The Better to Bite

by Cynthia Eden

  Apparently, I hadn’t been quiet enough.

  Dad had told me that he’d brought her home because her aunt, Rhonda Colter, was out of town with her husband and kids. They wouldn’t be flying back until tomorrow, and he hadn’t wanted to turn Cassidy over to the DHR folks. No, that wasn’t my dad’s way.

  He’d brought her to our home. He’d made her hot cocoa, the treat he always made for me when I was worried or down, and I’d sat with her as she cried.

  When she’d finally fallen asleep, I’d left Cassidy to her dreams. I guess she just hadn’t stayed with those dreams for very long.

  “My mom…” Cassidy pulled in a deep, shuddering breath. “She ran off before I was born, and I never even knew who my dad was. She—she didn’t say.”

  I forgot the water and perched on the edge of the couch. I turned on the lamp and its soft glow spilled into the room.

  “Granny Helen…” A tear trickled down her cheek. “She was the one who raised me. The one who always took care of me.” She turned her head toward me and there was no missing the desolation in her eyes. “What am I supposed to do without her?”

  I don’t know. But those weren’t the words she needed to hear so I bit back the truth. “You can stay here for as long as you need. Dad can clear out the other room upstairs, and you can stay with us.”

  More tears. “She…she didn’t die easy. Whoever attacked her, he hurt her.”

  Yes, but Cassidy didn’t need my confirmation so I stayed silent.

  Her palm pressed against her chest. “My heart hurts,” she whispered. “It hurts so bad.”

  I knew what she meant. When my mom had been buried, I’d felt like someone was ripping out my heart. The pain in my chest had lingered for days.

  Sometimes, I still felt it.

  “You don’t know what it’s like!” Anger burned in her words. “You don’t know how it feels to—”

  “My mom and dad were having problems.” The words just slipped out. But then, that was the story of my life. “My dad tried to act like everything was fine, but I knew the truth. I could see what was happening.”

  Cassidy blinked and stared at me with wide, tear-stained eyes.

  “My mom used to drink. I’d find the bottles that she hid around our place. I didn’t tell my dad, but I-I knew…”

  I’d thrown so many bottles out. So many. And seen the anger in my mom’s eyes when she realized what I’d done. But she hadn’t told Dad.

  Neither had I.

  “They separated. One night, she went out…drinking again, and she called us.” I would never forget that night. “She called and left a message on the machine.” I had gone to the movies with my friends. When I’d gotten home, my dad had just been arriving at the house. We’d gone in the house together and the red light on our answering machine had been blinking.

  “I’m so lost, baby. So lost. Can you help me?” A drunken slur of words with laughter in the background.

  But the one word, lost, had clicked in my head, and as I pictured my mother, I didn’t see her in a busy bar. I’d seen her car, the lights turned on bright, in the back of an alley.

  “She’d gotten lost,” was all I said now. “Taken a wrong turn on a dark night and wound up in the wrong place.” But her ending had been so brutal. “It looked like she’d been mugged. My mom had been shot at least four times, and her blood stained the ground under her.” So much blood. Her mother had been crawling back toward her car. She’d never made it inside again.

  “Y-you found her?”

  My dad had tried to stop me from finding her, but I’d been desperate, so filled with certainty that something was wrong. “Yeah.” The guilt was still there. Would always be. “I was too late to help her, though.”

  Cassidy’s hand reached for me. Her fingers curled around mine. “It’s not easy…what you do, is it?”

  I could only shake my head. “I just wanted to be in time for Granny Helen. Just once.”

  But death had beaten me again.

  The floor creaked behind me, and my head lifted. Dad stood in the doorway, and I wondered how much he’d heard. His face was blank, his eyes hooded. He didn’t talk about mom or that night—ever.

  My dad liked to forget the past. I knew it wasn’t possible to forget.

  I tightened my fingers around Cassidy’s. “You’re not alone,” I told her, meaning the words. “And it’s going to hurt and it’s going to suck for weeks, months.” Years. “But you’re strong, and you will get through this.”

  She hadn’t seen my dad. Her eyes were just on me. “How do you know I’m strong?” There was such doubt in her voice. “I’m not like you. I can’t do the things that you do. There’s nothing special about me, I’m just—”

  “Helen’s grand-daughter,” I said firmly. “And since she was so very special, I think you have to be, too.”

  Cassidy blinked. “Y-yeah, I am her grand-daughter.”

  “And you can be as strong as she was.” A fighter, right until the end.

  She nodded slowly.

  I rose. “Try to get some sleep, okay?”

  The covers rustled as she settled back on the couch. I took a few steps away from her.

  “Anna?”

  I stopped. My gaze met my dad’s.

  “Why do you think she was in the woods tonight? Her shop—it looked like a wreck, but how did she get way out here?”

  “My dad will find out,” I said, and he nodded. “Don’t worry, Cass,” I told her. “He’ll give her justice.”

  Even if he had to tear the town apart to do it. I knew my dad, and I knew he wouldn’t stop, not until he’d taken down the monsters.

  Chapter Thirteen

  I stayed with Cassidy until her aunt arrived to pick her up. Tall, lean, Rhonda Colter looked like a slightly softer version of her son, James. And James was there to pick up Cassidy, too. He grabbed her in a big hug and held on as tight as he could.

  “An animal?” I heard Rhonda ask my dad. “An animal killed my mother?”

  He gave a slow nod.

  Her eyes squeezed shut. “Sometimes, I hate this town.”

  I could understand her feelings.

  But when she reached for Cassidy, her face softened. “Come on, sweetie, everything will be all right.”

  Cassidy didn’t particularly look like she believed her.

  They drove away slowly, and I watched them until their car vanished.

  “I’m going into the woods today.”

  I glanced over at my dad’s quiet voice.

  “I’ll be taking Charles with me.” If he was going into the woods, he had to be talking about taking the ranger, Charles Channing—Rafe’s father. “We’re going to do some tracking,” he said simply, and I knew that he really meant they’d be doing some hunting.

  I followed him back into the house. Watched as he went into his closet and took out a rifle. And a small, black box that he’d kept hidden on the top shelf. He opened the box, and I saw the gleaming bullets.

  Silver bullets.

  “The stories about werewolves only changing under the full moon are just bull, huh?” I asked.

  He grunted. “Hollywood hype. They can turn anytime. They’re just stronger when the sun sets.”

  Nice to know.

  “And when the full moon rises,” he glanced at me with a glittering gaze, “they’re damn near unstoppable. Stronger, faster, and one hell of a lot more dangerous.”

  I swallowed.

  “If you’re hunting, it’s better to hunt them when they’re weak.”

  “Makes sense to me,” I murmured. Then, because I had to know, I said, “Is this—are the wolves the reason you left Haven?”

  He slid a silver bullet into the chamber. “I wanted a normal life for you. When I found out your mom was pregnant, we both wanted that.”

  I’d done the math before. I’d seen my parents’ marriage certificate. I knew they’d gotten married because my mom had been pregnant with me. But I also knew they’d loved each other. “So
you moved to Chicago.”

  He nodded and pushed another bullet inside his weapon. “Your grandmother was so angry with us, she stopped talking to me. Said I was abandoning my heritage.”

  I glanced around the quiet house. “Just what is our heritage?” My mom had visited Granny Helen, and she’d believed in witchcraft. Did that really make her…a witch? No, no, just because you asked questions, it didn’t mean—

  “My family…” My dad spoke softly as his fingers curled around another bullet. “We’ve always been hunters.”

  Hunters, not witches. My heartbeat began to slow a bit.

  “The wolves cross the line, every now and then.”

  And they start killing humans.

  “When they do, someone has to stop them.” He snapped the weapon back into place with a fast, fluid movement of his arm. “The stopping—that’s what my family has done for centuries.” He met my stare. “We put down the ones who are dangerous. By any means necessary.”

  A hunter. His sheriff’s badge gleamed.

  “Dad…” I wet my lips, but I had to tell him. “Rafe and Brent are wolves.”

  He didn’t look surprised. “I know about them.”

  “And you don’t think—”

  “I’ll kill only when I’m certain of my prey.”

  My teeth snapped together even as fear unfurled in my stomach.

  He secured the last bullet, then his hand lifted and curled around my chin. “I have to stop the werewolf making these attacks.”

  I knew that. I wanted him to stop the beast before anyone else died. I just didn’t want my dad dying in the process.

  “Don’t go into the woods today, Anna. Keep your mace close.”

  I’d already put it in my purse. I’d figured out that the secret ingredient in that mace was liquid silver.

  “If you get scared or if you need me, call.”

  “I will.” But I wasn’t worried for myself. I wasn’t the one going into the woods to face off against a werewolf. “Rafe’s dad…he’s like Rife, right?”

  A grim nod.

  “How can you trust him? How can—”

  “I’ve known him since I was a kid, and he’s the best tracker I’ve got.” His jaw locked. “And all wolves aren’t evil, baby. Just like all humans—”

  “Sure aren’t good,” I finished in a whisper.

  It was a lesson we both knew.

  ***

  A line of yellow police tape blocked off the entrance of Granny Helen’s shop. I slammed my car door and stared at the darkened building.

  Granny Helen had been there yesterday, bustling around in the back, warning me about the dangers coming my way.

  Had she known about the threat that stalked her?

  I’d be willing to bet my life that she had. A woman like her would have known death when it brushed close to her.

  You knew all about the wolves, didn’t you, Granny Helen? Everything about them.

  I was going into her shop. If I was right, she would have left something behind. Some info, some clue. Something.

  I started walking across the street, and then I saw someone else head toward Granny Helen’s shop. Someone with bright, blonde hair, someone who was too annoyingly familiar.

  Valerie stopped in front of the shop window, and she peered inside, pressing her nose close to the glass.

  What the…

  I knew why I was there poking around, but what was Ms. Perky-Pain-In-My-Ass Cheerleading Captain doing?

  I hurried my step. “Valerie!”

  She spun around, and I was surprised to find tear tracks on her face. “A-Anna?”

  I stopped just a foot away from her.

  “Wh-what are you doing here?” She demanded as she curled her arms around her stomach and pressed her back against the shop window.

  My head cocked to the right. “I was going to ask you the same thing.”

  The street was deserted then, almost too quiet.

  Valerie glanced to the left, then to the right. “You wouldn’t understand.”

  At this point, what wouldn’t I understand? “Try me.”

  “She was helping me.” Said in a rush with another nervous glance that fired down the street. “She said I was in trouble, and she was trying to keep me safe.”

  She had my total attention. “Keep you safe from what?”

  Her smile was just sad. “Anna, do you believe in monsters?”

  I looked past her and saw the broken remains of Granny Helen’s shop. “Yes,” I said definitely, “I do.”

  Stunned silence. Then, “Good. Because Haven is full of them.”

  And I realized I’d finally found someone else how knew the real score about this town.

  A motor growled in the distance.

  I pushed past Valerie and took out a special set of tools I’d picked up in Chicago. A girl needed some hobbies to keep her busy.

  “What are you doing?” Valerie’s voice was a shocked whisper.

  Right, the girl who knew about monsters was shocked that I could pick a lock. Figured. A few quick adjustments and the shop’s lock snicked. I glanced back at her. “I’m finding out just what Granny Helen really knew about the monsters in Haven.” Then, not waiting to see if she followed, I ducked under the yellow police tape and hurried inside the now open shop.

  My feet immediately stepped on broken glass. Good thing I’d worn my thick sneakers. The place was a total wreck. Shelves overturned. Books shredded. Statues and figurines smashed.

  I whistled. I was my dad’s daughter, and I knew what I was looking at. “A whole lot of rage,” I murmured.

  “What?” Valerie asked. The door closed behind me with a light click. There was no soft jingle of a bell. I looked back. The bell was gone. Maybe it was in the rubble some place.

  “Whoever did this…” I motioned with my hand. “Was very, very angry.”

  “We shouldn’t be here,” Valerie said, voice hushed. “This is wrong.”

  That she made me laugh. “The girl who stole my necklace is worried about doing something wrong?”

  “I didn’t steal it!” Not so hushed anymore.

  I winced. “Keep it down, okay?” But her face was flushed and her eyes glittered with righteous anger, and I started to believe her. “If you didn’t take the necklace, then who did?”

  “Someone who wanted to frame me. Someone who wanted the principal mad at me and someone who wanted the whole school to think I was a thief!”

  “Someone who doesn’t like you much, huh?” I stood behind the counter now. The cash register drawer was open and full of money.

  “Yes,” her disgusted voice followed me. “I guess that would pretty much be the whole school.”

  My gaze snapped up to her. “What are you talking about? You’re Team VIP!”

  She blinked.

  “Uh, you’re the popular one,” I tried to explain. “Head cheerleader and—”

  “Only because Kristen broke her leg at the beginning of the summer.” She wasn’t touching anything. She looked too afraid to touch anything. “If she hadn’t, I would have just been another girl in the line.”

  Huh. “Every time I see you, you’re surrounded by people.”

  Now her smile was bittersweet. “And how many of them do you truly think give a shit about me? When the wolf came after me in July, right after Brent’s big party for the Fourth, how many people do you think believed my story about the attack?” Her hands fisted. “They laughed at me. Said I was drunk. No one listened to me because no one cared.”

  Been there, done that.

  “No one…” Her eyes darted to a smashed photo of Granny Helen and Cassidy. “But her.”

  And now Helen was gone.

  I inhaled on a slow breath. We didn’t have a lot of time. I figured deputies would be coming by to search the place soon. My gaze scanned the wreckage once more. All of the books in the shop were on the floor, flipped open, some with pages ripped out. Drawers had been yanked out and tossed across the room. Rage, yes, but…m
ore.

  “Someone was looking for something.” But what?

  “From the looks of this place,” Valerie said, frowning, “I’d say he must have found it. I mean, come on, just look at—”

  “He didn’t find it.” I spoke with certainty now. “That’s why the place is so wrecked. He got angry when he didn’t find what he was looking for.”

  “Yes, well…” She rubbed her arms. “We’re not gonna find anything in this mess. Whatever the guy was looking for, it’s long lost by now.”

  I felt that slight internal shift in my body, the one that told me that my difference was kicking into play. “The attacker lost something,” I said, to push my power or gift or whatever the heck it was into better focus. “I want to find what he lost.”

  I took one step toward Granny Helen’s back room. Another. Another. I could feel the pull. The beaded curtains had been yanked down so I walked straight inside that back room and found more wreckage waiting for me. Tarot cards littered the floor. The death card stared up at me.

  “We should get out of here,” Valerie muttered, voice tense. “Like, now.”

  “Not yet.” I knelt in front of that death card. I picked it up and stared at the white skeleton as it glared back at me.

  “That’s just scary, okay? Let’s go!”

  I put the card down and my fingers smoothed over the wooden floor. The surface was old, faded a bit. I pressed against the wood.

  “Anna, seriously, we need to—”

  A soft snick filled the air and the piece of wood lifted softly. I slid my fingers underneath that crack and pried the wooden slat up more.

  “How did you know that was there?” Valerie’s voice had risen a bit.

  I didn’t answer her. My fingers touched somethingdeep inside that dark hole. I clutched it tightly, lifted it up, and found an old, leather-bound journal.

  The floor creaked as Valerie closed in behind me. “What is that?”

  I opened the journal carefully.

  1692.

  Just a date at the top of the page, one scrawled in shaky, faded hand-writing. The pages had yellowed, become very brittle, and I turned them carefully.

  More dates. And…names.

  Then one word. Curse.

  I turned the pages faster and faster. At the end of the book, I reached the last entry. Five years ago. I saw the names listed. Brent Peters, Rafe Channing, Giles Donovan, Catherine Falk…