Chapter Text
Billy
The moon was bright that night, a perfect silver coin cast against an endless stretch of a dark, blue night sky. Not a single cloud drifted to obscure its glow, leaving the world beneath it bathed in pale, ghostly light. The wind cut through my raven hair as I ran, my bare feet whispering over the cool, damp earth. Each breath I took carried the scent of pine, wet moss, and the distant brine of the ocean. This was home. The wildness. The solitude.
I wasn’t running from anything—not exactly. I loved my pack, but I craved moments like this, where my thoughts were mine alone. No shared consciousness, no voices bleeding into my own. Just me, the night, and the rhythmic pounding of my heartbeat against my ribs.
The trees thinned as I neared Incinerator Rock. The cliffs stood tall and proud, their jagged edges softened by centuries of wind and waves. This was where the boys of the tribe took their leap, proving themselves to the pack. A rite of passage. The night I jumped, I’d been fearless, adrenaline flooding my veins as I plummeted into the abyss. I still remembered the way the cold water had swallowed me whole, the way my lungs had burned as I fought for the surface, emerging victorious, baptized by the sea.
Tonight, though, the tide was too low. The jagged teeth of the rocks below were bared, waiting.
I exhaled, long and slow, closing my eyes to hold onto the memory a little longer. But just as I let the breath go, something snapped. A twig.
My muscles tensed as I whipped around, heart hammering. No one should have followed me here. My instincts, honed by years of hunting, screamed at me.
Then I saw her.
She was pale, unnaturally so, as if the moonlight had seeped into her skin and never left. Her black eyes were soulless pits, a predator’s gaze locked onto me. Her lips, thin and bloodless, curled into a tight grin. Her hair, fire red and unruly with curls, rippled unnaturally in the still night air. Had she been watching me? Following me?
Before I could react, she was there—too close, too fast. Her breath was ice against my skin, her touch colder still. Then, with a cruel smile, she pressed her lips to mine. A parody of a kiss.
And then—
I was airborne.
Falling.
The wind roared in my ears, the rocks rushed toward me. My body twisted, bracing for impact, but there was no time—
And then, nothing.
No water, no pain, no breath.
When people ask me what I remember from that night, I tell them the truth.
Nothing.
Nothing except that damn mustache.
Charlie
“Hey, Charlie!” Sheriff Harris called from his desk. “Head down to the res for me, would ya? Got a report about some shifty figures.”
I looked up from the paperwork in front of me, my coffee long gone cold. I wasn’t one to question orders—not yet, anyway. “Alright,” I said, pushing back my chair and tightening my belt.
Harris leaned back, folding his hands behind his head. “Those folks down at the res, they can handle themselves. Probably just some skittish tourist seeing shadows. If it’s nothing, head straight back.”
There was something in his tone that stuck with me, but I let it slide.
Forks was small, quiet. Crime here was little more than shoplifting and the occasional drunk-and-disorderly. Our force was thin, just a handful of us, and anything bigger than a domestic dispute, we called in the state boys. But I wanted to be more than that. I wanted to be the kind of cop people could rely on.
The drive to the res was uneventful. The closer I got, the taller the trees seemed to grow, closing in, making the sky feel smaller. When I pulled up, I saw people gathered around a fire, talking, laughing. Normal. Peaceful. No one seemed concerned. One man looked up, his smile faltering when he saw my car. He nodded once before turning away. Message received.
Nothing to see here.
I should’ve gone back to the station, but instead, I turned toward the beach.
I didn’t get out much, not like I should. The waves lapped against the shore, a steady, calming rhythm. The air was thick with salt and pine, crisp and clean. I took a deep breath, letting it settle in my chest.
Then, I heard it.
Laughter—high, lilting, wrong
I turned, but there was nothing. Just shadows and wind. Then—
A splash.
Something hit the water. Hard.
I ran, boots kicking up sand, my pulse thrumming in my throat. The tide was coming in, the waves growing restless. And there—just beneath the surface—
A body.
I didn’t think, I just moved. The water was ice, stealing the breath from my lungs as I fought my way through the waves. My uniform dragged at me, but I pushed forward, reaching the man just as he started to sink. His skin was blistering hot despite the cold, his body unnaturally still. I grabbed him, heaving him into my arms, and fought my way back to shore.
I collapsed onto the sand, gasping for air.
Then, I saw him
He was young—maybe twenty, maybe younger. His long black hair clung to his face, framing high cheekbones and a strong jaw. He was striking, his features sharp, like something carved from stone. Even unconscious, there was something about him that demanded attention.
Shaking my head, this wasn’t the time to ogle a stranger. I hauled him up and into my cruiser. Hospital. Now.
I’d barely made it back onto the dirt road when three massive shapes shot across my headlights. My heart slammed against my ribs as I yanked the wheel, barely keeping the car on the road.
“What the fuck—”
I threw the car in park, grabbing my shotgun before stepping out.
Something moved behind me.
I turned, expecting another shadow, another trick of the night. Instead, a man stood there, hand on my shoulder. His grip was warm. Strong. Familiar.
“We’ll take it from here, son,” he said, his voice deep, measured. Two shirtless men stepped out of the trees, heading for my car.
I hesitated. Every instinct screamed at me to take the kid to the hospital, but Harris’s words echoed in my head.
They can handle themselves.
I nodded.
“What’s his name?” I asked, the question slipping out before I could stop it.
“Billy,” the man answered. “Billy Black.” Then, after a pause, “Come back in a few days. I’m sure he’ll want to thank you.”
I nodded again, watching as they disappeared into the woods, Billy’s unconscious form cradled between them.
By the time I got back to the station, Harris waved me off. “A man named William already called in,” he said. “Said you helped one of theirs. No need for a report.”
That night, as I stood under the shower’s hot stream, scrubbing away the salt and cold, my mind wouldn’t let it go.
I ran a hand through my hair and exhaled, stepping out of the shower stall. This wasn’t how tonight was supposed to go.
The plan had been simple—come home, lock the door, and finally let go of the slow, grinding exhaustion that had been chewing at me for years. But instead, I’d spent the last few hours pulling a half-dead kid out of the ocean, dodging shadows bigger than any damn animal I’d ever seen, and handing Billy Black over to men who looked at me like they knew something I didn’t.
And now I couldn’t stop thinking about him.
Billy.
I didn’t know him. Hell, I didn’t know anything about him, other than the fact that he was young, striking in a way that made it impossible to look away, and apparently important enough to have people waiting in the woods to collect him.
I stood up and moved to the window, pressing a hand against the cool glass. The driveway below was still a mess of mud and puddles, tire tracks from my cruiser half-washed away by the rain. The porch light cast a weak glow over the front yard, making the bare trees look even more twisted, like skeletal fingers reaching for something just out of reach.
Maybe I should’ve taken him to the hospital. Maybe I should’ve ignored the way that man’s hand had felt on my shoulder—steady, firm, familiar in a way I couldn’t place. Maybe I should’ve demanded answers.
But I didn’t.
And now I was standing here, in the same old house I’d spent my whole damn life in, thinking about a stranger like he meant something.
Like he’d changed something.
I let out a short, humorless laugh.
Maybe I was losing it.
---
The station was quiet at this hour, the last of the calls filed away, and the warm glow of the desk lamp in the sheriff’s office cast long shadows against the walls. I rubbed a hand over my face, exhaustion sitting in my bones like damp clothes. Ever since that night on the res, I hadn't been able to shake the feeling that something had changed. I’d seen things I couldn’t explain, heard things that didn’t make sense, and yet here I was, expected to go about my days as if nothing had happened.
"You heading out, Charlie?" Sheriff Al Jenkins leaned in the doorway of his office, arms crossed over his broad chest. He was in his early fifties, built like a man who’d spent a lifetime hauling deer out of the woods, and his face was lined with the kind of experience I hadn’t earned yet.
"Yeah, I figured I’d call it a night," I said, grabbing my jacket.
Al studied me for a moment, then snorted. "You’ve been acting weird ever since you got back from the res. Got some kind of Native curse put on you?"
I rolled my eyes, but the way my stomach twisted at his words irritated me. "I don’t know what the hell I saw that night," I admitted, my voice lower than I meant for it to be. "But it wasn’t normal, Al. There was something—someone—" I stopped myself. I wasn’t about to start rambling about things I wasn’t even sure of. "Just doesn’t sit right with me."
Al shrugged like it was nothing. "Well, whatever happened, I got a call from one of the guys saying everything was taken care of. No bodies, no missing persons, no reports of a crime." He gave me a pointed look. "So whatever weirdness you think you saw, maybe it’s best you forget about it."
I didn’t respond right away. Al wasn’t a bad guy, but he liked his job simple. Forks was a quiet town. People here liked their routines. A world of monsters or where things moved too fast for the human eye didn’t fit into that.
But I wasn’t the same man I was a few days ago.
"Right," I muttered, forcing a nod. "See you tomorrow, Al."
He waved me off, and I stepped out into the cool night air, my breath misting in front of me. The drive to the res wasn’t long, but it gave me enough time to think. I hadn’t meant to go back—I figured Billy needed time to recover. But the last few days, I’d felt this gnawing feeling in my gut, like unfinished business pulling me back.
And then there was something else.
A restlessness that came whenever I thought about Billy.
It was stupid. He was a man I’d rescued on the job. That didn’t deserve the nerves tightening in my stomach, or the way my fingers tightened around the steering wheel as I pulled onto the dirt roads leading to the reservation.
By the time I parked near the cluster of houses, I could already feel the weight of eyes on me. The people here were quiet, cautious. They kept to themselves, and outsiders weren’t exactly welcome. A few nodded as I passed, but their faces were unreadable.
Billy was outside one of the houses, sitting in a wheelchair, his hands resting against the worn arms. He was staring out at the trees, expression distant, but I noticed the tension in his shoulders, the way his fingers clenched ever so slightly. His long, dark hair was loose tonight, catching in the soft breeze.
But what hit me the hardest was how no one spoke to him.
There was an unspoken distance, something hovering around him that I couldn’t quite name. The crunch of gravel under my boots was the only sound as I made my way toward Billy. Even though it was getting dark out, I could still see the way his shoulders tensed the closer I got. He hadn’t looked at me yet, but I knew he knew I was here.
"Billy," I said, testing.
Nothing.
I stepped a little closer, hands tucked into my pockets. "Hey- I uh, figured I’d come see how you were doing."
His fingers flexed against the armrests of his wheelchair. "I’m alive."
"Yeah, I can see that."
Silence stretched between us. The quiet here felt heavier than it had before. It wasn’t just the kind of quiet you got in the woods at night—it was the kind that settled deep into the bones of a place, something unspoken, unmoving.
I studied him for a moment. He looked… good. Strong. Despite the wheelchair, despite whatever damage his back had taken in that fall, Billy was still built like someone who could knock a man flat if he wanted to. His hair was loose, falling past his shoulders in dark waves, and his sharp features looked even sharper in the light. But there was something else in his face. Something worn down.
"You in any pain?" I asked.
Billy let out a sharp breath through his nose, looking up at me through slitted eyes. "I’m fine."
He wasn’t, though.
I’d seen the way he wanted to stand, how his whole body tensed with the effort before giving out on him. His hands curled into fists, his jaw locked tight.
I exhaled, shifting on my feet. "Look, I get that you probably don’t want to see me. I’m just checking in, alright?"
His jaw twitched, and his fingers flexed against the arms of the chair. "You don’t get it," he muttered.
"Then explain it to me."
That made him snap his gaze toward me. "Why? So you can feel better about saving me? So you can sleep easy at night knowing you did your good deed?" His voice was sharp, like he wanted to cut me with it. "I don’t need your pity, Charlie."
I huffed out a breath. "This isn’t pity, Billy. It’s just—" I hesitated, trying to find the words. "I saw what happened that night. I don’t know what the hell it was, but I know it wasn’t normal. And I know it sure as hell wasn’t fair."
Billy scoffed and looked away. "Nothing ever is."
His words settled in my chest, heavier than I expected.
I let the silence sit for a moment before speaking again. "I know it doesn’t mean much coming from me, but you survived. That’s gotta count for something."
Billy’s fingers clenched the armrests tighter, knuckles going bone white. "Yeah?" His voice was bitter. "To who?"
I glanced around, noting how no one on the res had approached. No one had come to check on him, not even in passing. The distance between him and his people wasn’t just physical—it was something deeper.
I sighed, shoving my hands deep into my pockets. "You eat yet?"
Billy shot me a side-eye. "What?"
"There’s a diner in town," I said. "Coffee’s decent. Burgers are solid. Figured we could grab a bite."
Billy stared at me like I’d just suggested we go wrestle a bear. "Why the hell would I do that?"
I shrugged. "I dunno. Maybe because you shouldn’t spend all your time sitting out here alone, brooding."
Billy snorted. "I don’t brood."
"You absolutely brood," I said. "You’re brooding right now."
Billy exhaled sharply, shaking his head, an almost exasperated smile forming on his lips.
"Look," I continued, "it’s not a date. Just two guys getting a meal. You don’t even have to be nice to me. You can sit there and glare at me the whole time if you want."
Billy exhaled, rubbing a hand down his face. For a second, I thought he was going to say no.
But then—
"Fine," he muttered. "But don’t expect me to thank you for it."
I smirked. "Wouldn’t dream of it."
As I moved to help Billy get into my truck, I felt something loosen in my chest. I wasn’t sure why.
And that unsettled me more than anything.
Billy.
What the hell did I just do?
That question looped in my head like a bad song as I let Charlie—this damn man—maneuver me toward the cruiser. His hands were careful but firm, gripping my arm just enough to steady me but not enough to make me feel helpless. Still, the whole thing felt like an unspoken truce, like we both knew I could’ve snapped at him for offering help but also knew I didn’t really have a choice.
The silence between us was… companionable, maybe. Or just awkward. I wasn’t sure.
Charlie didn’t rush me, which was something. I gritted my teeth as I pushed against the seat, trying to get some leverage, and a sharp sting shot up my spine. My jaw locked, but I didn’t make a sound. Wouldn’t give him the satisfaction of thinking I needed more help than I already did.
But I felt it.
That deep, ugly frustration in my chest.
What the hell would the pack think?
I already wasn’t much in their eyes these days. A wolf who couldn’t shift. A man who had to be lifted into a cruiser like some weak, pathetic—
"He was one of the best."
"Shame."
"It’s not the same anymore."
I could hear them.
They weren’t wrong.
I was broken.
And now, on top of it all, I was going to dinner with the man who had left me this way.
I should hate him.
I should resent him for pulling me out when I wasn’t sure I wanted saving. But sitting here, the thing I hated most was myself.
Charlie shut the door behind me and rounded the front of the cruiser, sliding into the driver’s seat with that easy confidence of his, like this was the most natural thing in the world. Like he hadn’t just helped me into the car like I was some old man who needed looking after.
I should cancel.
I should tell him to turn around, let me out, and pretend this never happened.
But then he glanced over at me, his fingers drumming once on the steering wheel, and that goddamn mustache twitched with the ghost of a smirk.
And I knew I wouldn’t.
God help me, it was the mustache.
I sat stiffly in the passenger seat, arms crossed over my chest like that might hold in the mess of emotions roiling inside me. Charlie didn't say anything as he pulled away from the res, the hum of the cruiser’s engine filling the space between us.
I should say something. I should ask him why he’s doing this—why the man who saved my life, a man I barely know, thinks he needs to check in on me like this.
But the words stuck in my throat, thick and bitter.
Charlie’s fingers tapped against the steering wheel, a lazy rhythm like he had a song stuck in his head. He looked relaxed, like he was just giving a buddy a ride into town. Like this wasn’t weird as hell.
I glanced over at him, at the easy set of his jaw, the way his eyes flicked to the rearview mirror every so often, tracking the road like second nature. His uniform was a little wrinkled from the end of his shift, his sleeves rolled up just enough to show tanned forearms dusted with light hair.
And the mustache.
Damn thing was doing too much .
I dragged a hand down my face and turned back toward the window, ignoring the heat creeping up my neck. I’d spent the last few days wallowing in frustration, drowning in the weight of what I’d lost. I wasn’t expecting this —whatever this was—to knock me off balance.
I wasn’t expecting him to look at me like I was still me.
Finally, he broke the silence. "You’re awful quiet over there. Second thoughts?"
I scoffed, forcing a smirk. "Would it make a difference?"
He made a noncommittal sound. "Guess not. But I figured I’d give you an out before we pull up and you start lookin’ at me like I dragged you out at gunpoint."
I snorted, shaking my head. "You did just haul me into your car."
"With your permission," he shot back, sending me a quick side glance, amusement tugging at the corners of his mouth.
I huffed, but the tension in my chest loosened a fraction. It wasn’t much, but it was something.
The truth was, I didn’t know why I’d said yes. Maybe it was the mustache. Maybe it was the fact that I hadn’t had a normal conversation with anyone since the incident. Maybe it was because, for the first time since that night, someone wasn’t treating me like I was already halfway to the grave.
Whatever it was, I was here now.