MC Beast

Beast POV

I first saw her just north of the Nevada boarder. It would have been impossible not to. For three hundred miles there’d been nothing but desert highway and barbed wire ranch fences protecting dead shrubs.

I almost convinced myself she was a mirage the heat conjured up to fuck with me. Nothin’ ‘bout her seemed right. Matted black hair. Skeletal rather than skinny. Wearing a once-white t-shirt that hung down way past her knees. Walkin’ so unsteady that I wager a tumbleweed could’ve knock her over.

She was too small, too fragile, too human to survive all alone way out here.

But she didn’t seem Other, either. Not with the desperate, jerking way she moved. Fae, shifter, or demon, it wouldn’t matter. This unforgiving environment would’ve forced some sort of change, and even a mostly-dead Other moved with more grace than she did.

When I got within twenty feet, she stuck out her thumb without glancing up even once.

I kept driving.

I didn’t have time to pick up a stray, and no way in hell could I protect that stray from what followed me. Wouldn’t surprise me if she were running away from something like that, and the last thing I needed was more crazy bullshit. Keepin’ to myself was the smart thing to do.

So of course, I didn’t do it.

As I passed her, I looked over for just one second.

I’d seen a lot of sad things in Texas and New Mexico. Abandoned cars. Main Streets lined with boarded-up buildings. Houses with sagging roofs and chicken wire for doors. Everywhere there were people who were hungry and hurting and needing things I couldn’t give them. So I don’t know why this small, random woman got to me so bad.

For a moment, I wasn’t aware of the road or where I was. I wasn’t even aware of myself. All I saw and felt were her gold eyes watching my car retreat behind strands of dark, matted hair. I couldn’t see enough of her to know how beautiful she was yet. In fact, right then she didn’t even look beautiful. Just young, desperate, and lonely…so lonely that I think I felt her loneliness even more than my own.

That loneliness jump-started somethin’ in my mind. How far was it to the next town? Twenty miles at least. How long would it take her to walk that far? And where was her fucking purse? Did she have anything to drink? How did she even get out here?

“Damn it.”

I couldn’t leave her out here without offering a ride. I’d drop her off in the next town if she got in the car.

If.

It was a pretty big if.

The car squealed as I hit the breaks. Then it jerked around a bit as I put it in reverse, like even it didn’t think I was makin’ a good decision.

Well too fucking bad. I didn’t care what this piece of shit thought. The only reason I’d driven it off the lot in the first place was ’cause Lenny promised me the car would make it to Bend and had given me a “good deal.”

And yes, I know should’ve known better. Lenny didn’t give good deals. But I couldn’t dwell on bad decisions I’d made three days ago—I needed to focus on bad decisions I was making right now.

The wheels had spun so much dust into the air that I could barely see the girl approach. She kept her head down as she approached, probably to keep dirt particles out of her eyes. Wind blew her hair over her face and shoulders, obscuring both, making her look like that creepy chick from The Ring.

God, I hoped she wasn’t a ghost. This car already drove like it was cursed, and vengeful spirits were a bitch.

I popped open the passenger door when she got close. Breathing deeply, I captured her scent.

Blood. A lot of it. All human. Most of it old and not hers.

My chest tightened as I stifled the growl clawing up my throat. That didn’t sit right with me. I didn’t know what she’d been through, but she was way too young to endure anything that ended in so much blood. My nostrils flared as I forced myself to inhale again.

She still bled a little. The metallic fragrance lingered, fresh and faintly sweet in the dry, desert air. Her panicky sweat sharpened that scent, but only slightly. Some time ago—a few days, maybe longer—she’d been running on pure adrenaline.

She wasn’t running on anything anymore. Her heart beat too fast, but not from fear. Heat and exhaustion made her breathing rapid and shallow. She wouldn’t survive much longer out here all alone.

A darkness within me rose, drawn to her vulnerability and called to hut.

No, I told it, forcing it down as it roared inside me, igniting the darkness in my blood and my even darker instincts. She is not yours. She is… she is…

The tightness in my chest twisted with my next breath. Beneath the layers of desperation was more of that sweetness, as pure as wildflowers growing on a grassy hillside. Yeah, she was human alright—all softness and sunshine and things creatures like me should never touch. Most humans had a little bit of Other in ’em, even if they didn’t know anything about it or our world. But there was nothing complicated about this one.

What the hell was she doing out here?

“Need a ride?” I asked as she griped the door to steady herself.

She looked up.

I thought she’d be a teen runaway. Even some crazy lady selling human teeth out of her pockets would have been more likely. Or hell, a real, honest-to-god banshee. What I saw was the last thing I’d expected.

Her bronzed skin had a porcelain appearance despite being caked with sweat and dirt. Her golden eyes had a predatory slant. Her chapped lips were almost too full, her delicate nose almost too long, her sharp cheekbones almost too proud. She was almost too much of everything—almost too much to be real.

But she was real, and she was hurt. Her knuckles, nose, and cheeks were peeling. She had some dried blood on her bottom lip, and a lot more on her shirt. She’d been in the sun too long, most likely ’cause she had no choice. She needed someone to help her.

And I doubted she’d let that someone be me.

She inhaled sharply the moment she saw me. Her lovely lips trembled, her over-sized eyes widened, and her grip on the door tightened until her entire arm shook.

She probably wanted to slam it.

She probably wanted to run as far as she could in the opposite direction.

She only didn’t because she was afraid of what would happen if a creature like me decided to chaise her.

I was used to getting these kinds of looks. Even Charlie sometimes got this wild look in her eyes when we were alone, like I’d turn feral at any moment. Couldn’t blame any of them, really. My face was covered with the kind of scars you prayed to god you’d never learn the story behind. It was so goddamn fucked-up that when you saw it, you couldn’t help but remember all the fucked-up shit in your own life.

It made me feel a little responsible. Stupid, maybe, but true. Sometimes recalling something bad was worse than the event itself.

I forced my gaze away from her beautiful face and back onto the road. “You wanna leave, I’m not gonna follow you.”

She gasped, surprised I’d read her thoughts.

“You wanna lift to the next town, get in.”

Then, I waited for her to slam the door.