I was hollow, hungry, aching for something. Only until this moment, I’d never realized it. The instant Gunnar’s lips touched mine, everything else washed away. There was just the two of us. This time. This kiss. This heat.

A wave rose up and carried me with it. I’d been struggling against the current for so long, now that I let go and let it take me everything clicked into place. A moment ago, I had been freezing. Now, Gunnar’s warmth spread through me. We fit.

Every cell in my body seemed to align and send a single message shooting to both my brain and my core. Him. This man. Gunnar. My need for him built with such force my knees buckled. Desire spooled through me, settling in my core. I was wet, throbbing, breathless.

Gunnar broke away first. His wolf eyes flashed bright silver. His lips parted and the tips of his fangs grew. It was startling, dangerous, and dead sexy.

“Jett,” he gasped. He seemed as dazed as I was at the hunger rising between us.

No. I can’t have this. He’s a shifter. He’s dangerous. If the Pack...no...when the Pack finally caught up to him, they would turn him into the thing I’d been running from for more than three years.

“Jett,” he said again, reaching for me. Shock made his eyes widen, going from silver back to blue. Whatever happened inside of me, he was having an even harder time processing it. I wanted to reach for him. My eyes snapped to the bulge in his jeans. I ached for him. My sex throbbed, wanting so badly to be filled.

I shook my head then brought my hands up, smashing them against my temples as if I could drive the desire out of me. I knew I couldn’t. On a preternatural level, I knew I never could again.

“I can’t,” I said, panting. “Gunnar…”

He caught my arm, his eyes still wide and desperate. “I wouldn’t hurt you. Do you understand that? I’m not like them. Birch Haven...that’s not what I am. And I’m not alone. There are plenty of other shifters, Alphas like me who refuse to live that way.”

We stood frozen, connected to each other by our eyes and the searing heat of his fingers on my arm. My heart beat wildly then began to slow. He was doing something to me. For days, I’d pretended he wasn’t. But, somehow Gunnar’s heart beat with mine.

Slowly, he lifted his fingers from my arm and stepped back. We both needed space and air. Gunnar scanned the trees, his eyes darting left and right. He sucked in a great breath and tilted his head toward the north.

“Can you sense them?” I asked.

When he opened his eyes, I saw his wolf for a second, then he went calm. “Yes,” he answered simply. “They aren’t close, but they’re out there. They’re not going to stop until they find me.”

He tore a hand through his hair then trudged back up the embankment. He found the rotted log and sat on it. I went to him. I wasn’t ready to sit beside him or get close to him yet. My rocketing heart steadied. I felt more like myself. I needed to think straight.

“What are we?” The question just flew out of me. This was uncharted territory for me. I understood the Pack as well as any non-shifter could. They hunted. They took human women for forced mates. The Alpha controlled Pack members absolutely then tortured and killed any who tried to break free. Gunnar was completely different.

Gunnar lifted his head slowly and smiled. “That’s the million dollar question, Jett. I only know what I am. You’re new to me.”

His words came out uneven and halting, like he was holding something back. “I think we’re safe here for now. Tomorrow, we’re going to have to figure out what to do. I have people waiting for me. People I care about. They’re not going to understand about you.”

Gunnar raised a thick brow and scratched his chin. “I think that’s an understatement. I’ll do what I can to help you get back to them.”

I don’t know what made me do it. Hell, I didn’t know why I did anything where Gunnar was concerned now. When this started, it was about a promise to a friend. Now, it was something so much more. I sat beside him and pulled the faded photograph out of my pocket.

“Jasmine,” I said. “Did I tell you her name?”

“You did,” he said. He took the picture from me, careful not to let our fingers touch.

“There were twelve us who escaped from Birch Haven. One of the shifters helped us. He was maybe like you, I think. I mean...not an Alpha. He wasn’t big like you. But, he knew what was happening to the women there was wrong. Anyway, he got us out. His name was Bates. He’s dead because of it. He helped us on the outside for a while. Brought us food, told us where to hide to avoid the Pack. Then, about a year after we got away, he told us my friend Jade’s sister had been brought to Birch Haven.”

“God,” Gunnar sighed. “I’m so sorry. What happened to Bates?”

“He was good, but eventually, the Pack figured out he was helping us. They followed him. He was at our camp one night and sensed them coming. We had to...he begged us to…”

“You killed him,” Gunnar finished for me. “Just like I made you promise to do to me. He would have rather died than let the Pack control him anymore or find the rest of you.”

Now that I’d started talking, everything seemed to rush out of me. The cautious part of my heart beat out a warning. I knew so little about this man. What I did know should have been enough to make me shoot him just like he’d asked me to.

“Jade was the closest thing to a sister I ever had. She was my roommate when we first got to Birch Haven. She came from a worse background than I did. She and her little sister had been in foster care. It killed her to leave Jasmine but she thought Birch Haven would give her a chance to make something of herself so the two of them would have something, you know? It’s all she talked about.”

Gunnar reached for me. “What happened to you? I mean, before.”

I bit the inside of my cheek. My skin warmed where Gunnar touched me. I wanted so much more. I hadn’t thought about the “before” part of my life in so long, much less talked about it. “My father was a shifter. My mother was human. They were forced together. I didn’t realize that at the time. It was only after Birch Haven that I fully understood what the Pack really does. He wasn’t around much. I only have fleeting memories of him. My mother told me he died. She said he was killed in action. The army or something. I know now that was a lie. Hal Magrum was killed in service to the Pack. It was my mom’s idea to send me to Birch Haven. We had no money. I got a scholarship. She was...unhappy. She was a disappointment to my father and a failure to the Pack. When she had me there were complications. She couldn’t have any more kids. So…”

“So she wasn’t useful to them anymore. I’m so sorry that happened to you.”

“But you left,” I said. “How? Why?”

Gunnar dropped his head. He wouldn’t look at me at first. Whatever his answer, I knew instinctively he was ashamed of it. My heart fluttered with all the possibilities. What exactly had he done for the Pack before he broke away?

“I was young,” he said. “I got recruited at sixteen. I was to be a soldier for the Alpha. They sent me to a training camp along with three other guys from my neighborhood. They were good. I was better.”

Gunnar let go of me. He rose and walked toward a tall, gnarled oak tree. Placing his palm flat against it, he seemed to need the support to get the rest of his words out. I wanted desperately to go to him. My need for his touch burned through me. I stayed still.

“I was a star,” he said bitterly. “Faster. Stronger. No matter what it was. I could hunt anything. Fell anything. When the Pack officers tried to break me down, they couldn’t. I was going to make my own father proud. God, I didn’t even know him. Never met him. He was dead before I was born. My mother told me he was one of the Alpha’s top generals twenty years ago. Anson Cole.”

“What happened?” I asked.

Gunnar didn’t look at me. He stared straight ahead. “I was too good too fast. Made the others recruits look bad. One of them, Sean Sutter. He was one of the neighborhood friends I enlisted with. He started turning the others against me. They planted literature in my bunk. Seditious shit against the Alpha. Sabotaged me with the officers and made them think I was thinking of rebelling. So, one day, one of the generals came to question me. He was so strong. The pull he had was almost overwhelming. It scared me. After he interrogated me, I overheard him talking to the officers. He told them there was no hope for me that I was too rebellious. They were going to kill me. So, I escaped. And the further I got away from the Pack’s influence, the more I was able to clear my head and see them for what they really were. You could say Sutter and the others did me a favor.”

“That’s when you found the other resistance fighters?” It just popped out. I’d been so riveted by Gunnar’s story I didn’t think about my choice of words. He turned on me though, eyes flashing. He crossed the distance between us in two powerful strides and grabbed me by the wrists, pulling me to my feet.

“Am I an idiot?” he said. It didn’t seem like he was talking to me. “They’re good. God. They’re so good. I thought Maestro was the best there was. But this...you...you make me want to tell you things. You make me want to trust you. What I just told you, about Sean Sutter, I haven’t uttered his name, told anyone about him in all these years.”

My heartbeat quickened, feeling like it slammed against my ribcage. I couldn’t breathe. Gunnar’s grip was so tight. He terrified me at the same time he drew me in.

“I’m not working for the Pack,” I said. “That isn’t who I am. Everything I told you about myself is true.”

He loosened his grip and I snapped my arms away from him. Sweat trickled between my shoulderblades. I gathered my hair in one hand and turned my back to him, exposing the nape of my neck.

“See?” I said. “No mark.” Gunnar let out an almost imperceptible groan. The sensitive flesh at the base of my neck flared hot. No, I hadn’t been marked by a wolf, but in that instant, I desperately wanted to be. Dropping my hair, I whirled around to face him.

Gunnar’s wolf eyes flared. His lips quivered and I saw his fangs had dropped again. Oh, yes, I wanted him. It scared me to think how badly. He said he wasn’t with them. But, how could I know for sure? Is this what happened to Melanie? The wolf who marked her was stronger, sure, but she said herself she hadn’t put up a fight. She’d wanted to, but it was if her body wasn’t her own. He controlled it even before he marked her.

“So you don’t trust me, and I don’t trust you,” I said, moving further away from him. “And yet, here we both are. You’re stronger and faster than I could ever be, but that doesn’t mean I can’t defend myself.” I pulled my gun out of my pack and leveled it at him. Inside, I trembled, but somehow I kept my aim steady and straight at Gunnar’s heart.

“You can’t hurt me unless I allow it,” he said, but his tone was more defeatist than threatening. I kept my hands steady, my finger on the trigger. This was a military-issued Sig Sauer. There was no safety, nothing to cock. Just point and shoot.

Something changed about him. It was barely perceptible, but he swayed to the side. His silver wolf eyes slowly faded, turning back to their human, pale blue.

“I am not working for the Pack.”

“You left Lowell alive,” he said. “Is that what they told you to do?”

“Lowell. The guard? I could have killed you Gunnar. I didn’t.”

“Right. Better to keep me alive so I can slip up. Tell you things. Betray my friends.”

His color wasn’t good. He’d seemed so much better after he shifted. Now, whatever benefit he’d taken from that was wearing off. God, what had they done to him? I kept the gun steady. Maybe he would trust me sooner if I lowered it, but he was still a shifter. He had twenty times the strength and speed that I did. Probably more.

Gunnar’s eyes rolled in the back of his head and he swayed to the side. He dropped to his knees with the grace of a falling tree. His heartbeat slowed. I could feel it thumping inside of me, taking my breath away.

“Gunnar!” I shouted. Still, I kept the gun aimed at him. But, I took a cautious step toward him. The wind picked up again.

“Run,” he said, his voice a choked whisper. “Jett, run!”