The last thing James "Jay" Hale ever imagined was to begrudgingly return to Beacon Hills, find out his older sister was murdered, and then be forced to go on a wild goose chase after an enigmatic Alpha that seemed to have a particular interest in ru...
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CHAPTER FOURTEEN: The More the Merrier!
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Scott glanced between Jay, who he was holding up, and Stiles, whose gaze weighed heavily on the blonde. He shook his head when he saw how both of their expressions were twisted. Stiles was more obvious, always wearing his heart on his sleeve. The frown marring his features showed how much the situation was eating away at him with panic and frustration. It was irritating for him, having to watch Jay impose himself as nothing but a martyr, continually offering himself up as bait for the Alpha to tear apart so he and Scott could hypothetically get away and not really caring about hurting his already bloody leg while doing it.
Why couldn't Jay ever just fight for himself the way he fought for others?
But while Stiles was leaning toward anger, Scott could see in Jay's blank eyes that he'd given up. Jay looked at Stiles, absorbed the anger being directed at him, and reflected nothing but self-contempt back. There was only one solution to the blonde, but Stiles and Scott were choosing to make the night much harder than it needed to be by not following it.
"We're not going to die," Scott spoke firmly, aiming to be the confident one out of the trio. If all of them were pessimistic, then nothing would ever happen. He needed to be optimistic enough for all of them.
"Then what's it doing? What does it want?"
"Me." Scott realized, his voice sharp with guilt. "Derek says it's stronger with a pack."
"Oh, great." Stiles quipped, his sarcasm barely disguising his unease. "A psychotic werewolf who's into teamwork. That—that's just beautiful."
He came up on Jay's other side to also loop an arm around him. He kind of felt bad about shoving the boy, but there was no way in hell he was going to apologize. And if the way Jay's nails dug into his shoulder just enough to make him jump meant anything, the boy wasn't willing to say anything either.
The three of them shuffled down the hallway with long and quick strides until both Jay and Scott abruptly came to a halt, their attention drawn to the wall of windows at the side of the corridor looking out on the courtyard. Stiles followed their gaze and froze.
On the roof, a shadowy figure was crouched low in the darkness, red eyes gazing directly at them through the black, night sky.
The three of them started moving, running, stumbling over each other as the Alpha bounded from one level of the roof to the next, landing and leaping in the same instant as Scott, Stiles, and Jay took a step to race ahead. It was mirroring their every movement. In the process, Jay couldn't help the hiss of pain when his leg ended up being bumped in their rush.
Behind them, glass exploded into the hallway as the Alpha crashed into the school. Scott pivoted on his heels and steered them to the adjacent stairwell. "Down, down!"
