Zane (Keepers Of The Lake Book 6)

by Emilia Hartley

  Zane

  Keepers of the Lake

  Emilia Hartley

  All rights reserved.

  This is a work of fiction. All characters, places, businesses and incidents are from the author’s imagination, or they are used fictitiously and are definitely fictionalized. Any trademarks or pictures herein are not authorized by the trademark owners and do not in any way mean the work is sponsored by or associated with the trademark owners. Any trademarks or pictures used are specifically in a descriptive capacity.

  Emilia Hartley © Copyright 2021

  Contents

  Emilia’s Heartlies

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  Chapter 13

  Chapter 14

  Chapter 15

  Chapter 16

  Chapter 17

  Coming Soon!

  More By Emilia Hartley

  Thank you!

  Emilia’s Heartlies

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  1

  Chelsea Montrose’s hands shook.

  There had been a time when she wistfully gazed at the gleaming lake and marveled at its sapphire beauty. Even when storms swept in and made it a calamitous mess, her wonder never faded. Her favorite was in the depths of winter when great waves would freeze, leaving walls of ice over the guardrails of roads that crept too close.

  What had been a source of wonder was now a source of fear.

  She could still feel the way the water crashed over her head, the powerlessness that consumed her as it dragged her away, and the horrible finality of it all when she realized she might die. Now, liquor sang in her veins. It made her a bit bold and dumb, numbing her terror.

  She bent at the waist and unleashed a scream. Her feet sunk into the sand as she stomped closer to the waves. That day seemed to spark the change that again ruined life as she knew it. Chelsea hated this lake. She hated the monster that lived in it and how she’d lost her only friend.

  The day the great wave hit the beach was the day that Asher Knuden made off with Zara. Chelsea didn’t mourn what could have been with Asher. She grieved for the friend that up and left her, vanishing into what felt like a whole other world. Chelsea had hardly seen her old roommate since Asher arrived with a fancy new car.

  All Chelsea wanted was to not be alone. Yet, the world seemed determined to abandon her.

  Hopping onto a rock sticking out of the shallow water, she shouted at the lake again.

  “Well? What do you have to say for yourself? Are you happy that you keep mucking up my life? Or do you want me to throw myself into the lake and let you have me?” She was belligerent.

  Any moment, someone would come by, tuck her into a police cruiser, and safely escort her home. There would be no fuss since it was now October, and no one was on the beach or swimming in the water. Had she done this a month ago and the authorities caught her, her trip would be to a holding cell.

  Not that she’d ever ended up in one. Chelsea usually knew when to stop drinking. Grief overwhelmed her today, and all she wanted to do was drown it out. Over and over, she strove to feel something other than empty, and every time she bothered, the world seemed to slap the back of her hand in reproach. Like it was trying to say that she couldn’t have it.

  “I can have whatever I want,” she screamed at the lake.

  The water lapped over the stone. It became slick. She leaned too far forward, and her toes caught the algae covered surface. Chelsea let out a yelp as she tumbled.

  But she didn’t hit the water.

  “You should be more careful,” a deep male voice warned her.

  She tilted her head back and found the sexiest man she’d ever encountered. There was a white streak in his dark hair. It tumbled to his shoulders and fluttered in the wind like the breeze was a lover raking its fingers through the soft locks. His eyes were every shade of blue she could have ever imagined. She sank into them, drowning.

  He lifted her from the rock and turned away from the lake. Away from the water’s edge, he set her on her feet and backed up.

  Chelsea balked. “You are buck naked.”

  He glanced down at himself and then shrugged, as if it meant nothing. “That seems to be my state of being, yes.”

  Her head spun. A naked man, albeit an unimaginably sexy naked man, just saved her from falling into the damned lake. She was either so drunk that she was imagining things, or this was the strangest day of her life. Considering the fact that she wasn’t the creative type, she settled for the second.

  This was very real and very strange. Were she sober, she would have checked out. Instead, her drunk haze was settling into a soft buzz. She gave Mr. Sexy and Naked a sly grin and sauntered up to him, trailing a fingertip over his chest.

  Holy hell, those pec muscles are firm!

  Her thoughts held her captive, and she stared at his chest for a moment too long. He reached up and took her hand in his. His touch was warm and real and all the things she longed for but could never find.

  A soft whimper tried to crawl out of her throat, but she held it back. She wouldn’t let her heart claim this strange man. She didn’t know a damn thing about him. Just because his touch—on her hand—made her feel things she’d thought lost, didn’t mean she could keep him. He could be a serial killer for all she knew. Maybe he was naked because he had to ditch his blood-covered clothes.

  Ugh, Chelsea thought to herself. I need to stop listening to true crime podcasts. They’re rotting my brain.

  When she finally drew her gaze upward, she found him watching her with an intensity that stole her breath. The dark depths of his eyes swirled like a whirlpool. The corner of his mouth quirked, and his nostrils flared.

  Did he just…sniff her?

  “I’ve been waiting ten years for you,” he whispered. The low and rumbling tone of his voice found its way into her chest.

  It made her breath hitch and her heart flutter.

  She shook herself and lurched out of his grasp. Her hand was still warm from his touch, a sensation that faded with each passing second. Confusion prickled her mind.

  “Only my mate could set me free from that fucking trap.” He glanced back at the lake and quickly raised a middle finger salute. When he turned back to her, he was almost glowing. His grin split wide, and he rushed up to her.

  Chelsea stumbled back, raising her hands to ward him off. “I don’t know who you are or what you think happened here, but I’m going to walk my drunk ass home and you’re not going to follow me. Got it?”

  His joy faltered. The glow surrounding him dimmed a bit. She immediately regretted her words, but then reminded herself that she didn’t know this guy. He came out of nowhere. It would have been one thing if she met him in a bar, where they were both looking for the same one-night hookup, but this was very different. And he had no clothes!

  Not a stitch of clothing.

  Her gaze dropped lower. Immediately, her cheeks reddened. He was most certainly a shower. There was no way he could get any bigger. If he did…well, that would be an interesting experience. One she wasn’t sure she was up for.

  “Alright, dude. I’m going to…” She glanced around and found the trail that led back to civilization. “I’m going to fuck off in this d
irection. See you never.”

  She stumbled in the direction of the parking lot, words swirling through her mind. Someone had used the word mate, once. She knew she’d heard it before but couldn’t figure out where in her buzzed state.

  Running her hands over her face, she cursed herself for day drinking. It was a horrible idea that led to her screaming at the lake and running into naked men. Okay, the naked men thing was pretty par for the course when it came to her. Chelsea wasn’t into relationships.

  Not unless they included a massive diamond ring and the kind of allowance that would let her buy anything. That was all Chelsea needed in life. Her heart didn’t matter. She’d learned long ago that her heart wanted assholes and dirtbags, the kind of men who would promise the world when they were in her bed. They were also the kind of men who were busy promising other women the world when they should be at work.

  In the parking lot, she screamed and kicked a truck’s tire. She hoped it was Mr. Fucking-Weird-and-Naked’s truck. It was his fault that she was thinking about her ex-husband at all. She’d wiped her past from her mind, one drink at a time, and it all came rushing back the moment she considered listening to her heart again.

  Her heart was dumb and wrong, and she would never have faith in it.

  Ever again.

  Zane Thompson didn’t quite have his land legs yet. He couldn’t run after his mate. Frustrated, he forced his body to obey him. It resulted in a halting and stiff gait, nothing like the run he wanted.

  He hadn’t even gotten her name.

  There was no question about it, though. Her return had broken the curse keeping him asleep. His nightmares beneath the lake haunted him in this unfamiliar waking state, but when he laid eyes on the blonde screaming over the water, everything else fell away. She nearly tripped and fell. He’d moved faster than he thought possible to catch her.

  It seemed his body would only respond if she was in danger. Storming away didn’t count, apparently. He followed, but found the parking lot empty. Had this parking lot always been here? Zane took in his changed surroundings. The town he once knew had grown up.

  He leaned and peered into the side mirror of a nearby truck. He, too, had grown up. Ten years carved furrows into his brow and painted a splash of white into his hairline. It wasn’t that he was ancient, or even old. It was the price of the curse that had befallen him. The way his brow had been folded while the nightmares plagued him. The bit of his soul that it had stolen in those long ten years.

  He straightened, caught his reflection in the cherry red paint of the truck, and scowled once again. Thankfully, there was a pile of clothes in the truck bed. Work clothes, he reckoned. The truck’s owner was a smaller man than Zane, so when the clothes proved to be a bit too tight, Zane left the front of the flannel shirt and the top button of the jeans open.

  Zane needed to find the blonde. If he couldn’t reconnect with her, he feared the spell would try to trap him back in the lake. He wasn’t a fearful man. The spell had empowered him in a strange way. He knew that he was capable of much more than the typical dragon shifter. Yet, the prospects of returning to the enchanted slumber threatened to shake him.

  He sniffed the air. The world smelled of burnt gas, hot metal, and coffee. Underneath it all, he caught the scent of gardenias and vodka. That was his mate.

  Why was she drinking, though? What horrid thoughts plagued her mind? He’d found her screaming at the lake. Her voice would have rendered her throat raw if he let her go on any longer.

  The faint memory of people floating in the water came to the front of his mind. He could see them suspended, turned upside down, and backlit by the bright sun above. Bottles of sunscreen, soaked beach towels, and broken sunglasses drifted between them. Among them, he glimpsed her face. His mate.

  Panic had pinched her features. Had that been real? He assumed everything that happened beneath the water had been one long nightmare. The trap meant for Alistair Webster had taken Zane instead. It was a prison, meant for penance. Zane assumed his nightmares were a part of the punishment, not a reality.

  That meant…Alistair had returned.

  Zane growled. The clan had come back only to welcome Alistair back into their ranks. They protected a monster. Zane should have known better when they started to return. The clan could not exist without Alistair.

  It was up to Zane to take Alistair down. His old friends had betrayed him. They must have been working with the witch all along. It was everyone against Zane if they were following Alistair. The monster needed to be stopped before he unleashed the clan on this unsuspecting town.

  His priority should be hunting down the clan and ending them. It was a risk to let them keep working alongside Alistair, yet the beast in Zane had other ideas. It directed him toward the scent of gardenias and vodka.

  2

  Chelsea went home and promptly threw out all her liquor. Cheap, ten-dollar bottles glugged as the alcohol bite made the air bitter. She wrinkled her nose. It was time for her to stop drinking. It was leading her to strange places. She knew she was lucky every time she went home with a guy she met at a bar and lived to see the next morning.

  Someday, that luck would run out.

  Hell, she was lucky the serial killer at the beach didn’t finish her off. To her surprise, he saved her from the thing she feared. He carried her away from the lake and held her like something precious. Even the way he set her back on her feet was gentle.

  Chelsea ransacked her brain, trying to remember who else mentioned the word mate. She knew someone had, but she couldn’t recall exactly who said it. The silence of the empty apartment didn’t help, either. Her ears rang. She had filled her life with so much sound that whenever she was alone, it was nearly suffocating.

  She spun on her heel, leaving the bottle perched in the drain, and reached for a Bluetooth speaker on the shelf. It connected to her ancient phone and began rattling on the metal rack. Music blared, filling the empty spaces. Chelsea felt like she could breathe again.

  What was she going to do?

  No one had answered her ad for a new roommate. Zara’s room was empty. All that was left were a few pencil sketches still taped to the wall, the only reminder that Zara had lived there at all. Chelsea wanted to huddle on the couch with her friend and demolish a box of oatmeal cream sandwich cookies. She wanted to tell Zara about the strange guy she met by the lake and how she still couldn’t stop thinking about him.

  With a deeply resigned sigh, Chelsea stepped back to the sink. The bottle in the drain was empty now. After hoisting it out, she happened to glance out the window and glimpsed someone climbing the front steps of the porch. Her heart rate quickened.

  Even with clothes on, there was no mistaking who that was.

  Naked-Guy had found her.

  She chucked the bottle into the bin, uncaring because they were all plastic and couldn’t smash against each other like the more expensive glass bottles.

  When she opened the front door, his head was slightly tilted, and she swore he was sniffing the air again. This time, he was dressed. Though, the clothes didn’t look like they fit him all that well. She could have sworn they belonged to someone else. The sleeves of the flannel shirt were straining over his arms. He hadn’t even tried buttoning it.

  The top button of his jeans was open, too. Not for dramatic effect, but because she suspected he couldn’t get it closed.

  What was his story?

  “Did you go skinny dipping and lose your own clothes? Who did you steal that awful outfit from?” She crossed her arms over her chest and leaned on the doorjamb. There was still a screen door between them, and it gave her a false sense of courage. The fraying screen would do nothing to stop him from forcing his way inside if he wanted to.

  “I told you,” he began. “We’re meant to be together. You can’t avoid me forever.”

  His closeness drew her into him, his heat inviting her. She wondered, absentmindedly, what his hair would feel like if she reached up and brushed the white lock away
from his face or the face he would make if she let her fingers trail down his cheek. Hunger pinched her stomach. No, it was lower. Heat unfurled in her core, so intense she nearly gasped.

  This was ten kinds of wrong.

  She raised a brow. “I’ve heard that line before. It doesn’t mean forever.”

  He scowled at her, his eyes seeing past her. No, not past her. They saw into her, delving into the pain she must have let show in that split second. She shut it down, stepped back, and slammed the door in his face.

  What kind of nonsense was this? Why was this guy stalking her? She knew her luck had to be running out, but she thought she’d been successful in avoiding creeps, and now that she was going sober, she wouldn’t risk the chance of running into one. It seemed she already had, and he’d taken a liking to her.

  This creep was mind-bogglingly sexy, though. She guessed if she was going to run into one eventually, she’d found the hottest one.

  He didn’t try to push into her house like she thought. He didn’t move to the windows and try to peer inside, either. The creep claimed a creaky chair on the porch and settled down. Chelsea waited on the other side, her heart thundering in her chest, and debated going outside.

  She yearned for a drink, another dose of false courage, but her scalp was already tight and making her head throb. She needed a glass of water. At her age, she needed to drink four glasses of water for every sip of liquor. Snatching a glass from the cupboard, she filled it with water from the sink while the aroma of alcohol in the air made her head spin.