Vivian Arend: Moon Shine

Evan Stone shot off the couch and scrambled to the window, clutching back the living room curtains as he stared into the darkness. His heart continued to rattle hard enough his hands shook.

It took a long time to blink away the images, for the echoes of screams to fade from his ears. To admit it was true. The flames were only in his mind. His dreams.

Instead of red and gold fingers consuming everything around him in destructive heat, outside his second-storey apartment window the streetlights of Whitehorse flickered. Their pale blue glow a faint defense against the chill of night.

As the fog in his brain cleared, the ache in his belly arrived, silent pain striking deep. The gaping hole in his soul became his single focus point. Far more than the dreams of his past, the unknown cut him apart and shot his concentration to hell.

Life as he knew it was over—but his future refused to arrive.

Somewhere out there was his mate. He’d scented her, following her trail from his hotel until she’d vanished without a trace. He’d dedicated every spare moment since to the search, but all his attempts had come up blank. Frustration led to restless nights pacing before passing out wherever he ended up. Restless sleep led to nightmares made of tortured memories.

He was past ready to move on.

A quick glance showed the clock on the counter had failed. Evan pressed his watch to check the glowing numbers. Time clicked over to twelve-ten as loud pounding sounded on his front door.

“Evan, wake up. Wake up .”

Bloody hell. “Shaun?”

Wolf-pack hierarchy said Evan was numero uno and Shaun second in command. Evan tried to maintain a light hand on the reins—he’d witnessed too intimately what happened when men and beasts allowed power to go to their heads. But laid-back ruler of his Takhini-pack kingdom that he might be, unless this was a real death-and-dying emergency?

He would happily take out his frustrations on his Beta.

Evan jerked the door open. Shaun stood there, his usual “what the fuck” attitude noticeably absent. Instead his dark hair and broad shoulders were covered with a thick layer of black and green…stuff.

“What the hell happened to you? Whoa…” Evan stepped back in self-defense as the first wave of putrescence hit him smack in the face. “Crap.”

“Not crap, it’s garbage.” Shaun knocked a handful of what looked to be half-decomposed road kill off one shoulder.

“Get a new hobby,” Evan snarled, his eyes watering. “Jeez, you reek. Stand downwind, I’ll come outside.”

“You need to get to the hotel,” Shaun insisted, even as he inched farther back on the landing. His face twisted into a horrified expression. “I can barely breathe, I stink so bad.”

Evan wasn’t sure what was going on. Their livelihood was based on the hotel, and over the past couple weeks, strange shit had been happening. He strode back to his bedroom, shouting at Shaun through the open door. “Stay there while I pull on some clothes. Tell me what’s wrong, and why the hell you look like a zombie.”

“Power is out at the hotel. Only the hotel—none of the other places on the block are affected, and the pack house three streets over is fine as well. I was in the middle of shutdown at the bar when everything went black. None of the usual fixes helped, so I thought I’d try you. But your phones are out, both your landline and your cell. And the shortcut between the hotel and your place was booby-trapped.”

Shaun grimaced at the muck-coated fingers he raised skyward as Evan joined him on the landing, fully clothed. They both turned and headed down the stairs to the street level. “Thanks for getting me. Did you turn on the generator?”

“Busted.”

“Bullshit,” Evan snapped. “I serviced that myself last week.”

Shaun stopped beside him, bits and pieces of debris falling off to the ground as if he truly were a zombie on his final legs. “Don’t go snarly at me. I know engines too, dude—it’s busted. No bullshit.”

“That makes no bloody sense,” Evan complained. “Plus, there’s no reason for an outage this time of year in the first place.”

They skirted the area where Shaun had hit the booby trap. Evan was too keen to get to the hotel to do more than give the setup a quick glance, but even that was enough to make him whistle in admiration. “Damn, the trick-or-treaters are out in full force already. Look—”

He pointed to the neatly assembled buckets hanging empty above their heads. Shaun grumbled. “They were hidden behind the board. That’s why I didn’t see them.”

“Must have sealed the tops to stop the smell from warning you off as well.” Evan shook his head, his stomach protesting the stench wafting off Shaun. “You must be dying. I’m dying standing next to you. God, you stink like… Hell, I can’t think of anything nasty enough, actually.”

“Fuck you. You want my help tonight?”

Evan made a snap decision. “No. Go home. Get a shower. Try not to freak your mate out too much, or she might decide to light you on fire and get a newer model.”

“Har-har.” Shaun stepped away as Evan pulled open a side-entrance door to the hotel. “Seriously, though. Call if you need me.”

“We’ll be fine.” Evan waved his Beta off before turning and entering the darkness.

He strode down the hallway with no hesitation as he paced the black-as-coal passages. He was familiar with every inch of the hotel he’d turned into one of the centerpieces of the Takhini pack resources. Plus, he was a wolf. His senses were sharp enough to warn him not only of his surroundings, but that he was rapidly approaching a group of upset people who’d gathered in the lobby.

Dim light greeted him as he rounded the corner to the open foyer. Swinging flashlights sent golden beams dancing off rock walls, the wet surfaces all that earmarked the impressive waterfall that usually graced the entrance to the hotel. The feature wall was silent. Even the voices he heard remained low, although their dismay and concern carried clearly enough, echoing in the darkness.

Evan shoved behind the desk and laid a soothing hand on the shoulder of a very agitated young wolf who was supposed to have the simple task of night clerk. “What’s up, Dale?”

“Thank goodness, you’re here.” Dale didn’t get another word out before the mixed crowd of humans and shifters in the lobby all started talking at once. Demanding the power be restored.

Demanding refunds.

Evan took a deep breath and used as much of his wolf power as possible to send out calming vibes. The mystical mojo wouldn’t work as well on the humans as his pack, but there was still a noticeable effect. “We’ll do our best to get things up and running ASAP. There must be a line down that services the building. Let me look into it. In the meantime, do you all have flashlights? Good—now return to your rooms, and I’m sure you’ll find we have everything fixed by the morning.”