The lobby opened in front of them in a wash of cold white light and long shadows, the tall glass panels reflecting four distorted figures instead of two. Scarlett slowed just enough to steady her breathing before stepping fully into view, her jaw locked tight, her posture forced into something that resembled control rather than survival. Scott was already there, pacing in short, agitated movements near the entrance, and the moment he saw Allison he crossed the distance between them in seconds, hands flying to her shoulders as if he needed physical proof that she was unharmed.
Scarlett barely registered the relief in his voice.
Her eyes had already found Stiles.
And the moment she saw him standing there something inside her chest gave way so abruptly it almost hurt more than the wound beneath her jacket. The tension that had been coiled tight under her ribs since she felt that first surge of terror didn't dissolve gently; it snapped, leaving behind a hollow, dizzying lightness that made her sway for half a second.
"Scarlett!"
He was already moving toward her when he said it.
She scanned him in a single, ruthless sweep. No blood soaking through his clothes. No limp. No shaking hands clutching at an injury. His movements were sharp, agitated, but intact.
He is not hurt, she thought letting out a little shakey breath.
The relief rushed through her more than she had expected; sharp and overwhelming and almost humiliating in its intensity. Her fingers flexed at her sides as if she needed to grab onto something solid to keep herself steady. It felt indecent, the way her body reacted.
He kept walking toward her, slowing only when he got close enough to truly see her. There was surprise in his expression—of course there was—but not disbelief.
He knew I would have come, she realized as the space between them closed until they were standing barely an arm's length apart. Close enough that she could see the rapid flutter at the base of his throat. Close enough that she could feel the aftershock of his fear still lingering in the air between them.
"Are you alright?" She found herself asking almost in a whisper.
"In all honesty," Stiles said, attempting a crooked smile that didn't quite hold, "scared shitless. The Alpha is here."
The words were light, almost flippant, but his voice betrayed him. It carried a faint tremor, the kind he tried to bury under sarcasm like he liked to do. Scarlett saw it in the tightness around his eyes, in the way his shoulders hadn't fully relaxed yet, in the restless energy still humming beneath his skin.
"Yeah I know," She swallowed. "I've seen him."
His eyes grew even bigger, before he get closer to her, "What?" he whisper-yelled. "What happened?" The smell hit her then.
Adrenaline and sweat hung in the air between them, sharp and immediate, but beneath that there was the faint metallic edge of blood, subtle yet unmistakable, and it didn't belong only to Stiles. Scott's scent was there too, thicker, darker, threaded with something unmistakably feral that stirred the most dangerous parts of her nature. Werewolf blood had always carried a different pull, richer and more intoxicating, laced with power and instinct, and now it blended with Stiles' warmth until the entire lobby seemed to shrink around her, the air growing heavier, warmer, charged in a way that made her skin feel too tight for her body.
Shit... she thought with dread.
At the same moment, her abdomen ignited again, not with a slow warning but with a brutal, merciless surge that ripped through her midsection and spread outward in blinding waves, as if something inside her had been set on fire and left to burn through muscle and bone alike. The agony stole the air from her lungs, and a fractured sound escaped her before she could contain it, something like a gasp; raw and involuntary.
Stiles' expression grew even more worried.
"What? What is it?" He stepped closer, instinctively reaching out. "Are you alright?"
The movement brought him nearer, and with that closeness his scent intensified, warm and alive and threaded with the rapid rhythm of his pulse. Her fangs pressed painfully against her gums as instinct surged up, louder than reason for a split, dangerous second; she could hear his heartbeat clearly now, fast and uneven from the fear that hadn't fully left him, and it would have been so easy to close the remaining distance, so easy to let control slip just enough to give in.
"Yeah. Yeah," she forced out, though the words came strained and thinner than she intended, her voice scraping at the edges as she tried to sound steady. Her hand rose between them almost on instinct, palm flattening lightly against his chest, to create space, to put even the smallest barrier between her and the temptation coiling beneath her skin.
The contact only made everything worse; she could feel the warmth of him through the fabric of his shirt, the firm, relentless thud of his heartbeat beneath her hand, alive and trusting and far too close for the state she was in.
"I'm fine," she added, though her breath hitched slightly on the last word.
He didn't move away. He just stared at her, confusion knitting his brows together. "You don't look fine."
Another violent wave of heat tore through her abdomen, hotter than before, and she bit down hard to keep from crying out, though a low, involuntary sound still slipped past her control. She shifted her weight carefully, almost imperceptibly, angling her body so the worst of the injury remained concealed beneath her jacket, her free hand hovering near her stomach on instinct before she forced it back to her side. She had to stay upright.
She had to stay focused.
She needed to stay in control.
Breathe slowly, she said to herself. Don't inhale too deeply. Don't lean closer.
"Scarlett?" he asked again, his voice softer now, the confusion gone and replaced entirely by concern. But before she could answer they heard Scott's voice.
The puppy was looking at his girlfriend with wide, worried eyes. He was terrorized. "Why did you come?" he was asking in panic. "What are you doing here?"
Allison's expression only grew more confused, "Because you asked me to?"
"I asked you to?" Scott asked, as if he wanted to make sure he had understood her well.
What the fuck is Peter doing? Scareltt thought with gritted teeth. It must have been him. But what was his plan? What the fuck was he going on about? Why was he playing with them like that? It seemed as if he was only hunting them. But why?
Allison's gaze changed in a more scared one, "Why do I get the feeling you didn't send this message?"
"Because I didn't."
Scott's grim confirmation had barely settled into the charged air when another brutal spike of pain tore through Scarlett's abdomen, sharper than the last, stealing the breath from her lungs so violently that she folded slightly at the waist before she could stop herself. A strangled gasp slipped out, low and broken.
Stiles reacted instantly. He reached for her again, fingers brushing her arm. "What is it? Scarlett—"
The contact sent a tremor through her, pain and hunger flaring together in a dangerous mix, and she sucked in another sharp breath.
Across the lobby, both Scott and Allison turned at once.
"Scarlett, is everything alright?" Scott asked, his voice tight with worry.
"Nothing," she said quickly, forcing herself upright, jaw locking against the fire ripping through her stomach. She turned her head toward Stiles, forcing steadiness into her voice even as her vision flickered. "It's nothing. We can't stay here. We have to move."
"What's the rush?" Allison demanded, frustration overtaking her confusion. "What's going on?"
Stiles didn't answer immediately. He was still looking at Scarlett, really looking at her now, noticing the way her posture had gone rigid, the faint sheen of sweat at her hairline, the way her breathing wasn't quite even. Something was wrong, and he knew it.
"Did you drive here?" he asked Allison instead, his voice sharper than before.
"Jackson did."
Scarlett let out a pained, humorless groan at that information, the sound dragged from somewhere between exhaustion and fury.
Scott stared at Allison as if she had just announced she'd invited a serial killer to dinner. "Jackson is here, too?"
"And Lydia," Allison added, growing more unsettled by the second.
A dark chuckle escaped Scarlett before she could stop it, thin and edged with something that wasn't entirely sane. "That's fucking fantastic…"
Allison turned toward her, alarm rising. "Why? What's going on?" Then back to Scott. "Who sent this text?"
Before he could answer, the heavy double doors behind them banged open.
Everyone flinched except Allison.
Lydia strode in first, irritation written all over her face, Jackson trailing behind her with visible annoyance. "Finally," Lydia said, brushing her hair back. "Can we go now?"
Allison nodded automatically, but then all of them heard it.
A low, dragging sound.
Above them.
Something heavy moved across the ceiling structure, claws scraping faintly against metal beams, slow and deliberate. The sound vibrated through the fluorescent panels overhead, making them flicker.
Scarlett's head snapped upward.
Her entire body went still.
She stepped in front of Stiles without thinking, positioning herself between him and the center of the lobby, her gaze locked on the ceiling as it creaked under weight that no human should have been able to carry. The pain in her abdomen flared viciously with the movement, but she ignored it, ignored the hunger rising in her throat at the scent of five beating hearts around her.
The ceiling groaned.
Scott's voice cut through the tension like a blade. "Run!"
The word detonated the moment.
They moved at once.
Scott grabbed Allison's hand. Jackson swore loudly. Lydia shrieked as something thudded above them, the metal panels rattling violently.
Scarlett shoved Stiles toward the nearest hallway. "Go!" she snapped, even as the effort made black spots dance at the edge of her vision.
They sprinted.
Every step sent fresh agony through her abdomen, the wound burning hotter with each impact of her boots against tile. Running made it worse. Everything made it worse. And surrounding her were four humans and one werewolf, their scents crashing into her senses in overwhelming waves. Fear. Sweat. Blood. Power.
Her thirst surged.
She swallowed it down brutally.
Not now.
She stayed close to Stiles, half a step behind him, half a step shielding him from whatever might drop from above. Anger burned just as fiercely as the pain.
The hallway echoed with their footsteps as they turned sharply and burst into the cafeteria, and in the moment Scarlett did, the pain crashed over her in full force.
Her knees nearly buckled.
She veered away from the others before anyone could grab her, staggering toward one of the long cafeteria tables. Her hand slammed down against it to steady herself, fingers digging into the surface as her weight collapsed forward onto it.
For a second she thought she might actually black out.
The burn in her abdomen felt like it was spreading, twisting deeper under her skin, and the smell of blood—so much blood in the air now —made her fangs press painfully downward again.
She lowered her head, bracing herself against the table, trying to steady her breathing before anyone noticed just how close she was to losing control.
Chairs scraped violently across tile. Tables groaned as they were dragged and flipped. The sharp screech of metal legs against the floor vibrated through the cafeteria, each sound amplified inside Scarlett's skull until it felt like the noise itself was splitting her open. Voices overlapped—Allison's tense, Scott's urgent, Jackson swearing under his breath, Lydia demanding to know what was happening—but the words blurred together into meaningless sound.
The pain swallowed everything.
She barely registered the movement around her, barely processed the barricade forming at the doors. All she felt was the burn spreading beneath her jacket and the pounding chorus of heartbeats surrounding her, loud and frantic and impossibly close.
"Scarlett."
Stiles' voice cut through the haze.
She felt his hands at her waist—careful, steadying—and the contact nearly undid her. Her entire body flinched. Every nerve was raw. His touch hurt, but not just because of the wound. It was the warmth. The scent. The pulse under his skin.
"You have to stay back…" she forced out, her voice rough and strained.
"Can you tell me what's going on?" he demanded, leaning closer despite her warning, his fingers tightening slightly as if he thought she was about to collapse.
She shook her head, "Stiles..." a small, sharp movement that made the room tilt. "Not now. Help the others, go."
She didn't trust her voice to say more. She didn't trust herself.
A dark, bitter thought slid through her mind with brutal clarity. I knew it. There's no anchor for hunger.
Stiles hesitated. She could feel it in the way he didn't immediately move away. He was studying her face, trying to read the pieces she was hiding. But then something shifted in his expression. His eyes flicked past her shoulder toward the far wall.
"Oh… shit."
Scarlett barely had the strength to turn her head, but she heard it then—the others still dragging furniture, the frantic shuffling as the doors were fully barricaded. She forced herself to breathe through the haze of blood-scent and pain. Focus. Control.
"HELLO!" Stiles suddenly shouted, his voice echoing loudly through the cafeteria.
The sound snapped everyone's attention toward him—including hers.
Allison, Scott, Jackson, Lydia—they had finished barricading the main doors and were now standing in a tight cluster, breathing hard, staring at Stiles like he had just lost his mind.
He spread his hands slightly, sarcasm bleeding into every word despite the fear still clinging to him. "Okay. Nice work. Really beautiful job, everyone."
Then he turned slowly and gestured toward the far side of the cafeteria.
"Now… what should we do about the twenty-foot wall of windows?"
Fuck, Scarlett thought. Glass was nothing to Peter's body now. It would not stop even a Beta, but breaking that would be a joke for a Alpha.
"Can somebody please explain to me what's going on?" Allison asked almost desperately, stepping closer to Scott. "Because I'm freaking out and I'd like to know why."
Scarlett observed all of them from where she stood. They were terrified. Allison was pleading, Lydia was on the verge of tears, and Jackson looked lost and confused. They had every right to be. Scarlett wasn't even sure Peter was just playing with them anymore.
She turned to look at Stiles; he was exchanging a glance with Scott just before his best friend moved away from his girlfriend. Why was Peter hunting them?
Scott had moved to the table next to her, agitated, his hand dragging over his face as if he could wipe the panic away. Scarlett watched him with a frown.
Fucking get yourself together, she thought, another sharp stab of pain twisting in her belly. She took a few steps back when she realized she was catching the scent of Scott's werewolf blood too clearly. As she did, Stiles spoke.
"Somebody killed the janitor."
Scarlett's eyes widened at his words, but she didn't say anything. She tried to remember if the janitor had been one of their targets… was he? She didn't recall anyone from the school. Had Peter killed a random man?
You did too.
It was true. She had fed on humans when she had been left alone. And Peter had seemed proud of her when they met again. He had always pushed her to embrace what she truly was, but werewolves… they weren't supposed to be killers.
We are hunters, but we don't have to be killers, Talia used to say. She had said it to Scarlett too.
"What?" Lydia asked, her voice rising even higher than usual.
"Yeah, the janitor is dead," Stiles repeated, tension threading through every word.
Did he see the murder? Scarlett wondered as she studied him. And then she scolded herself, because she shouldn't care. But she remembered how terrified he had been, and the thought of Stiles seeing a body… it shouldn't have affected her. But it did.
"What is he talking about?" Allison asked in panic. "Is this a joke?" She was looking at Scott, but he didn't turn toward her. Scarlett found herself confused by Allison's behavior. Was she a huntress or not? She looked scared. Out of place. She genuinely seemed to know nothing about this. And if Scarlett was right, Scott was making it worse.
"Stiles," Scarlett said, pushing herself away from the table she had been leaning on. He crossed the space between them immediately, his eyes even more worried now, but she didn't let him get too close. His scent was strong and dangerously appealing; her fangs threatened to drop. She could not lose control.
When she stepped back, confusion crossed his face, but before he could ask anything she spoke. "We have to go," she said, looking at him before turning to the others. "We can't stay here. Come on."
"Hey, wait," Jackson said, stepping closer too, and she couldn't believe that even his scent was appealing in that moment. The pain in her abdomen flared again. "Who killed the janitor?"
"No, no, no," Lydia said, her eyes wide and unfocused. "This was supposed to be over. The mountain lion—"
"No, don't you get it?" Jackson snapped at her. "There wasn't a mountain lion."
He was sharper than he looked. That surprised Scarlett.
"Who was it then?" Allison asked, her eyes shining with tears. This girl is not a huntress, Scarlett thought, more certain of it by the second.
"What does he want?" Allison asked again, her gaze fixed on Scott, waiting for an explanation. But he was still turned away, almost shaking. "Scott!"
Scarlett and Stiles exchanged a look. This was spiraling.
"I… I don't know," Scott finally said. "I just… if we go out there, he's going to kill us."
Scarlett's eyes widened. Was he insane?
"Us?" Lydia repeated, frozen in panic. "He's going to kill us?"
"Who?" Allison demanded. When Scott didn't answer, she turned toward Stiles and Scarlett. "Who is it?"
Maybe she was acting. Hunters could pretend. But her expression… could someone really fake that kind of fear?
"It's Derek," Scott said.
Scarlett's eyes widened in fury. Fucking puppy…
She turned toward Stiles and saw that he was just as shocked, his mouth slightly open as he tilted his head.
"Derek killed the janitor?" Jackson asked with a confused frown. Allison seemed equally unwilling to believe it. She shook her head. "Are you sure?"
"I saw him," Scott insisted, and Scarlett had to swallow down an angry growl. The wound was making her more volatile than usual.
"The mountain lion—" Lydia tried again, but Scott cut her off.
"No, Derek killed them!" he exclaimed.
"All of them?" Allison asked.
Scott nodded. "Starting with his own sister."
Scarlett's jaw clenched. He was crossing too many lines.
"And the bus driver?" Allison pressed.
At that, Scarlett turned toward her, remembering the night she and Peter had attacked the man, remembering the rush of it. But Derek hadn't been there.
"And the guy in the video store," Scott continued tensely. Scarlett's gaze flicked briefly toward Stiles, remembering that night too. "It's been Derek the whole time. He's in here with us. And if we don't get out, he's going to kill us too."
Jackson, Lydia, and Allison looked utterly terrified. And fear made blood race. Made it hotter. Louder.
Delicious.
Focus, Scarlett.
Hunger. It was always hunger.
How do you keep hunger down?
Control.
It was always about control. Ignoring the pounding rhythm of frightened hearts.
"Call the cops," Jackson demanded, turning to Stiles.
Scarlett's head snapped toward them.
"No," Stiles said simply.
"What do you mean 'no'?" Jackson shot back, his tone grating against Scarlett's nerves.
"I mean no," Stiles replied stubbornly. "Do you want it in Spanish? No." He took a breath. "Look, Derek killed three people, okay? We don't know what he's armed with."
"Your dad is armed with an entire sheriff's department," Jackson snapped. "Call him!"
"I'm calling!" Lydia announced, stepping aside as she pulled her phone from her bag.
Stiles moved to stop her, but Jackson shoved him back.
Scarlett reacted before she could think, stepping between them and pushing Jackson hard in the chest.
"Stay the fuck away, Jackson," she hissed, glaring at him.
He stared at her like she had lost her mind. "I can't believe this," he snapped. "You're siding with your pathetic boyfriend?"
Scarlett didn't move. She held his gaze, her fangs threatening to descend. "You better take two steps back."
"Or what?"
She felt herself teetering on the edge, hunger and pain and fury blurring together, but Stiles stepped in quickly, hands finding her shoulders and guiding her backward toward the windows.
"Hey, hey…" he murmured softly, positioning himself in front of her to block her view of Jackson. "As much as I appreciate the backup, we cannot start fighting each other right now."
Their eyes locked. She took a shaky breath, pain and anger tangling together, but after a moment she nodded. He mirrored the gesture, visibly relieved.
But that relief vanished when Lydia began speaking into the phone.
"Yes, we are at Beacon Hills High School," Lydia said, her voice trembling so badly that the words nearly collapsed in on themselves. "We're trapped, and we need you to— but—" She stopped abruptly, confusion flashing across her face before dread settled in, draining what little color she had left. "She hung up on me."
Scarlett frowned, exchanging a look with Stiles as Scott moved to stand beside him, tension radiating off all of them.
"The police hung up on you?" Allison asked, bewildered.
"She said they got a tip warning them that there are going to be prank calls about a break-in at the high school," Lydia explained, terror clinging to every syllable. "She said if I call again, they're going to trace it and have me arrested."
It had to be Peter. There was no other explanation. He had anticipated every move, cut off every exit. But Scarlett still couldn't understand the endgame. What was the point of hunting a group of teenagers inside a school? He had orchestrated this, piece by piece, but for what?
"Okay," Allison said quickly, turning to Lydia. "Then call again."
"No, they won't trace a cell," Stiles cut in, his voice sharp with urgency. "And they'll send a car to your house before they send anyone here."
That only made Allison more agitated. "What the— what is this?" Her hands flew to her hair, pushing it back as if she could steady herself physically.
Scarlett watched her carefully. Was Allison the real target? That was the only explanation that made sense, and yet… why here? Why gather all of them together? Why not isolate her when she was alone? What was Peter really trying to prove?
"Why does Derek want to kill us?" Allison demanded again, her voice cracking. "Why is he killing anyone?"
Silence followed the question, thick and heavy, and one by one their gazes shifted until they all landed on Scott. The realization seemed to dawn on him a second too late; his eyes widened.
"Why is everyone looking at me?" he asked.
Scarlett had to fight the urge to roll her eyes. Could he really be that oblivious?
"Is he the one who sent her the text?" Lydia asked, but Scott shook his head.
"No," he said quickly, then hesitated, sharing a glance with Stiles. "I mean… I don't know…"
He was a terrible liar.
"Is he the one who called the police?" Allison pressed, and this time Scott snapped.
"I don't know!"
She flinched at the force of his response and turned away.
"All right, why don't we all just throttle down here, yeah?" Stiles intervened, stepping between them and nudging Scott aside. "Scarlett, can you please come with us?" He gestured for her to follow, and she did, allowing the three of them a small pocket of privacy a few steps away from the others.
"Okay. First off," Stiles began in a hushed voice, "throwing Derek under the bus? Nicely done." The sarcasm was sharp but controlled.
"What the fuck is wrong with you, Scott?" Scarlett snapped, her restraint thinning.
Scott looked between them, panic written all over his face. "I didn't know what to do," he rushed out. "I had to say something, and if he's dead, then it doesn't matter, right?"
Scarlett's eyes widened. "What does that mean?" she demanded, turning toward Stiles. "What does he mean?"
Stiles inhaled slowly before answering. "He was thrown sixty feet after being impaled in the chest by the Alpha's claws."
The words hit her like a physical blow. For a moment, it felt as if the strength drained out of her body entirely. Peter had attacked Derek. How could he? Peter would never— but he had. He had attacked her too. And Derek. And Laura…
He would never hurt his family. That was the point of all of this. That was what she had believed. But he had hurt her. And Derek. And maybe Laura too.
"Oh God…" she whispered, her limbs trembling.
"Except if he's not dead," Scott continued anxiously, barely registering her reaction as he glanced past them. "Oh, God, I totally just bit her head off."
Her?
Was he really thinking about arguing with Allison right now?
"Are you serious?" Scarlett almost growled, and Scott's eyes snapped back to her.
"And she'll totally get over it," Stiles said quickly, trying to contain the situation before it spiraled further. Then his expression shifted abruptly as he looked at Scarlett more closely. "Scarlett… your fangs…"
She frowned and lifted a hand to her mouth, fingers brushing against elongated canines she hadn't even felt descend. Pain, hunger, anger—they were bleeding through her control. That could not happen.
She forced them back up, lowering her gaze briefly in something that felt dangerously close to embarrassment. Neither of the boys commented, though she could feel Stiles' eyes linger on her a second longer than necessary before he turned back to Scott.
"Okay. We have bigger issues," Stiles continued, pushing forward. "Like how we get out of here alive."
"But we are alive," Scott argued. "It could've killed us already. It's like it's cornering us or something."
Scarlett lifted her eyes to him, irritation cutting through the haze. "And what exactly do you think he's planning to do once he finds us instead?"
"She's right," Stiles added quickly. "I don't think he's planning on eating us all at the same time."
"No," Scott insisted, shaking his head. "Derek said it wants revenge."
Fuck. He told him.
Scarlett forced her face into calm neutrality, though tension coiled tighter in her chest. Her gaze flicked briefly to Stiles. Could they connect revenge to her? Could they connect her to the Alpha?
"Against who?" Stiles asked.
"Allison's family," Scott replied immediately.
Scarlett had to work twice as hard to keep the shift in her expression from showing. The Argents. Of course.
"Maybe that's what the text was about," Stiles said, his mind racing ahead. "Someone had to send it."
And that was the problem. They were starting to think. Starting to connect threads. And if they pulled too hard, the entire truth might unravel.
"Okay, assheads!" Jackson's voice cut sharply through the tension, forcing all three of them to turn toward him. "New plan. Stiles calls his useless dad and tells him to send someone with a gun and decent aim. Are we good with that?"
Scarlett's glare snapped to him instantly, fury flaring hot and immediate. "One more word, Jackson, I swear—"
"No," Scott interrupted with a heavy sigh, and both Scarlett and Stiles turned toward him. "He's right. Tell him the truth if you have to. Just… just call him."
Stiles' eyes widened, disbelief flashing across his face as though he couldn't quite process that those words had come from his best friend.
"I'm not watching my dad get eaten alive," he said quietly, the defiance in his voice undercut by something raw and protective. Scarlett watched him carefully then. He wasn't afraid for himself. He was afraid for his father. He would rather put himself in front of whatever was hunting them than risk that man stepping into it blindly.
"All right, give me the phone—"
It happened before Scarlett could fully register the movement. Jackson lunged from behind, grabbing at Stiles' shoulder, but Stiles reacted on instinct; he spun and drove his fist straight into Jackson's face. The crack of knuckles meeting bone echoed through the cafeteria, and Jackson stumbled back before collapsing onto the floor.
Allison and Lydia gasped in unison. Allison dropped to her knees beside Jackson immediately, checking his face, calling his name, while Lydia hovered close, pale and wide-eyed.
Scarlett didn't look at them. She stepped toward Stiles instead, drawn to the way his chest rose and fell too quickly.
"Stiles," she said softly, still half in disbelief at what she had just seen.
He inhaled shakily, jaw tight, adrenaline vibrating through him. She tilted her head up to look at him. "I thought we weren't supposed to fight right now."
He held her gaze for a second before exhaling through his nose. "I'm not fighting," he muttered, already reaching into his pocket and pulling out his phone.
Scarlett could see the conflict written across his face, the hesitation he was trying to bury. She reached out carefully, her fingers brushing his hand, a gentle, grounding touch.
"You don't have to do it," she said quietly. "If you don't want to."
For a fleeting moment, his eyes softened when they met hers, something warm flickering there despite everything around them. But then he shook his head and began dialing.
"Dad, hey, it's me," he said, lifting the phone to his ear. A pause. His expression shifted. "And… it's your voicemail."
Scarlett didn't catch any what he said after that because the pain hit her with a violence that erased sound entirely; it wasn't gradual, it wasn't a warning, it was a detonation low in her abdomen that stole the air from her lungs and folded her inward before she could stop herself. Her vision blurred at the edges, the cafeteria tilting for a split second as if the floor had shifted beneath her boots, and whatever Stiles was saying dissolved into distant noise behind the roar of blood in her ears.
She barely registered the way her hand flew to her stomach this time, instinct stronger than pride, fingers pressing uselessly against the wound hidden under her jacket as if she could physically hold herself together. The burn felt deeper now, spreading in vicious pulses that radiated up her spine and down her thighs, each wave sharper than the last, and she tasted iron at the back of her throat from biting down too hard.
"Scarlett?" Scott's voice cut through the haze, closer than it had been a second ago.
She hadn't noticed him moving.
He stepped toward her, worry overtaking the panic in his expression, and reached out without thinking. "Scarlett, what's—"
His hand brushed her side.
It was the lightest contact. Barely a touch.
But it landed directly over the wound.
The scream tore out of her before she could contain it, raw and animal and echoing violently off the cafeteria walls as her body arched away from him on instinct. Her knees buckled and she caught herself against the edge of the table, breath coming in fractured gasps, fangs snapping down fully this time without restraint.
Scott recoiled immediately. "I didn't— I'm sorry, I didn't—"
The scent of him flooded her senses all at once, amplified by proximity and fear and the sharp spike of his own alarm. Werewolf blood. Human blood. Five pounding hearts in a closed room. It crashed into her in a suffocating wave, and for one horrifying second the pain and the hunger fused together into something indistinguishable.
"Scarlett?!" Stiles voice came before he appeared in front of her.
She forced herself upright with trembling arms, every muscle shaking from the effort, jaw clenched so tightly it hurt. "Don't," she rasped, not even sure who she was warning anymore. "Don't touch me."
Stiles was at her side before she could sway again, one hand firm but careful at her waist, the other bracing her arm as he helped her straighten slowly, as if she were made of something fragile and breakable. He shifted his body slightly, almost instinctively stepping in front of her just enough to block the others' view, giving her a pocket of shadow and cover while she forced herself to breathe through the agony. His shoulder shielded her face from the room, and in that small, stolen second she clenched her jaw and willed the fangs back up, swallowing the metallic taste in her mouth until her teeth felt almost human again.
"Scarlett?" Lydia's voice cut through the tension, high and strained. "What's happening?"
Jackson, still rubbing his jaw as he got back to his feet, stared openly. "What's wrong with her?"
"Nothing," Scarlett said immediately, even though her voice came thinner than she intended. She kept her eyes down for a second longer before lifting them, forcing steadiness into her expression. "It's nothing."
The lie barely had time to settle in the air before the cafeteria doors exploded with a violent bang that made everyone jump.
The barricaded doors shuddered in their frames, metal groaning under force that no human could produce. Chairs scraped harshly across the floor as everyone instinctively stumbled back. Another blow hit, heavier this time, and the hinges shrieked in protest.
"Oh my God, oh my God," Lydia whispered, her hands flying to her mouth as the wood around the frame began to splinter.
Scarlett felt the vibration of it through the soles of her boots, through the table still pressed against her hip, through her bones. Every nerve in her body was already screaming from the wound, and now adrenaline layered over it, sharp and electric. She could smell him even before she heard the low, feral growl bleeding through the cracks.
They all instinctively clustered closer together, fear pulling them into a tight formation in the middle of the cafeteria. Scarlett was still half in Stiles' arms, her body not fully steady on its own, and she hated that weakness more than the pain itself.
"You have to go," she said quietly so that only Stiles could hear, eyes locked on the doors as another impact cracked the frame further. "I'll try to keep him busy."
She didn't know if she could. She didn't know if she could even stand long enough. But she knew she couldn't run like this, and the last thing she would do was slow Stiles down.
Stiles' grip on her tightened immediately. "I'm not leaving you here."
Another crash. The top hinge split, wood splintering outward. The metal bar they had shoved across the handles bent visibly.
Gasps rippled through the room.
"The kitchen," Stiles said suddenly, brain clicking into place even through the fear. "The door out of the kitchen leads to the stairwell."
"Which only goes up," Scott pointed out, panic edging his voice.
"Up is better than here!" Stiles snapped.
The barricade gave another violent shudder, one of the doors splitting straight down the middle with a cracking snap that made everyone gasp.
"Move!" Scott shouted.
They ran.
The group bolted toward the kitchen doors just as another thunderous crash echoed behind them, the sound of wood and metal tearing apart chasing them across the cafeteria floor. Scarlett forced her legs to move, pain lancing through her abdomen with every step, Stiles refusing to let go of her as they sprinted.
Behind them, the barricade finally began to give way.
And they didn't look back.