Page 34 of Rescued

“I kind of am,” Breanna admitted. “And at first the guys were really scary. But Boomer and his brother and Dealer are all right, once you get used to them.”

“Yeah.” Mikey kept walking. “About that. I’m glad you’ve made friends with them, but you still need to be careful—even with them.”

“I know.”

“I’m not sure you do.” She gave a sigh, sticking her hands in her pockets. “Look, to be honest, this is not the safest place in the world for someone who’s not a shifter, or who doesn’t have military training. These guys aren’t ordinary shifters. They’ve all been through a lot—some of them through things you can’t imagine. They’re carrying a lot of pain and anger. Anybody, even a human, can lose it if they get triggered. And the problem with traumatized predator shifters is that if they lose it, their animals can go rogue and turn into killers.”

“Oh,” Breanna said softly, suddenly feeling all squishy and edible. And then, “Even Switch?”

Mikey said, “Switch is sane, as far as I know.” A grin spread across her face. “As sane as any of us, anyway.”

Bree couldn’t help but respond to her smile. Like the guys, Michelangela wasn’t as intimidating as she looked.

Mikey sobered again. “You should be fine in the daytime, if you stay in the main area. But for fuck’s sake, don’t go wandering around at night, okay?”

She nodded. “Okay.”

Mikey gestured further up the path. “Sometime, when it’s not raining, I’ll take you up to the top of that trail. There’s an amazing overlook where you can see for miles.”

“That would be nice,” Breanna said. And resisted the urge to echo Switch: But I’m not staying.

Chapter 15

Switch should have let Breanna stay with Mikey.

Somehow, even though he’d promised himself not to get involved with her, he was doing it.

Bit by bit, day by day, she was becoming part of his life. And more and more, he wanted to take care of her.

He knew better. He couldn’t take care of anyone.

He could fly them places and say goodbye. He could fix machines and hunt down info on the dark web. Every now and then, he could come to the rescue, if he was lucky.

But the longer someone depended on him to take care of them, the greater the odds they ended up dead.

So he shouldn’t be letting Bree get this close. He’d fuck up her life, and she’d fuck up his. Hell, she already had.

Because now he was sitting here in the middle of the night trying to finish his new drone, and he couldn’t even concentrate, with her sleeping in the next room.

But when she wasn’t around, he felt like another panic attack was just over the horizon.

Switch took another slug of bourbon and tried to focus on his machines, shoving all the people shit out of his mind. Just slam the door to the past. Focus on things he could control.

It had worked for years—until it didn’t.

Which was when he started getting the shakes.

He had to get Breanna out of here. For her sake, and for his.

His wolf gave a little growl. No. We must protect her, or she will end up like the others. She must stay here.

She can’t fucking stay here. We can’t protect her for long.

We must. We must keep this one safe.

Images of Alice flashed into his mind—smiling. Laughing. Dancing. And then gone.

His hands shook, and the screwdriver clattered to the tabletop.