Echo Falls

by McDougall, Jaime

  Shopping with Elle turned out to be more about walking and looking than actual buying, which suited Phoebe just fine. The fresh air and acts of normalcy relaxed her. Maybe she’d stay for a while longer after all. The attack had been a result of being in the wrong place at the wrong time, not bad luck following her around. She jumped to the wrong conclusion and didn’t give enough credit to the fact weird things just happened sometimes.

  She could and would fight for Echo Falls. Here she could feel anonymous if she wanted. At the same time the city offered plenty of lovely little shops, cafés, bars and restaurants all ripe with opportunities to meet new people. With a short walk around the streets, you could pick up all the fresh ingredients to make a truly gourmet meal. Bakers, butchers and even pasta makers had little shops. Not to mention the more luxurious shops with fine wines, sweets, jewelry and spa products. Her shop, her photography business, would have a new place here, too, once she had truly settled.

  They wandered into bath and beauty store and she stopped, wondering what lavender soap made with all pure ingredients including goats milk would feel like.

  “Phoebe.”

  She put the soap back down on the display and looked at Elle, who suddenly had a serious look on her face. Apparently not satisfied with talking inside, Elle gently pressed Phoebe’s shoulder and urged her out onto the street.

  Once there, they stood close to the shop front and Elle lightly placed her hands on Phoebe’s arms.

  “Phoebe, I want you to know you can talk to me. We don’t know each other well, but you look like a person who is walking around with so much weight on your shoulders and it’s killing me that I can’t help you.”

  Phoebe stared at her for a few moments and then lowered her gaze, her shoulders sagging a little. When did I become so transparent?

  “You can talk to me.” Elle said.

  Rather than give into a dangerous temptation, Phoebe forced a smile and asked, “What brought this on?”

  “You look so tired.”

  She studied Elle’s face and saw nothing but genuine concern. Mother to Charlotte and a lot of other people, she guessed. Taking care of everyone and taking in the lost. Well, she’d certainly picked Phoebe out of the crowd easily enough. Phoebe did feel lost and incredibly tired. Mentally. Emotionally. Most of all, physically.

  Before Phoebe could say anything, an annoyingly high pitched voice called out.

  “Eeeeeelle!”

  More of a drawn out squeal than her actual name, both Elle and Phoebe reacted to it by tensing. Elle looked over Phoebe’s shoulder and sighed. She closed her eyes briefly, as if bracing herself. Phoebe turned and blinked when she saw the object of Elle’s wariness.

  She wore a rosy pink sundress with a matching handbag and stiletto heels. Even her nail polish matched, looking more like rosy pink claws at that length. She had her other arm, wrists encircled with gold bangles, loosely through Aidan’s arm. Laughing as if Aidan had said something clever even though he had a scowl on his face, the woman tossed back her long, wavy brunette hair.

  “Mia,” Elle said quietly.

  “She’s pretty,” Phoebe said, equally as quiet.

  “On the outside.”

  Aidan’s expression turned from a scowl to a mixture of surprise and relief when he saw them standing there. Phoebe and Elle walked over to meet them, the four of them then moving toward an alley to get out of the way of the foot traffic. Mia looked around and scrunched her nose a little, but the smile came back to her face as soon as Aidan glanced at her.

  “Elle!” Mia said again. “Funny to run into you. Where’s Charlotte?”

  “With River.”

  She nodded, her bright smile losing some of its life. “She always was good at that sort of thing.”

  Elle pursed her lips for a moment. “Child rearing?”

  Aidan cleared his throat and carefully unwound his arm from around Mia’s. “Mia, you haven’t met Phoebe Martin. Phoebe, Mia Ellis.”

  Somehow, Phoebe figured Mia wouldn’t be up for shaking hands, so she smiled as sweetly as she could and nodded. Mia did the same. The four stood there, Aidan and Phoebe looking at each other, Mia looking at Phoebe, and Elle looking at Mia.

  “Phoebe’s new in town,” Elle said cheerfully. “I was just showing her around a little before taking her to see Aidan.”

  “Oh?” Aidan and Mia asked at the same time. He sounded undeniably hopeful while suspicion edged Mia’s voice.

  “Don’t tell me you forgot,” Elle said to Aidan. Then she looked at Mia. “Phoebe was attacked on the night of the last murder. She and Aidan are working together on the case.”

  Mia arched her eyebrow and studied Phoebe. “You poor thing. Maybe I can -”

  “I think Aidan and Phoebe can handle it on their own,” Elle said.

  Elle and Aidan looked at Phoebe.

  Phoebe swallowed and looked at Mia, wishing she could disappear at will. “Yes. The case. We need to talk. I need to talk to Aidan.”

  “Aidan found her,” Elle said, moving to put herself between Mia and Aidan. “We should let them get on with it. The sooner the murderer is caught, the better.”

  “Elle, dear, it can wait for another -”

  Elle didn’t speak, growl or even move toward Mia. She simply stared. Phoebe looked between the two, suddenly feeling like a pawn in a game of human chess. Mia looked about to protest, but Elle narrowed her eyes a fraction. Mia lowered her eyes and then looked at Aidan.

  “We’ll have to catch up later.” She winked at him and then looked at Phoebe.

  Without a word, she left.

  Elle gave Phoebe a hug and a reassuring smile. She then hugged Aidan, who gave her a kiss on the cheek before she left. Phoebe watched her new friend walk down the street and thought that maybe facing Mia hadn’t been so bad after all. She glanced around and caught Aidan looking at her.

  Well, hello awkward silence. Nice meeting you here, she thought, not meeting his eyes.

  He cleared his throat. “I apologize for Mia. She can be…” He frowned. “Elle and Mia…”

  She smiled softly. “It’s okay. I get it.”

  “You do.” He didn’t sound as if he believed her.

  “I do. Call it female intuition.”

  He held up his hands. “Call it whatever you want as long as you keep it far away from me.”

  She laughed and they began walking down the street. She couldn’t help but sneak a few looks at him as they wandered. He looked like he had a lot on his mind. What are you thinking about, Aidan O’Bryan?

  “So who is River, besides Charlotte’s babysitter?” she asked.

  “River? She dropped out of school when she was fifteen. She’d gotten…” He looked at the people passing by. “She’d been hanging out with a guy who ‘changed’ her. She didn’t handle the change well and the guy left. Elle and Will took her in.”

  She tried to look casually around at the crowd. “They took in someone who had been ‘changed’? They know?”

  He cleared his throat and looked around. “We should go somewhere a little more private to talk.”

  She looked at him, tempted to do just that. Somewhere private to talk, just the two of them. A few months ago, she would have happily taken up the offer. Well, maybe not a few months ago when she’d been content and happy with her now ex-boyfriend. But that didn’t change the fact that the prospect of being alone with Aidan made her think about more interesting things than pleasant conversation. The kind of things that she shouldn’t have been thinking about.

  “I…” She licked her lips. “I have a lot of things I need to do.”

  He smiled. “You’ll have to do better than that.”

  “I don’t know what you mean,” she said, squeezing the tip of her thumb.

  “You push and push, but I told you: I’m here whether you like it or not. You can trust me.” He paused and then said casually, “Unless the problem is that you don’t trust yourself alone with me.”

  She felt a blush rush a
cross her cheeks as her eyes widened. “Don’t you have more important things to do?”

  All the humor vanished from his expression. “My pack and their concerns are always the most important things to me. Right now, you are one of those concerns. One of my concerns. You are an attractive, smart woman. You have the strength to be on your own, come back from violence, and to start a business. So why do you keep running?”

  “I have to,” she whispered, her eyes welling up with tears. Damn him! Don’t start crying in the middle of the sidewalk. You’re stronger than that.

  He stopped and moved to stand in front of her, shielding her from most of the prying eyes of the people walking by. “No, you don’t. Not anymore. I’m not asking you on a date, Phoebe. We need to talk.”

  No. She couldn’t afford to have any werewolves around her right now or ever. She couldn’t in good conscience put anyone else in danger, and just knowing her put others in danger. Maybe not now, but she had no way of really knowing that no matter how much she wanted it to be true.

  “Phoebe.”

  She placed her hands on his chest. “Please stop.”

  He looked down at her hands and she looked at him. Blushing, she let her hands drop and looked away.

  “Phoebe.” He pulled a handkerchief out of his pocket and began to wipe away her tears.

  She took the handkerchief from him and licked her lips. “You don’t have to worry about me, okay? You really, really don’t.”

  “Why is that?”

  She took a few deep breaths, wondering if she could do it. This secret had been safely kept for so long. Only one other person knew. Everyone else was dead. To tell Aidan, to not cut ties with him, could endanger him and his entire pack.

  “I want to tell you.”

  “Then tell me.”

  The foot traffic had died down. No one would hear her if she spoke quietly. If not now, then never.

  She closed her eyes and whispered, “Because I’m a werewolf.”

  When he didn’t speak, she opened her eyes and found him studying her face so intently she blushed again. Slowly, he reached up and touched her face. For the life of her she wished she could read his mind. For all she knew, he could be wondering how best to run her out of town.

  She lowered her eyes. “I’ve been a werewolf for a long time. Before I came to Echo Falls.”

  She kept her eyes locked on his chest, her stomach flipping at his continued silence. I should say something. Her heart beat faster, but her mind remained willfully blank.

  He took a deep breath. “Let’s go somewhere and talk.”

  CHAPTER TEN

  Thomas waved goodbye to the last officer leaving the station and then looked back down at the pile of papers on his desk. The top paper came from forensics. He’d known the moment he saw the return address that the news wouldn’t be good; that department just didn’t work that fast. The letter had confirmed his fears: a personal note from a pathologist he’d dated a few months back telling him to not get his hopes up.

  He cursed.

  He only needed one tiny bit of evidence, evidence that the rest of the police didn’t have to recognize, to prove that they had a traitor amongst the pack. He didn’t like thinking about the possibility any more than anyone else, but his gut told him he was right. Only a traitor would be able to direct the killer to non-pack werewolves.

  “And go back to pick up his clothes.”

  He frowned at that. Had the killer picked up his Were partner’s clothes, or had the partner picked up the killer’s clothes? The former didn’t make sense because Aidan had fought the werewolf off and hadn’t recognized the scent. Aidan knew every scent of every werewolf who lived in Echo Falls, so the Were he fought had to be a drifter. That brought everything back to the killer having pack help to know who to kill.

  He cursed again and rubbed his temples. He’d been over all this before, the same details and conclusions circling his mind in different ways. If he could just think of it in the right way with the right words, everything would fall into place.

  He opened his bottom desk drawer and brought out a folder from underneath the pile. If Aidan knew he had this folder, he would be furious.

  Since the second murder, Thomas had been carefully collecting every pack member’s alibis for the murder times. He’d done it as smoothly as he could so suspicions and accusations wouldn’t start flying, but that only meant his list still had little to no use to them. Yet.

  “You’re working late.”

  Thomas looked up to find Mia standing by his desk holding two coffees in Sophie’s cups. She smiled and walked over to him slowly, her heels clicking on the floor as she walked. She leaned down to place one cup in front of him and then pulled up a chair in front of his desk.

  “Still like it with half a sugar and a lot of milk?” she asked before taking a sip of hers.

  He looked at the coffee, wanting the pick me up but disgusted with the reminder of their past. “What do you want?”

  She sighed and traced her thumb around the rim of the cup cover. Sitting there with jeans and a pale blue blouse, her hair down and little makeup on her face, he could almost convince himself she was a sane, normal human being.

  “I miss you,” she whispered.

  “You didn’t miss me a year ago.” He scowled and looked down at the folder. He needed to keep his big mouth shut and not show her that it still hurt.

  “I know,” she said. “Biggest mistake of my life.”

  He snorted. He’d believe that the day he started believing in Santa.

  “I know you don’t believe me, but I do think what I did to you is the biggest mistake I have ever made. You are a good man and I just didn’t see it at the time I needed to.” She twirled a section of her hair around her fingertips. “I know you won’t forgive me, but I saw your car outside and I thought you might need a coffee. You always did work late when you had a hunch.”

  He looked up at her, at those pretty lying eyes, and saw no ill will there. Then again, he hadn’t seen the lies there before. He had found out the hard way by finding her in bed with another man. But tiredness settled around his shoulders and he couldn’t shake off the need for a coffee. The day had been too long to forgo it. He grabbed it and drank. She smiled.

  “Do you have a hunch about the murders?” she asked crossing her legs. He arched an eyebrow at her and she shrugged. “Like I said, you always work late when you have a hunch.”

  Studying her face, he decided that the shock value and her reaction would be worth sharing his theory. Worst case scenario, he could easily catch her with her wearing those heels. Best case? He had another mind to bounce ideas around with.

  “I think someone in the pack is working with the murderer.”

  She blinked and then shook her head. “No one in the pack would betray the rest of us like that. Would they?”

  So much for shock value. If she knew anything more about the murders than the rest of the pack, she’d trained herself well not to show it. He could believe that she would.

  “Well, it’s the hunch I have.”

  “It seems like a pretty harsh conclusion to come to.” She looked away for a moment and then back at him. “Do you think that new woman has anything to do with it?”

  “No. Not only was she attacked and almost killed the night of the third murder, she couldn’t have known that the other two victims were Weres.”

  She stood up and placed her hand on his shoulder. “Well, I should let you get back to it, then. If I hear anything, I’ll let you know.” She paused at the door and looked back at him. “I will always miss you.”

  He sighed and looked at the door after she’d gone. “I miss you, too.”

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  “How are you feeling?”

  Phoebe looked at the trees whizzing past the truck window and wondered if she really knew the answer to the question. She’d felt nothing but numb since they’d gotten into Aidan’s truck and driven past the outskirts of Echo Falls further into the
mountains. Hearty trees made up most of the view with glimpses of purple mountains in the distance. The sun had set behind them already, sending the damp summer dusk air into fog that snaked across the cracked asphalt of the mountain roads.

  The sounds of the engine and tires slowly made her relax. She’d always loved driving. Only recently had it become about driving until only fumes were left in the tank, racing to get somewhere safe – if that place existed. Out here, in the mountains with Aidan’s silent but strong presence, she could believe it did.

  “You asked me that yesterday,” she said finally. She looked over at him. The drive seemed to relax him as well, the worry and strain on his face replaced by peace.

  “And?”

  “Still sore but mostly healed already.”

  “Because you’re a werewolf.”

  She tensed, the words coming like a physical blow. Yet he sounded more perplexed than anything.

  “Yes.”

  He nodded and then began to smirk. His smirk turned into a smile before turning into a chuckle. She arched one of her eyebrows and looked at him.

  “You know, it explains a lot,” he said, shaking his head.

  “What do you mean?”

  “I couldn’t figure you out. You didn’t care you’d been bitten. You didn’t blink at the existence of werewolves. You didn’t ask questions when you figured out I’m a werewolf.”

  She squeezed the tip of her thumb, tucking the information away for future reference. The chances of her getting swept up into the affairs of another pack didn’t look all that likely, but it hadn’t seemed likely when she’d arrived in Echo Falls either. She needed to be more careful with her behavior. Silly mistakes could only lead to bad things, and she already had more than enough of those. She had to learn to better cover her tracks.

  “Do you have a pack? Did you?” he asked.

  She wrapped her arms around herself and stared out at the road. “No. Not a real pack. I had friends, but they weren’t… My brother…” She sighed. “No. No pack.”

  Relief flooded through her when he didn’t press the subject, though it must have made him curious. Revealing her inner wolf had been hard enough. Other things would have to wait until later. Much later.