Skin Deep (Are the Secrets I Keep)

CHAPTER 6

School's back on so no long trips to the ocean anymore. He's also planning on graduating by the end of the year, which means advanced classes and more exams than he cares for. Still, he'd rather leave with his high school diploma even if he's not going to college. Not a human-run college anyway.

With wolves and hunters scattered all over the place again, Stiles is reduced to going to a small river running through the forest on the south edge of town instead of any of the ones in the Preserve and thus Hale property. He takes his time, hiking out with a duffel bag and a picnic basket instead of driving along one of the back roads since he would've had to park and walk sooner or later anyway to get to his destination.

Once he's there, he spreads out a picnic blanket, strips, and slides into the river with his skin still wrapped around his arm and just floats for a while. It's a hot day but the water is nice, and he soon lets his pelt unravel from his arm. A twist of his body rolls him into it, and soon he's dipping gleefully in and out of the water, splashing around on the surface before diving down to snap up the occasional fish. After about an hour, he leaps out of the river and onto the sun-warm grass, flopping onto his back and then flopping back onto his belly before waddling over to his blanket to sun himself and dry off.

A snap of a twig disturbs his lazy afternoon, and a second after that, he's scrambling up on arms and legs, whisking his skin away and yanking a shirt over it before lunging for his pants.

No no no, nobody should be out here! There aren't any hiking trails nearby – it's why Stiles chose this place – and he was extra careful to make sure nobody was around. Unless-

He manages to pull his pants up just as Peter Hale steps into the clearing, and without hesitation, Stiles grabs the closest hard object – the basket – and chucks it at the man's head.

Peter – infuriatingly enough – simply catches it.

"I'm gonna kill you!" Stiles snarls.

Peter just smirks and saunters over with the basket. "Well that's a little uncalled for." He pauses and tilts his head to one side, raking an appraising eye over Stiles' damp hair and somewhat dishevelled appearance. His smirk widens. "Oh, Stiles, did I interrupt you from a bit of skinny-dipping? I assure you, you don't have to stop on my account."

Stiles stares in utter disbelief before most of the anger drains from him and he rubs at his forehead instead, feeling a headache coming on. "Why are you here, Peter? You are stalking an underage teenager! Don't you have anything better to do?"

"No," Peter says bluntly, and yeah, that's definitely a headache welling up behind his eyes. The werewolf drops down beside him, on his left, on the blanket, and even generously hands him back the picnic basket. Stiles takes it and just barely stops himself from smashing Peter over the head with it.

For a long minute, neither of them speaks. Peter leans back on his hands and stares out across the river, looking for all the world like there's nowhere he'd rather be. Stiles wonders if it's at all possible to study like crazy and try to graduate by the winter break, just so he can get away from all this bullshit.

"Boyd and Erica are dead," Peter reveals out of the blue. "The Alpha Pack locked them up without moonlight for the past couple months, and then released them when Derek and Scott and the other idiots broke into the bank to try and rescue them. They tried to chain them up but they ran into the Alpha Pack on the way out, and when it became clear Derek wasn't going to kill them himself, Kali and Ennis did the honours. Derek has the bodies. The pack's been debating what to do about them, if they should just bury them in-" A derisive, startlingly disgusted, humourless grin stretches his lips. "-my old grave under the floorboards, our very own dirty secret, or drop them off in a ditch somewhere where someone will find them eventually."