“Why do you assume I’ve done something to her?” I demanded, closing the space between us so I was right up in his face. Caleb didn’t blink.
“Because you’re an idiot.”
“Well, you can shove off, because all I did was tell her I loved her, and she bolted.”
“Of course she bolted. Didn’t you hear all that stuff she was saying to me before about grief and being scared to love again?”
“She was talking about me.”
Caleb slapped his forehead. “You’re an even bigger idiot than I realized. She was talking about herself. And you’re sitting here being angry with her for it.”
“Wouldn’t you?”
Caleb shook his head. “I’d be chasing after her, getting her to talk me what hurt her so bad that she’s terrified of loving me back.”
Shit. The fight went out of me, the tension in my body turning to shame. Caleb was right. Here I was, acting like a selfish idiot because I’d been vulnerable, and she’d shied away. I should have seen that she did that because of what happened to her last boyfriend. I should have found a way to reassure her, but instead I’d thrown a tantrum and run away. Some mate I was.
I sank against the tree, my head in my hands. “Fuck.”
“Don’t worry. You can fix it. Just find her, and apologise. Women like that, I’m told.”
“How do you know so much about this stuff?”
Caleb grinned. “Hey, just because I don’t have a mate, doesn’t mean I don’t know a thing or two about women, or about grief.”
I glanced at him then, noticing a flicker of something pass over his face. It was the first time since meeting him where Caleb looked anything other than in perfect control. He appeared vulnerable, human. In an instant, it was gone, and Caleb’s usual smug expression was back once again.
I got to my feet, dusting off my jeans. “I’ve got something to do.”
He nodded. “Good luck. And if she still hates your guts after you’re done, put in a good word for me. That girl is fine.”
I didn’t even bother to answer him. I dived into the trees, heading back towards my truck as fast as my human legs would carry me. Anna, I’m sorry. I’m coming for you.
23
Anna
I love you.
My hands gripped the Mini’s steering wheel so hard my knuckles turned white. The words pounded over and over in my head, the echo of memories mingling with Luke’s husky voice. Ben shyly saying those words for the first time over dinner at the Tir Na Nog pub, his nervous face watching me from over his shepherd’s pie. My dad whispering them in my ear as he tucked me into bed at night. My own lips trembling as I fought back tears to get the words out at their funerals.
The frigid night had left a layer of ice on the windscreen of the mini. I’d tried to wipe it away with my mittened hand, but it was holding fast. I didn’t want to go back to camp for water to thaw it and risk running into Luke, so I wound down my window, and navigated my way slowly along the track leaning out over the car door like the main character in a bad spy film.
Luke loved me. He loved me. My chest ached with the weight of that revelation. After everything he’d been through, that must have been such an incredible thing for him to say.
But I couldn’t say it back. Not yet. Those words…they still retained echoes of Ben, of his essence. He’d said them, and then he’d left me, just like Dad left me. The grief had only just begun to recede into a dull, empty ache. I wasn’t ready to open myself up to that kind of love anymore.
Luke loves me.
The tears poured down my face, the cold wind turning them to ice on my face. I kept my eyes glued to the road in front of me. I longed so badly to love him back, to fall into his arms and feel completely safe, but it just wasn’t possible. I knew I shouldn’t have run away. I should’ve tried to explain exactly how I did feel, but the words caught in my throat like a bone lodged in my oesophagus. Now it was too late. I’d rejected him. Guys like Luke didn’t stick around to get rejected twice.
I needed to get out of the forest. Away from the trees and the earthy scent that reminded me of both of them. Of Ben and Luke. Of my past and what might’ve been my future. I needed to clear my head and think.
I needed coffee. And a pie. And a friendly ear to bend about my current predicament. I’ll go to town. Derek will probably still be home. He’ll know what to do.
I kept checking behind me, but Luke hadn’t followed me. Good. But it didn’t feel good inside. I wished his wolf would come sprinting into view, pink tongue extended, powerful legs churning at the earth as he raced after me, ready to claim me back at any cost. I wished I could bear to hear those words from his lips again. I wished like hell I was brave enough to say them back, for I suspected I would mean them.
No. I couldn’t think about it. I wasn’t ready. I wasn’t strong enough. I have to get away…get away…
By the time I exited the forest, the heat of the engine had thawed enough of the ice that I could see the road ahead. I wound up the window and texted Derek to see if I could come over. He responded that he wasn’t home right then, but he would be in about an hour, and he’d be happy to see me.
The Bewitching Bites bakery on the high street was open. They were empty at this time of the morning, so the stunning Asian woman behind the counter made me a cup of tea for free and talked me through their extensive cake selection. She looked vaguely familiar, and I gave a start as I realised she was the same woman who’d been sitting on the back of the motorcycle I’d passed earlier in the week. I sat on a rickety table by the window and devoured the best Cornish pasty I’d ever eaten, thinking about Luke and trying to stop myself from throwing it all back up again.
You ruined everything.
My phone beeped. Derek was home. Good. I needed to talk to someone, to work this thing through in my head and figure out if I could fix it somehow. The woman boxed up half of a Heaven and Hell cake for me, and I drove over to his house. When Derek opened the door and saw my expression, his face immediately crumpled.
“Anna, what’s wrong?” Derek flung open the door and I slunk inside.
“I’m such an idiot. But I brought sugar,” I said, slumping down on his sofa. Derek took the cake box from my hands and fetched two plates, forks, and a knife from the kitchen.
“Here.” Derek passed me a small slice of cake. I pushed it away and grabbed the box, digging my fork into the layers of gooey whisky ganache. I shoved another slice in my mouth, and felt a tiny bit better. I was here with Derek. I had cake. I could sort this out, somehow.
“OK, I can see this is an emergency.” Derek nodded at the box as he picked up his own slice. “It’s about a guy, isn’t it?”
“It sure is.” I sniffed, shoving another forkful of cake into my mouth in a vain attempt to prevent a sob from escaping. “I met him on the dig and I…and he…”
“I figured,” Derek said darkly. “You’ve been pretty distracted the last few days. You’re only like that when you’re in love.”
I choked on my mouthful. My stomach heaved. I cupped my hands over my mouth as I coughed violently. “Don’t say that.” I whispered as I recovered. “Luke just told me…that he loved me.”
“That’s big. Especially after only a few days.”
“Yeah.” There was a pause while I scoffed more cake.
Derek asked in a strange, hard voice. “And do you love him?”
“I…don’t know. I think so. Yes. But it doesn’t matter. I got scared. I ran away. You should have seen his face, Derek. He was heartbroken. He won’t be back for me.”
“If he’s going to bail on you when you’re this emotionally battered, then he’s a complete bastard.” Derek declared. He moved closer to me and placed his arm around my shoulders. I sank back against him, enjoying the comfort of his shoulder while tears streamed down my cheeks.
“He just lost someone, too.” I sniffed. “I think we’re both a little too vulnerable for this intense emotional shit.”
“I
say forget about him,” Derek said. “You don’t need a guy like that dragging you down. You have other options.”
“Oh yeah? Like what? Every guy I love dies. I think I am cursed.”
“What about me?”
“You?’ I turned up to Derek, smiling. He was joking, right? We’d already talked about this. But his face looked deadly serious.
“Yeah, sure. Me. Why not?” Derek stroked my shoulder with his hand. “We’re perfect for each other. We’re both academics. We like the same books and movies. We’re always here for each other. We’re already close. It wouldn’t be much to take the next step.”
“Derek…” I shook my head, my stomach churning. Why did he have to say this now? “We’ve already been through this. I don’t see you like that. I’m sorry. We’re friends. Good friends, and I love that. But friends is all we’re ever going to be.”
His face turned hard. His grip on my shoulder tightened. “That’s a mistake, Anna, and you know it. We’re meant to be together, I can feel it. It won’t be long until you realise I’d make a fine mate.”
Mate? There was that word again. But why was Derek saying it? Only shifters talked about their partners as mates. But Derek wasn’t…
Was he?
“Come on, Anna. Don’t tell me you hadn’t figured it out.” Derek stared at me, grinning.
In a flash, the pieces slotted together. Derek going away all the time to work on his project, where he couldn’t be reached. He’d been gone at the same time as Luke – over the full moon. Derek had been the one who’d given me that book. No one had broken into my house – it was Derek all along.
I remembered Clara talking about her regulars coming in for their monthly pills. Derek must’ve been one of her regulars, which was why she couldn’t tell us if there were other new wolves in the area, which had led Luke to suspect Caleb. When all along…
Derek was the black wolf: the powerful shifter who’d destroyed the site and killed Misty Sharpe. I tried to scramble away, but he grabbed my other shoulder, pinning me tight against the sofa.
“But...” I spluttered. “But you’re a Peyton. I saw it on your family tree. Your family hated werewolves.”
“Correction, my family hated the Lowe. The Peytons are an ancient wolf pack, one of the first to settle in England. They wanted to be the only wolves in Crookshollow. This village is built upon two ley lines, a crossroads – it’s a vitally important centre of supernatural species coming and going across England. My family wanted to control that, in the same way my grandfather controlled the church. The Lowe stood in their way.”
“So why not just kill them? Why hurt the baby and make the villagers do it?”
“Because they were beloved.” Derek growled. “And that could never work. You can’t exercise control with kindness. We needed to remake the wolf. It’s not enough just to kill a person, Anna. You have to kill the myth of them, too. When that baby was found torn to pieces, werewolves were once again creatures to be feared. And that was exactly what my great-grandfather wanted.”
“That’s awful.” I sobbed.
“That’s the circle of life. The strong kill those who stand in their way. And now,” he added, his mouth twisting into an ugly grin. “You and your wolf are standing in my way.”
“But why?” I cried out, desperately trying to keep Derek talking. If he was talking, he wasn’t tearing me to pieces.
“Because your boyfriend and the other Lowe wolf were going to use them to establish their pack in this area. I couldn’t have that. Crookshollow is mine. I needed to show them what my grandfather had established a century ago – the Peytons are the dominant force in Crookshollow. And we are to be feared.”
“Why did you kill the reporter?”
“That woman,” he growled. “She was writing ridiculous, libellous things about my family, and my future mate. She called my great-grandfather mad. I couldn’t allow those words to stand unopposed. If other wolves read that story, they would believe the Peytons were weak. But I am not weak. I will not have my family name dragged through the mud in some cheap tabloid.”
“Is that what you’re doing?” I sobbed, trying to wrench my arm out from his grip. “Is this all to prove you’re some kind of macho super wolf?”
“I told you. It’s all to kill the myth of the Lowe, so that the Peyton myth can live on. I’ve destroyed the paintings, now I just need to make sure that no one who knows their true origin still lives. Then I alone will have control over the story of the caves.”
“But you haven’t,” I exclaimed. “The photographs have been in all the papers. The BBC did a detailed story about the find. Experts from around the world are going to be studying those images. They will figure out they’re fakes.”
“No they won’t, because they all want to believe in their own myths about the past. That’s what always gets me about you archaeologists.” Derek scoffed. “You think you’re so scientific, so impartial. But really, you need the meaning just as much as the rest of the world…the stories, the narrative, the mythos. You need to believe the paintings are a message from the distant past, and so that is exactly how they will be portrayed. No, I’m not worried about the paintings now. There are only three people who know the truth: the two Lowe wolves…,” he grinned, “…and you.”
Derek moved his hand to grip my chin, shifting his weight on my other wrist. I took the opening, and rolled to the side, launching all my bodyweight towards the coffee table. Derek cried out as I bent my arm back, my wrist snapping from his grasp. I slammed against the floor.
I grabbed the coffee table, trying to pull myself to my feet. Derek wrapped his powerful arms around my legs, dragging me back towards him. I grabbed my tea mug from the table and flung it into his face. He howled as the boiling liquid stung his skin, and he let go of me to rub his eyes. I scrambled away and backed towards the door, putting the sofa between us.
“Stay away from me, Derek.” I shuffled towards the front door. A few more feet and I’d be close enough to lunge for it. “I know martial arts.”
“No you don’t.” Derek grinned, shuffling towards me. The skin on his face was all red from where the hot tea had scalded him. Black bristles sprouted from his cheeks and forearms. I could already see his fingers deforming. He picked up a length of rope he’d left coiled over the edge of the sofa, and took another step towards me. “I’m your friend, remember? I know you took three classes at the YMCA, but then you quit when it clashed with Time Team on the telly.”
He lunged for me. I scrambled for the door. My hands closed around the knob, but Derek grabbed my hair, yanking me back. My scalp screamed. Derek shoved me face down on the floor, pinning my hands behind my back.
“Hold still.” He growled in my ear. I tried to wriggle away. Derek trapped my legs beneath his. My head throbbed, my chest tight with panic. Derek wrapped the rope around my hands, trapping them behind my back. Then he let me fall. I slammed down hard on my knees, then tried to wriggle across the floor like a snail, but Derek place a boot on my shoulder, stomping on me and keeping me in place. He held up a roll of tape. “I’m sorry about this,” he said. “But I think you’ll appreciate this. It’s a bit like being an Egyptian mummy.”
He rolled the tape around my body, taping my legs together, pinning my hands at my sides, and my legs together. Panic rose in my chest, pounding against the inside of my skull. This is bad, this is seriously bad.
Derek picked me up like I was a stack of towels and carried me out to my car. He stuffed me into the back seat, pulled the keys from my pocket, and climbed in the front.
“Sorry I haven’t put your seatbelt on,” he said. “I know you have a thing about that. But I figure you’re going to die soon, anyway, so it probably doesn’t matter.”
It took Derek three tries to start the engine. I hoped in vain that he wouldn’t get the hang of it, but after a lot of swearing it finally turned over. As my poor Mini bumped along the road, I slid around the seats, eventually ending up on the floor with my legs
bent awkwardly in the air. I could see trees flashing by through the window. We were heading back into the forest.
Luke, I thought, my mind reeling. I know you can’t hear me, but if you could. I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.
24
Luke
“Her car’s gone,” Caleb said, gesturing to the empty spot where her Mini had been parked.
“Yeah. She sped away pretty quick after my little revelation.”
“Any idea where she might have gone?”
I racked my brain. Would Anna have gone deeper into the forest?
No. I remembered what she’d said about her previous boyfriend, how he’d had an accident and died in the forest. If she was upset, she wouldn’t stay here, among the trees and memories. She’d head back to town, find someone to talk to, perhaps that guy she visited the other day.
“She’s in Crookshollow.” I said. “She had a friend there, Derek. I bet she’s gone to see him.”
“Let’s go,” Caleb pulled open the door of my truck and climbed in. “Keys?”
“Why are you driving?”
“Because you’re too upset to think straight. And you’re a shit driver.”
“I can just feel that cousinly love,” I growled, but there wasn’t time to argue. I climbed in the passenger seat and tossed him the keys.
Caleb gunned the engine and we tore down the road. Behind us, Ruth came running towards us, the police inspector from the other day hot on her heels. Ruth waved her arms frantically, yelling something I couldn’t hear. As we sped past, the car wheel flicked a wad of mud right into her face. I would’ve burst out laughing if I wasn’t so afraid.
We turned the corner, past the rotting oak where I’d first shown Anna what I truly was. We bounced along the road, every second feeling like a lifetime. Trees sped past in a blur. Rain pelted the windshield.
“Who’s that?” Caleb jabbed his finger at the road ahead. We were coming up to a T-junction – the left fork leading into town, the right deeper into the forest. In front of us, a car sped across the T-junction, hurtling down the forest track. My stomach lurched. It was Anna’s Mini. But a black-haired guy was driving it. I couldn’t see anyone else in the car.
Digging the Wolf: a paranormal romance (Werewolves of Crookshollow Book 1) Page 20