Page 42 of Brutal Reign
I roll my eyes as I swipe my chapstick over my lips, completely over her mean girl shit.
Hayden snorts a laugh. “Well, considering Ace kissed her to get back at Seb for doing it first…” she muses, trailing off with a smile.
Again, it’s a teensy bit satisfying to see the flash of surprise on Chandler’s face before she schools her expression, but Hayden really didn’t need to go there. I frown in my friend’s direction, Chandler seizing my moment of distraction to dart out a hand and pluck the tube of chapstick from my fingers.
“Hey!” I object as snap my head back toward her and reach up for it, but she’s already swiping it over her own lips with a smirk. “What? We already shared boys, what’s chapstick?” she chuckles as she smacks her lips and offers the tube back to me, waggling her brows. “Hope you like my sloppy seconds.”
This girl has no idea she’s playing with a nuclear bomb. A sudden rage flares to life inside me, so intense that it’s practically blinding. I mean, I should’ve assumed she’d hooked up with Seb, but hearing her confirmation makes my inner wolf murderous, and it takes everything in me to hold her at bay.
“Go fuck yourself,” I grit out, bringing a hand up in front of me- not to take my chapstick back, but to flip her the bird.
Chandler clucks her tongue, tossing the tainted chapstick into my lap. “Now why would I do that when I’ve got Seb to do it for me?” she scoffs, flipping her hair over a shoulder. “I’ll try to be quiet when I sneak into his bunk again tonight, but no promises.” That arrogant smirk returns to her lips as she turns on a heel to head back for the stairs, snapping her fingers in a directive for Bailey to follow.
Shit, my wolf is dangerously close to the surface.Too close.I squeeze my eyes closed, curling and uncurling my fists as I breathe deep and count backwards from ten.
“Hey, you okay?” Gus asks, leaning over to set a hand on my shoulder.
I blink my eyes open to find his face right in front of mine, forcing a smile. “Yeah,” I choke out. “I’mgreat.”
15
The evening breeze whips through the trees, rattling the canopy of leaves overhead while I pause to inhale deeply through my nose. It’s windier than usual tonight, making it more difficult to stay on the scent I’ve been tracking since I shifted. Luckily, I’ve got an edge that most other wolves don’t– my mom’s a tracker. Sharpened senses are woven into my DNA beyond the norm of most shifters, and though I’ve still got a long road ahead of me when it comes to honing my skills, I’ve already got a handle on the basics.
That’s how I know I’m getting close. Not only is Ace’s scent getting stronger, but his presence is also so damn familiar that my wolf can sense he’s near. The two of us have been running together for years. I knew he’d be out here because I know my best friend like the back of my hand, and on the rare occasion he allows himself to get riled up, the only way he can cool down again is by shifting to his wolf and going for a run to burn off his aggression.
I need the mental reset right now just as much as he does. I didn’t fully understand what was going through his head until I stood there and watched him kiss River, but now… well, it wasa harsh reminder of exactly why we made that pact in the first place.
A flash of silver catches my eye through the trees up ahead and I spring forward in pursuit, the damp earth of the creekbed squelching beneath my paws. He hears me coming, whipping around in alarm, but the moment our gazes lock and he recognizes my wolf, he visibly relaxes. Ace knows why I’m out here; why I need to run off this frustration just as badly as he does. And he knows I’d always rather run with him by my side.
For a second, I wonder if he’ll wait up for me. I wouldn’t blame him if he didn’t. But as we stare at one another, a silent understanding passes between us, and when I start toward him, he doesn’t turn away. He waits for me to catch up, then the two of us take off in tandem to continue our sprint through the forest.
We could use the pack mind-link to communicate with one another while in our wolf forms, but we don’t. Words aren’t what we need right now. We’ll hash things out once we’ve both calmed down, but for now, each of us needs this time to be alone with our thoughts, the wind whipping through our fur and our paws thundering against the forest floor.
A peace settles between us as we wind through the overgrown foliage together; an unspoken show of support and solidarity. Despite what happened tonight, me and Ace are a team and we’ll always have each other’s backs. It’ll take a whole lot more than a single argument to dismantle the friendship we’ve spent our entire lives building.
Time slips away, the moon rising higher in the night sky overhead before we eventually wind up back at the grove of trees near the gate to the squad complex where we left our clothes. I found Ace’s stuff stacked neatly on a log when I came out here looking for him. He always takes the time to fold his clothes when he shifts, while I just toss mine aside haphazardly– and ifthat’s not a reflection of who we are as people, I don’t know what is. My boy always has his shit together, while I’m a goddamn mess.
Nobody knows that, though. Well, nobody but Ace. I barely admit it to myself half the time.
The two of us shift back to our human forms, tucking our wolves away and getting dressed in silence. All the while, the air between us rapidly thickens with tension. It won’t be cleared until we talk about it. As much as I wish we could just move forward like none of this ever happened, things won’t be the same between us until we get everything out in the open.
Still, we take our sweet ass time getting down to it. Ace sits on the log and pulls a joint from his hoodie pocket, sparking it up. The two of us pass it back and forth, and only when the spent roach is tossed to the ground and crushed beneath his heel does Ace finally clear his throat to speak.
“You get it now, don’t you?” he grumbles, stuffing his hands into the front pocket of his sweatshirt.
I jerk a nod, dropping down onto the log to sit beside him. “Yeah, I do,” I reply quietly, staring down at my boots. “For what it’s worth, I’m sorry I fucked up our deal. It never should’ve happened, I just…” I heave a sigh as I trail off, shaking my head. “I wasn’t thinking.”
“Me neither,” Ace admits, shooting me a side-eyed glance. “It was pretty great though, huh.”
“Yeah,” I sigh, stabbing my fingers through my hair. “Fuck.”
A pause settles between us as my mind wanders back to how good it felt to finally give into those long-suppressed urges; how fucking incredible it was to finally just grab ahold of River and kiss her the way I’ve always wanted to. I lift my head, flickering a glance toward Ace, and I can tell he’s thinking about the same thing, staring off into the forest with a faraway look in his eyes.
“It can’t happen again,” he murmurs, idly running the tip of his index finger along the curve of his upper lip.
“I know,” I growl.
“If it does…”