Page 36 of The Wolves of Forest Grove

Allie Cat!” Viv’s shout from down the hall between first and second period almost gave me a freaking heart attack.

I whirled around and slammed my locker closed just in time for her to crush me against her in a tight hug.

Her scent, a combination of the strange smelling shampoo she liked to use, and powder scented deodorant enveloped me and I was able to take a full breath. A first since I woke up this morning.

“Hey Viv,” I said as she pulled away, holding me at arm’s length to inspect me with a critical eye.

“You’re not still contagious, are you?” she asked with a lifted blonde brow. Her hair was shorter than it had been the last time I’d seen her. No longer a bob, but more of a messy pixie cut. It suited her.

“No,” I replied with a forced laugh and tugged at one of her blonde strands. “Hair cut?”

“You like?”

“Suits you.”

“Thanks,” she said and did a little gangsta pose in the hall, drawing several side-eyed glances from the students milling about. “You look different, too,” she added after a second, nudging me to walk next to her on the way to class. “Did you do something different?”

“Nope,” I rushed to say. “But I must’ve lost at least five pounds from the flu.”

Viv pursed her lips, and for an instant I thought she would call me on the lie, but instead she shrugged and said, “Yeah, that must be it. But you’ve been looking on the scrawny side for a few weeks now. They feeding you properly over there?”

By they she meant my aunt and uncle, and I suppressed a flinch at the reminder of all the lies now building into a wall between me and my best friends. After last week, that wall had gotten even higher. Thicker. Soon, I wouldn’t be able to tear it down even if I tried.

I made a sound in my throat that was neither an agreement nor a denial, just a short awkward laugh.

The truth was I’d been eating less and barely able to keep my meals down since that night at Devin’s house all those weeks ago.

When he’d accused me of there being something going on between me and a fellow classmate.

When he’d shown me the truth of who he was deep down inside.

I should have reported him after he hurt me that first time. Then maybe none of this ever would have happened.

“Want to come over tonight?” Viv asked suddenly. “Dad’s out of town for a few days. I can get you caught up on Geo?”

Geography was one of the few classes Viv and I shared. She was in all the advanced level classes save for that one. I barely passed the regular level in several subjects.

Think of an excuse, Allie. You can’t be there alone with her.

“Um,” I started, floundering for some kind of reason why I couldn’t go over and coming up empty handed. “I…”

I was saved when Jared found us in the hall and sidled up next to me, falling into step at my shoulder.

“Hey Allie,” he said. “Feeling okay?”

I nodded, though I was sure the panic was clear on my face.

“Stone,” Viv said by way of greeting, clearly unimpressed he’d found us.

“Vivian,” Jared replied.

Jared was still waiting for a response and I didn’t really know what to say.

He wasn’t asking me because I was getting over the flu.

He was making sure I was keeping myself contained.

I’d been doing pretty good so far. Quinn wasn’t in our shared culinary class this morning, so I’d been able to focus on doing all the work alone, without any distractions.

I didn’t think I’d be as lucky for the rest of the day, but so far, so good.

“So far, so good,” I told him, hastily adding, “Thanks for asking,” as a blush worked its way into my cheeks.

Stella Baker openly gaped at us walking side by side from her locker as we passed and my skin bristled.

The second bell sounded, and I used it as an excuse to rush away. “See you at lunch Viv?” I asked, moving to go down the corridor to the left towards Mr. Brown’s history class.

“Yeah!” she called back, going the opposite way. “Jared?” I added, knowing he was coming to sit with us at lunch today whether I liked it or not. Better Viv think it was my idea. “Want to have lunch with us?”

He smiled. “Sure thing, Allie.”

Viv’s eyes widened as she looked between Jared and me. She was looking at me like I was insane, and a little like she was pissed.

Viv was not someone you wanted to piss off. But since I was one of her best friends, I got Vivian rage immunity. I shrugged innocently at her and mouthed sorry before turning to rush into class.

I had to stay exactly two and a half minutes after class to make up for the two and a half minutes I was late.

It was a rule of Mr. Brown’s, and made me miss catching up with Viv and Layla on their way to lunch.

When I exited the classroom, though, with a sour attitude and way more irritation than I should have been feeling, Jared was there.

“Figured Brown would make you stay late,” he said as the door shut behind me. “I had him last year and spent half my lunch period in there some days.”

“You didn’t have to wait for me,” I told him. Well, more like snapped at him. The irritation at being made to stay behind and listen to Mr. Brown’s nasally voice tell me that I owed him ‘two-point-five minutes for tardiness,’ still hadn’t gone.

Jared made me pause with a hand on my wrist. The contact made me immediately reef my arm away, gasping as a sizzling bolt of electricity struck something deep in my belly. “Don’t,” I shouted, too loudly.

It took me a second to get control back before I could finish, nostrils flaring. “Don’t touch me.”

He held his hands up in a placating gesture. “I-I’m sorry,” he said, amber eyes downcast.

I swallowed, calming my breathing. “Are my eyes okay?” I asked, suddenly afraid to look up.

There were still a few students down at the other end of the hall putting their things away before lunch.

I couldn’t have glowing eyes at school. I flitted my gaze up to Jared for a second so he could get a good look.

“Yeah. You’re good.”

I relaxed a little, the irritation leeching away.

“I’m sorry I snapped at you, I was just…” I struggled to find the word.

“Frustrated?” he offered.

“Yeah,” I admitted.

Jared’s lips twitched into a sad smirk. “I know you don’t want to hear it, but that’s normal. Heightened emotional responses are common, especially in the begin—”

“Jared!” a girl’s melodic voice called from behind me. Amanda Schmidt walked up to us, all hips and grace in her two-inch black heels.

Jared’s face turned stony in the span of a heartbeat, and I realized it was a face he put on for everyone else. In a beat he went from the Jared I’d come to know over the past couple of weeks, back to the closed off Jared I recognized from the last few years of school.

“Hey,” Jared said, rubbing at a spot at the back of his head.

Amanda Smidt looked me up and down, making no secret of her disbelief.

Her low-cut top accentuated perky B’s and it was a wonder you couldn’t see the top of her underwear for how low the waistband of her jeans rode on her bony hips.

“Oh, hey Allie,” she said, overly chipper before turning her attention back to Jared.

“Did you need something?” Jared asked her, and even though his tone wasn’t unpleasant, I could tell he wanted her to leave. I could feel the discomfort drifting off of him in waves, eliciting the same response in me.

“I was just thinking,” Amanda said, leaning into Jared’s side. “Since you missed a couple days of Philosophy that I could help fill you in before the test on Friday.”

Before Jared could work up a response, she went on. “I’m free Wednesday,” she told him, pulling her bottom lip in between her teeth as she pressed her chest into his side and put her lips to his ear.

If it weren’t for my new canine hearing, I may not have heard her. I wished I hadn’t.

Amanda whispered, her voice husky in Jared’s ear. “My parents will be out,” she said. “All. Night.”

A sharp growl ripped from my chest and I felt the swell of something other behind my breastbone, expanding my lungs to the point I thought they would start cracking ribs.

Mine, that foreign voice hissed in my mind. My hands tightened into claws at my sides.

What the hell was she playing at? I was standing right here, and she was acting like they were completely alone. Her fingers drew lazy circles on the soft skin of Jared’s forearm as she continued to lean into him.

Her cloying perfume clogged my nostrils. An assault of sugar sweet cotton candy and choking florals.

It was clear Jared wasn’t interested. Couldn’t she see that?

Couldn’t she take a fucking hint?

Jared’s gaze snapped up to meet mine and he flew into action, shoving Amanda away with a hastily called, “Some other time,” as he nudged me to turn away from her and herded me down the hall at a brisk pace.

“Call me!” Amanda called after us as we rounded a corner, and it took everything I had in me not to turn around and rip her fucking throat out.

Small growling sounds vibrated in my throat and chest and I had to work to keep my lips tightly closed to trap the sounds inside until Jared kicked open the door we’d come in this morning and tugged me outside, letting go as soon as it closed behind me.

Distantly, I was aware that my cell phone was vibrating in my pocket and that Viv and Layla were probably wondering where I was. Why I wasn’t meeting them at our usual spot in the corner of the cafeteria. The fact that Jared was also not at lunch right now would only raise even more suspicion.

But I couldn’t care about that. I needed to breathe.

Jared was saying something, but I was beyond hearing him. My mind kept going back to the thought I’d had only a minute before. I’d wanted to rip her throat out.

Not figuratively.

Literally.

My stomach turned and a sour taste coated my tongue.

“Allie?” Jared said, his voice louder now. I didn’t think it was the first time he’d said my name.

I looked up, my shoulders and chest still heaving slightly. The sky threatened rain. Big ominous clouds blotted out the afternoon sun and painted everything in shades of muted gray. But still Jared looked like the sun.

Even surrounded by a world bleached of color, he was vibrant with life. Burning bright.

I found myself drawn inextricably to his warmth. It wasn’t quite a tether drawing us together so much as it was something more like gravity. Like I wasn’t tethered to the earth anymore, but to him.

“Jared,” I choked, disgusted at the thoughts in my head that were mine and not mine at the same time. There was still a small part of me, the animal part, that wanted so badly to go back inside and chew Amanda’s head off. “I can’t do this.”

“I’m sorry, Allie,” he whispered, as though it was his fault a pretty senior wanted to fuck him. As if he’d asked for it. As if my reaction was his fault too.

I shook my head. “Stop it,” I muttered. “Just stop being so fucking perfect all the time.”

“Perfect? Allie, what are you talking about?” he asked with a dark laugh. “I’m far from perfect, and once you get to know me a little better, you’ll figure that out.”

I seriously fucking doubted that. My chest burned with the urge to cry a thousand frustrated tears, but I fought it. “I think I need to go,” I told him after a minute. “I wasn’t ready to come today.”

Part of me didn’t want to give up. I couldn’t just run away every time this got hard. I’d never run away before. I always faced my shit. But this was different, wasn’t it? What if I’d actually acted on my wolf’s instinct to attack Amanda?

Like…fuck.

“You can do this,” Jared held out his hand to me as the first droplet of rain landed with a cold bite to my forehead. His jaw was taut and shoulders rigid.

I looked down at his open palm, studying the lines and the small ridge of calluses below where his long fingers connected. “Let me help you,” he said. “No strings attached.”

Hesitating, I bit the inside of my cheek.

“We’re stronger as one,” he said. “Do you trust me?”

My heart in my throat, I bobbed my head. I did trust Jared Stone. As much as you could trust someone you’d only properly met two weeks before. I held my breath, lifting my trembling hand to place in his large, warm one.

The initial contact sent sparks shooting through my nerve endings and I clamped my jaw down tight against the sensation.

Jared ran his thumb over the back of my knuckles, and it was like someone injected my legs with a sedative.

My knees didn’t want to work anymore. I wobbled and Jared caught me with his other hand, clasping firmly to keep me upright.

His eyelids grew heavy and he blinked slow as he watched me through the haze of whatever strange magic drew us together.

“Jared,” I whispered, about to ask him to let me go when the sensations wreaking havoc on my body began to level out.

The lustful haze that had been making my breaths come shallow and my mind wander to his lips was lifting.

In its place, a steady sort of structure formed. Like a bridge between body and mind.

That piece of myself that was missing was returned, or at least borrowed back, lending me a rush of strength and clarity.

“As long as I’m calm,” he told me, his voice a low timber that I could feel in my bones. “It’ll be easier for you to be calm, too.”

I looked at our linked hands and back to him, still trying to make sense of all the new riotous emotions vying for dominion over me. “Like this?” I asked him. “I mean, we have to be touching?”

Jared licked his lips, considering. “No, I don’t think so, but it doesn’t hurt.”

We stayed like that for another few seconds before Jared spoke again. “Do you still want to leave? If you do, I can cover for you.”

I huffed a sigh and released one of his hands, keeping the other in mine, afraid if I let go that the rage and anxiety would rear back up again. He brushed his thumb over the back of my hand again and I sighed. “No, I should stay.”

How else was I ever going to get my life back? “There she is,” Jared said with a coy smirk, tipping my chin up to search my gaze. “I was starting to think I lost you there for a second.”

Despite myself, I grinned back at him. “Come on,” I said, tugging him back to the door. “If we don’t show ourselves soon, Viv is going to send a search party.”

“They really don’t like me, do they?” I shrugged. “You’ll grow on them.”

I pulled the door open and stepped back into the empty hall, towing Jared inside with me. “Like I grew on you?” he asked with a lifted brow.

Rolling my eyes, I finally let go of his hand, not ready to deal with the implications if someone saw us like that. I glanced around to make sure no one had seen and exhaled when the coast was clear. “Yeah. Like that.”