My Hockey Alpha Chapter 69

Nina

Click.

We both jumped as we heard the sound of a camera shutter clicking from my window. I stared with wide eyes while Enzo whirled around and ran to the window, shouting into the darkness as he gripped the windowsill with force.

“Get back here!” he yelled, his knuckles turning white as he held the windowsill. “Who are you?!”

There was a long silence, followed by what sounded like someone hitting the ground below. I squeezed my eyes shut and cringed, imagining someone falling out of the tree next to my window and breaking their legs, but then I heard footsteps pounding across the quad below.

I opened my eyes again to see Enzo climb up onto the windowsill.

“Enzo, what are you--”

Before I could stop him, I watched in awe as Enzo jumped out of the window. I ran over, my heart leaping into my throat as I expected to see his body splayed out on the ground below, only to see him sprinting across the quad like it was nothing. I forgot sometimes that he possessed superhuman strength, thanks to being a werewolf.

I had to follow him.

I sprinted from my room and out of my dorm, running down the hall and practically flying down the stairs. I burst out of the lobby into the cold autumn night air and ran in the direction that Enzo was headed.

“Wait! Enzo!” I called, willing my legs to pump faster as I tried to catch up with him. The wind whistled in my ears the faster I ran, my hair billowing behind me like a sail and coming loose from its braids. I didn’t know how I was able to run so fast, but somehow, I managed to catch up with Enzo just as he reached the edge of the woods.

I stopped beside him, panting, doubled over with my hands on my knees from my mad sprint.

“Did you see them?” I asked in between breaths.

Enzo shook his head, stoic as ever despite the fact that he had just jumped out of a second story window and sprinted halfway across the campus. The abilities he possessed as a werewolf never ceased to amaze me.

“No,” he replied. “They had their face and hair covered. I think it might’ve been a woman, but I’m not entirely sure.”

I let out a disappointed sigh and turned to head back to the dorms, but Enzo grabbed my arm and stopped me.

“We can’t just let her walk away,” he said.

“What’s the point?” I replied. “She’s already posted so many pictures of us. What’s one more thing at this point?”

Enzo looked ahead into the forest, his eyes glowing bright red. “We don’t know how long she was there,” he said. “She might’ve seen me teleport.”

My eyes widened. “Shit.”

“Yeah… Shit is right,” Enzo said, releasing his grip from my arm. “I’m gonna have to go in there and find her. You can go back home if you want.”

I shook my head vehemently. “I’m going with you. This is my mess and I won’t make you clean it up for me.”

Enzo opened his mouth as if he was going to say something, but then snapped it shut and simply nodded instead. “Alright,” he said firmly, his voice low and serious. “Let’s go.”

Together, we stepped into the forest and began our search. “Her scent is leading this way, I think,” he said, his eyes glowing red in the dark. He motioned for me to follow with his head. We quietly made our way down the side of a small hill, taking care to avoid tripping over tree roots and rocks, then came out on a hiking path at the bottom. I followed Enzo to the right, relying on his werewolf abilities to help lead the way. I didn’t want to use my phone flashlight in case it would give away our location to the stalker, so I was entirely reliant on Enzo to guide me through the dark.

“By the way,” I whispered as we walked, “I forgot to mention this, but… Did you heal my knee the other night?”

Enzo glanced over at me and shook his head confusedly. “No,” he replied. “Honestly, I didn’t really think of it. I was a little out of it myself after hitting my head. Why?”

“I’ll explain later,” I replied, furrowing my brow. If Enzo hadn’t healed my knee, then how had I woken up without a scratch on me?

Suddenly, my foot caught on a fallen log that I didn’t see in the dark and I felt myself pitching forward. Enzo’s arms shot out and caught me, lifting me over the log before I fell. I felt my face flush red.

“Thanks,” I whispered.

Enzo’s hands lingered on me for a few moments. Above us, the moon came out from behind a cloud and illuminated his features; his bulging muscles, the veins in his neck, his strong jawline… Something about being in the dark forest together made me want him in other, more intimate, ways.

He must have seen me staring at him, because he quickly pulled away. We stood there in awkward silence for a few moments before I turned and continued following the path, keeping my head down and using my phone flashlight to help keep myself from falling again.

“I really am sorry,” he said quietly after a few more minutes of walking through the dark woods. “I won’t lie and say that seeing you with Justin and Ronan made me feel… territorial. I got caught up in the moment when we won the hockey match and I wasn’t thinking straight.”

I was silent for a few more moments, biting my lip as I processed what Enzo had said. As I thought about our kiss on the ice, I couldn’t help but still feel his lips pressed on mine, salty from the sweat on his face after playing so hard. But at the same time, it hurt that he kissed me in front of the entire school without my permission.

“Enzo, I know how you feel about me,” I said quietly, looking down at the forest floor as we walked. “But I still stand by what I said that day. I think that it would be best for us to just stay friends. I mean, look what happens when people think that we’re together. We’re literally in the woods, trying to find a stalker.”

Enzo didn’t say anything for several minutes as we continued to walk. I could feel the tension between us, and I wanted to be able to talk to him more, but now was not the time. The stalker could be anywhere, and we had to get her camera from her before she potentially revealed the existence of werewolves to everyone on campus.

“Shh,” Enzo suddenly said, stopping short and holding out his arm to stop me from walking. His ears almost seemed to prick forward, as though he was listening intently. I didn’t hear anything out of the ordinary.

All of a sudden, a twig snapped nearby. Enzo and I both jerked our heads up, scanning the forest for the stalker.

When our eyes found the intruder, however, we realized it was much worse than any woman with a camera.

It was a werewolf.