Chapter 6: She saw everything

 

~ Yates ~

She was taking too long to wake up.

I sat there on the floor beside her, two fingers still pressed against her wrist checking her pulse for the third time in as many minutes, and tried to figure out what the hell I was supposed to do next.

Leaving was the smart option. The only option, really. I had broken into her house, fought an intruder in wolf form, and was now sitting in the dark with an unconscious human girl who happened to live next door. If anyone found me here — anyone from the pack, anyone from school, literally anyone with working eyes and a functioning brain — I would have zero explanation that made sense.

But Jack would not let me leave.

He was unusually quiet now, settled in a way he had not been since the verandah incident, like watching over her was exactly where he wanted to be. Which was insane. Which made no sense. Which I was choosing to ignore completely because I had bigger problems.

Like the fact that she still was not waking up.

I checked her pulse again. Still steady. Her breathing was even. No visible injuries that I could see. The intruder had not touched her — I had gotten here before anything happened — so whatever had put her on the floor was something else entirely.

Shock, maybe. Fear. The kind of overwhelming panic that shuts a person down completely.

I could not leave her like this.

That thought arrived fully formed and I hated it immediately, but it was there and it was true and Jack agreed with it so loudly I could feel him pushing at the edges of my control.

Fine.

I stood up, looked down at her for a long moment, then bent and scooped her off the floor. She was lighter than I expected, which did something strange to my chest that I absolutely refused to examine. I adjusted my grip, headed for the stairs, and climbed.

Her room was easy to find — the door was still open from earlier, the curtains still drawn the way she had left them after our verandah incident. I walked in, laid her carefully on the bed, and stepped back immediately.

This was already too much. Too close. Too familiar.

I turned to leave.

Her hand wrapped around my wrist.

I froze.

"I thought you hated me," she said quietly. "Why did you save me?"

I turned back slowly. She was looking at me with those eyes that I had been actively trying not to think about, fully awake, fully aware, her fingers still wrapped around my wrist like she had every right to stop me from leaving.

"You saw all that?" I asked. My voice came out rougher than I meant it to.

She looked away, and something that might have been embarrassment crossed her face. "I could not act like I was awake watching two werewolves fight," she said. "I learned that animals tend not to feed on dead humans, so…"

I almost smiled.

Actually almost smiled, which was ridiculous, so I forced my face back into something neutral and tried to ignore the way Jack was reacting to the sound of her voice. He would not shut up about how good she smelled, how pretty her voice was, how right this felt.

'Mate,' he said again, certain and satisfied.

I told him to be quiet.

"Do you know who that intruder was?" I asked, genuinely curious now.

"Ha…" She let out a breath. "I honestly do not. Probably a friend of Aunt Anne's or something."

That did not sit right with me. A friend would not have broken in. A friend would not have been standing over her unconscious body with that kind of energy. But I did not say any of that out loud because it was not my business and I needed to leave before this got any more complicated than it already was.

Except now I was standing in her bedroom and she was sitting up on her bed and my mind was going through so many things I should not be thinking about. Especially with the fact that I had seen her naked on that verandah and Jack would very much like to see her naked again.

I shoved that thought down so hard it hurt.

"I should probably get going," I said, and turned towards the door.

She stood up.

Too fast, apparently, because she swayed immediately and her legs did not hold and she tripped forward with a small gasp.

I caught her.

Of course I caught her.

My hands went to her waist on instinct and suddenly we were standing far too close, staring at each other eye to eye, her chest pressed against mine, her breath warm on my face. I could feel my heart racing. I could smell her properly now — that soft warm scent that had been driving Jack insane, so much stronger up close, wrapping around me like it belonged there.

Her eyes were wide. Surprised. Something else underneath that I could not name.

Then someone cleared their throat.

We both spun around so fast we nearly lost our balance.

Aunt Anne was standing in the doorway, one eyebrow raised, looking at us with that expression adults get when they have absolutely caught you doing something you should not be doing and are trying to decide whether to be amused or concerned.

We snapped away from each other like we had been electrocuted.

Aunt Anne burst out laughing.

"Already making new friends after your first day of school?" she asked, her voice warm with amusement.

"We are not friends," we said at the exact same time.

She laughed harder.

My phone buzzed in my pocket — a lifesaving interruption sent directly from whatever merciful force in the universe had decided I had suffered enough for one evening. I pulled it out, glanced at the screen, and saw Fanny's name with one word underneath it.

SOS

My entire body shifted into alert mode immediately.

"I have to go," I said, already moving towards the door. "Excuse me."

I did not wait for a response. I was past Aunt Anne and down the stairs and out the broken front door before either of them could say anything, and I ran. Properly ran, letting my wolf speed kick in, covering the distance between our houses in seconds.

But even with my sharp hearing tuned to the sound of my own footsteps and the night air rushing past me, I could still hear them.

Aunt Anne's voice, teasing and curious, carrying through the open window.

"What are you doing with the Alpha's son, Gwen? Yates Underwood?"

I did not slow down to hear her answer.

I checked my phone again as I ran. The message was still there. Still just one word. SOS. Fanny only sent messages like that when something was genuinely wrong, and the fact that I had been distracted enough by a human girl to not immediately respond made my stomach twist with guilt.

I pushed harder, moving faster, letting Jack take over just enough to get me there in record time.

Whatever was happening at Fanny's place, I needed to fix it.

And I needed to stop thinking about the way that human girl had felt pressed against my chest.