Fighting with Fire #2 ✔

𝐂𝐡𝐚𝐩𝐭𝐞𝐫 𝟏𝟖 - 𝐄𝐦𝐛𝐞𝐫

By that point, Abi and Storm had been searching for Zack for almost a month and we'd still heard nothing from them. While wanting to protect everyone, Theo constantly stressed out about them, thinking of all the worst possible scenarios. To say he was becoming paranoid would be an understatement.

Ever the all-knowing Alpha, Jason kept reassuring us that 'no news is good news', but I remained convinced that any news is better than no news.

Jade returned to normal surprisingly quickly, resuming school in the blink of an eye, as if the past few weeks never even happened.

Maia still hadn't transitioned yet, and Jason decided that whilst she remained in Montana under his watch and protection, she would join Hellgate High — which was great for me, because it meant that I was no longer the only Brit in the school, or alone in failing American History.

As part of American History, our class was to take a trip to the Western Heritage Center, a regional museum in downtown Billings, a city in Montana five hours away from Missoula.

For some reason, the bus driver didn't want to drive for five hours straight, so instead, we'd be driving just over halfway there, to a city called Bozeman, and staying overnight there in a motel. The weird thing was, he was happy to drive for five hours on the way back, just not on the way there.

Thankfully, Maia had been put in my American History class, so I wouldn't have to deal with Theo and Ryder squabbling the entire time.

After insisting that we needed more clothes, Maia dragged me to a mall in Missoula. Which, to be fair, was probably true — I might have been spending a little too much time in those ¾-length leggings.

She had a load of money on her debit card, which she somehow had with her whilst crawling through the wild landscape of Montana with a werewolf bite on her leg, and so she paid for everything.

By the time this trip rolled around, we both had multiple sets of new clothes, new makeup (which was strange to me, as it had been months since I'd worn any), and new shoes. We'd also decided to buy some mini suitcases for this trip, even though I was pretty sure I could've fit all my clothes into a backpack.

On this shopping trip, Jade came with us and gave surprisingly good fashion advice. She was also a dab hand at haggling prices down, meaning we got a ton of stuff on discount.

Whilst we were on our trip, Jason decided that he and Jade would just continue at school, laying low, and avoiding any issues.

"Be safe," he reminded me, Maia, Theo and Ryder right before we were about to climb into the yellow school bus, and advised, "Theo, and Ryder: don't bicker. Maia: try not to get too angry, or too emotional about anything. Ember: well... just try not to—"

"I get it, Jason." I butted in, providing the words he was too nice to say to my face. "Try not to get between Theo and Ryder too much — right?"

"Ri-i-ight. Something like that."

"C'mon, all on the bus now," the bus driver called out to us, "It's either that or we're leaving without you!"

"Jason, they'll be fine." Jade rolled her eyes, tugging at the Alpha's arm. "Let's just let them go."

"Well, be safe," Jason repeated before we clambered onto the bus, bags in hand.

"We'll be safe, Jason, don't worry," Ryder joked, quickly pecking my cheek.

Avoiding both Theo and Maia's stares, I blushed and mumbled, "Whatever."

I slumped down into a seat next to Maia, leaving Theo and Ryder to sit uncomfortably next to each other on the seats in front of us.