EIGHT LETTERS || Liam Dunbar [2]

SEVEN

"Hold on a second, I don't understand something," Katherine frowned, pushing her glasses up on the bridge of her nose. "Who's the Theo that isn't actually Theo?"

"The one you saw at the overpass," Stiles told her, his voice full of exasperation as he paced back and forth over the same strip of her bedroom floor he'd been walking on for the last five minutes. "He helped saved Scott."

"But he's not the real Theo," Katherine clarified, tilting her head to the side.

"No, he's not," Stiles grumbled, flailing his arms around slightly. "Why doesn't anyone get that?"

"I get it," Katherine shrugged. She closed the laptop and laid it onto her bedside table, then stumbled off her bed. "I'm just trying to make sure I've got everything right."

"Yeah, well, hurry up and change or something," Stiles muttered, running a hand through his hair. "Liam's waiting downstairs and we need to go."

She immediately blushed. "I'll be down in a second," she promised. Katherine immediately regretted showering. Whenever Stiles wants to investigate something, they almost always end in the woods. And whenever they go into the woods, someone tries to kill them. So she'd have to shower when she got home anyways.

Ugh.

"Uh huh," Stiles grumbled, then wandered out of her room.

Katherine wandered over to her dresser and pulled out the first things she saw, then grabbed a sweater from her closet. After almost five full minutes of changing — skinny jeans are a bitch to get on — she threw her damp hair up into a messy bun, then wandered down the stairs.

"So where are we going?" Katherine hummed as she slid on her old pair of purple Vans.

"Well we've been following him since the beginning of last block," Stiles began and Katherine immediately raised her brows.

"Is that why Liam ditched me?" She asked rhetorically. She already knew the answer.

Liam smiled sheepishly, "yeah."

"Alright," Katherine rolled her eyes. She straightened herself up, then stretched her arms out. "Let's go."

•••

"Why are we hiding in a bush, Stiles," Katherine grumbled tiredly, staring at the empty forest ahead of her. "You know, I was trying to actually get some sleep tonight. I already sat in the jeep for three hours doing nothing, and this feels like that all over again, just colder."

"Shut up and pay attention," Stiles rolled his eyes, giving her a light nudge.

Katherine grumbled quietly, then reached over and flicked his ear.

Liam let out a faint laugh, causing her to smile.

Just as Stiles opened his mouth to yell at her, a silver car pulled off on the side of the road just ahead of them. Katherine turned to look at him with a cheeky smile. "Shut up and pay attention," she mocked quietly.

Stiles grumbled at her quietly under his breath, but the three immediately went silent when they watched Theo walk around his car, open the trunk, take out something wrapped in brown paper, and walk into the woods. "See, I told you he was up to something."

"We just spent three hours watching this dude play video games in his bedroom," Liam scoffed, squinting at Stiles. "He'd better be out here covering up a mass murder.

"Let's find out," Stiles shrugged.

The two followed him out from behind the bushes, Katherine stumbling over every stick and rock she could possibly find. Each time she studded her toe Liam would stop her from falling over, she'd let out a long string of cuss words, and Stiles would elbow her in the ribs. In turn, she'd smack his arm, then a couple minutes later they'd do it all over again.