Page 11 of Brutal Mate

“Come on, let's go before we get caught creeping around out here,” Miley said, glancing back over her shoulder.

“You don't need to tell me twice!”

Chapter 5 - Kane

Having found no other leads in town, there was only one thing left for Kane to do. He had to search the woods and find out wherever the hell it was these damn teenagers were meeting at night.

He'd never forgive himself if any others went missing, and from what the girl, Miley, had said, he suspected there were a few teenagers creeping out at all hours of the night to avoid or annoy their parents.

He couldn't exactly blame them. It wasn't so long ago that he had been one of them, sneaking out for a few hours peace away from his own fucked up parents.

It didn't feel like nearly twenty years had passed since then, but they had. He was certain he would always carry the scars from that time no matter how old he was.

Perhaps it was for that reason he felt such a need to find these teenagers, to ensure that nothing bad befell them as it had him all those years ago.

And seeing her again wouldn't be a bad thing either, he thought as he wandered the woods, though he tried to force the idea away as soon as it entered his head.

She was nineteen. An adult, sure, but still nineteen. Already in his thirties, anyone whose age ended in teen should be the last person on his mind. And yet, when he imagined what he might find in the woods that night, he almost always came up with an image of her. Redheaded, smiling in the light of the moon as she drank and danced and messed about with friends.

It was an image that did all kinds of things to his insides, and before long, he was wandering aimlessly, unsure whether he was searching for the missing teenagers or for her.

Miley Peters had given him no real reason to think about her, and yet he couldn't get her out of his mind.

It was only the sound of music and raised voices coming from up ahead that made it possible for him to think of anything else.

By the sounds of it, someone was having a whale of a time. Unwilling to break up the fun of young folk, remembering just how much that fun had saved his sanity when he had been younger, Kane crept forward stealthily.

If he ran in there all guns blazing to ask questions, he was certain they'd all turn tail and run, thinking he had come to break it all up or something.

Kane bit back laughter imagining the stupid pigs who had so often stormed through the woods near his childhood home in order to break up late-night teenage parties. Every time, it only made the teenagers more determined to do it again the next night.

Creeping to the edge of a ravine with the scent of woodsmoke, marijuana and alcohol in his nose, Kane watched what was unfolding below.

Ten or so teenagers, some younger than the others, were all sitting around a bonfire on logs that looked as if they'd been moved to form a seating area. The lanterns and foil decorations that hung from the trees suggested this was a regular meeting spot of theirs, and the teenager that still dwelled within Kane actually felt a small flash of jealousy. Music played from a speaker system clearly owned by one of the richer kids in town, and there were a couple of girls dancing.

Kane recognized their kind immediately, the ones who wore the skimpy short skirts and wiggled their behinds to attract the too-young, too-dumb jocks and other popular guys.

Damn, it was like watching his high school years unfold all over again.

He watched for a while, reminiscing while alert for any kind of danger, wondering whether he should make himself known and ask the teenagers a few questions.

If Miley hadn't been there, he might have, but when he spotted her sitting on one of the tree trunks with a drink in hand and a smile on his face, he knew he couldn't risk breaking up the fun. She was much safer here than she was back home with those assholes who claimed to be her parents.

With a deep sigh, he took in the scent of his childhood memories before he turned and started to walk away. Maybe there were clues elsewhere in the woods, ones his packmates might have missed when they patrolled that morning.

But he had barely gone ten paces when he heard the scream. He reacted on instinct alone, turning on his heels to dash right back to the ravine. Nothing about that scream had been playful or silly. It had been filled with terror.

And the desire to protect overwhelmed Kane so violently that he could barely think straight. The urge to shift was painful, and it took all he had in him to fight it. Turning up in a ravine full of humans in wolf form would not go down well.

“What is going on down here?” Kane demanded even as he pounced down into the ravine, scaling the steep side of the natural bank effortlessly with his powerful human legs.

The mood in the ravine had changed so dramatically that it caused him to halt at the edge of the clearing.

The teenagers were no longer sitting around drinking or even dancing. They were huddled in small groups, looking absolutely petrified. And when they looked at Kane, their eyes widened further.

“We weren't doing anything illegal!” one of the boys insisted, throwing up his arms, dropping a half-empty beer bottle behind his back.

Drinking underage was most definitely illegal, but that wasn’t a concern of Kane's right now.

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