The haunted trail was Greyson's idea.
"My pack hosts it every year," he'd said over coffee three days ago. "It's cheesy. Fake blood and fog machines. But the forest at night is beautiful."
I'd agreed because it fit the plan. Dark. Intimate. Another chance to pull him closer.
Now I was standing at the trailhead in a black dress and cat ears, watching him emerge from his truck in dark jeans and a fitted black shirt that made him look like he belonged to the shadows.
"You look…" He stopped. Smiled. "Dangerous."
I grinned. Spun once. Let the skirt flare. "That's the idea."
The trail started innocently enough. Strings of orange lights wound through the trees. Recorded wolf howls played from hidden speakers. A volunteer in a zombie mask jumped out from behind a hay bale. I shrieked on cue and grabbed Greyson's arm.
He didn't pull away. Just let me hold on, his warmth seeping through the fabric of his shirt.
We kept walking. The lights grew sparser. The fog machines kicked in, threading pale mist between the trees. The recorded sounds faded, replaced by real forest silence—wind in branches, the distant hoot of an owl.
Then the trail split.
A volunteer in a plague doctor mask gestured left. "This way for the solo scare experience. Totally optional. Rejoin the main path in five minutes."
Greyson looked at me. "Your call."
I should have said no. Should have stayed close. But something reckless and stupid made me grin. "I'm not scared."
I went left. He went right.
The fog was thicker here. It curled around my ankles, swallowed the path ahead. I walked slowly, arms wrapped around myself. The synthetic lure I'd reapplied before leaving was cloying in the cold air.
Something rustled in the underbrush.
I spun. Saw nothing. Laughed at myself.
Then a presence materialized at my back.
Massive. Warm. Predatory.
Before I could turn, a hand braced beside my head. Another planted against the tree trunk on my other side. A wall of heat pressed against my spine, caging me without touching.
I froze.
"Sophia." His voice was low. Rough. Not the polite tone he used over coffee. This was something deeper. Primal.
My heart slammed against my ribs. "You—you scared me."
"I know." His breath ghosted over the side of my neck. Deliberate. Slow. "I can hear your heartbeat."
I should have laughed. Should have turned this into a joke. But my entire body had gone rigid, every nerve ending screaming at me to tilt my head and expose my throat.
His nose traced the line of my neck. Not touching. Just hovering. Inhaling.
"You wear too much perfume," he murmured. "It hides you."
My breath came shallow. Fast. "Hides what?"
"This." His hand moved—not to grab, not to control—just his fingertips brushing the right side of my neck. Exactly where a mate mark would sit.
The phantom heat that bloomed under his touch was instant and catastrophic.
It wasn't pain. It was recognition. Something buried beneath years of suppression clawing toward the surface, desperate and howling. Inside my chest, something enormous pressed outward so hard I gasped.
My fingers curled into the bark. My knees went weak.
"What—" My voice cracked. "What are you doing?"
"Trying," he said softly, "very hard not to do what I want to do."
The heat spread. Down my spine. Across my shoulders. Pooling in the right side of my neck until I could barely think through it.
For one crystalline, terrifying moment, I knew with absolute certainty that my feelings for this man were real. Not performative. Not calculated. Real.
And I had no idea who he actually was.
"Greyson—"
Voices erupted from the trail behind us. A group of teenagers, laughing and shrieking as a volunteer chased them with a plastic chainsaw.
He stepped back instantly. Hands dropping. The wall of heat vanishing.
I turned. He was watching me with an expression I couldn't read. Hunger. Restraint. Something that looked almost like pain.
"We should catch up with the group," he said quietly.
I nodded. Didn't trust my voice.
We walked the rest of the trail in silence. He didn't try to touch me again. Didn't make jokes or tell stories. Just stayed close enough that I could feel his presence like a physical weight.
When we reached the parking lot, he opened my car door. Waited until I was inside.
"Good night, Sophia," he said.
I drove home with the phantom heat still burning on my neck.
---
I didn't sleep.
I lay in bed staring at the ceiling, replaying the moment against the tree over and over. The way his breath had felt on my skin. The way something inside me had tried to claw its way toward him.
At three in the morning, I grabbed my phone.
I typed before I could stop myself.
*I haven't slept. I keep thinking about the moment against the tree.*
I stared at the message. Watched the cursor blink.
Then I hit send.
My phone buzzed in under a minute.
*I haven't slept either. Different reason—I kept thinking about what I should have said instead of nothing.*
I read it three times.
Inside my chest, something pressed so hard against my ribs I had to sit up. Had to breathe through it.
I set the phone face-down on the nightstand.
I did not reply.
But I did not delete the message.
---
The next morning, Yareli cornered me in the hallway. She was holding her phone like a weapon.
"Sophia," she said. Too sweet. Too sharp. "Come look at this."
She turned the screen toward me.
It was a photo. Her and a man I'd never seen before. He was tall, broad-shouldered, with sandy hair and a cocky smile. His arm was around Yareli's waist. The caption read: *My Alpha ❤️ #AskvalePackPride #LuckyGirl*
"That's Travis," Yareli said. Watching my face. "My boyfriend. The one I've been telling you about."
I looked at the photo.
At the man who was not Greyson.
At the smile that was nothing like the one I'd seen across a steakhouse table.
The floor dropped out from under me.
"He's handsome, right?" Yareli was still talking. "We're going to the regional summit gala next month. He's introducing me to the Lycan Council representatives."
I couldn't breathe.
"Sophia?" Yareli's voice sharpened. "Are you okay? You look pale."
I shoved the phone back at her. Turned. Walked to my room on legs that didn't feel attached to my body.
I closed the door. Locked it. Sat on the edge of my bed.
Pulled out my phone with shaking hands.
Scrolled to the contact labeled *Travis*.
Stared at the name that wasn't his name.
At the lie I'd been living.
At the man I'd seduced who was not the man I'd intended to seduce.
Inside my chest, something howled.
I opened the message thread. Typed with fingers that were not quite steady.
*Who are you?*
I hit send.
Then I sat there in the dark, holding my phone, waiting for the world to end.
