Chapter 3 - Kane

Leaving the hardware store feeling more than a little awkward, Kane stood on the sidewalk and breathed deeply in an attempt to decompress.

From the second he had walked in there, he had felt the tension in the air. He"d noticed the way the Peterses had looked at him with a mixture of suspicion and hope. They clearly hadn't taken well to his coming to question them, and yet they had still looked at him like some prized pig when he had announced his working for the mayor.

Though he had tried hard not to think on what he had overheard of their meeting with Jack that morning, it was next to impossible with how they looked at him—not to mention the fact he had sensed their daughter watching him from the aisle the second he entered the store.

The heat he had felt at her gaze on his back had been like nothing he had ever experienced before, and though he was a huge, muscular military veteran, he had felt the oddest urge to turn and run.

When he had laid eyes on the woman—their poor daughter—he hadn"t been able to stop from thinking, if she is forced to marry, he"ll be a lucky man indeed.

Though clearly young and mistreated, she was quite a sight to behold. Kane wasn"t sure he had seen natural hair so vibrant red, nor eyes so green, eyes that pierced him the second he looked into them. Another reason he had wanted to run.

Never in his life had looking at someone made him quite so uncomfortable. And yet, as he stood outside the store, attempting to pick up Hanson"s scent to meet up with him, he felt the urge to head back inside.

He told himself it was because the Peterses knew more than they were letting on. He had sensed that much. But something in his gut wouldn"t quite allow him to accept that as reason enough.

No, something else was tugging him back inside.

He gritted his teeth and clenched his hands into fists, fighting the urge when he picked up Hanson"s scent on the breeze and started in its direction.

Hopefully his packmate had been having more luck than he had so far. The Peterses weren't the first he had questioned. He had already been to the grocery store and the florist, and it was abundantly clear that many of their new packmates weren"t entirely trusting of their new alpha or his men. Very little had been offered up to him, and though it was increasingly frustrating, he knew that anger and violence would not help matters.

He could only hope that Hanson had better luck, having been a part of the pack since birth.

He had just stopped outside the tattoo parlor, where Hanson"s scent trail had stopped, when he sensed someone sneaking behind him.

His hackles rose, his jaw clenched, and he whipped around just in time to see the Peters girl slip out from the alley beside her father"s store.

She looked this way and that several times as she appeared before hurrying toward him, practically on tiptoes.

The way she crept unsettled Kane, not because it was creepy—in fact, it was kind of cute—but because she felt the need to do so at all in her own town.

Whether it was the other townsfolk or her own parents that caused her to do so, Kane wasn't sure, but either way, he didn"t like it.

As she approached, he slipped into an alcove between the tattoo parlor and the shop next door to hide himself from view of the hardware store. And when she slipped in after him, she actually looked relieved.

"Are you alright, Miss Peters?" Kane asked, keeping his distance when he felt her discomfort.

She glanced back over her shoulder once more before answering, "My name is Miley. Please, don"t call me Miss Peters."

Kane bit back a scoff. It didn"t take much to understand why she didn"t want to be associated with such a name.

"Are you alright, Miley?" Kane corrected himself. Even her name is pretty, he thought silently, his cheeks heating at the adolescence of it. He straightened his back and clenched his jaw, hardening once more. "Did you remember something?"

Miley glanced back again. Her anxiety was abundantly clear. The bruises that poked out beneath the neck of her t-shirt were no surprise, and they left Kane fighting back sympathy.

He knew all too well what it was like to have abusive parents. It was the very thing that had led to his being turned in the first place. Maybe if his parents hadn"t been beating him black and blue, he wouldn"t have run away that night, the night he was attacked in the park and left for dead, only to wake naked and alone with no recollection of what had happened in the three days after that.

"I…umm…" Miley stammered, her head lowered as if she couldn"t bring herself to look him in the eye. Then, finally, she did. "My parents would kill me just for sneaking out back. If they knew I was talking to you, they"d—"

Kane cut her off with a hand on her forearm.

He shouldn"t have touched her. He knew that. Not only because he"d leave his scent all over her, but because she was little more than a teenager, not to mention the fact he didn"t know her. But it was instinctual, and the second his palm touched her warm flesh, he couldn"t bring himself to pull back.

He heard the way she sucked in a breath and followed her startled gaze to where his hand laid on her arm. For several seconds, they remained like that, connected by the simplest of touches, and yet Kane felt and uncontrollable urge to pull her closer and stop her quivering.

He felt it beneath his palm, saw the paleness in her face and how her cheeks flushed with something akin to embarrassment.

Oddly, he felt it, too. Embarrassment, or whatever this was, was not something he was used to feeling. He snatched his hand away.

"I"m sorry," he apologized quickly. "Whatever you have to tell me, tell it. You have my word it won"t get back to them."

Miley"s gaze met his, and this time it was he who sucked in a deep breath. The sensation of looking into those deep green eyes again was akin to being slapped hard across the face, even punched in the chest. And Kane liked it. He actually liked it.

Taken by surprise, he stepped back, but found he was unable to look away or even blink.

It was only when Miley dipped her gaze that he was able to do so.

His muscles hardened against the reaction she had caused within him. Her closeness in the alcove left him uneasy. And yet, he felt the urge to step closer again, almost immediately.

It was his need for whatever knowledge she had on the missing persons, it had to be.

And so he did step forward, careful not to touch her again as he dipped his own head and whispered, "Tell me what you know."

His voice came out far more husky than intended, and their sharp inhales synced as their gazes met again.

"I…I…I don"t know much about the girl from the bar. I don't go in there, but my father does."

Kane scoffed at that. It didn"t take much to guess where Mr. Peters spent most of his time. He tried hard to focus on what she was telling him and not what he was feeling throughout his entire body.

"I do know the two kids, though," she admitted, her cheeks flushing crimson. "I haven"t really spoken to either of them that much, and I couldn"t tell you where they are, but I do know where they've been. This one guy is the younger brother of a boyfriend of a friend, and he follows Lexi and Callum everywhere they go. They even hang out in the woods where…"

Miley finally lowered her head again. Kane took a second to register what she was telling him before he opened his mouth to question her.

He didn"t get the chance before she shook her head and rang her hands together. "I shouldn"t be telling you any of this. The guys would murder me for getting them into trouble, and if my parents knew I"d been sneaking out at night, they"d…"

She shivered, and Kane again felt the urge to touch her, to comfort her. His throat tightened. He could imagine all too easily how it felt to need to get away but be terrified to even try for fear of what might happen if caught.

"You sneak out and go drinking in the woods with some friends, and the missing teenagers are younger siblings of those friends?" Kane said, hoping for confirmation. "Don"t worry, your secret is safe with me."

Though an odd sense of protectiveness tightened his chest at the thought of this beautiful young woman alone and sneaking out to the woods in the middle of the night, he suspected she was safer doing that than she would be if she were caught out by her parents.

He remembered all too well the beatings he had received for being caught himself. He wouldn"t inflict that on anyone.

Miley looked at him as if surprised before finally nodding slowly. "There isn"t much for us to do around here in Nightstar, and you know how parents can be."

She shrugged as if it were no big deal, and Kane cringed. Maybe if he had been born a wolf, he would have considered having kids of his own, but he certainly wouldn"t have treated them the way his parents had treated him, or the way Miley"s were clearly treating her now.

"How old are you, Miley?"

At the question, she raised a brow. "Old enough to know it"s none of your business," she snapped back at him. Kane was taken aback by that. She was meek and mild, frightened even, and yet there was venom in her tone.

Her eyes widened and she quickly averted her gaze from his. "I"m sorry. I don"t know what came over me."

Kane bit the inside of his lip, angry with himself for putting her on the spot like that. He knew how it felt to be constantly on edge, constantly battling the urge to fight or flee, always looking over your shoulder with a need to just survive the next couple of hours.

The urge to grab Miley, throw her over his shoulder and carry her away from it all was so strong he had to shove his hands into the pockets of his jeans.

"I didn"t mean to make you uncomfortable," he said carefully, "I only wished to know the gap between you and the missing persons."

It was a lie, but it was the best he could come up with. He wished to know her more than he cared to admit.

"Nineteen," Miley said, lifting her gaze with a gentle smile as if she were sorry, too. It was the first smile he had seen on her lips, and though it barely touched her mouth for a second, it made his insides flutter.

What the fuck? He had never felt that before. He wanted to feel it again.

Clearing his throat, he said, "Then you"re right. You are old enough to know it"s none of my business, but anything you can tell me might bring us one step closer to finding Deneen and Tommy, and maybe even Miss Coleman if the disappearances turn out to be connected somehow."

Miley nodded and clasped her hands together.

"Like I said, Deneen and Tommy come to hang out in the woods with Callum pretty often. At least once a week. Callum and the others are there most nights."

Kane"s insides twisted. He had heard stories from Jack and Zander a million times of how they"d had a pack within their pack when they were younger, practically teenagers, and how they'd spent a lot of time in the woods drinking, dancing and doing all kinds of rebellious shit before they'd left. If it had been Callum who had disappeared, he might believe that was happening here. But from what Jack had said, Tommy and Deneen were far too young for that.

"It"s really all I know," Miley admitted, looking down as if it embarrassed her. "But I thought it might help."

"You"re right. It"s the first lead I"ve gotten, so thank you," Kane said. He reached out and squeezed her shoulder with gratitude, surprised when she shrugged him off.

"Yeah, well, don"t go telling anyone where you learned it!" she said, and Kane sensed her hackles rising.

She stepped back, and at almost the same moment, her entire body stiffened. Kane"s did, too, having heard exactly what she had.

"Miley! Miley! Where the fuck are you?"

"I"ve got to go!" Miley exclaimed, and before Kane could thank her or offer any kind of help for her situation, she was gone.

Fuck! he cursed, his teeth clenched, his hands tightening into fists.

What he might have done if her father hadn"t interrupted them, Kane didn't know, but he was enraged at being unable to find out.

He was still standing there when the bell of the tattoo parlor dinged at the opening of the door and Hanson's scent wafted into Kane"s nostrils.

It did nothing to remove Miley"s scent. She had smelled like a mixture of earth, vanilla, and citrus cleaning products, and yet as the scent started to fade, he actually felt the disappointment of missing it.

"Kane? Everything alright?" Hanson asked, appearing outside the alcove. "You hiding from something?"

Hanson glanced up and down the street as if he expected some enemy to jump out of nowhere. Then he leaned against the brick wall and crossed his arms. "I don"t see anybody."

Kane leaned out of the alcove and looked toward the hardware store. She really was gone. His chest tightened.

Fuck! He cursed again. This odd feeling in his chest was so foreign to him; he wished he could reach inside himself and rip it right out at the root.

"Kane?" Hanson barked with concern.

Kane flinched and shook his head. "Sorry, just processing a lead."

Hanson cocked his red-blonde head. "What lead?"

Kane bit the inside of his lip, wishing he hadn"t said anything. He always liked to check these things out first before sharing with anyone, even his alpha. It helped avoid blame when things didn"t pan out the way they hoped. And yet, here he was, blabbing to a man who had slowly come to be trusted by him and his friends, a man who had found his way into the inner circle of the new pack, and yet Kane still hesitated.

He did help us save Bonnie, and he hasn"t done anything to mistrust him since then, Kane reminded himself. It had been over a year since their arrival in Nightstar, even since they"d taken over the town.

He should trust him by now.

"Someone said the two teenagers have a habit of sneaking into the woods," Kane explained. Hanson scoffed.

"That"s hardly surprising. They"re teenagers."

"Human teenagers," Kane pointed out, "in a town full of werewolves. I"m sure I don"t need to tell you how dangerous young shifters could be for humans in a town like this?"

Hanson shook his head and asked, "Should we take it to Jack?"

Kane pursed his lips and shook his own head. Straightening his back, he said, "Let"s keep questioning. We might learn more, and I don"t want to take anything to Jack until we have something solid to go on. We don"t want to miss anything just because of one tiny lead."

For a second, Kane thought Hanson might argue. Then, as if he remembered his standing in the pack, he dipped his head and said, "You"re the boss."

Kane flinched at that. Though he had become an important member of the pack and was definitely higher in the pack hierarchy than Hanson, it still felt odd to be called such a thing.

Would he treat me with such respect if he knew the truth? Kane wondered. Hanson was yet another born and bred werewolf. He"d probably never so much as sniff respectfully in Kane"s direction if he knew the truth.

Fighting the anxiety that seemed to cling to him more and more with each passing moon, Kane said, "Let's get on."