CHAPTER TEN
ELIAS
My brain has officially leftthe building.
There’s no other explanation I’m willing to entertain for the sight in front of me.
A massive, fur-covered, bleeding… creature crouches in the moss, one hand braced on a fallen log, the other clamped over his side. His—because yes, somehow I know the creature is male—breath comes in hard, controlled pulls. The air around him smells like earth, pine sap, and the unmistakable scent of living fur. His fur is a deep reddish-brown, shot with darker streaks, and up close it glints with an almost metallic sheen where light slips between the trees.
But it’s his eyes that pin me in place.
They’re not animal eyes, though. They’re not empty or glassy or purely instinct. They’re sharp and bright, a molten amber gold, framed by thick dark lashes. They’re wary and in pain and… something else I can’t name yet, intense enough that my knees want to give out.
This is Bigfoot.
A real, very cranky representative of a species I’m about to lose credibility describing.
And I’m walking toward him like this is normal.
“Okay,” I whisper, mostly to myself. “Okay. We’re doing this.”
My heart is pounding so hard that if this were a cartoon, it would be visibly bulging my chest out of my jacket. Strangely, though, the fear that’s making my hands shake has almost nothing to do withhimand everything to do with the blood drying along his ribs.
The wound looks ugly. The fur around it is dark and matted. Fresh crimson still seeps in slow, sticky lines.
“You’re hurt,” I say, dropping to a cautious half crouch.
He gives a short, rough huff and turns his face away as if that will somehow make me leave. It’s a very large, very majestic version of “if I can’t see you, you can’t see me.”
“I’m not going to hurt you,” I say. “Just let me look.”
His gaze snaps back to me. That one look feels like a physical touch, cool and probing. Up close, I can see the precise lines of his features. His brow is heavy but elegant, his nose broad but defined, his mouth full and expressive, the lower jaw strong and slightly squared. There’s a fine scattering of shorter fur along his cheeks and under his eyes, almost like stubble.
He looks more like some wild, ancient forest guardian than anything out of a horror movie.
“I need to see the wound,” I say softly. “May I?”
His jaw tenses, then relaxes slightly. He doesn’t nod, but he doesn’t pull away when I shift closer and reach, very slowly, toward his side.
His fur is softer than I expect when my fingers brush it—coarse at the tips but dense and plush beneath. Heat radiates from him, solid and comforting.
I move carefully, parting the blood-matted patch until I can see the broken skin. The entry wound is ragged and swollen around the bullet. Even without medical training beyond basic wilderness first aid, I can tell it shouldn’t stay inside him.
“I’m going to press around it,” I warn. “Just to see how deep it is. This will probably hurt.”
His eyes narrow, as if to sayI know that, human, but he doesn’t stop me.
I apply a little pressure, and the reaction is immediate.
“Mother of all mossy cedars—OW.”
I jerk back so violently, I nearly topple onto my ass. “You—” My voice comes out about two octaves higher than usual. “You talk.”
He’s breathing harder now, more with exasperation than pain. “Unfortunately.”
The word hangs in the air between us like a dropped dish.
We stare at each other.
