We rode back to the school in silence.
* * *
The newspaper sat on our kitchen counter, headline blaring “Gas Dril ing to Begin.” Fabulous. I moved it to the far side of the counter and started pul ing stuff out to make dinner. Nobody wanted the gas dril ing—it was dangerous to the environment probably wel beyond the span of the studies they’d done. But nobody could blame the farmers around Junction for leasing their land, either. The economy was in the crapper, and people were desperate for assurances and cash. General y not in that order.
I was digging around in the fridge’s vegetable drawer when I heard the newspaper flop open.
“Dad?” I asked, glancing around.
No one was there. A chil ran across my arms, and I rubbed it away. Maybe I’d left the door open.
Ignoring the newspaper, I stepped to the mudroom. No. The door remained shut. Locked, even.
The newspaper rustled again, and slow as a victim in a horror flick, I turned to watch as the sections and pages rearranged themselves as if a person pawed through them.
Or a ghost.
The sections slapped apart, one fal ing at my feet. The local. “Teen Train Track Suicides Stump Cops.”
“Mom?” I squeaked.
Nothing.
“I’m total y losing it. Thank you, Sophie.” I picked up the paper gingerly, setting it by the sink. I read snatches of it as I made dinner. It mentioned the werewolf connection Hascal and Jaikin had suggested, but only in passing. Instead, they focused on the idea the victims had seemed depressed and might have used drugs causing hal ucinations (although they admitted finding no trace of il egal substances in their systems).
Weird. Werewolves showed up in Junction, then the CIA, and the Russian Mafia, and now there were even more suicides. Maybe normal wasn’t achievable anymore.
I made it through dinner by pushing my food around the plate more than eating it. Dad cal ed to say he’d be working late at the factory, so he wasn’t there to examine my every move. But Annabel e Lee was.
Over the cover of her newest book she watched me.
When I final y rose to scrape my plate, she spoke up. “I saw them kissing.”
My back straightened.
“Pietr and Sarah.”
I sighed. It was one thing to put on a show around me, but to be kissing elsewhere … My stomach clenched, and I was glad I hadn’t eaten much.
“I’m sorry he’s so stupid.”
I set my plate in the sink with a clank. “That’s the problem, Annabel e Lee. He’s not stupid. If he was, I wouldn’t be so, so messed up over him.”
“I’m sorry he’s—” She paused, and I looked at her, waiting. “I’m sorry he’s with her,” she concluded.
“Me too.”
* * *
That night as I finished changing for bed I heard a long and wavering cry outside, a howl that twisted the air the same way it twisted my insides into bows.
“Oh my God, what’s that? ” Annabel e Lee raced into my room, dropping her book on my bed as she zipped past me to yank open the window. “A coyote?”
The cal reverberated off the wal s, fil ing my bedroom with its rich song—distinct, distressed, and powerful. My blood rushed in recognition.
Pietr.
“No,” I whispered. “Definitely a wolf.”
She looked at me as I joined her at the open window. “You don’t seem worried about the horses.”
“They’re safe.”
“What do you think it eats?”
“Everything,” I said with a grin. “But not horses.”
“Why’s it out there? Is it hunting?”
“I don’t know.”
“Wel , what does it want?”
“I honestly don’t know.” I grabbed the window frame. “Come on. It’s cold.” I realized, closing the window, I didn’t necessarily mean the weather outside.
* * *
“Why is he watching you like that?” Derek asked, grinding each word out as we stood in the hal between classes.
I looked around his shoulder. Sure enough, Pietr’s eyes were fixed on me. Sarah was nowhere in sight.
“I have no idea. Maybe he needs to tel me something.…”
“Go.” Derek didn’t bother to mask his disgust but dismissed me in a very kingly fashion. Which irked me. A lot.
Although no hal way in Junction was particularly expansive, something about crossing from one side to the other—to Pietr’s—made me feel like I was embarking on my longest journey ever.
“What’s going on?” I asked, keeping my tone light. “Other than you watching me makes Derek grouchy.”
“I didn’t mean to stare.”
So much for my little ego trip. Stupid heart. Stupid girl.
“We have a lead,” he said, eyes glowing. “A place we think they’re keeping her. Cat and I are going to snoop around more today to pinpoint things. Then we’l free her.”
“That’s great!” But the thril drained away, replaced with a sudden and daunting dread as I realized what it meant. “You’l break the agreement. The CIA wil —what’l they do if you…?”
“Try to free our mother?” His eyes narrowed.
“You can’t.”
He drew back, as far from me as the hal way al owed, his back to the wal , eyes hooded.
My mind scrambled. “Don’t you want to get a look inside first? See the lay of the land?”
He stared at me.
“Pietr. Think.” I glanced up and down the hal . Derek’s eyes burned into my back, and I changed my posture. Stiffened—going for an indifferent-seeming stance. Just another lie as my heart threatened to spil out of my mouth. “I know you want her out. And she’l get out. We’ll get her out. But why risk angering the CIA? What about our progress?”
“Their progress has slowed to nothing.”
Struggling with a reply, I pressed. “What if we wait a little longer? Play this out? Do it their way so we can see how the place is set up inside?”
“Cooperate so they take us into its heart?” He rubbed a hand across his chin and I shivered, remembering the feel of his jaw, the touch of his fingers.
“Yes. Cooperate first. Maybe they’l stil give us what we want,” I insisted.
He closed the smal distance between us before I could catch my breath. He reached out, but dropped his hand, casting a look over my shoulder. At Derek.