Chasing the Beta

by Jessica Edwards

  Realization kicks in. “Oh, those notes. Were they useful?”

  He cracks a big smile. “They were really useful for the test we had. Thank you.”

  He enters his combination code and opens the door of his locker, but as soon as the door gives way, something falls out and lands on the floor.

  “Damn papers.” Max murmurs, he goes to pick it up, but not before I insist first.

  “No, it's okay. I'll get them for you.” I kneel down and pick up what appears to be pictures, and as I turn

  them over, my heart stops.

  What. The. Hell?

  In front of me, I see the pictures that were taken of me that day when I shifted in Ryder's house. I look through them all and sigh in relief because thankfully, he doesn't have the picture of me transforming into a wolf, but why does he have these in his locker?

  Max had them all along?

  I stare numbly at him, and when he notices my expression, he frowns.

  “What's wrong?”

  I don't show him the naked pictures because god knows how many times he's looked at these. “Why do you have pictures of me?”

  Max looks taken aback. “What?”

  I show him one of the pictures that's of me in my underwear and shove it in his face. “What's this!? What are these doing in your locker Max?” I shriek.

  He puts his hands up in surrender, he looks as shocked as I am. “I swear Alice, they're not mine. I don't know how they ended up in my locker but I promise you, I didn't take these.”

  He's lying again!

  I walk away in anger, but Max soon catches up with me. “Alice, please listen to me.”

  I stop and look at him in horror. “I've had enough of listening to your excuses.”

  Max begs. “Alice, please believe me. I didn't do this. I don't do things like this.”

  There was nothing I could say at this point.

  “I thought I told you to stay the fuck away from her!?” A voice bellows from behind me.

  Max's head swings towards Ryder and so does everyone else in the corridor, but my attention is still drawn to the pictures I hold in my hand, the pictures of me preparing myself for the change.

  Why did Max have these pictures?

  Ryder comes to stand next to me and immediately his body goes into overdrive. He snatches the pictures away from me and glances briefly at them before shoving them into his pocket.

  “You perverted piece of shit.” Ryder takes Max by the collar of his shirt and shoves him to the floor. I can't say anything because of the shock.

  And I thought things were going to be fine between us.

  From the corner of my eye, I see Silver walking away

  with a smirk on her face.

  As students gather around, I make a move and hide behind a wall to keep myself hidden.

  It was out of my hands with what happened now.

  Students gather around quickly and form a circle around Ryder and Max. They take out their phones and anxiously wait to see what happens next. I look at both males to see both have white knuckles from clenching their fists too hard, and gritted teeth from the effort to staying quiet.

  I see both of their eyes flick from me then to each other. Their faces unreadable, with no fear and no invitational smirks.

  Oh no.

  Max charges towards Ryder but he steps back in surprise, turns to guard himself but it's too late, Max's head makes contact with Ryder's gut causing a wheezing sound to escape his lips. I wince from the blow and shake my head.

  I can't watch this. Ryder's going to hurt him so bad.

  Both men grunt as they take handfuls of each other's clothing and attempt to wrestle each other to the ground. Ryder releases a hand-hold and uses it to jab Max in the ribs. Max releases both hands, grabs Ryder's hair, and brings his face down sharply onto

  his bent knee.

  The students cheer in excitement, but not me. Watching them fight makes me want to shout at them to stop hurting each other, but they probably wouldn't listen.

  What a bunch of animals.

  I gasp in horror when I see blood flowing from Ryder's broken nose as he staggers backwards. But in an instant, Ryder charges towards Max, but he dodges to the side in one fluid move. Ryder swivels in his direction; his menacing eyes blazing red with rage, the rest of his features indistinguishable. Ryder continues forward, using his own momentum to shove Max into the lockers, he grunts from the impact.

  Ryder quickly reaches with his hands; attempting a choke hold, but Max springs away; knocking Ryder's legs out from under him. Ryder crashes to the ground, but before he can think to get up, Max gets up on top of him, locking his arms under his knees. Ryder glares up at Max, leans back and head-butts him, he growls in agony at the impact. Ryder smirks and punches Max in the jaw; his head snaps to the left.

  Ryder throws another punch to the nose where blood dribbles down the side of Max's face.

  “What the hell is going on here!?” A deep voice halts Ryder from punching Max in the face again. All the students who were watching are now running away

  from the sudden disturbance, but some students still remain at the scene. I remain standing behind the wall, keeping out of sight from Mr. Edmund and the people who used to know me as the girl who had a normal life, but no longer has that.

  Out of nowhere Mr. Edmund appears and heads straight to Max and Ryder.

  Shit.

  With a face like thunder, he grabs Ryder from the back of his shirt and pulls him off Max.

  “Get up!” He shouts at Max, who looks ready to strike again. Strike who? I don't know but I'm betting on Ryder.

  Mr. Edmund stands between Max and Ryder. “What's the reason for this!?” He looks from both boys.

  Neither of them say anything because they just glare at each other.

  Mr. Edmund puts his hands on his hips. “There better be a good explanation on why you two are fighting in the school's corridor.”

  Max points at Ryder and grits out. “He started it!” Ryder spits. “And I was just getting started.”

  Mr. Edmund stands in front of Ryder. “That's enough. I'm sick of your antics.”

  Ryder squares up to our teacher. “What are you gonna do about it, Oliver?”

  Mr. Edmund merely chuckles. “Don't test me Ryder. Now, what was this all about? Hm?”

  Max pants. “It was just a misunderstanding.” Ryder looks over at Max. “The fuck it wasn't!”

  Mr. Edmund looks at Ryder with a bored expression. “Less of the language.”

  Ryder rolls his eyes.

  Staying any longer might result in me getting caught. So, without a backward glance, I turn to leave, but because of the choice of my clothing today, and the fact there's wolves around, I stand out a lot and it doesn't go unnoticed.

  “And where do you think you're going Miss Smith?”

  I halt my movements and clench my eyes shut, but I stay with my back turned to him.

  Surely he didn't know I was hiding there the whole time?

  I can feel my fingertips beginning to grow numb and my mouth going dry. So, I continue walking. “Alice! Come back here this instant!”

  “Come here right now.”

  With my head down, I walk a little closer to Max and Ryder, but I don't raise my head.

  Mr. Edmund chuckles, and when I see his feet in front of me, I straight away feel the anger boiling from within me. How I wish I could hurt him right now.

  In one jerk, the hood is removed from my head and immediately, I can hear people gasping and talking amongst themselves.

  I raise my head and glare at Mr. Edmund, but he just smirks at me.

  “Skipping classes now, are we? I told you before to be careful about who you associate yourself with, and this is how you turned out. A drop out.” He tuts. “Such a shame.”

  How. Dare. You!

  “I'm not coming back here.” I seethe, and immediately I taste the iron inside my mouth. “And you know exactly why I'm not coming back.”

  H
e just smiles at me and turns to look back at the three of us. “You three can meet me in the library after school.” He looks at each of us individually and smiles.“I'll be looking forward to seeing you, and if neither of you are there, I'll deal with you personally.”

  Mr. Edmund walks away, leaving the three of us standing awkwardly in the empty corridor.

  Great.

  Everyone knows that if a teacher tells you to go to the library at the end of the day, it only means one thing. Detention.

  Chapter 14

  Detention. A punishment of being kept in school after hours, a punishment I never thought I'd ever get. I had always been a good student who followed the rules, and I was never a person that stood out, so whenever there was trouble in the classroom, a teacher never looked my way and assume it was me.

  It was never me anyway.

  Max, Ryder and myself stand in the empty corridor all alone, neither of us speak because we all have mixed emotions right now. Ryder probably wants to kill Max, Max probably wants to do the same but is confused with the whole situation with the pictures, and then there's me whose hurt and sad that Max was the person who had the pictures of me, but I'm also hurt that both boys got hurt because of this. Ryder keeps forgetting about what he is and forgets his own strength, but after watching the fight, Max can actually hold his own, and that surprised me. 'Can we please talk about this? Like adults?' I don't realize that Max's talking to me, but Ryder steps in before I have a chance to think of anything to say to him.

  “Don't speak another word because I'll actually beat the crap out of you.” Ryder grits out.

  Max takes a step towards me, but Ryder stands in front of me, leaving me only to look at the floor. Ryder growls. “Don't come any closer. You have no right to even look at her after what you fucking did.”

  Max doesn't back down. “I didn't do it! I've never seen those pictures before in my life!”

  Ryder scoffs. “By now, we know that you're a liar, and we now know that you're a pervert.”

  “I might've been a liar but I'm not one anymore, and I'm definitely not a pervert.”

  “Why are you explaining yourself to me? I don't give a shit about what comes out of your mouth.”

  “Alice, please talk to me.” He begs but I can't raise my eyes to look at him. So, I continue to stare at the ground.

  “She doesn't want to talk to you, and she probably never will after this.”

  Silence.

  Ryder chuckles. “I'll see you in detention, Fields, because looking at you makes me want to punch you in the face until you become unrecognizable.”

  Ryder takes me by the hand and leads me away from Max and down the corridor.

  He doesn't say a word, only opens a door, leads me into an empty room and closes the door behind us. He places me in a chair and kneels down in front of me.

  “Alice?”

  He places a finger under my chin and pulls it up to look at him. Gone is the anger he had pointed at Max, because now he looks at me in worry. “You okay?”

  All I can do is shake my head, and immediately Ryder pulls me into his arms, and gently runs his hand through my hair.

  “Forget about him Alice because he'll only keep lying to you.”

  I pull away from Ryder, my eyes tearing up but I refuse to cry in front of him.

  “Why did it have to be him? I didn't think he'd lie to me again after these last couple of days.”

  Ryder shakes his head. “Alice there's more important things to worry about today than to worry about a boy.”

  I frown. “What do you mean?”

  He caresses my cheek. “I can see from looking at you that you feel it too.” Ryder sighs and places a hand on my forehead and looks away from me. “Shit.” He murmurs.

  This makes me panic. “What? What is it?” He looks at me in regret. “I'm sorry.” “About what?”

  Now, I was really confused.

  He doesn't answer me straight away. “I'm so sorry that I've put you in this situation.”

  “Ryder, what the hell is going on?”

  He tenses his jaw. “You've been feeling unwell today, haven't you?”

  “How did you know that?”

  He clears his throat. “Because it's happening to me too.”

  “You look fine though.”

  “That's because I'm used to it by now.” “Used to what?”

  “It's the effect of the full moon. It's tonight.”

  I gasp in horror because it means we're going to be stuck in the school's library with Max, and he has no idea what we are.

  Me and Ryder kept to ourselves for the rest of the afternoon, but every so often the effect of the full moon would get to me. Ryder was always there to

  help me keep calm and kept me from shifting. While we were together in that classroom, I had asked him what happens after the feeling of wanting to collapse, but he corrected me and told me that the feeling of collapsing is actually the trigger to shifting, because the body is shutting down and the wolf wants to take over. Ryder also told me that the longer you refuse to shift on a full moon, the worse it gets throughout the night, and because I'm a new wolf experiencing the full moon for the first time, it's very likely that I will shift. He said it’s unavoidable.

  What scares me the most is shifting in front of Max, because it'll reveal a secret I wish was kept hidden from the oblivious people of Small Town, but if it hadn't have been for Max for rescuing me from falling in the school's corridor, I would've shifted in front of the whole school, and for that I'm grateful that he was there at the right time.

  At 3:30, me and Ryder leave the classroom and walk hand in hand to the library, where Max already waits. The moment he sees the two of us, he smiles a small smile to me but that changes when he looks at Ryder.

  Ryder pulls me to the other side of the room as far away from Max as possible.

  It's not long before Mr. Edmund comes into the library, and looks around the room with a smirk on his face.

  He stands in front of the room and crosses his arms over his chest.

  “You all came.” He looks at each of us individually. “A small part of me thought that neither of you would show up.”

  He moves his attention to me and Ryder and looks down at our hands clasped together.

  “Well, isn't that sweet? Now I can understand the reason why you two were fighting, but let me tell you this boys, fighting is not tolerated in this school,' he gives Ryder a menacing look. “You of all people should now that. Just because you're strong and a powerful being, doesn't give you the right to take it out on someone weaker than you.”

  Max swings his gaze to Mr. Edmund. “Sir?”

  Mr. Edmund looks at Max as though he's forgotten that he's in the room as well. “Mr King is a troublemaker, and from the looks of things he was winning the fight. Be grateful that I turned up when I did Mr Fields, because another minute or so and you would've ended up with serious injuries. Like before.”

  Max looks insulted by that, but he doesn't say anything. He's most likely biting his tongue right now from saying something he'll regret. Just like the rest of us.

  “The three of you will clean up this entire room until

  it's spotless. I want the books back in their correct places, and I want all this crap off the floor. Do you understand?”

  “Are you fucking serious?” Ryder says under his breath, but Mr. Edmund hears everything.

  “Yes, I'm fucking serious. You're not leaving until this place is clean.” He points to the floor. “All of this should last you the whole night.” He chuckles.

  I look at him in disgust because I know exactly what he's doing. He's done this on purpose. Holding the three of us together is going to cause some serious damage. I didn't do anything, but I'm still here taking a punishment that wasn't even my fault.

  “Have a great night.” Mr. Edmund smiles and leaves the library.

  When the doors close, I let go of Ryder's hand and catch up to Mr. Edmund. As soon as I see his back I
call out to him, he turns around with the same smile on his face.

  “What can I do for you Miss Smith? Do you wish to ask me anymore questions?”

  “What have you done?” I seethe. He frowns.

  “Do you realize what you're doing? You're just going to walk away and let a human get severely hurt?”

  “Didn't I tell you to keep out of trouble or things will unexpectedly happen?”

  “I had nothing to do with the fight.” I grit out.

  He shrugs. “You were still involved, and that was enough of a reason to give you detention. I told you that the full moon was in a couple of days. So, I did warn you. Good luck.” He turns his back on me.

  “He'll die! Or do you not care at all!?” I yell.

  He turns back to look at me and chuckles. “You really have no idea, do you?”

  “About what?”

  Mr. Edmund points in the direction of the library. “About the people who you associate with. You let people in without even finding out who they really are first. You're oblivious to everything and that makes you vulnerable.” He sighs. “Tonight, something will happen, and everything you knew or thought you knew, will change.”

  He walks away, leaving me wondering what he means by his words.

  When I go back into the library, Ryder sits in a chair with his legs propped up on the table, while Max pushes a trolley with mountains of books piled in it.

  At least they weren't fighting.

  I take my own trolley of books and go to the first bookshelf. I grimace at all the spider ebbs I see on the shelves, but continue to do what was asked of the three of us.

  After a couple of hours pass, the sky darkens, and it makes me feel even more afraid than I was a couple of hours ago. Ryder comes to help me put the books back to their original places. He stays by my side the whole time, because every now and then, my body acts like it has a mind of its own. All Ryder does is talk to me in a gentle tone, and suddenly everything's back to how it was before. I know Ryder's probably used to the full moon by now, but I can sometimes see him clenching his eyes and grunting every now and then, but it's not as consistent as me.