"Hi." William jumped. The girl beside him who had spoken laughed. " A little jumpy are we?" William said nothing in response. It had been a while since they had defeated Carson and there were days like these were William was just a little more jumpy than usual. He guessed it was because of the full moon but her never thought about much; at least enough to care.

It was their second day back from winter break and Lynne still wasn't home. She had called them when they were in Beacon hills stating she would be later than expected and just to head home. She also threatened them saying if they skipped school she would rip their throats out.

"Um...Hi." William responded to the girl." He had never seen her before in his life but for some reason she was perfectly comfortable talking to him. Which was weird since William was mostly considered the guy who hung with only his family and like two other people. She shorter than him with light brown hair arrayed with red streaks. Her ears were different as well, having about three to four piercings ear. She smiled and her looked down at her clothes which happened to be ripped jeans and a green day shirt.

"Your William right? You hang out with Lauren and Lex and Mase?" William nodded. Lynne had drilled it into his head to be careful of people they didn't know especially ones who acted strange like this. She didn't appear to be a werewolf or anything else. She sighed.

"My name is Nicole Bachman but you can call me Nikki." She held out her hand. William shut his locker and shook it.

"I would introduce myself but you already know who I am." He said. She rolled her eyes in a humorous way.

"So are you going to Landon Ashburn's party tomorrow?" William raised an eyebrow. Landon was probably the most popular kid in the junior class, he played football but William preferred Lacrosse and hadn't really gone to any games so he hadn't talked to him or really see outside of algebra 2.

"I never even heard of it." Nikki raised an eyebrow.

"Well he practically invited everyone. He's a jerk and all but you should come...bring your friends...it will be there's one of your friend's now. Gosh he looks terrible" William turned and looked over to see Lex. Nikki was right. Lex was bleary eyed and his face was red, his clothes were ruffled and looked as though he had worn them yesterday, which he had.

"I'll consider the party...I have to go." William said. He pushed pat Nikki who shrugged and turned the other way. Lex scowled suddenly and hit his locker when he couldn't get it open. People around started stare but luckily he didn't make a dent in it.

"Lex!" He turned and looked over at William. He frowned.

"Hey Will." He said in a hoarse and more people had seemed to be calling him that lately and he had no idea why. He had always been William not Will.

"What the hell happened to you?" William asked. Lex pursed his lips.

"Leila's dead." William stared at him.

"What?" Lex bit his lip and choked back a sob.

"Leila is dead." She was leaving early this morning because she was going to return a movie we rented last night. Sly was fine with and said he would either have James or himself drive me to school and Leila and I could drive home together. We were on our way out and we got a call from Leila. She said...she said that something was following her and it went static. We went to find her but when we did she was dead." He took a shaky breath.

"Why would Sly make you come to school?" William asked in alarm.

"I decided to go-

"God Lex are you kidding me?" The boy scowled at William.

"Shut the f-

"Stop it... call Sly or James to pick you up." Lex stared at him. William rolled his eyes and pulled out his phone. "Fine I'll call him."

"Is Lynne back?" Lex asked with a flat voice. William took a deep breath and shook his head. He put in Sly's number quickly but looked up when he heard footsteps coming towards him.

"Mr. Riggs!" Lex looked up. Mr. Deran...the principal came walking towards him with a grim look his face. "It concerns your...um family." He said. Lex took a deep breath and gave William a sad look.

"When Lynne comes back call Sly he wants to talk to her." And he turned shouldering his bag. Mr. Deran muttered some things under his breath to Lex and Lex looked as though he was going to cry again. If it was acting William didn't know. It was obvious Sly had taken care of it and asked the school if he could bring him home. They couldn't deny that. It was probably something like Leila got hurt while driving the car got put into the hospital and then died later.

Suddenly his phone buzzed and he looked down.

From: Lynne:

Come home straight after school today. I need you to meet some people and something happened. I'm not going to explain now so don't even try Lauren.

William smirked for a moment and closed his phone. But the smirk was gone as quick as i came. Sly was down to two other people now. He was weak and that would give anyone a perfect chance to kill him. Carlee had left only a day after Sly had become the alpha which was partly suspected knowing her but now Leila was dead. Sly would be weak and would have to deal with Lex who was an emotional wreck. James would probably be the only not dramatically affected. He wasn't close to any of them.

And there was another problem. When Carson was alpha it was survival of the fittest and now Sly had to get them close enough that they would sacrifice their lives for each other. Or at least something like that.

"Travis get to class!" William sighed and walked forward as he heard a teacher yell at him.

"Yes sir!"

v