Four

Brady

Sam and Jake had a tight grip on me. As soon as we stepped into the forest, I shook them off me. They backed up from me as I paced back and forth. I was trying to calm myself down but nothing was working. Kennedy had a boyfriend! How in the hell could this happen? Why was this happening to me?

"Brady what's going on with you man? Sam asked me. I took deep breaths and kept pacing until I stopped shaking. I turned and looked my friends. They stood looking worried. I knew they could help me with this whole thing but I still didn't want to tell them. I shook my head no.

"Nothing I'm fine."

"Tell us what's going on," Jake said. His voice was flat and he stared me in the eye. I could feel a slight tightening in my chest. It wasn't fair he was using the Alpha command on me. The tightening increased.

"Kennedy has a boyfriend."

"What does that have to do with-"Sam asked but suddenly stopped and looked at me,"Shit man! You imprinted on her?"

"Yes and she has a fucking boyfriend!" I said. My arms started to shake again as I replayed the conversation.

"Ok just relax Brady. Sure she has a boyfriend but you know the rules of imprinting. You are there to be whatever she needs you to be," Jake said.

"Whatever she needs me to be? How in the hell can I be the only one to imprint on somebody who already has somebody? She doesn't even live here. I don't want this Jake. I don't want to be whatever she needs."

"Wait a minute," Sam said stepping up "When did you figure out you imprinted on her?"

"At the beach."

"And how did you feel? I mean how do you know you imprinted?"

"I don't know how I felt Sam! Look that doesn't matter. I don't want this."

"You can't reject an imprint Brady," Jake said.

"This is wrong. Its just not about her having a boyfriend. I mean yea when I heard that I felt upset. I just can't do this. She's not staying here and you know what happens when you don't have your imprint with you. There has to be a way to break this."

"I've never heard of an imprint being broken."

"You've also never heard of this many people imprinting. Its supposed to be rare and we're already at six. Jake can you just talk to your dad? There has to be something I can do. I don't want this."

"I'll talk to him. You should-" Jake was cut short by Sam's phone.

"Yea babe…she what…we'll find her," he said before ending the call. "That was Emily. Kennedy and Naomi had some kind of disagreement. She took off walking."

"Walking in the dark and she has no idea where she is. What is it with these girls?" Jake asked "Sam you go South. Brady head to my place and I will head North. Hopefully she hasn't got far."

"Look for a mango scent," I told them. They both looked at me. "It's from whatever she puts on her hair. I don't want to be her imprint but you notice things. We're wasting time."

I didn't wait for them to say anything before turning and phasing. As I ran towards Jake's the feel of the dirt on my paws brought me some kind of relief. It felt good being able to run. As I was running I made sure to keep my nose up in the air. It helped to get a hold of the scent. I had been running for about ten minutes when I caught her scent. I quickly phased out, slipped into my pants, and headed in her direction.

I reached out and grabbed her shoulder. Kennedy turned around quickly and screamed. I held my hands up and stepped back. Kennedy saw it was me and stopped screaming.

"Where are you going?" I asked her. Kennedy rolled her eyes as she turned and kept walking. I shook my head and fell in step beside her. A howl in the woods went off. I was pretty sure it was Jake. Kennedy stopped walking and grabbed onto my arm. As soon as her hands touched my skin my heart started to speed up.

"I think we should head back. Naomi and the girls are worried about you."

"The only reason I'm going back is because I don't want to be eaten."

"You won't be eaten by wolves trust me."

"How do you know?"

"The wolves around here are harmless to humans."

Kennedy looked like she wanted to say something else but decided against it. We turned and headed back. I sent a quick text to Emily to let her know everything was fine. I knew she would be the one to tell the guys. It had been about five minutes of complete silence.

"This silence is killing me," Kennedy finally said.

"Me to but I figured you needed time to think."

"I did," she sighed "I love Naomi. She is my best friend but she can be so overbearing sometimes."

"So can Jake and Sam. Be glad you only have one friend to deal with. You wanna talk about what happened? Sometimes it takes an outside view to get a true understanding of things."

"Naomi hates my boyfriend. I used to be able to deal with it but lately it's getting harder to. What if I marry James? I don't think I can live with my best friend and husband hating each other."

"Well why exactly does Naomi hate James?"

"It's a long story."

"I got time."

She sighed again. I could tell she was debating on telling me, she chewed on her lips for a minute.

"I don't know why I'm about to tell you this when I don't even know you. But James and I started dating sophomore year of college. Everything had been going fine. But then about six months ago we had a fight. It was a pretty big fight and he kept trying to leave. I grabbed on the back of his shirt, trying to stop him, and he yanked his arm away from me. When he yanked away his elbow hit my nose and I fell to the ground. Naomi came in and started yelling at James. Before I could tell her what really happened she told James to get out. So he did. I tried to talk to her and tell her what happened but she didn't want to hear it. She thinks he hit me but he didn't actually hit me."

"How often do you guys fight like that?"

"It was a one-time thing. We had been drinking a lot that night. We both agreed not to drink that much again. Naomi just doesn't know how to let things go."

"Well I don't know Naomi or you that well. But I can tell she loves you. She just wants the best for you and if she thinks James isn't it she's going to say it. But if I can be honest, drinking is no excuse. There is a way you handle things and that's not it. You never said he apologized to you for what happened."

"I told him there was no need too. I grabbed him, I set everything in motion."

"Kennedy you're making excuses. Regardless of who did it, there was a way to get out of that."

She looked away from me and focused on the ground as we were walking back. After a few minutes I cleared my throat.

"So where exactly are you girls going tonight?"

"I really don't know. Naomi planned everything. I learned long ago to just let her do what she wants to do."

I laughed when she said that. We finally made it back to Emily and Sam's. We had just stepped on the porch when the door flew open. Emily stepped out and wrapped her arms around Kennedy. "Kennedy you can't just storm off like that! We were all worried about you. The woods are nothing to play about."

"Well I guess it's a good thing that Brady found me huh?"

"Brady found you?" Emily asked slowly. She looked over Kennedy's shoulder at me. It a good thing the imprints couldn't read our mind. I knew what Emily was going to be asking. Naomi came to do and Emily stepped aside. Naomi thanked me and quickly pulled Kennedy into the house. When they were gone Emily stepped out onto the porch.

"Brady do you have something you want to tell me?" Emily asked smiling at me.

"Yes I do. I'm gonna go get ready. I'll be back," I said walking off the porch quickly.