Chapter Text
Stiles doesn’t know how she got in this position. Yeah, it was almost the full moon, but it was only 4PM the day beforehand. She figured she still had at least a day and a half before she would find herself in mortal peril. Was that too much to ask?
Clearly it was.
She had just finished showering in the girls’ locker room after lacrosse practice. Considering she was the only girl on the team, she had the place to herself. She went to her locker and was almost finished getting dressed, but it seemed the effort was in vain.
She let out a startled and pained shout as she was shoved into the lockers face-first, hard enough to ring her chimes. She groaned in disorientation and tried to understand what was happening. The side of her face ached as it swelled, she could already feel blood running down from her forehead. She froze in fear as she realized an unidentified male was pressed against her back, growling animalistically and groaning, groping at her body, and tearing at her clothing.
“What… the…” she muttered as she turned her head. “Jackson?” she squeaked in equal parts disgust and horror as he rutted against her ass. “Oh, GROSS!” she wailed.
Jackson snarled in reply, continuing to lick and bite at her shoulder and the back and side of her neck. She gagged at the scent of his saliva on her skin – overpowering even to her human senses. She was distantly thankful that his teeth were at least blunt.
“Dude… get off me,” she said, her voice gradually gaining strength until she was shouting. “Jackson! Come on! Get the fuck off of me!”
He did not respond to her protests. Nonverbal and intent, he simply tore away her shirt and ripped her jeans open. When his clawed hand dragged down her belly, leaving thin cuts in her flesh as he moved, she froze up in terror. When his fingers slid beneath the top of her panties, she was spurred into action. She threw her head back with all her might, breaking his nose and disorienting him long enough to break free of his hold.
She did not make it more than 10 feet before he was whirling around, his face now fully transformed. His fangs dropped ominously as he let out a thunderous roar – furious at her attempted escape.
Stiles flinched and fought off her instinctual desire to run. Look at that, Derek, she thought glumly. I do listen after all!
“Oh God… please…” she whispered tearfully, trying to stuff down her terror.
Her phone was still in her bag behind Jackson and – as a result – utterly inaccessible to her. Wearing only a ripped bra and torn open jeans, she backed away slowly, hands held out in front of her defensively. Heart in her throat, she was fully aware of the likelihood that she was going to be raped and/or murdered any second.
“Jackson, you don’t wanna do this, man,” she breathed.
The Beta merely growled in reply, fangs snapping to refute her assertion.
“Okay, clearly you do,” she whimpered. “But like… NORMAL-you doesn’t want this. Just stop and THINK, okay? It’s me – Stiles. Remember, loud, annoying Stiles? The one you’ve been picking on mercilessly for like a decade? Don’t throw away our long-term, mutual, hate-hate relationship like this, man. You don’t want to be all up in this, no matter what your wolf says.”
But said wolf was clearly the one in the drivers’ seat, steering the douchey, metro jock to stalk ever closer. His nostrils flared as he scented her, close enough now that she could feel the bursts of air from his exhalations across her bare skin. Too much bare skin.
“SCOTT?” she called frantically, praying that her best friend would hear her somehow from the other side of the school. But she realized Scott was most likely already gone. If not, he would be too busy focusing on Allison to hear her call. Her lips trembled as her panic soared. “ANYONE? PLEASE!” she wailed.
Jackson roared again in warning and Stiles sobbed. She was out of options. She was going to have to try her luck. Luck which, historically, was unwaveringly dreadful.
That day, however, fate was feeling uncharacteristically merciful. An impeccably timed loud crash out in the gym caused Jackson to jolt and turn toward the sound.
Stiles took off like a shot, mind racing faster than her feet seeking a solution to her current deadly dilemma. She knew she had only been granted a matter of seconds to save her own life.
She spotted the heavy metal door to the weight room and bolted toward it, a half-baked plan forming in her mind. She did not pause at all once she was through the door, because in the far corner, stood an even thicker set of metal doors leading to the electrical room – sufficiently fortified and (hopefully) werewolf proof. She snagged a cross bar for weights in passing. She could hear Jackson tearing through the locker room after her, heard him clattering through the weight room. She slammed the electrical room doors behind her, using the cross bar as a makeshift slide bolt through the handles just in the nick of time to prevent the doors from moving.
She backed away slowly into the darkened interior of the room, heart hammering in her ears as she listened to Jackson barreling into the doors. He roared and clawed, desperate to reach her.
Stiles slowly sank down onto the floor, back against the wall. She watched with wide, tearful eyes as the metal dented and bowed in places. She prayed to any God who would listen that she would live through his.
Drawing her knees up to her chest, she wrapped her arms around them and promptly descended into the mother of all panic attacks.
_______________________________________________
A hand on her shoulder made her gasp and sit up, slamming her back against the wall as she made an aborted attempt to recoil from the touch.
The lights were on. The absence of deafening roars and groaning metal caught her off guard. How long had she been out of it?
“Jesus, Bilinski, you alright?” Coach Finstock asked, looking genuinely rattled. Of course he had to ruin the redeeming moment by commenting, “Damned mountain lions spend so much time in this school, I’m starting to wonder if I can add ‘em to the track team.” He snickered to himself at that before asking, seemingly as an afterthought, “Did it bite you or anything?”
Stiles shook her head jerkily in reply, not out of her mental fog just yet. Between the panic attack and the adrenaline crash, she was bone weary.
“Riiiiggghttt,” Finstock said incredulously in response to her vacant expression. He turned and called behind him. “One of you knuckleheads make yourself useful! Go meet the medics in the parking lot and lead them back here!”
Stiles looked up in a daze, seeing that there were dozens of people crowding around the heavily damaged doors. She noted in confusion that Jackson had bowed them inward so far, Finstock must have been able to reach through and slide the bar out of the way. But what had driven Jackson away? And where was he now? A chill ran through her at the thought that maybe he was nearby, watching, listening, waiting…
“Hey… uh… Coach? Can I… get a shirt… maybe?” she asked hoarsely.
Finstock seemed to realize at that exact moment that her top half was only clad in the remnants of a bra. He recoiled as if slapped, swiftly distancing himself from the scantily clad teenaged girl. A minute later, he tossed an oversized, black BHHS gym uniform shirt to her from clear across the room.
Stiles was immensely grateful for the cover. Thanks to her position hugging her knees to her chest, no one had seen the scratches on her stomach yet – not even her. She planned to keep it that way. She realized what it must look like.
She retreated into herself again while she waited, listening to the sound of the approaching sirens. She barely registered as she was checked over by the medics and led outside to the ambulance.
The sight of a patrol car rolling up, however, had her slipping on a familiar mask on autopilot. She smiled when she was supposed to, joked, and laughed as expected. She downplayed and dodged with experienced ease, all while the rest of her mind remained shut down in response to the latest horror she had endured.
She thanked Deputy Parish for his concern and assured him that she would be fine, just needed sleep. She climbed out of his patrol car when he dropped her off at home. Promised to check in with her Dad later. Waved before walking through her front door.
She stood in her living room finally, keys still in hand, marveling at how well she functioned during episodes of shock. Good thing life had given her so much practice, she supposed.
She took a steadying breath, closing her eyes and wincing as her heart rate began ratcheting up again. Her hands were shaking as she clutched at her chest.
In 1 2 3 4… Hold 1 2 3… Out 1 2 3 4 5…
She kept focusing on her breathing.
So what if she had nearly been sexually assaulted and slaughtered by her lifelong bully who now just so happened to also be a werewolf?
So what if he was out there somewhere, possibly skulking outside her window right then, waiting to attack?
No reason to panic.
No reason at all.
In 1 2 3 4… Hold 1 2 3… Out 1 2 3 4 5…
In the silence of her empty house, the sound of her cell phone ringing was jarringly loud. Thankfully, rather than sending her into another panic attack, it actually startled her out of it.
She swallowed hard as she answered.
Erica’s bored voice came through the line as soon as she had the phone pressed to her ear, “Derek says come see him.”
Stiles scoffed in disbelief. “Yeah, how about no?”
She took a second to ponder the timing of this call. Clearly Derek and his flunkies were aware of what happened. She frowned thoughtfully. Huh… maybe that explained why Jackson hadn’t reached her…
Erica snorted and relayed, “Derek says, ‘Now.’”
“Charming as ever,” Stiles snarked as she trudged up to her room. “Look, even if Derek managed to dig down really deep and found the manners to say, ‘please’ instead of ‘now’ for a change, he would still be shit out of luck. Why, you ask? Because I can’t go anywhere. No Jeep. They wouldn’t let me drive – what with being in shock and all. And hey, tell Der I said thanks for that, by the way. Always a pleasure to survive yet another near-mauling courtesy of a Hale bite-recipient. He should seriously give me a punch card to keep in my wallet for this shit. Like every 10th attack earns me a free therapy session or something.”
There was a terse, gruff question in the background on Erica’s end.
“The medics didn’t take you to the hospital…” Erica stated in a manner that made it clear she wanted more information.
It made Stiles aware of the fact that someone from the pack must have been there in the crowd at the edge of the parking lot, watching her. Great.
“Yeah, well, I couldn’t exactly tell them what really happened to me, now could I?” Stiles snapped bitterly as she entered her bedroom and dropped her bag. “But hey, most of the damage was psychological this time. So, you know, yay for that!”
Turning to her mirror, she groaned in disbelief when she got a look at her reflection.
“Except, apparently, for the damage to my FACE! Fuck!” she shouted furiously. “Tell Jackson he owes me a new face! And a shirt and bra and jeans and underwear… and like $500 worth of water and soap because I’m going to have to bathe for a week straight in scalding water to wash him off of me!”
She cringed at the memory, thankful it had not gone any further, but fully realizing that she was going to have nightmares about it for a long time to come. For now, sarcasm was her best defense.
There was a commotion on the other end of the line, a lot of roaring and yelling and crashing, but it was largely indecipherable chaos over the phone.
“Erica…? Hello…? Really?!” Stiles scoffed as she realized the call had disconnected.
She shook her head, grudgingly taking a measure of comfort from the fact that Derek was aware. It meant Jackson was likely already chained up or locked in a cage.
With a sigh, she fired off a text to her Dad telling him she was home safe. Not waiting for a reply, she turned, tossing her phone onto her desk.
And man, when did she get so tired?
She dropped down onto her bedroom floor heavily, initially planning to just sit for a few minutes.
But once she was sitting, she thought about how much nicer it would feel to be lying down.
And once she was lying down, she thought it would feel even better to close her eyes.
Just for a minute.
_______________________________________________
“Stiles.”
Her eyes rolled beneath their lids and brows drew together in response. She knew that voice. That grumpy ass tone. It had served as her unwelcomed, mid-night alarm clock on numerous occasions in the past year.
“Go away,” she mumbled, steadfastly refusing to open her eyes.
“Stiles.”
She sucked her teeth in irritation at the way he said her name. Like it was an order, not a request. It wasn’t, ‘Oh, I see you’re lying in the fetal position on your bedroom floor, injured yet again as a result of my poor life choices and severely deficient pre-bite interview process. Can you wake up?’ NO. It felt more along the lines of, ‘Wake up, clumsy, anxiety-scented human. Your lack of consciousness inconveniences me.’
One might say that Derek Hale’s ‘people skills’ were ‘rusty.’ She huffed a laugh at her own mental SPN reference before remembering she still needed to address the grumpy werewolf hovering over her.
“Ugh,” she groaned. “Sleep now. Talk later.”
“STILES!”
She knew without looking that he had just graduated to the Scowl of Epic Disapproval. If she kept going at this rate, she might even earn the highly coveted Exaggerated Eye Roll and Bitch Face of Doom.
“Whhaaattt?” she whined. That’s right. Whined. She had hard-earned whining rights at this point. Had she been standing, she might have been tempted to stomp her feet. “Can’t I get the rest of the night off? I’m all werewolf-ed out. I’ve already been chewed on enough today, thank you very much.”
The world was instantly upended. She yelped as she found herself standing on her feet with Derek holding her upright by her upper arms.
“What the hell, dude?!” she griped.
She blinked repeatedly, struggling to focus on his stupidly hot, perpetually scowling face.
She gave a scowl of her own as she snapped, “You know, you really need to learn ‘no means no.’ Maybe then you could pass it along to your pound puppies and spare the rest of us all the bad touching.” She scoffed and shook her head as she said, “Man, and here I thought I was safe from this shit when you killed your creeptastic Uncle, and he came back slightly less rape-y, but nope. Here we are again – and with me more saturated in wolf slobber than ever before. Hell, even Peter only ever had his mouth on my wrist. Who would’ve thought that particular traumatic event would one day seem so small in comparison? Jackson’s got me over here feeling nostalgic for your Uncle’s slightly lower-level violations. I hope he’s happy!”
A growl had been rumbling in Derek’s throat all throughout her diatribe, steadily growing in intensity the entire time she spoke until finishing on a furious and powerful roar.
She flinched and snapped her ever-errant mouth shut, grimacing when she took in his expression. Yup. He was pissed. Like half a step away from ‘Activate Instant Kill’ levels of pissed. She mimed zipping her lips shut as best she could, given his tight grip on her arms.
Derek gave a rumbling sigh and a skeptical look, clearly doubtful that she would ever manage to keep her mouth shut. He leaned closer to her, nostrils flaring as he put his super sniffer to work. His eyes glowed a lovely, murderous crimson as his gaze became affixed to the nape of her neck.
Knowing all too well what he was picking up on, she snorted and abandoned her brief, doomed effort to stay quiet. “What? You thought I was kidding about how long it’ll take to erase all evidence of Jackson’s douchebaggery? Alas, no. That prick attached himself to my back like a horny, homicidal limpet. And you think it smells bad? Shit. It felt way worse. In fact, I have an excellent idea! I hereby nominate you to be the one he humps next time because – Honestly? No exaggeration? – it was objectively worse than if he had actually decided to kill me. Like, if I had to rate ways Jackson would ever touch me on a scale of how repulsive and appalling I would find them, murder would have been on the complete opposite end of the spectrum from what he did.”
She tried to maintain her shield of comedic, irritated rambling, but under the power of Derek’s intense scrutiny, she slipped for a second. She shuddered involuntarily at the disturbing memory of Jackson’s tongue and teeth against her skin. The smells… her blood and the metal of the locker… Jackson’s breath and spit on her skin. The feeling of his body pressing into her back, hard and intent. The sounds of his snarls and heavy breathing. The sense of helplessness and inevitability of what was going to happen to her. The way he had groped at her body and nearly… Her stomach lurched and she winced as tears filled her eyes. She swallowed with significant difficulty as she stuffed it back down. Chancing a glance at the Alpha’s expression, she hoped that he had missed her reaction.
No such luck. Derek was still studying her up close like a bug under a magnifying glass. His thick (frankly, confusingly attractive) eyebrows were drawn together in some undefined, undoubtedly manly Alpha emotion that was not meant for mere humans to understand.
Stiles wanted to cover her face, but he still had a firm grip on her arms. In a futile attempt to mask her true feelings, she forced a laugh. “I mean, that guy straight up oozes douche out of every pore. I’m basically gonna have to bathe in a vat of industrial grade bleach to get his scent off, right? So, you know, if you want to contribute to the ‘Help Stiles Get Clean’ fund, feel free to donate. I accept cash or credit.”
Derek’s eyes narrowed for a moment, then he grunted in reply. Evidently, he had chosen a different medium for his donation. Stiles froze when he leaned forward and brought his cheek against the nape of her neck, rubbing against her in a way that somehow simultaneously calmed her and caused her pulse to race.
“Uh… Der?” she squeaked. “What are you doing?”
“Covering his scent,” Derek replied simply.
“Oh. Yeah. Sure. Right,” she stammered. Because that was a totally reasonable explanation for why Derek Hale – grudging ally / frenemy / source of mutual irritation – was currently nuzzling her neck. Also why he was splaying his giant, warm hands out – palms pressing flush against her skin as he dragged one down the back of her neck and the other up under the back of her shirt.
A short, deep, rumbling sound reverberated inside his chest as he released his hold on her arms. (Rumble translation: ‘STAY.’ as far as she could tell. She was not yet fluent in Derek’s wolf’s nonverbal commands.) He moved around behind her, slowly drawing her back against his chest, pressing his body against hers. She fought to keep her breathing steady, noting that this was a far more enjoyable version of the position she had been in earlier. Her tensed muscles began relaxing – some part of her instinctually put at ease by his actions.
Derek continued rubbing his stubbled jaw against her neck and shoulders, breathing wetly against the places Jackson had mouthed. Stiles eyes rolled closed and she swallowed hard, not wanting to point out any other locations Jackson had touched because she was so not going to think about Derek putting his hands or face down…
Nope.
She had a handle on this. She was not going to think about Derek’s epic hotness while he was crowding all up in her business doing werewolfy scenting things. She winced and tried to talk down her teenaged hormones, forcefully subjecting her mind to traumatizing images of Coach Finstock wearing a speedo and Deputy Barton (the one with the big ol' beer gut and so much body hair she seriously had Scott make sure he wasn’t a werewolf) in a negligee.
Mercifully, Derek finished a moment later. Seemingly satisfied with his work, he urged her to sit on the edge of her bed, then dragged her desk chair over and sat in front of her. She had just opened her mouth to ask what he was doing, when – with precisely zero bedside manner to go along with his nonexistent social skills – he reached out and ran his fingers over the swollen bruise and gash on her forehead.
“Fucking OUCH!” she yelped, pulling away.
She watched as a curious thing happened to Derek’s face. A flicker of something passed over his features so fast she nearly missed it. She struggled to identify it, surprised to realize the only way to define it would be remorse. She frowned thoughtfully at that, then gasped in surprised relief as he placed his fingertips against her face more gently and began drawing pain from the wound.
“Oh… o-okay, that… that’s really nice,” she sighed. “More of that, please. Keep it coming.”
Derek’s lips twitched. Not in an actual smile, but rather what equated to one in the complex, nuanced language of Derek-facial-expression-ese. She was nearly fluent in that dialect, but every so often he still threw her a curveball (e.g. remorse.)
She closed her eyes and leaned into his touch gratefully. The nerve endings in her face had been singing soprano rebukes about its collision with that locker this entire time, so it was a wonderful change.
As the pain gradually tapered off to nothing, she opened her heavy eyes. She flinched when she found Derek’s knowing gaze passing over the front of her body, nostrils flaring as he scented her blood.
“NOPE. Leave it,” she warned, holding up her hands.
Derek arched a brow, giving her a challenging look.
“Don’t look at me like that!” she huffed. “It’s fine. Nothing life threatening. Just some scratches. They don’t even hurt.”
Clearly detecting the lie, he gave a low growl of disapproval.
She rolled her eyes and conceded, “Okay. Yes. They do hurt and I definitely should have disinfected them before passing out on the floor, but cut me some slack, would you?” she whined. “I’ve had a really epically shitty night and I was in shock and I hid the scratches because I couldn’t come up with a way to explain to the paramedics how the ‘mountain lion’ had very obviously tried to get into my pants with a decidedly human shaped, sharply clawed hand!”
Oh, WOW. Definitely not the right thing to say, because in addition to Derek letting out a growl so forceful it caused her windows rattle, the red lights of impending Alpha rage were now back in his eyes.
She grimaced and cleared her throat nervously before making a shooing motion with her hands. “Right. Good talk. So, um, how about you – you know – go, and I’ll break out the first aid kit and get it all taken care of pronto. K? K.”
Derek leveled her with the most thoroughly unimpressed look she had ever received in her life. Paired with the crimson glow in his gaze, it made for an image she might someday recall in amusement.
In that moment, however, there was no amusement to be found. Derek was serious and had no intentions of letting her get out of this.
She let out a screech of indignation and flailed her hands. “FINE! Jesus. Here,” she yelled in defeat, leaning back and lifting the shirt up far enough to reveal the tops of the scratches. They started just below her ribs, running diagonally downward across her belly.
Derek’s entire body went terrifyingly rigid at the sight.
She bit her lip guiltily, thinking that if he disliked this, he was going to be really mad if he saw the rest of it. She could feel that the scratches went on for another few inches below the shredded waist of her jeans, but she was not going to shimmy the material down any further unless strictly necessary.
He remained stone still, glaring at her injuries for a full minute.
She finally couldn’t take it any longer and started fidgeting. “Uh… You good, big guy? Because you can’t like… physically fight the wounds, you do realize that, right? And you kinda have that stabby look in your eyes and it’s kinda making me seriously question my decision to roll over and literally show my belly to the literal apex predator in my bedroom.”
That seemed to do the trick. Derek took a deep breath, visibly attempting to force his muscles to relax .
“Show…” he tried around fangs – and hello, when did those show up? He sounded positively guttural. He trailed off, clasping his notably clawed hands together tightly. He swallowed and clenched his jaw, tilting his head to the side and blinking repeatedly, clearly working to calm himself. Once he had fought back the shift, he motioned for her to move the material and said in his regular voice, “Show me the rest.”
“Seriously, Der?” she pouted. “We really need to work on establishing boundaries. I mean, I realize you’re only 50% human, but you seem to have like 0% human respect for personal bubbles.”
“Stiles.” he said firmly.
“GOD. Okay!” she cried angrily.
After a moment, his brows slowly rose expectantly, his gaze flicking from her face to her hands and back as if to ask why she had not moved yet.
“Just… give me a minute,” she huffed. “I’m sorta… trying to work up the nerve here.” She winced before grudgingly confessing, “I haven’t… uh… actually seen it yet.”
Derek’s eyes went wide as he gave her a look of blatant disbelief. “STILES!” And oh, she hadn’t heard him shout her name in that particular tone since the time he was falling into a pool while paralyzed. “Are you kidding me?!” he demanded.
Her jaw dropped open indignantly. “Hey! I went from being attacked, to being completely surrounded by people not in-the-know about werewolves, to passing out on my bedroom floor. When exactly have I had time for a full body inspection?”
Derek bowed his head and raked his fingers roughly through his hair in vexation.
She should not find that particular tick of his to be endearing, right? Or note that it was very specifically his go-to ‘I can’t believe what Stiles just did’ gesture?
Yeah, no, definitely not the time to be thinking about that stuff. She totally got it. Moving on.
She decided to try and take advantage of his brief distraction in the hopes that she might get a look at her wounds before he could. With a wince, she slid the fabric of her wrecked jeans down another few inches.
“Ow, ow, shit, shit, ow,” she whimpered involuntarily as the movement freed material that had become affixed to the dried blood, effectively reopening the wounds.
Well, so much for being sneaky.
Eyes snapping up, Derek sat forward to examine the scratches (that ended – mercifully – an inch above the top of her pubes. So, like… huzzah! for not having to show off her bush to the ridiculously hot Alpha. Nice to know she would survive the day with at least a modicum of modesty intact.)
The bottom of every scratch was deepest, each punctuated with a quarter-sized gouge where a chunk of her flesh had been removed.
“Huh…” she commented dazedly, fighting off a wave of nausea and dizziness. “Yeah, that… that’s where he was at when I broke his nose. Guess he yanked his hand off at that point. I probably should’ve thought that through…”
Derek snarled as he got to his feet, stalking over to her closet, and angrily retrieving her first aid kit. And how weird had her life become when the local werewolf Alpha was familiar with where she kept her bedroom first aid kit?
When he returned with it, she held out a hand and said weakly, “Here. Gimme. I’ll do it.”
Derek glared at her hand so fiercely, she snatched it back for fear of getting her fingers bitten.
“Geez. Suit yourself,” she grumbled.
“Lay back. Up on the pillows.” Derek ordered.
Stiles huffed and groaned as she complied. Once in position, she draped an arm over her eyes and focused on her breathing. She really did not want to watch Derek hovering over her in bed with his large, deft hands moving so carefully over her bare stomach. She already had more than enough daydream material to torture herself with, thank you very much, given his proclivity for working out shirtless anytime his wolf was restless.
She bit back a cry when he started cleaning out the wounds. She would have asked for more of his magic pain relief, but she figured his hands were already busy enough.
Several minutes later, he was clearing away the bloodied gauze and antiseptic wipes, then standing up as if finished.
She looked down at her stomach and frowned. “No bandages?” she asked curiously.
“No point yet.” he answered, reaching down to grip her hand and hoist her up onto her feet. “Shower. Now.” he ordered, pointing in the direction of the bathroom.
She opened her mouth to argue that she really just wanted to sleep already, but stopped when she realized that she was fully on board with washing away the events of the day. Nodding in agreement, she shuffled over to her dresser and dug out a change of clothes.
She took her time in the shower, washing her back and neck at least 4 times before she was satisfied. Not that she wanted to wash Derek’s scent off, but there was definitely still residual Jackson slobber on her skin and that shit had to go.
By the end, she let out a long sigh of relief, feeling like herself again. She grudgingly conceded that Derek might have been onto something with this whole shower suggestion.
When she pushed back the shower curtain, she arched a brow seeing that her dirty and wrecked clothes were no longer on the floor. She rolled her eyes and wrapped her body in a towel.
“Not creepy at all, Sourwolf,” she muttered, well aware that he could hear her.
She dried off and pulled on her underwear and a loose tank top. She had gone with her softest, baggiest pair of PJ pants, not wanting anything digging into her stomach for obvious reasons.
When she entered her bedroom, she smirked at the state of her bed. Everything – from her comforter to her sheets right down to her pillowcases – was gone.
“Dude, where is my bedding?” she huffed.
Derek reluctantly answered, “In the washer.”
“Uh huh,” she said in amusement. Pointing over at the tightly sealed trash bag under her window, clearly ready to be taken with him when he left, she added, “And let me guess, my clothes are in there?”
He did not even bother replying.
“I get it,” she relented, holding up her hands. “Removing Jackson’s scent. Trust me, I am so totally here for it.”
She chewed the inside of her cheek, noting that Derek had removed his trademark leather jacket at some point. She guessed it had also been scent-contaminated during this whole process. Judging by the size of that trash bag bundle under the window, she figured he was planning to remedy it elsewhere.
“So…” She motioned to her stomach and asked, “Am I allowed to bandage myself up now, or are you still in ‘I am Alpha, hear me roar’ mode?”
That earned a quintessential Derek Hale bitch face.
She let her head fall back as she laughed victoriously. “So bossy,” she snorted at him as she walked by.
He was markedly more relaxed as she climbed onto her bare mattress and rested back on her pillows. She fell back on her time-honored tradition of rambling to fill the silence, talking enough for the both of them.
“Okay, let’s get this over and done with so we can continue on our way. We both have a busy night ahead of us. I mean, you’ve probably got shadows you’re supposed to be lurking in somewhere and as for me? Well, I have a schedule just chock-full of undoubtedly terrible and traumatic nightmares. I’m sure I’ll get at least 20 minutes of solid sleep in there somewhere along the way, so I’m really looking forward to getting to that part, you know?”
He grunted in reply as he carefully began applying antibiotic ointment to each of the wounds.
She sighed and tilted her head, studying his expression as he concentrated on his work. “So, hey, I meant to ask – why did this happen? I mean, Scott’s my best friend and he’s never tried to have sex with me. Which, can I just say? Thank GOD.” She cringed at the thought. “I mean, for sure, he’s tried to murder me. On like, multiple occasions.” She frowned to herself at that before asking deadpan, “Do you think that’s his subconscious seeking revenge for all the times I’ve kicked his ass in Mario Kart?”
Derek sighed but did not bother to respond. No big surprise there. Stiles smiled to herself, though. She was sure he secretly thought she was hilarious. You know, on some heavily repressed level.
“But anyways,” she continued, “Jackson despises me. And the feeling is oh, so incredibly mutual. He’s been making my life a living hell since elementary school. Why did he decide out of nowhere tonight that he wanted to jump my bones?”
“Full moon tomorrow,” Derek stated plainly, not pausing or looking up as he added, “You’re ovulating.”
“I – hey, huh, what?” she stammered in disbelief.
He sighed and grumbled, “I should’ve realized it might be an issue.”
“How exactly did my fertility schedule become common knowledge?” she asked incredulously.
“We can smell it,” Derek answered simply.
Stiles flailed her hands and feet in response to that calmly delivered bombshell.
“Oh my God!” she cried. “You can smell it?”
“Lay still.” Derek ordered with a frown as he pressed a hand down on her hip firmly, completely unbothered by her freak-out.
“What even…?” She covered her face with both hands, taking a steadying breath before grumbling, “No wonder you don’t understand personal boundaries, dude. You can literally smell what my freaking uterus is up to at any given moment.”
She could have sworn she heard him give a quiet, amused exhale in response.
After a long groan, she shook her head and uncovered her face before looking back at him. “Fine. I’m… ovulating. Which, by the way, it’s my body and I would need an app to even know, but evidently you guys can tell from a distance.”
“Your stomach hurts when it happens,” he commented.
She gaped down at him in confusion until he glanced up at her.
Rolling his eyes, he grudgingly explained, “Your breathing hitches when you bend at the waist and you smell like low level pain. You usually press your fist into your stomach to try and ease the ache. It’s never more than an inconvenience to you, and it only bothers you for a few hours once a month, so you never really notice it.”
“But… you do,” she stated, studying him in bewilderment.
He shrugged. “I notice a lot of things.”
“Awesome…” she answered, taking a moment to digest that bit of info before joking, “By the way, congrats on nearly meeting your monthly quota for spoken words with that explanation. Well done.”
He gave a lip twitch in response.
With a sigh she said, “Okay, so how exactly does me being fertile translate into Super Douche slamming me into a locker and trying to bang me through it?”
Derek’s jaw flexed and eyes flashed red again.
In lieu of responding, he rested a hand on her stomach, covering the gouges, and began taking her pain.
“Oh…” Her eyelids fluttered in surprise. “Whoa… Good wolf,” she praised as her entire body went limp. She practically melted into her mattress in relief. After a moment, she patted his arm and said dazedly, “Hey. No fair distracting me with your wolfy magic fingers. You didn’t answer my question.”
He waited for her pain to taper off before removing his hand. Somewhat reluctantly, he replied, “You’re a fertile, unmarked, unclaimed, female pack member.” He taped down a gauze pad as he added, “Jackson and Lydia split up. He’s alone now, so his wolf wanted to claim you.”
Stiles recoiled at the thought. “There are so many things about that statement that I take personal issue with, but firstly, I’m not even his pack member.”
Derek looked a bit awkward before saying, “I see you as pack. I’m the Alpha. You’re pack.”
She frowned at that, tilting her head to the side, and wondering when the hell that had happened.
“Huh.” she breathed, deciding not to ask. They were straying dangerously close to discussing feelings and she could tell it was making Derek’s flesh crawl. “Soooo… what am I supposed to do about this?” She frowned as she considered her options. “I mean… I do have a doctor’s appointment next week. I guess I could go on birth control that’ll prevent me from ovulating and – ”
“No.” Derek said a bit too abruptly.
She gave him a curious look.
Several seconds of uncomfortable, awkward silence passed between them.
“Right…” she finally said before offering, “No, yeah, I can see how that would probably make me smell all weird and chemically to your super sniffer. Probably way worse than that cheap laundry detergent I used to use that made all of you nauseous.”
That must be it. Because she really did not want to consider any other reasons why Derek would be opposed to her no longer smelling ‘fertile’ every month.
…
He did not reply, so she chose not to push for an explanation.
“Then what should I do exactly?” she asked worriedly. “Because I’m not up for any repeat performances here. Once was more than enough.”
“Track your cycle. Any time you’re fertile the week of a full moon, I’ll scent mark you,” he said resolutely.
She arched a brow. “Wait, seriously?”
“He won’t go near you if you smell like me,” he assured. “None of them will.”
“O…kay,” she said with a nod. “I mean, you are the resident werewolf expert and all, so I guess I’ll have to defer to you on this.”
They fell into a relatively comfortable silence after that while he finished bandaging her up.
Once he was done, she sat up and cleared her throat before asking somewhat anxiously, “So, Jackson… Is he… uh…?”
“Chained up.” Derek answered as he put her first aid kit back in its usual place.
“Right. Got it. Good to know,” she said in feigned nonchalance, rubbing her sweaty palms over her knees and pretending to be fascinated with the pattern of her PJ pants. Chained up… but sure to feature in her nightmares for the next few weeks at least. She sighed to herself in resignation.
“Here.” Derek said, drawing her attention.
“Hmm?” she asked.
She looked up just in time to watch him cross his arms, grab the bottom hem of his shirt, and pull it off over his head in a spectacular move he just had to have practiced in front of a mirror at some point in his life because JESUS. She focused all of her energy on not making a strangled sound of longing, but her lips parted, and she was sure her expression became notably pained. He was at least wearing a tank top underneath but dear God, it was easily three sizes too small and looked painted on.
He held out the Henley to her and she accepted it in a daze. When he just stayed there staring at her expectantly, she finally caught on.
“OH! You want me… to put… because of your… now?” she stammered.
His brows rose and he blinked in reply.
“Gotcha. Right. Putting it on,” she said as she clumsily pulled the warm, Derek scented shirt over her head. She had to roll up the sleeves several times and chew her lips to keep her composure.
When she finished, Derek held out a hand and waved for her to stand up. And honestly, at this point, if he did not get the hell out of her bedroom soon, she was either going to say something exceptionally humiliating or just melt into a puddle right there on her floor.
She stood from the bed and steeled herself. “So you’re just gonna…” she breathed as he wrapped his arms around her. “Right. Okay. This is… yeah…” she said, clearing her throat and trying to stay calm.
Derek returned to his earlier position of rubbing his hands and face against her skin. This time, she noted in surprise that his eyes were closed, and he was rumbling steadily, like a werewolf version of a purr. She shivered involuntarily and leaned into the contact, breathing in deeply and savoring the way Derek was overwhelming her senses.
As minutes passed, she found herself leaning against him more heavily, her body relaxing as her exhaustion settled in. She yawned several times before nodding off, only waking to the feeling of being rested back onto her bed.
“Thanks, Der. You’re a good guy,” she muttered as she let sleep take her.
Maybe she would have a few dreams that night that did not feature Jackson, after all.
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AUTHOR’S NOTE: So, what did you think? This is another one that was just an idea in my head that demanded to be written. It's supposed to be a one-shot, but I might be persuaded to continue if there’s enough interest... ; )