by Roxie Noir
“It’ll all be fine,” he said, trying to sound soothing even as his voice was rough at the edges.
“I should be comforting you,” she said, miserably winding spaghetti around her fork.
Before Jake could answer, there was a knock at the front door.
Chapter Six
Jake stood, his plate of pasta still steaming in front of him, as Ariana looked up in some alarm.
“It’s Boone and Coleman,” he said, leaving the kitchen for the front door.
“Why is Boone here?”
“I texted him,” Jake said. She looked a little mad at him, but Jake couldn’t focus on that right now.
“When?”
“Earlier,” Jake called, moving through the cabin. Regina was still asleep on the cot on the floor, snoring just a little. She looked less like a seductress and more like a kid asleep. Suddenly, Jake wondered how old she was: twenty-two, twenty-three? He’d been young and dumb at those ages, he knew, and he felt bad that she’d been pulled into this madness.
He swung the door open and Boone stood there, wearing flannel, jeans, and a leather jacket, practically the pacific northwest uniform.
“Hey,” he said. He’d never been one for a lot of talking.
“Come in,” Jake said. “Coleman with you?”
On the cot on the floor, Regina’s eyes fluttered open.
Boone shook his head. “I haven’t seen him lately,” he told Jake. “You?”
“Me either.”
Boone stood still, looking at Regina on the floor as she woke up, slowly. Ariana came to stand in the doorway to the kitchen.
“You’re the younger one?” Boone said to Regina.
She opened her mouth, then swallowed, tried again. “Yeah,” she said. “Violet fucked me up pretty good.”
“You guys want spaghetti?” Jake asked.
“I ate on the way over,” Boone said. In the doorway, Ariana made a face.
“I’m starving,” said Regina.
The four of them sat around the kitchen table, everyone but Boone eating, Boone just drinking a beer.
“Coleman’s not coming?” Ariana said, stabbing a meatball with her fork. Jake knew she wasn’t thrilled that everyone had just showed up at their house, or that he’d forgotten to tell her that Boone and Coleman were coming, but she could deal with it. They were in deep shit, here.
Boone shrugged and took a gulp of beer, as Regina’s eyes flitted from face to face.
“You guys don’t know?” she asked.
Everyone turned to look at her, a fork halfway to her mouth. She sat up straight and put it down.
“Coleman went back to the Alaska pack,” she said, quietly.
Jake frowned, and saw Boone do the same thing. Coleman couldn’t just rejoin the pack. It wasn’t that easy; once you were cast out, you had to do something to get back in their good graces, to be allowed back. Otherwise he’d just be up in Alaska, living near them but shunned.
“What did he do?” Boone asked in his slow, deep voice.
Regina swallowed and looked down at her food, nervously fidgeting with her fork.
“He went to Brock about the hum— about Ariana.”
Jake slammed one fist onto the table, nearly cracking it and making all the plates and silverware rattle. “Goddamn it,” he roared. Then he pushed his chair back and stormed out of the cabin, slamming the back door open to feel the fresh air on his body.
That fucking asshole, he thought. That utter coward wants back in so he fucks up my life instead? I swear to God if I ever see him again I’ll wring his fucking neck and then I’ll hang him from the trees and let the crows eat his eyes out—
“Jake, you okay?” asked a soft, deep voice from the doorway.
Jake looked up from where he’d paced to, his hands both balled into fists at his sides. Fur was just starting to come through his skin, and he realized he was panting and sweating, even in the cool night.
“I’m fine,” he said through gritted teeth.
“When was the last time you shifted?”
“Why the fuck is everyone asking me that?” Jake shouted. “I don’t see how that’s any of your business, you nosy fucking—“
Boone held up his hands, looking totally unperturbed. “Hey,” he said, and Jake slowed his rant. “Let’s just shift now.” He shrugged out of his leather jacket, tossing it onto the steps, and began unbuttoning his shirt.
Jake was still breathing hard, and his palms had indentations from his nails in them. “I can’t,” he said. He rubbed his eyes, his scalp with his hands. “It’s been too long now, I don’t know what will happen, I don’t want to hurt anyone...”
“I’ll guard you,” Boone said. “Ariana can lock the door. We’ll be fine. You’re in bad shape, man.”
Jake looked up at the bright kitchen window, casting a golden glow over this little patch of woods. Boone was right, of course: he desperately needed to shift, because it wouldn’t be long before he didn’t have the choice anymore. He’d just turn into a grizzly, wherever he was, and probably go on a rampage.
That was a good way to get shot, even in a town where everyone wasn’t already armed to the teeth with anti-grizzly guns.
Suddenly, realized what Violet was really up to.
She didn’t want to fight him. She wanted him miserable and uncomfortable, so that he’d either shift in public or go after her in bear form, and then someone would kill him.
She knows she can’t kill me, so she’s trying to get someone else to do it.
“What is it?” Boone asked. He’d stopped unbuttoning his shirt, so he looked kind of like Superman, his hands frozen mid-torso.
“Violet wants humans to kill me,” Jake said. “That’s what she’s doing.”
Boone thought about it for a moment.
“I didn’t think she was that smart,” he said. “Come on. Shift first, politics later.”
Jake began unbuttoning his own shirt just as another vehicle pulled into the driveway.
* * *
“I got it. Stay here,” Ariana said to Regina. The other woman had wolfed down her plate of pasta and was currently chowing down on a peanut butter sandwich, so she just gave a thumbs-up and kept on chewing.
She opened the door, expecting Coleman, but it was a police officer.
“Evening, miss,” she said, taking off her hat.
“Evening,” Ariana said.
“I’m officer McGinley,” she went on. “You mind if I come in?”
“What’s this about?” asked Ariana, who was in no mood to deal with the police just then.
“We received a tip that a fugitive is hiding here,” she said, trying to look past her into the cabin.
That had to be Regina.
“A fugitive,” she said, trying to sound as doubtful as she could.
Jake walked in through the door from the kitchen.
“Hey, Michelle,” he said. “What’s going on?”
Ariana could still see the signs of stress in her boyfriend: the rumpled hair, the slight flush, the sweatiness, but she hoped he looked fine to the policeman.
“Hey, Jake,” said the officer. “We got a call that a fugitive is hiding out here.”
Both of Jake’s eyebrows went up. “Not that I know of,” he said. “Who is it?”
“She’s been identified as Regina Barrow, and she robbed several convenience stores in the last couple days. Anonymous tip said she was here.”
Jake shrugged. “Come on in,” he said, a little bit too loudly. “No Regina here.”
Ariana stepped back, annoyed with Jake. She was sure that the cop didn’t have a warrant to search their place. Why was he just letting him in?
Officer McGinley looked at the cot on the floor. “You’ve got someone staying here?” she asked.
Jake jerked his thumb toward the kitchen. “My buddy Boone,” he said. “He didn’t want to drive back into the mountains after having a few.”
Ariana’s heart beat faster. In a few more steps, they’d all
be in the kitchen, and then he’d see Regina and the jig would be up, unless the woman had taken the hint and hidden.
“Smart idea,” the officer said. Then she nodded and walked through, into the kitchen.
The only person there was Boone, washing up the dinner dishes, his beer on the counter next to him.
“Mind if I look through the cabin?” Officer Michelle said. “Sorry about all this, it’s just when we get a tip, we’re supposed to follow up.”
“Be my guest,” said Jake, and Ariana could see the tension in his neck, the cords standing out on it. One by one, he cracked all of his knuckled, and she hoped the cop didn’t know it was a nervous habit of his.
She slumped into a chair and wished Regina hadn’t shown up. Now, not only did she have to worry about a sexy bear-lady being under her own roof, she was apparently a fugitive from justice. Ariana glared hard at Jake, who glared right back. The water sloshed in the sink as Brock washed dishes.
At least one of them is house-trained, she thought.
From the next room, she heard the officer’s radio crackle, and then her voice, answering it softly. Both Jake and Boone stopped what they were doing and turned their heads, ever-so-slightly. Boone reached out and shut off the water, stopped clinking dishes together in the sink.
Then they exchanged a significant look with each other. Ariana couldn’t hear a thing, but she knew that their hearing was much, much better than hers.
What? She mouthed at them, trying furiously to figure out what was going on.
Before they could answer, Officer McGinley came back into the room, still talking quietly into the radio.
“Yeah, no sign of her here,” she was saying. “But you want me to ask him to come with? Could be helpful.”
A crackly voice answered.
“Got it,” she said, and then stood up straight and looked from Jake to Boone.
“There’s been another bear attack,” she said. “A young woman was killed in downtown Evergreen.”
A hush fell over the room, and Ariana’s heart plummeted into her stomach.
“Jake, would you mind coming to the crime scene with me? We could use someone who knows bears a little better than the police.”
Jake and Ariana locked eyes for one moment.
Don’t go, Ariana thought. I know you feel worse than you’ll tell me.
“Sure,” he said.
Chapter Seven
Jake stood at the crime scene, restless and itching. The body lay in the street, still, surrounded by police officers and a small crowd of curious people.
“She was walking home from roller skating,” another officer said to Jake.
“It was a bear,” Jake said. “I can tell you that much.”
The body was small and female, with a dark brown pixie cut. She didn’t look older than mid-twenties, and despite his misery, Jake felt a deep pang for the girl.
Was this his fault, he wondered? Was he being a coward by refusing the shift and fight Violet?
I could end this, he thought. I could end this, no problem.
He felt a prickle begin below his skin.
“Any chance you could tell what kind of bear it is?” asked the officer.
Jake knew exactly what kind of bear it was. He knew he had to fake some uncertainty, though.
“Those claw marks are pretty wide,” he said. “That’s a big bear paw.”
“Witness reports say it was a grizzly,” said the officer. “But there are no confirmed reports, you know...”
“Didn’t it walk down the street the other day?” Jake asked. “No one confirmed that report?”
The officer shook his head.
Jake sighed and put his hands on his hips, pretending to waffle back and forth. His whole body itched and burned, and it was all he could do to focus on what he was saying.
“It could definitely be a a grizzly,” he said. “Claws look big enough, and—“ he bent closer to the poor girl’s neck, wincing as he did “—so does this bite.”
“This poor girl,” whispered the officer next to him, and Jake felt another pang of guilt stab through him. “How do we get this bear?”
“Officially, you need a permit to shoot it,” Jake said, beginning to give the talk he’d given so many times in the last few days, on autopilot. “That takes a little while, and then there’s the problem of tracking it out of town, shooting it in the right place...”
The cop just looked at the dead girl. “And unofficially?”
“Unofficially, shoot the fucker,” Jake said.
“I wish we knew a thing about tracking bears.”
Then, Jake had an idea.
“What if you tranquilized it instead?”
The officer looked over at him.
“And did what?” he asked.
“There’s a big grizzly population in Montana, pretty far from civilization,” Jake said, slowly, the idea just forming as he said it loud. “We could rehome it there. That way, we could officially give you the forest service’s full resources.”
There was also a big shifter pack in Montana, Jake knew. Moreover, they didn’t get along at all with the Alaska pack — generations ago, one brother had murdered another and then left for Montana, starting another pack there. The pack had grown, and every so often, when two shifters met, there would be an explosive fight before everything simmered down again.
In short, Violet would be at the bottom of the pack and miserable, if she wasn’t just killed outright.
He thought it was a fitting punishment.
“Anything to get that thing out of Evergreen,” the cop said.
* * *
“Tell me the truth,” Ariana said. She and Regina and Boone were sitting in the living room now, a fire going in the fireplace, the three of them drinking tea. It was late but there was no way she could sleep, not with Jake out there, with a dead person, among the police and jonesing to shift.
“He’s bad,” Boone admitted.
“How bad?”
“This is exactly what Violet was trying to do,” said Regina, softly. The morphine had already worn off but she’d refused more, and she touched her bandages gently. “Make it so he can’t control when and where he shifts, or what he does when it happens.”
Ariana swallowed and stared into the fire. “And everyone in town is on edge, ready to shoot any bear they see,” she said darkly.
“Pretty much,” Boone said.
“What can I do?” asked Ariana.
“We need to get him far away,” said Boone. “When he comes back I’ll take him far out to somewhere.”
“He won’t hurt you?”
Boone shrugged, but his face remained stoic. “He might try,” he said. “I’m sure I’ve had worse.”
Regina looked up at him through her eyelashes. For a moment, Ariana thought she saw a spark of something.
“You shouldn’t go,” she told Boone. “It should be me.”
“It’s dangerous.”
“He won’t hurt me.”
Boone looked at Ariana for a ling time, his face impossible to read.
“You don’t know that,” he said at last.
Yes, I do, she thought.
Hours later, Ariana jerked awake when the front door opened. Boone and Regina were gone, probably to another room, and the fire had died almost all the way down.
She heard someone stumble inside, breathing hard.
It was Jake.
Ariana jumped up. She’d fallen asleep on the couch, trying to wait up for him, and she slipped on her shoes and went to the door.
He was there, leaning hard against the wall just inside the door, which was still hanging open.
“Jake,” she said, softly.
He looked up at her, and she gasped. It was like he didn’t even recognize her. Ariana’s heart clenched in her chest, and a twinge of fear wormed its way into her heart. Was he too far gone already?
“Babe, stand up,” she said, kneeling down in front of him.
Jake swallowed h
ard and looked past her, then at her. He didn’t say anything, but his shirt was drenched in sweat and now he’d gone white. She picked up one of his hands, and it felt clammy.
He’s a time bomb, she thought. If what they said is true, he could lose control any moment.
She knew that if she were smart, she’d leave the cabin, go somewhere else for a little while. Boone and Regina could handle it, even if they might get hurt in the process.
Jake’s eyes went unfocused, and he swallowed convulsively.
She couldn’t just leave him like this, alone, set to destroy the cabin he’d built with his own hands.
“I’m taking you somewhere so you can shift,” she said.
He looked at her again, and started to talk.
“Don’t...” he said.
“Don’t argue,” she said. “Just stand up. I can’t lift you.”
“I’ll hurt you,” he whispered.
“No, you won’t,” she said. “Now stand.”
Ariana’s hands shook as she steered his huge truck through the narrow, winding two lane roads, barely avoiding the trees. Jake had turned bright red again and he was breathing hard and covered in sweat. They’d barely spoken during the car ride, and she could tell that Jake was completely focused on staying human, just for a little while longer. She wished she could help, but she didn’t know what to do besides drive faster, far away from Evergreen and the national park, heading toward an old lumberjack camp he’d told her about in his painful, halting voice.
“Turn here,” he told her through gritted teeth.
Ariana slammed on the brakes and her headlights picked out a tiny dirt road through the forest, barely more than two dirt ruts. She swung the wheel around, the tires slipping just a little as she made the hard left, and then drove as fast as she dared down the little track, branches smacking into the truck as she did thirty, thirty-five, forty through the deep woods.