Page 17 of The Enforcers: KANE

He didn’t move.

“Look, I know it’s you, Hunter,” she said. “You might as well shift and talk to me.”

He still hesitated. One ear twitched, the only sign that he wasn’t a wolf statue.

Maybe he’d become modest in his old age. And they were in a public place, even if this was the darkest part of the parking lot.

She pulled his jeans off the pile of clothes and tossed them to him. “In case you’re embarrassed, you can put these on.”

As soon as the jeans landed at his feet, he shimmered and blurred, turning human with a crack of bones. He picked up the jeans and started shimmying into them as fast as he could, looking like he was trying to hide himself from her.

It wasn’t fast enough to camouflage his gorgeous body, though. He looked like a bodybuilder—or an underwear model. Ridiculously tall, totally ripped, with broad shoulders tapering to a taut waist and six-pack abs—or maybe an eight-pack. Hell, it might be the whole twelve. Long, lean legs, with an impressive package between them.

Suddenly the night seemed much hotter.

Kane flicked her a glance. “Quit looking,” he muttered.

That one phrase sent her flashing back into the past. He’d always said that when they were living on the street—when he’d been forced to shift back in front of her.

He’d thought of her as a little girl then, but it still embarrassed him. She’d wanted to look then, and my-oh-my, she wanted to even more now.

Her standard answer came back to her effortlessly. “What’s to look at, Wolf?” she teased.

He froze in the middle of buttoning the top button on his jeans.

“Shit, Raven, it really is you,” he said.

He walked toward her, hand outstretched tentatively, as if he were afraid she was going to vanish in a puff of smoke. His short dark hair was disheveled, just like it used to get when he was a kid. His face was harder now, with stern lines, and his torso was crisscrossed with old scars. As she looked into his eyes, though, she saw a glimpse of the boy she used to know.

She smiled at him. “Hi, Hunter,” she said.

In two seconds he was at the truck, crushing her in a giant hug that knocked the breath out of her. “I can’t believe it’s you,” he murmured in her ear. “I thought you must be dead. I thought I’d never see you again.”

The emotion in his voice shafted her in the heart. She’d never thought he’d feel so intensely after all these years. She’d tried to tell herself it was just one of those things. On the street, people came together and drifted apart. No big deal.

But with his arms around her, all the old feelings came rushing back. Like losing your home, and then finding your way back when you never expected to.

Something warm expanded in her chest, making her suddenly want to cry.

She couldn’t have that.

“Whoa, smooshing me,” she said.

He eased his grip and stepped back. “Sorry,” he said. “It’s just—all these years… I know what the streets do to people. And I—I wasn’t there for you. When I looked for you and couldn’t find you, I figured you didn’t make it.”

He turned and leaned his hips against the front of the truck. “I never forgave myself for that,” he said quietly.

He was only inches away from her, and she could feel the heat radiating off his body. That warm place inside her chest felt like it was catching fire.

Crap, crap, crap. Over ten years later, and he still made her feel things no one else ever had.

“Ah, Hunter,” she said, bumping him with her shoulder, trying to keep it light. “I didn’t know you cared.”

He flinched. She could feel it, like someone had punched him in the gut. She bumped him again. “Come on,” she said. “It was the streets. Tough times. People came and went.”

His voice was low. “Is that all it was to you?” he said. “I know you were just a kid, but—we were a crew, you and me. I swore to protect you, and then I got caught up with Selina and I let you down. And you left without even saying goodbye, or giving me a chance to make it right.”

His face was shuttered now, but she could still feel his pain. She’d always been able to feel other people’s pain—it was one of the downsides to her power. She’d learned to live with it, to shut it off when she had to.