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Chapter
Sixteen
The drive to the settlement takes roughly half an hour. It is deep within the forest, along a dirt track that snakes between the trees and keeps the place obscured from the road. What I am not expecting is to find that it is a pretty small but established little settlement. What looks like an old, abandoned warehouse has been turned into makeshift apartments. As we approach and Jake parks on the grass, I can see women moving about, rushing off in different directions.
A few eye the car, and I get a curious looks from those walking past. Three women stand by a clothesline running between the trees, hanging out sheets. Jake stops the car and climbs out. However, one thing I notice is that it is all women, not a man in sight.
Despite Jake’s claims that they are used to him now, they do not all seem comfortable with him here. Or is it me they aren’t comfortable with? Their unease is certainly demonstrated as he climbs out, and the rogue women take off, except for those by the makeshift clothesline. Jake pops the trunk, and I watch as he moves toward them with the box in his hands.
I expect him to give it to them and return when I see him talking to the older woman. Her eyes dart to me sitting in the passenger seat before she nods, and they both walk off into the old abandoned warehouse. The other two women watch them go until Jake waves for them to follow him.
“I thought he said they were used to him,” Lexa says as we watch them disappear inside with him.
I find it a little strange, too. They almost appear frightened.
“Well, they are rogue. You know how skittish they are. I’m a complete stranger to them. I’m sure it’s nothing,” I tell her before realizing I, too, am now a rogue.
This place is probably my future, and that thought kind of scares me. So, I can see how these women would be a little wary of people in the settlement. Yet, as Jake said, his tiny slice of kindness is probably heavily relied on because I can tell they don’t have much out here besides their few vegetable gardens. And their sparse belongings are either handmade or in bad condition. Even the sheets hanging on the clothesline are holey and stained. I want to help them, yet I have no idea how. They are so far out and in a remote place.
The human town I know won’t be so welcoming, and I understand why they remain out here, off the grid and away from everyone. If the council learns of them, they will be kicked out and probably fined for not registering. Or if this place is registered, why aren’t they receiving aid? Now that I look closer at the few women I do see, some are sporting slowly healing bruises.
No one wants to be ostracized from their pack, but many she-wolves have little to no protection from their mates or family. It is one of the main reasons I’ve wanted to be Alpha. No one deserves to be beaten and abused. Packs always turn a blind eye unless it gets on the news. Even then, the punishments are only a slap on the wrist. The victim is never helped, and their treatment would be even worse than before if they report it.
The only option is to run and become rogue, leaving your family, possessions, and whatever ranking they might have behind. Looking at my own situation, I am proof of that.
My father was one inch shy of murdering my unborn children and me. I truly did nothing wrong. Axton is my fated mate. I rejected him, but instead of my father going after Axton for posting our video, he took it out on me.
So, I feel for these women out here on their own. I will have to find out more from Jake. Maybe Alisha and I could come up with a way to help them.
I am about to hop out of the car when Jake comes back out of the building. He smiles, walking back to the car, and the woman he went inside with watches him from the giant warehouse doors. He gives them a wave, and the older woman nods in return before he climbs in the car.
“That’s it? You just drop supplies and leave?” I ask him as he fastens his seatbelt.
“Pretty much. I try to come out here once a week, sometimes more, depending on what they need.”
“How do they contact you?”
He rummages through his pocket before handing me a list. I glance it over; it is a list of stuff they are running out of or will need soon.
“So, what do you get for doing all this?” I ask him.
“Nothing. It was part of me getting the place so cheap,” he tells me as he winds down his window. His scent wafts to me, and I can smell the rogue women’s scents on him, making me curious how many live here for it to be so strong.
As he turns his car around, I decide to ask. “So, how many live out here?”
“Around twenty, give or take, a few kids, too,” he tells me while driving down the long driveway.
I nod, looking at the list, my brows furrowing at how so many could live off the minimum, especially knowing there are children there.
“I don’t get why a human woman was helping them in the first place,” I tell him. I find it odd. We usually stick with our own kind.
“Mary’s daughter, she is a werewolf, the older woman you saw me talking to. That is her granddaughter.”
“But Mary is human,” I tell him, and he nods.
It isn’t completely unheard of, yet more of a taboo thing and frowned upon. A werewolf can have a child with a human, but that doesn’t mean the governments want them breeding together, which is why shifters live separately from the human populations. Glancing down at the list again, I sigh before looking at Jake.
“What?” he asks, plucking the list from my fingers.
