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“Can’t a girl have hobbies?” I asked Colton.

“With Fields?” he added through gritted teeth.

Fuck, I had to choose between the truth—obviously not an option—and the lie that would work best but vaguely sickened me.

“Romance isn’t always steak dinners and roses for girls like me.” I winked at Colton, which seemed to piss him off further. Though I didn’t miss the slight wince or the hurt in his gaze.

The hurt that he didn’t deserve to thrust at me, since he was engaged, and we’d been broken up for over a decade.

“You two worked the case when I told you not to.” Colton obviously didn’t buy the lie. He highly doubted I was an exterminator. I was sure he’d be drumming up theories about who I really was. But he’d never get it right.

“The kid is alive and back with his parents, yet you’re glaring and growling because you didn’t get to be the hero.” I rubbed my head which was pounding, my throat raw and my hands beyond agonizing at that point. I needed out of this fucking situation. The victory of the kill was wearing off quickly, and I just felt weary. Tired.

Colton’s eyes widened as he shook his head, backing away. “You think I give a fuck about looking like a hero? Jesus Christ, Hadley. The world really did a number on you, didn’t it?” His voice was injected with disappointment that shouldn’t have bothered me.

He stepped forward so he was toe to toe with me. “I don’t give a fuck about my image, haven’t since I was a stupid teenager who thought that meant something. I care about people. My family. Residents of this town, and despite everything you’re doing to try to change that, I care about you, Hadley.” He jabbed his finger at me, not violently, but the simple tap of his finger reverberated through my chest. He leaned forward, breath hot in my face. “And I know a couple of things to be true; you’re not a fucking exterminator, you’re chasing death, and Dante Fields is going to get you killed if you don’t wizen up.”

I choked out a laugh to cover up how unsettled he made me. “You give him too much power, Colton. If anyone’s getting me killed doing reckless shit, it’s me.” I shoved his hand away and poked my finger in my own chest. “And I don’t need you keeping me safe. If I remember correctly, it was me bringing a kid home safe when that’s your job. How about you focus on that and leave me the fuck alone?”

On those cruel words, I turned around and walked back to my car, ignoring Dante on my way past.

It was unfair and mean of me to say that shit to Colton. But the only surefire way to ensure that he didn’t focus on what I was doing there was to insinuate that he was unworthy of his job. I knew that was his secret fear, failure of being the good guy. Saving people. Living up to his parent’s legacy.

I hoped that by the time I left Dreadwood Falls, all of my bridges would be burned, and a werewolf would be dead.

fourteen

“What are you doing here?” I sighed, releasing a plume of smoke.

I had been sitting on the steps of the front porch, chain-smoking. And drinking. Celebrating. It was what I usually did after killing a monster or saving a person, eager to drink twice as much since I’d achieved both. Though to be honest, this was also what I did when I didn’t save a person. I often consumed significantly more booze and maybe a warm body with a hard dick to distract me from my self-hatred—or at least to make me hate myself for different reasons.

We technically won this one, but it was a hunt I hadn’t planned on, not the one I came here for. But a victory, nonetheless. Even if I had paired up with Dante. And almost … liked it?

I’d been musing on the number of supernatural creatures apparently calling Dreadwood Falls home, getting more confused and suspicious by the minute. I come to town and all hell suddenly breaks loose?

A happy coincidence? I thought not.

But what else could it be? The witch? She didn’t even know me but, apparently, she wanted me dead. Then again, my reputation as a hunter preceded me.

My initial plan was getting messier by the second, my wounds barely healing before I gained a whole new bunch. At this rate, I was going to be facing a werewolf on a full moon with second-degree burns, bruised ribs, and black eyes. And now there was the problem of the deputy on my porch.

“I come in peace.” Colton held up a bottle like a white flag. He wasn’t in uniform. Just jeans and a flannel, his hair damp, curling around the nape of his neck. As if he’d just showered and come straight here.

He looked tired again. I assumed he’d had a long night, cleaning up our mess, attempting to find evidence in the charred remains of the sewer, trying to figure out the truth behind Dante’s and my lies.

He’d never come up with it. Colton, for all his smarts, was too straight and narrow to go for the monster angle. Especially when there were enough human monsters walking the planet.

He looked exhausted, weary, his expression turning hopeful when I stood, throwing my smoke in a potted plant.

I took the bottle, inspecting the label. “You’re lucky this is better than what I have.”

I led him inside, deciding I’d let him stay long enough to get him a glass and ice, then led him to the backyard so I could light another cigarette. It surely wasn’t good for my lungs to be chain-smoking, but I was pent-up, tense, unable to fight the feeling that I was missing something.

Colton and I didn’t speak for probably ten solid minutes. The silence felt loaded but comfortable. He didn’t try to hide the fact that he was watching my every movement. He was eyeing me in an effort to learn me, not leering at me. A girl could feel the difference. I was a wholly unfamiliar creature to him than the perky teenager who used to prance around this very same house.

Her ghost felt as if it were suffocating me.

“Those will kill you,” he shifted his weight, settling back into the chair beside me, facing the woods.