Marked Northern Shifters 1

Nothing worse than acting needy at the beginning of a relationship, especially when you were jobless and he was gainfully employed, especially when you were scared of werewolves no one else believed in—and which you sometimes thought you had imagined on your own.
    Except Bill had disappeared and Alec had an ugly scar he could not explain away. And godawful nightmares where he was a pet. Or prey. His hallucinatory werewolves had talked about that.
    Never mind. He gritted his teeth. He hated how the scar took over whenever he was stressed. What he needed to think about was finding a job.
Okay, this feeling that he was unemployable had to go. It wasn’t true. So getting and keeping jobs wasn’t one of his strengths, and the library was the only place he’d ever enjoyed, but he could work…somewhere. Employment Canada could help him out.
He was too old to go back to stripping, and besides, he’d never been good at it.
He let out a shaky sigh. At least he had Liam. Alec winced. One night did not mean you had someone. He’d always been careful not to make a relationship into more than it was, a kind of protection from falling too fast and hard—but when he had so little else, he found it hard not to lean on this new relationship right now.
The elbow came out of nowhere, clipping his shoulder.
“Hey, sorry, man.” The voice sounded amused, not sorry, but Alec just slid sideways as he raised his gaze. And froze while his heart stuttered in fear.
Cold blue eyes stared down at him. The face of an angel. Gabriel moved into his personal space, Alec stumbled back, and Gabriel reached out as Alec spun and ran. He didn’t care if it was stupid to run, if a werewolf could sprint by him at will. He had to get away.
Gabriel had dubbed him prey during their last encounter and apparently he meant it.
Don’t run, don’t run, don’t run , some logical part of his brain screamed. But he couldn’t fly and he couldn’t just be taken by the nightmare that was Gabriel.
Alec threw himself into a Tim Hortons. It teemed with people buying their morning coffee. Surely wolves wouldn’t expose themselves to a crowd? He didn’t want to bring a massacre down on innocents, but numbers should be a deterrent. Alec hoped. His disbelief in werewolves had all but evaporated. They felt, at the moment, horrifically real.
They couldn’t grab him as they had before, in the dead of night, and drag him off to their den where he watched them shift into wolves during the full moon. But fuck, it was the full moon.
Alec closed his eyes. Between Liam and the job, he’d lost track of the moon. Not that the knowledge would have prevented this encounter. It was day and Alec had thought daylight safe.
He’d also dared to hope they’d forgotten him—though they’d vowed not to—or that they’d been a terrible figment of his imagination.
After five minutes, Alec managed to order a cup of coffee. He must have sounded strung out because the girl frowned as if he was acting oddly. Never mind. He sat in a corner where people wouldn’t stare and a werewolf might not notice—though that was stupid thinking. Alec needed a strategy and fast. His overwhelming desire to phone Liam had to be discarded. No way in hell would he bring this curse down on Liam and Ira.
A man slid in beside Alec and before he could jump up, a hand clamped down on Alec’s leg, just above his knee. A painful, solid grip.
As if they couldn’t find him. They’d warned—though this past year he’d tried to forget the warning—they could track his scent.
“Drink your coffee.”
Gazing down at the steaming drink, Alec tried to remember to breathe, though his lungs clogged with fear. The voice was Luke’s, not Gabriel’s. Two of them hunted him.
He had to get on a plane and get on it now.
A taxi to the airport, that’s what he needed. He carried some cash in his wallet. “Drink your coffee.”
Luke wanted to be obeyed. With shaking hands, Alec pried off the plastic lid.
“Good boy.” Luke was pulling out some kind of bottle, as if to add something to Alec’s coffee. “I’ve told Gabriel you’ll make a good pet.”
Alec threw hot coffee into Luke’s face. The hand released his leg and Alec was running. He had to stay in public places where they couldn’t openly accost him. He raced down the sidewalk towards Main Street. He’d seen taxis here from time to time, though most of them had probably been summoned. The police station was farther on; maybe he could make