Chapter 2 - Kit

The Williams pack was resting after their day of hunting—except for me. Because I never truly became one of them, and my back aches from the hours spent on my hands and knees scrubbing the damn bathroom floor.

Twelve fucking years of this, and I'm still here. Letting them all boss me around because I know it won't be better anywhere else.

I stood up, dropping the sponge into the bucket of now-dirty soapy water. Stretching, I listened to the dead quiet that filled the house and looked to the window to my right. It was night, well into it, and I was the only one awake. It was like that a lot.

Memories of years and years of servitude crowded up in my head as I shut my eyes, rubbing them with my pruney fingers. Not sure which was worse, too much attention from constant bullying or zero attention and being forced to clean up after a bunch of mutts.

I sighed. Both options were shit, but I didn't have much of a choice, now did I?

Leaving the bucket upside down in the tub, I padded out to the front hall in my socks. I smelled like bleach and glass cleaner, and my hair wafted into my face where it fell out of the clip I'd put it in.

Tick, tick, tick.

The clock on the wall up ahead chimed low right as I passed it, and I looked at the time. Past midnight. With a sarcastic grin, my heart full of vinegar and exhaustion, I mimed holding up a glass.

"Happy birthday, Kit."

I was officially thirty, and this birthday wasn't any better than the twelve before it. Fate, it appeared, seemed to have it in for me when it came to birthdays, starting with the last one I celebrated outside the Williams pack.

A familiar ache clawed behind my ribs as I thought of Sandy and Jade. I hoped they were doing okay—not for the first time, either. Similarly, their names weren't the only ones that haunted me as I fought daily to survive in a pack that hated humans so much more than the Edwards ever did.

Kaiden.

My eyes prickled as I remembered how he'd set me up for the fall. Pretending to like me, pretending to go in for a kiss, only to ridicule me yet again.

Why did this shit still bug me? It'd been years. Ugh. I was so pathetic.

Pressing on, I was even more desperate for a dose of fresh air, and I hurried down the stairs before someone noticed me.

The compound here had always been so much bigger than I was used to, and even after all this time, there were still sections that I'd never visited, so as I slipped by the east wing, I just shrugged like I always did.

A patrol wolf walked past in the vestibule ahead of me, and I quickly ducked to the left to go toward the side door. He was muttering something, and his words filtered down the hall until I was too far away to hear him.

"Fucking assholes. I've had guard duty for like three nights straight. Fucking tired. If Eli doesn't switch me out, I'm going to need some of that shit to get by."

I didn't know what he was talking about, but I didn't really care, either. I was so sick of living here, and I was more than overdue on my nightly walk around the compound—my rule-breaking, probably dangerous nightly walk.

My steps were soft as I approached the side door, but I was forced to stop when I heard more voices coming from the corner up ahead.

"Eli, we'll get you what you need. You need to be more fucking patient."

The voice wasn't familiar, and I flattened myself as best I could against the wall so that I wouldn't be seen. This was new.

"Don't fucking tell me what to do, Reggie. I have a product to deliver."

I heard the shuffle of feet against the stone floor and a low thud.

"Don't fucking call me that."

Curiosity got the best of me, and I leaned around the corner to see what was going on. I couldn't see whoever Eli was talking to, but the alpha was visible—plain as day and pinned to the wall. I was not meant to be seeing whatever was going on, and my heart jumped into my throat as I tried to sneak backward.

"Get the fuck off me, and go get your fucking buddy to get me my drugs. I have a business to run and a lot of young, stupid wolves looking for a quick high."

A scrape against the floor, and then I was backpedaling as fast as I could. I didn't want to turn away for fear that I wouldn't see Eli coming.

It had been the stupidest fucking move, because I walked right into the corner of the next section of the hallway. The edge bit into my spine, and I involuntarily yelped, the noise cutting through the air far too loudly.

"Oh no."

Faster than I could think, the pound of footsteps rang through the hallway, and suddenly I could see Eli. He glared, a partial shift taking over his mouth and making his fangs descend as his normally pale blue eyes shaded yellow.

"Fucking stop her!"

I turned and ran, moving as quickly as my inferior human legs could carry me. The front door was so close. All I needed to do was just get there. Please. Please.

The guard wolf patrolling at the vestibule was Rook. He stopped when he saw me run up, and I used the knowledge of wolves in the pack that I had and yelled out.

"Back there! A rogue wolf! Help!"

He took off, and I was so damn grateful that he was as dumb as a bag of rocks. With Rook gone from the entrance, I shoved myself forward, practically throwing myself through the doors.

I had no shoes, no warmer clothes than what I wore, but I didn't care. I needed out of that house, to begin with, and now I was the unfortunate bearer of knowledge that I wasn't supposed to have. The Williams pack was selling drugs to other wolves. Eli was selling to…kids?

God, this was so fucked.

I rushed off through the trees, the branches nearly bare as late autumn trudged on. They scratched at my skin as I sprinted with no sense of direction. Away, that's all I knew. I needed to get away.

Again.

It only took a few yards for my shirt to be torn to shreds, blood turning sections of my skin red as I pushed on. I couldn't run anymore, and the bottoms of my feet were no better for running without shoes. The socks were done for, and the tiny pajama shorts I had on were doing nothing to keep my legs unmarred or warm.

Exertion was keeping me from freezing, but I knew that wouldn't last. I couldn't survive in the woods with no shelter or protection or food. And just as the enormity of that thought hit me, I stumbled over a thick tree root and went ass-over-tea-kettle in the damp fallen leaves.

My head hit the ground hard, and I knew I'd be sporting a lump, but worse was the twist my ankle made when it got wedged between the root and the earth.

"Fucking hell."

Struggling, I pulled myself up to stand, bracing my weight on the trunk of a nearby tree. I was filthy now, and the aches and pains were really piling up. As I stood there catching my breath, noises in the trees were pulling my attention in several different directions. Bugs, animals, I couldn't wholly tell, but all of them made me feel watched. Ever the prey, right?

Snap.

I jerked my head to the right, but I couldn't see shit with it so dark. God, how far had I come? Was I even still in the Williams territory right now? I was terrible at judging distance, and it wasn't like I could smell where I was like a wolf could. I'd run for, what…fifteen minutes?

"Dammit. I'm so screwed."

"You have no idea, human."

I jumped, falling on my ass again. There was someone right there next to me, and I didn't hear him get close at all. It had to be another wolf, but I knew the voices of the Williams pack and this…this was not one of them.

"On your feet," another wolf ordered.

I pushed up clumsily, my ankle throbbing. "I'm sorry. I didn't know this was your territory. Please, I'm just trying to get away from—"

The warmth of a deep breath skidded across my skin. The other man had gotten right up to me in a blink, and I knew he was scenting me.

"You're coming from the Williams pack. I can smell it. Well, we have lots of questions for one of Eli's trespassers. Trust me."

"No! I swear. I'm not looking to—"

A hand clamped down around my mouth, and my heart rate kicked up all the higher. "You're coming with us, Williams. Doesn't matter what you were doing."

I fought against his hold, but there was nothing that a human could do against a determined wolf. Sweat made my hands slick, and the cuts along my extremities oozed as I tried to break free, my subconscious not caring that it was futile.

"Mmm!"

Yelling against the mitt on my mouth wasn't doing me any good, but the need to fight, to flee, was too hard to bite down. This couldn't possibly be happening. I'd just run away from the Williams pack, who wanted me dead because of some fucking drugs, and now I was being captured by some random wolves in the forest because I was just a dumb human who'd wandered into the wrong place.

Again.

Dammit! God fucking dammit!

"Quit thrashing, human." The arms around me squeezed down—hard. "You'll be taken to the Alpha. He'll know what to do with you."

The pressure ached where the wolf held me tight, and I could feel the bruises forming. It was as bad as being clamped down into an iron cage. And then it got worse; the hold tightened around my middle, smothering my diaphragm.

Stars bloomed behind my eyes, and I knew I was going to pass out soon. No, no, no. This was bad. Do something, Kit!

But there was nothing. Just the emptiness of forced slumber crawling up out of the depths to claim me.