The Accidental Werewolf 2: Something About Harry (Accidentally Paranormal Novel)

by Cassidy, Dakota

  Good, this was good if she could just keep her talking. “And the kids?”

  “No!” she screamed, waving the gun in the air. “I don’t want to talk about the kids with you. You’re dirty, dirty, filthy! You slept with Harry!”

  If she went too deep, tried to lie her way out of sleeping with Harry, it would only make Leah angrier. So she changed tactics. “Why did you do it, Leah? Why would you turn a human?”

  Of the many sides of her personality, indignant was the one Leah projected best. Her spine stiffened, her chest rose from her core. She shot Mara a look that said she should know why she’d turned a human. “Because my mate needs to be pure, of course. Pack law says so, no matter what that half-human slut Marty and her mate Keegan do. Your mate should be a werewolf. But you wouldn’t understand that, would you, Mara? Because you’re a whore—a disgusting slutty-slut whore!”

  It was all Mara could do not to tear Leah’s throat out. Her comment about Marty and Keegan made her see red. But she had to find the children. Stay calm. She’s cracking. If she could just get a fingertip in that crack, she could break it wide open. “Why did you hurt Jeff, Leah? The police said he called them. How did you get him to do that?”

  Leah’s eyes shone, her gaze sly with her brilliance. “I made him call the police after I saw you go to his house. It was easy.”

  This had all been some bizarre game of cat and mouse? “He’s alive?” Oh, thank God Jeff was alive.

  Her chin lifted, the silhouette of it against the coming night sharp and sure. “For now . . .”

  Panic began to rise in Mara’s chest, so tight she was afraid it would explode. “Why did you send Harry to the lab that night, Leah? You could have chosen any other venue. Why at Pack?”

  She rolled her eyes as if it were obvious. “Because, you dimwit, I couldn’t let him go home to Mimi and Fletcher when he was going to turn. What kind of mother would I be if I let them see that? It would frighten them, and I wanted to be there with him when it happened. And Pack was the perfect place. It was where we met—where we would have fallen in love if not for you!”

  Mara heard nothing else but one word. Mother? Leah thought she was Mimi and Fletcher’s mother? If she was granted more time, she was going to kick herself for never picking up on a single clue about just how disturbed Leah really was. She kept her next question as casual as possible. “So are the kids with Jeff?”

  “They’re hiding,” she taunted, grinning wide, her eyes flashing like they were playing out some game.

  Hiding. Okay. Mara fought to stay sharp—aware, flexing her fingers to keep the ache of the cold away. “You did such a good job of hiding them. You’re so smart.” Praise—validation—recognition. Wasn’t that what every mad genius secretly wanted?

  Leah was back at attention again, standing erect, waving the gun at Mara under the setting sun. “You don’t mean that, liar! You want the children. You want to be their mother. I saw you tubing with them. I know! But I won’t let you, Mara! You’re dirty, so dirty! If I can’t have them, you can’t have them either!”

  Mara held up her hands. “No! You don’t have to give them to me, but don’t you want to tell Harry where they are, Leah? You can’t be a whole family without him, right? He completes the picture.” Just saying those words made her want to gag, retch until her stomach was empty—she fought the bile rising in her throat.

  “He’s so handsome, isn’t he? We’d make a perfect couple,” Leah cooed, her eyes far off and glazed now, a teenager this time. One with a crush no one had ever suspected.

  Darkness was coming, and the temperatures would drop to the teens. If the kids were somewhere around here, they’d freeze to death.

  Praying for patience, Mara continued to play the game. “You would. So let’s go get the kids and you can bring them to Harry yourself. He loves them so much, just as much as you do.” Mara moved even closer, pressing her knuckles against the rocks inches from where Leah stood. She held out her hand, forcing it to still. “Why don’t you give me the gun, and you can go find Harry, okay?”

  Leah stiffened, visibly tensing. In a flash, the gun was pointed at Mara’s chest. “You lie, Mara! You’re never going to let me go. I could’ve made Harry love me, but you ruined everything. You took him from me. You used your slutty charms and stole him away. You’re unclean, dirty, dirty Mara. I hate you!” she screamed, her finger reaching for the trigger.

  “Nooo!” a familiar voice bellowed. Just before Leah screamed her rage, a body fell from high atop the crag of rocks onto her.

  Leah was knocked to the ground, the gun dropping from her fingers, her head crashing against a sharp edge on the face of the rock.

  Mara went for the gun just as Guido rolled to his side and grabbed it, but Leah was stronger—so much stronger than him.

  She rose and pounced on him, fighting him for it, clawing at his fingers until she had it aimed at his chest. Her screams angry, her howl frenzied—she pulled the trigger before Mara could blink—the blast of the gun earsplitting, cracking and echoing in the open space.

  Guido’s anguished cry rang in Mara’s ears as a pool of blood began to form at his shoulder.

  Sorrow at Guido’s still form mingled, danced, warred with rage until rage won the battle. “I’ll kill you!” Mara howled, racing toward Leah’s back, preparing to launch herself at it.

  Out of the inky darkness, Nina was there, her warrior cry a high-pitched roar of wrath. She fell on Leah, tearing her from Guido’s body just as Harry ran to his side, ripping his shirt off and pressing it into the oozing wound.

  Wanda and Marty pulled up short behind him, dragging him from Guido and replacing his hands with theirs. “Go!” Wanda ordered with a harsh bark. “What Leah says is true. Arch says she has the kids! Find the kids and Jeff!”

  Nina hauled Leah up by her neck, shaking her like a rag doll. “Where are the kids, you fucking fruit loop?” she hissed in her face, jerking her body, flashing her fangs.

  Leah hung almost lifeless, her eyes half-mast. Yet she summoned the will to spit in Nina’s face. “I’ll never tell you. Never, ever!”

  Mara’s rage spread through her limbs and tore at her self-control. She shoved Nina hard, dragging Leah from her grasp and wrapping her fingers around her neck. “Where are Mimi and Fletcher? Tell me, damn you!” she screamed, curling her fingers into Leah’s hair and drawing her head back until her body bowed.

  “Let’s play a game, Mara,” Leah choked out with a grin. “I’ll give you a clue, you have to . . .” She swallowed, blood from her split lip seeping from the corner of her mouth. “Guess. You have to guess!” She began to laugh; whatever was broken in her was pulling away, leaving nothing but fragments of the Leah Mara thought she’d always known.

  Mara’s teeth clenched, her nose flared again. Still no scent of the children. Suspicion began to claw at her gut. “Liar!” she hollered. “I don’t believe you have them, Leah. You don’t smell like them. Now who’s the liar?”

  Leah laughed, sputtering a cackle. “I have them. Yes, yes, I do! Olly olly oxen free!”

  “Tell me where the children are, Leah, or I’ll kill you myself!”

  Leah struggled against Mara’s grip, her hands clawing at Mara’s. “You’ll never find them,” she said on a harsh gasp for air. “You’re not the only one who’s smart enough to create a serum. I made one, too. I took away their scent. You’ll never find them without me . . .” She was bragging, taunting, and it only made Mara want her dead—pummeled so far into the ground, no one would ever find her remains.

  Mara’s other hand went to Leah’s neck, she squeezed until her eyes bulged and unconsciousness was almost upon her. Her hands shook from the force she was using, her head pounding, screaming the wild rage erupting in her.

  “Stop!” Harry yelled, putting his hand on hers, pulling. “Stop, Mara,” he said quietly. “She’s the only one who knows where the kids
and Jeff are. Stop now!” he bellowed in her ear.

  Leah’s eyes popped open when Mara’s grip eased, focusing on Harry, becoming soft. “I loved you, Harry,” she said on a gasp, her chest pumping up and down. “But . . .” She hacked a cough, a tear, glistening in the moonlight, fell from the corner of her eye. “You never even knew I existed. We would have been good parents together. I would have taken good care of them.”

  Harry gritted his teeth. Mara watched him gather himself, batten down the hatches on his fear and anger. He ran his hand over Leah’s hair, soothing her, gazing into her dull eyes. “You can still do that, Leah. Take me to them. Good mothers want to protect their children, right? Let’s protect them—together,” he forced the word out as though it tasted sour.

  Mara’s eye caught something on the ground, a familiar piece of spiral notebook paper just like the one they’d found at Jeff’s. She scrambled to pick it up, kicking up dirt, ignoring the gash in her forehead she’d somehow acquired. A map. It was a hand-drawn map . . . One Leah had probably made in order to remember the spot where she’d left Mimi and Fletcher. She stared hard at the paper—a piece of it missing. It was torn, frayed, probably from Leah’s fingers worrying the edges.

  But it looked familiar.

  Her eyes widened. She knew where this was. She and her brothers had played there often as children. The kids were . . .

  No. Jesus. No. Not there.

  There was nothing there for miles and miles but a grouping of caves and frozen ground and rocks—so many rocks. Even with the strength of their paranormal skills combined, as cold as it was, and the amount of time the children and Jeff had been missing, they’d never find them in the masses of rock before they froze to death. If they hadn’t already. Oh, God, how long had they been there?

  Mara’s heart screamed in her chest. Think, Mara, think! There had to be a specific reason Leah had chosen this area. Everything she’d done so far had been carefully planned—meticulous. All of it geared toward an obscure message she wanted to send. A game she wanted everyone to play, to recognize and validate, while she sat back and reveled in her superior intellect while no one had a clue she was the one pulling the strings of this marionette.

  And then she knew. Without a shadow of a doubt, she knew.

  “I know!” Mara screamed into the night, holding up the piece of paper. “I know where they are!”

  “Where?” Harry rasped, his voice tight.

  She couldn’t say it—she couldn’t say the words out loud. She’d rather die than say the words out loud. Turning her back to the group, she forced herself to speak the next words calmly. “Get Guido and Leah and follow me. Do it now!”

  Mara took off, pumping her legs harder than she ever had in her life. Harder than when Sloan and Keegan had raced her to home base when they played tag. Harder than when she’d run track against Lavinia Meyers in high school, her toughest opponent in all of paranormal-ville.

  She ran harder because she knew—she knew what Leah had done, and there couldn’t be much time left—if there was any at all.

  If she let it, the horror of it, the sick, twisted plot involved to pull it off would thwart her, wear her down until she wouldn’t be able to move a muscle.

  Leah had buried the kids and Jeff alive.

  * * *

  THEY all came to a screeching halt in the exact spot marked on the map. Harry flung Leah’s semiconscious body down on the ground, the air wheezing from his lungs.

  Nina had wrapped Guido’s wound with Harry’s shirt, pulling it tight under his arm to stop the bleeding.

  Wanda grabbed Mara’s hand with trembling fingers, looking out at the vast expanse of nothing but snow-covered ground and miles of rock. “Where are they, Mara? I can’t smell anything! I know these kids now. I know their scent!”

  Marty lifted Leah up by the front of her shirt, shaking her so hard Mara heard her teeth rattle, then hurled her back to the hard surface beneath their feet. “Tell us where the children are now!” she screamed down at a broken and battered Leah, her hands balled, the wind pushing at her slender body.

  “You’ll never find them. Never, ever.” Leah wheezed a giggle from the ground before Nina planted a foot on her chest and drove it into her flesh, making her scream in pain.

  “Shut the fuck up, fruity, or I’m gonna shoot your ass myself!”

  Harry began to pace, his heart thudding in his ears like thunder itself. He sniffed the air—nothing. Jesus Christ, there had to be at least a million square miles of rock. Piles and piles of rocks. It was getting colder by the minute, and he couldn’t smell them. What good was this damn werewolf thing if he couldn’t smell them? “I don’t get it, Mara!” He yelled the words over the wind that had begun to swoosh in heavy gusts. “How can they be here? I can’t smell them either!”

  Mara dropped to the ground on all fours by the first grouping of rocks, stacked taller than he was. She placed her ear to it, her hair flying around her head in a tangled mass of ebony. “She’s covered their scent with something. Now, shhh! Listen, Harry! We have to listen! Listen and look—look for anywhere the dirt is soft.”

  The stacks of granite were endless. Why weren’t they ripping them apart? What good was all this superhuman strength if they didn’t use it? Harry’s hands reached to the top to begin pulling the rocks down, away from their tiny faces.

  “No!” Mara screamed, bolting upright and pushing at him. “Don’t just start haphazardly throwing things around! What if they cave, Harry? If I’m right and they’re under this mess, we can’t afford for it to collapse!” Squeezing his hands, Mara fell back to the ground, pressing her ears back to the sharp edges of the rocks.

  She was right.

  Fear clawed at his throat, terror ripped a hole in his gut, but he dropped on all fours right along with her and listened.

  “They’re going to die. Everyone’s going to die.” Leah laughed on an ugly gurgle of blood. “There’ll be no playing mommy for you!”

  Harry’s eyes flew to Leah’s body but feet away from him and he fought the urge to rip her face off.

  Nina leaned down next to her, raising her fist up high, she brought it down on Leah’s jaw, the crack of impact slipping to his ears on the wind. She hauled Leah with her, clamping her ankles as she, too, dropped on all fours and listened.

  His chest was tight—so tight he thought he’d never take another breath again without laboring.

  Focus, Harry. Find the kids. Donna will kill you if you don’t find the kids.

  He began crawling along the face of the rocks, his ear scraping the ground as he went, inching his fingers across the rough edges, willing himself to focus.

  Donna’s gone, Harry. She’s never coming back. You’re all they have. They need you. Find the kids, Harry. If you do nothing else with this werewolf gig, use it to help you find the kids. Listen. Listen for Mimi’s breathing—you know it. You’ve heard it a million times while she napped on your lap. You know the pattern.

  But what if she wasn’t . . .

  Don’t think about it, Harry! Find the kids.

  And then he heard it. That slight hitch, the adorable little hiccup Mimi always made when she was sound asleep.

  Use your ears, Harry—follow the sound. He crawled. He crawled for all he was worth.

  His eyes grazed something—something plastic—caught up in the formation of rocks. His eyes focused on it, rounding in horror.

  He yanked it from between the rocks, examining it. It was just like the straw from the juice boxes the kids were always trying to convince him that Donna had let them have.

  He’d have never seen them without his new eyesight. Not in a million years. And in that second, he was grateful—so grateful.

  He couldn’t stop the mere second or two of horror—at the mental instability it took to do something like this, but when it passed, he began screaming, his voice hoarse and raw, the
cold wind biting and unforgiving. “Here! They’re here!”

  CHAPTER

  20

  All at once, five pairs of hands began digging; dirt flew in frozen clumps, tearing at Mara’s knuckles, ripping her flesh. Shards of rock broke and scattered, and she had to remind herself to slow down. If this caved in . . .

  “Slowly!” she screamed, remembering the intricate way Leah had designed Carl’s trap. If this was anything like that, Leah would have designed it to fall on the kids and Jeff. “We have to be careful not to jar it or it will cave!”

  Oh, God. Please, please don’t let it fall.

  Marty was bleeding, too, tears streaming down her face, flecks of dirt in her blond hair, as she dug right alongside Wanda.

  Wanda’s nylons were shredded, her shoes lost, her prim driving gloves falling away from her fingers with each drive of her hand into the wall of rocks.

  Harry began screaming Mimi’s and Fletcher’s names while Nina anchored Leah with her knee in her chest. She yelled into the face of the crumbling tower, “Auntie Nina’s coming, kiddos! Hang tough, Jeff!”

  As they widened the hole around the straw, Mara caught her first peek of Mimi’s purple hat. Joy welled up inside her, the most unbearable joy she’d ever experienced. “Here! Mimi’s here!”

  “Fletch!” Nina called out next. “I found Fletcher!” she hollered above the screeching wind.

  “Jeff!” Wanda and Marty screamed simultaneously, digging faster.

  Leah’s head lifted suddenly, howling her rage. “They’re all dead! Dead, dead, deader than doornails!” she keened.

  “Shut up, you crazy nutbag!” Guido screamed before the final shot of the night rang out, scoring Leah’s skull. He fell back on the ground with a grunt, the gun falling to the frozen ground.

  Tears stung Mara’s eyes, but she looked straight ahead, steeling herself, willing herself to dig until her hands touched flesh. Mimi’s flesh.