Page 7 of The Alpha Experiment
He turned and fixed me with his intense gaze. “It’s not a sane world. Explain.”
Well, that was an alpha command if I’d ever heard one.
Another hard swallow, because I couldn’t seem to clear the lump in my throat. But this was Colin. I could tell him anything. “I’ve been getting these emails…”
Colin listened without interruption as I haltingly got out the story of the bizarre recruitment emails, including pulling up the last one on my phone to show him how it’d taken a turn for the threatening.
He frowned at it, taking the phone from my hand to scroll up and down, as if that’d give him anything else to look at.
“But I have no idea if it’s them taking the photos,” I added, not sure if I hoped it was or hoped it wasn’t.
It wouldn’t be great to have another crazy person out there stalking me and Fiona, but on the other hand, that person would almost certainly have an agenda related to Fiona’s alpha status or to pack politics. And that, I would know how to deal with. My family’s large, prosperous pack could take any comers, and werewolves rarely bothered with the human justice system. A werewolf enemy could be handled through werewolf means. Not necessarily simple or safe, but reliable.
If I had some unscrupulous corporate asshole on my heels, that would almost certainly mean dealing with it through human channels. And that meant depending on people I didn’t know—police officers, judges, lawyers—to help me, rather than leaning on the support of people who’d do anything for me, no questions asked.
Colin chewed on his lip, his eyes going distant. “Okay,” he said slowly, focusing on me again, a little half-smile on his face. “Okay. Here’s what we’re going to do…” I let out a long, shaky exhale. Colin’s attention never failed to warm me; it always had, ever since the day we’d met, two gawky adolescents at Camp Full Moon. Colin had leaned over and whisper-drawled in my ear that the logo looked exactly like his bare ass, and that maybe they should’ve called it Camp Uranus, and I’d lost it giggling.
We’d been best friends ever since. Or maybe the friendship had really started when he’d come out to the camp’s main driveway the next morning, where I’d been raking leaves as my discipline for laughing during the head counselor’s welcome speech. Without comment, he’d picked up another rake and split the work with me.
“Newt. Focus!” I snapped back to the present. Colin’s face was awfully close. He’d leaned in to peer at me, and that smile had transmuted into a frown. “I’d like to say we can do this tomorrow after you get some sleep, but there’s a few things that need to happen right away, even though it’s the middle of the night. I mean, unless you’ve already done some of them. Please tell me you called your parents and Fiona.”
“I checked in with Fiona. She’s in bed safe and sound. I haven’t…worked myself up to calling Mom and Dad yet.”
Colin’s frown deepened.
“That’s first, then.” I opened my mouth to protest, and he laid his big hand over my mouth. His fingers felt rough against my skin, and a lot hotter than a human’s. I’d spent so much time with alphas, but I rarely touched one, since I’d grown up and stopped getting quite as many hugs from my dad and alpha siblings. I’d forgotten how warm they ran. When I subsided, he took his hand away. “No question, okay? They need to know about this. Fiona’s involved. You may be a grown man, but she’s still a kid. Alpha or not.”
Yeah, she was, and Colin was completely, one hundred percent right that I should’ve already called my folks.
I found myself looking down at my lap, unable to meet his eyes. “This is my fault. I just…I don’t know how to call my parents in the middle of the night and tell them I’ve put Fiona in danger.”
“No. No, totally fucking no.” I looked up at last to find Colin leaning down a little, looking into my face, with nothing but sympathy written on his. “No. Not your fault. This is all the fault of whoever’s doing this. What did you do to bring this on you and Fiona, exist? And you seem to think your parents are going to be pissed at you, instead of pissed-off about someone stalkingyou, just as much as they are about Fiona. You’re their kid too. They love you just as much.”
That hit hard, like a punch to the solar plexus. I had to look away again.Dammit. I knew my parents loved me: they told me often enough, and they’d always shown it, too. No shortage of affection and support in the McEwen family. But I’d always felt lesser.
Iwaslesser, in many objective ways.
“Yeah,” I managed to choke out. “Yeah, I know they do.”
Colin nudged my shoulder again—and then he didn’t lean away, staying a solid wall of heat and friendship against my side. “Let’s call them, okay? And then we’ll drink the rest of the beer.”
Chapter 3
Fight or Flight
We never got to drink the rest of the beer.
The call to my parents went about as well as I’d expected. I put them on speaker so Colin could chime in, and he ran interference for me like a boss. My dad got that grim-voiced thing that meant he was so angry he had to repress it or explode, and my mom went quiet, which meant she was plotting some kind of horrific punishment for whoever had taken those photos.
My mom might not have had any supernatural ability to kick ass, but she didn’t really need it. I almost pitied whoever ended up in her crosshairs.
And who that unlucky asshole would be was really the only point of disagreement. I’d come around to the idea that it was too much of a coincidence to get the emails and the photos in the same short span of time. But my dad was convinced the stalkers had to be a werewolf pack that wanted Fiona as a mate for one of their own. He scoffed at the idea of a human company posing any real threat to us.
Colin and I looked at each other over the phone, our frowns matching. I could tell Colin, who’d spent more time with humans than my dad had, thought this was pretty naïve, just like I did—but we’d both known my father long enough to know there wasn’t much point in arguing. Not while Dad had his hackles up.
“Who’s going to tell Fiona?” I asked, once my parents’ first wave of fury and shock had died down a little. “She’s not going to take this well.”
That was the understatement of the year. Fiona had all a typical nineteen-year-old’s desire to spread her wings away from her family’s interference, amplified into infinity by the overconfidence of being an alpha, of being special, of having stronger shifter magic than a normal were—and by how much she’d gotten fussed over because of it. She paradoxically wanted to escape from our parents’ over-interest in her life, and hated not being the center of attention.
