Page 5 of Camp Dire

And for me it is Piper.

I lean my head against the wooden wall of the cabin and huff out long breaths that turn to fog in the night air.

Sleep, Piper. Sleep for the both of us. Rest, knowing I will keep you safe.

I run off into the darkness of the night and finish my perimeter checks before heading back to my own cabin. My wolf is none too happy about not being allowed to go to his mate. By the time I get back and dress after changing, my phone is ringing. I can sense what I’m about to be told before I even answer the damned thing.

“There’s been another one.” My brother’s voice fills the room since I put the thing on speakerphone.

“Great!”

“It’s a wolf this time.”

“One of ours?” This is the first time the killer has ever killed a wolf. This is not going to make anyone in town happy. My head starts to bang right behind my eyeballs.

“And there’s more.”

“Oh great! What more?” I don’t think I can take any more.

“We have a witness.” A long pause fills the cabin. And I try to understand what my brother is telling me. Having a witness is a good thing. How can it be…? “But we have a problem.”

“A problem?” I don’t need another goddamned problem. That is for sure.

I prepare myself for my brother to say something about the witness being scared and not coming forward, that the killer saw the witness just like the witness saw the killer, that the witness is a human and our killer isn’t one.

“She…I…She’s mine.”

Oh shit!

This is so much worse than I could have even imagined. This isn’t just a problem. It’s a big damned complication that has my headache intensifying to maximum level!

Chapter Six

Piper

I’ve been with the younger kids all day, helping them carve pumpkins and hike a shorter trail than the other -older- campers. I also spent the day staying as far away from Doyle as I could. He’s been even more annoying than he was before he was pulled out of the kitchen by Merrik. I’m eventually going to have to do something about him and tell him I have no interest in him whatsoever. Hopefully, then he’ll turn his attention somewhere else.

Usually, men like him don’t take conversations like that very well. Maybe…Larry can help me when the time comes. I shoot down the idea as soon as I have it. There is no way I would want to put someone in the middle of this. I’ll have to take care of Doyle on my own.

And it’s that knowledge that keeps me strung tight all day long. Apparently, I’m not the only one either. Annie seems out of sorts and so does Merrik. Maybe they had a fight. I shouldn’t be so happy about that, and I feel shitty about it. Annie is my friend. I’m a horrible person for lusting after her fucking boyfriend in the first place but now, I’m getting happy about them having issues. I’m going to hell.

That feeling might have caused the fight, but I like to think that it was something more altruistic on my side. When I come back to the camp’s community area and find Merrik yelling at one of my littles, Ralf who is only eleven, I lose it. I stomp over and step in between the two, pushing Ralf behind me.

“What do you think you are doing?”

He straightens to his full height like that’s going to stop me from calling him out on bullying a fucking eleven-year-old.

“I’m correcting a behavior that needs to be curbed before Mr. Andrews gets any older.”

“A behavior? He’s eleven years old. What behavior could you possibly be ‘correcting’?”

He looks at me like he can’t believe I would question him. I refuse to back down and wait for his answer with my arms crossed over my chest. His eyes narrow on me and he runs his eyes up and down my body.

“Ralf Andrews is the oldest boy in his…family. As such he needs to make sure he is in a position to represent that family. Fighting with younger boys is not that way.”

I turn to look at Ralf who has his head down and he won’t look me in the eye. “Ralf…why would you fight with younger kids?”

He doesn’t say anything but shrugs his shoulders. I turn back to Merrik standing in front of me with a self-satisfied smirk on his face. He raises his brows at me when our eyes meet.

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