by Selena Scott
Celia and Caroline fell beside him and started yanking at his shirt and shoes simultaneously.
Thea and the woman ran back out into the night for Jack. He was heavier than he looked and lanky to boot. He was somehow harder than the other two to get into the house. His elbows and long feet seemed to catch on every doorway.
“Hurry!” Thea couldn’t stop herself from yelling. They were around minute 55 of their hour limit and she didn’t want to waste time asking what the hell happened if they surpassed it.
They dumped Jack in the third bathroom, another clawfoot tub that was almost running over.
“Help us!” a voice shouted from down the hall and they all ran back into the first bathroom where a humongously magnificent Jean Luc lay completely naked on the dingy tile floor. Celia was at his feet, bright red and huffing, and the other woman had him by the arms.
In almost perfect unison, Thea and the warrior woman knelt down and hoisted Jean Luc around the middle. The four of them managed to plunk him in the tub; water poured out the sides and flooded the floor immediately. All but his too-long legs were submerged in the tub and he came up, wild-eyed and gasping.
“What? What! I—”
“No time!” Caroline shouted over her shoulder and the four women were out and into the next bathroom.
They made quick work of the redhead’s clothes, a blue T-shirt with some sort of animated character on it and ripped black jeans. Luckily, he wore no underwear under the jeans. Caroline tossed off his glasses. He was much easier to lift. The tattoos all across his arms and chest and shoulders went technicolor under the water. Just like Jean Luc, he came up, fully awake, gasping and sputtering, his orange hair a shade darker as it dripped with water.
“Only one more minute!” screamed Caroline as the four women peeled into the final bathroom.
Jack, different from the others, was dimly awake as they all piled in around him, tearing at his soft blue shirt and worn jeans. His shoes went and his socks and Thea was the one who stripped the blue briefs from him.
She knew, inherently, that she was witnessing something in his muscular, wiry, golden nakedness that she would think about later. But now, there was only getting this man into the tub behind him.
He went in with his baseball cap still on and stayed under longer than the others. When he came up through the clear, steaming bathwater, his eyes were blurry, but clearing quickly. His mouth quirked into a smile that Thea was already starting to know pretty well.
Jack took one large paw and slicked the water off his face. He shook the wet from his hair and tossed his cap onto the bathroom floor.
“Well,” he said to the four women who now sagged in varying stages of fatigue around his bathtub. “I must have done something right in a former life.”
CHAPTER FIVE
It was closing on two hours later when they were all finally settled enough to actually speak about what had just happened.
It was almost midnight, they were all starving and all three of the men were lying in makeshift floor-beds on the living room floor. There were bedrooms enough for them, but they had all wanted to be together for at least a little while.
Though Thea didn’t think of herself as a homemaker in the least, she knew how to cook good food fast. In twenty minutes she’d raided the dry and canned goods pantry of the cabin and prepared a tremendous pot of penne and red sauce, peas she tossed with a little vinegar, and had a popped can of frozen dinner rolls coming out of the oven.
She and Caroline served everything up onto plates and brought it out into the room where the men were all still recovering. Jean Luc sat up with his elbows on his knees. The redheaded man’s legs were crisscrossed, almost like a child’s, and Jack, of course, was splayed out like he was on a beach in Hawaii.
Various moans and groans of thanks and gratitude were passed out along with the plates of food that had elicited them. Thea gave a sharp nod at the acknowledgement and then found that she didn’t have it in her to do much more than start eating herself.
“Should we start with names, perhaps?” That came from the woman who’d rode in on the horse. She looked around the group with a bright smile and spaghetti sauce on her pretty chin. Her shiny brown hair was tied up in a humongous knot on the back of her head, and she wore different clothing but Thea was certain that she was the woman she’d seen in the store the day before. Yup, that smile definitely had enough wattage to fry the brains of a cashier. “I’m Caroline Clifton. From New Jersey originally. But I live in Boston.”
She looked to the person next to her like they were in a kindergarten class and about to go around the circle sharing names and their favorite colors.
“Oh,” the redheaded man was taken aback. “I’m Tre?” he said as if it were up for debate. He adjusted his thick, black-rimmed glasses. “Tre Sullivan? I live in Brooklyn.”
“Me too,” Celia said through a full mouth of peas and bread. She introduced herself, as did the rest of them, until they got to the woman that none of them knew.
She set down her fork and sighed, her hair catching the light. It looked both golden and red at the same time. It was cut choppily and hung just over her shoulders. Most of her weapons had been taken off, but there was still the glint of steel at her wrist and at her ankle. “My name is Martine West. I don’t live anywhere.”
There was a healthy pause before Jack cut in. “Are you waiting for us to ask you what the hell happened out there, or…?” He waved his hand in the air, urging her to start explaining.
“No.” She pinched the bridge of her nose and spoke in a low, smoky voice. “Sorry. I didn’t anticipate having to explain all this tonight. I’m not sure where to start.”
“Are we safe here?” Thea asked. “From that… thing?” She couldn’t bring herself to say ‘man’. He’d been something else, she was sure of it.
“Very,” Martine nodded. “He’s gone back to his realm. I injured him enough that it’ll be a few weeks before we hear from him again.”
“I’m sorry, his ‘realm’?” Celia asked, her eyes wide and the silver of her septum piercing catching the light just like Martine’s daggers.
The group, whether they noticed it or not, was drawing closer to one another. Soon, they all sat in a tight circle, with their dinner plates in front of them, almost shoulder to shoulder. Thea was grateful that she’d started a fire in the hearth behind them before she made dinner, because it softened the room as well as warmed it, made it much cozier.
“Yes. I—how do I start…” Martine sighed again, clapping her hands in front of her as if she’d made a decision and was sticking to it. When Martine lifted her green eyes to the group, she spoke to each and every one of them. “I guess I’ll just go with the truth, then. I’m a demon hunter. And all of you were lured to that clearing by a demon.”
“A demon,” Caroline whispered.
“Yes. It’s like a game. They use maps like those, or visions that they plant in people’s heads. Or clues left in books and songs and folklore. And then, once they have you there… well, you were all there tonight, you saw what happened.”
“I saw it,” said Jean Luc in a very low voice. “Hell, I felt it. But I have no idea what it was.”
“Right. Sorry. Again, I don’t interact with people that much and I forget that you don’t know what I know.” Martine quickly tied her hair back and hummed for a second as she thought of a way to explain what had happened. “That was Arturo Clay. He’s someone I’ve met before. Tried to destroy before, but he’s good. Infamous, really, the best at what he does.” She leaned forward and held everyone’s eyes one by one. “He gathers the souls of those who are lured by the trap. And brings them back to the realm… where they’re eaten.”
“Like cannibal style?” Celia asked, her eyes wide. She’d thought that Arturo guy was hot, in a bone-chilling kind of way. Now, though? Not so much.
“No, your body wouldn’t be eaten, but your soul would.”
“Why go to all the trouble of luring us so
meplace?” Jack asked. “Why not just march into a Walmart or some office building somewhere and snatch someone up?”
Martine nodded. “It’s done that way occasionally. If a demon is in danger of starving to death and there’s no choice. But souls are like food in some ways, there’s… flavors.”
“Yuck,” Caroline whispered, still deeply shaken by the idea that something wanted to eat her. She pulled a little closer to the people on each side of her, Thea and Tre.
“And,” Martine continued, “boring or unadventurous ones are like eating plain pasta, or plain rice. The interesting, complicated, brave, jealous, greedy, thrill-seeking, wild-hearted, honorable people who can be lured into something like this…” she held up her map, “are the ones that they want.”
“How did you come by that map?” Jack asked her, assuming that she’d gone hunting for it exactly the way that he had.
“I have lots of artifacts like this. I collect them. Follow them to their ends in the hopes of destroying the demon that set them out like traps. Time was up on this one.”
“What did he do to us?” Jean Luc asked, placing a hand over his heart which was still beating strangely in his chest. He’d never forget that gutting feeling of the blue energy cutting through him, dividing him, it seemed. As a former professional athlete, Jean Luc had a different relationship with his body than most people had. The amount of time he’d spent honing it, training it, teaching it, nurturing it, and lately, healing it, was prodigious. He was utterly in tune with each and every part of himself. And tonight, that had been taken away from him. He’d been in and out of consciousness, in searing pain, and completely out of control of himself. They told him it had taken all four women to drag him inside, disrobe him and get him in the bath. Even though he was outrageously famous and women threw themselves at him wherever he went, he was still a pretty shy person. The idea that his humongous body had been such a burden to these women, and then that he’d been naked in front of them without being conscious, well, it mortified him. He was intimidating-looking, he knew that, and his body generally required a disclaimer or two to emotionally prepare whoever was about to see him. Especially now, with his scars. Beyond that, he felt as if he could feel that blue energy still pulsing through him, writhing in his chest. He wanted his old self back.
Martine shut her eyes in what looked like almost mortal pain. All the men saw, immediately, what was written there on her face. Regret, guilt, sorrow. She was obviously tremendously sorry that this had happened to them. “He was preparing you. Making you even more enticing to a demon. The energy that he shot toward you, it changes you. Complicates your soul, adds another dimension.”
“Just tell us,” Tre said, in a hushed voice. What could she be talking about?
“He turned you into bear shifters.”
You could have heard an ant cough in that room. Seriously, it was as if Martine had pressed pause on a television screen. Not a soul moved.
Thea was the first to move. She tilted her head to look at the rest of the group. There were various states of shock and disbelief, ranging from Caroline, who looked enthralled and thrilled to her core, to Tre, who looked completely and entirely skeptical.
“Maybe you should elaborate on that, sweetheart.” That was Jack, sitting up now. His eyes had gone directly to Thea’s the second that Martine had made that wild statement.
“I know it’s hard to believe, but that’s what Arturo Clay does. It’s different for each demon. Arturo does bears.”
“Arturo does bears,” someone repeated softly, in a sort of dazed whisper.
Celia was looking around the group like she couldn’t believe that she’d let these people into her family’s lake house. If her brothers and sisters ever found out, they’d never stop teasing her. Did you hear that Cece went on a wild goose chase to Michigan and almost got inducted into a cult!? Not to mention the fact that her parents would probably skin her alive for inviting strangers into their place. Oh God. How the hell was she gonna get everyone out now? Could she even do that in good conscience? Where would they go? It was the middle of the night. The morning then. First thing in the morning, this bunch of crazies was getting the boot. Jean Luc LaTour included.
“You don’t believe me,” Martine guessed, looking from face to face. “Humans,” she muttered under her breath. “Alright. I’ll show you, then.”
When Martine rose, the group all naturally pulled back away from her. It didn’t bother her, she was used to it. She tilted her head back, held her arms out, and rolled her eyes until only the whites were showing.
She really was a pretty person, Thea thought, observing the obviously insane Martine. She had the kind of bone structure that created shadows in all the right places and that spiky, gold-red hair. It was a wonder that—“Holy shit!”
Thea was on her feet in a second and so was half the circle of people.
Martine had stood there, her arms out, as a woman. And then she’d simply folded in on herself. And now, perched on the crooked hinge of a reading lamp next to the old, plaid couch, was a Red-Tailed Hawk. One of its yellow eyes watched them all, calculating in the way an animal does, but observing the way a human does.
There were a few moments of pandemonium. Hair pulling, swear words up the wazoo, people pinching one another.
“It’s a parlor trick,” Tre murmured to himself. “Trap door of some kind. She used the light, distraction. There’s gotta be some kind of…”
“Hot damn, son!” Jack exclaimed next to him, grabbing his shoulder. “Did you see that?”
“Ohmygoshohmygoshohmygosh.” Caroline’s fingers were anchored over her mouth and her eyes were wild and wide. She was excited and thrilled. But scared, too. It suddenly hit her all at once that no one, not a soul, knew where she was. Her husband was all the way back in Boston, and she, impulsive Caroline, had gone off in search of an adventure and ended up in a place where people turned to animals.
Celia, Thea, and Jean Luc were silent, externally at least. Internally, they alternated between utter blankness and wild, racing guesses.
It couldn’t have lasted more than a few minutes but it felt like an hour before the hawk on the lamp did a tight, swooping circle around the group and landed, in full view, a gorgeous, golden, naked Martine.
Any theories that Tre was working on about parlor tricks immediately raisined up in his brain as he watched every feather shrink and smooth and become skin. He saw the arching way her back straightened into a human’s, her arms, lengthening gracefully. Her face smoothing away.
The men all averted their eyes, fighting the strange urge to whistle aimlessly or clear their throats, as Martine shoved herself back into her clothes.
“So,” she said to the group, straightening that tight black shirt of hers. “Obviously I’m a hawk shifter.”
“Bear shifter,” Jean Luc repeated what she’d said earlier, as if he weren’t hearing himself right. He pressed a hand to his brow and sought the floor with his other hand as he lowered himself down. “You’re saying that I’m—we’re—bear shifters the same way that you’re a hawk shifter.”
“Yes,” Martine nodded.
“Why?” Jack asked that most favored question of his in a low voice.
“Because your soul has just become two souls. That of a man and that of a beast. An animal. You are infinitely more complex and interesting and wild than you were just a few hours ago. To consume your soul now would be the greatest of treats. Arturo didn’t mean for you to get away. He didn’t mean to have to wait to take you into the other realm. He would have taken you right then, before it had a chance to incubate inside you. Before you had a chance to learn your shift.”
Tre held his hands out in front of him and tipped them one way and then the other as if they’d look different somehow.
“Psychedelic,” Celia muttered under her breath and Tre, the only one who heard, shot her a little smile.
Martine arranged her feet under her and looked around at all the faces. “You need rest.
All of you. It’s too much for one day. We’ll try again in the morning.”
They looked at her as if she was speaking Greek until Thea rose up in that long, graceful way of hers. “She’s right.”
All attention focused on Thea. Her hair pulled back under the cap she still wore, there were more shadows than features on her face right then. But her hands were on her hips in a no-nonsense sort of way.
“It’s time for bed.” Thea was suddenly put in mind of the ducklings who’d hatched on her farm last year. They’d lived in what seemed a constant state of befuddlement for almost a month. Bumping into one another and tripping over their own feet. The group needed a herder of sorts. And she could do that for tonight.
Bear shifter.
Demon.
Trap.
She pushed it all from her head and clapped her hands just once. The group, excepting Martine, sort of startled. “Let’s pick rooms.”
***
Thea spent the next twenty minutes making sure each person was settled in. Celia sort of dazedly helped pass out linens before stumbling into her own room. Then, when all the doors were closed, Thea went back to the living room and gathered up all the dishes. She quickly and efficiently cleaned up from dinner. She knew all about mice in these old houses. There was no reason to add anything else to this group’s load right now.
Thea being Thea, she didn’t ask herself any cosmic questions. She didn’t ask herself whether or not she believed. She didn’t even ask herself if she was going to stay in the morning or not. All she did was ask herself what came next. And that was bed.
She hadn’t picked a room for herself yet, though she was pretty sure there was one more bedroom available on the first floor. Sure enough, there was one door still ajar and after washing up in the bathroom and grabbing her backpack, Thea walked right in.
The room had two twin beds, side by side, wood-paneled walls, blue carpet, and Jack laid out, long and lanky, over one of the beds. He was naked save for a pair of dark blue boxer briefs. He had one palm under his head and his legs were crossed at the ankle. His hat was off for the first time that Thea had seen and that blond curly hair, in need of a cut, tumbled everywhere.