Wolven

5. a shadow follows

"Fun fact for you guys," April said from beside me, her knuckles white where she was crushing her phone in her hand. "That was not subtle. Nothing about that was in any way subtle. You could have seriously hurt him, Flint."

April's furious eye roll told me Flint answered her with a shrug of his shoulders. Not that I could blame him; it had been Tristan who'd rushed at us, anyways.

"Maybe the punching wasn't so necessary," Nova called from the back row of the car. I could only see her shoes up against the window, ankles crossed.

"When a bear attacks, you don't turn tail and run," Rowan pointed out. "That only guarantees a chase."

"Oh, Tristan's proven himself one terrifying grizzly alright," Nova agreed with just the slightest hint of irony. "Be real, Tristan's just a stupid puppy whose ears are easy to stomp on. It took two whole seconds for Clay to knock sense into him last night. Speaking of which, did you actually end up sleeping with Jade last night?"

"Was she worth it?" Flint asked, leaning forward.

"She seems nice enough," Coal said through half a shiver.

I reached to turn up the heater for him, and to try hiding the uncomfortable warmth in my own face. I considered lying to them, but I'd never been good at secrets. Especially not from them, after all we'd been through and all we had to worry about. I figured at the least they could get a laugh out of it.

"I don't remember any of it," I admitted. "And I'm pretty sure she doesn't either."

Only Flint snorted behind me.

"That sounds like rape," Rowan said with concern.

"On whose end?" April asked the windshield.

"Well, as long as you don't tell the Alphas," Nova said from the back. "It seems like a 'no harm, no foul' situation. Imagine if Hawke knew our reconnaissance party ended with two missing packmates and his son sleeping with a human. We're 0-2 at this point."

"No kidding," Flint said, scratching at his chin.

"We've got enough to worry about without an outsider trying to wedge her way in," Nova continued. She finally sat up to lean forward between Coal and Rowan, pushing her chestnut hair from her face. "No one here is a chaste little saint, right? Now that Clay's got it out of his system, he can add the notch to his bedpost and we can all move on."

I didn't answer her. She met my gaze in the rearview mirror, and in her hazel eyes I saw the only secret I'd ever managed to hide from the world. Nova wasn't challenging me per se, but the lift of her eyebrows carried a warning she didn't need to verbalize.

"Does Hawke have any new leads he's working with?" April asked from beside me.

"A few nights ago he found an old article from 1921 in some night town in Iowa," I recollected. "A place supposedly like this valley he's trying to locate."

"What did the article say?" Coal asked.

"It mentioned that the population suffered a hit due to suspicious circumstances. At the time, the widespread blame was placed on that Hunter myth, so no convictions were ever made, let alone any suspects identified."

"The Hunters," April echoed, her eyebrows dipping. "Suppose they're the ones picking us off. Myths have more truth to them than history, sometimes."

"No such thing as Hunters," Coal whispered. "Right?"

"At least for now, this place feels safe," Nova said.

"Safe and boring," Flint muttered under his breath.