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            Right before I close my eyes I see a man walking toward me. A new man. He looks vaguely familiar, do I know him?

            Not wanting to cause more trouble for myself, I just lay there and watch as the man comes closer. I was not expecting what happened.

            “Hey, I couldn’t help but overhear,” he announces his presence loudly, as if he was purposely trying to irritate my abductor. “it sounds a lot like you’re taking this young lady against her will.” c*****g his head to the side, he looks down at me expecting me to answer. I was so shocked at what was happening, all I could do was nod my head in agreement.

            “Well! Now that that’s settled,” clapping his hands together loudly, I’m positive he’s just trying to annoy Dave now. “come, let’s get you out of here.” He offers me his hand. Hesitantly I take it, grabbing my bag with my other.

            “What do you think you’re doing? So what if she doesn’t want to come with me, she IS coming whether she likes it or not. She’s belongs to me now and there’s nothing you can do about it.”

            “I’m Deacon by the way,” he looks at me with a smile, completely ignoring what that asshole just said. “what’s your name?”

            “I’m Bailey, and thanks. Can we please get out of here now?” I ask with a nervous smile, unsure of how this is going to all go down.

            Nodding, he holds on to my hand pretty tight and we start walking back the way I came. Before we get more than four feet, Deacon pushes me behind him causing me to fall to the ground. When I look up I see them both as wolves fighting each other. They move so fast it’s hard to keep up, but it seems like Deacon has the upper hand. Deacon looks like the bigger wolf, so it might not be much of a challenge for him.

            Maybe ten minutes or so later, Deacon has him by the throat, growling but not killing him. Is he trying to get him to submit?

            But it doesn’t matter because he refuses and when he gets loose for a second, instead of going after Deacon again he lunges at me. Blocking my face and neck with my arms, his teeth scrape against my skin, tearing it open but he’s unable to latch on because Deacon pulls him away from me with his snout and rips his throat out before he can do too much damage.

            When he’s dead, Deacon shifts back and jogs over to me, gently pulling my arm out, causing me to wince.

            “It’s pretty deep, but it won’t kill you. Before we go, let me patch it up as best I can for right now.”

            “Don’t worry, I got it.” I wave him off and rummage through my bag for one of my old tank tops to rip and use as a bandage. When I’ve wrapped it up, I make sure everything’s in my bag and tell Deacon I’m ready to go.

            “You’re pretty good at bandaging yourself, how’d you acquire that skill?” he asks in a teasing tone as we walk.

            “I had to be or I’d probably be dead by now.”

            Even though I made it sound lighthearted, I think Deacon knew there was still some tension around that subject. He looked at me with a mixture of concern, sympathy, and admiration. I just ignored it and pretended like I didn’t notice his reaction. I’d rather not talk too much about it right now.

            After walking for a while, we get back to the guys car.

            “Do you know how to drive?” Deacon asks, gesturing to the driver’s side door.

            “Not even a little, you?”

            Letting out a deep sigh, he shakes his head. Taking the keys, he opens the door and sits in the driver’s side seat, checking everything out.

            “Can’t be that hard, can it?” he smiles and pats the passenger’s seat, inviting me to get in.

            “Please don’t kill us, not after I just got free.” I say, only half joking.

            “We’ll be fine.” Starting the car, he puts it in drive instead of reverse and we almost go right into the trees. My hearts racing and he’s just laughing. Rolling my eyes, I buckle my seatbelt and hold on for dear life.

            We’re lucky we’re all the way out in the middle of nowhere, if he was driving on crowded streets, we’d be dead already along with anyone else unlucky enough to get near him driving. He’s spun the car out into a field three times already, making this the fourth.

          “Can you please f*****g ease off the gas, you’re gonna kill us!”

          “Oh come on, this is fun!” he laughs maniacally.

          “You’re insane.”

           After around an hour and a half maybe two hours, he pulls up to the side of the road. It’s the middle of the night now, and I can’t stop yawning. Especially after all the adrenaline pumping through my body at his reckless driving.

          “Go ahead, you should get some sleep. You can lay your seat back or crawl into the back, it’s up to you.” Deacon says in a quiet and gentle voice.

          “What about you?”

          “I’m just gonna lay my seat back a bit, I’m fine.”

-----

          Slowly opening my eyes, the sun momentarily blinds me. This morning I don’t feel as foggy or tired as I usually do when I wake up.

            Did I dream last night? I can’t remember anything if I did. Oh well. I think with a shrug.

            I hear Deacon moving and the car door open, when I look over to see what’s going on, he’s already out of the car. Then I remember we parked on the side of a road last night.

            “Where are we?” I ask, following him out of the car.

            “Gilberts Creek, West Virginia. Let’s ditch this piece of s**t and get walking.”

            “It wasn’t really a piece of s**t until you almost killed us multiple times and completely messed it up. You know that, right?”

            “Gods I love your sass, we’re gonna get along just fine.” He smiles, walking forward into the forest.

            “Sorry, but I can’t go with you. I’m looking for a pack I used to know.”

            “Where are they?” he asks, head c****d to the side.

            “Somewhere in Virginia, I can’t remember exactly, but I know I’ll find them.” I insist, mostly trying to convince myself more than anything.

            “Well, the part of West Virginia we’re in, Virginia isn’t very far. I’m going to a shifter community on the border of West Virginia. If you want, we can walk together and then you can go to Virginia the rest of the way by yourself.”

            Well, at least I’ll have company and it’s on the way to Virginia anyway. Might as well. Right? ...Fuck it.

            “Alright, let’s go.”

------

            After walking for an hour or two, sweat is trickling down my spine and falling into my eyelashes. Reaching into my bag, I pull out my water bottle and realize this is my last bit of water and there’s only a few mouthfuls left. Looking over to Deacon, I see he’s struggling, too.

            “What’s this?”

            “It’s a bottle of water, idiot.” Rolling my eyes, I wait for him to take it from me. For a few silent moments we’re just standing there, me holding the bottle against his chest and him looking down at me in a mixture of confusion and surprise. Hitting his chest with the bottle a few times snaps him out of it, a huge smile fills his face.

            “Thanks, you uh, you didn’t need to give me some.” He says after taking the smallest sip possible and handing it back. Rolling my eyes, I take a mouthful and shove it back into his chest before walking off so he drinks more.

            “You sure do roll your eyes a lot.” He points out as he jogs over to me.

            “Yeah, but that’s because I’m constantly surrounded by an idiot.”

            “Hey! Words hurt, Bailey.”

            “That’s the most unconvincing sad face I’ve ever seen in my life. And that’s saying something.”

            Turning around, I let out a little chuckle and hear him laugh behind me. We keep walking until it’s finally nightfall.

            “We’ll make camp here, we should be there in the next day and a half, two days tops.”

            Laying down a few feet apart, as I stare at the stars my mind starts to go into a whirlwind, from my weird dreams, to my past, to what happened, to what the future may hold. Everything is flooding my mind all at once and I need to distract myself.

            “Tell me about yourself Deacon, anything. Just start talking.” Trying, and failing, to keep the desperation out of my voice didn’t help at all.

            “You okay?” the concern in his voice would be kinda endearing if I wasn’t about to have an anxiety attack.

            “I’ll explain later, just please talk as much as you can.”

            “Sure, yeah. Uh, well I’m twenty three. My parents died when I was young. I was originally from a pack in the north with them, but I was visiting my nan and they were killed. I stayed with my nan until she died a few years later, I’ve been doing whatever work I can since then. I just can’t seem to find a pack that feels like home. I stay in shifter towns every now and then before I leave again,”

            Taking deep breaths in and out, trying to relax and focus on what he’s saying is helping a little. I try to focus on everything, his words, the sound of his voice, the feeling of grass beneath me, the wind against my skin, the scent of fresh grass and moss, anything and everything I can name. My heart eventually starts to slow back to normal as I continue my breathing.

            “My favorite color is green, I hate my brown eyes, I love swimming. That’s all I can think of right now, are you feeling better?”

            “Yeah, I think I’m alright now. Thank you.”

            “Overwhelming thought attack?” he asks with a knowing smirk.

            “Why would you think that?” I might have come off a little more aggressive and defensive than I meant to.

            “Woah,” he laughs, holding his hands up in surrender. “I’m not judging you or anything, don’t worry. I just recognize it. I used to get like that a lot.”

            Letting out a calming breath, I shake my head in embarrassment.

            “I’m sorry, I’m just not used to this. I don’t know why all of a sudden I’m getting so overwhelmed.”

            “I mean, from what I can tell a lot has happened lately. Not all good. You’ve probably been dealing with a lot of s**t for a long time now.”

            “And how can you tell that?” I ask, skeptically.

            “I mean, I did just save you from being kidn*pped. So.”

            Oh. Right.

            “And earlier you wrapped up your own wound and you acted like it was a joke when you said you’d be dead by now if you couldn’t bandage yourself but the look in your eyes said you were being more serious than you let off.”

            Curling up in a ball, I tuck my right arm under my head and wrap my left arm around my knees, facing Deacon.

            “You’re right. I’ve never really talked about any of it before, though. It’s weird, I’m so used to just bottling it all up and pushing it to the back of my mind.”

            Scooting closer to me so we’re facing each other and laying only a couple feet apart, Deacon looks at me expectantly.

            “It might help ease some of the anxiety you have about everything if you talk about some of it.” He offers after I’m quiet for a while.

            “Well, I was eight when my parents and the rest of my pack was murdered. Then the man who murdered them all took me in, essentially making me a slave. I had to do all the cooking and cleaning, and I was his family’s punching bag. I hated them so much, and then I found out he’s the one who killed my family. It was only a week from my nineteenth birthday so I left. But I will go back and kill him one day. Dorian is a monster and the Beartooth Pack is nothing but savages. That’s why I have to get to my father’s best friend’s pack in Virginia. I need them to train me when I turn twenty and shift for the first time. I need to be able to kill Dorian. And maybe… maybe he’ll be able to tell me more about my parents. I don’t remember much of them besides they were the Alpha and Luna, just bits and pieces…” Eventually I trail off, falling asleep as the words die in my mouth.

-------

            As I wake up, I notice there’s something covering me. Glancing over my side I see a big jacket laying over me. Is that Deacon’s? I wonder.

            “You were shivering in your sleep.” Deacon says, standing over me.

            Nodding, I smile my thanks and get up to stretch. My arm is throbbing, the skin around my wound is warm. I need to clean it out before it gets infected.

            “I’m gonna go search for a stream or something, I have to clean this out,” I gesture to my arm. “I’ll fill up the empty water bottles while I’m there, too.”

            Wandering through the woods, I zone out and begin daydreaming.

               His round eyes are the color of blueberries, but the closer he came I noticed the amber hues             reaching out of his pupils mixing with mossy green arches. Long, dense, black lashes cover his                   narrowed lids, but the fiery passion is still very much visible. The way he looks at me takes my breath away. We’re just inches apart, he cups my cheek with his hand and presses his forehead to mine.     Staring straight into my eyes, he tells me how much he loves me with just a look. My chest fills with warmth and a love so deep I can’t understand how I could make up this feeling in a day dream.

             As I snap out of it, the feeling in my chest slowly fades like it was never there. Why are do these things feel so real? And now they’re happening during the day, too? Why am I imagining all of these things? Dwelling on these questions, I almost walk right passed a stream.

            After cleaning and redressing my arm, I fill up the empty bottles in my bag with water and head back to Deacon.

            On my way back to where I left Deacon, I start to hear voices. Walking slowly to keep quiet, I sneak back over and find a man and a woman talking to Deacon.

            There’s something about them I don’t like, they give me a bad feeling. Like that other guy did before he abducted me.

            Sneaking behind a tree as quietly as I can, I try to listen to what they’re talking about.

            “Don’t give us that, Deacon. If you hadn’t found a girl to bring back to our elders you wouldn’t be here.”