“Hey. I just wanted to check in and see how you’re doing today.”
His familiar deep voice sent goose bumps racing down my arms and legs. I couldn’t help smiling at my memories of last night, at least the good one of his kiss when he had arrived. “I’m fine, although I’m doing a lot better now that you called.”
“Then I’ll have to call more often.”
“That sounds good to me.” I could only imagine the love-struck smile that tugged at my lips.
“Did your parents get home soon after I left?”
“I’m not sure since I went up to bed. They were here when I woke up this morning.”
“And you were okay? I mean after I left,” Noah said hesitantly, his voice worried.
“Yes, of course. Why wouldn’t I have been okay?” I really didn’t need him to answer that. The strange wolf and the person sneaking around in the woods last night appeared in my thoughts, but I wasn’t about to bring them up. As far as I was concerned, it would be better if we both forgot about them. “Dakota was here.”
He laughed softly. “You’re right. What am I saying? He’s not one to mess with. You were definitely safe. I hope he’ll learn to trust me someday.”
“He will. Just give him time. He can be leery of strangers.”
“Well, hopefully I won’t be a stranger to him for long.” Noah paused, and just when I was thinking of a way to change the subject, he continued. “Have you thought any more about what you saw?”
“Not really. I’m trying to forget it.”
“What about telling your dad? Just to be vigilant.”
“No way,” I said quickly. “If my dad thinks there was someone out in the woods, he’ll put the entire town on lockdown and I probably wouldn’t be allowed out of his sight. If it happens again, I’ll tell him. I’m just not ready to sound an alarm over something I’m not sure of. It happened so fast that now, looking back, I think it could have been the shadow of a tree blowing in the wind. It was really dark.”
“Laken, I know you have your doubts, but I would feel a lot better if you told him.” It was almost as if he was pleading with me. Why couldn’t he just let it go? I had told him several times that I wasn’t sure about what I’d seen.
I sighed, frustrated. I knew that I had really seen a person in the woods last night even though a part of me truly wished that I had been mistaken. Obviously, I wasn’t doing a very good job of convincing Noah that it had been my imagination. “I’ll think about it, okay? But that’s the best I’m going to do right now.” As images of the night before flashed through my mind, I twisted a lock of hair around my finger. “I just wish none of this was happening. It’s hard to believe that about a month ago, things were pretty boring around here.”
It suddenly hit me. Xander and his father moved to town a few weeks ago, right about the time the golden-eyed wolf appeared. Although, for the most part, Xander seemed harmless, I had to admit that his intense stare sometimes scared me. And then there was his reclusive father who locked himself up in their remote house with an alarm system and a driveway gate. Maybe the jewelry making was just a cover story. Did Xander and his father have something to do with the wolf? Could Xander be the person I had seen last night?
That’s crazy, I told myself. You spent an entire day with him last weekend and he was a perfect gentleman. Not to mention how warm and friendly his father was. Despite my thoughts, I couldn’t shake my suspicions. I distinctly remembered him watching me in the school parking lot last week. There was something I didn’t trust about him, I just didn’t know what it was yet.
“Laken?” Noah’s voice broke me out of my thoughts. “Are you still there?”
“Yes, sorry,” I said. “I was just thinking about something.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s nothing, really.” It was one thing for me to suspect Xander, but I didn’t want to plant any suspicions in Noah’s mind unless I could prove them. “I was just thinking about how safe I used to feel. We never locked our doors for as long as I can remember, and now everything is different. It’s not the way it used to be.”
“I’m sure it will all blow over in time,” Noah said, but something in his voice told me he didn’t believe his own words.
“I hope you’re right. But until then, at least I have Dakota.”
“Just promise me if you see anything suspicious, anything at all, you’ll let me know right away.” Grave concern lingered in his voice.
“I will,” I promised, a warm glow coming over me as I realized he cared about me.
“Good. Well, I need to run and you probably need to get back to whatever you were doing.”
I glanced across my desk at my books. “Calculus homework,” I groaned.
“Sounds fun.”
“You’re welcome to come by and help,” I offered.
“No thanks,” he replied quickly. “But I’ll call you tomorrow, okay?”
“Yes. I like hearing your voice.” I also hoped that he would stop by school one afternoon like he’d done last week.
“Me, too. I’ll see you soon,” he said, leaving me to wonder if he had read my mind.
After a quick good-bye, I hung up the phone and set it down on my desk. I reached for my Calculus book, but I found it extremely hard to resume concentrating. My thoughts bounced from Noah’s kisses to my suspicions that Xander had been watching us from the woods. My homework seemed to be worlds away as I stared straight ahead, entranced in my thoughts.
Finally, with a deep sigh, I picked up my pencil and resumed writing what I could only hope were the correct answers to the Calculus problems.
***
“Where were you Saturday night?” I fired my burning question at Xander the first chance I got Monday morning which happened to be at my locker before homeroom. I had been in the midst of organizing my books when I sensed him behind me. Without hesitating, I spun around to face him as I glanced around to make sure no one, specifically Marlena or Carrie, was listening. I didn’t even want Brooke or Ethan to hear this. I hadn’t told them about the person in the woods Saturday night, and I didn’t want to.
I stared up at Xander, watching his reaction. The other students milling in the hallway were a blur behind him. He didn’t answer immediately, but rather gazed at me curiously, his ice blue eyes meeting my stare.
I was quickly mesmerized by his gaze and handsome features. Somehow he didn’t seem as intimidating as I remembered, but that could be because his blue jeans and khaki colored shirt weren’t as dark as the black clothes he wore so often.
“Good morning to you, too,” he finally said, his voice laced with sarcasm.
“Are you going to answer my question?”
“Not until you tell me why it matters to you.”
I sighed deeply, staring at him. He obviously wasn’t about to answer me until I explained why I was asking. I folded my arms across my black sweater.
“Fine.” I glanced around to make sure no one was listening. “I saw someone in the woods behind my house Saturday night,” I stated quietly.
Xander glared at me incredulously. “And you think it was me?”
His reaction made me wonder if asking him point blank had been a good idea. “Well, was it?” I asked slowly, deliberately.
“No, of course not. If you must know, I was out with Marlena Saturday night. Unlike you, she accepted my invitation to the Homecoming dance.”
My mood suddenly darkened on two accounts. First off, I knew he was telling the truth. Marlena would never let a guy she was dating out of her sight on a Saturday night. And secondly, jealousy rose up inside me at the thought of Marlena and Xander together.
“Oh,” I said. “Okay. I’m sorry. It must have been someone else.”
I shook my head and started to turn back to my locker when Xander grabbed my upper arm. I stopped, looking up at him.
“Why would you think I was in the woods behind your house like some kind of psychopath? Do you really think I’d do that?” he asked
softly in a hurt voice.
“I don’t know. I barely know you.”
“But you think I was stalking you? Trust me, Laken, that’s not my style. If you don’t want to go out with me, I get it. I’ve moved on. If you want an alibi, just ask Marlena. I’m sure she’d be happy to tell you exactly what we did Saturday night.”
“That won’t be necessary. But if you must know, sometimes, you--you scare me a little,” I admitted reluctantly. I looked up, meeting his blue eyes. “Like when you corner me here at my locker.”
He instantly dropped his hand away from my arm. “Were you scared of me when we went hiking?”
“No. That was actually nice. But last week, you acted a little strange after you asked me to the dance.”
“And I apologized for that.” A faint smile formed on his lips. “Look, there’s a lot you don’t know right now, but once you do, you’re going to understand where I’m coming from.”
“Then tell me,” I challenged him. “You’ve been dropping hints like this since you got here. Why can’t you just come out with it?”
“Because it’s not that easy. You wouldn’t believe me, anyway.”
“Try me.”
“Not so fast. First, tell me what happened Saturday night.”
I shrugged, not wanting to talk about it. “It’s nothing, really.”
“That’s not true. You said someone was in the woods behind your house. Were they watching you?”
“I don’t know. It was really dark. I saw something move between the trees and I thought it was a person, but it was hard to tell.” I glanced away from his stare, aimlessly watching the other students as I suddenly wished he would drop the subject.
“This isn’t good,” he muttered, looking away from me before his gaze settled on me again. “Listen, Laken. I need you to trust me. I’m glad you told me about this. If it happens again, I need you to tell me right away. Even if it’s in the middle of the night, just call my cell phone,” he said seriously. “This is really important. Do you promise to tell me if it happens again?”
I knew he wouldn’t accept no for an answer. “Sure. But I just hope it never happens again.”
“Yeah,” he agreed with a deep breath before abruptly changing the subject. “So what are we doing for our History assignment?”
Grateful to talk about something much less frightening, I grinned. “How about the Underground Railroad?”
Xander smiled, pleasantly surprised. “You mean slaves escaping to Canada?”
“That’s right. One of the routes went straight through New Hampshire. In fact, a house in town was part of it. I haven’t been in it, but I’ve heard it has a lot of secret hiding places.”
“Wow. All I could think of was the Mayflower or the Boston Tea Party. That’s a much better idea. I knew there was a reason I picked you for a partner.”
“You didn’t have a choice, remember? Everyone else had already teamed up with someone.”
“I know.” He paused, leaning in close. “But I only wanted to work with you,” he whispered into my ear.
As he raised his head, my eyes met his again and my breath caught. Tingling shivers raced through me, and I swallowed nervously.
The moment ended abruptly as Xander looked down the hall. I followed his gaze to see what had ripped his attention away from me so quickly. Shiny blonde hair bobbed above the heads of the other students in the distance. Xander backed away from me, his eyes locked on the crowded hallway. “Hey, I’ve got to run. We’ll get started on the project soon. Don’t forget what I said earlier.” He shot one last quick, almost apologetic smile my way before dashing off into the mob of students.
I sighed with disappointment, watching him until he disappeared into the crowd. With a frown, I turned back to my locker, my mood suddenly as dark as the midnight black sweater I wore.
Chapter 19
Rain moved into the area Tuesday morning and pummeled the region for several days. Heavy, moisture-filled clouds hung in the sky, shielding the blue heavens with their low cover. I trudged to school and home each day in my dark green rain slicker, holding my black umbrella high above me as I ran from the parking lot to school each morning and then back again each afternoon. The steady rain filled dips in the pavement with puddles and saturated the grass. By the time I returned home each day, my shoes and ankles were dripping wet. But the rain didn’t bother me one bit. Noah called nightly, lifting my spirits as if the sun had found me through the dense clouds.
The miserable weather also made me feel safer. Hopefully, whoever had been in the woods Saturday night wouldn’t return in the pouring rain. And Dakota needed no convincing to stay in and gnaw on raw chicken. He never minded a light misting drizzle, but he only ran outside for quick bathroom breaks at my insistence during monsoon-like downpours.
On Thursday afternoon, I headed to my locker after the last bell rang to get my things before I was to meet Xander at his truck in the parking lot. We had decided to check out the library in Littleton that my mother had told me about.
As I walked down the hall, my phone buzzed in my book bag. I hurried between a few students, bumping into one of them in my rush to get to my locker where I dropped my book bag on the floor and knelt beside it. I reached into it, feeling around blindly for my phone. When I finally pulled it out, I had a text from Xander. Something came up. I’ll meet you at the library at four-thirty.
I sighed. That figured. Now I would have to drive there by myself instead of riding with him. Perhaps this was a blessing in disguise. I hadn’t been too thrilled at the idea of being alone with him for thirty-minutes on our way to Littleton. At least now, I would only have to endure his company at the library while we started our research.
I dropped my phone back into my bag and stood to sort through the books on my locker shelf. Once I had the ones that I needed for the night, I reached for my dark green rain slicker. I slipped it on over my purple V-neck sweater and blue jeans, not bothering to pull my braided hair out from under it. Then I reached for my umbrella before shutting the locker door. As I turned with my book bag strap over one shoulder and my umbrella in my hand, Brooke emerged from the crowded hallway. A navy rain slicker cloaked her shoulders, her shiny red hair brushing against the hood that folded behind her neck.
“Hey, Laken,” she said smiling. “Want to grab some pizza in town? I’m so sick of this rain. I just don’t feel like going home and being trapped inside one more night.”
“I can’t. Xander and I are meeting at an old library in Littleton to start working on the research for our History project.”
Brooke wrinkled her nose. “I don’t even have a topic yet and you’re already starting? I wish you would tell me what you guys are doing. You seem a little too excited about it.”
“I’ll tell you soon enough. But for now, he made me promise I wouldn’t tell anyone.”
“I still can’t believe you ended up with him for your partner. I’m working with Abby and, while she’ll do a good job, it won’t be nearly as much fun as it would be with a hot guy.”
I laughed. Sometimes Brooke’s mind seemed to be stuck in the gutter. “At least you won’t be distracted.”
“Are you admitting that you will be?”
“What?” I gasped. “No, of course not,” I lied, trying my hardest to keep a straight face.
Brooke stared at me with a knowing look in her blue eyes. “Good try. You can’t fool me. I can tell you have a thing for him.”
As I frowned, feeling heat flush my cheeks, a male voice suddenly interrupted us. “A thing for who?” Ethan asked from behind Brooke.
“Xander,” Brooke answered quickly, glancing up over her shoulder at Ethan with a bright smile.
Ethan shot her a secret smile and then looked at me, but not before I noticed his brown eyes softening the moment he looked at her. He shrugged. “Where have you been, Brooke? That’s old news.”
I groaned and rolled my eyes at both of them. “It’s not news at all, so can we please stop talking ab
out this?”
“Only if you give me an idea for this stupid History assignment,” Brooke pleaded.
Ethan’s eyes widened in mock surprise. “You and Abby haven’t picked a topic yet? You’d better get a move on it. It’s due tomorrow.”
“I know. What are you doing your project on? I need help. I’m getting desperate.”
“So what’s new?” Ethan teased with a warm smile.
She turned and playfully slapped his shoulder. “Hey! Just for that, you’re taking me out for pizza before I start on my homework tonight.”
“I’m always up for pizza. Laken, are you coming with us?”
“I can’t. I’m going up to the Littleton library with Xander. I think I mentioned that earlier, remember?”
“Oh yeah,” he said thoughtfully. “But I think he may have left already. I saw him running down the hall a few minutes ago. He looked kind of upset. What was that all about?”
“I have no idea. He sent me a text a few minutes ago saying something came up, so we’re meeting at the library instead of carpooling up there.”
“Maybe Marlena beckoned,” Brooke piped up.
As Ethan and I stared at her, her teasing smile faded. “What? Let’s face it, they are an item,” she defended.
I sighed. “You’re right. And it’s none of my business. All I care about is that he shows up at the library on time to help me with our research.” I glanced at my watch. If I left the school now, I would get to the library about thirty minutes earlier than Xander. I could use that time to get a head start. “I think I’m going to take off. I’ll see you guys tomorrow, okay?”
“Yep,” Brooke replied. “But I’m not going to tell you what Abby and I come up with for our History project until you’re ready to tell.”
“That’s only fair.” I waved to them with my free hand before turning on my heels and plodding through the crowded hallway to the double doors. Once outside, I paused under the overhang to open my umbrella. Rain poured from the sky, pattering into the puddles that shimmered in the sidewalk dips.
Shadows at Sunset: Sunset Trilogy ~ Book 1 Page 26