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The car got darker. Probably more snow. But that rumbling was getting louder.
Closer.
More urgent.
The darkness around me shifted, turning brighter, like a sliver of sun had managed to melt through the snow. Maybe the heat of the car was doing some good after all. I imagined myself turning on the car and backing out of here, like nothing—
I definitely had not visualized anything scooping away the snow. What the hell was that?
It looked like a hand, but it was too big.
“Help!” That was some straight-up damsel in distress bullshit right there. The scoop was definitely a hand, and whoever it belonged to was aware that I needed some assistance.
Please be friendly.
And if they weren’t, I had a shovel and I wasn’t afraid to use it.
The next roar rocked the car, and whoever was on the other side grabbed the car handle, shaking the car back and forth like they didn’t know how to open a car door.
My instinct was to lock it. I wasn’t going down like some horror movie heroine, but chances were getting better by the moment that I was gonna die out here.
The creature ripped the door off the hinges, revealing a giant, furry body. It wasn’t human, or like any shifter that I’d ever seen before. Its giant hands reached into the car, and as I gripped the shovel, a scream turned to cement in my throat, the world went black.
Chapter Two
Lars
Hannah should have never been this deep in the mountains. Especially not on a day like today. But thank the moon I sensed her, because it would’ve been months before anyone found her body.
Humans. They had no regard for their own mortality, and a tendency to be reckless in a way that impacted the rest of us.
It wasn’t like me to intervene between a human and their own fate.
But this was no ordinary human, and this wasn’t meant to be her fate.
Because her fate was inexplicably intertwined with mine.
I’d known it the moment I’d seen her inThe Mating Gameproduction office, with her strange hair, her decorated skin, and that glow.
The glow was alluring. It spoke directly to my soul in a way that nothing had since…
No, I couldn’t think about that now. All I could do was dig.
Her heartbeat grew louder. Frantic. I’d thought I’d gone mad when I sensed her so close to my cabin. It wasn’t unusual for humans to come this deep into the mountains, but it was typically cross-country skiers, hikers, and unsavory characters up to no good.
At first, I wasn’t sure if there was anything under this giant pile of snow after the avalanche. But I’d heard a scream.Herscream. And I felt her near. This couldn’t be all in my head. Just because I’d been spending too much time with shifters who spent more time as human than beast, didn’t mean I couldn’t trust my senses.
That heartbeat grew louder, more frantic. Fumes from the car burned my nostrils.
Hannah was screaming, babbling, but the snowy mountain silence swallowed the meaning of her words. I had to work faster. Move the snow before more fell on us. We could both get trapped under here if I wasn’t careful. The door was stuck, and I didn’t want to ruin her vehicle, but this thing probably wasn’t getting out of here for weeks. It was a goner no matter what.
She screamed as I ripped the door off the hinges. Her blue eyes grew wide, those pink lips parted in an O. Frozen like the snow, she had no idea who I was like this.
Mate.
“Hannah. It’s me, Lars.” My voice didn’t sound human. Unlike other shifters, I could speak in my natural form, but Hannah wouldn’t know me like this, or maybe at all. We’d only met once atThe Mating Gameheadquarters. She didn’t know about all the times I’d watched over her from my home deep in the mountains, making sure none of the sleazy shifters who liked to fuck with the show got anywhere near her. Hannah was used to being around shifters, but none like me. Humans had given us many names—
Bigfoot.
