But…Chance’s eyes followed Kate’s slow progress around the front of the truck like he wanted to tuck her under his arm and keep her safe.
Maybe she’d misjudged packs. Maybe they legitimately cared for one another, instead of seeing females as vessels for their spawn.
“Kate, Dalton, this is Emily.” A crooked smile took Chance’s face. “She’s going to buy us our first round.”
Kate held out her hand for a shake. “I’ll be a cheap buy,” she teased easily. “Water for me.”
Emily grasped her palm and smiled politely. “They can probably do orange juice.”
“Oh, yeah, I want that.”
Dalton shook her hand and canted his head in that same animalistic way Chance had done when he’d first met her. “Nice to meet you,” he said in a careful tone.
“Come on, it’s cold as balls out here,” Chance grumbled, hand on Emily’s lower back as he guided her toward the front door.
“Balls aren’t cold,” Emily and Dalton said at the same time.
She pursed her lips to stop the unexpected laugh in her throat, but Kate let off a single, “Ha!” that echoed down the empty street.
Chance aimed her toward the door, but when Dalton and Kate disappeared inside, he pulled her to a stop. “Why were you waiting out here? You’re shivering.”
“Oh.” She frowned, trying to come up with a good reason. There wasn’t an answer other than she was hoping to see him sooner than the few seconds it would take him to come inside. Which was a stupid and dangerous thought. “It didn’t feel that cold to me.”
Chance watched her lips as she spoke, and a tiny frown took his blond brows. “Do you know how to tell the truth?” he asked so softly she almost missed it.
Shit, she wasn’t being smooth about this. If she’d had any question about what he was before now, his admission he could sense a lie told her exactly what he was. The truth. Okay. “I wanted to spend more time with you.”
His eyes skittered up to hers. “You’re a dangerous woman, aren’t you Emily Chastain?”
“No.”
“Lie.” Without another word, he gripped her hand and pulled her into Smiley’s behind him.
She was too stunned to say anything, and anyway, her teeth were chattering now from a combination of nerves and cold. Chance sucked her confidence out with every word he spoke to her. Not because he was trying to put her beneath him, but because he was calling her on her bullshit, and now she didn’t know where she stood with him. And with horror, she realized that she didn’t like tricking him like this.
She stared in shock at where their hands were connected as he weaved them through the standing patrons of the bar, gripping her hand firmly but gently. He was so warm. Much warmer than she’d imagined his soulless body to be.
He wore a baby blue sweater that made his eyes look bright, and the thin material clung to the thick muscles of his shoulders. He murmured something to one of the men on a barstool, then as the man nodded politely and offered her his seat, Chance gestured for her to sit down.
The bar was loud with the music and talking all around them, so Chance leaned down against her ear and said, “Sometimes it takes a while to get a drink on Friday nights. Didn’t want you standing after waiting on me so long.”
“Oh. That’s really thoughtful, thank you.”
The man behind jostled her, but Chance stilled him with a deadly glance, and the guy one seat over slid to the opposite half of his chair.
She was shivering in earnest now in her battle to keep her wits. It was obvious she wasn’t as strong as she’d fancied herself in training. A few minutes with a werewolf, and she was questioning everything she’d known to be true.
Chance eyed her with a hard look, then sighed and rubbed his giant hands up and down her outer arms, warming her with the friction. “I’ll take your jacket to the coat rack when we get you warmed up, okay?”
“O-okay.” Why was she shaking so danged badly? This was how she felt when she’d shot her first deer years ago. It was an adrenaline dump that usually came after making a good shot. Why did she feel like she’d just killed Chance? The thought hurt in ways she didn’t understand and didn’t want to. Leaning forward, she hugged his waist and rested her cheek against his hard torso. He allowed it and even wrapped his arms around her shoulders, rubbing her back to warm her. Over her shoulder, he ordered a few shots and an orange juice.
“Shots?” she asked.
“Hell yeah, woman. Whiskey will fix what ails you.” His smile was downright predatory, and his eyes hard as ice, and for a moment, she thought he knew. Knew about her treachery and wanted to get her drunk so she would spill her secrets, but that was impossible. She’d been careful.
Slowly, she detached from his body and paid the bartender, then with two shots tipping dangerously in her trembling grasp, she followed him through the crowd to a table where Dalton and Kate were sitting. Kate was on Dalton’s lap, and he was whispering something into her ear, but it was the look on Kate’s face that stopped Emily in her tracks. Whatever he was saying to her, she adored it. Adored him.
“What’s wrong?” Chance asked.
What was wrong? She was wavering, and everything she knew didn’t make sense anymore. Not here where she could see these monsters in person. Kate was human, and Emily had deemed her a traitor before she’d even traveled to Galena. But as Dalton rubbed the swell of her belly affectionately and kissed Kate gently, none of what Uncle Victor and Dad said felt true anymore. Dalton hadn’t just procreated. He was building a family.
She felt sick. “I can’t do this.”
“Do what?” Chance asked in a dead voice.
“It’s not how I thought it would be.” She was panting now, panicking. She couldn’t breathe, couldn’t move. All of the oxygen had been sucked out of the room, and now Chance was doing something to make the air around him feel impossibly heavy.
Turning, he put one of the shots and the orange juice in front of Dalton and Kate, then rounded on her. His eyes held quiet reserve with an edge of danger as he took a menacing step toward her.
“Well then, take the shot, and we’ll both go to hell together.”
He knew. Fuck. He knew.
Chance took the tiny glass from her fingertips and tilted his head back, exposing his muscular neck as he tossed back the amber liquid. And with fire in his eyes, he set the empty glass on a passing waitress’s tray, gestured for two more, and then cupped Emily’s neck. With one last angry glare, he leaned forward and pressed his lips to hers.
She was shocked to stillness at how warm and soft his lips were. And with a gasp, she closed her eyes and opened slightly for him. He stepped closer, pulling her waist to him as he trickled whiskey into her mouth. Holy hell, this was sexy. She sipped it until his tongue chased hers into her mouth and brushed against hers once, twice. He pulled away suddenly and took the other shot from her hand, then downed it and walked away to the jukebox, leaving her to stumble forward a step. He’d left her legs numb. And as the warmth of the shot trickled down her throat, she tried desperately to remember if any kiss had ever felt like that before.
None had measured up. Not a single one.
Maybe this was part of it. Maybe shifters were master manipulators. Masters of seduction who excelled at getting women to fall at their feet so they could procreate. She clung to that fleeting thought, but it didn’t stay long. Even when Chance wasn’t around, she warmed at the thought of him in ways she hadn’t for anyone else. He knew he was being hunted, knew it in his marrow, but he was still here against his instincts. The anger in his eyes said he knew he was being tricked, but he’d still kissed her.
She wanted to retch. Wanted to leave this place and never come back. She couldn’t keep going like this and keep herself intact. She was losing herself inch by inch to the monster leaning over the jukebox right now.
She was letting everyone down. Letting Dad down and Uncle Victor. She was letting herself down. And worst of all, she was letting Chance down.
Worst of all? She couldn’t do this.
She bolted for the exit, but a strong hand wrapped around her upper arm and pulled her around. He’d made it all the way across the room too fast. He wasn’t being careful. Chance’s smile was slow and feral, stretching the sharp angles of his jaw and making him look like an avenging angel. He pulled a couple of shot glasses off a tray a waitress offered and told her to, “Put these on my tab.” Then he handed Emily another shot and lifted his in a silent cheers.
She hesitated, scared if she lost her mind too much to the liquor, she would expose herself completely.
“Little bunny, hiding in your hole. Don’t worry, I won’t let anything get you,” Chance said low.
She wasn’t the hunter. He was.
Tears burned her eyes, and she blinked hard, trying desperately to regain her composure. He was staring, waiting for her to fall apart, so she tossed the shot back and pressed her hand against her mouth to contain the tiny sob that wrenched its way up her throat. Chance took the empty glass from her and set it on a table, then pulled her close and danced to the slow country crooner on the jukebox in the middle of four other couples on the make-shift dance floor.
“When I was a kid, I was scared of everything,” he murmured against her ear. “It’s the way I was raised. I was different, and different scares people. Fear makes people do horrible things. Do you know what the best thing you can possibly do for yourself is?”
“Are you threatening me?” she asked breathlessly.
“No, little bunny. If I was threatening you, you would know.”
“Then tell me. What can I do for myself?”
“You can open up your mind to the possibility that not all people are the same, and it doesn’t make them better or worse. It just makes them different. Do you want to know the worst thing you can do for yourself?”
The whiskey was hitting her hard, and she closed her eyes against the dizziness as they rocked back and forth, back and forth. “What?”
“Listening to someone whose mind is completely closed. Listening to someone who feeds on hate. Be better. Make decisions based on your own experiences.”
“You don’t understand.”
Chance rested his cheek against hers and inhaled deeply. “Emily, this is me giving you a chance to get to know me and make your own decisions based on the type of man you think me to be.”
“Man,” she gritted out.
“Yes,” he snarled, more growl than word as he eased back and leveled her with a harsh glare. “Because despite what you think, that’s what I am. I’m good. I care. I feel. I’m pissed at what you are doing, but every tear you’re letting slip down your face right now is gutting me. I’ve caused them for some reason I don’t understand, and I fucking hate it. I don’t know why you’re hunting me, or why you were in my den, but this is me giving you the chance to make an educated decision about me before you go down a path you can’t come back from. Do you understand what I’m saying to you?”
“I should go,” she choked out angrily.
Chance reared back like he’d been slapped and let his hands drop from her waist. His eyes sparked with fury. “Fine. Maybe you should.”
She backed off the dance floor, afraid to give him her back. Uncle Victor had warned her about exposing a weak side to a predator, but as she put distance between her and Chance, the expression on his face morphed from anger to disappointment.
He left the floor and headed back to the table where Dalton and Kate sat, and just as Emily turned to leave, to call Uncle Victor and tell him she couldn’t do what he’d bid her to, she saw it.
Dalton laughed at something Kate said, tossing his head back as he did. And in the light of the swinging fixture that hovered over their table, something shiny glinted around his neck.
Dalton had a hanging scar.
It was healed, but red and angry looking. The rope had to have dug deeply into his throat to cause scarring like that on a shifter.
Dad had done it. He’d reached the pack and tried to end them with tradition—hanging the males and burning the females and pups in their houses. Suddenly, Emily felt sick. Talking about it with Uncle Victor and Dad was one thing, but seeing the gruesome aftermath was something different altogether.
It was a tradition as old as time, Hell Hunters hanging the soulless. But she wasn’t convinced werewolves were soulless anymore. What if they were people just trying to survive, and Dad had gone after them in the night just to hurt them? To kill them. To destroy their family.
“Oh, my God,” she murmured as she swung her horrified gaze to Chance who sat beside Dalton now, staring sadly back at her.
He wasn’t the monster.
She was.
Chapter Five
Emily stumbled from Smiley’s and into the street, heaving frozen breath like a freight train in front of her. Her entire life, she’d been lied to. She’d been turned into a weapon by the two men who were supposed to take care of her.
Dad and Uncle Victor had convinced her she needed to stay friendless and lonely because that made her strong. They’d manipulated her into living a half-life so they could weaken her enough to use her against the shifters when they felt like pulling a trigger. She was the damned bullet!
An entire life of being told she was privileged and righteous because she was human. All of the horrifying bedtime stories about cold werewolves with no heartbeats and no feelings, but she’d seen Chance’s face in there. He felt everything. He was warm. He had a heartbeat. For fuck’s sake, he knew she was betraying him and still he’d warmed her at the bar and bartered a seat for her so she could be comfortable.
Chance was right. The worst thing she could do was listen to men whose hearts were full of hate, and what had she done? Listened to them her whole damned life! She wanted to claw at her skin and drain the Vega blood out of her, cell by cell. Disgusted with her entire life, she pulled her cell phone from her back pocket and dialed Uncle Victor. He’d already called ten times since she’d been in the bar.
“You’re late reporting in,” he said in his scratchy, sickly voice. He was on his deathbed, and that used to make her sad, but not anymore. Karma was a cold bitch, and Uncle Victor had pissed her off repeatedly.
“I’m not doing it.”
“Niece,” he drawled out in a pitying voice.
“Don’t you fucking call me that. You’re no family of mine. Not anymore. You said they hunted Dad in the night and killed him while he slept. You lied!”
“Emily, no one knows what really happened—”
“Dalton Dawson has a hanging scar, Victor. Dad did that. You lied to me. You both did. They aren’t monsters like you said.”
“Emily, you’re emotional, and it’s understandable. It’s a jolt meeting them for the first time. They’re conniving, and they have instincts on how to turn you. You have to be stronger than that.”
“Stronger? I let you and Dad turn me into”—she looked down at herself in disgust—“this thing I can’t respect anymore. Fuck your mission to hurt people. Fuck Dad’s mission. If he died at their hands, he asked for it.”
“Emily!”
She ended the call and dropped the phone in the mud, desperate not to touch it an instant more.
“Who are you?” Chance asked.
With a gasp, she rounded on him. Her teeth chattered with how much she loathed herself right now. He was leaning on the side of his cousin’s truck, head cocked, green eyes lightened, arm muscles straining against his sweater. He could kill her in an instant.
Maybe she deserved it.
“I’m Emily Vega, daughter of Emanuel Vega, and the last of the Hell Hunters.”
“Fuck,” Chance said, backing up a few steps as if she was a snake poised to strike.
He looked behind him at the bar, then back. “You can’t hurt my family. Please. Dalton’s lost a baby before, lost a mate, and he is finally happy with Kate. He’s going to be a dad. Please, just let us be.” His blazing eyes were stripped bare and so raw she couldn’t ho
ld his gaze.
“Did you mean what you said? Does the offer still stand to show me who you are?”
“Why would you want to? Don’t you know already?”
Gritting her teeth, she dared a glance at him, then back to his shoes, an inch deep in mud. “I was told you’re different than you turned out to be, and by people I trusted.”
“Your dad?”
She dipped her chin once, feeling like her insides were ripping apart. “And now I don’t know anything. Can’t trust anything. Did you kill him?”
“Vega?”
She had to know. Had to. “Yes.”
“No. Dalton did. It was his right.”
“His right?” she asked in a small voice. “Vega was my dad.”
“Your dad hunted us, hung Dalton, and tried to burn Kate alive.”
“You aren’t man-eaters?”
Chance shook his head slowly. “No.”
So many lies. So many. Emily’s face crumpled as her vision blurred, and her eyes leaked for all the treachery that she’d allowed to touch her in the name of family. “I’m so sorry for what my dad has done.”
Biting her lip hard, she turned and made her way toward her ATV, but when she looked up, Chance was there, leaning against the seat with his arms crossed like he’d been there all night. She startled to a stop at how terrifyingly fast he was.
“The offer still stands.”
“But I’m…I’m…” Evil.
“You’re a work in progress, Em.”
She liked that nickname. Em. It sounded nice in his deep timbre.
“Will you come here?” he asked, making it her choice.
She squished through the mud, her hiking boots sinking deeper with every step. When she reached him, he pulled her between his legs and against his chest. “Come inside. I’m going to buy you another drink, we’re going to dance, and you’re going to make friends with me and my pack. It’s the best way for you to see we’re like regular people, just with a bonus but complicated side that we fight to keep hidden. Then, and only then, are you allowed to judge us.”