I’m moving before I can think. Whoever this fucker is, he’s making Lisette upset. She may not be mine, but while she’s here, she’s under my protection.
I stride across the sidewalk, forcing people to scramble out of my way.
“Damnit, Beast! Watch where you’re going,” a man grumbles.
My gut clenches at the nickname. Has she heard it? Has she heard the whispers about me? Doesn’t matter. I throw open the café door and stomp in, ready to drag the man away from her.
He looks up as I approach, and recognition lights his eyes.
“Dorian?”
Lisette’s whispered word stops me in my tracks. Hearing my name from her lips floods me with something I can’t describe. Like warmth, relief, and alarm rolled together. It sets me off balance.
The honey-brown eyes I remember so clearly are wide with surprise. Her lips part, and she stands so fast her chair topples.
“Oh my god. Dorian!”
And then she slams against my chest, fitting perfectly in my arms.
The scent of cherries fills my lungs as her head presses against my shoulder, tinged with the cinnamon she just ate. Not scents I would have put together, but on Lisette, I want to taste them.
It’s madness. I don’t kiss women I just met.
But Lisette isn’t a new acquaintance or a pretty woman at a bar. She used to be mine.
Holding her small frame against my chest, I wish to hell she still was.
“I can’t believe you’re here,” she says, burying her hands in the back of my jacket like she’s afraid I’ll disappear. “I can’t believe how big you are.”
“I grew up.” My voice is like gravel from disuse. For Lisette, I make the effort. “One of us had to. You’re the same size.”
She gasps and leans back, then smacks my arm. “I am not. I was eight years old and like three feet tall. I grew at least two feet.”
She tries to glare at me but it’s hard when she has to crane her neck. At 6’5”, I have well over a foot of height and probably a hundred pounds on her. Her head barely reaches my shoulder.
She’s perfect.
Unlike me.
Lisette’s gaze travels over my face, lingering on the scar lining my left cheek.
Someone mutters, “Beast” from a few tables over.
And suddenly every eye in the room is on her.
CHAPTER TWO
LISETTE
I’m halfway through my cinnamon roll when the hot blond guy showing the piece of paper around stops at the table beside mine.
I’m not staring. Definitely not glued to his movements like everyone else. I’m drinking my coffee.
A man in his fifties wearing one of those old cowboy shirts with the pearl snaps squints at the page. “Don’t know his name, but that’s Beast you’re looking for.”
“Thomas Johnson!” Mae hisses from behind the counter, wiping her hands on her apron.
“You gonna make the man ask the whole town? Everyone knows who he’s looking for. Some hospitality,” Thomas gripes back. He adjusts his faded Hollow Peak Feed Co. trucker hat, then flicks the paper. “That’s Beast. Lives somewhere up in the mountains.”
