HUNTED

Aila and Connor stared at each other as blood splattered from the side of his head; his eyes widened in shock before he collapsed to the ground with a bullet lodged into his head. Aila clutched her stomach in disbelief; Connor was dead. The man that took so much pleasure in causing her pain was lying cold on the floor, eyes open with blood spilling across the surface. She could hear her heart beating uncontrollably as the adrenaline and wolfsbane was still pumping through her system.

With her eyes still wide, she turned her head slowly in the direction of the burning building, where an extraordinarily handsome, dark-haired man walked towards her, his silver eyes gleamed from the light of the moon. He brought his hand down that held a gun and moved his eyes from the body to Aila; she instinctively took a step back, eyeing the pistol in his hand. He arched an eyebrow and lifted his shirt to place the gun in his waistband; her eyes lingered on the taut muscles shown beneath but looked away quickly when she saw a smirk on his face.

"Who are you?" She asked; her voice came out stronger than how she felt.

Her mind started running wild; she was going from one situation where she was abducted to another where she would again be abducted. Glancing around, she noticed now how men started to appear from around her along with quite a few gigantic wolves. Werewolves? Their eyes illuminated in an amber hue.

She felt her eyes reflect at them in their startling blue glow as she glanced from face to face, lastly landing on the man who now stood directly in front of her, his arms crossed against his body, the veins bulging out from his biceps beneath the plain black t-shirt he wore. She bit her lip.

Did he shrink his shirt on purpose? It almost looked painted on, showing off his defined abs beneath.

"Damon Steel. Alpha of the Silver Crescent Pack. Your Alpha." His deep husky voice rumbled across the parking lot, peeling her attention away from his body and back to his face, his eyes now pierced through her own.

Your Alpha.

A growl vibrated from her chest while her back automatically straightened at his authoritative tone. The Alpha's eyes became hard and stormy, lips tightening as his jaw ticked to her reaction. A bark from the side snapped Aila out of her locked gaze with his, making her glance in the direction of the wolf who barked at her. Once her eyes found the wolf, they glowed again, making the wolf yelp and lower its head in submission to her.

Frowning, she looked back at the alpha male, Damon Steel, who took a step towards her, his hands now at his sides balled into fists. She could see him physically shake, almost as if he was having an inner battle with himself to stay in control; his eyes were glowing as brilliantly as the moon now. Yet, Aila held her own and did not step back this time; she did not know what was wrong with her. All she knew was that she did not like his tone.

"I have no Alpha." She snapped, "What do you want with me?"

A man with short auburn hair standing behind Alpha Damon growled,

"We just helped you. Show a little respect."

Aila's eyes glanced from the man to Alpha Damon, ignoring his comment.

"To take you home." He said while eight blacked-out SUVs turned up from behind the burning building. They lined up one after the other in front of them.

A single nod from Alpha Damon signalled the group of men to get into the cars. Whereas most of the wolves scattered off into the forest, and any remaining ones transformed in front of her. Her face reddened as she glanced away from the naked men and women before they climbed into the cars with towels wrapped around them. The only people left in the car park were her, Alpha Damon and the red-haired man who spoke to her before.

"Get in the car, Aila," Alpha Damon commanded.

She did not question how he knew her name; so far, most people knew more about her than she did. Instead, she raised her bound hands,

"Can I at least have these removed? It hurts like a bitch."

Alpha Damon looked at the red-haired man, who nodded his head once and came forwards, placing leather gloves on his hands. While her hands were being unchained, Aila kept her eyes locked with Alpha Damon's; his cold stare made her involuntarily gulp. However, there was something about him that made her feel like she had met him before, but she knew without a doubt, she would remember a face like that. Although he had a domineering presence and one look alone seemed to make shivers crawl up her spine, she knew she was completely safe with him. Every instinct in her body said so.

How odd.

He just shot a man without blinking an eye and was an Alpha of a well-known bloodthirsty pack. Her pack. Shrugging, she put those thoughts to the back of her mind; she felt exhausted. Everything from the night was creeping up on her, not just from the wolfsbane, silver chains and the physical assaults but emotionally too. She moved her eyes away from the Alpha and looked at the burning building; her jaw tightened as tears filled her eyes. Sighing, she looked back down as the man dashed the chains to the side.

Alpha Damon walked towards the last SUV and opened the back door, waiting for Aila to follow. She made her way to the car and stopped just in front of him, searching his eyes, she realised she trusted him wholly, and with that thought, she climbed into the back of the car and shimmied over to the other seat. He followed behind her and closed the door.

Aila looked out the darkened window, staring at the emblazed prison she was forced to stay in. Clutching the leather seat, her eyes filled with tears again, but she let them fall freely on her cheeks this time.

"Please. Try not to scratch the leather. I just had the seats redone." The red-haired man spoke from the driver's seat across from her.

Glancing down, she noticed her claws were extended and clinging to the seat; she inhaled deeply and watched in wonder as they shrunk back to her human nails. Her eyes glanced at Alpha Damon, who was scanning her from head to toe, then lastly held her gaze, he parted his lips to speak, but she turned her head away as another tear fell down her wettened cheeks. The car pulled away, making her shift her attention to the burning buildings shrinking in the distance along with Connor's body left on the ground.

For the next hour, Aila sat in a daze. She either stared out the window at the starry night sky and dark bluish fields or at the leather seat in front of her that had another man sitting in it. She began to shiver from the cold emptiness she felt inside. Was she in shock? She felt so numb, as though nothing mattered. She wrapped her arms around each other after putting her hood up over her head, trying to keep the heat from her head leaving. Shrinking into the seat further, she looked back out the window, glancing at the luminescent moon ahead.

The whole time, she forced herself to ignore the overpowering presence emanating from the 6ft4, built Alpha who sat next to her; she felt his gaze on her face every couple of minutes, but she took no notice of him. Her mind was reeling with her friend's deaths and everything she had suffered in that place in such a short period of time.

"Aila, what happened to you?"

Alpha Damon's deep voice snapped her out of her reverie; she did not realise she began to shake. Taking a deep breath, she calmed herself down, relaxing her body. She turned her head to the side and looked at Alpha Damon, reading the sincere expression on his face. Sighing, she forced a smile on her own that did not reach her eyes.

"Nothing."

He scoffed, "That doesn't look like nothing. You have bruises and blood all over your face, and I can take a guess that your body is the same."

"It was nothing in comparison to what they did to the others," Her voice cracked at the end of her sentence, and she looked away before her eyes gave way again.

"I am sorry for what they put you through."

She nodded her head once in response but kept her gaze on the view as the car drove quickly on the road. After a while, she relaxed again as her body went back to feeling numb. She glanced to the side after feeling a light vibration from the leather seat; Alpha Damon's chiselled jaw was ticking as he glanced to the rear-view mirror and met the eyes of the driver. She realised he was angry, but she did not know what for.

Aila took that moment to assess the man beside her; she knew he was drop-dead gorgeous the moment she laid her eyes on him, but now she was up close to him, her breath hitched at how the man before her was even real. He must have been sketched by an artist or a gift from the heavens; no one should be that good looking. He pressed all the right buttons for her.

Her mouth unconsciously parted as her eyes greedily took all of his profile in. His silver eyes shone brightly against his olive skin, thick black eyebrows and intoxicatingly messy chin-length, wavy black hair. His chiselled jaw had the perfect amount of stubble styled up to his high cheekbones, and his earthy scent was the 'cherry on top'; she felt like swooning but instead inhaled his scent deeply.

A smile crept up his face while he looked out the corner of his eyes at her; she immediately closed her mouth and looked away, her cheeks flushed at being caught ogling at him. She kept her face away from him and pretended to look out the window but couldn't help but occasionally stare at the reflection of him. Her body felt an alluring pull towards him, and she knew it wasn't his attractiveness alone.

In fact, it couldn't be his personality, she didn't know him, and she couldn't help but dislike dominating males; it was always the same. Unless they could put her in her place, she never wanted to know. Was that because she was from a strong Alpha bloodline? Every bone in her body couldn't help but disobey, even with her adopted parents, Mandy and Andy, she would break any rule set in place, but they never complained.

Sighing, she leant her head against the window. Her body finally gave in to exhaustion after the high of the adrenaline from earlier wore off; she found her eyes close as the purr of the car's engine helped her doze off into a dreamless sleep.

"We will be home soon." Alpha Damon's husky voice was low but high enough to wake her up.

Aila nodded her head; it was only then that she realised she did not ask where home meant; she automatically figured he meant Oakton, her hometown. She internally rolled her eyes at herself and her stupidity; she really did just set herself up. She was sitting in the car with the Alpha of the Silver Crescent Pack, the pack that allegedly killed her parents and wanted to kill her.

Nice one, Aila. You absolute melt.

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