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The expression on her face was hard to read in the flickering light of the bonfire.

“You’re here hunting a feral and protecting me,” she said. “When that’s handled, you’ll move on? Just hop on your bike and hit the road without a backward glance?”

I swallowed hard, my throat suddenly dry. “I don’t know, Cameron. It’s what I’ve always done.” Was she saying she wanted me to stick around? “Would it upset you if I did leave?”

Rather than answer, Cameron trailed a finger along my forearm, tracking the hash mark tattoos I had there. “What do these mean? Do they have some sort of significance? I’ve wondered since I first saw them.”

I’d never told anyone what they meant. The tattoos were part of my journey that no one else needed to know about. But Cameron had changed something in me, and I’d never felt closer to anyone. Glancing around to check that no one was in earshot, I decided to tell her the story.

Touching the tally marks, I said, “Each of these is a year I’ve lived on my own. I get a new one each year. It reminds me of what I’ve lived through.”

“Tell me,” Cameron said, gazing up at me.

“Tell you what?”

“All of it. I tried to get it out of you last night, but you kept circling back to me. I want to know about you. All of you.”

I sighed, wondering where to begin. No one had ever wanted to know the whole story. Ollie had asked before, but when I shut down, he hadn’t pushed. This was different. Cameron was different. I’d never really laid it all out for anyone before, but it was best to start at the beginning.

“My surname isn’t really Zane, for one,” I said. “I actually don’t know what my real last name is.”

“You don’t know? You said you were in foster care. Did you get put in as a baby or something?”

“It’s not that simple,” I said, slipping an arm around her waist. “My first memory is of a long, dark road. I was around six years old and stumbling along the road in the middle of the night. It was pouring rain. The road ran through a forest, which made it seem darker than it was. Everything before that moment is nothing but black. No memory, no clue where I’d come from or even who I was.

I remembered my first name was Nate, or Nathan. Other than that? Nothing.

“It was freezing cold, and I was soaked. Honestly, if it had been three or four degrees colder, the rain would have been snow. I was shivering like mad and hugging myself as I walked. I had an oversized waterproof jacket on. No clue where that came from. I must have gone like that for at least an hour, probably two, just shuffling along, crying every now and then. The worst thing was what I heard in the woods by the road. Well, what I thought I heard, anyway.”

“What did you hear?” Cameron asked, her voice low and quiet. She stared at me intently, engrossed in the story.

“Snuffling, growling. Every now and then, I thought I saw yellow eyes peering out at me through the branches. I suppose it could have been anything. Wolves, coyotes, maybe some wild dogs—maybe even shifters, for that matter—but it freaked me the hell out. From that day forward, I was terrified of big dogs. German shepherds, golden retrievers, anything big enough to do damage freaked me the fuck out. Kind of ironic in hindsight.” I chuckled.

“Eventually, I stumbled across this small shop on the side of the road. I was desperate to get warm and dry. The sign above the door said Zane’s Bait and Tackle.

A little fishing supply store and gas station combo.

I climbed up the three concrete steps until I was under the awning, out of the rain.

I just stood there. I didn’t know where to go, and I was too scared to speak.

“A guy was inside at the register, but he was totally absorbed in a magazine. I must have stood there for ten minutes, shivering. Finally, I sneezed, and that snapped him out of it. He saw me, jumped up, and let me in. My lips were blue, and he wrapped me up in a sweater, then sat me beside this little electric heater he had behind the counter. He called the cops as soon as I was settled.”

“So, you took your name from the shop?” Cameron asked.

“Yeah. Didn’t know what else to call myself.

Cops tried to get a last name out of me, but I didn’t know it.

They sent me to child protective services and tried to find my parents, but nothing came of it.

From what I overheard from my case worker, the police thought my parents were probably junkies who got tired of using meth money to feed a child and dropped me off on the highway.

” My lips twisted in disgust. “If that’s true, I’ll be happy to show them what I think of them if we ever come face to face. ”

“Is that what you think happened?” Cameron asked. “That they just dropped you off like a dog they didn’t want anymore?” The pain in her tone brought back memories of the sadness I’d felt as a child.

“No clue. It’s a good story, but who knows. Maybe that’s what happened, maybe not. Doesn’t really matter now.” I shrugged. “Anyway, after they realized they wouldn’t find my family, I got dumped into the system. And let me tell you, that was hell on earth.”

“That bad?”

“That fucking bad. You know, they make orphanages out to be these awful places in movies and books, but after living through foster care, I’d be happy with a dozen pissed-off nuns.

The assholes I was bounced around to were only in it for the checks they got each month.

Some homes were worse than others. One reeked of cat piss, and the woman there spent most of the money she got from the state on her twelve fucking cats.

Actually, that one wasn’t so bad. Some of the homes were abusive.

Physically, that is. Thankfully, I never had to deal with any sexually abusive foster parents, though I’m sure a bunch of kids aren’t that lucky. ”

Cameron stared at me. The sadness I saw in her eyes didn’t anger me the way it usually did when people showed pity or sympathy for me. My own face was a scowling mask, almost like dragging the memories out was physically painful. Her compassion gave me the strength to keep talking.

“Sometimes, though, the other kids were worse than the foster parents. When I was twelve, this one little fucker named Colby Bryant decided to have a go at me. We were living with a couple. The Crows. Well, I was in the backyard mowing the lawn, since that was the chore Mr. Crow had given me. I had to mow the whole three acres every week in the summer. I was dripping with sweat and cursing the push mower when Colby came running up, all excited and shit. He says, ‘Nate, there’s a couple in the house talking to the Crows. They say they’re looking for their boy.

They lost him years ago, and they think you might be him. ’”

“Well, that got me moving. I busted ass back inside. I damn near had tears of hope in my eyes when I got there.” I gritted my teeth, making the muscles in my jaw bulge. “Cam, do you want to know what I found in the living room?”

“I don’t think I want to know, but sure, let me have it.”

“See, Colby’s chore was washing the cars out front.

Mr. Crow collected cars—all of them garbage and not worth a dime, but he had about ten of them.

Half were perpetually up on blocks, but he still made Colby wash them all every week when I mowed the lawn.

Turns out, that was when he and Mrs. Crow would have a little fun in the living room.

With both kids off working, they’d bang their brains out.

Colby looked through the window while he took a break and thought it would be fun to get me to walk in on them.

When I came running in, that’s what I found.

Fat Mr. Crow with even fatter Mrs. Crow bent over the coffee table, humping away. ”

“ Jesus ,” Cameron hissed, burying her face in her hand.

“Yeah. They saw me, freaked out, started yelling at me to get back outside where I belonged. Colby laughed his ass off. That was the last time I let myself believe my parents were ever coming back. I told myself from that day forward that the unconditional love between a parent and child didn’t exist. It was nothing but a myth humans and shifters told each other to feel civilized. ”

Cameron chewed at her lip, obviously weighing whether to ask something. After a few seconds, she said, “The scars on your back? Was that from when you were a kid in the system?”

I lifted my hand, letting the firelight reflect off the Celtic ring on my finger. “See this?”

She nodded.

“This was the first thing I ever stole. I was fourteen and getting into lots of trouble. One night, I decided to break into this shitty little pawn shop on the outskirts of town. This silver ring caught my eye, and I stuck it on my finger, then went around grabbing a few other things. I was trying to figure out how to open the register when the cops showed up. Place had a silent alarm, and I was too dumb to realize it. Spent a month in juvie. Got out, and my foster father at the time lost his shit. He was a Baptist pastor and thought his foster son getting arrested made him look bad to the congregation. He took his belt off and told me he wasn’t going to let the child spoil for—as he put it—‘sparing the rod.’ He used the side of the belt with the buckle.

Tore me up good. It looks worse than it should because I didn’t get any medical treatment.

I said fuck that place and left that night. ”

“You ran away? At fourteen?” Cameron looked horrified. She was probably imagining Gael going out on his own in a few years.

“I did,” I said, pulling the blanket tighter around us.

One of the camp workers walked by with a carton of popcorn in little boxes like you’d see at the circus or zoo and handed us some. We ate in silence for a few minutes before Cameron spoke again.

“Where did you go?”