Outliers
Chapter 9

If the moon smiled, she would resemble you. You leave the same impression of something beautiful, but annihilating.

- Sylvia Plath

The dirt I stood on quickly bled into grey rock that dipped down into a small, natural pool of water. Under the quickly darkening sky, the water looked so dark and inky, bottomless, as if it were waiting for the next creature to dare to dip into it and be consumed whole.

It was beautiful.

The water, perfectly still against the tall rock face surrounding it, beckoned me in a way I found only nature could. I wanted, needed, to venture closer.

“What are we doing here?”

“Strength building, swimming’s a great exercise.” I turned to replace the Alpha already kicking off his shoes and stepping towards the water. I hated how my eyes were immediately drawn to his figure, following his movements, focused on the strong, shifting muscles beneath his tan skin. If he could feel my burning gaze on his back, he didn’t show it. He didn’t look back at all as he, in one movement, dived into the glittering black water.

When he re-emerged, the water dripping down his neck and from his broad shoulders, his dark brunette hair now black and hanging flat across his forehead and down the nape of his neck, he was grinning.

I felt as if I couldn’t breathe, rendered frozen by the emotion warping the Alpha’s expression, the pure joy that radiated from him.

At my prolonged gaping stare, the light in his eyes dimmed ever so slightly, and the smile stretching his lips eased. My stomach lurched at the sudden loss of emotion.

“Are you getting in or are you going to stand there gawping at me all night?” His gruff, familiar tone sprung me into action. I didn’t respond, for fear of becoming a mumbling mess, as I kicked my trainers off, ripped off my sweatshirt to expose my black sports bra, and my joggers to expose my black boxer short underwear; very aware of the Alpha’s gaze as I did so.

There was a gentle heat spreading up my pale neck. Not from embarrassment - I wasn’t any more exposed now than I had been in training countless times over - but from the intensity of Alpha Harris’ gaze. His eyes didn’t falter from me, and I couldn’t tear mine away from him.

I held his gaze as I stepped up to the lip of the pool, the rock cool under my bare feet. And continued to do so as I lowered myself slowly into the icy water.

Hissing at the sharp temperature, my attention was stolen from the Alpha. I submerged myself quickly, head entirely under the water to adjust for as long as I could hold my breath before I burst back up, gasping for air. Alpha Harris had now moved across the pool, to the other side of a large central rock that jutted out from the water into the air like a prehistoric shark’s fin.

“What are we doing?” My voice echoed against the tall walls of rock that surrounded us.

“Swimming,” he answered simply, as if it were obvious.

“You want me to swim in circles?” I asked, eyeing the surrounding pool. It was beautiful, and big enough for a large group of people, but not so big that a lap would come even close to tiring me.

“You better get started if you want to be back in bed for a reasonable time.”

I gritted my teeth, trying my best not to growl my frustration.

“For how long?”

“Until I say we’re done.”

Alpha Harris had me swim in that damn pool until the moon was glowing brightly, the night sky was as black as coal and the muscles in my entire body were burning so bad I thought they were surely melting off my bones. Every few laps that I completed, he had thought it funny to splash me or disrupt my swimming. I’d never seen the Alpha more at ease, more jovial. It was a damn pain. He did very little other than annoy or watch me swim, occasionally taking to diving into the water as I passed, so I had to twist out of the way so as not to get flattened by his gigantic self.

It was when I had lost count of how many laps I had done and I was nearly about to drown from exhaustion that I realised I’d lost sight of him completely. The sun had long been set by now, the water far too dark to see beneath it. But I couldn’t scent him. He was under there, somewhere he had to be, holding his breath for far longer than I thought was possible.

Treading water, I finally stopped swimming, twisting from side to side, my eyes locked on the water straining to replace him.

A sharp yelp filled the night air as something tugged my legs and pulled me down. Just as quick as my head went under, I was back up again, Alpha Harris’ arms wrapped tightly around my thighs as he held me up and out of the water while I caught my breath back.

He was laughing at me, at the scowl on my face as I glared down at him. My hands pressed down on his shoulders. His expression had melted from his usual stern expression into a wry amusement, and just like before, I was transfixed.

“You’ve got to be more vigilant,” he teased, releasing me just enough so that I slid down across his front and back into the water as he moved us closer to the edge of the pool. I nearly shuddered at the contact. Then his arms were gone, but he was still so close. His laughter had subdued, a soft smile on his face that slowly faded as again he was staring at me, watching me, waiting for something. Only I didn’t know what.

We were not physically closer to each other than any other training session, no more exposed to the other’s gaze. But there was something intimate about this moment, under the watchful eye of the moon, basking in the cool water of the natural pool.

“Alpha Harris,” I breathed out, a small voice inside my head screaming at me to move away while I stayed frozen in the shallow of the pool. The water came to the hollow of my throat, my toes barely resting on the rock beneath. I should have stepped back, moved closer to the natural sloping shore, away from Alpha Harris.

I was trapped in another staring contest, unable to look away and submit to the man before me as a good, obedient wolf would. But there was no challenge in the Alpha’s eyes, eyes that had once appeared black and I now realised to have the faintest flecks of warm caramel, a feature that shouldn’t be close enough for me to notice.

“Thane.” The Alpha muttered, barely above a whisper. But the deep timbre of his voice echoed endlessly in my ears, amidst the repetitive pulse of blood rushing through them like white noise.

“What?” I mumbled back, too distracted to register even my own words.

“My name. Call me Thane.”

“Thane,” I repeated, his name breathless on my lips. His eyes closed, a soft exhale parting his lips at the sound.

Thane stepped closer, his arm winding around my waist and pulling my chest to press against his scorching skin - a sharp contrast to the icy water. I didn’t object. His nose graze the length of my neck, and I heard him inhale, knew he was breathing in my scent. I still couldn’t move. I didn’t want to move away from him. Not as a dangerous throbbing in my core had me melting into his embrace, not as my pulse raced and I too allowed myself to grow drunk on his scent. A scent I knew I would never forget.

But then I felt the caress of his lips on my skin and knew how wrong this all was.

Palms flat against his chest, I pushed him away gently. He allowed me to. Immediately Thane’s arms had released me, his touch nothing more than a memory on my skin, and I felt a cold wash of reality bathe my entirety.

This was oh so wrong. I was a fool; a fool for allowing this to happen, for allowing my attraction to the powerful man before me to burn at all. Especially as I realised for the first time that he too, may share an attraction for me.

“Emily.” My name caressed his lips softer than I thought any word could, his voice rough.

“We should go back.” My tone was flat and cold. I didn’t miss the way his jaw clenched and his eye hardened.

I turned pulled myself from the water, feeling it drip down my back as I pulled myself up onto the rock ledge, not allowing myself to watch as Alpha Harris did the same.

He didn’t respond to my abrupt tone or the sudden stiffness to my body as I snatched my discarded clothes from the ground. I didn’t bother to put them on, or my shoes. I was wet through and we had no towels, and I really didn’t feel like washing my freshly cleaned clothes so soon.

Not waiting for him to follow, I was already stalking back through the trees, eager to get back to the safety of the pack house, where I knew Alpha Harris would keep his distance. I needed that, so I could think clearly and assess what the hell had just happened.

My body felt drained from the swimming, but more so over the ache in my chest that wouldn’t dissipate.

By the time I was back in my room, unable to stop myself from looking out of my window at the line of trees where I knew Harris would emerge, I caught his stern figure’s slow approach across the field. His body looked tense, the muscles tightly coiled within him, begging to be unbound. But he didn’t storm towards the main house, didn’t express any fury in his face, only centred his gaze on what I was certain was my window. He watched me, watching him, as he came closer. His bare feet pressing into the grass, a slight sheen to his body as the moonlight reflected from the water that hadn’t fully dried, he was still only in his shorts, the damp black fabric clinging to his muscular thighs, seeming unbothered by how exposed he was to my gaze.

It was too much; he was too much. He wasn’t just a man, wasn’t just a wolf. He wasn’t just an Alpha.

If I wasn’t careful, if I let him, this male could ruin me.