┏━━━━⋆°.☾⋆.ೃ࿔*:⋆━━━━┓

SUCH A SNITCH

THE WEEKEND CAME QUICKLY, AND GIVEN THAT HANNAH WAS WORKING OVERTIME AT THE STATION, EMERSON HAD THE HOUSE TO HERSELF.

She normally had a tendency to watch a bunch of old movies while her guardian was out, and so that was exactly what she had been doing until her night was thoroughly interrupted.

The girl was in the kitchen, her nose all but pressed against the microwave to watch the popcorn bag spin around, when a different kind of noise filtered into her ear.

It was a creaky sort of sound, wood pushing against wood, following by a lull of whooshing wind. It was a sound she knew— it was the sound of her bedroom window opening.

Emerson's thumb clicked the off button on the microwave, her breathing stilling completely. Her eyes flickered toward the ceiling when she heard feet that were trying to be quiet, but were failing based on the way something was knocked over.

She knew being in Beacon Hills for this long was too good to be true; the bad man would always find her, and perhaps he know had once more.

Fear seized her entire body, but her instincts, the ones she honed throughout the years of evading capture, drove her toward the front door. Her quick pace, or jackrabbiting heart rate, must've alerted the intruder because their clamouring feet began to hasten, too.

Emerson wasn't even two feet away from the front door when she collided into something hard, the force causing her to almost lose her footing on the concrete step. Hands steadied her, grabbing at her biceps.

When she looked up, she couldn't stop herself from inhaling sharply. The man stood there, clad in a leather jacket that only added to his broody demeanour, and he looked just like his mugshot photos, honestly.

Though, he was looking her like he already knew who she was, and the realization that Isaac must have snitched quickly dawned on her. It forced her to play along.

"Derek."

His response was almost as immediate as the way his hands retracted from her. "Emerson."

Footsteps emerged from behind her, and once she craned her head to see just who the hell had been inside her house, she was less than pleased at the sight. The dirty blond had a sheepish look on his face, partly due to Emerson's erratically beating heart. "Did I scare you too bad?"

A low growl reverberated from her chest. "Oh, I oughta kill you, Lahey!" she yelled, trying to take a lunge at the kid before the hands that were once steadying her grabbed her arm once more. "Snitches get stitches! It's the oldest saying in the book!"

Isaac looked pained for a split second, perhaps a trick of the pot light shining down on the three, before he was simply frowning. "I couldn't help it!" he tried, gesturing to the man behind Emerson. "I can't exactly say no to him!"

Emerson's lip curled back, spinning to face Derek. "You're the most reckless asshole I've ever met, genuinely," she barked out, her eyes rolling, "and for you to send him to break into my home is f—"

"We need to talk."

The blonde girl blinked at his interruption, quick to shake her head. "No the fuck we do not," she breathed out, her heartbeat attempting to return to its normal steadiness, "not after this little stunt. Hell no."

He then rounded his car, the one that was parked in the driveway where Hannah's usually was, and pulled the passenger side door open. He levelled a stony glare in her direction— the kind that made you think twice about disagreeing with someone.

"Get in the damn car."

.ೃ࿔*:⋆

If Emerson didn't know any better, she might've thought she was being walked to her demise the minute Derek parked his car under an ominous overpass. When he led her toward the entrance of an abandoned subway station, it wasn't really helping his I just want to talk case.

The blonde had to play her cards right, here, because it was already a two versus one situation, and she sure as hell didn't have power from a pack member to back her up. If you took Isaac out of the equation, Emerson was confident that she could step up to the Hale man, but this wasn't the case.

Especially not when they entered the abandoned subway station, and her eyes locked onto two approaching figures.

One was a blonde girl with an easy smirk on her face, and the other was a face she recognized immediately from the days she spent passing him at her and Elizabeth's table.

"Boyd?" she asked, her voice raised in both bewilderment and annoyance. "You've recruited Boyd now, too?!"

"Erica's here, too," Isaac contributed, gesturing to the nameless girl standing beside Vernon Boyd.

Emerson rolled her eyes, waving off the introduction he was clearly trying to make, before her agitation was aimed back at Derek. "The Argents are using this town as a fucking shooting range, and you thought that now was the perfect time to create a pack?!" she fumed. "Are you really that dense, Hale?"

In a matter of seconds, Derek was shoving her into a rickety old seat, looming above her. "You're an Alpha," he stated, and Emerson's momentarily shot an unimpressed glare at Isaac, "one with no pack."

"Thanks for the reminder," he muttered bitterly, slumping back in the seat. "Any other groundbreaking observations to share with the class?"

Derek's face was set harshly, and somehow the movement of him crossing his arms made him look larger. Though, Emerson wasn't going to be intimidated by the lousy leader before her— not when she had only ever been scared of a singular person before.

"You have no scent, and you know a little too much for someone that no one knows anything about," he rattled off, like it was obvious. "I'd like to know why."

"What is this, an interrogation?" she sneered, and for a split second, she felt the backs of her eyes heat up before vanishing. "I don't need to tell you anything, and you can't make me."

The man's arms uncrossed, a crimson glow emitting from his own eyes to match hers, before they raked over her face. He was searching for something, and internally it made her want to squirm.

"You're hiding from something."

She had quick words of deflection on her tongue, always ready to be used. "It's none of your business."

Derek's head tilted to the side. "It could be," he mused, taking a step away from the girl. "I could help you... if you joined us."

The offer made her head whip backward, like she'd been slapped. She'd heard stories of packs with two Alphas before, of how they'd almost always rip one another to shreds over a war between egos. However, packs like these were stronger than others, and many took a chance just to revel in such power.

He wanted her to join his pack, only because he wanted to gain more power. Would he end up killing her for that same power, way down the line, like the bad man always did in her grandmother's stories?

The thought almost made her throat close up.

"No."

Derek looked confused for a beat, before his normally neutral face took over his features. "What do you mean no?"

"You said it yourself; no one knows anything about me," she started out by saying, rising to her feet from the old station seat, "and I'd like to keep it that way. You've already drawn too much attention to yourselves—"

Emerson wouldn't be a pawn, nor would she fall into the most obvious trap she'd ever seen. Her skin itched, she needed to get out of there. She cleared her throat.

"— so thanks, but no thanks."

⋆°.☾⋆.ೃ࿔*:⋆

[ wyn's note ]

MEET-CUTE EXCEPT THEY FIND EACH OTHER SUPER ANNOYING!!

derek has put the offer out there and emerson is wholly #notinterested ... we can't even blame her cause she's comfortably under the argents radar rn, and derek is deffo not LMAOAO

all my love x