Chapter 6 #2
The next morning, I stop at another drugstore and buy a burner phone and activate it, then stomp my old one and toss it in the dumpster behind the store.
I haven’t turned it on since leaving Georgia, and I’m damned sure not turning on my other two phones.
I can’t risk being tracked if they manage to find the hotel I stayed at and then triangulate cell phone data.
Yeah, it’d take them a while, but the risk isn’t worth it.
I should’ve tossed the other two phones, but they don’t take up much room and I might have use for them at some point.
Two miles down the road is a public library.
I stop in there and use their wi-fi with the new phone and search for news stories about me.
Nothing.
Yay?
Either my absence hasn’t been noted—difficult to believe—or Dad hasn’t reported it yet.
I don’t log into my regular e-mail account.
Or any of my social media accounts, for that matter.
Not even to go in and delete them. I logged out of all of them on both phones and deleted the apps from the phones before shutting them down the other day.
I want there to be no record of me checking those accounts.
I won’t risk it. Not even using a VPN. I want it to look like I literally dropped off the face of the planet.
My father has money and resources and a deep well of anger—all with an even more tenacious thirst for revenge when he feels wronged.
The best I can hope for is that he disowns me, and as long as I never cross his path again he’ll forget he even has a fourth son.
Except I’m not that idealistic. I am Randolph Sterling’s smartest son, after all.
It’s more realistic to assume that with his campaign kicking off he has bigger fish to fry than my ass. If they dig into my actions it’ll soon be evident I willfully disappeared and wasn’t a victim of foul play. Once he wins the election, he might devote time and resources to tracking me down.
If he were to lose the election…
Well, I’ll hopefully have an even deeper hole to hide out in by then. Because his rage over losing will need an outlet, meaning I’m the perfect target. Hell, he’ll probably figure out a way to blame me for the loss despite my disappearance.
The road takes me through several densely wooded wildlife management areas, with excellent camping opportunities. So I opt to stop for a couple of days and rest. There’s spotty cell coverage at best, there aren’t many other campers right now, and I still haven’t scented any shifters.
I pick up a couple of paper maps and spend evening hours studying them. I’ll make my way through Brooksville and stop at their public library to use their computers and check news reports.
I hike during the day and spend a couple of hours each night shifted and running before jerking off, taking a shower, then collapsing into deep sleep. While biking has been great to help me expend energy that my brothers usually only burn in a gym, I love shifting and running.
That was something else I always knew irritated Dad.
That the skinny, shortest, and omega son could outrun and outlast not only his Alpha sons but him as well.
I got to where if I had to attend a family run, I’d deliberately sandbag and let them win because there’d be hell to pay if I didn’t.
Easier to ignore my brothers’ taunts after than to have them roll me while shifted and forcing me to submit, or punch or trip me when we weren’t.
Wisely picking and choosing my battles is something else I excel at over my brothers.
Which is also why they’re all married and basically miserable bastards, and I’m on the run for my life.
But I’m free.
Right?
In a perfect world I’d meet and marry a handsome, rich Alpha who’d kick Dad’s ass, send my brothers packing with their tails between their legs, and let me bring Mom home to finally give her a calm and peaceful life.
Maybe even have pups, I don’t know. I’m not an expert.
Once my father realized I was an omega, he told me in no uncertain terms the topic was off-limits, and I was not to talk to anyone about it.
I do know that, in the past, male omegas who caught literally hid out while a female, usually human, was bribed, paid, or otherwise compelled to pretend she was pregnant.
Then, voila, baby arrived, the woman scampered off to wherever she came from, and the Alpha and his mate raised the baby using whatever excuses were viable.
Sometimes the female, if she was a shifter or a human who knew the score, lived with them and pretended to be the wife of one or the other of the men. I’m not judgy.
Then again, that’s how it works for wolves and other canine shifters. Not sure if that applies to other species.
Dad’s whole “purity” bullshit. Hell, he rarely tolerated human mates, unless they were non-shifters from shifter families. And even then usually wealthy families. If they were from a tornado-ravaged trailer park, forget it.
I awaken the fourth morning before dawn and listen to the quiet around me. It’s peaceful, but I can’t stay here forever.
On the other hand, at least I know it’s a great hiding place. Part of my explorations involved checking out roads running through the area, other campsites, trails, local stores, and restaurants scattered around the extremely rural area.
If I am careful, and if I hunt at night while shifted, I could easily hide out here for several months without spending any money.
There are houses around here where the residents leave their doors unlocked.
I’m small enough shifted I look more like a ridiculously large German shepherd than a wolf, and I could pinch food here and there that likely wouldn’t be missed.
If I’m desperate, I could pretend to be a dog, show up limping, get myself “adopted” by the family, and suck down dog food. That’s a backup plan.
Finally, I pack and head west, making it to Brooksville later that afternoon.
In the library I go straight to the computers, search for news…
And find nothing. Only information about Dad running for office.
Nothing about me.
Sitting back, I stare at the monitor and refuse to let hope take root inside me.
I got careless once already and this is where it got me. I won’t make that mistake twice.
While I’m there I search for information about Bushville City. I find ads for local businesses, classified ads for things like used furniture and baby chicks, and not much else.
I’m ready to leave when I scent something that stops me in my tracks—
In the faint air currents stirred by the building’s AC, I smell…something.
Stepping backward between two rows of shelves I close my eyes and inhale.
Yep. Definitely a shifter, but not a species I’ve smelled before. Not a canine or feline.
And warmly fresh, not even minutes old, meaning they’re in the building.
A plan forms in my mind to track them down until another thought hits me: If I can scent them they can probably scent me, too.
And I might not want them to scent me.
That’s enough to get me moving. I hurry outside, grab my bike, and I’m about to jump on it when I smell the scent again. I follow it through the parking lot and realize it’s coming from an older pickup truck, looks like a work truck, with Bushville City Dairy & Creamery painted on the doors.
With an address, phone number, and website.
I snap a picture with the newest burner phone and then beat feet, cutting across several streets and over five blocks, zipping through a small city park, down through a wet swale, and along a busy road before disappearing into a wooded property with a for sale sign tacked on a pine tree.
Only once I’m far enough off the road does my pulse start to slow. I pull out the burner phone and look up the place.
It’s about a mile past the intersection where I’d hoped to start my search…
Except now the gaping hole in my plan makes itself known.
Okay, so Dad hasn’t made it public knowledge that I’m gone. No impassioned pleas to the press to help locate his “beloved son.”
Did you hear me gag? Because I definitely implied that.
I’ve milked cows before, manually and with milking machines.
A place like that might could use an extra hand who isn’t afraid of hard work.
My worry is that an enterprising person with a need to pad their bank account might happily sell me out to Dad if he offers a bounty.
The problem swirls through my mind while I kick back with a bottle of water and a sandwich to ponder it.
By the time I finish, I decide on a version of a story with some honesty—I’m gay, my dad threw a shit-fit, and I refuse to be forced into a marriage I don’t want to a woman I barely even know. And I have a genuine fear for my safety.
If they press me too hard for details, like my legal name, in a way that I feel uncomfortable with, then I skedaddle.
If they’re sympathetic to my plight, maybe it buys me a few weeks to catch my breath.
Another problem soon hits me—Florida weather. I just make it to the Bushville City intersection and duck into a farm and feed store when the bottom drops out of the sky. I’m standing inside the door staring at rain so heavy I can’t even see across the parking lot.
“Help you, wayward one?” a voice asks from too close behind me, making me shriek and jump as I turn.
Oh, he’s a shifter, all right. Old one, some sort of canine, but not a wolf.
He stares up at me, squinting. I’m 5’-10”, and he’s a good three or four inches shorter than me, and at least fifty pounds heavier than my lithe 180. Shifters age more slowly than humans, and he looks to be in his seventies, so he’s got to be older than that.
I swallow hard and fight the urge to bolt, but he’s not approaching any closer than the four feet separating us. There weren’t any vehicles in the parking lot, so I don’t know how many other people might be in here with us, maybe employees parked out back.
“I… I…” I swallow hard, my throat dry. Words fail me.