Chapter 5: Chapter 5

Austin stood at the sound of ruffling leaves and what sounded like twigs snapping at least fifteen feet behind him. He turned around and used his wolf senses to make out who it was but he could neither catch a scent nor hear a heart beating.

Strange, he thought.

Brawling with the bark of the tree and yelling at the piercing white of the moon had done him more good than he was ever going to admit. The feeling of his bruised knuckles healing brought a bitter-sweet kind of pleasure to him. Again, Élancé came to his mind, but he brushed her off. He knew he couldn’t afford to get entangled in a mating process right now. He knew he felt something too—

He repressed every thought of it, but he could feel his wolf inside of him, and he knew, that fighting fate was sooner or later going to gnaw at everything he was.

“Goddamn Crystal moon pack,” he muttered under his breath, irritably. “Why couldn’t they just stay on their own side of the turf?”

Austin held the irritation deep in his throat as he dragged his legs to head home. But he knew the real reason he was irritated. And as much as it was his guests showing up unannounced, it was more so the way Élancé looked at him.

Austin made his way out of the woods and back into the building. He wanted to be alone. So, he decided to skip the main floor—the busiest part of the building—to the kitchen where he had a mini bar set in place for nights like this.

When he got to the kitchen, he found a variety of drinks that could numb him, but he stuck with what was familiar. He picked out a bottle of vodka, separated the fixed cork from the bottle with ease, and took a whiff of its contents. Austin was pleased. He placed the bottle down on the counter and picked out a glass.

When the first glass-full went down Austin’s throat, he felt a sting and a hotness almost like the one he felt after hitting the rough bark of the tree with his fists. It was hot, but not hot enough; so he drank more, and more, knowing fully well, that he would probably never get drunk because of his powers. But he could get close.

*

“He just might make it,” Jack, the doctor said as he stashed all his medical equipment back into his bag. He had worked for something over forty minutes trying to scrape off the goo from Hogwash’s arm—what was left of it anyway. Élancé was pleased with this news. She brushed her father’s hair off his sweaty forehead, and placed her palm on it. His fever seemed better, but she knew she would feel much better if he regained his full consciousness. She absolutely could not lose him.

“Is there anything I can do to hasten his recovery?” Élancé asked, trying to curtail the desperation in her voice.

“You can wait,” Jack spoke as he stood. “This fight is his, not yours.” Then, he walked away.

Before then, Élancé had not realized that there was no one else with them. She took her father’s limp hand in hers and released a deep sigh. Then, for the first time since she arrived, she took in the inside of the house in all its grandeur.

The thought of Austin crept to the front of her mind again, like a persistent cancer, only this cancer was one that half of her wanted so badly to not go away. The look on Austin’s face dried up her throat and she realized she needed a drink, or water. Anything to get the cold hearted alpha out of her head.

Élancé looked around. James was nowhere to be found. She caught the scent of a few werewolves out of her line of sight.

You shouldn’t bother them with things like that, Élancé thought to herself. Then she stood and decided she would find the kitchen herself. How hard can it possibly be to get a glass of water?

Élancé walked past the major room her father was recovering into another room, but she found it empty when she twisted the door knob open. She closed the door quietly and turned around. She saw a corridor with amber lighting and walked through it. She found a door at the end of the corridor and twisted it open, but it had no lights. With her wolf vision, she was able to tell that she had located the kitchen, but she needed lights to pour herself a glass of water.

Élancé used her heightened senses to find the light switch, but just before she flicked the switch upward, she caught a very intoxicating scent in the room.

Instantly, Élancé’s wolf came alive, jumping and stretching inside her.

Austin.

The alpha of the dark moon pack was sitting opposite Élancé on a bar stool. Close to him was an empty bottle of vodka and his ruffled shirt which looked like it was taken off in haste.

There was a heated moment of silence between the two of them as their eyes stayed on each other. Élancé noticed the beads of sweat which had gathered around the divide of Austin’s chest.

She tried to stop her eyes from staring at his body—the curves of his biceps and the way the light glistened on his wet skin. Within seconds, the kitchen became hotter than it actually was. Élancé felt her throat dry up even more.

Austin felt drawn to Élancé, even though he tried to lie to himself; to his body. He could feel Élancé’s body heat make him warmer and warmer. He held her scent for some time, but he wouldn’t let his body give him away. It was harder now that he had alcohol in his system. He cursed that his senses were both heightened and dimmed at the same time. It was like Élancé’s scent was all he could get a hold of in the entire building.

“You,” Austin let the words slip out of his lips.

Élancé could feel the hidden bass in his voice and the faint smell of alcohol in the kitchen. She noticed his hair was disheveled and concluded he must have constantly been running his hands through them. Could it be that he too, was feeling prickly from longing? The hazel of his eyes seemed to make her thighs quiver.

“What is your name?” Austin asked with a gruff voice; his tone, a bit slurry from the alcohol. But that didn’t stop what Élancé was feeling from being in the same room as Austin.

Élancé considered not replying Austin. Especially after the way he had treated her before, but she remembered that they were under his protection, at least for now. She broke eye contact with Austin, partly because she didn’t want to give him the satisfaction and also because she needed to be free from gaze.

“Élancé,” she replied, trying to remember why she came to the kitchen in the first place. She father and should have just stayed with her father and avoided all the drama. But she knew there was a part of her that wanted to stay.

Austin once again pressed his feelings deep inside himself. He studied Élancé’s frame from head to toe and picked up the glass which was half filled with the brown liquid.

“Mate indeed,” Austin scoffed, then he emptied the contents of the glass down his throat at once, as if trying to urge it to press down on everything he was trying to swallow.

Élancé felt her stomach recoil from Austin’s words. She felt rage in the form of hotness boiling deep inside her, and at that moment she rued ever meeting Austin or having to seek shelter in his pack.

“I knew you were a cocky prick, but I never made you out to be a bully and a jerk,” Élancé spoke with intent. She wanted to say more, but she thought of her father. He needed to rest up. She caught what seemed like a short-lived smirk on Austin’s face, but doubted what she saw to be true. “If there was somewhere else I could be, even if it was on the edge of the world, I would be there. Anywhere is better than being here with you.”

Austin was surprised by Élancé’s outburst, but he couldn’t say he completely hated it. If anything, there was a part of him that felt even more drawn to her. A part of him that felt sad for her. He stopped Élancé just as she was about to leave.

“Élancé,” Austin called out to her, surprised at himself, but not feeling any regret that he did.

Élancé stopped, almost instinctively, feeling the gravitation between the both of them. “Is he going to be okay?” Élancé turned around and he felt relief as he caught her eyes again. “Your father,” he said.

Élancé felt her eyes get red hot from the waterfall of salty tears that were gathering clouds. She tried to hold them all back in, but some tears escaped and slid down her cheeks.

Austin climbed down the stool, once again surprised by the affection he felt towards her. He walked close to Élancé and wiped her tears clean.

“I’m sure everything is going to be fine. Don’t be a baby about it,” he said.

The faint scent of alcohol on his breath and the buzz from Austin’s rough palm against her skin sent tremors all over Élancé ’s body. She could feel a rush of blood rising between her legs. Élancé flinched instinctively, jerking backwards slightly. There was something about Austin’s statement that threw her off.

“What is wrong with you?” Élancé asked, with irritation in her facial expression. “Why do you act this way?”

Austin, seeing the look on Élancé’s face, lets himself slide back into a cold demeanor. He felt a little bit angry that he had let Élancé see him like that. He needed to make up for it.

“I’m holding a meeting tomorrow, to talk about how to go forward with the attack,” Austin said, with the chill of his demeanor back in play.