravery and visit the Gray Back Crew. In the week since Jason’s kiss, she’d met the Boarlanders and Ashe Crew. They’d all been kind and easy to talk to. She’d only managed to embarrass herself in front of the Gray Backs—the crew that felt the most important for some reason she couldn’t discern.
Georgia locked up the station and climbed down the ladder. Onto the passenger seat, she tossed her satchel with all of the notes she’d taken over the past week tucked safely inside. The engine to her trusty Jeep roared to life, and she puffed steam in front of her face as her warm breath collided with the cold November air. The first snow would fall soon, and she would need to track down a more permanent residence than the station. It wasn’t built to live in, after all.
She ran her fingers through the open air out her window, catching the cool draft until her skin prickled from the cold. Ancient pines were so thick here, she couldn’t see far off the side of the road. She slowed for a rabbit that ran in front of her tires and smiled as the little hare disappeared into the brush on the other side. Easing onto the gas, she turned on a mixed CD she’d made when she was in school. Oldies were her jam. And that right there was how she’d known she and Bill wouldn’t be anything more than friends when she’d met him for coffee yesterday. He’d scoffed at her taste instead of listening to why she loved classic rock. If he would’ve asked, she would’ve told him about how she and her mom would dance around the living room to these songs when she was young. Mom worked shifts waiting tables at a local diner, but when she had a night off, she’d turn on an old radio and sing at the top of her lungs along with Georgia while they wiggled around that old trailer they’d struggled to afford. Life was hard. It was cold and revolved around money to buy food, warmth, to pay the bills, and keep the lights on. But on those nights when Mom was smiling and dancing and singing, life was perfect.
Up ahead, an old, white Ford truck was pulled over to the side of the road. Georgia slowed as a man wiped his hands on a greasy rag and waved. He shut the hood of his truck as she pulled over.
He looked familiar, but she couldn’t put her finger on where she’d met him before.
“Hey,” he called. “I’m broke down. Do you think you can give me a ride? Bad carburetor.”
“Do you want me to call a tow truck?” she asked. If her Jeep broke down, she’d be hanged before she abandoned it anywhere.
“Nah, I have the parts to fix it at my trailer. I’m just up the road.”
“Do I know you?” she asked, canting her head and studying the man with the dark hair and bright green eyes.
“I’m Easton, fourth in the Gray Backs. I saw you the other night. You’re Jason’s ranger.” His quick smile appeared and faded as he offered his hand.
She shook it as the familiarity of his face slid into place. It was strange that he’d called her Jason’s anything, though. “Uh. I’m a ranger, yes. I remember you now. I’m sorry I left so quickly. I was actually going to introduce myself to your crew in an official capacity soon.”
“Official capacity,” he repeated.
He was still clasping her hand, so she pulled away and nodded to her Jeep. “Hop on in, and I’ll give you a ride.”
“Uh…” Easton closed his eyes tightly as if he were searching for a word. “Thank you.”
He sauntered over to her ride and climbed inside, then gripped the roll bar as he waited.
Okay then. Georgia turned down the music and pulled around the old truck. Grayland
Mobile Park was only two miles off the main road, so the drive wasn’t long. Easton didn’t talk. He only looked out the window, nostrils flaring as if he were scenting the air.
Jason had mentioned Easton and how she shouldn’t smell afraid around him. The man beside her didn’t affect her fear trigger like Jason had, though. Perhaps she’d just gotten used to the bear shifters through meeting the other crews and researching them over the past week.
They weren’t out-of-control monsters like she’d thought. She smiled over at Easton and felt silly for how intimidated she’d been by them before.
Easton wouldn’t hurt her.
None of them would.
****
Jason slid out of Creed’s truck and stared in horror at the front lawn of his trailer. His belongings were strewn everywhere. Bills and old letters to home he’d been too chicken to send rolled lazily in the wind.
“What the hell?” he said on a breath.
Creed cursed beside him and shoved his door open. “Easton!”
No answer but the shuffling of paperwork that blew in waves in front of Creed’s tires.
Jason looked around helplessly at the notebooks, lamps, and broken dishes that made a trail from his trailer to the fire pit. Flames licked the sides of the brick, and Jason bolted for the fire. What had Easton done?
Stacks of papers had been burned. The only clue to what they were was the tattered edges. A piece flew out of the fire and Jason caught it on the breeze. Scribbled across the scrap of paper were the words I’ll never need.
Jason swallowed hard as he read Tessa’s cursive. He knew the rest of that sentence by heart. I’ll never need you like you need me.
Easton had burned her letters, and from the melted scraps of glossy black, the pictures of him and Tessa together, too. And at the bottom of the ashes burned her journal.