Page 57 of So I Fell for Bigfoot

“He’ll be furry soon enough. He spends every winter that way. And to be honest, I’m not sure you’ve given him a chance to be human.”

“No, probably not.”

“He’s been on our turf the whole time. Staying at HQ. Going to the concert. Marissa and Tina have been working closely with him to make this next date special.”

“I’m not sure he’s ever been with a woman when he’s human.”

Bibi gave me a wicked grin. “Well, aren’t you the perfect person to show him the ropes? Well, maybe not ropes, unless that’s something that excites you…”

The thought of Lars tying me up made my lady parts tingle. But when I pictured it, he was in his natural form, and we were in that room high above the mountain, the one that overlooked the valley, leaving us totally vulnerable. If only if I’d known what dangers had awaited us the first time I was with him there.

“I’ll miss his tail,” I said.

She cocked a purple brow. “So that part wasn’t made up for the online story?”

“Not even a little bit.”

Lars’s tail wasn’t much more than a nub most of the time. But it expanded when he was aroused, and it was fucking magical. Every pun intended. I’d never come so hard in my life, and it left me totally ready for his massive cock.

Which surely was still magnificent, but…human.

“What else is different about him as a human?” Bibi asked.

“He’s so chill.” I laughed. “When he’s in his natural form, there’s this element of danger about him that is so freaking hot. Don’t get me wrong, he’s gorgeous, but he’s such a cinnamon roll.”

“I think we’ll have our fill of danger soon enough, no matter what form he’s in.” Bibi rose from the table. “We have a meeting at the library this morning with Laura and Wendy. They’ve been researching Leif’s claim that Armand plans on resurrecting their ancient pack. He’s adapted well to modern life, but I have a feeling that he’ll rely on ancient, forgotten practices to pull off his plan.”

A chill went down my spine. “I’m really worried about the girls, Beebs. There’s no reason for them to be blowing me off. We’ve got to get them away from those wolves.”

“Agreed. But first, we need to find out exactly what those wolves are up to if we want to have a chance of stopping them. I can’t imagine what will happen if a bunch of ancient shifters descend on Sunset Springs. Especially with all those camera crews in town.” She shuddered. “Are you ready to go? I think we should stop at the Mercantile for one of those fancy fruit drinks Gretta makes.”

Armed with a blueberry beet juice that neutralized all my late-night cookie dough sins, we arrived at the library. The building was tiny, but full of energy. Laura had made it the hub of the village with story hour for the ever-growing legion of littles in the area, steamy shifter story night for the ladies of the pack, and the biggest collection of shifter history books in the West. Laura had often lamented that the pack hadn’t seemed all that interested in the tomes of their ancestors, but those texts had been getting plenty of action since the discovery of the Hudaknocker, and even more so with Armand in the mix.

“Ironic but delicious choice of drinks,” Wendy said as she accepted her beet juice. “Okay, so we don’t have any texts that go back to the time of Leif’s rule. They had written language then, but it’s not comparable to anything we have now, and we’re hoping to find an expert that can help us decipher. Laura’s been looking through some of the spell books that are a little more recent.”

Laura looked up from the ancient grimoire she’d been poring over. “Nothing else about this is modern. But it’s fascinating. There were some rituals that involved blood. The ancient shifter packs believed it was a way to pass wisdom and strength from the elders to the younger generations.”

“Oh.” Bibi put her fingers to her lips. “How much blood?”

“Very little.” Laura smiled as everyone sighed with relief. “Just a few drops were put in with an herbal elixir. It was served over a fire, and there was a ceremony built around it. It actually seems like a beautiful changing of the guard type of thing.”

“But those drinks were ceremonial, and given to healthy, able-bodied shifters,” I said. At least, that was how I understood it. “They weren’t trying to resurrect long-dead shifters.”

“Some of these texts do allude to shifters being immortal at one time.” Laura ran her fingers along the edge of the page. It looked thick, not like paper. “And the curse that took that away from them. If they’re talking about Lars’s brother in these texts, they probably wouldn’t want to come face to face with him, even if it did mean a second chance at life.”

My heart sank. That meant if Armand succeeded, those ancient beasts probably wouldn’t be too happy to see Lars, either.

If he’d even been a fraction as awful as his brother back in the day, he’d made a massive turnaround. And here I was thinking he was too nice. There was something to be said by not being hated for all of eternity.

The library door swung open, and Marissa appeared in the doorway. “You probably want to check social media, because the hunters caught Leif on video abducting another hunter. Of course, they think he’s Lars, and everyone wants answers. Now.”

twenty-six

Bibi

The footage didn’t lie. Someone had clearly captured Leif red-handed, or fur-handed in this case, with a hunter in his grasp. He roared at the horrified onlookers while the hunter pleaded for his life, and then disappeared into the mountains.

My stomach churned every time I watched the video. Hoping for a different outcome was completely futile.

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