“Okay,” I said, pacing back and forth in the living room, “okay, okay, okay.” I repeated the words like a weird mantra, hoping against hope that maybe somehow, somewhere, those words would work like a magical charm that would just fix everything. Uncle Zeke would be out of jail, the mafia wouldn’t be after me, and the man I cared for most in the world wouldn’t be some kind of undying freak of nature.

“Rebecca!” Matthew called again from outside. “Please let me in. It’s fucking freezing out here!”

I looked back at the door as I chewed the inside of my cheek. I couldn’t believe this was actually happening. There was no way this was real. No fucking way.

I was a reasonable person, wasn’t I? I was sane. Wasn’t I? I hadn’t somehow slipped into a mental fugue state, had I? And this was all just some crazy dream or hallucination?

I shook my head. “No, Rebecca, this is real. This is really, really real.” I collapsed onto the couch, dropped the pistol, now with one less bullet, on the coffee table. I needed to think.

Outside, I heard Matthew groan loudly, the patio shifting as he settled down to sit with his back against the front door.

The wolf I’d heard earlier, the howl that had called to me. This was the second time a wolf had appeared near me, the second time one had come around me while I was sleeping. The first time, Gladys had run it off, that I remembered. This time, when I’d been the one to investigate, all I found was a naked firefighter-slash-private-security guy. Which meant—what?

I blinked slowly as I stared at the front door. “No,” I whispered. “No fucking way.” Equally slowly, I turned my eyes back to the TV in the entertainment center in front of me. I watched my eyes blink in the black mirror of the screen. “Can’t be.”

“It can be!” Matthew called. “I promise!”

What? I leapt to my feet. How’d he hear me? Did he have telepathic powers, or was the cabin just wired to pick up sound? This guy was a security professional after all.

“How can you hear what I’m saying?” I finally asked, my voice at normal volume.

“Because I have great hearing!”

I didn’t speak for a long time. “What are you?” I asked finally. “And tell me the truth.”

“I’m a shifter, Rebecca.”

“And what the hell is that?” I asked, still standing in front of the couch.

“I can turn into a wolf. I can also only be hurt by silver.”

“But I hurt you with a bullet.”

“Technically,” he called. “But I got better!”

I giggled a little despite the situation.

“Knew I could still make you laugh!”

I didn’t reply, just shook my head in dismay.

“Look,” he said. “If you come open the door and let me put some clothes on, I’ll explain everything, okay? I should have told you earlier tonight about what I really am, but I guess I chickened out. I just didn’t want you to dealing with this, what with the meeting tomorrow. And the stuff with the note in your bedroom happened, and getting you out of town to somewhere safe became way more important than me opening up this whole can of worms.”

“And you’re safe?” I asked. “I mean, you’re harmless, right? Like, it’s not a full moon or anything, and you’re not going to tear me apart like in the movies?”

He laughed. “No, I’m not going to tear you apart or anything. I can control myself just fine, I promise.”

I sighed as I went over to the door. My fingers lingered on the deadbolt as I took a deep breath. “And you’re not pissed?”

“Pissed?” he asked with a snort. “I’m fucking freezing my ass off out here, Rebecca, and I’m covered in blood. I just want to take a hot shower and put some clothes on, okay? That’s all.”

I took a deep breath and then flicked the lock open. He clamored to his feet, fit as a fiddle and now actually wearing his underwear, as I pulled open the front door for him and stepped aside.

“Thank you,” he said as he came in. “I promise as soon as I take a shower and wash this blood off, I’ll explain everything.”

As he walked by, shifter or werewolf or whatever, I couldn’t tear my eyes from his brief-clad body. He really did have a great ass, even if a tail might sprout out of it every now and then.

He stopped at the opening to the hallway and shot me a look. “Take a picture,” he said, completely deadpan, “it’ll last longer.”

I rolled my eyes as I shut the door. “Take your goddamn shower, Matthew. After that, you’re going to explain everything.”

I’d heard military guys could take showers fast, but I’d always thought that was an exaggeration. Turned out I was wrong. Of course, I’d always believed that the supernatural didn’t really exist. So guess I was oh for two, there.

Now, as we sat across from each other at the small kitchen table between the conjoined living room and kitchen, both our hands around fresh cups of hot coffee, I eyed Matthew carefully. Nothing about him looked inhuman. Nothing about him looked like a monster. Hell, I couldn’t even tell that he’d been shot less than an hour before. Everything about him just seemed like the all American boy next door. Served his country, fought fires on the weekends, protected damsels in distress.

I mean, what was there to not like about this guy?

“Okay,” I said after a long moment. “Talk.”

And he did.

He told me about shifters. About how he’d been adopted, and hadn’t known what he was until he was a teenager and he’d first shifted in his bedroom. How painful it had been. About how he’d thought he was a freak, an undesirable. He told me about the children he’d saved in the house fire he’d happened to be near, that he’d transformed to get in and out, and how Peter Frost and Richard Murdoch had found him later by sniffing him out. Literally.

About how the other guys at the security agency were shifters as well. All of them.

“I never had a pack, not like the guys here. We’re practically family, like I was saying.”

“It’s one of those things you wanted to tell me, wasn’t it?” I asked. “You were worried about telling me then, weren’t you?”

“Of course I was. I’ve been hiding this my whole life, like some kind of stain. Growing up, I’d always known I was different from my family. And then, when puberty was the only thing affecting all the other guys, I had this thing happen to me. Right then, I really knew just how different I was, just how much I didn’t belong in my family.”

I reached across the table and touched his hand as I winced. “I’m so sorry I shot you, by the way.”

He chuckled and gave me a warm smile. Those dark, smoldering eyes of his glanced up at mine. “It’s okay. I can genuinely say that was a first for me. All this has been.”

“A first?”

“I’ve never told anyone I ever cared about. About this, I mean. I just didn’t think they’d ever understand, you know? It’s not like, hey, I’ve got a weird mole on my back, or a third nipple. This is serious.”

I laughed. “Wait. You don’t have a third nipple, do you?”

He grinned. “Did you not notice it earlier?”

I squeezed his hand before pulling mine back and placing it back around my coffee cup. “One thing I was wondering,” I said. “Last night. That was you, wasn’t it?”

He blushed a little and looked away. “Yeah,” he croaked out. “Yeah, that was me. I just—I caught your scent when I’d shifted back at my house, and I didn’t quite realize it was yours till I got there. But I followed it all the way back to your place and kind of sat there for a minute. Till, of course, that crazy old lady came out.”

“Oh, Gladys isn’t crazy,” I said with a wave of my hand. “She’s just protective. Her and Zeke go way back, and she just keeps an eye on me.”

“Well, whatever she is, I’m just thankful she’s got bad aim. Buck shot probably hurts like hell, even as a wolf.”

I grabbed his hand again as we both laughed, and he squeezed right back.

We stayed like that for hours, both talking and laughing.

By the time the sun came up, I’d never felt closer to another man. Ever.

Which only made his betrayal worse.