Chapter 6 Luca

The smell hit me first, thick and rotten and dragging a trail of old blood behind it.

A rogue.

The moment it reached my lungs, my body reacted before my mind caught up. I was already sprinting behind the last houses on the west side of town, gravel slicing under my shoes and adrenaline pounding through my ribs. I should have called my father. I should have waited for Mason or Rafe. A future Alpha was supposed to make smart decisions not reckless ones but the mix of panic and a stupid desire to finally prove myself shoved me forward.

Then I caught a second scent in the air, warm and familiar, sweet the way sunlight feels when it comes through a kitchen window. Milk and honey.

Aria.

My chest dropped so hard it almost knocked the wind from my lungs. The rogue was heading toward her house and the idea alone made something cold and sharp cut through my chest. I pushed myself faster as I slipped into the trees behind the Morgan property. Moonlight washed over her backyard, the pale fence, and the soft grass. Her house was quiet except for the faint glow coming from her bedroom window upstairs. She was awake.

I forced myself lower as I listened. The uneven scrape of paws hit my ears before the rogue appeared. When it stepped between the trees, my breath caught. Its skin hung in torn patches and its fur stuck out in clumps. It moved strangely like it wasn’t fully inside its own body anymore. Its eyes were wrong too, empty of anything alive. It sniffed once, then locked onto Aria’s yard.

“No.”

I barely got the word out before the shift ripped through me. My bones snapped and reshaped as heat flooded every vein. My skin stretched and tore as fur replaced it. The world widened and sharpened until I could see every leaf and every grain of dirt under my paws. I hit the ground running and launched straight toward the rogue.

It heard me a second too late. We collided hard crashing through branches that splintered and whipped past my sides. Its claws slashed along my ribs, and pain burned white hot for a moment. I didn’t care. I bit down on its shoulder and felt bones crack under my teeth.

It staggered but twisted and clamped its jaws around my foreleg. The taste of my blood filled the air. I tore free with a sharp wrench and lunged at it again shoving it back toward the fence that separated the forest from Aria’s yard making the wood splinter loudly.

Inside the house, a light switched on. Panic shot through me. If she came outside now, she would see everything.

The rogue snapped its head toward the glow inside her house. Hunger surged through its scent. It immediately lunged and my heart sank at the thought of it reaching her. I didn’t think, I just reacted and slammed into it again. We both hit the cobblestones near the porch as searing pain exploded down my neck as its claws tore deep. Warm blood spilled over my fur and down the stones.

Aria’s footsteps rushed toward the back door. Her heart thudded fast and scared, the way prey sounds when it realizes something in the dark is watching.

I had to end this now.

I pinned the rogue with everything I had left and sank my teeth into its throat. It jerked once, then again, and its body went limp. I stayed there for a moment, panting and shaky, the metallic taste of blood heavy in my mouth.

When I finally lifted my head, Aria stood on the back step. The porch light lit her face, and her eyes were wide and stunned. She looked at the mangled yard, the deep claw marks, and the blood staining the stones. She didn’t understand it but fear clung to her like mist.

I stepped deeper into the shadows, trying to hide the glow of my eyes and slow my breathing. Every part of me wanted to run to her, to push her inside where she would be safe but I couldn’t let her see me like this.

Her gaze drifted toward where I hid. She stepped off the porch, slow and cautious, and her bare foot landed right in a smear of my blood. She froze instantly. Her breath hitched and she crouched down to look more closely at the ground. Her fingers hovered above the blood, then she pulled back quickly. Her eyes lifted again and landed straight into the darkness where I was hiding. For a second, I felt her focus lock onto the exact spot I stood.

A twig snapped behind me, and I whipped my head around. Relief hit me when I recognized the scent.

Mason.

He stepped close enough for our eyes to meet through the dark. His voice brushed my mind clearly. Go, I’ll handle the rest.

No, I handle my mess.

But he was already moving toward the body. Aria took another step forward, her whole body tense. She bent down again, staring at the gouges in the ground and the dark stains across the stones. Confusion, fear, and curiosity all rolled off her at once.

“What the hell...” she whispered.

Before she could take another step, her mother’s voice echoed from the front door, calling her name and she turned toward the sound.

I bolted. My paws hit the ground hard as I tore deeper into the trees. My body ached everywhere, my blood trailed behind me, and the ringing in my ears matched the pounding in my head. By the time the pack arrived, Mason had cleaned up the scene enough to keep Aria and everyone from seeing anything else.

She was back inside and safe. That was all that mattered. I slowed once I was far enough away, shifting back behind a thick tree. My legs trembled under me, and blood dried sticky along my skin. I rested my forehead against the bark and finally let myself breathe.

I knew I would get ripped apart for this later. Sneaking off alone and shifting so close to a human. Fighting a rogue without backup? Well that was breaking half the rules I was raised with but none of it mattered.

All I could think about was how close she had been to seeing me, and how scared she had looked standing in the cold night with nothing protecting her except a poorly built fence and my reckless wolf tearing something apart a few yards away.

He didn’t care about rules or consequences. He only cared that she was safe. That she had looked toward the trees like she was searching for something and almost found me.

AUTHOR’S NOTE:

Okay but LUCA going full wolf mode in Aria’s backyard while she’s literally standing there barefoot is making me sweat. How is she supposed to chalk that mess up to “a raccoon” when the yard looks like a crime scene.

Tell me your thoughts. Would YOU have stepped outside if you heard suspicious noises at midnight, or would you have locked every door and pretended absolutely nothing was happening?