When it all falls apart

Chapter Ten

"How do you even know that?" he finally finds his voice as they sit down around the table and Lydia gets them all some water.

"The stink of ozone was a huge give away. Also, there was something… around her? When I looked at her, you know," Jackson says, referring to his werewolf vision.

"Holy crap. Are you sure Derek doesn't already know? Maybe she's a part of the town already?"

Lydia is already shaking her head.

"She mentioned she was hired two weeks ago, she just came into town. I don't think she even noticed Jackson, really, but there was something weird with her, even I could feel it. I know Beacon Hills has been calm and all, but it's better we let the people responsible for this kind of crap know about it before it turns into something, right?"

"And Derek is responsible for stuff since when?" Stiles asks in surprise, and Lydia stares at him as if he's stupid.

"Since we cut ourselves from that crap, and they dealt with the whole thing on their own," she says firmly, "I'm not saying I want any part in it, because I didn't back then, and I don't now, but I am grateful for the fact that they kept us away from that bullshit. Plus, maybe she isn't even trouble. She could just be settling down in this calm little town in California, we don't know."

He taps his nails against the table for a moment, thinking things through.

"And why do I have to talk to Derek?"

"Uhm, because you already do?" Jackson points out dryly, shrugging when Stiles glares at him, "What? You do! Plus, it's either you or Lydia, I don't want to go to him."

At that, the other two stare at Jackson, because his tone is betraying something that he's hiding.

"Why not?" Lydia asks, and the man sighs, having lived with her long enough that he knows it won't do him any good to try and lie his way out of this.

"Because I feel… weird when he's around. Maybe it's the bite, maybe it's the fact that he's another pack, I don't know. I don't want to know. Can you please just talk to him?"

Stiles scratches his head nervously, not liking this one bit. He likes his quiet life, he likes not being in this shit.

Argh!

"Fine! I'll talk to him tomorrow, after class. He always comes to pick up Laura."

"Thanks," Jackson tells him quietly, squeezing his shoulder in gratitude.

They end up watching too much TV and eating Stiles out of house and home, before the couple leaves, and Stiles goes to bed.

The next morning, he's at school earlier than usual, and greets the parents distractedly, until Derek arrives.

"Emily, can you handle the kids for a minute? I'll be right back."

His assistant nods, helping the kids with their backpacks, and he goes to where Derek is kissing Laura's forehead.

She shoots past him with a yelled "Hi, Mr. Styls!" and he smiles brightly, heading over to her dad.

"Hey, so, uhm, I have a thing I need to talk to you about, it's nothing to do with Laura, noting bad or anything, but could you stay today after class, when you come to pick her up?"

Derek frowns in worry.

"Did anything happen?"

"Not really. Just some information Jackson thought you should know."

"Oh," the other man relaxes a little, "I won't pick her up today, she has a playdate with Michael, apparently," he sighs longsuffering and weary, and Stiles wants to laugh at his face – and also hug him, but that's weird, so he won't, "There's a note with the permission slip for his parents to take her too. Maybe you could come to the house when you're done? I'll be home all afternoon."

The house. The Hale house. The remodeled Hale house he hadn't even gone by to take a look at because he feels so weirdly about the place.

"Okay, sure. I'll be by after four, is that ok?"

Derek nods.

"Yeah," he smiles at Stiles and he smiles back.

They both just realize they are kind of standing there, smiling, when one of the kids yells, and breaks them out of their funk.

"Ok, I gotta go. See you later," he waves awkwardly and goes into the classroom.

Smooth, Stilinski, smooth.

X

The house is huge.

It's only one story high, but it spreads out – immaculate white with a big, old blue door and white windows.

It's beautiful.

Stiles isn't very sure what he was expecting, and realizes Derek couldn't possibly be raising Laura in the charred remains of his family's death tombs, but this is not what he was expecting at all – airy and bright and well taken care of.

He sighs and leaves his car, walking slowly to the front door, taking the whole place in – there's a small garden on either side of the walkway, and there's grass on both sides of the house, spreading towards the backyard, in what he assumes to be a huge space for Laura to run around. He smiles, glad that Derek has this now, and knocks.

It doesn't take long for Derek to answer the door, looking a bit worried, with his phone in his hand, as if he's expecting a call – Stiles can bet it's because Laura is at a friend's house.

"Hey. Come on in."

"Thanks."

He follows the man inside, and Derek takes them to a spacious living room, gesturing for him to take a seat, as he does the same, and then he just stares at Stiles expectantly.

"So," he starts, gathering his nerve, "Lydia and Jackson moved back last week, and Lydia decided to start couples Pilates, god only knows why, because, well, werewolves, but she did. And because she wants to do it, Jackson went along with it, because in the long run, it hurts less," he pauses to breath, and realizes Derek is staring at him with an eyebrow raised, intrigued. He should get to the point soon, before Derek thinks he made this up as an excuse to show up at his place – which wouldn't even make sense, because Derek was the one who invited him, but, anyway, "So their first class was yesterday, and it ended at eight, and they came to my place after it, both of them were really freaked out, because, apparently, the Pilates instructor is a demon."

"A demon?" Derek asks, looking more doubtful than freaked out, which, well, could either be due to the fact that he's been taking care of the crazy from Beacon Hills for over ten years now and is used to it, or to the fact that he doesn't believe Stiles and thinks he's crazy. It could be a little bit of both, too.

"That's what Jackson says. He told us it looked like she had a kind of… aura? Around her? When he looked at her, you know, with his eyes all changed, and stuff," he's well aware his answer sounded like a question, but he's out of practice with this, "He said electricity demon, to be more precise."

Derek is quiet for a long moment, before staring at Stiles, his eyes serious.

"Why did you think to tell me about it?"

"Jackson did it, actually. But I would have suggested it, anyway," he shrugs, "You're the Alpha around here. I'm not sure how that works when there are other species involved in the game, but it does count for something, right? Plus, what would we do about it? We haven't dealt with this kind of stuff since… Well, you know," he finishes lamely, but Derek only nods.

"Thank you."

"You're welcome."

There's a long, awkward pause in there, in which Derek looks at him as if he's trying to figure him out, and all he can do is sit there, fighting not to squirm. Finally, the other man sighs and gets up.

"I should go there, try to talk to her before picking Laura up."

Stiles gets up too.

"Do you want me to come with?"

Why is he offering?

He doesn't want to come with, he doesn't want to be in the middle of this madness again! Why is he offering? WHY IS HE OFFERING?

"Do you want to?"

"Yeah. I really do."

He doesn't.

At least he thinks he doesn't – but Derek doesn't look at him weirdly or anything, and he can pretty much feel his heartbeat fast and steady as always, and he's not lying.

He really, really doesn't want to get into the whole 'I'm lying to myself' thing, so he doesn't say anything else, just follows Derek out the door.

They go in their own cars, because Derek will have to pick up Laura after this, and it would be out of Stiles way to bring them both back to the preserve since he would already be in back in town. Derek follows him, and soon they get to the gym.

They get in together, and Derek smiles charmingly at the receptionist, asking for their Pilates instructor, and mentioning he's thinking of taking some private classes, maybe they could talk?

"Oh, you're in luck, she's in the break room now, her next class doesn't start for another twenty minutes."

They thank her, and follow her directions to the break room.

There's a young woman there, shouldn't be older than Stiles, with black hair and pale skin. She has Asian features and seems cute and adorable, and Stiles turns to stare at Derek and sees his eyes fading back to its usual… impossible myriad of colors, but he won't get into that now.

The man looks at him with an eyebrow raised, as if to say, 'Hell, Jackson was right', and Stiles shrugs at him.

"Hey!" the woman finally notices them and greets them both with a bright smile, "Can I help you guys?"

"We're looking for the Pilates instructor?" Derek says, and she nods.

"Oh, that's me! I'm Kira. Are you looking for classes?"

Derek takes a step further in to the room, and Stiles very carefully closes the door behind them both, to give them some privacy.

"Not exactly. I'm Derek Hale."

Before he can go any further, she smiles at him again, brightening up.

"Oh, the Alpha! I was going to look for you last week, but my apartment had an electricity problem – ironic, right? – and then I had to get that fixed, and my cat kind of decided to redo my curtains, so I had to buy new ones, and it was all a mess, but I was going to look for you! It was the other one, Jackson, right? Who told me about you? Are you in his pack too?" she fired the last question at Stiles last, and he shook his head – man, the girl could talk.

"Uhm, not really. Jackson is my friend. I'm Stiles," he says awkwardly, and she nods again, still smiling.

"Oh, yeah! The Sheriff's son, right? Jordan told me about you, but I didn't know you were, you know, into this."

"Into this?" he repeats.

"Yeah. I mean, Jordan – Jordan Parrish, you know? The Deputy? We met a while back, I was still in High School, and he helped me out a bit, so he told me Beacon Hills was a cool place to live if you were, you know, different. I do know he's the Sheriff's liaison with our kind of stuff, but he didn't mention you were in the town's Alpha's pack."

He just stares at her incredulously, taking a small step back, as if to ward off Kira's words.

Derek looks a tiny bit uncomfortable, but confused too.

"So, you came here because Parrish told you too?"

"Yeah. I'm sorry I didn't look for you sooner, it's just… This is all pretty complicated, maybe we could arrange a meeting later today? And I can make a better impression than I seem to be making right now, because Stiles looks like he's still freaking out?" she says, slowly taking a small card from her bag on the table and giving it to Derek, who stares at it for a second.

Stiles doesn't even answer, still processing the information.

"Sure. I'll call you and set it up."

"Ok! I have to go now, set up for my next class," she waves awkwardly and leaves them.

Derek takes Stiles by the arm and gently guides him out of the gym to their cars.

"You heard it too, right? She did say liaison with the Sheriff, not the Sheriff's department?"

"I did."

It does make Stiles feel a little bit better that Derek seems to be in the dark about this too.

"Do you… Are you…" he starts, but doesn't really know what to ask.

"No! I have no contact with your dad, at all, Stiles. I never did," he takes a deep breath and shakes his head, evidently pissed off, a little bit of the old Derek showing up, and it makes Stiles want to laugh, but he doesn't, because he knows it wouldn't be well received now, "Parrish moved here about five years ago. He got a job at the station, and he came to us when we had a small problem with some stray Alphas. He keeps us informed of what goes on at the department, things we could help out with, and in turn, we help him. It's been years since we had any real trouble, though – just the occasional hunter trying to stir things up, a couple of creatures who want to live somewhere safe, that's it. I only ever deal with him, though."

"But she did say…"

"She did," Derek confirms it, staring at him worriedly, "Are you ok?"

"Yeah, I'm… It's gonna be fine. I'll head over to his place, and… talk," he trails off, chuckling darkly to himself, "This god damn town, I swear," he mutters before turning back to Derek, "Hey, what is Parrish, anyway? I've seen him around town, he doesn't look, you know, wolfy."

Derek snorts, but there's a small smile on his lips before he answers it.

"He's a Hellhound."

"The keeper of dead souls thing?" he says, surprised as Derek nods.

"Yup. He catches fire too, when he's angry, and he sleepwalks in times of battle."

Stiles stares at Derek, trying to decide if he is joking or not, but he doesn't seem to be.

"Aren't Hellhounds supposed to be dogs?" he asks quietly, already heading to his car, but Derek hears him anyway.

"That's speciesist!" The comment is made with a small laugh, and Stiles can only stare as the other man gets in his own car and drives away with a small wave at him.

He decides not to go home right away, detouring to his dad's place – he and his dad are going to have a very serious talk.