Taylor nodded. “Right. Trail, stop every ten minutes. Picnic spot.”
“Yeah. And call for me if you find anyone. I’ll do the same.”
“Got it.”
The changing huts were rickety as fuck, and Taylor was fairly certain the only thing holding them together was the rivulets of dried bird shit dripping down the sides. Panelling was missing from one of the corners, and when he turned to put his stab vest into the totally not secure locker, he caught sight of Amil through the gaps in his own hut.
He was already naked, all long legs and dusky skin. Taylor’s eyes reflexively dropped to his arse, as though two weights were hanging off his eyelids. He dragged them back up to Amil’s face, which was in one of his hands, the other scrubbing aggressively at the back of his neck.
Taylor dropped his gaze and removed the rest of his clothing.Behave,he warned his wolf, who was already pushing to the front and centre of his mind.
When everything was securely away, he took a deep breath, tipped back his head and let the wolf push through his human consciousness.
His skin pebbled as fur sprang through with practiced ease, his spine curving and rocking him forwards into a prone position. When he opened his eyes again it was through the gaze of his alpha wolf.
Everything was sharper, like he’d turned the saturation up to max on the TV. The sounds of the woods beyond buzzed in his ears, and he could hear birdsong so clearly it was as though it was in the hut with him.
When his wolf behaved it was… freeing. Like his mind was clear enough of thoughts and he could justbein his body and not worry about his stupid brain wrecking everything. But when his wolf was losing its mind, well… it was better to be alone when that happened.
He looked down at his two massive paws, big as dinner plates with their black claws and orange-brown fur a shade darker than his own ginger hair. Twigs cracking outside the cabin brought him back to the present, and he realised that Amil was already skirting around the hut and onto the track beyond.
Taylor huffed and pushed open the door with his front paws. Amil’s wolf—a black-brown beast with slender, pointed ears—looked back over its shoulder, so Taylor trotted after him, careful not to get too close.
Standing next to Johnny, shoulder to shoulder every day, he had almost forgotten just how big he was in wolf form, but next to Amil he was like a fucking horse. He didn’t mind that, in all honesty. Whenever he ran with the kids it meant he could herd them in whichever direction he wanted. He and Johnny would run parallel, making them stay in lock step without them even realising.
Amil stopped further up the track, shaking out his coat before standing next to a thick-trunked oak tree. He dipped his head, honey eyes like two mirrors as he stared up at Taylor, watching his every step. Taylor knew what he had to do, but the way the omega’s ears swivelled back and forth, alternating between forward and flat, gave him pause.
Taylor sniffed the air, already scenting the bitter smell of unease rolling off Amil. Not wanting to draw the moment out, he dropped his head and pressed the underside of his jaw to Amil’s head, letting the omega scent the thick mane that ran down Taylor’s chest and between his front legs. In return, Taylor gave the omega one quick lick behind the ear and padded away.
It wasn’t the most thorough scenting, but it would do so as long as they stayed within a few hundred metres of one another. Without a word, he slipped past Amil and towards the right-hand path. He may have also flicked him in the face with his tail as he passed, because he was a childish motherfucker and couldn’t resist.
Slowly, Taylor sucked in a lungful of forest air. It smelled different to home and to the woods around the pack house, and it was taking all of his concentration not to get distracted by the different noises in the undergrowth.
The thick canopy above cast shade over the path, making the gravel cool and crunchy beneath his pads. His ears swivelled at every shuck of leaves as they rubbed across one another in the late morning breeze, every skitter, every scamper in the bushes.
He crested a bank, passing a bench and a public bin that smelled of old food and cigarettes. That, combined with the heavy blanket of summer pollen kicked up by the nettles and shaggy grass, had him sneezing all the way to the top of the track.
His ears twitched at the sound of other shifters somewhere in the distance—their footfalls were uneven, slow, which meant they were probably old. Someone howled in the distance, but hereasoned that Amil wouldn’t have found anyonethatquickly, so he carried on.
Winding between the trees, he dropped his head as his nose picked up the scent of something else. Something softer… milky… like puppy fur. It smelled like Marty and the girls, but lighter… cigarettes, and… something extremely unpleasant. A beta, but young. Dirty.
Taylor pushed his muzzle through the gravel all the way to the tangled weeds at the edge of the path. He let his paws carry him deeper into the woods, ignoring the rustle of the other animals as they jumped out of his way.
It wasn’t until he came nose to nose with a massive horse chestnut that he finally stopped. Green clusters of conkers pricked his paws, but his pads were so wide and leathery he barely felt it. There was a scent on the rough trunk, like someone had rubbed up against it recently.
And then he saw it. Movement to his left—a streak of something cinnamon coloured between the ferns.
Taylor barked, leaping after it as it bolted away. It was small but fast, and it managed to weave through the trees with much greater dexterity than he ever could.
“Stop,”he said in his alpha voice across the barely there scent bond, it was weaker than a cotton thread but it was there.
“Stop,”he said again, rocketing forward until he could snap at the pup’s tail. The young wolf squealed, cutting left then right, but Taylor kept pace. Fear vibrated across the scent bond, and before the kid could shoot off again Taylor hefted his shoulders into the small wolf and sent it sprawling into the undergrowth.
It wriggled, trying to right itself, but got tangled up in its own gangly legs. Taylor was above the pup in an instant, pinning it down with his own huge body. “Stop,”he said again, calm that time, letting his voice come down like a lead weight across the bond.
The pup looked up with wide, terrified eyes, legs still kicking as it seemed unable to look away from Taylor.
“Calm.”
