#alwayslove40

Allison chewed on the inside of her lip as she scanned the crowd out of habit, searching for anyone who looked out of place. It was the third time she’d done it, and again she found her gaze falling on the older man who seemed to be watching them, or perhaps more accurately, watching the girl who’d just recently befriended her.

“Lydia, there’s someone on your six,” she kept her voice low, just in case it was a werewolf. Besides a creepy amount of staring he hadn’t exactly exhibited anything that would suggest so.

The young woman in question took a sip of her drink and snorted. “Allison, no one says ‘on your six’ unless you’re in the military. Normal people say ‘behind you’.” Right, and Allison was supposed to be normal now. After what’d happened with her grandfather her family had ‘given up’ on hunting. She was just a teenaged girl now, if a teenaged girl with above average abilities.

“And anyways,” Lydia’s smile had the air of a secret, and the lights made her eyes seem a strange pale green instead of hazel. “I can take care of myself.”

She wasn’t sure if she believed Lydia or not, Beacon Hills might be stranger than most towns, but even they didn’t know about werewolves and how to handle them.

-

Allison’s worry had been sweet, until it had become stifling and cloying. She knew the girl meant well, but it was almost enough for Lydia to flat out tell her that if she couldn't handle a werewolf then there was something wrong with her.

Especially a werewolf that had been following her for some time now.

She did find herself intrigued, not because it was the sort of behavior she expected from humans, but because it was the longest she’d seen a werewolf go without killing or turning a human.

Allison’s family might have decided to hunt werewolves, but it was what Lydia’d been born to do, she knew more about them than she knew about math—which was saying something. And this one’s behavior was...odd.

It was following her again, and honestly, it was getting to be a bit much.

“We both know you’re there, you might as well show your face.” She breathed deep, readying herself for a scream that would burst his eardrums if he tried anything.

There was a beat of silence, in which she could feel him moving, then finally: “now why would I do that? Just when I feel like we’re starting to set up a routine?”

She almost laughed, routine? What, had he been a comedian before he’d been bitten? “Because if you don’t I’ll scream your head off,” she replied brightly. Knowing full well he’d been following her around enough that he’d seen her do it, multiple times.

Footsteps, how generous of him, came from her left and she turned to see him approaching. Tall, but then again at her height most people were tall, dark hair, denim blue eyes, a goatee that added a flair of melodrama. He was better dressed than most werewolves too, his clothes actually looking newish and well kept, instead of like he’d lived in them for weeks.

Everything about him screamed danger and she found herself on high alert. “Who are you?”

He smiled at her, showing off a set of very human teeth. “Does it matter? You’re going to try and kill me anyways. I thought it was frowned upon for a banshee to know the names of her victims.” It shouldn’t have surprised her that he knew what she was, but it did.

“Indulge me,” she flashed him a saccharine smile, all in all she usually followed the rules. But with this one she had to admit, she was curious. “You’ve certainly broken a few yourself?”

A deep laugh left him as he stepped closer, instead of stepping back she braced herself. “What? Not going on a murderous rampage? I’d like to think I’ve got more class than that.”

She laughed back, if much more derisively than his. “Class? Really? I doubt it.”

“Do you now?” He was standing right in front of her, forcing her to crane her head up to look him right in the eye. Did he really have to loom like that? It wasn’t exactly helping his ‘werewolf with class’ case. “Well, let me prove it to you,” he started to lean down and Lydia felt her heart stopping in her chest.

Closer and closer and her nails dug into her palms. All she had to do was scream and this would all be over damn it! But her scream felt trapped in her chest as he came even closer, nose ghosting against her cheek as he went for her ear. “You see my dear, I’m not like any werewolf you’ve ever met before.” A shiver raced down her spine.

He pulled away and her eyes widened when she saw his eyes were flaring red. An Alpha!

Jarred into action she opened her mouth and screamed, the unearthly sound echoing in the alley.

But it was too late, he’d already vanished.

-

Ears ringing from the scream, Peter grimaced as his body healed itself. He’d cut it close, but it was worth it. Oh, but she was quite the delectable woman.

He stared down at her from the rooftop as she began walking again, easily following her as she made her way home. Part of him was miffed that she hadn’t discovered his gift, but he could be patient, it was only a matter of time after all.

The roof across from her home was perfect for hiding out in, giving him the perfect spot to see through her bedroom window. While only giving him the barest hints of her; but really, there were some things better experienced for the first time in the flesh, and not at a distance—and the flesh of the young miss Martin was certainly one of those things.

She walked across the span of her window and his eyes tracked her every movement until she vanished on the other side.

Only to reappear seconds later, something in her hands, a glint of silver catching in the light. A smile, much more wolfish than the one he’d given her earlier, spread over his face. The spiral charm hanging from the necklace as sure a proof as any that he’d been right in his claim to be not like most werewolves.

There would be death, but it wouldn’t be random, wouldn’t be senseless.

He was here for one thing, and one thing only. Revenge.

And not even she would stop him.