Page 3 of Unbearable Attraction
LUKA
The screams hit Luka suddenly, cutting through the morning air with a terror that made his bear surge beneath his skin. He broke into a run before conscious thought caught up with instinct, his boots pounding against the gravel path as he raced toward the cemetery. Whatever had been pulling him in that direction was no longer a mystery—something was very, very wrong.
Supernatural tourists fled past him in the opposite direction, their faces pale with shock and fear. He recognized the werewolf pack from Asheville, their enhanced senses likely making whatever they'd encountered even more overwhelming. A young witch couple stumbled by, the woman sobbing as her partner half-carried her toward the parking area. Behind them, a fae photographer abandoned expensive equipment in his desperate flight from whatever horrors awaited in the old section of the cemetery.
But it was the nature of their terror that made Luka's instincts flare dangerously. This wasn't the clean fear of facing a known threat, this was the primal panic of encountering something that shouldn't exist, something that violated thenatural order so completely that even supernatural beings couldn't process it.
His bear roared to full alertness as he crested the small hill leading to the founding families' section. The sight that greeted him should have sent him fleeing with the others, should have triggered every survival instinct honed by twelve years of loss and hard-learned caution.
Instead, it stopped him cold.
Dozens of ethereal figures swirled through the morning mist, their forms shifting between solid and translucent as they moved among the ancient headstones. Spirits, more than he'd ever seen manifesting at once, their faces marked by centuries of sorrow and an anger that made the air itself feel heavy with accumulated grief. The very atmosphere pulsed with supernatural energy so intense it made his teeth ache and his bear pace restlessly behind his ribs.
And in the center of it all stood Leenah Carrow.
She was impossibly small against the backdrop of manifesting spirits, her dark hair whipping around her face as ethereal winds stirred by otherworldly presence caught the strands. But there was nothing fragile about her posture. She stood straight and calm, her bright blue eyes tracking the movement of spirits that would have terrified seasoned supernatural warriors. Her black cat crouched at her feet, fur bristled in warning but staying protectively close to her human rather than fleeing to safety.
Luka knew her, of course. Everyone in Hollow Oak knew Leenah Carrow, the town's resident ghost tour guide and amateur historian. He'd seen her around town for years, buying coffee at The Griddle & Grind, researching in The Hollow Oak Book Nook, leading groups of curious tourists through the cemetery with the kind of confident competence that spoke of genuine expertise. Their interactions had been limited to politenods and brief greetings. She'd always struck him as someone who valued her privacy as much as he valued his.
But seeing her now, facing down supernatural forces that would send most shifters running for the hills, something primal and possessive awakened in his chest. His bear responded with a recognition so deep it bypassed rational thought entirely, flooding his system with protective instincts that had nothing to do with his general duty to guard Hollow Oak and everything to do with the small, fearless woman standing calmly among swirling manifestations of the dead.
The spirits pressed closer to her, their ethereal voices creating a whispered chorus that raised goosebumps along his arms. He couldn't make out individual words, but the urgency in their tone was unmistakable. They wanted something from her—needed something from her—and the intensity of their desire was powerful enough to make reality itself bend around their collective will.
Leenah lifted one hand as if to touch the nearest spirit, her movements slow and deliberate. The manifestation of an elderly Native American woman whose traditional dress suggested she'd been dead for centuries reached back with fingers that flickered between solid and ethereal. When their hands would have met, light pulsed through the air between them, and Luka felt the protective wards around Hollow Oak shiver in response.
That was when her gaze found his across the cemetery.
Their eyes met, and the world narrowed to that single point of connection. Blue clashed with amber, and Luka felt something fundamental shift inside his chest. Not just attraction, though the way her chin lifted with quiet defiance sent heat pooling low in his belly, but recognition. As if his soul had been waiting his entire life to see exactly this: a woman brave enough to face the impossible, strong enough to stand unafraid in the face of forces that defied understanding.
His bear rumbled approval, a sound that vibrated through his chest with startling intensity.Mine, the animal seemed to say.Protect. Claim.
The logical part of his mind tried to assert control, reminding him that he barely knew this woman beyond casual greetings and professional reputation. But logic had no place in whatever was happening here. The spirits, the morning's strange magical disturbances, the way Leenah stood untouched in the center of supernatural chaos all felt like pieces of a puzzle clicking into place with inevitable precision.
A puzzle that put her directly in the path of forces he didn't understand.
Every alpha instinct he possessed screamed at him to move, to put himself between Leenah and whatever otherworldly threat surrounded her. The spirits might not be attacking—yet—but their presence was powerful enough to affect Hollow Oak's protective wards. If they decided she was a threat rather than whatever they currently saw her as, or if their manifestation attracted less benevolent supernatural attention, she'd be standing alone against forces that could tear her apart.
Luka approached slowly, his hands held visibly at his sides in what he hoped was a non-threatening gesture. The last thing he wanted was to startle the spirits into aggressive action, but staying back while Leenah faced unknown danger wasn't an option his bear would tolerate.
"Easy," he murmured, though he wasn't sure if the words were meant for the manifesting dead, for Leenah, or for his own increasingly agitated shifter nature. "Nobody needs to get hurt here."
The spirits turned toward him as one, their ancient eyes assessing his approach with expressions that ranged from curious to hostile. He could feel their attention like physical weight, pressing against his mental defenses withthe accumulated force of centuries. But underneath their initial suspicion, he sensed something else. Hope, perhaps, or desperate relief.
Whatever they wanted from Leenah, they seemed to approve of his presence. Or at least, they didn't see him as a threat to their purposes.
Leenah, however, looked significantly less pleased by his arrival. Her eyes narrowed as she took in his cautious approach, and he caught the faint tightening around her mouth that suggested she was about to say something sharp. Even surrounded by manifesting spirits, she managed to look irritated by what she obviously interpreted as an unwelcome rescue attempt.
The spirits began to fade as his presence shifted their attention, their ethereal forms becoming translucent once more before disappearing entirely. The sudden absence of their supernatural pressure left the cemetery feeling strangely empty, as if the morning itself had lost some essential vitality.
Leenah remained exactly where she was, chin lifted in quiet defiance and arms crossed over her chest in a posture that radiated independence and competence. Her cat continued to glare at him with mismatched eyes, as if blaming him for disrupting whatever communion had been taking place.
Luka stopped just outside arm's reach, close enough to intervene if needed but far enough away to avoid crowding her. His bear wanted him closer, wanted him to check for injuries, to wrap her in his arms and carry her somewhere safe, to eliminate any possibility of her facing such danger again. But the expression on her face suggested that any of those responses would be spectacularly unwelcome.
"Are you hurt?" he asked instead, keeping his voice low and calm despite the adrenaline still coursing through his system.
The question seemed to snap whatever patience she'd been holding onto. Her eyes flashed with something that might have been annoyance or might have been outright anger, and when she spoke, her tone carried the kind of sharp edge that suggested his instincts had been exactly as unwelcome as he'd feared.
He had the distinct feeling he was about to learn exactly what Leenah Carrow thought of unwanted rescue attempts, and judging by the set of her shoulders, it wasn't going to be a conversation that went well for him.
