Dark Side of the Moon (24 page)

“I’m going to shift inside if you want to, too,” I told my brother.

He nodded, and ascended the stairs, Josie following him.  London and the betas joined us, Artemis, Josie, and I heading upstairs to the bedrooms for some privacy from the males, my bag in tow; I left Dan’s in the living room.  As soon as I was furry, I headed back downstairs to my brother.

He was already on the ground, sweating profusely.  A moment later, I heard something in his body snap.  He was still clothed, but I didn’t think he could move to keep from ripping them.  Dan kicked off his shoes, but that was about it.

It took him a few minutes to finally change.  His clothes stretched beyond their limits, ripping in some places as he shifted.  Large paws replaced his hands and feet, his ears and nose and mouth elongated, forming a muzzle.  The hair that formed over his body was white in color.

The whole time, he moaned and groaned until they turned into howls.

Dan struggled to stand after he completed the transformation.  While he gained his footing, London and Channing shifted, needing to get into the woods.  Josie, reddish in color, approached Dan and whimpered a little, trying to comfort him.  I remembered this part all too well.

As soon as Dan was able to successfully take a few steps and London rubbed his scent all over him, we led him to the doggy door.  London barked twice when we were in front of the group, and everyone split down the middle.  Channing and Artemis took off in one direction with their group, and we took off in another with ours.

Though I did like running through the woods with everyone, I was anxious for the appearance of the rogues.  We were all on alert, waiting for any unusual noise or scent.  It was a little difficult this time because Dan was struggling to run and keep up with us.  He’ll get used to it in time.

We had been running for a couple hours without any sign or scent or noise.  Then, we heard a howl in the distance, and my heart pounded in fear and anticipation.  London immediately changed course to meet up with the other group.  They had spotted something, and if we all attacked, we may get somewhere with the rogues.

We ran as fast as we could to meet the rest of the pack.  Now was our chance.  London would figure out why this wolf was on his territory.  Dan and I would figure out why it tried to kill us before being interrupted.  Adrenalin pumped through my veins, driving me to get there as quickly as I could.

As we grew closer to the rest of the pack, we heard sounds of a struggle.  London charged forward, urging the rest of us to pick up the pace even more.  Hopefully, they had the rogue pinned down, or almost completely pinned down.

But a moment later, I saw the black wolf running straight for us.  While I slowed down to avoid collision, London went for him, hitting him so hard that they both tumbled to the ground.  Everyone closed in on them, the other group approaching us for back up.

Everything was a blur, fur flying everywhere.  My heart pounded as I watched everyone dogpile on top of the rogue.  Growls and snarls ripped through the air.  Two wolves approached me, their eyes wide with shock at the scene before them.  I just knew that they were Dan and Josie.  I don’t think any of us have seen anything like this before.

Then, everything became silent.  The pack slowly dispersed, moving away from the dogpile.  A couple wolves limped away, but I knew their conditions weren’t very serious; they weren’t bleeding, so they were probably sprained or the wolf had bitten them a little too hard.  London was the last to move away, and when he did, I would have gasped if I could.

The rogue was lying on the ground, unmoving and drenched in blood.

My eyes tracked my mate as he approached me.  He had blood all over his muzzle, and it didn’t appear to be his.  London looked at me for a moment before walking off into the woods.  It took all of us a while to move.

They had killed another wolf, another person.

He had told me that they tried to avoid killing rogues, but it did happen on occasion.  And though it was extremely shocking to witness it, I could understand London’s actions.  He was frustrated that they couldn’t catch this wolf, and he wanted to eliminate the threat to his pack by any means necessary.

When I caught up to him, I rubbed myself against him, trying to comfort him in any way I could.  He just glanced at me before looking straight ahead.  I had no idea if he’s killed anyone before, so I had no idea what was going through his mind.  And we couldn’t speak until the sun graced us with its presence.

The walk back to his house seemed to last forever.  Everyone remained silent and walked behind us.  All of us were probably thinking the same thing:  Who was the wolf that they killed?

When we arrived at the house, most of us slowly slipped one by one through the door.  London immediately made his way upstairs, and I followed him.  Everyone else that came inside stayed downstairs for the night.

We slipped into London’s room, and since he was bloody, he stayed on the floor.  Curling up into a ball, he slowly let out a shaking breath.  I lay down beside him, and licked his muzzle, comforting and trying to clean him up.  We’d have a lot to talk about in the morning.

The shower across the hall turning on woke me.  My back ached from sleeping on the floor last night.  I was alone, my mate probably the one that turned on the shower.

Slowly standing, I grabbed my bag, and opened the door.  When I saw that the hallway was empty, I made my way to the bathroom.  My heart pounded the whole time, a mixture of anticipation and fear and sadness.

London was already under the spray, and either didn’t hear me or chose not to.  Setting my bag down, I hesitantly pulled back one side of the shower curtain.  We had already skinny dipped while camping, this wasn’t much different, and I just felt like I really needed emotionally him right now.

He didn’t look at me as I put the curtain back.  He stood close to the showerhead, his hands stretched out on the wall in front of him, head hung as the spray washed over his him.  I really didn’t know what to say to him.  So I stepped to him, and wrapped my arms around his waist, resting my head on his back.

“I love you, London,” I softly said to him.

He took a deep breath, and moved one of his hands to cover mine.  For a short while we stood like that, unmoving and silent.  Then, he moved his head to look up at the showerhead before turning to face me.  His eyes were full of pain, but we both knew that he did the right thing.  The rogue could have attacked so many other people had he not finally stopped him.  “I love you, too, Selina,” he whispered back.

I kept my eyes on his as I moved my arms to wrap around his neck and leaned in to give him a kiss.  He, thankfully, immediately returned it, seemed almost desperate for it.  My heart pounded in my ears in both arousal and fear, especially when he pushed me against the wall, moving his hands down to rest on my hips.

London tightly gripped them and deepened our kiss.  We were getting a little too hot and heavy, and needed to stop.  I gasped when I felt his arousal growing against my stomach, and he just moved to caress my neck.

I squirmed against him for a moment, moving my hands down to his chest.  As soon as I applied a little bit of pressure, he pulled away from me, both of us breathing heavily.  London moved his hips away from me, and rested his forehead on mine, closing his eyes.

Giving him a quick kiss, I told him, “We need to talk about what happened last night.”

“I know.  I just wanted to wash the blood off first, and you were still asleep, Selina.  Want to finish our shower first?”

After I nodded, we quickly washed the woods off us.  And…I couldn’t help sneaking a peak at London while he dried off.  His body was almost perfectly toned and lean, and I found myself wanting to run my hands all over him.  But then I became nervous for two reasons; one because I was a little scared about the next part in our relationship and because I was sure London could hear my increased heart rate and me trying to keep my breathing under control.  Thankfully, he didn’t say anything about it; I wasn’t sure what would come out of my mouth if he confronted me about my apparent arousal.

London waited until we were dressed and my hair was mostly dry before we descended the stairs.  Channing, Artemis, Dan, and Josie were sitting on the couches, dressed, yawning, and rubbing the sleep out of their eyes.  I guess the rest of the pack left sometime before we woke.

We both sat on one of the empty couches.  Taking a deep breath, London addressed us.  “I killed one of the rogues last night.  He wasn’t as big as the other one, which makes me believe it was the second rogue we encountered, not the one that’s been terrorizing the town.  And we have no idea who in the hell he is.”

I took one of London’s hands in mine, and squeezed.  I knew he was upset about killing someone else, even if he didn’t visually show it, and we wouldn’t get any information from him about the other rogue, but at least we finally got somewhere for our efforts.

“We’ve got to go to school shortly, so try to appear normal.  And as soon as night falls, we’ll initiate Dan into the pack.  If you still want to join, that is,” he said, looking to my brother.

Dan nodded.  “Yeah, I’ll still join.”

“Alright, let’s get going.  And remember, nothing happened last night, and do not talk about it under any circumstance.  We can’t have it getting out that I killed someone because it won’t end well.”

“We’ll text everyone to let them know,” Channing responded, pulling his phone out.  Artemis did as well, and they sent out a mass text to all of the pack members.

After they exchanged numbers with Dan, we ventured outside.  Dan and I had to go to school because I knew my mother was going to call to make sure we weren’t skipping.  And honestly, I think being around people would make London forget about what happened or see that what he did was for the best because our pack was more protected than before.  We only had one threat to eliminate now.

But today was going to be a very long day at school.

Chapter 26

School was a little stressful for the next couple of days.  Everyone in the pack was wary of other people finding out what happened on the full moon.  And we were waiting to see who it was that London killed.  We didn’t know if they were from Moonlight Falls or if they were an outsider like the other rogue.  The one thing we had to distract us temporarily was initiating Dan into the pack the night after the full moon.

With each passing day afterwards, London appeared to be a little better.  He actually painted most of his feelings away instead of talking about them, and none of them gave away what happened that night.  Some of his paintings were dark while others where more what he normally did.  As long as he was getting better, I didn’t care what he painted.

He seemed to be a little happier when I told him that now we only had to worry about one rogue rather than two.  And if we were able to take one down with everyone helping, they would have no problem doing it again.  That was going to be our plan for the next full moon.  But in the meantime, we were planning what to do before and after prom.

On Saturday morning, I was on the phone with Artemis, figuring out if we were going to go to Blue Pine or not after prom for something to do when the doorbell rang.  I was a little curious as to who was at the door because I was going over to London’s after I dropped Dan off at Josie’s, so I knew it wasn’t my mate.  Mom was closest to the door, so she opened it to reveal a woman I had never seen before.

I was trying to listen to Artemis and the woman at the same time.  She told my mom, “Hello, I’m Andrea Peterson.  I’m looking for my son, Derrick.”

My eyes widened with curiosity.  “Artemis, I hate to interrupt you, but I really need to call you back,” I told her.  Without waiting for a response, I hung up so I could have my full attention on this woman.

“Oh, uh, there’s no one here except my husband and children.”

“He told me that he was friends with your son Dan.  Could I talk to him?” she asked.

“Sure.  Dan, could you come here for a moment,” Mom called.

Dan emerged from his room, thinking he was in trouble.  He gave the woman a confused look as he ventured into the living room.  “Yes?”

“I was wondering if you’ve seen my son, Derrick.  He’s been missing since Tuesday.”

I didn’t think my eyes could widen even further.  Tuesday was the night of the full moon.

“Sorry, ma’am.  I haven’t.  I haven’t heard from him either, but I thought it was because we had gotten into a fight that night over my new girlfriend,” he lied.

“Oh, o-okay.  I figured I’d start here since I knew you were friends.  Thank you for your time,” she sadly said, turning to walk away.

Holy shit.  I needed to talk to London right now.  “Hey, Dan, are you ready to go to Josie’s?”

“Yeah, let me put my shoes on.”

As he disappeared into his room, I texted London, asking him to get the pack together immediately.  He asked why, but I didn’t respond.  I quickly put my shoes on, and grabbed my wallet and keys.  Dan met me outside, and clamored into my car.

As I pulled out of the driveway, he asked, “Are you thinking what I’m thinking, Selina?”

“That Derrick was the second rogue and we killed him Tuesday?”

“Yeah.”

“Then yes.  And we need to tell London immediately.”

“Why hasn’t anyone gone out to check and see who it was?”

“I have no idea.  I kind of didn’t want to ask the person who committed the killing on the grounds of he was finally getting over it.”

I sped all the way to London’s.  This information was just too important to wait for speed limits.  And as I drove down the road, I recognized some pack members jogging toward his house, worry on their faces.

As soon as I parked the car, London opened the front door of the house.  He met us at the bottom of the stairs.  “What’s going on, Selina?”

A couple pack members were here.  “Can we wait for everyone to show up first?”

“A lot of people can’t make it.  Just tell me.”

I took a deep breath.  “Derrick’s mom just showed up at our house.  She said she hasn’t seen him since Tuesday night.”

His eyes widened, and a couple people gasped.  After taking a deep breath, London looked around at the pack members who were present.  Raff and Charles were there.  “You two, lead a small group out into the woods.  Act like you’re out for a hike or about to go fishing or something so you’ll accidentally stumble upon the body.  Frantically call the police, and tell them that you came across him like that.  Do not deviate from that story, got it?”

They nodded their heads before heading off down the driveway with three people.

“What are we going to do?” Dan asked.

“Go on like normal.  We all don’t really have alibies for that night.  Then again, we did attack him as wolves, so that’s what it’ll look like.  If anyone asks, just tell them you were home.”

“Yeah, about that.  I actually told my parents that I was staying at Derrick’s that night.”

“Fuck, Dan!” London yelled, running his hand through his hair, frustrated.

“Wait, there might a way around this,” I interrupted.  “Tell them that you told our parents you were staying with Derrick, but you were really having a guys’ night with Channing and London.  They will definitely vouch for you, and you were ‘too embarrassed’ to tell Mom and Dad that you were hanging out with your sister’s boyfriend because you wanted to get to know each other better because London’s going to be around for a while.  If you tell them you were with Josie, then Mom and Dad won’t let you out of the house on the full moons, and you’ll have to sneak out every month.  That story may just work if you keep to it.”

“Good thinking, Selina,” London complemented.  “Everyone else got that?  Dan was with Channing and me that night if anyone asks.  Now go act normally, and tell everyone the news over the phone, not texts.  Don’t leave a paper trail of any kind.”

They all nodded before heading off.

I looked to my mate.  “If we’re going to act normally, then I should take Dan to Josie’s.  Tell her to not worry about coming here.”

As Dan pulled his phone out to tell his mate, Josie arrived.  We quickly explained the situation with her, and she understood the gravity of it all.  After we told her about the search party, she and Dan immediately left so that he wouldn’t be near the body.

Once we couldn’t see their car, London and I headed inside.  But as soon as we were inside the door, Channing’s car flew up the driveway.  Then it was time for round three of explanations.

“Holy fuck,” Channing breathed, running his hands over his face.

“I never would have suspected him,” Artemis whispered.

“I don’t think any of us did.  But it makes sense that he’d lure Dan out to the woods for the other rogue to attack him.  The only questions that remain unanswered are why him and why us,” I said.

“We could try to capture the other rogue this time.  Or we could just eliminate him, that way we don’t have to worry about him escaping,” London suggested.

“I like the second one better.”  I took a deep breath, and slowly exhaled.  “We need to get off this topic, think about something happy instead of somber.”  I looked to Artemis.  “Sorry I had to hang up on you.”

“It’s okay, Selina.  It was important.  But what I was saying on the phone was there’s a bowling alley in Blue Pine that we could go to afterwards.”

“That ought to be interesting,” Channing said.

For a little while, we tried to talk about the prom that would be occurring in a week’s time.  It was a nice distraction that carried over to lunch.  But after Artemis and Channing left, thoughts about Derrick came to mind.  It was difficult to think that he was dead.  Sure, he had been annoying and I wanted him to leave me alone, but I didn’t want him to die because of it.  But there was absolutely nothing we could do about it now.

I told London that I needed to have my mind taken off the whole situation, so he led me up to his studio.  I didn’t have any of my supplies with me, and luckily London loved me so much that he allowed me use his supplies.  We both painted random things on our own canvases until dinner time.  Instead of going out, we just found something to make in the kitchen.  I liked cooking with my mate as much as I liked painting with him.  After dinner, we ventured to his room to watch a movie.

But when we were lounging on his bed after eating, I lost interest in the movie.  Ever since Wednesday morning, I had been thinking about the shower we had shared.  I really did love London, and I could see us together in the future.  I just didn’t want things to change between us after we mated.

London must have heard my increased heart rate for he turned down the volume on the TV.  “Everything okay, Selina?” he softly asked.

I looked down at my hands that were twisting together.  “I just…I’ve been thinking about what’s going to happen after we officially mate, and…I don’t want anything to change.”

He gently cupped my chin and lifted my head up so I could look at him.  “Nothing will change unless we want it to, Selina.  If anything, we’ll probably be even closer.  Just look at the other mated couples in the pack.”

“I know, but….” I took a deep breath.  “I love you, London, but…I’m kind of scared of the next step.”

“Talk to me then.  What are you scared of?”

I looked away from him.  “I know you and Ricky had a relationship before, and…I just don’t know what to do that would be right or anything.”

“There’s not that much to it, Selina.  And that’s why we talk to each other, to figure out if we did something wrong or felt weird so it won’t happen again or if we felt something enjoyable so we can remember to do it again next time.  And I promise I will be gentle with you unless you tell me otherwise.”

My face flushed.  “Let’s just take it slow for now, London.”

“How slow is slow?”

I knew he was playing with me, and decided to go along with it.  “Well, I don’t think this is slow,” I said turning to look at him.

Taking a deep breath, I moved to sit up on the bed.  London stared at me the whole time, waiting to see what I would do.  Placing my hands on his chest, I eased him from his side to his back resting against the headboard.  Once he was where I wanted him, I moved to straddle his lap.

Both of our breathing and heart rates increased.  As I leaned in to press my lips to his, he rested his hands on my hips.  My heart pounded in my ears as butterflies fluttered in my stomach.  London’s lips were so soft against mine, and at first, the kiss was tame, just enough to make the both of us want more.

London slid his hands up my back to press me into him as the kiss became more urgent.  Very soon, I was panting for breath, and wasn’t sure about our growing arousal.  I’ve never felt this way before in my life, and I wasn’t sure if I should act on it.  London’s lips caressed my neck and his hands traveled down my back.  I jumped a little when the tips of his fingers slipped under my shirt, but I wasn’t sure if we should stop just yet.

He slowly traced his fingers along my back, drawing shivers out of me.  He thankfully didn’t try to push me, though, just teasing me a little.  When his hands rested on my hips and his lips returned to mine, he shocked me by flipping us over so I was beneath him, flat on my back.

Since I had been straddling him, London settled between my legs.  I gasped when he ground his hips into mine, which prompted him to do it more.  My body felt hot, my brain almost on sensory overload.  But before it went completely numb, I tore my lips away from his, and gently pushed on his chest.  We were both breathing heavily, and I could see the lust in his eyes.

“Too much?” he breathed.

I didn’t trust my voice to not waver, so I nodded.

London gave me one more kiss before moving to lie beside me again.  It took us a while to regulate our breathing, but my butterflies never dissipated.  Though I really liked what just happened, I was still unsure of mating with him.

After the movie that I could not for the life of me remember what it was about, I decided that it was time to go pick up my brother.  When I messaged him, he said that Josie was dropping him off at home.  So after I gave my mate a couple good-bye kisses, I returned home as well.

Dan and I tried to act normally around our parents until we left the house again to hang out with our mates, and when we went to school on Monday morning.  The whole pack was on edge as we awaited the announcement about Derrick.  Raff and Charles had shown up after I left London’s Sunday night, and told him about coming upon a body and calling the police.  They were pretty sure it had been Derrick, but the news had been very quiet about the whole thing.  We weren’t sure if the school was going to tell anything to us in the next coming days.

They waited until the Friday before prom to say anything at school or in the news.  They had confirmed that Derrick was the one in the woods.  And after a thorough examination, they determined that he died from an animal attack.  London had ripped him up so much that they weren’t able to tell if it had been a wolf or a bear that attacked him, which was lucky for us because there wouldn’t be a hunt for Derrick’s attacker.  How could there be if they didn’t know what it was?