Page 14 of Alokar (The Alliance Rescue #2)

Hannah

Shit!

Ewok was a Bigfoot.

Fuck!

No, not a Bigfoot—a Kerzak—an alien. Honestly, I couldn’t decide which idea felt harder to grasp.

But I sat there, transfixed by the firelight dancing across the short fur that covered his powerful frame, fur that emerged from beneath the ordinary jeans and flannel shirt that now seemed almost comically inadequate to cover his massive form.

He’d been devastatingly handsome as a human man, all sharp jawline and warm honey eyes. But even in his true form, stripped of pretense, he still possessed an undeniable magnetism that left me breathless.

He seemed taller than before and broader, as if the disguise had weighed him down.

His hair cascaded from his crown in thick, lustrous waves.

The color was a striking blend of chocolate brown and silver, with deeper tones dominating where the fur grew shorter around his broad shoulders and powerful chest, while lighter silver streaks threaded through like moonbeams.

What truly set him apart from the crude depictions found in grainy photographs and sensationalized documentaries were his remarkably humanoid features.

His face, while undeniably alien, possessed a refined quality that suggested both wisdom and gentleness.

High cheekbones created elegant shadows beneath eyes that were unchanged, deep, honey brown—intelligent and expressive.

His brow ridge, though pronounced, wasn’t brutish but rather gave him a distinguished, contemplative appearance.

His nose was broad but well-proportioned to his face, with a jawline that was strong and defined, covered in the same chocolate-silver hair that adorned the rest of him, though it grew shorter and more refined around his mouth, almost beard-like.

His teeth were surprisingly white and well-formed, with canines that were more like those of a predator than a human.

The same chocolate-silver hair that covered his body grew sparsely on his hands, revealing tan skin, and sharp black claws adorned each fingertip.

His strikingly handsome features, even in this form, challenged every preconception I held about what he should look like—be it Bigfoot or extraterrestrial.

The angular planes of his face remained achingly familiar beneath the soft fur, and maybe that’s why, deep down—though I really didn’t want to admit it—my soul recognized the person underneath.

No matter how dramatically different his appearance was, his essence was unmistakably Ewok. My friend.

Now that the initial shock began to ebb, leaving my heart rate slowly returning to normal, I found that while I was pissed as hell that he’d deceived me, fear didn’t affect me, even slightly.

The weight of the rifle across my thighs suddenly felt heavy with shame, a cold reminder of my earlier panic.

With careful movements designed not to draw attention, I shifted the weapon off my lap and propped it against the log beside me, the metal making a soft scraping sound against the bark.

Ewok’s warm brown eyes—those same eyes that had done wonderfully gooey things to my insides—watched me carefully. As his gaze tracked my movements, I couldn’t help but think of all the documented sightings, all those terrified accounts of creatures like him watching silently from the forests.

The realization hit me like a slap, jarring something profoundly sorrowful from the depths of my heart.

“I just realized something,” I said, my voice catching slightly.

“All those years my dad spent hunting Bigfoot, it was just a waste. Bigfoot wasn’t some unknown cryptid, just an alien visiting Earth.

” The thought of my father’s unwavering belief in a creature that I now knew didn’t exist made my heart fracture a little more.

“Your father was not wrong.” Ewok’s eyes flashed with something sharp and fierce, as though the suggestion genuinely offended him.

“He knew the DNA wasn’t from any known Earth species.

He recognized that whatever was moving through these mountains was something unknown, and he dedicated his life to finding answers.

His efforts were nothing short of noble. ”

Ewok’s words carried such heartfelt sincerity, delivered with the same utter sweetness that had drawn me to him from the beginning.

Part of me desperately wanted to admit that he was still the same gentle, caring Ewok I’d come to know, underneath that furry exterior.

If I closed my eyes and listened only to the cadence of his voice, he was still the man I’d been growing feelings for.

The man who made my pulse quicken with just a glance.

Jesus!

Would anybody believe that me—Hannah fucking Rainwater, Bigfoot hunter, had fallen for Bigfoot?

Probably not, especially since most people didn’t believe in Bigfoot—or aliens for that matter—in the first place.

But as much as I wanted to pretend things could remain unchanged, the truth was that everything had shifted. Our cozy little expedition through the wilderness, filled with my secret fantasies of romantic entanglements around crackling campfires, was over.

“What happens now?” I asked, steeling myself for his answer.

“What do you mean?” Ewok poked at the glowing embers with a charred stick, the action putting a small but noticeable distance between us.

I snorted, a harsh sound that made him cock one thick brow. “You don’t need to pretend that you’re helping me any longer. I know you can simply track this Yaard creature with your superman nose. Exactly how far away can you smell anyway?”

He shrugged those massive shoulders with casual indifference. “I believe in Earth measurements, around fifty miles.”

Holy shit! That was over double the distance attributed to a grizzly bear’s legendary nose. “Like I said, you don’t need me tagging along. You can just follow your nose straight to him.”

“I can’t.” His brown eyes reflected the dancing orange flames, and something vulnerable flickered in their depths. “Other than residual traces left on surfaces he’s touched, I haven’t caught even the faintest whiff of Yaard’s scent.”

“What does that mean exactly?” I tensed, my muscles coiling with sudden anxiety.

The tea had worked wonders to calm me, but I still felt emotionally raw and wary—not of Ewok, never of Ewok—but of the very real possibility that I might lose my chance to avenge my dad’s death. “Is he not in the mountains?”

“I believe he is here,” Ewok said with such unwavering conviction that I believed him completely. “The absence of his scent could mean he’s already dead, and his body is so deep underground that I cannot detect the decay. Or perhaps he’s discovered some method to mask his smell.”

“Do you think he might possess one of those disguise devices like you do?” I doubted my own theory even as the words left my lips.

I always found myself drawn to Ewok’s scent, which was an intoxicating blend of rich leather, smooth whiskey, and the comforting warmth of a well-tended fire.

Taking a deep breath, I was relieved to find it unchanged, that wonderfully masculine fragrance still wrapping around me like a familiar embrace.

“I believe so,” Ewok frowned deeply at the troubling implication. “But even our most advanced camouflage technology only alters visual appearance, never scent signatures.”

I glanced upward, craning my neck to take in the vast expanse above us.

The sky stretched endlessly overhead, a deep velvet canvas unmarred by clouds, with countless stars scattered across its surface like crushed diamonds carelessly flung by some cosmic hand.

The air had grown crisp, carrying the sharp bite of mountain altitude, but the night remained perfectly still—only the faintest whisper of breeze stirred through the pines.

“What do you smell right now?”

Ewok tilted his head back, the firelight catching the silver threads in his fur as he drew in a long, deliberate breath.

His broad chest expanded impressively, and I watched the way his nostrils flared slightly—a gesture I’d witnessed countless times before, but which now seemed infinitely more natural and purposeful in his true form.

“A pack of eight wolves stalking a deer approximately three miles away.” His clawed finger extended toward the southwest, pointing into the darkness beyond our flickering circle of light.

“That’s near Horseshoe Bend.” I knew that terrain.

The distinctive horseshoe-shaped curve in the rushing Nooksack River, fed by the glacial runoff from Mount Shuksan’s snow-capped peaks.

The area boasted class three rapids that drew kayakers who craved the challenge of navigating its churning waters.

He nodded once, a gesture both familiar and somehow more regal in this form, then drew in another deep, measured breath. His eyes drifted closed momentarily, as if he were reading an invisible map written in scent alone.

“A large herd of elk,” he said, opening those warm honey-brown eyes and pointing with unwavering precision toward the north.

“That’s Yellow Aster Butte.” Another landmark I could navigate to blindfolded.

“The elk like to feast on the flowers.” It was one of the region’s most favored hiking destinations, famous for its spectacular carpet of wildflowers that painted the meadows in brilliant hues during spring and summer, then transformed into a breathtaking array of fiery orange, deep crimson, and golden yellow when autumn claimed the mountains.

Another confirming nod. Another careful, analytical inhale that made his powerful chest rise and fall.

“The mother grizzly and her cubs that we encountered the other day are currently following the ridgeline of that distant peak. There’s another grizzly close to them—injured, I suspect—there is a note of decay in its scent.

” His clawed finger traced an invisible line toward the northwest, where a jagged, snow-capped summit emerged from the darkness against the star-studded sky.