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He got her into the truck, safely nestled in the passenger seat.
If anything happened beyond his control, he’d bail. He’d keep her safe above anything. January hadn’t run. He owed it to her to do the same.
He reached over and touched her. She was trembling. She didn’t lean away from him, though. She didn’t bolt. She just sat there, dazed and shaking. She was terrified. He got it. He’d scared the heck out of himself. He was a more mature shifter. His bear didn’t pull stunts like that. He didn’t just come out like that. He’d never had anything like that happen before. He’d lived in the city for a year. He’d felt a bit wary about going to dinner tonight, but only because he hadn’t been here in a while. He was excited, and he was wary about that too. He didn’t want to get hopeful. He had no idea what he was doing, and now this.
His bear thought he was in danger, and he wanted to protect him.
Or had he wanted to protect January?
“I one hundred percent didn’t want you to find out like that.” That was a vast and epic understatement.
A weird warmth washed over him. It wasn’t a comfortable feeling. More like sitting in a sauna for too long and not being able to breathe feeling, but at the same time enjoying the warmth and the way the sweating purified the body.
Out of nowhere, she burst out forcefully, “How the flying fuck are you a bear?” She shook her head right as he was trying to find the words to explain. How had Sam and Trace done this? Had they just gone for it? Thaddius was lucky with his mate. Glendy already knew about shifters. Her ex-husband was a member of the new clan that had bought his clan’s extra land and now lived there. The clan they were all trying to skirt around and get along with at the same time.
“I—”
“Because if that didn’t happen, my family’s right. I’m going into some kind of crisis and I’m not okay.”
“January.” He took a chance and grazed her arm with his fingers. She shivered, but didn’t slap him away or scuttle back. He set his hand on the middle console, but he had her attention. The fear blazing in her eyes unnerved him. He’d do anything to make it go away. “I really am a bear. And a man. It’s complicated.”
“You’re right it’s fucking complicated. Holy fucking fuck, and I hate that word, but fuck! You can’t just change into a bear. That’s like… that’s like—”
“Shifters. We’re called shifters.”
Her nostrils flared and she snorted. And then she laughed. “This is crazy. That’s not real.”
“I’m real. I’m a bear and a man. There are wolves, too, but we try not to have contact with them. They’re kind of unpleasant, at least historically. We like to fly under the radar and go undetected. They do too, but they hide right in plain sight. We like to hide as far from sight as possible. In Greenacre.”
“What? All of you? The whole town?”
“Not the whole town.” Shit. Here was he giving up secrets when he didn’t even know if he could trust January with them. This was exactly what everyone in Greenacre who was against opening up was afraid of. She could out them. Set them up. Expose them somehow. She’d need video evidence, but what if she snuck back into the village and got it somehow? He couldn’t guard against everything, and all those cameras, would they be enough? But deep down he knew she’d never do that, never, ever hurt anyone. “Just most of the town.”
“You mean at the clinic?”
“Not Josephine. She’s Trace’s mate, but she’s fully human.”
“But Trace and Kier?”
“Yeah.”
“You seem so… not normal. You’re too big to be normal. Oh my god, that’s why you look the way you do. So big. So burly. So jacked.” She dropped her eyes, suddenly awkward.
Of all things, she was embarrassed about noticing their physical size? Tavish saw the flush on her cheeks, and again there was a rush of something inside him and that weird warmth. He tried to shake it off. “That’s certainly part of it.”
“That’s why it was strange when Josephine was talking about how you do outdoorsy stuff to get so in shape.”
“Was it strange?”
“I got some vibes.”
“Oh. I see.”
“I don’t see. I don’t see how this can be possible.”
“If you want, we can talk in a bit. I could drive around for a while. It might give the shock a chance to wear off.”
“No, that would just give me time to formulate a thousand questions and overwhelm you.”
