Page 39 of Red

Oh great, I love being seen as a child. I move away from the desk to sit in one of the two lounge chairs. Wrapped in black leather, I rest four of the five books beside me and start reading.

Stark comes and sits next to me. I quickly rotate my chair around to face the map instead of him. It’s covered in string lines, along with red and blue pins scattered across.

Stark’s chair spins, but I keep my eyes to the map.

“I was thinking,” I begin, keeping my head facing forward, “if there are all these werewolves now in the house and you’re worried about them being around me, I could, you know, go home? Come get me when this is over with or whatever.”

“No, Red. It’ll be fine.” His lips come together and his tongue finds the corner. I have to stop myself from watching. “Is it frustrating?” he asks.

I quirk my eyebrows together. “Being stuck here? Yes.”

Being around him when he acts this way? Also, yes.

“Not being able to hear any of our thoughts.”

I forgot he read the book titles.

I flip a page. “I read everything. Don’t think too hard about it.” I don’t know why he hasn’t left. The house is full of chaos and he came in here to talk to whoever that one guy was. “Don’t you have people to boss around?”

A small growl slips from his calm surface. “What exactly do you think we’re doing?”

I give up and close the book. “My guess? Rotations through cuts of the forest. Keeping a distance from the humans but making sure they don’t travel closer to us.”

“Did Pratt talk to you about this?”

I turn my chair some more to face him—a task with his height. “Yes, and I’m sure he didn’t expect you to move a bunch of people in the house I’m in to kill me.”

“No one is going to touch you.” The way his intensity increases, I squirm in the chair.

“What’s the issue anyway? Usually, you just scare the camps off, and the humans go back.”

“This one’s different.” Is that stress in his voice?

“How?”

They’re guarding it.

Oh.

His hands slip into his pockets, shoulders back, revealing nothing. “Just is.”

Wow, men are agitating.

I drop the topic, tuck my legs up into the oversized seat and open my book again.

“So, if you look here—” I glance up to see Stark standing at the map, his muscular frame draped in a black T-shirt and a nicer pair of pants today, a finger pointing to a red line. “This is our current border. Humans have no rights to cross it, to keep things calm, as you know. We get the forest, and they get their cities. But here—” He grabs two white pins from a small container and pokes them above the red line. He ties a small knot over each, connecting them with a yellow thread. “This is how far we’ve seen them walking, and this is where they put up camp.” He places a red pin. It’s right under the line of the agreed-upon border. “No one’s been in, but we’ve tracked most of the traffic and can assume it’s growing. There have been multiple reported sightings of men walking heavily armed past our border, and they have no problems using the guns they carry. So we assess and protect from a distance for now.”

“Is it only your cohort on this?”

Are they who killed Pratt? I wonder. I don’t dare to ask, but the answer slips onto his face for a brief second.

“The other four have their instructions. Some are stationed at the edge of where we will work, and a few others are keeping up regular routines.”

This is not good. Stark runs his hand through his hair, and the lines around his eyes show. Maybe we both suck at sleep. The best ones I’ve had are after healing.

“Well, thanks for telling me what’s going on.”

“Anytime, and if you want to hide in here while everyone stays, consider this your extended room.”