“I’m not a werewolf,” said Carrie.
“Melanie says that her brother keeps coming home covered in scratches. She wanted to know if the lupine virus could be transmitted through scratches,” said Mrs. Finch.
“It can’t,” said Carrie. “But I don’t have it, so it doesn’t matter.” She had learned all about how to contract the lupine virus, and scratches was not one of the ways. The problem was that she was realizing that unprotected sex was one of the ways, and she and Holden had—
“Let me talk to your parents, Carrie,” said Mrs. Finch.
“I told you, there aren’t any phones—”
“Oh, please. There’s barely any place left in the world where there’s no cell phone service, Carrie. I don’t believe you.”
Carrie dragged a hand over her face. She didn’t know what to do.
Mrs. Finch leaned forward. “It’s true, isn’t it? You’re a werewolf. You killed your own parents and covered it up.”
“I did not,” said Carrie. But suddenly—out of nowhere—she was crying. She’d never been accused of it out loud like that. Her brain had leveled the accusation at her, silently, but hearing it out loud… it broke her.
“Ha!” Mrs. Finch stood up in triumph. “It’s true.”
“No,” growled Carrie. She was so angry at stupid Mrs. Finch, because she was ruining her life, and she’d just finally gotten her life to a place where it was actually working. The tears were streaming down her face, and the anger was wracking her body.
And the wolf began to stir.
Mrs. Finch grabbed the phone in her office. “Now, don’t worry, Carrie. Once the SF gets here, they’ll take good care of you. You’ll be treated for your sickness. Because that’s all it is. It’s a sickness. And you’ll be able to live a normal life this way.”
“No.” Carrie stood up. This wasn’t what she wanted. She wanted a perfect high school experience. Just a few more weeks. Was that too much to ask?
Anger surged through her. The wolf leaped.
She lunged for Mrs. Finch.
Mrs. Finch stumbled backwards, eyes wide.
Carrie leaped over the desk. She tackled Mrs. Finch.
“Carrie, calm down,” said Mrs. Finch.
Carrie’s hands were twisting and changing. Wolf claws were ripping through her fingertips.
Mrs. Finch screamed.
“Shut up,” Carrie snarled. She swiped her claws over Mrs. Finch’s throat.
Blood sprayed everywhere.
But Mrs. Finch didn’t make another noise.
* * *
Carrie stood over Mrs. Finch, staring down at her hands, which had morphed into claws. She couldn’t figure out how to make them go back to human hands.
And she was pretty sure that Mrs. Finch was dead.
There was a lot of blood. It had pumped out of Mrs. Finch’s neck, staining her clothes dark red. Now Mrs. Finch wasn’t moving. She was simply staring blankly at the ceiling, her mouth slack. Her skin was already looking pasty.
Carrie didn’t like being in here with her, because the blood smelled…
Well, her wolf sort of wanted it. Her wolf wanted to shift and… and eat Mrs. Finch.
That horrified Carrie.
Plus, she’d never meant to kill Mrs. Finch, although she couldn’t deny it actually made things easier, since Mrs. Finch was going to call the SF.
Of course, in other ways, it made things worse, because what was she going to do about Mrs. Finch’s body? If she just left it here, then everyone would know that she was the last person to see Mrs. Finch. Also, Carrie was covered in blood, so she didn’t think she could leave the office, even if she could figure out how to get her human hands back.
What was she going to do?
She needed help. She couldn’t do this alone. There was only one person she knew she could trust with something like this.
Mick.
She needed to call him.
She tried to get her phone out, but it was awkward with wolf claws. She couldn’t keep hold of it, and it fell to the floor.
Carrie knelt down over the phone and gingerly used her claws to call Mick.
She waited while it rang.
“Little fael?” he said.
“Mick, I need your help,” she whispered.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Carrie waited for Mick in the living room of the house. It was warm enough that the fireplace was dead and cold. She huddled on the couch just the same.
When Mick had arrived at school, he’d touched her shoulder, and the wolf claws had gone away immediately. He’d sent her away, telling her that he’d take care of Mrs. Finch’s body. She was to go straight home.
So, she’d been waiting here for him for hours. She felt really bad about killing Mrs. Finch, but she’d also felt like she didn’t really have a choice. If Mrs. Finch hadn’t been so nasty about everything, it never would have happened.
But deep down, she knew that there was no excuse. And she also knew that Mrs. Finch was married to Mr. Finch, the art teacher, and that the two of them had twin daughters who were only in fifth grade. Carrie had seen the family together at various school functions, and they always seemed happy together. She thought of the little twin girls with no mother. She thought of poor Mr. Finch, who was a pretty nice guy, being too sad to even mix tempera paint for his classroom.
She felt horrible.
She wasn’t sure what had happened to her, but ever since Mick had shown up, she had become different. The wolf made her impulsive and vicious. It made her fearless. Sometimes those things were good. Other times, they hurt people.
However, she had to admit, that whatever she did almost always seemed to work to her advantage. She was selfish.
“I don’t mean to be selfish,” she whispered. She looked at the place where she’d found her mother’s and father’s bodies. “I’m so sorry, Mom and Dad. I never meant for this to happen.”
And she tried to cry.
But now, for some reason, she couldn’t.
Maybe she was becoming hard. Maybe she was turning into a monster.
Finally, Mick came back. He stalked into the living room to find her. His nostrils flared.
He was angry? He hadn’t seemed angry before. He hadn’t shown any emotion when he’d come to help her. He must have been controlling himself, she realized, keeping his real feelings inside so that he could get to the task at hand. Now that it was done, he was letting it all out.
She got up off the couch. “I’m sorry, Mick. I didn’t mean to kill her. It just happened.”
He shook his head. “You are too attached to this life, little fael. This experience should show you how dangerous it is. If that woman can figure out what happened, others can too. We have to leave.”
“No.” She drew in breath. “No, that would mean that I killed her for nothing.”
“You did kill her for nothing,” Mick spat. “She wasn’t even meat for your wolf.”
“I can’t leave,” she said. “I can’t leave Holden. He and I just started—”
“Holden,” Mick said the word with disdain. He hated Holden, and he’d made no effort to disguise it. “That boy is not important.”
“He’s important to me.”
Mick took her by the shoulders. “Listen to me, Carrie. You are not a normal young woman. You are a wolf, and you are special. You belong amongst your own people, not out here. We must leave.”
She tried to wriggle out of his grasp, but he held strong. “I’m not going anywhere.”
“You must.”
“No.”
Mick shook her. “We don’t have time to argue about this. Pack your things.”
“I won’t.”
He shook her again, this time harder.
It hurt. She struggled. “Let go of me. You’re hurting me.”
Mick’s fingers dug into the tops of her arms. “And what about the ways you hurt me, hmm?”
She felt afraid. “What are you talking about?”
“Yo
u are my wolf,” he said. “I am your alpha. But all you try to do is push away from me. Do you have any idea how much that tears at my heart?”
What? She didn’t say anything.
Mick shut his eyes. “For God’s sake, Carrie.”
She spoke in a tiny voice. “Let go of me.”
Mick didn’t let go, but he did loosen his grasp. His fingers stopped digging in to her, and he smoothed his touch over her arms.
Shivers went through her. She looked up at Mick, and she thought again of how gorgeous he was. And maybe it didn’t so much matter about her parents anymore. She’d killed Mrs. Finch, so they were both just as bad as the other. And Mick did want to take care of her. She relied on him.
Mick sighed, his shoulders slumping. “You make me insane.”
“I’m sorry,” she murmured. “But I don’t want to leave. I want to stay here. That would make me happy.”
“I want you to be happy, little fael,” he said. His fingers traced their way back up her arms, over her shoulders. He touched her clavicle. Her chin. Her jaw.
And with each touch, Carrie felt herself come a little undone. Thrills urged through her. Her legs felt weak.
“You don’t need Holden.” Mick’s voice was unsteady.
“But you said…” She licked her lips. He said he was too old for her, and he’d spurned any advances that she’d made towards him. And besides, even though Mick was very nice to look at, she was connected to Holden now. So, she shouldn’t even want Mick at all. But standing this close to him, she found that she did want him. And what was more, she had knowledge of what she wanted. She knew what it would be to give herself to Mick, to feel his body move in hers.
She took a shaky breath.
Mick ran his thumb over her bottom lip.
She shut her eyes.
She felt his lips meet hers, sweet and soft, warm pressure there.
His tongue darted into her mouth, sweeping inside and claiming her.
She pressed her body into his, all her skin against the hard muscled length of him. He felt solid and firm, and he excited her. She thought about wrapping her legs around his strong, firm body, squeezing his hips between her thighs.
Mick let out a strangled noise, and he let go of her.
She opened her eyes to see him pulling away with effort. She gazed at him in confusion.
His face twisted. He clenched his hands into fists and then released them. Then he closed the distance between the two of them. His voice was harsh. “It’s your fault. You drive me to this.”
“What?” she said.
He slapped her.
She was too shocked to move. The pain was only a bit of stinging, but Carrie had never been struck across the face before. Her jaw dropped open and she stared at him in horror.
Mick bared his teeth. “Don’t tempt me again, Carrie.”
* * *
Carrie stood in the living room for a long time after Mick had left her there. She touched the place where he’d hit her.
She wasn’t going anyplace with him. She had never trusted him, not truly. Maybe she’d found him attractive, but that wasn’t the same thing. And now, she was frightened of him. He’d hit her for no reason. She hadn’t done what he said. She hadn’t tempted him.
It was growing dark outside, and the moonlight filtered through the window.
Carrie felt the pull, and she looked up.
A full moon.
Maybe that was why she hadn’t been able to control herself with Mrs. Finch. Maybe the full moon had taken control of her brain.
But even now, she could feel the tempting tug of the moon on her wolf, and she was able to resist it, push it back. It took effort, but she could do it. But that was probably only because it was early in the evening, and the moon wasn’t high in the sky. After all, the first night that she’d shifted, it hadn’t been until after midnight.
She left the living room and went looking for Mick.
She found him in the guest room, shoving his things in a bag.
“We can’t leave yet,” she said to him.
He looked up to see her, and his face twisted. “Carrie. Listen, I’m sorry about what happened. I don’t know what came over me. I never should have raised a hand to you. I feel awful.”
She didn’t want his apology. She wasn’t going to forgive him. Anyway, she needed to buy some time in order to figure out how to get away from Mick. “It’s a full moon, Mick. We can’t go anywhere.”
“Please, Carrie, if there’s any way you can forgive me—”
“We have to stay here. We can’t be shifting into wolves on the road.”
He sighed. “What makes you think we’d be wolves on the road, little fael?”
“Well, it’s a full moon.”
“So?”
She folded her arms over her chest. “We have to shift at the full moon, don’t we? That’s why my parents died. Because we shifted. And there wasn’t any way to prevent that.”
Mick looked down at the floor. “We’ll stay until after the full moon.”
Now she was confused. “Don’t we have to shift at the moon? Mick, what is it that you’re not telling me?”
He set down his bag on the bed. “We’ll go for a run in the woods again tonight. You liked that last time, didn’t you?”
She remembered the last run in the woods, the two of them naked together afterward. The way that Mick had insisted nothing was between them. That had been before Holden, before she was confused about everything. She didn’t think she wanted to be naked with Mick again. If he slapped her for tempting him when she was clothed, what would he do if she wasn’t? “I don’t think so.”
He raised his eyebrows. “You plan to shift in the house, Carrie?”
She backed out of the room. “I can resist it. I’m resisting it now.”
He arched an eyebrow. “Can you?”
Suddenly, the wolf was surging in her, pressing against the thin layer of her skin, scrabbling to be let out.
She pushed back, but excruciating pain went through her, doubling her over with its black, inky agony.
She grasped the door frame to keep herself upright, gritting her teeth and groaning.
Mick advanced on her. “We’ll go for a run,” he said in a quiet voice. “And I am sorry for hurting you, little fael. It’s the last thing I ever wanted to do.”
The pain went away. The pressure of the shift went away.
Carrie sagged against the door frame, panting and wide-eyed.
CHAPTER TWELVE
Holden yanked open the blinds in his bedroom, staring up at the full moon. It was low in the sky, just crowning over the horizon, but he thought it might be the most beautiful thing that he’d ever seen.
He wondered why he’d never spent much time looking at the moon before. It had always been there, his whole life, every night, hanging in the night sky. It was so pretty, the way it changed shape, dwindling down to a sliver and then growing fatter and fatter as the month wore on. It was set in a sky of glittering stars, but it glittered biggest and brightest of all the things in the night sky. He was enamored with the moon.
He wished he could somehow get closer to it.
“Holden?” said Melanie.
“Hmm?” He didn’t turn away from his window. He could hear his sister just find without looking at her.
“What are you doing?”
“Nothing,” he said, staring lovingly at the moon.
“Because it looks to me like you’re looking at the moon.”
“So?”
Mel came further into the room. He heard her rather than saw her. “Listen, Holden, I didn’t want to say anything because I wasn’t sure, but I can’t get in touch with Mrs. Finch, and I told her what I thought, and now you’re mesmerized by the moon, and… I don’t know, I think I should call the SF.”
Holden turned around. “What are you talking about, Mel?”
“I think you’re turning into a werewolf, little brother.”
He furrowed his
brow. “What?”
“The scratches on your back,” said Mel. “And that girl. No one’s seen her parents since the last full moon. And Mrs. Finch couldn’t get in touch with them. It’s like they disappeared. I think they’re dead, Holden. And I think she did something to you.”
Holden looked back at the moon, his heart stuttering. What had Coach said? You don’t want to find yourself howling at the moon, so wrap it up next time.
The moon reached for him, at least that was how it felt. Its beams of light shone down and penetrated his skin.
Something inside him moved.
He lurched back, looking down at his body.
“What?” said Mel. “Holden, what?”
He ran his hands through his hair. “I need to find Carrie.”
“No, that’s the last thing you need to do. She’s the one who did this to you.”
He shook his head. “She wouldn’t have. I don’t believe she meant to do it.”
Mel took him by the shoulders. “You are my baby brother, and I’m not letting you out of my sight.”
He shook her off. It wasn’t hard. He was a good deal stronger than she was. “Sorry, Mel.” He headed for the door.
“Holden, I’m calling the SF!” she yelled.
He didn’t stop, though. He left the apartment and ran for his car.
* * *
Holden pulled up in the driveway of Carrie’s house and got out of the car.
The wind had picked up, and it was tossing the tree branches, making them rattle like old bones. The wind cut into his skin, taking his breath away. He struggled to walk across the driveway to the door of the house.
And when he looked up at the moon, its light stabbed him deep in his chest, making something in his body writhe.
Terror splintered in him.
There was something in his body—something foreign and strange. And he wasn’t in control of it.
He banged on the door of the house.
But the noise from the wind was so loud, he wasn’t sure if anyone heard him, so he tried the door knob. The door opened.
He stepped over the threshold. The house was dark inside. A faint light filtered out from the kitchen, but it only cast a ghastly glow over the hallway, barely illuminating the features of the place. The house was old and stately. From here, Holden could see the outline of the chandelier hanging in the foyer, the ornate carved crown molding against the ceiling, the framed paintings on the walls. Right now, the house was giving Holden the creeps.
Child of the Moon Page 10