Purity (20 page)

***

When I first awoke, the darkness fooled me into believing it was night. But as my eyesight adjusted, I noticed pinpricks of daylight coming through the window above the cot. I listened for breathing, or any sign of another person in the darkness with me, but heard only silence. I got to my feet shakily and slid my hand across the window. My fingers came away smeared with peeling black paint.

The bed shifted easily, folding neatly inward when my knee brushed against it. I inched my way around, but there wasn’t much space, and I realised I had to be in some kind of mobile home, a modern caravan maybe.

There was little furniture, and I soon found a door. I tried to open it, but it was locked. The caravan could have been surrounded by werewolves, but I would rather risk an escape than sit around and starve, or worse, wait for them to come to me.

I fumbled around in the dark, feeling past the bed. There had to be something I could use to free myself. I found a small stool hidden under a pulled-out foldable table and decided that was the best I could do. Determined, I took off my cardigan and tore it into jagged pieces, fear for my life giving me strength. I wrapped my wrists and hands as best I could then stood before the largest window. If the window broke,
if
, I needed to be ready to run.

Using the stool, I whacked it against the window. I cringed at the noise and paused to listen. Nobody came running, so I kept hitting until I heard a nice cracking sound. I could almost smell the freedom. Again and again, I lashed out at the window until it finally shattered. I cleared away as much glass as I could before climbing out and half-falling to the ground. I only scratched myself a little on the broken shards.

Ignoring a pain in my ankle, I ran, blinded by the sudden light and still unsteady from everything else. I heard nothing and saw no movements, so stopped a moment to take in my surroundings and try to figure out a hiding place, somewhere to go.

The place appeared to be abandoned. I had been locked in a small neglected camper on a space of grass surrounded by shrubbery. Nothing was familiar. I felt as though I were in the middle of nowhere and might never find life again.

I slipped into the shrubbery, hoping to eventually find a real road or a house. I avoided the dirt track in case the werewolves came back that way in the car, but I tried to follow the general direction of the track to find my way out to a main road somewhere.

I kept moving, sweat running down my back as I listened for movement. After a while, I entered a copse of trees. I wasn’t sure if I should try to cover my scent or hope to expose it. I had no idea how long we had been driving. Had they ditched me?

I pushed on, an unbelievable stitch in my side. I breathed too loudly and stumbled too hard. My head felt swollen beyond belief.

I heard a snarl before I saw the shape approach.

Werewolf.

He crouched as if to jump, and I held my breath. Despite the pain, I ducked out of the way as he leapt into the air. He came at me again, and I fell, kicking out at his face repeatedly, somehow rolling out of the way of his fangs.

I pulled myself up by a tree, landed one good kick in the werewolf’s face, and heard him whimper. He was small, I realised, young. He definitely wouldn’t be alone.

Launching into a desperate run, I only made it a couple of yards before two strong arms wrapped around my waist and dragged me off my feet. I flailed, struggling to get free, but when the hands released my waist, one yanked my hair before I could regain my balance. Whimpering, I froze as an iron grip held my throat.

Dar again. I recognised the earthy smell from his hands.

“Bloody nuisance,” he growled.

I automatically clawed at his fingers, trying to remove his grip from my neck, but the darkness came before I could win that particular battle.

Nathan

We headed home without her. Without any further signs. Without any hope of finding her.

“Why did they take her?” I kept asking. “Why now?”

I knew Byron didn’t have any answers, only unsatisfying speculation. One person knew what was going on, the one person we still hadn’t found. If I had stayed with Opa and kept searching for Vin, if I had gone after Willow’s scent instead of giving up, if I had done something different a million separate times, Perdita might be safe.

Back at the house, Amelia seemed to be spinning around the room, she paced so fast around us.

“What happened?” she demanded. “She’d only just left. I don’t understand!”

“Neither do I!” I shouted. “I was only a couple of minutes behind her. I don’t get how she could just vanish without me even hearing anything.” I paced for a couple of seconds, trying to think. “They had a car. There are one-way streets around her estate, so they may not have driven past me. I don’t remember any cars passing me, but I… I don’t know.”

“We found her bracelet close to the motorway,” Byron said. “She must have left it there on purpose.”

“This might not be our business,” Opa said.

“He scented werewolves at her house. Of course it’s our business,” Byron said firmly.

“Ryan,” Amelia said, “you’re a tracker. You found her before, so you can find her again, right?”

“It’s not that simple.” He shook his head, looking distressed. “I have to be given a clue.”

“What kind of clue?” I spat. “A bloody postal code?”

His lips tightened. “Vin works with humans who see things the rest of us don’t. Psychics, maybe. All I know is that I would be given a location, and I would have to work it out from there.” He glanced at Amelia. “This could be your chance.”

“I have no idea where to start,” she said, her face paling.

“You’ve been with her lately,” Ryan said.

“Yeah, she’s been helping me try to find information on the whole gypsy thing. But we hadn’t gotten anywhere. Joey found some websites, but I haven’t had the chance to look properly yet.”

“If you can trace her, I may be able to track her the rest of the way,” Ryan said. He turned to me. “Does your wolf still see her as mate?”

“Yeah, of course.”

“Good. That may help. We should all go to where you found the bracelet, drive around, and split up to cover more ground. She could have left other traces on her way. If she was able to get away with a bracelet, then who knows what else she did? We have to stay positive, but we can’t let them get further away. If they do, then the only way to find her will be to rely on Amelia, and that might be too late.”

“Don’t say that,” I whispered.

“If Vin has her, it’s for a reason. He may play his hand before we can get to her. Be prepared is all I’m saying.” Ryan’s face hardened. “We should move before the scents fade even more.”

“Right,” Byron said. “Amelia, you stay—”

The front doorbell rang. Repeatedly. We all glanced at each other, a wave of fear thundering through the room.

A scent wafted through the air. “It’s her dad,” I said. “He thinks I did something.”

“Come on,” Byron said in a weary voice, and we followed him toward the front door. “We need to deal with this.”

Stephen Rivers stood on our doorstep, apoplectic with anger. “Where. Is. She?” He ground the words through clenched teeth.

“We don’t know,” Byron said. “But we’re going to help look for her. The dogs are good at picking up scents. We’ll help you find your daughter, Mr. Rivers.”

“Goddamnit, you people did something to her. Something you’re involved in. Where
is
she?”

“I swear to you, if we knew, she’d be back,” Amelia said, getting in front of the rest of us. “Have you called the police?”

“Of course I’ve called the police. I’ve to go to the station and make a proper report and convince them that she hasn’t run away with her idiot boyfriend.” He glared at me. “They’re going to come here, you know. You lot will be top of the suspect list. If she’s here… if she’s…” He bowed his head, and all of the fight left him.

“I’m going to find her,” I said. “I’m going to get her back, no matter what it takes.”

His phone rang, startling everyone, but when he answered, all of our ears pricked up.

“What? Where? Yes, yes, of course. I’m on my way.” He hung up, breathing heavily. “The police got a call from someone claiming to have seen a girl matching Perdy’s description. I have to go with… with pictures. To make sure.”

“To the station?” I asked.

“Screw that,” Mr. Rivers snapped. “To the place they saw her.” He turned and ran back to his car.

 
“We need to follow him,” I shouted.

“Nathan, Ryan, Amelia, with me,” Byron called out. “Dad, Jeremy, take the dogs and follow us. Be ready to run.”

We jumped into the car and followed Perdita’s dad. He drove toward where we had found the bracelet, then he kept going and turned off onto a smaller road, one I had never been on before. A few homes were scattered here and there, and in the distance we saw a police car parked outside one of the houses. Perdita’s dad pulled in behind them, and we followed suit.

Another car appeared before we all got out, and Joey and a man who looked like a chubbier version of Perdy’s dad jumped out, both of them glaring at us.

“What are
they
doing here?” Joey asked loudly.

A policeman who had been to my house before to question us beckoned us over, but Perdita’s father got to him first.

“Are you taking it seriously now? Are you treating it the way you should have after my first call?” he yelled, gripping his walking stick tightly.

The policeman didn’t bother to even look his way. He kept his eyes on us, and his lips barely moved as he spoke. “Mr. Rivers, this isn’t the first time you’ve called us about your daughter. She’s a young adult. She has a history of running. We treat every case with the level of seriousness it deserves.”

“She doesn’t have a history of anything!” Mr. Rivers spluttered. “How dare you imply—”

“We follow procedure. Sir, I’ll have to ask you to step aside. I need to ask these men some questions and figure out what happened here. If you want your daughter home, I suggest you allow me to do my job.”

Byron and I bristled at the garda’s rude tone.

“Are these the men you saw?” the garda asked an agitated woman next to him.

She glanced at us. “What? No! Weren’t you listening to me? Four men. Big ones. Two fair-haired, one with longish brown hair, and one skinhead. The car slowed at the light up at the end of the road there, and the girl barrelled out of it. I didn’t know what was going on, if it was a couple of teens messing about or not, but one jumped out right after her and grabbed her by the hair.” She shivered. “It was so violent, and she screamed like nothing I ever heard before. I ran into the house to get my phone, to get help, and as I was waiting to speak to someone, I looked through the window. I couldn’t see very well at that distance, but they packed her into the boot, and I saw one of them…” She gulped. “He closed his fist, and it looked as though he hit her. I was never close enough to make out the car reg.”

“Was this her?” Perdy’s dad showed her a couple of old photos of Perdy.

The woman frowned. “Maybe. The hair colour is the same. I mean, it was all so quick.”

“Wait,” Amelia called out. “I have a newer photo of her on my phone.” She showed the woman. “Think. Is this her?”

The woman stared at the picture for a couple of seconds. “I… I think so. Oh, she’s so
young
.”

“Which way did they go?” I demanded.

The garda lost his patience. “All right, that’s it. Everyone back off. We’ll speak to all of you in turn, so wait by your cars, and do
not
leave.” He turned his back to us.

“Small-town idiots,” Byron muttered.

As we walked away, we heard the woman give a description of the car and the direction it had gone.

“I’ll ring Jeremy and let him know so they won’t stop here,” Byron whispered.

Joey pushed against me when we got back to the cars. “I know there’s something going on. I know it. You better not be hiding anything that would help find her.”

“Nothing I can tell you will help,” I said. “
I’m
going to find her. As soon as the coppers let us go, I’m going to find her.”