Page 2 of Fallen Wolf
“Maybe I need to change up my look a little, what do you think Fluffy Thor?” Then I shook my head at how sad that my only friend was my cat and he couldn’t talk back. I was going to be one of those cat people. I looked at myself again, maybe if I wore my hair a bit differently. I brushed it and swept it to the side. I was a natural blonde, like my mom. But it was just so straight and just hung there limp. I did my makeup every day, but it was minimal, just some blush and some lip gloss. I didn’t want to look like Olivia George. Ugh, she looked so fake. I also didn’t want to spend that much time in front of a mirror. I have better things to do, like watching Netflix.
I looked down at my nicest shirt, could it be the shirts? I had so many of Destiny’s old clothes, she had given me most her wardrobe when she had left. She’d said she was going for a different look in college. But I saw her photos, she still wore the same things. I assumed she just was trying to help my style a little. Or lack of style. I wasn’t complaining, they were nice clothes. I had used some of them, but I always went back to my old shirts. They were like a safety blanket, and I really needed to get out from under it. I put on some Netflix and started watching some old episodes ofCold Case Files.I was a true crime junkie.
I tried on some different looks while Fluffy Thor looked on. His expression never changing, he was very much likegrumpy cat. He just looked like he was judging me all the time. I heard the front door to my house open and close. I froze, my hand holding tight to the top I was just about to try on. My head swung to my closed bedroom door as I heard footsteps, my body wouldn’t move, I was frozen… I was going to die and I couldn’t even run. Who was in my hou—
“Ada? Are you down there?” I let out a deep shuddering breath and I held my knees and took a few deep breathes to help my racing heart. I needed to stop watching true crime shows while I was home alone, this was not good for my health. But in a situation like this I was hoping the flee factor would have kicked in. I was going to be the easiest victim if I just froze like that. Plus, this wasn’t going to help my career choice. I wanted to be a cop. But I wouldn’t make a good one if I couldn’t chase the bad guy. I moved over and grabbed my phone, shit. It was past six. I was supposed to start dinner and have it ready now.
“Yeah, sorry mom, I was just doing… homework and I lost track of time.” I threw on the pink shirt I was wearing earlier and ran down the hall to see mom standing in the kitchen fixing herself a drink.
“I can see that.” She replied, and I could hear the smile in her voice. “Don’t you worry, we will make tonight pizza night.” She turned to face me, her smile a little bigger than usual. Why was she smiling like that over me forgetting to start dinner? Then it dawned on me.
“Ugh, she called you, didn’t she?” I rolled my eyes when mom nodded, she placed the glass down in the sink and spread her arms wide. I went to her and she wrapped me into her warm embrace. I felt safe with my mom, she was my comfort.
“Oh, baby girl. Destiny just wanted to tell us about you meeting a new friend today. Tell me all about her, where is she from? What’s she like? Would you like to invite her over?”
I moved away from mom and pulled the pizza menus out. I didn’t want to tell her anything because I didn’t know if this girl wanted to be my friend. It had been one day, one class and I didn’t want to get mom’s hopes up that I had made a friend if I didn’t. I just shrugged.
“Oh, I know… being a nosy mom. But you can’t stop me. I want to see you happy Ada and you have just not been yourself since Destiny moved away to college. This new girl might be needing a new friend and I just know you would make her the best of friends. You just have to put yourself out there. You’re amazing and I’m sure in no time this new girl will see that too.”
Mom hugged me then tapped on the pizza menu from Rawlins before leaving the room. I didn’t realize mom noticed so much stuff. I wouldn’t make a good friend. If I did, how come I didn’t have any? I felt my throat tighten a little as I looked down at the menu, my eyes a little unfocused with unshed tears. I blinked a few times to stop myself from crying. I wasn’t going to cry anymore about this. Too many tears already been shed over this, I wasn’t going to start again now. Pizza… need to get yummy pizza.
I lived in Watson, there were three pizza places here. But mom and dad loved the seafood pizza that the Rawlins pizza place did, so we always ended up eating there. I didn’t know why we kept the other stores flyers if we were never going to order from anywhere else.
“The usual?” I called out to mom. She replied, “as if I would eat anything else.” Which made me chuckle. I ordered from the pizza place in Rawlins. They delivered to us normally, but they said it would be a while, because one of their drivers was out sick. I didn’t want to wait too long, I was hungry now. So, I told them we would pick it up. Dad could swing past on his way home. But when I called him, he said he was running late at the office. I offered to get it. After all it was my mistake that we were having pizza to begin with.
I didn’t mind the drive out to Rawlins. It was beautiful out there and sometimes I saw gray wolves. Not always but it was exciting when I did. I thought they were magnificent creatures. I saw them at school a lot too, I had mentioned this to the teachers but they acted like I was seeing things. Which was really weird, there were right there in front of their eyes. Maybe it was like some paperwork thing they had to do if they saw one on school grounds? So they pretended they didn’t see it.
I had even seen some fighting in the woods behind the football field once. I was actually following Saint Wood there last year, I’d known that he hung out back there with other Kiba boys and I wanted to… I didn’t know… see him? Try and talk to him.
Like I could talk to Saint-fucking-Wood.
I’d had a crush on the guy since I was in middle school. He was a year older, but age didn’t matter when you were in love… okay. Not love but a huge silly crush that I couldn’t stop.
But that day I followed Saint into the woods and when I got in there, there were two huge gray wolves and I almost peed my pants I was so freaked out. Saint was nowhere to be seen, I was scared something had happened too him. I hid myself in a bush until the school bell went and when I looked up, I couldn’t see the wolves anymore. I was terrified enough that I never went into the woods after that.
Saint wasn’t like me. He went in there every day. Even the wolves howling didn’t stop him. He wasn’t afraid of the world like I was. He had no fear.
3
Huxley
It had beena long day at school, it was always a long day. I fucking hated school. Members of my own pack went crazy over the new girl, Lexi, all day and it was setting off my wolf with the heightened emotions of the shifters in the air. Hell, all the packs had gone crazy over this girl, Lexi Turner’s scent. To be honest I wasn’t sure what it was about her that made them act like total douchebags to each other. Yeah, she smelled different to the other girls at school. But nothing that different to make me chase her around like some lost cub.
Ranger Lovell from Pack Kiba was doing a pretty good job of that, and Parker Tolson from Pack Kenneally was more aggressive than usual. My own pack—Pack Rawlins— told me that she smelled like their mate, I had no idea what that meant. How could you smell your mate? We didn’t find our mates like that, so I didn’t understand what was happening to all of them, even my best friends, Mason and River were all caught up in it.
My wolf barely registered her at all, there was only one female it called to, and Lexi Turner was not her. For the last four years, my wolf has wanted nothing more than to be close to Ada Stephens… wanted to claim her. I had never told anyone this, not that I was ashamed or embarrassed. I wasn’t sure if it was normal for your wolf to feel this strongly about someone. I didn’t want to be the only one. No one else had ever mentioned feeling this way about someone, so I kept it to myself.
But Ada, she was the prettiest girl I had ever seen. When I started freshman year at Port Willow High, she was right there in class with me. While the other kids stared and made fun of me for my scars, she just smiled and talked about how excited she was that her parents had bought her a kitten over the summer break and it was this little ball of white fluff, she showed me photos on her phone of him. She talked nonstop about this little kitten, about how she had named him Fluffy, but her sister Destiny had wanted to call him Thor.
She could talk for hours and not take a breath, but she was becoming my first real friend outside of my pack and I hung on every word she said. We were encouraged to make friends, connections outside the pack. Especially with girls we might want as our mate. I wasn’t good at talking. I didn’t ever know what to say so I was quiet, but that didn’t seem to bother her at all, she spoke enough for the both of us and never complained about my lack of communication skills.
Not once did she ask me how I got my scars, she didn’t even stare at them, she just looked me right in the eyes every day with this huge smile and told me all about what Fluffy Thor had got up too every time we were in class. I woke up each day with a smile on my face and excited to be at school, knowing that I was going to see her in class. My parents were so happy to see this positive change in me, and I was too.
As the weeks went by, I noticed her a lot more, and not in the way where I wanted to be her friend anymore. My wolf had moved past that stage before I had a chance to realize what I was doing. I was always seeking her out, always wanting to be near her, needing to protect her. But I didn’t think I could protect her… I would only let her down.
She wasn’t popular with the other students and slowly as more weeks passed she became quiet and more reserved. Only pointing out when something was wrong, or referring to the school rules, which in turn made her a target for bullies. The same ones I had been avoiding all my life.
She stopped talking to me about her kitten in class and I’d helped by not talking to her at all other than in greeting. Eventually I didn’t try to be her friend anymore and she didn’t greet me anymore, she just would do her work and not speak a word to me.
