Soon she couldn’t touch the bottom of the lake, and she had to wade further out, kicking her legs to stay afloat. She turned to face the shore, where Hunter was just watching her, a smile on his face.
“You coming or what?” she called back. “You’re making me look like an idiot out here by myself.
“Fine,” the young man called back, and he pulled his shirt off and kicked off his boots. He stepped forward, taking his jeans off as he did so, and stepping into the water in nothing but his boxer briefs. Sasha watched him, unable to keep from biting her bottom lip as he sank further into the water. He really was quite good looking.
He swam out to meet her, treading water less than a foot away. Still, that was too far a gap for Sasha, so she kicked towards him until her chest pressed against his. He slid his arms around her body, and she placed her hands on his shoulders.
“I’m glad you asked me out,” she said with a smile. She wasn’t the type of girl to get so chummy on a first date, but something about Hunter made her feel at peace. She closed her eyes, relishing the feeling of his strong hands on the small of her back. Beneath her own fingers, his shoulders were hard and sturdy. She opened her eyes to see his dark ones. He closed them, and she closed hers again.
Sasha leaned forward, and so did the young man. Their lips touched as they kept themselves afloat in the water. The kiss was soft, tender, their lips together, and then she parted hers at a gentle probe from his tongue, and their tongues danced together, exploring one another’s mouth.
When they broke apart, Sasha couldn’t help but laugh. “I promise, I never kiss on a first date.”
“I’m glad you’re breaking your rule then,” Hunter replied, and then they kissed again.
The night wore on, and they didn’t go further than kissing, but they did do that a lot. They went into shallower waters, where they could stand and embrace, and as their mouths became one their hands explored, his running down over her bubble butt, squeezing the smooth yet firm flesh there, and hers slid between their bodies, fingers tracing his abs.
Finally, it was time to go. “I didn’t bring towels,” Hunter said. They were near the shore, crouched down so most of their bodies were still in the steaming water, and not in the chill air.
“We’ll have to run for it,” Sasha said with a grin.
“Okay, are you ready?” Hunter asked, taking her hand.
“Let’s go!” she said, practically yelling in the still night. She moved first, pulling him up and out of the lake after her. They ran laughing and shrieking into the freezing air, stopping to gather their clothes but not bothering to pull them on, running barefoot in the cold snow up the hill to his truck. Sasha dove in and Hunter followed on the other side of the vehicle. He cranked the engine, then reached forward and hit the control for the heater, hot air hitting them full blast. They giggled and laughed as they dressed, and then it was time to go home.
Hunter pulled up in front of Sasha’s grandfather’s home twenty minutes later. He kept the engine running but killed the lights as he put the truck in park.
“I had a lot of fun,” he said.
“Shut up,” Sasha said playfully, leaning over and kissing the young man on the mouth. He returned the kiss, and it was some time before they broke apart. When she finally pulled away, Sasha smiled and opened the truck door.
“Don’t ghost me,” she said.
“Ghost you?” Hunter asked.
“You don’t know ghosting?”
“No. Is that a thing?”
“Oh man, is Alaska one of these places where you guys get, like, movies years later? And don’t know slang?”
“I guess so,” Hunter said as he laughed.
“Ghost. Don’t disappear on me. Don’t take me out and get a little sugar and have a little fun and then never call me.”
“I don’t have your number,” Hunter reminded her.
“You know where I live,” she said teasingly, and then she hopped out of the car and walked to the front door, giving her hips an extra little shake, knowing full well Hunter was watching her.
Chapter Four
The afternoon after her first date with Hunter, Sasha found herself picking up a prescription for her grandfather, the drug store a small little building just off Main Street. She was waiting for the order to be filled when she heard the door ding behind her and spun from the magazine rack she had been perusing.
A man stood there, staring right at her. He was handsome (something Sasha had noticed about Tall Tree. A lot of the population seemed to be made up of handsome young men, as though she had stepped into some sort of Abercrombie and Fitch catalog or something.) but off-putting, his skin deeply tanned, his hair black except for a streak of white along one side.
“Hi there,” he said, coming toward her. Sasha glanced around nervously. The pharmacist was a man who looked even older than her grandfather, and he had disappeared into a small back room to count and bottle the pills she needed. No one else was in the store.
“Hi,” she said, trying to keep any sense of unease from her voice. She wasn’t sure why the man with was making her feel so uncomfortable, she just knew he was.
He was wearing a leather jacket and dark jeans with holes in them, his large feet clad in black motorcycle boots, and indeed, looking at the man, Sasha could see a Harley parked in front of the door.
“I’m Kurt,” the man said, stopping a foot or so away from her and extending his hand. “I heard we had a new resident.”
She shook his hand, his grip strong.
“Yeah,” she said.
“I wanted to say hi. I like to be the welcome wagon around these parts.
The door dinged again. “I’ve already welcomed her,” Hunter said, standing in the doorway. Kurt turned.
“Ah, Hunter, new blood and you come running, huh?”
Sasha didn’t like what she was hearing. It sounded as if the men were fighting over her. She had enjoyed her time with Hunter the night before, but she wasn’t property to be fought over the way dogs would fight over a bone.
“Skunk, why don’t you leave the girl alone?”
“Don’t call me that,” Kurt said, anger flaring in his eyes.
“Miss, here you are,” a voice said from behind Sasha, and she turned to see the pharmacist holding a small white paper bag.
“Thank you,” she said, taking the bag quickly and then hurrying out of the store.
“Hey, I came to see you, I stopped by your grandfather’s house,” Hunter called after her, stepping outside behind her.
“Come by later, okay?” She was in a hurry to leave, Kurt made her very uncomfortable, and the testosterone show was too much for her.
Sasha expected Hunter to come see her, but the day wore on, and the evening came on, and then night proper, and he never did, and Sasha found herself feeling rather disappointed.
Her grandfather retired to his bedroom earlier than usual that evening, leaving her alone in the rest of the house by nine. She sat in the living room for some time, channel surfing, but the old man didn’t have cable, and only a few channels came in, so it wasn’t much of a surf. She turned off the TV and stood, stretching her arms above her head.
That’s when she heard it. A deep growl. There was nothing else the sound could be, she knew that it was a growl, like a dog warning that he’s about to attack, raspy and husky and frightening.
Sasha moved to the nearest window and looked out, but she could see nothing but the forest nearby. She squinted her eyes, trying to see in the darkness, the growl constant and growing louder. She was scared, and she turned away from the window and hurried to the front door, double checking that it was locked. Here the growling was even louder, and Sasha stood on her tips of her toes to look out of the square of glass near the top of the door. She could just see the porch in front of the door, and there, coming up the stairs, was a massive dog.
No, not a dog, she realized as she watched it near the door until it passed beneath her field of view. It was a wolf. A
wolf with pitch black fur, a wolf that, as Sasha slunk back from the door with growing horror, began to scratch at the door.
“Go away!” she called, not loud enough to wake her grandfather, perhaps doing that subconsciously, feeling foolish for being so frightened by a wolf. Of course, there were wolves here in the forest in Alaska, and no doubt there were any number of other animals that were just as dangerous, or more dangerous, like bears. She was in a house, safe and secure, and the wolf was outside. Being so frightened was ridiculous.
And yet, she was terrified. She had an unrealistic image in her mind of the wolf pouncing, busting through the front door, rushing at her with jaws wide, shrieking as they closed tightly around her throat.
In reality, the wolf scratched at the door for some time, and then she heard it’s heavy footsteps as it turned away from the door and padded along to the left, towards the living room. Sasha followed the wolf’s steps from the safety of the house, and she saw it pass in front of one window in the living room, shocked at the size of the thing. Not that she had ever seen a wolf in real life, but this one, the black one on the porch, with a streak of white running down the side of it’s head to about its mid back was absolutely huge. Surely larger than a wolf was meant to be.
Its lips curled back from long white teeth, it’s fur seemed to stand on end along its neck and back. It paused there, at the window and turned, and she was sure the yellow eyes were staring right at her. The thing growled again, and it pressed its nose against the glass of the window. Again, Sasha had the idea that the wolf was going to come in for her. This time it didn’t seem like a silly notion, she was sure it was going to happen. She watched the beast bend down and back, gathering its power in its legs, preparing to jump forward, through the glass.
Sasha turned, intent on rushing to get her grandfather, on waking an old, sick man, thinking that he would be able to help her, a foolish thought to be sure. The old man had cancer! He was dying! What would he do?
Behind Sasha, the window shattered. She screamed and turned. The massive black wolf was inside, it’s head dipped, its teeth bared. Frothy white saliva dripped from its jaws as it stalked forward.
“Grandpa!” Sasha yelled, turning to run again but tripping and falling to the floor. Upstairs there was a loud bang, and Sasha figured it was her grandfather coming to see what was wrong. Instead, another wolf bounded down the stairs and into the living room. I was pure white, the same color as snow. It was also clearly older than the black wolf with the white streak. It was thinner, it’s fur stragglier.
The black wolf leaped towards Sasha. She threw her arms up to protect herself, jamming her eyes shut and waiting for the blow to come. It never did. Instead, there was a yelp, and when she opened her eyes, she saw the white wolf had intercepted the black, and they were rolling along the floor back towards the broken window, jaws snapping at one another.
The white wolf rolled onto its feet and latched its teeth around the black wolf’s leg. With a great jerk of its head, it whipped the younger wolf out through the broken window and onto the wrap around porch. Then it glanced back at Sasha, as though it was making sure she was okay, and somehow the young woman knew that was exactly what the wolf was doing, and then it turned and leaped out at her attacker.
Sasha quickly came to her senses. She pushed herself up and ran upstairs to her grandfather’s room. The door was open, it had indeed been the loud banging she had heard moments before. The old man’s room was empty, the blanket on the bed shoved aside, his pajama bottoms nearer the door, discarded with a long rip down one leg.
Sasha didn’t know what to do. Her grandfather was missing, a wolf had tried to kill her, and she had been saved by another. She could hear the beasts battling outside, having knocked one another off the porch, they were now in the front yard, yelping and snapping their jaws.
She knew she should call the police, but something kept her from doing so. She felt as though something was going on, something the police wouldn’t understand, but she didn’t know exactly what. It had to do with her grandfather, his room being empty, the pajama bottoms on the floor. She was piecing it together, of course, she was a smart girl, but the rational part of her brain just wouldn’t allow it.
Sasha hurried back downstairs. She looked out of the broken window, couldn’t see the wolves, but she could hear them, somewhere, snarling.
A pounding on the door jerked her away from the window. She turned towards the door but didn’t make any movement towards it. “Sasha!” she heard, a familiar voice.
“Hunter!” she called loudly as she ran to the door and unlocked it, jerking it open. The man she was falling for stood there, concern etched into his handsome face. He wrapped his arms around her. She wanted to ask what he was doing here, had he known she needed him? But he was faster, pushing her gently away, his hands on her shoulders so he could look her in the eye.
“Where is Connor?”
“He’s out there,” Sasha said, pointing to the yard beyond them. “He’s a wolf I think.”
“Lock the door and wait for us,” Hunter said, and he stepped back and shut the door for her. She locked it and ran for the broken window, looking carefully through it to the porch. Hunter was gone, in his place stood a wolf, its fur a deep chestnut brown, the same color as Hunter’s hair. His clothes were scattered on the porch around the massive paws of the large wolf, and then it was bounding into the yard, leaping down the stairs in one go, and it paused there for a moment, it’s head tilted to one side, then it turned into the woods and ran into them.
Sasha had no idea how much time passed from the moment the wolf that she understood was somehow Hunter went into the woods, and the moment when she saw him again, still as a wolf with the naked and human figure of her grandfather draped over his back re-emerge from the trees. It felt somehow like no time, just minutes, and hours all at once. She had stayed by the window the whole time, her eyes on the woods, and when she saw them, she ran to the door, unlocked it, and flung it wide.
She ran down the stairs to meet the wolf, her slight embarrassment of seeing her grandfather naked disappearing in a flash when she noticed he was covered in bite marks and scratches and blood.
“Is he okay?” she asked the wolf, but the animal simply knelt so she could ease her grandfather off of its back. The wolf then went to the porch and as she watched it changed, the hair fading away somehow, the legs straightening, the feet growing until Hunter was there, naked and turned away from her, pulling his clothes back on quickly. When he was dressed, he turned and rushed back down the porch stairs, bending and lifting Connor’s broken and battered body in his arms, turning and taking him into the old man’s home.
Sasha followed along, a million questions swirling around her mind, but knowing that just then wasn’t the time. Hunter laid Connor down upon the couch.
“I can’t believe he would be so brazen,” Hunter said, fury in his voice.
“Who?” she asked.
“Kurt. He’s gone past the point of no return, he’s had problems with the way the pack was headed, he wants… more from us, he wants violence, but this, attacking you and your grandfather? There’s no turning back from this. He’s declared war.”
“I don’t understand any of this,” the girl said. “You… you’re a wolf.”
“A shifter.”
“A werewolf,” she said, almost hysterical, and it made Hunter smile.
“No, a shifter,” he said.
“My grandfather,” Sasha went on.
“He’s hurt.”
“We should take him to the hospital,” she said.
Hunter was shaking his head, surprising the young woman.
“No,” he said.
“Why not?”
“There is nothing they can do for him there, not about this. Cancer, that is what they can help him with, but this it’s different.”
“What do you mean it’s different?” Sasha asked. “Tell me what the hell is going on.”
Hunter sighed, knowing
that though they didn’t have the time, he would need to explain, at least partially. “Let me make a call first, and then I’ll explain this all to you.”
He reached into his pocket and pulled out his cell phone, pressing the screen quickly and then moving off into another room, leaving Sasha to pull an afghan blanket from the back of the couch and cover her grandfather’s nude frame with it. He was unconscious but living, his hairy chest rising and falling in a slow, steady rhythm.
Hunter was not gone for long. He returned to Sasha, stood beside her as she straightened up.
“What are you?” she asked.
“I told you, I, and Connor, and a lot of others in this town, are shifters.”
“I don’t know what the hell that means,” Sasha complained.
“It’s ancient and magical. That’s why the doctor couldn't do anything for your grandfather. We aren’t many, but we are everywhere, all across the globe. Your grandfather, he’s our leader, we have a pack here.”
Sasha held up her hand. “Why can’t a doctor help him?”
“Wolf bites and scratches, from one of us, it’s not like a normal bite or scratch. It’s got power behind it. Power I can’t even begin to guess at, but without the proper help, it won’t heal.”
“What’s the proper help?”
“Damien,” Hunter said, using a name Sasha was unfamiliar with. “He’s coming now.”
“That was Kurt?”
“It was.”
“Why?”
“With your grandfather being sick, there’s been a push from certain people, certain shifter’s, wanting to take control of the pack when Connor… well, when he passes. Kurt is one of them. Right now, we live in peace. Not every pack is like that, and Kurt wants us to change. There’s a war going on, right under your nose, not just your nose, the whole world’s nose. The packs, some of them, are fighting for a piece in the new world being built.”
“New world?” Sasha asked.
“It would take all night to explain it, and I promise I will at some point, but it’s not the time. Damien is coming, and he’ll need my help.”
Wild Winter Page 3