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“Hey, Audrey?”

Audrey glanced up from where she was reading her book. “What’s up?”

“I was about to go on a hunt,” I said. “I was wondering if you wanted to come along.”

“You want to hunt together?” she asked, not bothering to hide her skepticism.

“Of course,” I said. Back in our old pack, we had gone on hunts together. Those private moments together were when I started realizing how I felt about her. I was hoping that doing something that we used to do together might ease some of her stress and anxiety. I knew she didn’t fully trust me, but I hoped that this might be a small way to re-earn that trust.

She chewed the inside of her cheek as she shifted in her seat. Her eyes glanced out the window, where warm sunshine beamed down invitingly on lush green trees. I knew that longing expression on her face, and the way her fingers twitched as if she was imagining them as paws running along the ground.

After a moment, she turned back to look at me and gave a short nod. “That sounds nice,” she said, almost whispering.

A few minutes later, I waited outside. I had shifted, and my wolf itched to run through the woods, to dig his claws into the earth and charge after prey. But the instant the smaller auburn-furred wolf emerged from around the house, all thoughts of hunting were temporarily driven from my wolf’s mind. I had forgotten how beautiful she looked as a wolf, her fur sleek and her eyes bright copper.

She dipped her head to me, waiting for me to take the lead.

We ran through the woods, darting between trees. My wolf loved getting the chance to get out and run again. It had been too long for him. But he was more interested in the fact that Audrey was here. Her presence kept distracting him. He was more interested in being close to Audrey and her wolf than in catching any prey.

Audrey, for her part, seemed determined to focus only on the hunt. Her nose twitched as she followed the scent of prey, her ears pricked for any sound of rustling in the bramble. She almost refused to look at me.

At least, at first. After some time, she seemed to relax and get into the hunt. She would glance my way to see if I scented prey or if I had noticed any danger. Her tail swished excitedly as we tracked a deer through the forest, moving slowly. When we caught up to it, we both stilled.

Audrey looked at me, her head tilted. With a jerk of my head, I told her to go ahead, that I would come behind her. She bobbed her head as if nodding and turned back to the deer, every inch of her alert. She dipped into a half-crouch, waiting for the perfect moment. I watched her form, admiring it. She had always been a skilled hunter. It was nice to see she still had that knack.

At the perfect moment, the exact time I would have moved, she struck, jumping into the air toward the deer. Before it could get two steps in, Audrey landed on its back, bringing it down to the ground as I arrived. Together, we landed the killing blow.

We shifted back. Audrey’s eyes shone bright with exhilaration as she beamed, looking more like herself than I had seen her since meeting her again.

“Good job,” I said.

“Thanks.” She pushed her hair from her face. “It’s been a while since I’ve hunted. I forgot how much I missed it.”

“I wouldn’t have known it from that performance,” I remarked. “You’re a natural.”

Her smile faded a little at the words, and she hesitated. “Thanks,” she muttered.

I frowned. I had said something wrong, but I couldn’t figure out what it might be.

Before I could ask, though, she said, “Are you good to take this back to the house? I want to hunt on my own a bit.”

Blinking, I nodded, trying to hide my surprise. “Yeah, I’ll meet you back at the house. Is everything all right?”

“It’s fine,” she said, though it wasn’t convincing. “I just want to keep going.”

Before I could press her any further, she shifted again and ran into the woods, leaving me alone with the deer.

***

Audrey was back home by the time I got out of the shower. I was planning on asking her what had happened in the woods, why she had run off, but the instant I saw her, I knew it was a bad idea. She had a serious, contemplative expression on her face that put me on edge.

Something was wrong. I didn’t know what, but I wanted to see if I could help. I reached out and touched her shoulder. I felt her muscles tighten beneath my fingers as she slowly turned to face me.

“Is everything all right?” I asked.

“You keep asking me that,” she said with a sigh. “Why?”

I raised an eyebrow. That wasn’t exactly an answer. But I had a funny feeling that pointing that out wasn’t going to get me any further than I already was.

“You’ve been acting odd ever since we ran into each other again,” I said. “You’re not…”I trailed off. What I wanted to say was that she wasn’t her anymore. I could still picture the fiery woman she used to be when she came to my house all those years ago. That playful smirk and the glint in her eye she always used to get when she bantered with me. Now, she jumped at shadows, and her shoulders were always hunched over.

“Everything’s fine.” She tried to shrug her shoulder from my grip, continuing not to look at me. “Really.”

I didn’t let go. Instead, I gently nudged her back around to face me. I took her chin in my free hand and tilted it up so she had to look at me.

“Is it something to do with Reacher?” I asked. “Or your father?”

Alarm flashed in her eyes, and she shook her head so hard that she yanked her chin from my grasp.

“Of course not,” she said, giving a tittering laugh that sounded about as genuine as a snake-oil salesman’s pitch. “Everything is fine with them. Why wouldn’t it be? And besides, even if there were issues with them, what would that matter? It’s not like I live there anymore.”

I let go of her chin and give her a long, searching look. “Audrey, you can tell me anything.”

She didn’t respond. Instead, she ran her hand through her hair as she stared out the window, eyes far away as she lost herself in contemplation. As she did, her baggy sleeve drooped down, slipping to the elbow. The setting sun caught her arm, lighting it up, making the long, thin bruises on the skin more visible.

Long, thin bruises that looked an awful lot like fingers.

Rage began to simmer, growing hotter every second I looked at them. My wolf snarled, howling in fury. I didn’t know who the hell had done that to her, but they were going to pay for putting their hands on her.

“What’s that?” I asked, trying to keep my voice even as anger threatened to creep in.

Despite my best efforts, she must have noticed an edge to my voice because she froze. Her eyes grew wide with surprise and then panic, similar to how she’d looked in the woods.

“What’s what?” she asked.

Gently, trying not to spook her, I reached out and took her hand, extending her arm so I could get a better look. The dark splotches on her arms stuck out starkly against her pale skin. They were unmistakably finger marks.

“Who did this?” I growled.

“No one.” She tugged her hand away, but I didn’t let go. She glared up at me, a hint of her former fire returning to her face. After days of seeing her look like a shell of the woman I remembered, seeing the spark in her expression was almost a relief. “Let go of my hand,” she demanded.

I obeyed, letting go of her. “Was it Reacher or your dad?” I demanded.

“I fell a couple days ago,” she answered. “That’s all.”

I didn’t respond right away. Those bruises were deep but had already begun healing. There was no way she had gotten them since moving here, and there was no way in hell she had gotten them just by falling.

I moved my hands to her shoulders, thumbs brushing against her bare skin. “If something happened to you, you know you can tell me,” I said, trying to sound gentle despite the rage rushing through me. “You’re safe here. I promise.”

The dubious expression in her expression told me she didn’t believe me. “I don’t know what you’re talking about,” she muttered, her eyes averted to her feet. “There wasn’t anything wrong there. There’s nothing to tell. I swear.” She glanced up, finally meeting my gaze. Based on the way she paled and her uneasy expression, I was fairly certain she knew I didn’t believe a word of it.

As much as I wanted to push the matter for my own purposes, I knew that forcing her to tell me wasn’t going to do any good.

Instead, I said, “You know you can tell me anything, right?”

She gave a small smile that didn’t reach her eyes. “I know,” she said unconvincingly. She hesitated. “I’ve got to go take a shower.”

Before I could say anything else, she turned and hurried out of the room.

I stayed where I was, listening as her footsteps hurried up the stairs, then faded into nothing. I tried to hold back my growl of frustration. Inside, my wolf snarled, his tail swishing in fury. He wanted to tear whoever did this to her to ribbons. It was the least they deserved.

But Audrey wasn’t going to tell me anything. Not right now. Not after everything I had done to her.

I had to figure out a way to make her trust me again. The only question was how.