Chasing the Beta

by Jessica Edwards

  Max keeps to himself on the other side of the room, and every so often I'd peak a glance at him to see what he's doing, but I can never see him. It's like he's hiding from us, and for some reason that strikes me as odd.

  “Do you think Max is okay?” I ask in wonder.

  “Who the fuck cares? We have way more important things to worry about tonight than caring if Max is alright.”

  I hold a book in my hands and stare in the direction I last saw Max, and that was when I came back into the library. “I'm just worried for him.”

  “Alice, did you forget about what happened today? He had the pictures of you.”

  My eyes widen. “Ryder, he's going to get hurt if this shift happens. I can't hurt someone innocent, so he needs to get out of here.”

  “Unbelievable.” He says under his breath. “Just please check on him.”

  Ryder shakes his head and goes to check on Max, but the moment he leaves, I feel an intense pain in my chest and my hearing becomes muffled. I cover both of my ears and whimper in agony, but both of my hands suddenly drops from my ears, presumably because I've lost control of my body.

  Oh no! Where's Ryder? I need him!

  With all the strength I can muster, I place my hand on the shelf to keep steady, but when I look up at the window, the full moon shines brightly in the sky, causing me to roar in complete and utter torment.

  Where the hell is Ryder!?

  I fall to the ground on all fours and fight to hold on, but I can feel myself fading. I can feel her thirst for blood increasing every time I try to fight the transformation. I know it's a losing battle, and I'll hold on for as long as I can. But it was too late.

  The full moons taken over, and there's nothing I can

  do to turn back.

  She rises to her full height and walks to the end of the shelf and looks from left to right.

  What are you looking for?

  Her head swings back to the left and she growls.

  Oh no, what is it?

  She prowls to the left side of the room and suddenly stops, and I don't know if I heard right, but it sounded like she let out a little cry.

  She walks into an aisle, but then runs at speed to the end of it where she sees a body lying unmoving on the ground.

  No! It can't be! Please don't let it be him!

  Lying on the ground with blood coming from his chest, is Ryder. His shirt is completely torn in the front, and because it's a full moon, you'd expect a wolf to tear this body to shreds, but she lowers her head to look at Ryder, leans back her head and howls.

  Please let him be okay. Please.

  Suddenly, a growl comes from behind us, and as she turns around to see what it is, I can't believe what I'm seeing.

  No. Tell me this isn't happening.

  I'm looking at a wolf I know I've met before. The black wolf with blue eyes. The one I saw in the woods that day.

  It's the same wolf! It couldn't be. Could it?

  The wolf stands at the other side of the aisle, but he doesn't come charging at us like I thought it would, it instead takes a longer look at me, then runs out the doors and out of the library.

  I'm in complete shock because there was three of us in this room, now there's only two, and that's me and Ryder. The only person that wolf could be, is Max.

  Chapter 15

  Shortly after Max left the library, I was left alone with Ryder.

  He still hasn't woken up from the wounds Max inflicted on him, but at least he's still alive.

  She stands by his side, as if she's protecting him from anyone who comes close, but there's nobody here.

  What I find completely strange is that she's not running into the night, killing everything in her path. She's instead in a library, quietly standing next to a human body.

  Me on the other hand can't get the image of that wolf from my mind. I mean, that couldn't have been Max, right? It struck me as odd when I couldn't see him for all those hours, but I never thought this would ever happen. It never occurred to me that Max could be a wolf too, I don't think anyone would've guessed what he really is.

  So, could the reason be that he was quiet through the majority of the night, because he was silently fighting to keep in control, but instead lost the fight and allowed the power of the moon to take over?

  Most likely.

  How long has he been a wolf? How did he become one? Who is his Alpha?

  The questions I want to ask Max is never ending, but I get distracted from my thoughts because I can hear voices.

  Two male voices.

  “Something's wrong, Kellan. So, help me sniff him out.”

  A sigh. “He's probably fine, Bane. You're always paranoid when Ryder isn't around.”

  “He's our Alpha.” Bane snaps. “And we protect our Alpha.”

  “Ryder can take care of himself. If he couldn't do that then he wouldn't be an Alpha.”

  A growl. “Kellan, stop talking and get in here.” “In the library?”

  “Yeah. I'm getting a scent.”

  The doors to the library open and immediately she growls when she hears their footsteps getting closer to us.

  Steady. We know these wolves. They're good people. Well one of them was.

  But she ignores me and carries on being on high alert.

  “You smell that?” Kellan whispers. “Blood, but there's something else too.” “What do you smell, Bane?”

  “Another wolf, and it's a female.”

  I see their forms walking inside the room searching for Ryder, but they can't see me. Not yet.

  “Do you think it's Alice?” “Yeah. That's her scent all right.”

  Bane and Kellan pass our aisle, but Kellan stops and slowly turns his head in our direction.

  Oh no.

  “Holy shit!” Kellan backs away and slams into Bane, who turns with an angry face, but when he sees her his eyes widen in surprise.

  “Fuck me.” Bane looks from me to Ryder on the floor, and his face turns to anger again. “What the fuck did you do!?” He roars and charges at me, but is stopped by Kellan.

  Ryder stirs on the floor but doesn't open his eyes.

  She leans down her head, takes in his scent and licks his face.

  “Get off him!”

  She doesn't listen. She instead stands in front of the body and growls at Bane.

  Kellan grunts. “You're only making her angry so shut up!”

  Bane struggles in Kellan's hold, but he puts his hands up in surrender. “Alright, I'll stop. Just let me go.”

  Kellan releases Bane and both of them stare at me. “What now?” Kellan asks.

  Bane takes one step forward, to which she growls. Kellan places a hand on Bane's arm to stop him from taking any more steps.

  “She doesn't like that. You're just provoking her otherwise.”

  “What do you suggest I fucking do then? I need to get to Ryder.”

  “Let me try.” Kellan takes one step forward and stops, and this time she doesn't growl. Not once. When he takes another step closer, she again remains silent.

  Why isn't she growling at Kellan? Maybe she doesn't find him as intimidating as Bane?

  That gives Kellan enough of a reason to approach me and Ryder.

  The moment he's in front of me, he stares into her

  eyes, and with his hand he lifts it up and touches my snout, she purrs in return from it.. “Hey, Alice.”

  She lets out a little noise that makes Kellan smile. He passes me to get to Ryder, and kneels beside his body. He puts Ryder's arm over his shoulder and picks him up off the floor.

  Kellan walks past me and walks back to Bane who looks at me in fascination, but he soon forgets about me and runs to help Kellan carry Ryder out of the library and back home.

  ********************

  When we arrive back at the wolves’ house together, I end up shifting back to my human form.

  Bane and Kellan carry Ryder to the living room and place him on the couch. I follow them inside and run upstairs to quic
kly change into some clothes, then rush back downstairs to sit with the wolves.

  By the time I reach the living area, Ryder's woken up and looks absolutely pissed off. Kellan sits on one side of Ryder while Bane sits beside Silver on another couch facing our direction.

  'What the fuck happened tonight?' Bane demands. Ryder doesn't answer because I can see from his face

  that he's at a loss of words about the whole situation with Max.

  “Max is one of us. He's a wolf.” Ryder slouches on the couch next to me.

  Bane's expression doesn't change, Kellan's eyes look like they might pop out of their sockets and Silver? She doesn't seem bothered at all by this statement.

  “What?” Bane asks.

  “He's a wolf, and he's a strong one too.” Ryder sighs.

  Kellan's eyes widen. “All this time, he was one of us?”

  Ryder nods.

  “That fucking cockroach.” Bane spits.

  “How can someone keep a secret like that?” Kellan asks.

  Ryder tenses his jaw. “I don't know but I should've known.”

  “What I want to know is what the hell happened to you? I want to know who fucking did that to you.” Bane points to Ryder's chest.

  Ryder pulls his bloody shirt over his head, and looks at where the wound should be, but it's completely healed.

  “I should've known he was one of us, but I didn't want to believe it.” Ryder murmurs.

  “Are you saying that it wasn't her that attacked you?” Bane looks at me.

  “Of course it wasn't Alice. This was all Max.”

  “But it's the full moon, and it was Alice's first one. Why are you protecting her?”

  Ryder glares at Bane. “It wasn't her that attacked me.”

  “Bane you saw the whole thing. She was standing right next to him, and from what it looked like to me, Alice was actually protecting him.” Kellan says gently.

  Bane shakes his head. “It doesn't make sense though. She should've been hunting for blood tonight, but instead...”

  “She stayed by my side?” Ryder asks while looking at me in longing.

  I nod to his question. “She stayed by your side, and she didn't move away from you.”

  Ryder leans over, and kisses me on my cheek. “Thank you.”

  “For what?” I ask with a smile. “For protecting me.”

  I caress his cheek. “She didn't want to leave your side, but what happened when you went to Max? It's my fault you got hurt.” I still don't know what happened when I asked Ryder to go and check on Max.

  Ryder leans back on the couch and looks straight ahead. “No, it wasn't your fault. When I left to go and see where he was, he was on the floor on all fours, grunting and groaning. I was watching the whole thing, I didn't want to believe what I was seeing in front of me. He was fighting to keep in control but when he looked at me straight in the eyes, he stopped fighting and started shifting. One second he was on the floor, and the next it was me who was on the ground. I didn't even see the attack happening, it was instant.” There's a pause.

  “What were his eyes like?” Kellan asks.

  Ryder clears his throat. “They were blue. So, he's someone's Beta.”

  “Max is always alone. I haven't seen him with another person, other than when he's with me.”

  Even in school, he's always by himself.

  Ryder looks at me but he doesn't say anything. “There's still a pack out there somewhere, and we've got to find it.”

  “This is good news! Now, we know who's responsible for the murders.” Silver says this with a smile, and

  somehow it bothers me a lot. Silence.

  “That's a serious accusation, Silver.” Kellan says softly.

  She shrugs. “Who else could be responsible for the murders? We've found the murderer, guys!”

  I shake my head. “It's not Max. He wouldn't do that.”

  Silver tilts her head. “How would you know? You know nothing.”

  “I know more than you do. Max wouldn't kill innocent people and he definitely wouldn't kill my mother. His reaction at the diner wasn't fake.”

  Silver chuckles. “You know Alice, people can act. In this case, Max is a really good actor, and he's a good liar too!”

  “Stop it, Silver. You don't know what kind of person he is.”

  Silver stands from her chair and pouts. “And you do? Because from what I've heard, you don't know Max at all because if you knew him well, he would've told you what he was, and trusted you to have this information. So, really he doesn't trust you at all, and he probably never will trust somebody like you.”

  She walks away, leaving me only to stare at her in

  distaste.

  I swing my gaze to Ryder. “Max isn't the killer.”

  Ryder looks at me in pity. “We don't know that, Alice.”

  “I do! He's not the person who killed my mother. He just wouldn't do that.”

  “What about the pictures of you? Why all of a sudden are you sticking up for him?”

  “Ryder, he's getting accused of a lot of things recently. His expressions to everything that's happened is exactly the same as ours. I think he's innocent in all of this.”

  Ryder doesn't look at all pleased.

  I place my hand on his knee. “Let me talk to him and see what his story is. He'll tell me everything this time because there isn't anything to hide anymore.”

  Ryder thinks for a very long time about this, but every single one of us in this room wants to know who Max Fields really is, and when Ryder nods his head, I now know that I've got to get as many answers from Max as possible to prove to Ryder and the wolves, that he's not a killer.

  Chapter 16

  Max is a wolf. A shapeshifter. Like us. That's something I'd never thought I'd say.

  I thought Max was just the new guy in school who moved to come and live in Small Town, but then ends up being somebody completely different.

  I still think I'm living in a dream world where this is only a dream, or a nightmare in my case. I'll wake up, my mother will be alive, I'd be back to normal, Sam never would've been attacked, and Max never would've come to Small Town in the first place.

  Everything would be normal. I wish it was that easy.

  I don't waste time reaching out to Max because I know exactly how he must be feeling right now. I mean, how do you explain something like this to somebody? But there's nothing Max should be worried about because we're both in the same position. He'll probably want to know how I become a wolf in the first place, and if he asks me that, I won't hesitate to tell him the truth, but in return, I expect the same from him.

  It's only fair.

  This time I'll be the one to message him to meet me in the diner because it's only right that I reach out to him after last night. Knowing Max, he'll probably want to avoid people for a while, especially me and Ryder.

  I message him to meet me in the diner at noon, but that it's completely up to him if he shows. It's his decision in the end if he wants to open up to me or not.

  I need answers more than anything right now, but the more I think about how Max could be responsible for the murders in this town, it just doesn't make me think that he'd do something like that. I can feel it in my heart that Max isn't capable of doing such a thing. He might've lied in the past, but he's always been a kind and friendly person. There's nothing about him that tells me that he murdered those people. He just wouldn't do that.

  I wait for Max in the diner for about thirty minutes, and in those thirty minutes, I've been a nervous wreck. I'm also anxious to see if he'll show up, but from the look of things, maybe Max just isn't ready to talk to me today.

  When I go to grab my bag that's placed next to me, the door to the diner opens.

  Could this be him?

  I look to the diner's entrance and see a tall figure approaching me, and from the way this person holds themselves, it's definitely a guy. He wears a black hoodie with the hood up, a denim jacket, black ripped jeans and black boots. He walks
with his hands in his pockets with his head looking towards the ground; avoiding all eye contact with everyone.

  He came.

  When he sits down opposite me, he still doesn't look up and doesn't say a word either.

  There's so many questions I want to ask him, but I need to be careful about what I ask and how I ask it, because I don't want it to seem like I'm interrogating him.

  “Max?”

  He still doesn't acknowledge me.

  “Max?” I call his name again, he glances briefly at me but looks back down again. He looks as though he hasn't slept at all.

  What now?

  I take a deep breath and exhale.

  “You were a wolf all this time?” I ask cautiously. He scoffs. “So were you.”

  I clear my throat. “Did you know I was one?”

  He brings up his head and stares at me. “Did you?” I plead.

  A pause but then he slowly nods. “How did you know?”

  “Your scent is incredibly strong. I don't know if it's because you're a female or because you're a new wolf.”

  “I'm new, and I'm still learning how to be one.”

  Max nods. “It's not easy learning your new abilities. Especially hiding your scent from others. Let me be the first to tell you that.”

  “How long did it take you to hide your scent?” “About five years.”

  I gasp at that.