ALPHA: Heir Of The Four

Chapter Twenty

Chapter Notes : Ava-Rain's POV

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- 'And the moon shines red tonight, as I break your heart & sever mine. . .' -

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Kane was not somebody one would go to if they were down and needed to be cheered up. I saw him scowl more than I ever saw him smile, and our very rare and limited conversations weren't enough for me to know if he actually liked me or not—accepting me and liking me were two entirely different things.

     What I did know about him was that he cared deeply about Caleb and the rest of the pack. That he would do anything and everything to protect his brothers. I knew just about everything that one could accurately conclude about him if you were brave enough to sneak a glance in his direction, but I did not know Kane. And since I had no other choice but to be the obvious thorn in his side since, despite my protests, Caleb demanded that I stay outside with his beta while he talked to the Hellands alone, I decided to finally take it upon myself and make an attempt to get to know him better.

     "So. . ." I pulled my gaze from the dirt road and turned my head to the side to look up at him. We both had our arms crossed over our chests, but it was probable that he had either done so out of irritation or anger, while I had done so to give off the illusion that I wasn't, in fact, highly intimidated by Kane. "You and Kasey—"

     "There is no 'me and Kasey'," he snapped and stared down at me, "nor will there ever be a 'me and Kasey'."

     "But—"

     He pushed himself forward from his car, which we were both leaning against, and turned to face me. "I'm sure you've already gotten it into your head that we can all live in one big fairytale world, where humans and wolves alike can look past each other's differences to come together, join hands and sing 'kumbaya'. In a perfect world, maybe. But this isn't a perfect world, but the real world. A world where no good ever comes from wolf and human pairings. And in this world, a human would be wise to remember that a wolf will always be a wolf. A beast first. A beast always. And if you forget that, then you have nobody but yourself to blame when you get bitten, or worse, mauled to death." Kane then moved around me, walking over to the front of his car to rest against the hood.

     I didn't exactly know how to react to his words. Had he intended to put the fear of God—Luna—in me? Were his words of advice more for himself and his own situation? Or was he just trying to shut me up so that he could endure the rest of our time together in silence?

     Instead of maintaining the distance that he had put between us, I, instead, copied his actions and went to stand by his side in front of his car. A thorn in everybody's side was a role that I was obviously born to play and, not to pat myself on the back or anything, one that I was excellent at playing. "Is this your way of finally telling me without telling me that you don't like me?"

     His response hadn't come right away, but it did eventually come. "If you really think I just told you all of that because I don't like you, then you're definitely not as smart as you think you are."

     "So, you do like me?" I smiled up at him, hoping it would get him to do the same but not entirely gullible enough to think that he would.

     He didn't.

     Again, he stared down at me, though that time it didn't seem like it was meant to be an intimidation tactic. "You're annoying. You get yourself into bad situations that you can't bail yourself out of, which results in others getting hurt when you drag them into the mess that you create. You act before you think because you never think things through."