by L. A. Banks
Who the hell was Max Hunter?
The question was so terrifying that she could feel her heart slamming against her breastbone. Her mind raked over every detail about him, trying to put her insane behavior into rational context. But all she could imagine was what his hands would have felt like, soapy, massaging her scalp while her wet body was pressed against every brick-hard ridge of his under the spray.
Flight was the only rational answer her mind could scavenge, and she jumped out of the tub, left the water running, and headed out of the bathroom with a towel loosely draped around her.
“Hey, hey, hey, whoa,” he said, watching her rush around the room and gather her ripped, soiled clothing.
“I’m out,” she announced, struggling to pull the fabric over her damp skin.
“You’re panicking, and will catch your death of cold out there,” he said calmly, staring at her.
“Better to catch it out there than in here.”
The verbal snipe cut deep, but he tried to shrug it off, telling himself that the wounded always lashed out.
“I’m not a threat to you, Sasha . . . and you aren’t one to me.”
She found her nine that had been in his jacket pocket. “Oh, no?”
He shook his head. “You don’t wanna do that,” he said with no judgment in his tone as he headed for the bathroom.
“Yeah? Why not?” she called out behind him.
“Because I’m going to show you the best part of the day,” he said, jumping into the tub, and then ducking into the shower spray, while leaving the curtain open and making a complete mess of water on the floor.
Strange curiosity drew her to the bathroom entrance. “What’s the best part of the day?”
He ignored her and kept washing his body, then finally glanced at her with a half-smile. “You still plan to shoot me for just breathing this morning?”
“Okay. I’m sorry. I just feel . . . really . . .”
“Out of control.” He looked at her and trapped her gaze. “It’s the meds, or the lack thereof, Sasha. Think of how long you’ve been on them, and how this is perhaps the longest stretch you’ve gone off them.”
“I hate that you might have a point.” She briefly closed her eyes as water from her wet hair dripped onto her shoulders. “I’ve taken that crap for as far back as I can remember, and this is the longest stretch without it.” She didn’t explain that she was also panicking about the Rod thing and her own possible contagion. Hunter didn’t need to know all that. But maybe the man had a point; her emotions were all over the place. It had to be the med withdrawal.
“Then can you not shoot me, at least not when I haven’t done anything?” His eyes were merry but his voice was patient. The combination did something to her.
She grudgingly slid the gun onto the dresser as she watched him towel off, half expecting him to just shake the water from him, her gaze hunting every delicious line of his body. Deep wood tones against stark-white, very small towels. Oh, yeah . . . Onyx waves of thick hair sent water streaming down his back, chest, and over his shoulders, adding to the glistening beauty of his sculpted frame.
This was outrageous; her own body was betraying her again. Had to be the heavy med withdrawal. He lifted a foot and rested it on the edge of the tub, toweling off his leg, and all she could do was stand there watching the muscles work beneath his dark skin. Then with one majestic shake, he sent water everywhere from his dripping wet hair, spraying her face—then winked at her and quickly strode out of the room with a taunt in his eyes.
Oooohhh, she was gonna get him!
On him in a flash, she dashed to tackle him from behind as bizarre playfulness thrummed within her and he quickly sidestepped her and then jumped on the bed. Suddenly they were laughing, nipping, and making quick snatches toward each other, each missing, reversing the hunt as whim dictated. First she chased him, and then he would fake left or right and go after her.
“We need to do this outside,” he said, panting, after missing her again.
“Revenge is a bitch—I will prevail,” she said, laughing and sidestepping him.
“Not during the best part of the day.” He grinned a wolfish grin. “You don’t know how to do it yet.”
“Ha!” she said, hands on hips and breathing hard, chuckling. “Do what?”
“Wanna see?” He had the excited expression of a little kid on his face. “The long shadows are the best part of the day, Sasha . . . c’mon!”
Too curious to even fake a refusal, she gathered up her torn boots. His smile widened, and he quickly picked up his amber and silver amulet off the floor, looped the long silver chain over his head, and began pulling on his clothes as best he could.
She laughed hard when the front of his jeans flapped open, destroyed.
“Not a problem,” he said, lifting his chin in mock indignation. “I have bungee cords in my trunk, thank you very much, mademoiselle.”
“But you don’t have on any underwear!” she shrieked, covering her mouth and doubling over. “Oh, no, Hunter— I am not walking into Wal-Mart with you like that!”
“They won’t see. I move fast. And you should talk— you’re still half wet and your pants are half hanging off you, so I’ll be fine shopping au naturel.”
“Oh, no. Not.”
“How much you want to bet? I’ll even make you a wager.”
“No. End of story. Plus, you are not going to steal stuff out of Wal-Mart. You just aren’t.”
“I won’t steal it. I have money. You give them the tag and tell them I decided to wear my selection out of the store.”
“Oh, my God . . .”
“Come outside and play, Sasha. The shadows are amazing in the afternoon.”
Grudgingly, she followed him out to the parking lot and squinted at the bright contrast of sun versus dark motel room. Pure embarrassment kept her looking anywhere but at him as he boldly strode to his truck holding the front of his pants closed with one fist and then fumbling under the seats for the infamous bungee cords.
“This is beyond tacky, Hunter. Why don’t you just stay in the truck, tell me your size, and let me get the jeans?”
“Because I might see something else in there I want. And I’m hungry.”
She rolled her eyes. Clearly this man was just trying to push her buttons. His antics were so outrageous that a smile continued to break free of her restraint.
There was nothing to do but laugh as he yanked out a tangle of stretchy cords in varying lengths and made a huge production of finding the shortest one to thread around his waist through his belt loops. Hooking the ends together, he gave her a triumphant snort.
“Voilà!”
She took off his jacket that she’d draped around her, despite the bitter temperatures, and casually handed it to him. He tilted his head in a question. She couldn’t hold it in any longer and burst out laughing again.
“Put the jacket on, please,” she said, shaking her head.
He grabbed it from her good-naturedly and looked down and shrugged. “What can I say?”
But the moment he slid the jacket on, he reached for her hand, clasped it, and began running. Stumbling, laughing, and having the time of her life, soon she could give fleet-footed chase as he dashed toward the densely wooded area that sat back from the roadside motel.
The whole thing was surreal—highway at their backs and nothing but thickets and trees looming before them. Being with him was a live-in-the-moment flash of intensity. Something about this man eclipsed the past and the future, making the present the only slice of time there was.
Her heart beat in a hard, joyful rhythm as she tried to catch up to Hunter, who scaled fallen logs and came down with stupefying grace. She slowed her chase to better watch him plunder the woods, her muscles contracting and releasing in anticipation of motion that her mind overrode. Fear of breaking an ankle, stepping wrong, being stabbed by a jagged branch or rock made her wary. She’d never been in this terrain before, never on this stretch of land.
&
nbsp; Sensing her nervousness, he turned and stared at her, his eyes sad as she slowed her gait.
“Don’t tell me you’re going chickenshit on me, Trudeau,” he said, baiting her by calling to her like one of the guys she’d trained with.
Her gaze narrowed a bit. A challenge was something that she found hard to ignore. But she also had common sense and a mission to fulfill; apparently he had neither.
“Uh, the store?” she said with a hint of sarcasm, even though she’d smiled. Sasha turned her wrist over as though she had on a watch and tapped the back of it with her forefinger. Plus, it was so cold outside she could see their breaths! Now that they’d stopped running, her wet hair and top was beginning to make her teeth chatter.
“They stay open all night—we’ve got time. But check this out,” he said, running, leaping, and then he disappeared.
Sasha stood very, very still, her hackles up, senses keen. Then out of a shadow ten feet away, he landed in full view.
“What a rush!” he said, smiling widely. “It’ll warm you up, too.”
She backed away slowly, the hair on the nape of her neck bristling. “What the hell was that?”
“Dance with me, baby—come on, it’s sooo cool.”
She looked him up and down. “Explain.”
He let out a weary sigh. “You’re taking all the fun out of it, Trudeau.” When she didn’t move but folded her arms over her chest, he relented. “Oh, all right.”
Walking past the endless stand of trees, he stretched out his arm and touched their long, eerily narrow shadows. “Like jumping railroad ties,” he said plainly. “This is easy, the shadows are close together. It gets challenging when they’re far apart. But this is the best part of the daytime hours, while the shadows are long and stretch far.” He stopped walking and turned to smile at her with a dashing smile. “Want to try it?”
“I . . . wait—how do you do it?”
He threw up his hands and rolled his eyes. “How do you do it? That’s like asking how you have sex.”
“Well, the uninformed need directions the first time out.” She reinforced her stance and folded her arms over her chest again.
“Yeah, yeah, one can tell you the technical basics, but to really do it, you’ve got to follow an experienced teacher, if you ask me,” he muttered, growing peevish. “It’s all about trust. Just one man’s opinion.”
“How do you—”
“All right, all right!” He stalked up to her and looked her in the eyes, and then laid his hands on her shoulders. “You have to get to a place in your mind that’s still, and call the wolf. When she comes, you’ll feel this incredible surge of energy . . . heat . . . like your body’s burning up. It makes you want to shed your clothes, run, feel the wind on your face, ripping through your hair . . . this heat is so intense . . . so erotic a pull that it steals your breath until you almost cannot breathe.”
“Like last night,” she said quietly.
He nodded, and for what seemed like a long while, neither of them spoke.
“Then,” he murmured, “you reach out and touch a shadow. It will feel cool to the touch, will stop the burn, and the next thing you know, the only thing that keeps the agony in check is moving faster and faster through the shadows. You’re running, dancing, ripping from one to another, gaining momentum, energy, prowess, and when you come out of it, for a brief while you can sustain whatever the properties were of the object that cast the shadow.”
“Whoa . . .” she whispered, awestruck. “Like the multiple scents you cloaked yourself with before?”
His intense stare began to slightly glow and the hunger it suddenly exuded made her swallow hard. “Yes,” he murmured. “If you step into a stone shadow, the spirit of the stone will lend you its strength. If you’re being hunted, find metal or stone shadows, or that of a tree, and the blow you lob when you come out of it will literally crush a man’s jaw.” He smiled a wicked half-smile. “Buildings work like that, too.”
“You have got to be kidding me,” she said in a faraway voice.
“If you need speed, catch and jump into the shadow of a car moving quickly. You can ride that shadow doing sixty, seventy, eighty—whatever the vehicle is doing.” He laughed and shook his head. “But a couple of times, trying it as a kid and chasing rigs along the side of the highway at night, I was almost road pizza.”
She just stared at the man, wide-eyed.
“Hold my hand and run with me after you call your wolf . . . and don’t let go. I’ll take you through the trees, run you back to the clearing, and let you feel the shadow dance outside.” He waited for her response like an excited child. Unable to withstand her hesitation, he pressed his point, cupping her cheek with his warm palm. “It’s not a curse, Sasha. It’s an extraordinary gift from the Great Spirit. It’s not from the demon realms . . . it’s Mother Nature sharing all her children’s gifts with each other through the shadows.”
While she didn’t claim to understand, the gentle plea in his voice and the honesty she saw in his eyes made her step forward. She fingered his amulet and he closed his eyes.
“Yes . . . I admit, there are dangers.”
Bingo. Her gut was never wrong.
“There are shadows made from nature, then those not of the Great Spirit.” He looked down at his chest and then removed the amber and silver he wore, and looped the chain over her neck. “Sometimes when running or in hot pursuit, things are a blur, the shadows so dense . . . things are whirring by so quickly that you cannot make out one from the other. Normally the unnatural darkness is colder, like the most severe absence of warmth, not refreshing coolness. It will make the hairs on your neck stand up. This,” he added, tracing where it lay against her breasts, “will keep you from falling into a demon door.”
“Shit, then forget shadow dancing.” She began to take the chain from her neck, but he placed a calm hand over her chest.
“When we go to my people up in the mountains, I’ll have them make you a ward . . . until then, keep mine. I’ve been doing this for a long time.”
The soft timbre of his voice and the gentle promise in his eyes stilled her. Never had someone so completely given of themselves to her. She touched the amber while looking at him.
“This looks so old and sacred . . . it’s too important to who you are . . . I—”
“Please,” he said quietly, his eyes searching her face. “Wear it and dance with me unafraid.”
Not waiting for her answer, he took her mouth. Soon the unbearable heat that he seemed to summon from her just by his touch began to consume her. His tongue writhed with hers in a sultry dance, one that promised so much, and his arms surrounded her, pulling her into their exquisite warmth. Her hands sought his back, her chest straining to create a friction bond with his. Her pelvis locked with his and his ruined jeans soon provided him no protection. It was insane how much she wanted this man.
“Let her out to play, Sasha. She’s not a monster . . .”
“I’m afraid to . . . I’ve never been this long without my meds, never—”
“What color is she?” he panted against her neck.
“Black?”
“No.” He kissed her hard and fast and then pulled back.
“Yes, yes she is,” Sasha argued, squeezing her eyes shut tightly. “She’s huge . . . stands like three feet at the shoulders . . .”
“That’s my wolf,” he said in a low, sensual rumble. “I can’t believe you saw it within your own wolf’s shadow land.”
“The silver one, then . . . she’s me?”
He nodded as his breath hitched.
All she could do was stare at him for a second. He had a look on his face that held such blatant arousal, she wasn’t sure if she should make love to him on the spot or run.
“Run . . .” he whispered, reading her eyes, if he hadn’t read her mind.
A flash of glowing amber lit his gaze with unmistakable desire. Instinct kicked in and she turned on her heels and became a blur though the trees. Within sec
onds she could feel his nearness, his hot pursuit, the burn of something within her reveling in newfound freedom. Her strides became longer, more fluid, and obstacles to sail over in graceful hurdles were now sought-after things. She could hear Hunter’s deft footfalls, his breath. Sweat coated her body and the pleasure now bordered on agony.
A burning hand suddenly clasped hers, and the next thing she knew she was sailing. Each footfall hit a cool dark place. The rich, earthy scent of the forest clipped by snow filled not just her nose, but her lungs, her soul. She came out of the shadows into a clearing, her eyes wild, her hair static charged, her body on fire. And then he grabbed her again, this time pulling her so she almost fell.
“Sasha!” he yelled, excited, his voice deep and commanding. “Look up—birds!”
She wasn’t sure which direction to look. In the air or on the ground, but clear as day she could see the fast-moving shadows of a flock of Canadian geese.
“Oh, God, wait until you feel this, Sasha!”
She didn’t have time to even respond. In two long strides she’d been pulled into the shapes flitting across the ground. Weightlessness, sailing, climbing, her stomach rising up in the cool, soundless space, feeling like she’d dropped in a roller coaster . . . the ground was beneath her, and then she landed on all fours on the other side of the highway in another stand of trees.
A gleeful shriek tore from her throat and she began running with her arms open and leaping into nothingness, running the length of tall pines. She saw Hunter loping beside her, a smile on his face, his form only visible in broken frames as he passed from a tree into dappling sunlight and into another tree. Happiness filled her as his laughter echoed like a sonic bomb, making her feel it as well as hear it. She wanted to dance, twirl, make shadow angels in this glorious between-worlds place. Then he reached out and grabbed her hand again, this time veering off sharply toward the highway.
She began screaming before he did it. The eighteen-wheelers were moving at ninety miles per hour! Jerked into a flash of sunlight, he jumped, made them both hit the shadow, and the next thing she knew she was running at a speed her mind couldn’t comprehend. Then like skipping stones, he jumped into the shadow of an SUV, and another, and a car, crossing the highway, reversing their steps, and returned them back to the motel pull-off in a tumble to the ground within a tree shadow.