Barely Breathing | Book Three/Season Three A

7

chapter 07

"Hey, get out of the way, get back. Get this area cornered off before they trample every piece of evidence." I hear the Mr. Stilinski pushing his way to the front of the crowd.

"Back up! Everyone back!" A female deputy shouts, motioning for the crowd of curious teenagers to move backwards.

"Get these kids out of here!" Mr. Stilinski yells to the teachers before turning and coming face to face with me and Stiles. Scott and Isaac stand off to the side.

"Dad, just come here. Look, look. Look at it. It's the same as the others, you see?" Stiles points out to his dad. I follow them over to the tree, not really knowing what else to do.

"Yeah, I see that. Do me a favor. Go back to school, yeah?" He says, looking to me and then back to Stiles, letting us know that he's talking to the both of us.

When neither of us move, he turns to coach and says, "Coach, can you give us a hand here?"

"You heard the man! Nothing to see here! Probably just some homeless kid." Coach attempts to reassure the students in the most offensive way possible.

"Coach..." Scott starts, not sure how to word his sentence.

"Yeah?" Coach speaks annoyedly.

"He was a senior." I finish for him, crossing my arms over my chest.

Coach covers his moth with the palm of his hand and lets out a sigh before asking, "He wasn't on the team, was he-"

"Kyle! Oh, God, Kyle! Oh, God!" A girl screams as she's held back by a group of deputies.

"Go on." Mr. Stilinski waves us off. I grab Stiles' hand and lead him away, knowing he's too stubborn and curious for his own good.

"You see the way the twins looked at him?" Isaac asks, walking close behind the three of us.

"Yeah, you mean like they had no idea what happened?" Stiles answers his question with another question.

"No, no, they knew."

"The kid was strangled with a garrote, all right. Am I the only one recognizing the lack of 'werewolfitude' in these murders?" Stiles continues to argue his point, his arms flailing in the air as he does so.

"Oh, you think it's a coincidence they turn up and then people start dying?" Isaac rhetorically asks.

"Well, no, but I still don't think it's them." Stiles says as we all come to a stop at the bottom of the hill, habitually forming a circle so that we can all see one another.

"Scott?" Isaac looks to him for support. I look around, waiting to see what he says.

Scott looks to Stiles who crosses his arms over his chest, hoping that Scott will take his side.

"I don't know yet." He finally responds, sighing at the end of his words.

"You don't know yet?" Stiles repeats his words mockingly.

Scott looks to him and throws his head back before pointing to Isaac and saying, "Well, he's got a point."

Stiles looks to me as if Scott has betrayed him in some way before throwing his hands down frustratedly.

"Seriously, dude, human sacrifices?" Scott questions Stiles' theory which I thought we were all on the same page about until this moment.

"Scott, your eyes turn into yellow glow sticks, okay? Hair literally grows from your cheeks and then will immediately disappear, and if I were to stab you right now, it would just magically heal, but you're telling me that you're having trouble grasping human sacrifices?" Stiles argues his point.