Blood Moon (45 page)

Nick was having none of it, grabbing my
wrist and pulling me back into a strong hug. While I probably
shouldn’t have felt anything but self-loathing, it was hard to
focus on anything other than the way his arms felt around me. For
the first time in weeks, I felt safe.

Then that blanket of safety slowly slipped
away and I felt something else. With my need for revenge satiated,
that hole left by David’s death was slowly hollowed out again, and
I let my grief slip back into place. I fell to my knees in Nick’s
arms and cried. Cried for my loss. Cried for the closure I finally
felt.

I’d killed the monster responsible for his
death, and in doing so, learned she was also responsible for my
brother’s. While this wasn’t exactly the closure I’d been hoping
for seven years ago, knowing what happened to him did give me a
semblance of peace, and, given enough time, I felt pretty confident
that I’d me able to move on from all of this and live a relatively
normal life.

There would definitely be some adjustments,
and I would need Nick’s help to try and control my transformations.
But, for the first time in a really long time, I would be allowed
to grieve, knowing that the person responsible for all of this
couldn’t hurt anybody else.

“
W
hat do you mean
you’re leaving?”

I didn’t blame my father for being upset by
my unexpected announcement. It wasn’t like I gave him or my mother
any warning about my decision. Not that I’d have been able to give
them much anyway; I’d only just decided last night.

It had been almost a week since I killed
Gianna. I never returned to my parents’ house that night, too
rattled to face them then or even the next morning. After leading
me from the abandoned house, Nick took me back to his place where
he made me tea and offered me his bed. I didn’t sleep much, instead
hearing everything he and his Pack discussed.

With Gianna disposed of, their mission here
in Arizona was complete. So what next? They were ordered to return
home to Canada, where they would take care of her existing army. It
was suspected she had planned to start a war with the Pack for
their interference, and Marcus wanted to put a stop to it before
they gained power or appointed a new leader.

I think it was hearing that Nick was leaving
again that stung the most. True, while I was still mourning the
loss of the life I could have had with David, I knew that I
wouldn’t be able to handle Nick leaving me again. He’d been so
great and done so much to help me through everything, so when he
brought up the possibility that I could join him, I jumped at the
opportunity.

He suggested we go before the next full
moon, though, wanting us to be at the compound before it happened,
just in case the shift was forced upon me again. It made sense, and
as much as I hated the idea of leaving my parents before the
holidays without much of an explanation, I knew Nick was right.
This was best for everyone.

I shrugged, looking around my dad’s office.
I let my eyes linger on all of the framed commendations that
decorated his walls, remembering each and every ceremony we’d
attended to show our support. As they traveled more to the left, I
avoided my mother’s eyes as she stood beside me silently. “I know
it’s sudden, but I think it’s for the best.”

“For who?” he demanded, standing up and
pushing his desk chair back so hard it hit the wall behind him.
“Because I can guaran-damn-tee you that it’s not
best
for
your mother and me.”

“Dad—”

“Where will you go?” he asked, cutting me
off. He didn’t let me answer before asking another question. “How
long will you be gone?”

“Canada,” I replied. “Up to the mountains.”
I paused, catching his eyes. “And I don’t know how long. I
just…need some time.”

“Canada,” he repeated, his eyebrows knitting
together with doubt. “You hate the cold. Where will you stay?”

He wasn’t wrong; I’d never been a fan of
sub-zero temperatures, and I was fully aware of the climate
difference from Arizona to the Canadian Rockies, but this was just
something I had to do. Deep down, my dad knew this.

“I do,” I replied carefully. “And I’ll be
staying with…” Unsure of just how much I should tell him, I paused.
Then I realized it was best to be as forthright as possible,
because he would just find out in his own way if I wasn’t. “Nick.
I’ll be staying with Nick. He’s got a place near the mountains.
It’s hidden and away from any major cities, so it’s quiet and I’d
be able to get the space I need right now.”

He wasn’t happy hearing this—I could see it
in his eyes—but he kept quiet, looking to where my mother stood
next to the closed door. “And you’re okay with this, Laura?”

It hadn’t escaped my notice that she’d been
silent this entire time, and I worried because silence had never
been a good thing when it came to Laura Leighton.

Her blue eyes held mine, instantly
transporting me to a time where I was just six years old and being
scolded for threatening to run away. I felt about three feet tall
as her stare burned into me, and I dropped my head, unworthy.

With a quiver in her voice, she stepped
forward and took my hand, showing me her support, even though I
felt the conflict in the warmth of her skin and the tension in her
eyes. “I don’t think we have much of a choice, Keith. She needs
this.”

Relieved to have my mother—mostly—on my
side, I pulled her into my arms, using a little more of my strength
than necessary, which made her stumble slightly before slamming
into me. “Thank you,” I breathed as she stroked the length of my
hair and cried onto my shoulder.

Dad walked up behind me and wrapped his arms
around the both of us, and when we parted, I handed him my gun and
badge, effectively ending my bereavement leave and extending it to
a leave of absence. Even though I knew my first investigation would
never really be solved, O’Malley had taken it over after David
died. It was originally only supposed to be temporary until I
returned from my leave, but now he’d take the lead until it
inevitably ran cold. Clarke was still trying to find the person
responsible for David’s murder, too. He wouldn’t, though, because
she was nothing more than a pile of ash in an alley while her
maker’s ashes mingled with the dirt of an abandoned house.

“What about your place?” Mom asked, wiping
the tears from her cheeks.

“As soon as it’s released, I’ll try to rent
it out,” I explained. “I’ll still have my cell phone, and I’ll call
when we get there and give you the number there, too. This is
just…something I have to do. It’s all just too much.”

With a few more hugs and promises to keep in
touch, I exited the building. My colleagues all wished me well, and
for the first time I realized just how much I would miss all of
them, too.

It’s not forever
, I tried to tell
myself, even though I wasn’t sure if it was entirely true or not.
I’d love to be able to come back, but would I ever be able to exist
in this world, knowing what I am? The last time I tried that,
someone I loved died. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if
that happened again.

Which is why I have to go with Nick. I need
to learn how to fully control what I am.

In my car, my hands trembled, making me grip
the wheel tighter until my knuckles turned white. I was nervous
about what I had to do next, but I couldn’t leave without saying
goodbye to two more people.

I stopped at David’s grave first, kneeling
before his headstone and telling him again how sorry I was about
what happened. Guilt needled at me as I danced around the subject
of leaving town with Nick. If he were here, David wouldn’t be happy
about this, so I assured him that it was because he was gone that I
had to go. I explained that I needed to learn how to control what I
was, and that was all there was to my decision.

Could he hear me? Honestly, I didn’t know. I
liked to believe he was still with me in some way, and if things
like werewolves and vampires could exist, why couldn’t spirits?

Even in the crisp, late-November air, I felt
warmth all around me. It seeped into every pore of my body,
reminding me of the way I felt in David’s arms. With one final
goodbye, I stood and walked through the cemetery until I was at the
foot of Bobby’s grave.

I stood in silence for a minute, not quite
sure what to say at first, but then the one-sided conversation just
seemed to flow naturally. It usually did.

“I’m sorry I haven’t been by in a while,” I
began. “There’s a lot that’s been going on lately.” Everything that
had happened this last month poured out of my mouth. I started with
the attack in the park, the weird changes I went through, the cases
I was working on, and finally the discovery that there was an
unknown world within our own. I imagined the look that would be on
his face when I told him that I was a werewolf, and I laughed,
because I knew he’d find it ridiculous without some kind of
proof.

“Who even knew any of this was real?” I
continued before taking a long pause. “Anyway, I came to say
goodbye. Now that I know the truth about what happened to you and
took care of the thing responsible, I’m going up to Canada with
Nick. I need to learn a little more about what I’ve become and how
to control it.” Another long pause, and I heard the wind whistle in
my ears. I sighed. “I don’t know when I’ll be back—or if it’ll even
be for good when it happens—but know I love you, and that you’re
always with me.”

As the sun continued to set, darkening the
sky slightly, I turned away from his gravesite, ready to leave this
life behind me and find a place in my new one.

The wind picked up again, this time a little
stronger, and the smell that surrounded me seemed…off somehow. I
couldn’t explain it, and it might have been nothing at all, but I
thought back to the smell of the early stages of decay that greeted
me at David’s grave, and I realized that the dirt above Bobby’s
grave smelled strangely clean.

I knew that after seven years, the smell
wasn’t going to be quite as potent—to animals and werewolves alike,
I suppose—but there still should have been something. Even an
unembalmed corpse could take upward of ten years to fully
decompose. Add to the equation a solid oak coffin, and you’d be
looking at double that. Maybe more. Even the grave next to Bobby’s
carried the subtle notes of rotting flesh, and its occupant had
been dead over twelve years.

Curious, I knelt down and sniffed a little
more deeply. I didn’t pay much attention to the few people that
walked by me on their way toward the parking lot, looking my way
strangely or talking in hushed whispers about the strange red-head
who was sniffing someone’s grave.

I smelled the minerals in the dirt, heard
the worms shifting through the earth beneath the thick, green sod,
but that was it. There was absolutely no hint of decay from this
spot, only the subtle notes that continued to carry on the breeze
from neighboring graves.

Frustrated and confused by this, my fingers
curled into the grass, the blades threading between my fingers, and
before I realized what was happening, I started tearing it up. My
heart thumped wildly as my fingers breached the top layer of soil
and I tossed it aside. When I glanced down at what I was doing,
shocked to find I was doing it without my brain having consented to
it, I noticed that my nails had extended into claws, my fingers
longer and in the first stage of transition. It was an unattractive
sight, and something that happened before they retracted completely
and turned into paws. It was also the first time I had directed the
change to one specific body part before. Part of me was proud of
this achievement.

I dug. And I dug. And I dug some more. I
tried ordering myself to stop once I realized what it was I was
doing, but it was a futile attempt. I was on a mission, and nothing
could stop me.

Nothing, that is, except the feeling of my
hand hitting the coffin buried six feet into the ground.

Hours must have passed. The sky was
completely dark by the time this happened, and I was covered in
sweat, my chest heaving with labored breaths. Dirt soiled my
clothes and skin, and it was trapped painfully beneath my claws. I
stared down at the mahogany coffin I stood upon, the full
realization of what I’d just done finally hitting me. My stomach
knotted; I couldn’t believe I disrespected Bobby’s memory by
digging up his grave. Who does that?

Ashamed, I prepared to claw my way out of
the grave when my heightened night-vision allowed me to spot a
piece of wood. Kneeling down, I picked it up and noticed that it
was the same mahogany color as the coffin. The wood surface creaked
beneath me when I shifted my weight, and when I looked down, I
noticed a small crack that led beneath the small mound of dirt
still on half of the coffin. Frantic for answers, I shoveled the
soil away until I fell back on my ass in shock at the sight that
greeted me.

There, in the top half of Bobby’s coffin,
was a large hole, the inside empty. Its edges were jagged, like
someone had broken out. So many scenarios ran through my mind from
Bobby being buried alive and digging his way out to someone robbing
his grave.

Before I could cook up more ridiculous
theories, a voice from above startled me. “It was only a matter of
time before you found out,” Nick said, kneeling down and extending
his hand out to me. “Come on. It’s time I told you the truth about
the night your brother died. You’re ready.”

Slowly, I stood and accepted his help,
finding myself more desperate than ever before for answers.

the
Blood mooN
trilogy continues
in…

Wolf mooN
Coming january
2015