Alpha Jasper

Thea

“We are going to die...”

I nestle my head between the cushions of June’s beaten up old couch, wishing it would completely drown out the sound of her insistent voice.

I showed up here fully believing she wouldn’t find out about Jessica going missing.

She never leaves the damn house—I even have to buy her groceries for her—and I assumed her parents wouldn’t tell her either.

“Missing? No one ever goes missing here,” she says, sounding so distressed I almost feel sorry for her. Too bad she thinks it’s a fictional character that’s the cause of the disappearance…

“She hated everyone here,” I try to convince her. “It wouldn’t surprise me if she just upped and left.”

June doesn’t look convinced. Her fingers fiddle with the bottom of her shirt, as they do when she’s nervous. Her eyes are like mine, hazel, although a little darker.

Sometimes we get called sisters, which I take as a compliment more than she does. June is very beautiful. Slim facial features, round doe eyes and the sweetest smile.

Her hair is thicker, more voluptuous than mine, and always styled neatly.

Her face is shadowed, as her back faces the window. It is quite a scene, with the thunderstorm currently raging outside.

It doesn’t rain very often. And storms occur so rarely it’s considered an event.

So with rain beating on June’s roof and windows, and thunder rumbling in the background, I’m surprised she isn't frightened.

“What if she was kidnapped? What if we are next?” she demands, raking her hands through her mass of curls.

In that moment, she looks a lot like Jessica. “June, calm...”

“I live alone... Oh, Goddess!” She starts pacing in front of me. “I’m next, aren’t I?”

I jump up, grabbing June’s shoulders. I glare at her, holding her tight as she shakes beneath my hands. She is genuinely scared, and I can’t really blame her.

Something like this has never happened in our peaceful little town.

All of a sudden the wind howls loudly from outside, and the lights flicker off.

We aren’t in complete darkness, but it is enough to make June cry out and dive at the couch, throwing a blanket over herself.

The trees outside wave their branches around, the little light from the dark clouds casts strange shadows across the floorboards.

“It’s fine... just wind,” I croak. Storms scare me. Always have. The thought of Mother Nature’s potential casting a terrible disaster across the Pack is terrifying.

The sound of June’s whimpering brings my attention back to her. “We just have to wait for it to pass.”

Again, the wind picks up, thrashing the trees around so violently a branch snaps off a nearby one, skidding across the deck.

And then, the door blows open.

The force is so strong, it swings back and hits the window, smashing it completely. The crash of the glass and June’s scream are similar. Glass scatters across the ground, landing at my feet.

“We are going to die!” I hear June faintly through the sound of the wind in my ears. It is deafening, as I fight my way to the door. The force of the wind is unnaturally strong.

Something is wrong, things like this never happen!

I grab the edge of the door, glass crunching under my shoes.

Using the strength I developed from carrying plates to customers at work all day, I force the door closed, only satisfied when I hear it click.

Relieved, I collapse to the ground, surrounded by glass.

“Thea? Are you alive?” I hear June ask tentatively, peeking out from under the blanket. We lock gazes.

“No thanks to you,” I mutter jokingly, patting my hair down.

I don’t want to bring up how the wind was the strangest thing I have ever had to deal with. How I found the courage to shut that door, I am not sure. It was as if I was being willed to stop it.

“Where is Squiggles?” June asks, finally emerging from the blanket. Wind still billows through the hole in the window, sometimes sending a leaf in. That isn’t going to be easy to fix.

“He was in his...” I break off, as my gaze finds the spot where the dog was moments before. June’s face instantly pales. Her dog is her life. Everyone in the entire town knows it.

So the second he’s out of her sight without knowing exactly where he is …

We spend the next five minutes searching June’s small cabin for the dog. Under the couch, behind the fridge, around the chairs. Nothing.

“He’s out there,” June says, her face falling in defeat. She glances at the door, and I know what she is thinking.

Instead of being trapped in the small room, full of wind and screaming, the dog had escaped. Into the forest, most likely.

“When the wind passes, I am sure he will come back,” I tell her, but the words completely pass her by. She is already at the door, opening it.

Instantly, the room is consumed in deafening wind, blowing shards of glass toward me.

I push forward, grabbing her by the forearm to stop her from making her thoughts a reality. Visions of her getting lost in that storm haunt me. No way am I letting her walk out there on her own …

“You stay here. I’ll go out and find him,” I promise, warily casting a glance outside. The rain is relentless, and doesn’t seem to be easing anytime soon.

Hopefully the thickness of the forest will be enough shelter.

Despite not wanting to send me out in the storm, June nods, fueled by the thought of her missing dog.

So, mustering as much courage as possible, I run outside, slamming the door closed behind me. Outside, the rain hits me like bullets. This is the first time I’ve felt rain on my skin in a long time.

The feeling is uncomfortable, as the cold liquid winds its way through my hair, and dribbles across my skin.

I head down the same path I had taken last night, the canopy giving decent shelter from the onslaught of rain, but not so much from the wind.

I fight against it, my hair whipping around my face as I run.

“Squiggles!” I call loudly.

My eyes scan everywhere as I go, looking behind tree trunks, and under bushes. He’s gone. The feeling of defeat sets in only a few minutes of being in the forest.

The further I go, the darker everything seems to get. Am I imagining things, or are shadows seeming to crawl out from behind those trees?

I keep walking, shivering at the feeling of my wet clothes against my skin. Now I am starting to regret walking around for her stupid dog.

And it’s beginning to seem like everything is against me at this point. The wind may have died down, from my position in the forest, but rain stills coats my entire body.

“Squiggles, please...” I croak, stumbling over my feet as I walk. The dirt path has mixed into mud, sticking to my feet—I didn’t take time to put on shoes.

Kicking a stick in front of me, I groan in frustration.

Not only is June going to kill me for losing her precious dog, I'm probably lost, and the idea of getting hypothermia is becoming more realistic by the second.

Then I hear the sound of a man clearing his throat, from behind me.

I jump, twisting around while praying to the Moon Goddess that it isn't a murderer lurking within the woods.

I see nothing. No one. Nada. Instead of seeing another person, I'm stuck staring at tree trunks and a thick mass of leaves. Like an idiot. Someone, or something lives here.

And I don't think I'm very welcome.

Calling out ‘hello’ is probably a stupid thing to do. At least that is what every horror movie I have watched suggests.

If whatever is in here doesn't know I have accidentally accompanied it, then maybe I may just get out of here alive. But it sounded like a very normal person making a very ~normal~ noise.

So I stand still, unsure of what to do. But then I see something. A figure. The outline is shadowy—almost fuzzy in a way. I have to strain my eyes to make sure I'm seeing right.

Because if I am, there’s a man standing farther down the path, his back facing me.

I may have just found someone to take me back the way I came. Because I believe I strayed from the path.

“Hey! Ah... Hello?” I decide to try my luck. Better than dying out here alone. My words carry through the wind, and for a moment, I assume he didn't hear me.

But then his head turns.

I can't see much of him. It's almost as if he's completely consumed by his own shadow. Only the outline can be seen, which shows me he is very tall, and of a much larger frame than I am.

Definitely a man. A man who could either help me, or kill me on the spot.

And then, he walks away! Down the path he goes, strolling away without even acknowledging me.

“Wait! I'm lost,” I call after him. He disappears around a corner. Well, either I stay out here and possibly die from the cold, or I follow him... The latter presents the only option.

Forcing my freezing limbs into action, I jog after him, pushing violent branches out of my way as I fight through the bush.

When I sight the man again, tendrils of darkness seem to chase after him. I decide I might be going crazy. But I still follow. I still follow the path he strolls on.

Despite the pace at which I chase after him, he only seems to get farther away. The distance between us is agonizing, but every slight turn of the man’s head keeps me going.

Perhaps he wants me to follow him after all. But right now, I don't have time to ask him.

And then, suddenly, he vanishes around yet another corner. And when I make it around, I'm back at June's house.

I let out a deep breath in surprise. The quaint, old cabin with the broken window stands in front of me, and I can't help but think I'm hallucinating. The man is gone.

Like he had been carried away with the wind. And instead, I'm looking at a police car parked in front of June's porch, the rain leaving a slick sheen over the bumper.

Luca. My heart races.

I run up the porch steps, wet feet slapping against the wood. I call through the window, waiting for June to get me out of this vortex of wind and rain.

The moment the door opens I stumble inside, yelling at her to close the door behind me.

Twisting around, a frazzled June presses herself against the door, the wind from the broken window blowing her hair around wildly.

But I don’t really notice her, despite failing the mission to find her dog. I do notice the man standing in the corner.

I stride over to him, throwing myself into his arms. “I’m sorry.”

I was apologizing because I know he is going to be mad. Being uptight about safety is his job, and the fact he is my boyfriend, and soon to be forced mate, makes it so much worse.

He just happens to be in his police uniform as well.

“I can’t believe you would do something stupid like that... Putting yourself in danger,” Luca mutters into my hair. I want to roll my eyes.

This isn’t the first time I’ve heard those exact words from him.

I pull away from him, glancing over at June. “I’m sorry. I couldn’t find Squiggles.”

She shrugs. She’s visibly calmer now, having had time to cease worrying while I was nearly lost out in the storm.

“I called Luca, because I thought you weren’t going to come back…”

“How long was I gone?” I ask. June and Luca exchange glances.

It gives me a decent amount of time to assess the two. They look similar. Not just because they are born into the same Pack, but because they are first cousins.

They share the same hazel-colored eyes we all do, but his hair’s slightly lighter from working in the sun a lot. But their facial structure is very similar, which at first I found weird.

But now I’m kind of used to it.

“Like, four hours,” June said. My eyes widen. Four hours? I swear I was only gone for about half an hour. I clutch my head in confusion. And then I remember the strange man.

“Someone else was out there,” I tell them. “A man.”

Luca looks out the window, probably assessing the weather. No way is it possible for him to go out there and look for him now. And who knows if that man was even real?

It could have been my imagination, from the cold.

Speaking of the cold, I suddenly become aware of the icy feeling crawling under my clothes and across my skin. June notices, and rushes across to the chest where she keeps all her blankets.

“Dad and I will head out tomorrow to check the area for June’s dog, and the man,” Luca tells me. He’s in business mode. I can spot it a mile away. His shoulders are pushed back, arms tense.

His expression is even grim. I hate when he gets like this.

June comes up behind me, wrapping the blanket over my shoulders. I just want this day to end.

And to find out who that man was.