by Nancy Holder
Then book after book after book about treasure hunting, shipwrecks, ancient civilizations, and lost mines. A fleeting smile crossed her mouth. It seemed that Mr. Henderson was Wolf Springs’ answer to Indiana Jones.
Unsure of how much time she had, she satisfied herself that In the Shadow of the Wolf was not on the shelves, then stood and moved to his filing cabinet. It creaked as she opened it, and the first thing she saw was a large file labeled HISTORICAL DETECTIVE. That had been the name of the assignment that had led to Katelyn and Cordelia researching the Madre Vena mine. She pulled open the file and started thumbing through the papers, which were from her class, filed in alphabetical order. FENNER, CORDELIA/McBRIDE, KAT, came up quickly, and she pulled it out. They’d gotten an A. He had circled the letter and written “GOOD WORK!” beside it. A few sentences were marked, and in a couple of places in the margins he had written, “CONCLUSIONS DRAWN HOW? BACK UP ASSERTION!”
On the last page, he had written, “SWITLISKI?” and “YOU TWO ARE DEF. ONTO SOMETHING.” She was about to put the paper back when something slipped to the floor. She squatted and found a paperclip.
And then she saw something wedged between the file cabinet and the book case. She used the paperclip to fish it out.
A business card for Fenner Construction, Lee Fenner, Owner. She stared at it as the wheels turned in her mind. Had Mr. Henderson been trying to find the mine for Mr. Fenner? Is that why Lee had pushed Cordelia to choose it as their project?
Is that why he was missing? Had he found it?
Katelyn thought of the Hellhound. Had it been guarding the mine?
Or had someone else done something to her history teacher? Did the police have any leads? Obviously, they had missed the business card.
Then someone called out, “Hello?”
6
She must have made too much noise.
Katelyn tucked the business card in her pocket and ducked down behind Mr. Henderson’s desk. Then she looked up with horror at the open filing cabinet, sure to attract attention if someone came in through the office door.
She could make up an excuse, she thought, trying to stay calm as she braced herself for discovery. She could say that she had lost something valuable. Something belonging to my best friend. With all the rumors going around about Cordelia and their history teacher, no one would blame Katelyn for trying to learn the truth.
She heard the classroom door open. Every muscle in her body tensed. Then there was silence. Her hearing snapped into overdrive and she heard a voice murmur, “Hello? Huh. Weird.”
Then the door closed.
Mike Wright. A wave of fury shot through her, and she was stunned by how fierce it was. It was like somehow he embodied everything that was wrong about her life, this place. She was sure all the kids at her old school that had seen therapists on a regular basis would know a name for it.
Breathe.
She shut her eyes and clamped her jaw. Her chest heaved. Very slowly, her emotions ebbed. She waited a few seconds to make sure she was in control of herself, then reached up and eased the file drawer shut. Then she snaked back through the caution tape, and tiptoed through her history classroom.
As carefully as a tightrope walker, she opened the door and peered into the hall. Seeing Mike and one of his redneck homies messing around with Trick’s locker, she almost took off along the hall after them. She looked down and away, overcome again with the desire to hurt Mike.
Permanently.
Mike and the other boy started snickering, then went trotting on down the hall. Katelyn hurried over to Trick’s locker. From what she could tell, they had used lipstick to write the F-bomb and the worst homophobic insult for “gay” Katelyn had ever heard. What a moron! In Santa Monica, Mike and his minion would have been expelled for what he’d just done. But here?
Katelyn looked around for something to clean off Trick’s locker. She finally grabbed some paper towels from the girls’ bathroom and set to work, smearing the lipstick until it was illegible. If she had her way, Trick would never see what Mike had done. Mike was a bully and a moron and the stereotype of every prejudice she had held about the south. He was mean and stupid. And he seemed to be getting away with more than his share of nasty pranks.
I could just kill him, she thought.
She finished, tossed the paper towels, then snuck back outside. She was halfway across the parking lot, which now had five cars in it, including one painted like the Confederate flag, when her phone rang. Startled, she glanced down at the number. She didn’t recognize it, but she answered anyway.
“Are you alone, cher?” said the voice on the phone, deep and masculine, touched with a lilt of Louisiana Cajun.
Katelyn was so startled she almost dropped the phone. It was Dominic Gaudin.
“Yes. Hello. Do you know what’s happened?” she said urgently, hunching over the phone as if to muffle their conversation. It dawned on her that someone might be watching — someone not connected with her high school. A pack member, reporting her every move to Lee Fenner. She pushed that to the back of her mind. So what? she thought resentfully, gazing around.
“Oui. She has called me,” he said. “I’m coming for her.”
Katelyn caught her breath. “Where is she?”
“She’s alone, and frightened,” he said. “She has no one.”
“Me,” Katelyn said firmly. She searched the lot. And then she felt a fillip of anger. She could see Mike Wright through the windshield of the Confederate flag car. He was smoking a cigarette and, from the way he was nodding his head, listening to head banger music. He hadn’t noticed her. “She has me.”
“She’s not sure of that. She knows that her father has threatened to kill anyone who helps her.”
Katelyn gave her head a shake. “I’ll help her.” She started to walk in Mike’s direction and realized that was a bad idea. So she slipped into the shadows of the trees, making her way toward her parked car.
“Or maybe you’ll tell them where she is, if I tell you. To get in good with your new family,” Dom said.
She was speechless. “They are not my family.”
“They are who you run with.”
“No way. They are who I run from.” She laughed bitterly.
“Ah,” he said. “Then you’ll come with her, when I come for her?”
Her stomach did a somersault and she caught herself giving another quick shake of her head before she remembered he couldn’t see her. Part of her raced ahead to how wonderful it would be to be free of insane Lee Fenner and his whole dysfunctional family. And as far away from Justin as possible. She would miss her grandfather and Trick a lot.
“What would your pack think of me?” she asked him. The mistake?
“It doesn’t matter what they think of you, cher. What matters is how they treat you. I am the alpha, and if I accept you, they will, too. We’re more disciplined than the Fenners. And I’m not losing my mind.”
All plusses. And she and Cordelia could be friends again. She had no one now.
“I’m afraid of what would happen to my grandfather.” She decided to leave Trick out of the discussion. She didn’t need to go around advertising to werewolves which humans in Wolf Springs they could use as leverage to get her to do what they wanted. “They might retaliate.”
“Did he think of you, forcing you to come here?” Dom asked her. “He knew a girl had been killed in the woods. There has been a second one since your arrival. Your teacher is missing. Does he send you home?”
“How do you know . . .?” she began, then trailed off. Had someone told Cordelia about Mr. Henderson? Did Dom Gaudin have a spy in Wolf Springs?
“He’s still my grandfather,” she said.
“And Cordelia is your best friend. She’s the only real friend you have. And you’re the only friend she has. She risked everything to keep you safe. She could have died. Her pack has been her whole life, and she’s going to be lonely in my pack, until she makes some friends.”
“Tell me whe
re she is,” Katelyn asked.
“You say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ when you speak to me, cher,” he said, not unkindly. “I’m an alpha. You need to show me respect.”
“Please tell me where she is.” She tried not to sound impatient. All this ritualistic manners stuff was annoying when there were bigger issues at stake. “Please.”
“I will send someone to take you to her,” he said. “Tonight. Be ready.”
Alarm bells went off. “Where? What time?”
“Your cabin. Midnight.”
“No, wait. I think they’re watching me.”
“We’ll make sure they aren’t,” he said.
He disconnected.
Lunch.
And Trick was studying her. Since it was a cold November day, everyone was crowded inside the lunchroom. She would be welcome to sit at his table — his arty, slightly nerdy crowd really liked her — but she kept to her spot in the stairwell of the unused staircase at the back of the room. She was going through the motions of eating the peanut butter sandwich her grandfather had made for her the night before. He had added an apple. It was the exact lunch he made for her every day, and she found it very touching. All she was missing was a juice box and she’d have the lunch she used to pack for herself in elementary school. But the truth was, she had no appetite. Her phone call with Dom was swirling in her mind. Could she really leave? Just go? And then what? What kind of life would she have? She’d be a runaway. A statistic in the growing population of Wolf Springs citizens who had met bad ends.
And if she went missing, her grandfather would go crazy. Could she do that to him?
The questions were drowning her, so she made a pretense of texting so she could keep to herself and try to figure out her next step.
Even with staggered lunch periods, students were packed in tightly and the place was steamy, making the wolf mural that filled one wall look like it was sweating. Beau was also looking at her from across the room, and she kept up the show of texting so she would have a good excuse for avoiding him, too.
Then Kimi actually texted her.
Yo!
Hi, Katelyn texted back. How’s it? Jane?
Left me 4 a boy! came the reply.
Abandoning texting, Katelyn called her. “What?” she said once the connection was made. “Some friend she turned out to be.”
“You know how some girls are,” Kimi said. “Girlfriends are what you have until you hook up with a guy. And, hi.”
“Ridiculous!” It felt like old times. She wondered if that was why Kimi had started texting her again. But it didn’t really matter, did it? They were talking.
“It’s no guy you know,” Kimi said. “Doesn’t go to our school. He’s a total stoner, though, so boring.”
Katelyn was nearly giddy with the normalcy of their conversation. She almost burst into tears, which made no sense, but she held onto the phone with both hands and tapped her toes happily on the stair.
“So, big news,” Kimi said. “My mom told me to tell you that she met a family court judge at Pilates who said she’d sign off on your emancipation papers if the case came before her. Which, hell, yeah.”
Katelyn was stunned. Before she had flown out to Wolf Springs, Kimi had been lobbying for her to file for emancipation so Katelyn could stay there and live with Kimi’s family. Kimi’s mom was an attorney and she’d been willing to present the case and assure the judge she would provide Katelyn a home. Until that moment, though, Katelyn hadn’t been convinced it could actually work.
“Making deals outside of court like that, isn’t that illegal or something?” Katelyn asked, as butterflies danced in her stomach. Another chance to leave Wolf Springs dropped into her lap?
She ticked a glance in Trick’s direction to find that he was still looking at her, and she turned her head slightly and cupped her mouth.
“If you could offer some proof about why Wolf Springs is a bad living environment, that would seal the deal,” Kimi continued.
“Well, there was a murder recently.”
“Right on! I mean, oh, how awful and sad. Anyone you know? Or knew?”
“I guess she was in some of my classes, but no, I didn’t. And my history teacher is missing.”
“Jeez. Is there a guy running around with a chainsaw, too?” Kimi asked, and Katelyn snorted.
If only I could tell you what’s really going on, she thought. You wouldn’t believe any of it.
Then she inhaled the mingled scents of soap and leather. Not Justin. Trick. Up close, she could see the stubble on his cheeks and chin, and the flecks of blue in his green eyes. Without warning, her vision telescoped and she felt as if she were falling into his eyes, into their depths, and she felt incredibly dizzy. Then she blinked to try to pull herself out of it.
“The missing teacher is a nice addition,” Kimi said. “I’ll tell my mom.” Then she added, “Are you okay? I mean, were you close to him or anything?”
“Close,” Katelyn ventured, testing out the idea. Then she gave her head a sharp shake. “Kimi, I need to go. I’ll call you when I get home.”
“From the cabin in the woods, wa ha ha,” Kimi said. “Kiss kiss. You’ll be home before you know it.”
“Mwah. Sounds poifect,” Katelyn said, and hung up. She closed her eyes and pressed her finger against the bridge of her nose. She inhaled slowly, then exhaled, then opened her eyes again.
The telescoping was gone. But Trick was standing right there, in living color.
“Yes?” she said.
“I’m coming over to your house after school,” he informed her. “I’m going to help your grandfather chop wood for the winter.”
“Quaint. I’ll be home later. I’m going to Cordelia’s house again, just for a little bit.” She almost added, I’m going swimming, but she doubted that Justin had been serious. It was practically sleeting outside.
“No, you aren’t,” he said. When she frowned at him, he added, “It’s not Cordelia’s house anymore, is it?” He wasn’t asking. He knew.
“Trick, I don’t have to explain myself to you.” The words came out more sharply than she had intended. How did he know?
“Your pappy told me to watch out for you.” He narrowed his eyes and pursed his lips in displeasure. “He’s trouble, Katelyn. You’re new here. You don’t know about his past.”
“I think I know who you mean, and trust me when I say this, Trick. He has a girlfriend. They’re practically engaged.”
“That’s never stopped him before,” Trick retorted.
Her cheeks went hot.
“Are you okay?” he asked, and she nodded. “You don’t look okay.”
“I’m fine,” she insisted.
“Don’t go over there this afternoon. There is absolutely no good reason for you to go.”
“Got it,” she said, and she took a big bite out of her apple. He shifted his weight on his hip, upset and pissed off, and she took another bite. Clenching his teeth, he turned on his heel and walked away. She stared at his retreating back — okay, his butt — and smiled.
I’ll get out of here, she mentally told him. I’ll take you with me.
She devoured her apple like it was a rabbit.
~
Afternoon.
Katelyn walked to the end of the high-dive and stared down at Justin. Treading water in the steamy pool, he was bobbing in the water. His hair was slicked back, accentuating the planes and angles in his face, and she felt awkward in the swimsuit he had brought for her. She wondered if it was Cordelia’s — likely, since it was so baggy on her. Cordelia was taller than she was.
“Just jump,” Justin said. “You’re not afraid, are you?”
He had no idea who he was dealing with. She backed up, ran, then sprang off the board. She executed several axial twists before she slid into the water without a splash. When she came back up, he was staring at her open-mouthed.
They were at the Y, where her grandfather had found her gymnastics lessons, and while it was almost as bad a
s Trick had said, there was a woman on staff who had been a gymnastics coach at Cal State Long Beach, and taught private lessons. She wasn’t in, but Katelyn took her card.
Justin had rationalized the swimming by emphasizing the need to stay in shape. Whatever condition you were in as a human directly affected your strength and stamina as a wolf.
“What about your mental health?” she had asked him, and he’d clouded over.
“You mean Lee? He’s just as unpredictable in wolf form as human,” he said shortly. “Something’s got to be done, and soon.”
She told herself that she didn’t care about any of that. It wasn’t her business. All she had to do was steer clear of Lee Fenner.
And wait until midnight, and see what happened next.
~
The hours dragged by. Her grandfather asked her if something was wrong and then offered to play a game of Scrabble. Her heart was only half in it, but when he won by 400 points she had to admire his skill. When she went upstairs she passed the time by reading more of Cordelia’s diary. After Cordelia’s first transformation, they had had a party, like a werewolf bat mitzvah, orchestrated well away from the kids who hadn’t yet changed.
Cordelia had once had her daydreams and crushes, and even tried to get her father to accept a human boy into the pack. She had been told to break up with him and wait for a mate to be selected. Selected? Cordelia had wanted to date and have a boyfriend, but it turned out werewolf teenagers — or at least the daughters of the alpha — lived much more circumspect lives than Cali girls. Or pretty much any other girl, period. Boys, too, since they were also half of the equation. So maybe Justin didn’t love Lucy. Maybe it was simply that they were facing an arranged marriage. Maybe love was supposed to come in time.
I don’t care, she told herself. I don’t want him.
Katelyn was afraid she’d fall asleep in her room — she had to get up so early every morning to drive to Wolf Springs High — so she put the diary down and did some stretching exercises. She wondered where Cordelia was. She wondered if the Fenners were watching her right now.