The Bitter Taste Of Ashes...

Chapter 2

My heart doesn't stop pounding until I exit Lycan Towers. I have never been so pleased to leave a place in my life. Okay so WTF went on in there? It's still raining and I turn my face up to the rain and let it wash over me. It cools and refreshes and I slowly feel my equilibrium ebbing back.

Damn I need more Adderall.

Nobody has ever had an effect on me like Derek Hale and I can't for the life of me fathom why. There's a lot of myth surrounding werewolves, especially Alphas and their ability to 'influence' humans-most of it disproved as a load of hokum. Certainly those I've met made no impression on me. There again they weren't thirty (on the face of it) year old Adonis's, with the Midas touch and powerful as Caesar.

On the walk back to Baby I calm down and think more rationally. What was it? His stunning looks? Power? Wealth? Impeccable manners? Commanding presence? Or a combination of the above? The fact he appeared so young and yet exuded confidence and seemed so at ease with himself? What?

I'm pleased to see Baby and I think she's pleased to see me.

We thread our way through LA and make for the Pacific Coastal Highway. It'll take longer but I need the soothing costal views and time to steady my jangled nerves. We leave the city limits behind, join the highway and settle into a lane and cruise along at a steady fifty. It's a speed both Baby and I are comfortable with. The truth being, she will go no faster...Baby has her limits!

After several miles I begin to feel incredibly foolish. I run the interview over and over on a loop in my head and decide I'm overreacting to something largely imagined. Okay, he was very attractive, confident and at ease with his environment and wealth and power are a heady mixture. On the flip side he was arrogant, cold, impersonal, at least on the surface. There again he has every right to be arrogant, he's made his business from nothing to a global empire in twelve years. Some feat for a human, unheard of for a werewolf.

My mind wanders. What makes someone so single minded, so driven to succeed? Some of his answers were so cryptic - as if he had a hidden agenda. And Lydia's questions! I roll my eyes. I cannot believe I asked if he was gay!

Kill me now, please, right this minute!

And asking about his family like that, all stuff I should have known. He must think I'm an absolute idiot. My eyes flicker to the speedometer, dead on fifty. I realize I'm driving with even more caution than normal and his words echo in my head, 'You'd better drive carefully.' His stern voice and intense gaze. A shiver slithers down my spine and I deliberately press on the accelerator and get nowhere...As I said, fifty is Baby's limit.
Forget him Stiles I chide myself, I'll never have to see him again and settle back for the rest of the drive home. Except I will, at the graduation ceremony.

Fuck!

We live in a small community of duplex apartments near the campus. It's been home for nearly four years, but not for much longer. Straight after graduation we're moving to an apartment Lydia's parents bought her for her twenty first birthday, in LA. She's going on vacation with her parents and brother to Barbados and when she returns she's got a internship lined up with the LA Daily News. I've got interviews lined up for two internships with Advertising Firms in LA, I just pray I get one of them.

When I arrive back in the apartment Lydia is curled in front of the television cuddling her ancient teddy, Roscoe. She's still in her Eeyore pajamas so it's not good news. She saves them for depressive break ups and various illnesses. At least she's stopped hurling and the remains of a bowl of chicken soup is on the low coffee table. I know she'll want the gory details beyond the digital recording and I'm not looking forward to the interrogation.