The Better to Bite (21 page)

“Yes,” her disgusted voice followed me. “I guess that would pretty much be the whole school.”

My gaze snapped up to her. “What are you talking about?  You’re Team VIP!”

She blinked.

“Uh, you’re the popular one,” I tried to explain. “Head cheerleader and—”

“Only because Kristen broke her leg at the beginning of the summer.” She wasn’t touching anything. She looked too afraid to touch anything. “If she hadn’t, I would have just been another girl in the line.”

Huh. “Every time I see you, you’re surrounded by people.”

Now her smile was bittersweet. “And how many of them do you truly think give a shit about me? When the wolf came after me in July, right after Brent’s big party for the Fourth, how many people do you think believed my story about the attack?” Her hands fisted. “They
laughed
at me. Said I was drunk. No one listened to me because no one cared.”

Been there, done that
.

“No one…” Her eyes darted to a smashed photo of Granny Helen and Cassidy. “But her.”

And now Helen was gone.

I inhaled on a slow breath. We didn’t have a lot of time. I figured deputies would be coming by to search the place soon.  My gaze scanned the wreckage once more. All of the books in the shop were on the floor, flipped open, some with pages ripped out. Drawers had been yanked out and tossed across the room.  Rage, yes, but…more.

“Someone was looking for something.” But what?

“From the looks of this place,” Valerie said, frowning, “I’d say he must have found it. I mean, come on, just look at—”

“He didn’t find it.” I spoke with certainty now. “That’s why the place is so wrecked. He got angry when he didn’t find what he was looking for.”

“Yes, well…” She rubbed her arms. “We’re not gonna find anything in this mess. Whatever the guy was looking for, it’s long lost by now.”

I felt that slight internal shift in my body, the one that told me that my
difference
was kicking into play. “The attacker lost something,” I said, to push my power or gift or whatever the heck it was into better focus. “I want to find what he lost.”

I took one step toward Granny Helen’s back room. Another. Another. I could feel the pull. The beaded curtains had been yanked down so I walked straight inside that back room and found more wreckage waiting for me. Tarot cards littered the floor. The death card stared up at me.

“We should get out of here,” Valerie muttered, voice tense. “Like,
now.”

“Not yet.” I knelt in front of that death card. I picked it up and stared at the white skeleton as it glared back at me.

“That’s just scary, okay? Let’s go!”

I put the card down and my fingers smoothed over the wooden floor. The surface was old, faded a bit. I pressed against the wood.

“Anna, seriously, we need to—”

A soft snick filled the air and the piece of wood lifted softly. I slid my fingers underneath that crack and pried the wooden slat up more.

“How did you know that was there?” Valerie’s voice had risen a bit.

I didn’t answer her. My fingers touched somethingdeep inside that dark hole. I clutched it tightly, lifted it up, and found an old, leather-bound journal.

The floor creaked as Valerie closed in behind me. “What is that?”

I opened the journal carefully.

1692.

Just a date at the top of the page, one scrawled in shaky, faded hand-writing. The pages had yellowed, become very brittle, and I turned them carefully.

More dates. And…names.

Then one word.
Curse.

I turned the pages faster and faster. At the end of the book, I reached the last entry. Five years ago. I saw the names listed.
Brent Peters, Rafe Channing, Giles Donovan, Catherine Falk…

“It’s a list of them all,” I whispered and excitement had my hands trembling a bit.

“What?” Valerie was right behind me now.

Carefully, I closed the old book. “I have to get this to my dad. Helen—she found a listing of all the cursed families. She knew the wolves!”

A door squeaked open. Not a door at the front of the shop. The back entrance, the door just a few feet away. My head whipped toward that door, and I saw Cassidy standing on the threshold. Her eyes widened in surprise. “Anna? Valerie? Wh-what are you doing here?”

The journal was a heavy weight in my hands.

“You
broke
into my grandmother’s shop?” She continued, her voice hardening as she took in the scene and advanced on us. “Why?”

I held the book tighter. Time to get this all out in the open. “Because I wanted to find out who hurt her.”

“An animal attack, it was—”

I shook my head and her words stopped. “You know the truth, Cass. You have to.” She’d lived with Helen. Helen had surrounded herself with magic and mystery. How could Cass not know? “You were the one who told me about Haven and the witches who came here—”

Cassidy swallowed. “That’s just a story. I was messing with you. I don’t…”

Her words trailed away, as if she couldn’t even bring herself to finish what she knew was a lie.

“Haven
is
cursed.” It was Valerie who spoke now. “A wolf came after me—”

“It came after me, too,” I put in quietly.

“And it killed your grandmother,” Valerie finished.

Cass stared at me, eyes wide.

“But it wasn’t an ordinary wolf.” I gripped that journal tightly, aware of Valerie close to my back. We were in this together. “It was someone who lives here, in Haven, someone who was cursed. Someone who changes into a wolf and kills.”

No change of expression crossed Cass’s face, but she swallowed, once, twice, as if choking back emotion. “She always told me to keep silver close.” Her gaze dropped to my necklace. “She wanted you to have the silver, too.”

To keep me safe.

I realized then that, yeah, Cass understood the truth, even if she hadn’t wanted to admit it, not even to herself.

Her eyes squeezed shut. “You know who the wolves are?”

Her voice sounded too hollow. Too broken. I nodded, then realized she couldn’t see me. “I do now.”

Her eyes opened and dropped to the journal. I saw understanding in her sharpening gaze. She held out her hand. “Give me the book.”

I didn’t. Right then, I didn’t trust what she’d do. I could practically feel her rage spreading to fill the room. “They aren’t all bad, Cass—”

“
Bullshit!”
Her voice snapped like a whip. “A werewolf freaking killed her! He ripped her to pieces! Don’t stand there and tell me they’re not—”

“One wolf.” I braced my legs and lifted my chin. Valerie was dead silent behind me. “Not all of them. You can’t punish them all for what one—”

“Can’t I?” Cass laughed, and I really didn’t like that mocking sound. The pain and fury were pushing her too far, twisting her. “If what you’re saying is true, they’re all cursed. All monsters, and maybe it’s time someone took them all out.”

“You don’t mean that.” I hoped she didn’t. “You’re upset. You need to just—”

“I need my grandmother back.” Her smile was cold and bitter. “But I’ll settle for putting the bastard who killed her in the ground.”

This wasn’t the Cass I knew. “Let my dad—”

“Do what? Let him find more bodies? Let him protect the wolves?” More laughter, the kind that held a crazy edge.
Too much pain.
“
Werewolves.
Granny told me to watch out for monsters. She told me they howled and clawed, but she never told me that she meant actual werewolves! She never told me they were real!”

And I suspected why. “Because she wanted to protect you.” As much as she could.

A tear slid down Cass’s cheek. “But I could have protected
her.”

Now it was too late.

Her dark gaze dropped to the journal. “Give it to me.”

I wanted to help Cass, I truly did, but… “No.” Because right then, I didn’t trust her. “People’s lives are in here, we can’t just—”

Cass lunged for me. Valerie screamed. I scrambled back, slamming into Valerie, and holding that journal as tightly as I could.

“
Everybody, freeze!”
Deputy Jon’s voice cut through the chaos.

We all froze. Cass was right in front of me, breath heaving hard. I couldn’t see Valerie. She’d jumped back when I hit her.

“What the hell is going on in here?” Jon demanded, coming in with stomping feet. “Didn’t you see the yellow police tape? This scene is off-limits! You could be destroying evidence, you could be—”

“They’re trying to steal from the shop!” Cass burst out.

I blinked as my jaw dropped.

She jabbed a finger at me. “They broke in here—”

Um, yes, guilty on that score.

“And they were trying to steal my gran’s journal! Make them give it back to me!” I saw the bright, almost feverish light in her eyes.

Vengeance. That was all that Cass wanted right then. I couldn’t really blame her.

But I couldn’t let her out all the wolves, either. Or worse, attack them.

Cass might think she was tough, but I doubted she’d survive a confrontation with a werewolf. So far, not many folks had.

Jon frowned at me. “That true, Anna? Did you break in here?”

Valerie cleared her throat. “I’m pretty sure the door was unlocked, sir.”

Grateful, I fired her a quick look over my shoulder. Wow, she’d moved fast. She was almost out of the room. One foot in, one foot out.

“Hmmmm.” Jon didn’t sound particularly believing. I turned back to face him.

“She’s taking gran’s journal!” Cass yelled, her hands fisted now. “That’s stealing!”

I raised the journal. “You should take this,” I told him.  “Take it, and give it to my dad.”

“No!” Cass was crying and breaking apart before my eyes, and I hurt for her. “Give it to me! Give it—”

But Jon had already opened the journal. His eyes narrowed slightly as he flipped through the pages. When he neared the end, I saw him hesitate. I knew he’d seen what I’d seen—

His name.

Deputy Jon looked up at me and nodded slightly. “I’ll be taking this piece of evidence in to the station.”

My breath expelled in a relieved rush.

Cass started to sob harder.

“Anna, I want you to come to the station with me. I’ve got some questions for you about that unlocked door.”

Figured.

He inclined his head toward Valerie. “You make sure Cass gets back to her aunt’s, would you?’

“I-I will.” Valerie sounded very subdued. A new attitude for her. But then, maybe I didn’t know her at all. Maybe I just saw the outside, what she wanted me to see.

Maybe that’s all anyone ever saw. If we looked past the surface of our friends, would we see monsters inside? Or just lost souls?

I glanced back at her once more. She’d tried to cover for me. “Thank you,” I mouthed the words.

Deputy Jon led me toward the back door.

“This isn’t over,” Cass whispered. She glared at me as I walked past her. “Why would you want to protect them?”

I didn’t get a chance to answer her. Jon’s hold on my hand tightened, and he pulled me outside.

He put me in his squad car. In the back, figured. He slammed the door and hurried up to the driver’s side. He didn’t speak until he was seat-belted in the front. “Are you afraid of me?”

I thought about it for a few seconds. “No.”

He grunted and cranked the engine. “Remember that.”

I’d try.

“How long have you known about me?”

I could lie and say since I saw his name listed in the journal, but what would be the point? “Last night. When you came back in the house.” He’d tried to catch a scent, like an animal would, and his teeth—let’s just say they’d been a bit sharper than normal.

“That journal can destroy a whole lot of families in this town.” He drove forward, nice and slow.

I saw Rafe on his motorcycle. He was staring at the deputy’s car, at me in the backseat, with stunned eyes.

“It can stop a killer, too.” My hands dug into the seat. “And don’t you think it’s time the rogue was put down?”
Rogue.
I knew that term, and I used it deliberately. I’d learned it in a science class, a lifetime ago. A wolf who left its pack.

He didn’t answer. Just kept driving.

Maybe that was answer enough.

***

“I want you to stay in this room, Anna, do you understand?”  My dad frowned down at me. I was sitting in his chair, positioned behind his desk, swiveling from the left to the right. He’d closed the blinds at the door, the better to keep prying eyes off me—and to keep my eyes off the folks on their way to the station.

“You’ve only told me like ten times already, Dad,” I said with a slight roll of my eyes.

“Yeah, and you still haven’t
agreed to stay inside.”

But I didn’t want to miss this scene. Dad had gone through the journal. He hadn’t let me see it again—no big surprise there—but he’d gone through the book, made phone calls, and in his words, “dragged some asses” to get this meeting at the station.

Night had fallen. Thanks to my dad, I knew night wasn’t the best time to talk to werewolves, but night was the best time to have a secret meeting in this town. And that’s what my dad was doing.
A meeting of wolves
.

Rafe had joked that there weren’t werewolf group meetings, but now there would be. My dad was calling out the wolves in Haven.

“There could be a killer among them,” my dad told me, and my gaze dropped to the gun holstered near his waist. I’d bet my college fund that he had silver in that gun. He’d loaded his shotgun with silver, so it only stood to reason he’d armed his handgun with silver bullets, too. “And I don’t want you anywhere in his sights.”

Too late. “He’s already come after me before.” I rubbed my neck. My necklace was chafing a bit. Itching.

My dad’s lips thinned. “He won’t be coming again.”

“And how are you going to find out who the killer is? Get them all together, and then ask the psycho wolf to please step forward?”

He exhaled roughly. “Credit me with some cop sense, would you?”

I stopped swiveling. “Don’t cut me out of this. I want to be there!”

Voices rose from outside the building. The grumpy, annoyed voices of folks who did not want to be coming out at night to meet with the sheriff. They weren’t going to meet at the station, that would have been too obvious. But there was an old, closed-down theater right behind the Sheriff’s station, and I knew all those grumbling voices were headed for that theater.