The Lone Shifter: A Mount Edge Shifter Romance

by Sara Summers

  “You knew too.” My voice sounded harsh even to my own ears.

  “I did.” Dad’s head bobbed. “Stetson, can you take Kina home?” he turned to my brother.

  An image of Stetson in the car with Kina, his hand on that strip of skin I’d wanted to touch so badly, filled my mind. Even knowing how unrealistic it was, I couldn’t take the idea of them together.

  “No. I’ll take her.”

  They stared at me for a long second.

  “Rhett, your soulmate is… delicate. She’s asked not to be around you, and for the sake of her health, we’d better listen.”

  “It’s fine, bro. I’ll make sure she gets home safe.” Stetson’s hand found my shoulder and squeezed. I pushed him off, that image of his hand on Kina’s thigh lingering in my mind. If I didn’t get out of there, I’d be punching my brother the way Kina had punched the guy waiting outside her meeting.

  “She’s my soulmate.” My hands were shaking, so was my voice. “I’m taking her.”

  I left before either of them could argue further, my mind spinning with one thought.

  The last time I’d driven Kina anywhere had been when I took her to the doctor’s office.

  KINA

  “You need to get it checked out.” Kennedy said, for at least the fifth time.

  “I’ve broken bones before, and this doesn’t feel broken.” I said, for at least the fifth time.

  Kennedy sighed.

  “If it doesn’t look better by Monday, I’m taking you to the doctor.”

  I nodded. It was the only way the discussion would end. Kennedy knew that she was the only person in the world who was looking out for me, and I knew it too. Letting her have a say made us both feel better.

  My eyes, the traitors, followed Rhett as he walked away from his dad and Stetson and Perky McPerk, as I’d taken to calling the YouTube girl in my mind. Her name—Isla Mae—was just as perky as the rest of her, and I hated perk. The keys he held so tightly told me exactly what his intentions were.

  “He’s not driving me home.”

  It wasn’t a question; I wouldn’t be getting back in the car with Rhett, no matter how many times he asked or begged or tried to force me.

  “I know.” Kennedy brushed a strand of her hair behind her ear as her lips pressed together in a thin line. Everyone always told us that we looked similar, as if I really was her daughter. Our hair was nearly the exact same shade and length, and we styled it similarly. Our bodies were shaped the same, built more on the strong side than slim.

  The only real difference between us was that I was short and she was tall, but the heeled boots I typically wore made up for that a little.

  She was in a hard position when it came to me and Rhett. Loving us both, she tried to find a way not to choose sides. We had made it easy by staying away from each other and I rarely brought him up, but I knew she struggled deciding how to approach it.

  “I’m taking you home.” Rhett told me as he approached.

  Kennedy opened her mouth to say something, but I didn’t want her to have to take a side.

  “I’m taking myself home. You can come pick up your car later.”

  I plucked the keys from his hand, not giving him time to argue before I spun and headed to his fancy silver car.

  Rhett went to follow me, but I heard Kennedy say,

  “Leave it.”

  I didn’t want to hear my soulmate yell at my favorite person in the world for keeping it a secret that she had become my mother too, so I pulled away quickly.

  Anxiety ate at my stomach while familiar feelings rushed back. I’d been out of control, in pain, abandoned, hurt, and alone.

  “I am not my feelings.” I repeated my mantra out loud, hoping that would dispel the pain. “I chose to walk away from him this time, and I am not my feelings.”

  I managed to calm myself a little bit, though my body yearned for an escape. The only escape I knew was through the drugs and alcohol that had nearly taken my life, and even though they weren’t a resolution, I wanted them.

  My fingers shook as I picked up my phone, sending a text into the group chat for the rest of the regulars at my meetings.

  Me: Can anyone meet me in forty-five minutes?

  I didn’t have to say why, or what we were meeting for. They knew; we always knew. It didn’t matter how long it had been, we knew.

  My phone vibrated a dozen times in the cup holder, but my attention was firmly taken by the three men in front of the door to my apartment. One of them had a black eye with bruises that lined up perfectly with my fist.

  Panic filled me and my breathing picked up again. What had I been thinking?

  Okay, I knew exactly what I’d been thinking, I just should’ve thought about it a little longer. Making an enemy out of Josh was a terrible idea. As the biggest dealer in Edge Valley, he had plenty of power and even more money. We’d grown up in foster care together too, so he’d already hated me even before I punched him in the face.

  Briefly, I considered pulling out of the parking lot and calling Kennedy. It’s what I would’ve done had I not just seen Rhett, but after that drive with him I knew I couldn’t call her. She was his mom too, and I couldn’t handle any more time alone with him.

  So I got out of the car, dropping the keys on the front seat and locking them inside with the button on the door. Rhett’s car was an expensive one, and Josh and his goons would definitely try to take it if they had the chance.

  I wasn’t against letting Rhett’s car get stolen, but if it did I would have to see him again. That, I was against. Since Josh and his goons wouldn’t be willing to get caught breaking into a Maserati, locking the keys inside was about as safe as not bringing the car near them.

  “Nice ride.” Josh sneered.

  “Nice face.” I shot back. The black eye I’d given him was swollen and undoubtedly painful, which made me feel better than it probably should have.

  I probably shouldn’t have said that.

  One of Josh’s goons swung at me, and I did what any girl who’d grown up fighting would do.

  I ducked, and then I slammed my knee into his groin with every ounce of strength I had.

  The goon collapsed to the ground, and the side of Josh’s mouth lifted.

  “You haven’t changed much.”

  “Neither have you.” I folded my arms, forcing myself to look confident despite the way my heart thudded in my chest. “Stay away from my group.”

  “Tomorrow, you’ll be begging me to come back.” Josh smirked. He gestured to his buddy, and the next instant they each had a hold of Fone of my arms. I tried to scream, but the goon I hadn’t incapacitated had his hand over my mouth so hard it would leave a bruise.

  “I can take a punch, but I don’t appreciate you taking my customers away. When the rest of them watch you fall apart, they’ll come back.”

  My heart sank when what he said clicked. I was the one who had started the Narcotics Anonymous branch in Edge Valley, and I was the reason it ran the way it did. If he injected me, I would fall apart the same way I had the first time I took the drug. Everyone who went to my meetings would hear what had happened, and some of them would lose hope that they could change.

  There was a sting as the needle entered my arm, and I closed my eyes as the drug entered my body. Calm bliss flooded my system, and I stopped fighting.

  I didn’t have to ask what Josh had given me; he and I both knew that heroin was my drug of choice.

  “You know where to find me when you need more.”

  Josh and both of his goons left me, and I fell back against the wall of the building.

  Something inside me screamed that it wasn’t real, that it was just the drug, but I didn’t care. It was the release I’d wanted, the high I’d needed, and I hoped I’d never come down from it.

  When the rush faded a few minutes later, I peeled myself off the wall with a contented smile on my face. I wanted to shift and go for a swim in otter form, or to just lay down in one of the hammocks in the
park near the school. When I tried to leave to do those things, I realized that I’d locked my purse and phone in the car with the keys.

  Wandering Edge Valley suddenly sounded like the best idea on the planet.

  RHETT

  “What do you mean, she didn’t show up?” my mom spoke quietly into the phone, but I’d been tuned-in to her since Kina drove away in my car. “She scheduled a meeting and she isn’t there? Where is she?”

  I’d been trying to get information out of my parents through the entire luncheon, but they hadn’t let a single thing slip. Stetson hadn’t been any more helpful than the two of them.

  My stomach clenched, and I closed my eyes. In the years Kina and I had spent apart, the GPS in my mind that led me to her had developed into something much stronger. When I’d first found her I’d only known which direction I had to go to get to her, like I was a fish stuck on some sort of reel that she used to constantly pull me in.

  Months after we split up, I’d closed my eyes to go to sleep and I’d seen through her eyes. I’d seen where she was, who she was with, and what she was doing. At first it was only once a week or so, but it had gotten to the point where every time I tried to fall asleep I saw through her eyes. I hadn’t slept in years, because I could only sleep when she was asleep and she didn’t sleep much.

  That ability had only grown stronger with time, and eventually I was able to see through her eyes any time I closed mine and thought about her. She was typically in her apartment working on something with her hands or inside the ice cream shop she worked in.

  With my eyes shut, I focused on the mental image of my soulmate that had lingered long after she left. When her vision took over mine, I saw her wandering down the sidewalk next to some bakery. She was laughing like a maniac, talking to some guy who looked at her like she was the sexiest thing on the planet.

  Which she was.

  Jealousy flared in me, and I opened my eyes. She was fine.

  “She’s not answering her phone.” Mom whispered to dad. She tapped her phone screen a few times. “It says she’s at home, but if she’s at home then why isn’t she answering her phone?”

  “She might’ve forgotten it. She’s probably on her way to the meeting right now.” Dad assured her, rubbing his hand over her back.

  Mom nodded and leaned into him, but she still looked troubled.

  Anger flashed through me. She had my parents worrying for no reason so she could spend time with some guy? What was wrong with her?

  I shook it off and went back to eating.

  Fifteen minutes later, I was leaning up against the wall, avoiding the dance floor when my mom brought it up again. She was a few feet to the side of me, and I could feel her eyes on me.

  “I shouldn’t ask, should I?” She whispered to dad.

  “If she’s in trouble, he’s the only one who can find her.” Dad reminded her. “Just ask him.”

  “I should’ve gone with her.” Mom moaned, hugging dad tightly. I shut my eyes to check on her again, and yep, she was still on her date.

  “Kina is fine. She’s on a date, walking around Edge Valley.” I turned to leave.

  My mom grabbed my arm, stopping me before I could go.

  “Where is she, exactly?” She demanded.

  “In front of a bakery.”

  “Which bakery?”

  Dad started rounding up my brothers, pulling them off the dance floor and away from the dessert table.

  “Edge Bakery, Brooke’s place.” I turned to leave, but she grabbed my arm again. “I can’t do this, mom. It hurts too much.”

  When I met her eyes, I was surprised to see the fear in them.

  “Get over it. Kina swore away relationships after you left her, so the only reason she would have left her phone behind and gone out with someone is if she relapsed. She’s your soulmate, she should mean everything to you!” My mom’s voice rose as she spoke, and I’d never seen her so angry in all of the twenty-one years of my life.

  “She does!” I snarled, my body tensing at the idea of not caring about my soulmate. “I’ve left her alone for her own good.”

  Even while I yelled, my mind spun to put together the pieces of Kina’s story that I’d picked up over the past few hours. She ran meetings for addicts, she’d punched someone for trying to sell to her group, she might have relapsed…

  “She’s a druggie?”

  “In recovery for two and a half years.” Dad stepped in. “We need to go find her, and it will go faster if you help. Are you coming?”

  I nodded once, my fists clenched at my sides.

  “Let’s go.”

  My dad took a few of my brothers—there were eight of us total—and swung by her apartment while my mom, Stetson, and I climbed into his truck and hit the road.

  “Which drug?”

  My mom said,

  “You don’t need to worry about it,”

  At the same time Stetson said,

  “Dope.”

  “She’s into heroin?” my body flushed. How had I not known that my soulmate was an addict? I’d been looking through her eyes for years.

  “She’s not into it anymore.” Mom’s voice was clipped, and she shot Stetson a murderous look. “She runs the Edge Valley NA sector, which is mostly full of students around your ages who have been or still are addicted to drugs too.”

  “How?” I ran a hand through my hair, dread flooding through me. How could I have let her get into drugs? If I’d known, I would’ve gone back to her, found a way to help her through it.

  Mom and Stetson spoke at the same time again, mom saying,

  “That doesn’t matter.” At the same time Stetson said,

  “She was a foster kid with Edge Valley’s biggest dealer. He followed her here because he hates her, and he’s the guy she got arrested for decking. When you left her right before graduation, she went to him. He got her hooked on it and—“

  “That’s enough.” My mom’s voice was sharp, and her eyes pierced into Stetson. “Kina will tell Rhett her story if she chooses to. As soon as you’ve lived it you can make that decision. Until then, you don’t say a word.”

  “She’s his soulmate.” Stetson protested, though he stopped telling the story.

  “And he chose to leave her.”

  The way my mom said it was like a knife in my gut.

  “Turn here.” I butted into the conversation, leading them toward the woman I’d had to fight to stay away from for three years.

  While I wanted to know whatever my mom and Stetson weren’t telling me, it was more important to get to Kina and make sure she was okay.

  I shut my eyes and let my mind find her. As soon as I saw through her eyes, my body went rigid. The guy was leading her into an apartment building, his hand underneath her shirt and running over the bare skin at her waist.

  “Hurry.” I ground out the word.

  Stetson pushed down harder on the gas.

  When we were getting close, I closed my eyes again and focused on my soulmate.

  She was on top of the guy she’d been with earlier, both of their tops off while they made out on a mattress. He was on his back underneath her, his hands reaching toward the lacy band on the back of her bra.

  “Turn here.” I snarled. We were getting close, but I didn’t know if we’d make it in time.

  “What’s wrong?” mom demanded, and I didn’t have to open my eyes to see how terrified she was.

  “He sees through her eyes sometimes. Thinks the mental GPS evolved after so much time staying away from his soulmate.” Stetson explained quickly. “What’s she doing?”

  I ignored the question, directing him to Kina.

  My eyes opened when I felt us close enough, and I yelled for him to stop.

  Stetson was out of the car in an instant, and I yanked the lever that controlled his seat before I threw myself out of the door and bolted toward my soulmate.

  I rammed the door of the apartment I knew she was in, and when it didn’t budge the first time, Stetson
rammed it and it flew open.

  He was getting up off the floor while I stormed into the bedroom. Kina’s bra hadn’t come off yet, thankfully. She gawked when I entered the room, and when I yanked her off of him and set her on her feet, she teetered.

  My fist hit the guy’s face, and I didn’t hold back. I punched him while my mom pulled Kina into her arms, neither of them reacting to the blood and violence. Stetson yanked me off of the guy and held me down.

  Blood pounded in my head and chest as my breathing slowed, and I turned to make sure my soulmate was fine. She was staring at the wall with a vacant look in her eyes while my mom helped her back into the bloodstained sweater.

  “What happened, Kina?” My mom’s voice was softer than I’d ever heard it.

  “Josh stuck me to get back at me for punching him.” She said, though a smile curled her lips.

  “Who is this?” mom prodded, gesturing to the guy I’d pummeled. He was fine; I hadn’t hurt him that badly.

  “Don’t know, but he looks like Rhett.” Kina sighed dreamily.

  My body stiffened, and I looked back to him, the urge to hit him again coming at me like a ton of bricks.

  “Doesn’t kiss as well as him though.” She admitted, leaning up against my mom.

  That relaxed me a little.

  Stetson and my mom exchanged glances.

  “Let’s get you home.”

  RHETT

  When we got to Kina’s apartment, my dad and brothers had already broken into my car and carried her bag inside. I tried to help her out of the car, but my mom blocked me and Stetson took my place. Had they been anyone other than my mom and brother, I would’ve decked both of them to take my place at my soulmate’s side.

  “You need to go home.” Mom didn’t beat around the bush, blocking me again as I reached the stairs that Stetson and Kina were approaching.