Chapter Seven

Hunter’s POV

There was something in Lila’s eyes.

Stefan, her mate sat beside her and across from me in his private cabin, shoveling food into his mouth like he hadn’t eaten in weeks. While Lila her eyes did that thing where they dart around too much.

I knew that look. She was up to something, the mischief in them were bright.

“So, Hunter,” Her voice was gentle, too gentle. “I saw Selena watching you during training today.”

I kept eating. This was a bait and I knew she wanted me to take it but I didn’t.

“She’s pretty, don’t you think? Strong warrior. Good family.”

“Didn’t notice.” I replied gruffly.

Lila didn’t stop, I watched her exchange a glance with Stefan but he simply shrugged and kept eating.

“Traitor.” She hissed and I smirked.

“What about the healer’s assistant? She would make a good mate for someone.”

I stabbed a potato aggressively with my fork. “Not looking for a mate.”

“You’re always looking, you just don’t know it yet.”

Stefan finally spoke up, his mouth half full. “Leave him alone, Lila. He’ll find someone when he’s ready. Hunter is a grown man.”

“When he’s ready, he’ll be old and gray and alone in a cabin with tons of cigarettes as his only companion. Maybe he’d have a cat but I think that’s the highest he’d go.”

“Sounds perfect to me.” I muttered and Lila shot me a deadly glare.

She kept going. Listing names. Describing girls. Pointing out every eligible she-wolf in the outpost like she was reading a shopping list and even offered to bring some of her friends from the pack if I didn’t like any of the women in the outpost.

At one point, I stopped listening.

My eyes glanced away from the table to wide open door and that’s when I saw her.

She walked past, heading somewhere, probably back to her cabin. She moved slowly, like her body hurt. Her bright ginger hair was messy, falling loose around her face. She wore an oversized sweatshirt that showed off most of her slender, smooth legs.

She looked tired, completely worn out but I couldn’t look away.

For a few seconds, I had no idea how many, I just watched her. The way she rubbed her shoulders, the way she paused to look up at the sky. The way the fading light caught her face and made her look so soft.

“You’re staring at Dakota.” Lila’s voice cut through the calm in my head and my head jerked back to the table to find her staring right at me.

Stefan had stepped away from the table to get a drink.

“I was looking at the door. She happened to be in the way. Am I supposed to magically make her disappear?”

“She’s my sister-in-law, Hunter.”

“I know who she is.”

“Then stop staring.”

“I wasn’t staring.” My voice came out harsher than I intended. “I was looking. There’s a difference. And even if I was looking, which I wasn’t, it wouldn’t matter because I’m not interested.”

Lila’s grin widened. “I didn’t say you were interested.”

“You implied it.”

“I implied nothing. You just confessed.”

I set down my fork, “I’m not interested in her, or anyone else. Especially her, she’s soft, weak, still cries when she falls during training.” I shook my head, “I would never be attracted to someone like her, besides, she’s Stefan’s little sister.”

Lila never gave up easily, her eyes stayed on me, following my every move until it became so unbearable that I pushed the food aside and rose to my feet.

“I’m going to patrol.”

“What? It’s dark. At least wait until after dinner so you could go with the others.” Stefan pointed out, returning to the table with a glass of wine.

“Since when did darkness stop rogues from attacking?” I murmured and walked out before they could say anything.

I walked fast, my boots crunching on fallen leaves as I moved deeper into the woods surrounding the outpost.

Why did I look at her?

Why did I keep looking?

She was Stefan’s sister. She was completely off limits.

And Stefan was the closest thing I had to a brother, I lit a cigarette, taking a long slow drag and letting the smoke burn my lungs.

But my mind wouldn’t stop.

Stefan and I were raised together, almost like brothers after my parents died.

My father was the Alpha’s Beta before Lucian’s father became Alpha. He was accused of treason and murder, of working together with rogues to infiltrate the pack house and murder the Alpha.

I was just five, couldn’t defend myself and they made me watch as they butchered him. They murdered everyone in my family overnight and it was Stefan’s father, that saved me.

I didn’t think about it often. What was the point? He was gone and I barely remembered his face, his voice or anything real. Just fragments of the life I used to have, the sound of his laughter that I couldn’t quite hear anymore.

Staying in the pack was too risky so Stefan’s brought me to the border and I’ve been here ever since.

The border became my home and the warriors were family to me.

I owed everything to Stefan and his father and I could never betray them.

I smoked another cigarette. Then another.

But it didn’t help.

Everytime I closed my eyes, I could almost see those beautiful hazel eyes of hers glaring at me, those perfectly shaped lips that…

“Snap the hell out of it!” A voice yelled inside my head.

The sudden sound of a twig snapping under the weight of something cut through the silent night. I froze, every sense coming alive inside me.

My wolf pushed forward, alert of whatever danger was coming.

Whatever made that sound couldn’t be an animal. Animals either moved quietly or they moved fast. This was something else, something trying to be quiet and failing.

“Rogues!” My wolf snarled, my nose twitching at the horrid stench that filled the air.

But they wouldn’t dare come so close to the outpost, not when they knew we were out here.

That thought barely formed in my head before I heard another sound, the sound of glass breaking and it came from the direction of the cabins.

My heart stopped for a second.

Dakota.

I didn’t think, didn’t bother to alert the others, my legs just moved, racing toward her cabin faster than I’d ever run in my entire life.

I cut through the trees, branches whipped against my face, my heart pounding so hard it was miracle it didn’t burst out of my chest but I didn’t slow down.

The cabin came into view and I threw open the door, instantly.

The broken window was the first thing my eyes landed on in the dark room and my heart dropped to my stomach when I saw a dark figure on the bed, its claws reaching for Vania’s throat.

She was still asleep, completely passed out from exhaustion.

No no no no.

The rogue’s head snapped toward me, its red, glowing eyes fixed on me as its twisted and rotten features came into full view under the moonlight pouring in from the broken window.