Chapter 7

Jace

The air in the school cafeteria was suffocating. For me, being trapped in an enclosed space with so many people had always been pure torture. The overpowering perfumes, greasy food, hormones, and the smell accompanying all that shallow, loud chatter blended into one overwhelming mass that constantly irritated my heightened senses.

I sat with my pack at our usual table, tucked away at the far end of the room.

We were the group everyone stared at but no one dared approach.

To them, we were the rich, arrogant elite.

To us, they were blind, fragile mortals who had no idea that the monsters they'd feared as children were now eating in the same cafeteria as them.

But right now, I couldn't have cared less about the commotion surrounding us.

Only one thing occupied my mind.

Willow.

I stared at the untouched food on my plastic tray while my mind replayed our encounter in the hallway that morning over and over again.

Her touch.

That electric, scorching jolt that had raced up my arm when I'd grabbed her wrist.

I was twenty-one years old. In a matter of weeks, I would take over full leadership of the pack from my father.

I'd fought countless battles, but that fragile, terrified human girl had turned my entire world upside down in a single second.

My wolf paced restlessly beneath my skin, growling and demanding her scent.

"You can't let her distract you this much, Jace," Zane, my future Beta, spoke up.

His voice was quiet and rational, as always.

"For days, you've talked about nothing but this human. The vampires are getting restless along the border, and Silas provoked us again last night. That's what we should be focusing on."

"Zane's right, man," Caleb added, leaning back in his chair. "Look, I get it. The girl's... weird. And you feel sorry for her and everything. But she's just a human."

Slowly, I raised my eyes and fixed Caleb with such a dark, threatening glare that he immediately stopped chewing his gum.

His throat bobbed involuntarily as he swallowed.

My Alpha aura began leaking from my pores without my permission.

"She's not just a human," I growled from deep within my chest. "Last night, in the alley... when I touched her, my wolf nearly broke through my control. And her scent, Zane. You don't understand. She constantly reeks of fresh blood and fear. Someone is systematically beating that girl. And her clothes... she covers herself up so no one can see."

Lexi, who had been silently picking at her salad until now, suddenly put down her fork.

Anger flashed in her eyes.

"When I saw her in the hallway this morning, she could barely put any weight on her left leg. She was limping, Jace. And no matter how much of that damn makeup she piled on, I could still see the purple bruise beneath her eye."

My jaw clenched so tightly that my teeth ground together.

A sharp, red haze crept into the edges of my vision.

The thought of someone inflicting physical pain on that fragile creature awakened a murderous instinct so deep within me that I could barely keep it under control.

I wanted to find whoever had done this to her.

I wanted to hunt them down.

I wanted to tear them apart slowly, piece by piece, and smear their blood across the ground.

"So what's the plan?" Maya asked, folding her arms across her chest.

She was our best tracker and, when necessary, our most ruthless warrior.

"Want me to follow her and sniff out where she lives?"

Before I could answer, the air changed.

It wasn't the wind.

No window had opened.

A scent simply reached me beneath the cafeteria's overpowering smell of food.

Coffee.

Cheap soap.

Jasmine.

And that suffocating, salty aroma that always accompanied terror.

My spine straightened.

Every one of my senses immediately focused in a single direction.

The entrance.

"She's here," I whispered, my voice barely more than a growl.

The pack immediately followed my gaze.

Willow stumbled slowly through the cafeteria doors, her steps hesitant and unsteady.

Her enormous navy-blue hoodie almost completely swallowed her slender body.

She had pulled the hood low over her face, and her black hair hung like a dark curtain, shielding her from the world.

But my wolf's vision didn't need to see her facial features to recognize her suffering.

I saw the way her left leg buckled slightly with every step.

I saw how tightly she clutched her side, as though she needed her own hands to hold her ribs together.

And I heard her heartbeat.

It hammered like the heart of a trapped bird.

Beside me, Zane drew in a sharp breath.

"She's really limping. Badly."

"Someone really did a number on her," Lexi whispered, her voice tight with emotion.

I watched Willow join the line at the food counter.

She tried to make herself smaller, curling inward as though she hoped she could somehow disappear into the tiled walls.

That was when I noticed them.

Two tables away, near the center of the cafeteria, Brad and Chloe sat with their idiotic little clique.

After yesterday's incident at the café, I'd thought they'd learned their lesson.

I'd thought my threat alone would be enough to make them understand that Willow was untouchable.

But humans were stupid and arrogant.

I heard their whispers.

My werewolf hearing easily picked out their voices from the noise of the cafeteria.

"Look at that pathetic loser," Chloe hissed, leaning toward Brad. "Yesterday, those idiots made us look like fools in front of that bastard Jace."

"I'll take care of it," Brad said with a grin, his voice dripping with cruel amusement. "Let's make it look like an accident."

Every muscle in my body turned to stone.

My wolf roared inside my head, and adrenaline flooded my brain.

My hand gripped the edge of the plastic table so tightly that it cracked with a loud snap.

I rose from my chair.

"Jace, don't!"

Zane's hand immediately slammed against my chest, holding me back.

A warning burned in his eyes.

"There are too many humans! You can't expose yourself in a fucking school cafeteria over some asshole football player! You'll be breaking your father's rules!"

"I'm going to slit that bastard's throat," I growled.

For a brief moment, my eyes flashed green.

My canines pressed painfully against my gums, and claws began tearing through the skin at my fingertips.

"Watch them," Maya suddenly said sharply.

Willow had just collected her tray, which held a glass of water and some cheap sandwich.

She turned and started toward the edge of the room, heading for the most isolated tables.

That was the exact moment Chloe sprang to her feet.

She pretended to bend down toward her bag, as though she were looking for something.

Then, with a sudden, calculated, aggressive movement, she slammed straight into Willow, who was limping toward her.

It wasn't a simple collision.

Chloe used her shoulder and threw her entire body weight into shoving the girl.

For Willow, who could barely remain standing because of her injuries, the impact was devastating.

The tray flew from her hands.

The plastic cup hit the floor with a loud crack, sending water splashing everywhere.

And Willow followed it down.

But she didn't fall like a healthy person who could catch herself.

She landed directly on her left leg, on her injured thigh.

The sound of the impact was dull and sickening.

The cafeteria immediately fell silent.

A few students laughed, but most simply stared.

"Oops! Sorry!" Chloe whined, theatrically covering her mouth with one hand. "You're so clumsy! You're always getting under my feet!"

All hell broke loose at our table.

Before I could even take a single step, Lexi shot to her feet so fast that her chair toppled backward and crashed against the floor.

Pure murderous intent burned in my sister's eyes.

She didn't care about our secret.

She didn't care about the school.

Like an arrow released from a bow, she charged across the cafeteria toward Chloe and Brad's table.

I moved too, with Zane and Caleb right behind me.

The air vibrated with the power radiating from us.

Students who found themselves in our path instinctively leaped aside, their faces pale with terror.

No one wanted to stand in the way of an enraged pack.

But as I drew closer, my gaze wasn't fixed on Chloe.

It was fixed on the floor.

The pressure in my chest became so painful that I could barely breathe.

Willow wasn't getting up.

She wasn't trying to make herself invisible.

She wasn't attempting to escape the curious stares like she always did.

The pain was simply too much for her to keep her mask in place.

She lay curled up on the filthy floor.

Both of her hands clutched her left thigh desperately, trembling as she pressed against the exact spot where I suspected an enormous purple bruise was spreading beneath her clothes.

Her hood had slipped back, exposing her face.

And then I saw something I'd never seen before.

Willow was crying.

Not just shedding tears.

She was sobbing.

Small, violent spasms shook her body, and a muffled, heartbreaking whimper escaped her chest.

The sound shattered the last remaining fragments of my wolf's self-control.

She didn't care that everyone was watching her.

She didn't care about the humiliation.

The physical pain and the terror that had been consuming her for so long had finally overwhelmed her completely.

That sight...

That fragile girl lying on the floor, sobbing as she wrapped her arms around her own body...

Something inside me broke beyond repair.

Lexi was already there.

She dropped to her knees beside Willow and, without hesitation, pulled the trembling girl protectively into her arms.

"Shh, it's okay. I'm here... it's okay," Lexi whispered before shooting a murderous glare upward.

And I stopped in front of Chloe and Brad.

The two humans looked up at me.

Their mocking smiles vanished from their faces within seconds.

My mere presence seemed to suck the air from their lungs.

I didn't need to shift for them to see me as a monster.

The darkness radiating from me, the pure, raw fury of an Alpha, was almost tangible.

Behind me, Zane and Caleb silently blocked every possible escape route, their expressions threatening.

Slowly, very slowly, I leaned toward Brad.

My voice wasn't loud.

In fact, I was practically whispering.

But in the deathly silence of the cafeteria, my words sounded like a death sentence.

"Tonight," I hissed, my gaze drilling into Brad's terrified eyes, "when you close your eyes... pray. Because if either of you ever goes near that girl again, even once... I swear on my blood that you will never wake up again."

Chloe broke into muffled, hysterical sobs.

Brad trembled like a leaf in the wind.

Neither of them could speak.

I turned away.

Rage still pulsed through my veins, but my attention immediately returned to the fragile figure on the floor.

Lexi was trying to help Willow stand, but the girl could barely support her own weight.

Tears soaked her face, and her eyes were confused and terrified.

Ignoring every human law, every wolf law, and every school rule, I walked straight toward them.

Lexi stepped back.

Without a word, I bent down and lifted Willow into my arms with one effortless movement.

She was light.

Far too light.

She fit against my chest as though she'd always belonged there.

The moment my arms wrapped around her, Willow drew in a sharp, trembling breath.

Her hands instinctively clutched the fabric of my T-shirt, but she didn't fight me.

Overwhelmed by pain and exhaustion, she simply buried her tear-streaked face against my neck.

The crowd parted before me.

With enormous, wide eyes, they watched in stunned silence as the school's most feared, untouchable boy carried the most despised, overlooked girl out of the cafeteria in his arms.

I didn't care about anyone else.

All I could feel was the warmth of her body in my arms, her salty tears against my neck, and the beating of my own heart.

A heart that, in that moment, became forever intertwined with hers.

Whoever the monster was who had done this to her...

Their days were numbered.