WE ARE THE ROYALS OF RIDGEWOOD

COLE

The air is different today, I can feel something in the air. Not to mention the shit we have been going through with the pack, my father’s handling my uncle’s death, who was the beta and in-house leader of his pack in Louisiana, then Landon’s family… shit!

There is an imbalance that’s happening and I cannot just put my finger on it. It’s not helping that since I stepped foot in this school Sarah has been talking, I swear the girl cannot shut up. She is really cute when she rambles on but I cannot help but feel irritation, because my mind is going in circles, marking and revisiting anything I might have missed.

Then she walks by. The world stills and I can feel the others as well become dead silent and watch her. She is smirking like she has a secret joke and then notices us looking and plasters the fakest nice smile like we can be fooled by it.

I have never seen her before because if I had, she would be someone I would remember. After all, she would be right next to me all day… And night. She is an angel with the devil in her. Her hair that’s so long it practically reaches her perfectly shaped butt, and her long legs go on for days, flirting around on a skirt. I have never seen a woman as beautiful as her.

And my wolf… it’s like it needed her, to sniff her, bite her, mark her make her his, it thrashed so hard for me to go after her but I held my ground, watched her until she rounded the corner and then the sounds were back again.

Dean and Kyle looked at me, we had all seen her, and from their reactions, so subtle only we could understand, we knew had to find out who she is, all she has to give and where she comes from … right now.

The girl on my arm, still talking doesn’t seem to notice that my attention has just been snatched by another girl, still going on and on about the concert she is going to. I move away from her and the boys follow me. the girl’s font follows us, already knowing that when we move aside, they should know their place and stay put until we are back. True submission.

Something I didn’t see in her and made my wolf want to demand it, in a very detailed manner.

“Who the fuck is she?” Kyle asks first. He looks intrigued, something I wouldn’t wish on anyone, because if Kyle is intrigued by you, that means pain, in slow ways and you will scream, blood and eventually you will be begging for death.

The girls know this because they are at first drawn to him, needing, wanting to taste him to be close to the danger itself, the unpredictable Kyle. The loose cannon, hoping they will be the special ones that he will eventually see and love them. But then they run, but that’s another mistake they do because he hunts them and they cannot hide from him. It’s the hunter in him, in all of us.

“Must be a new student, like an exchange student,” the dean replies to him as he looks thoughtfully in the direction to which she disappeared. And he sniffs the air.

I raise an eyebrow at the act. He looks back at me and shrugs. “Her scent, I have dreamt of that scent before, and I have never sniffed anything like it before,” he explains lost in his thoughts.

Something about her scent too threw me off. Intoxicating and also familiar but I cannot seem to find why it is so familiar. When we locked eyes, I felt a thrill like I have never felt before and it was a thrill I have always wondered if I will ever feel with my mate.

“I need to get her files in the office and know what is up with her,” Dean says as he starts to head off, thrown off by the interest they all are showing her.

The last time we had an interest in the same girl, the last time we shared, the girl ended up in shreds. She took a favourite, a personal interest and that almost broke us. And in turn, we destroyed her after we found out it was her true intention from the word go.

But Landon took the hit because turns out he was the favourite and he was falling for her.

It was a mess, which we are still recovering from even after all that time.

Right now, after we claimed our mates to avoid sharing again after we swore we wouldn’t, our bond is stronger.

“Wait,” I speak up and they all look at me as if I am holding them up from something. “Remember what happened with …” I don’t even have to finish my sentence, they all know what I am referring to.

“yes, this is just to make sure we don’t fall into any more traps, with all that’s going on worth the packs, you can never be too careful,” dean replies thoughtfully and then heads out.

I nod once and Kyle smirks at me, a wicked glint in his eyes. “You are just as interested if not curious more just like we are.”

“I am merely being careful, I would not want us to fall into the same rabbit hole as the last time we did this.”

“Don’t do that bullshit with me,” he laughs but it’s low sarcastic laughter. “I know you, Cole. I saw the way your eyes flared when she looked at you. And we all felt it, the spark the electric energy that passed through all of us when she passed, which means you can express how you truly feel about this situation.”

He wants me to confess that I too want to know more about the girl other than her name. I want to know her lineage, I know that she is a werewolf, I want to know the colour of her fur when she shifts, I wish to know how her howl sounds when she is thrilled, enjoying a run at night under the moon.

But I don’t say all of this, because even to me, it sounds as insane. After all, I saw the girl for less than two minutes. I have a mate and yet I have never felt what I felt for her. I am stoic in my ways, balanced out, and rarely show emotions. And I am not about to start opening up to Kyle anyway.

“Fuck off,” I flip him off and go towards my girlfriend.

The classes already started, but no one dares tell us to get in.

Everyone in this school, town, and even around knows who we are. The Royals of Ridgewood. The four of us cause chaos where we step, thrive in the darkness of it all and our dark indulgences have made us form powerful allies as well as enemies, but we are the big bad wolves.

We hunt, kill and destroy those who seek to harm us. No questions asked, no feelings attached.

We are cutthroat. And we are not about to let a girl who is possibly a decoy to further weaken our pack defences distract us.

I will not let it happen.