Rose’s POV
“Greg, stop already.” I free my hands from his, and halt.
“What is it? Let’s keep escaping till we get out of here.” Greg says.
“Keep escaping? No! I must save Sophia.” I retort, and turn my back to Greg. “You don’t even care about her nor do you care about your Beta.”
“Dylan?” Greg hits his head and sits on the ground. “He should be safe. Let me try to mindlink him.” He tries hard but his glowing eyes only wane every minute.
“He’s not. Wait, Greg.” I suddenly say, noticing creepy movement amidst the trees as the leaves rustle weirdly.
“What is it?” He stands up, and looks at the direction I’m staring at.
“I smell a similar wolf. Who might this be?” Greg nuzzles me but I jerk him off.
“Stop being silly. I can smell the similar wolf too but the smell is only lingering. It’s evaporating but lingering!” I repeat, trying hard to control my noise level.
“Who could it be?” He asks, cupping his jaws and moping around this arena.
“Could it be Dylan?” I ask after sighing severally.
“Dylan? No, it isn’t.” He retorts, breathing in and out multiple times.
“Could it be the Sophia you’re talking about?” He asks but I shake my head, telling him it isn’t.
We both fold our arms on our chest, and stare at the moving object and sniff the lingering smell.
“Over here.” Jude commands. “Take her to the pack.” My eyes bulge out on sighting Jude. Midway catching hold of his stares, I squat down and cover my ears.
“What’s wrong, Rose?” Greg asks.
“Nothing is wrong.”
“Then why this?”
“Everything is wrong.” I yell at him, blinking my eyes and covering my ears. If Jude takes Sophia to be his Luna, then I’m done for. She will be a great Luna and destroy all our packs. Whoever gets favour from her can be a beta but I don’t want that. Who even knows if I’ll get favour from her?
“Yes. Everything is wrong.” A hoarse voice repeats after me. I slowly raise up my head and Greg does too.
“Who are you?” Greg says and Jude smirks.
“Don’t say anything.” I nudge him, and start to freeze. I bow my head a bit and fold my arms across my chest.
“Rose?” He suddenly calls my name.
“Yes, Jude?” I retort, and he smirks.
“You say Alpha Jude.” He corrects me.
“Okay, Alpha Jude.” I correct my words, and raise my head a bit so that our eye contact each other.
“Is there any problem, Alpha Jude?” Greg asks.
Jude smirks and replies. “There’s no problem. I can see you’re a Brave mate. What pack are you from?”
“I don’t reveal it, please.” Greg replies, and wraps his hands on my shoulder.
“Yes. He is my mate, please.” I demonstrate fake confidence and follow behind Greg as we walk out on Jude. Jude chuckles and claps his hands as we move. His laughter gets to Greg’s nerves but he tries to collect himself.
“Sophia is right there in my pack house.” He guffaws and we suddenly stop. Greg looks back, and I do. We walk back to meet him.
“Sophia is with you?” Greg fumes, and creepingly forms fists with his hands.
“Yes, she’s with me.” Jude shrugs and chuckles, popping in and out dimples on his chin.
“Do you need her?” He asks.
“I don’t have much to say. I’m returning to my pack, and she’s returning to her high school. Release Sophia and let’s go.”
“Come on.” Jude rolls his eyes at him and then at me. “Don’t make it look so easy like that.”
“Isn’t it easy? Who are you to keep Sophia in hostage?” Greg asks and moves few inches forwards. Jude moves few inches to meet him too and they both stare and bark at each other.
“I’ll do to you as I did to Dylan.” Jude barks at him and his eyes glow into dark green. I shudder even more when I see Greg trying to fight. He’s only a wolf. He doesn’t have the vampire trait in him. I’m an hybrid, I know who is a vampire. I know when a vampire gets annoyed and starts to shift. A Vampire can start to shift without showing any sign – these are all written in a book. The book is right there in my portable box in school, it must be dusty right now.
“What did you do to Dylan?” I ask and now, I’m damn confident. His eyes dim back and return into normal eyes.
“I killed him.” He smirks. “With my bare hands.”
“He tried to fight me like your mate is trying to, now. I throttled his neck and choked him to death. I also took his memory… and.” he snaps his finger and licks them with his lengthy tongue.
“And…?” My heart gasps, and Greg fumes, impatiently waiting for a response.
“And I took his memory.” He smirks real good this time, and moves away from Jude.
“If you’re willing to join my pack, then you can go with Sophia.” He says and moves away.
“Your statement is contradicting, please.” Greg says and he stops immediately. With smirks plastered on his lips still, he shoots threatening glares at Greg then at me but less threatening. He speaks up to support his indirect speech.
“Don’t you dare disrespect. Well, you don’t know who I am. I saw you shifting the other day, you both are just mere wolves.” He says. I breathe out. Goodness gracious, he doesn’t know I have vampire’s trait in my blood. If he does know, he will prepare an attack and always conquer me but the fact that he doesn’t know, I’ll win every single game. My mindlink is blocked already. I’ve not even unlocked it for Greg, I’ll do that if we get out of here. If my mindlink is free, then he would have heard all this I’m thinking about and dealt the hell out of me.
“I have found my mate. So you can be on your way.” He says, raising his tone for each word.
“Sophia is your mate?” Greg asks, questioningly.
“Yes, she is. We will return to school. Don’t worry, she’ll be safe.” He says.
“What about her mother and Dylan?” I ask him.
“Isabella? She’s joined my pack. That’s her rightful pack but her mate is within your region. Once I track him down, I’ll kill him immediately.” He says.
“Alpha barks.” Greg mutters.
“Beta shivers.” Jude mutters too. I roll my eyes at both of them.
“You’re bringing her to the high school?” I ask again.
“You need ears.” He bluntly replies. “I told you that earlier.”
“Can we have a look at how she’s faring?” I ask. Greg nudges him but I roll my eyes at him.
“No, you can’t. But I can ask that through our mindlink.” He replies.
“And we would hear you?” Greg rolls his eyes at him. Thank goodness Jude doesn’t notice that.
“Yes, sure. But that’s if you join your mindlink with ours.”
“How?”
“Join my pack.” He replies. “You won’t regret it. And you will, if you don’t.”
“We have our packs. Do you think we are fools to desert our packs just like that?” Greg says.
“You don’t have any pack any longer.” Jude concludes.
“How?”
“Thanks for asking. Dylan is dead. Karl is now one of my members” he says. “And you” he points at me. “Your mates in school are signing out of the packs you both are in.”
I sigh, but relax my spines.
“Let’s go by the way.” I clear my throat, clutch onto Greg and move away from Jude.
“You’re in my packhouse already.” Jude says.
“What?” I say but Greg doesn’t give a fuck. He moves faster.
“Water.” Jude snubs.
“You can’t escape.” He says as precariously blunt as ever. “You’re captured.”