I N S T I N C T | Jackson Whittemore

16: dirty minded

Dirty Minded
Chapter Sixteen

Annie sat in the back seat of Scott's car, ducking her head from the roaring engines of police cars, making sure no one spotted her. It hadn't been a minute after Gerard's little discussion, before Scott called and said that he needed her help with something.

Stiles got into Scott's car, still a little traumatized about what had just happened. Before he could say anything, Annie jumped to it, "So the thing that was outside Isaac's house killed a mechanic and almost killed you?"

Stiles took a breath in, processing it all, and once it had transferred through, he slowly nodded his head. "Sounds about right," he said.

Annie looked at Scott, and Scott raised his eyebrows. That was an odd remark to that kind of question... although, it would make sense considering the tragedy he just saw. I mean the mechanic's hydraulic system failed because of the lizard creature puncturing it, and Stiles had to see the entire thing happen because he was paralyzed from the neck down.

"Are you okay?" Annie finally asked.

"Yeah," Stiles nodded. He turned to Scott, "You were right. It's not like you. I mean... It's eyes were almost, like, reptilian... But there was something about them."

"What do you mean?" Scott asked.

"You know when you see, like, a friend in a Halloween mask, but all you can actually see are their eyes and you feel like you know them you just can't figure out who it is?" Stiles looked down at his hand, flexing and relaxing the numb parts, trying to regain feeling.

Annie sat forward, "Stiles, are you saying you know it is?"

"No," Stiles sighed, looking up and Annie and Scott, "but I think it knew me."

* * *

Annie leaned her back against the railing on the stairs at school, listening to Stiles recite his love to Scott... or otherwise deciphered as Allison passing a message to Scott.

"I love you," Stiles gulped. "I love you more than—oh, my God. I can't!" Stiles shook his head, refusing to say all of this random lovely duvet stuff to Scott. "You and Allison just have to find a better way to communicate."

"Come on," Scott sat up. "You guys are the only ones we can trust," he looked between Annie and Stiles. "Is she coming to the game tonight?"

Stiles groaned, "Yes! Message complete. Now, tell me about your boss."

Scott looked up at Annie and she crouched down next to the boys, "He thinks that my family keeps some kind of record of all the things they've hunted... Like a book, maybe."

Stiles nodded, "He probably means a bestiary."

Scott and Annie both began to laugh out loud. Scott blinked a few times before choking out, "I think you mean beastiality."

Stiles sat with a straight face. He was serious. "Nope, pretty sure I don't. It's like an encyclopedia of mystical creatures."

Scott shook his head looking between his two friends, "How am I the only one who doesn't know about this stuff?"

"Okay, you're my best friend... you're a creature of the night, it's like a priority of mine," Stiles bobbled his head.

All the countless nights spent researching and surfing the web has become a regular thing in his life. He always seemed to know things before Scott did... and Scott was the werewolf.

Scott sighed, looking up at Annie, "If we can find it... and it can tell us what this thing is—"

"And who," Stiles spoke up as they both looked up at Annie who slouched at the sudden stress on her shoulders to find the stupid book.

"We need that book," Scott commented.

* * *

Jackson walked into the boy's locker room, checking the area once more before looking back to his best friend. Danny was shocked Jackson wanted to meet in such an odd place, and he was pondering the outcome of the situation. He was kind of worried Jackson had gotten tired of him and wanted to kill him off.

Jackson pulled out the hard drive containing the full moon video on it. He had been prioritizing his main attention span on trying to uncover any secrets hidden in the footage, and so far... he'd found nothing. It was just him sleeping. The rest of his attention was prefixed on Annie and the lacrosse game tonight.

He handed Danny the drive, "I need to see if you can brighten the resolution on this."

Danny nodded, taking the video, "Sure."

"Whatever you find," Jackson leaned in close, looking around the lockers, "you need to keep it to yourself, got it?"

Danny crunched his eyebrows, "What's on it?"

Jackson sighed, "It's just me... in my room... in bed."

Danny scoffed, raising his eyebrows, "I'm supposed to watch you in bed? You remember all of the times I told you, you're not my type?"

Jackson gave a dirty glare to Danny, "Just do it."

He began to walk away before he turned around and smirked, "Oh, and by the way, I'm everyone's type."

* * *

Allison gave a dirty look between Annie and Stiles before breaking out in tears of laughter. Annie looked over at Stiles and raised her eyebrows, laying her hands on her hips and saying, "I told you."

Allison finally caught her breath and in between pants said, "I think you mean beastiality."

Stiles pinched the bridge of his nose, "No, I mean bestiary... and the two of you," he pointed between Annie and Allison, "I don't want to know what's going on in your heads."

Allison nodded, regaining her stability. She had no clue what Stiles was talking about, but it felt good to laugh, to feel happy. It had been such a long time since she'd last smiled, and truthfully, she was afraid those muscles had stopped working. She inhaled, "Can you describe this thing?"

"Um..." Stiles grabbed Annie's planner from her hands, giving an example, "it's probably like a book... old, and worn."

"Like..." Annie looked up, remembering the book Gerard had dropped outside of Allison's house, "like, bound in leather?"

Stiles's eyes perked up...

They found the bestiary.

"Can you get the book?" Stiles fisted the palm of his hand with his other hand, panting in excitement.

Annie slumped down, if the book was anywhere, it'd be in his office. "Not without his keys..."

Allison smiled, sitting up, "I'll take care of it."

* * *

Allison watched as Gerard shut his office door and stuck his keys in his coat pocket. He smiled at her as he made his way over to her, lacing his arm around her's.

The closer and closer he got, the less and less she felt confident about her plan. Gerard stopped, "By the way, I need to warn you... You may need to be a little patient with me."

Allison laughed nervously, "How come?"

"I'll probably have lots of questions considering I've never actually seen a lacrosse game before," he smiled.