Hunt Me! I Crave the Chase (Spooky Boys #3)

Blair’s eyes were wide and alarmed. “You know how I love guitar? And music?” I added.

“Yeah?” Blair kept staring at me. He was looking at me like he didn’t recognize who the fuck I was, and that was fair. I’d never actually let him know me.

“The part I hate the most about it is the fact I have to sing in front of other people. I only do it now to remind myself that it’s different. That I’m not a party trick anymore, and that I’m doing it on my own terms.”

“But you…” Blair shook his head. “But you always loved that shit. The parties. The medals. The—the—you know what I mean.”

“No,” I shook my head. “I didn’t love it. I don’t.” I bit my lip, and my heart hurt. “I just…I just wanted to survive, you know? And if I became who Lydia wanted me to be then she…” I trailed off.

“Then she?” Blair prompted.

“She would stop hurting you.”

“What the fuck.” Blair was shaking, and I was too. “What the actual fuck.” And then he was pulling me into an apple-scented hug, and his arms were wrapping tight around me—and I just…fuck. I could breathe again. “What the fuck.” He repeated a broken, jittery record.

“I hate baseball,” I admitted, unable to hug him back because it didn’t feel like I deserved it. “I hate parties.” I sucked in a breath. “And those baseball retreats Lydia and I always went to? Yeah. They weren’t fucking sports related.”

My heart hurt.

“Unless you count hunting monsters as a sport. Which I guess…some people probably do.”

“What—” Blair pulled back and I groaned, dragging a hand through my hair, my voice wobbling.

“Look. It’s probably easier if I just show you.”

So I grabbed the hem of my shirt, and even though I was terrified—yanked it up.

Blair stared at my torso like his brain had completely broken.

“What—” His hand hovered, like he wanted to touch the jagged myriad of scars on my skin, but didn’t know if it would hurt me. “Fuck.” He sucked in a breath, eyes wet, and I just… “Why didn’t you tell me?”

Fuck.

“Because it was my fault we were in that mess,” I said, voice cracking. “And I just…”

“No it wasn’t.” Blair shook his head, then pulled me into another awkward hug. “It wasn’t. It wasn’t your fucking fault.” The gear shift dug into my ribs but I ignored it.

This time I hugged back.

And it was good and right and warm.

“I don’t think I ever felt safe a day in my life,” I admitted, one last final truth, “Until I met Mutt.”

Blair shook as he squeezed me closer. We were a jittery, quivery mess.

And then we both jerked away at the same time—because that was enough of that—and coughed awkwardly. “Okay, so.” My cheeks were still hot, my shirt officially back into place. “Boys?”

“Boys,” he agreed for the second time that day.

Apparently Blair’s advice for dating men was to:

“Get sloppy when you give head.”

“Care about what they have to say.”

“Use a lot of tongue.”

Advice one and three were pretty much the same fucking thing—and self-explanatory, so they didn’t really help. He did, however, give me some solid date ideas. And after I’d told him how obsessed with Disney movies Mutt was—Lady and the Tramp in particular—we came up with the most genius idea for a first official date.