Unleashed (5 page)

“My last name’s Sokolov,” he said. “Russian.”

To go with the Vladimir. She was mildly surprised that he wasn’t Native American or something. “Are you from Russia?”

“Nope.” He sounded amused. “I’m from Wolf Springs.”

Now she was afraid she sounded as close-minded as Ed. “What year are you in?” Maybe he didn’t even go to high school. He looked older than seventeen or eighteen.

“Senior, like you. This year’s gonna take forever. I cannot wait to graduate.”

“Same here,” she said, feeling herself thaw a little. He had a great smile.

He touched his forehead, and it took her a second to realize he was reflexively pushing back phantom tendrils of hair. The buzz cut was new, then.

“I’d probably better warn you,” he went on. “Everyone knows you’re coming and there’s been a thousand theories about why. Aside from the real one.”

She thought about Samohi. Over thirty-five hundred students went to her school, and still the new kids got noticed. She supposed that when there was one-seventh the number of kids, it made sense that you got noticed more, especially on a late transfer.

He held up a finger. “News travels faster than you can text. And gossip travels faster. Except you can’t really text here, because we have crappy cell coverage.”

He pushed back more ghost hair again. He caught her looking, and he shrugged. “Sorry. I had to have my head shaved for the surgery.”

“Oh.” She was mildly shocked, but she was too polite to show it.

Unsure what else to do, she studied the next oil painting. It was of a tree, with a deer peering from behind it. In the foreground was a big rock shaped vaguely like a heart. And behind the deer, a shadow, also somewhat heart-shaped. The signature on this one wasn’t M.M., but she couldn’t make it out.

“I was messing with you,” he said suddenly.

“What?” she asked, confused.

“The surgery. That was a joke. Do you always take everything literally?”

She colored. It was true that she’d lost her sense of humor over the past weeks, but he was a stranger. How was she supposed to know when he was full of it?

“What rules were you talking about?” she asked, quickly changing the topic.

“Rules?” He looked from the painting to her.

“Getting invited in.”

“Oh, it’s a court thing,” he said, waving it away. “Some guys at school …” He suddenly looked uncomfortable. “Anyway.”

“Oh,” Katelyn murmured. But a
court
thing? What did that mean? Before Katelyn could prod for any more information, Ed came back with two cans of Diet Coke and one can of beer cradled against his chest, and the discussion was bookmarked. He handed one of the soda cans to Katelyn and the other to Trick and popped the top of the beer for himself.

“No crackers?” Trick asked.

Ed shook his head. “All’s I got in the pantry is spaghetti sauce and rat turds.” He slid a glance toward her. “We got rats, by the way.”

Was that the source of the scratching? She shuddered and decided she wasn’t thirsty anymore. Rats couldn’t get into soda cans, but they could climb all over them.

“Anyone’s a vampire, it’s your pappy,” Trick said. “He lives on air. You cook?”

It took her a minute to track that Trick meant her. “He wouldn’t like what I make,” Katelyn said. “I’m a vegetarian.”

Ed looked at her as though she had informed him that
she
was a vampire. “Hunting’s natural, you know. We’re predators.”

“I’m not,” she insisted, feeling fresh anger. She had never understood hunting. “How can anyone feel good about killing an animal?”

“What you eat from the supermarket …,” Ed began.

“Vegetarian,” Trick cut in. “In search of the wild tofu beast.”

Her temper flared again. “I need to call Kimi,” she told her grandfather. “She hasn’t heard from me and she’ll be worried.”

Neither of them said anything in response and she stared while Trick guzzled down the soda and gave the empty can a little squeeze. Katelyn wondered if they recycled up in the Ozarks. She doubted it.

“Much obliged for the soda, Dr. M.,” Trick said. “I’ll be by bright and early Monday morning.” He smiled apologetically. “Don’t know if Doc’s told you, but we need to leave by six-thirty on account of him living so far away from Wolf Springs.”

“Leave? Six-thirty?” she said. Had she missed something?

“I’m your ride to school,” Trick said. “Didn’t the doc tell you?”

“We ain’t had much time to talk,” Ed offered.

Trick turned to Katelyn. “I paid him fifty bucks. You’re going to class me up.” He headed for the kitchen. He was still in his stockinged feet, and now that she knew they had rats, she winced every time he took a step. She was never going anywhere in that house without wearing shoes. Forget about her bedroom slippers.

Trick reappeared and crossed to the front door. When he opened it, she was surprised to see that it had begun to rain again. He bent over to put on his boots, giving her a great view of his butt—a nice butt—and her grandfather glanced at her just in time to catch her gaze. She turned her head, flushing.

Suddenly the same low moan she’d heard in the truck echoed through the
plink-plink-plink
of the raindrops on the porch stairs. Low, eerie, mournful. It was followed by a hollow thud, and then another, in a pulsing rhythm. A chorus of moans joined in, and then they rose in pitch and intensity and the hair on Katelyn’s neck stood up. They weren’t moans. They were howls.

“Ah, de children of de night,” Trick said in a thick Count Dracula accent. “Vat music dey make!”

“I thought they were starting tomorrow,” Ed muttered. “Dang fools.”

The wolf seminar
. Katelyn brightened. She was willing to bet that those howls were the attendees.

“Is that drumming?” she asked Ed.

He rolled his eyes. “Supposed to go on for days and days.”

“It’s a self-improvement seminar,” Trick said. “A guy named Jack Bronson—”

Ed growled and gave his head a shake, then drank his beer.

“I heard about it on the plane.” Katelyn cut in before he could say anything more. “ ‘We all have a wolf side.’ ”

“Except for me. I’m just a big kitty cat,” Trick said, winking. He stood, pressing his feet into the boots, and she was disappointed that the porch light bleached the green from his eyes. Then he stepped out of the glare, becoming a silhouette once more.

“Keep your powder dry,” he tossed back, then loped into the rain. She was going to see him Monday. An unbelievably cute guy was her ride to school. Her stomach did a little flip at the thought.

“Let’s have dinner,” Ed said, coming up beside her.

“I thought you didn’t have any food,” she replied.

He raised a brow. “You didn’t want company. I got an eggplant Parmigiana ready to microwave. Tomorrow we’ll go to the farmers’ market for fresh vegetables.”

“You knew I was a vegetarian?” she asked him, surprised not only by his “empty cupboard” performance, but also by the fact that maybe he knew something about her.

“Gimme some credit, gal.”

He headed for the kitchen. She thought about the rats and tried to swallow down the acid that flooded her mouth.

“I’ll pass.”

“I might have exaggerated about the rats,” he said over his shoulder. “Trick tends to eat me out of house and home.”

So he hung out with her grandfather? She wondered why. Didn’t he have a family of his own? Maybe it would have been all right if he’d stayed for dinner. He could have been a buffer between Ed and her. She was a little sorry now that she’d acted so put out by his unexpected visit.

“What did he mean by ‘court thing’?” she asked, trailing after Ed.

“A few of the local inbreds tried to pin some break-ins on him. Suspicion was cast, so the judge said for him to make sure he’s invited into any houses he enters. She meant it as a joke but Trick’s made it his mission to follow her orders to the letter.”

“Because … of his kind?” she asked uncomfortably. With the exotic combination of his dark brown skin, green eyes, and striking Asian bone structure, he’d have a modeling contract in five minutes in L.A. But out here …

“Sure. Same as in your school, I’m guessing.”

She was abashed. “Um, California …”

“Right.
Everybody
there is a drama nerd.”

“Drama,” she said slowly. “His kind is drama nerds?”

He walked into the kitchen. “Yeah. Writes poetry, too. No wonder he gets beat up all the time.”

“Is he gay?” she asked. She knew it was lame to ask, but …

He guffawed. “Trick? No. Definitely not. But I’ve ordered him to be a gentleman around you. If he takes one step out of line, you tell me. I’ll set him straight.”

She smiled faintly, amused and relieved by his assessment of Trick, and appreciative of his thoughtfulness. Maybe he wasn’t so bad.

“There’s your connection with civilization,” he said, reaching underneath a cabinet and pulling out a telephone. She stretched out her hand for it just as another howl filtered through the room. He shook his head. “Idiots. Probably all from the city.”

Yeah. From a beautiful city full of cell phone coverage
, Katelyn thought.

She dialed Kimi’s number and Kimi picked up on the first ring.

“Katie!” Kimi shrieked. “Finally.
God
!”

“That’s me,” Katelyn said, smiling at the sound of Kimi’s voice.

“Is it as bad as we thought?”

Katelyn cast a furtive glance at her grandfather, who was bustling around the kitchen. She wished he would just leave so she could have some privacy. She felt weird with him in the room. “You could say that.”

“No upside?”

An image of Trick passed through her mind, but she dropped it. “What’s going on back home?”

“You’re not here.”

“I miss you, too,” Katelyn murmured, swallowing hard. She was afraid she might start crying again.

The microwave dinged and her grandfather made a point of moving around her to get to it. She clenched her teeth. “Well, I’ve got to go—dinner’s ready. I’ll call again later.”

“You can’t go!” Kimi protested. “How was the flight, what’s it like there, and—”

“I do have to go.” Katelyn’s voice trembled as she tried to hold back the tears. “It’s time for dinner.” She was suddenly not hungry in the least. All she wanted in the world was to be home with Kimi and her family.

“You’re probably eating squirrels,” Kimi said. “Oh, my poor baby.”

“Eggplant Parmigiana.” Katelyn had to dig deep to add lightness to her tone. “But the microwave is powered by squirrels.”

A smile flickered over her grandfather’s face. She refused to acknowledge it.

“I miss you so much already,” Kimi whined.

“Same,” Katelyn replied, her stomach twisting into knots. Her friend could never imagine how badly she missed her.

“Okay, go eat with the enemy.”

“Bye,” Katelyn said softly. With all the resolve at her command, she hung up and faced her jailer.

“Want a glass for your soda?” he asked her.

He would never understand her, not anything about her. He didn’t even know what he had done to her by dragging her to this godforsaken place.

He was waiting for her answer. The best she could manage was a nod.

When she finally crawled into bed, she was exhausted. She stared up at the ceiling and listened to all the sounds of the night in this new place. Everything was different than it was back home. Even the smells. She thought she might never be able to sleep, but her exhaustion was so absolute, so complete, that she was out within minutes.

She startled awake hours later and lay still in the dark, heart pounding, as she tried to decide what had woken her. The rain was still coming down hard and she listened to it for a moment, trying to calm herself down. Her mouth felt dry and chalky and she desperately wanted something to drink.

After a minute, she got up and tiptoed into the hall. Her grandfather’s door was closed and she hurried down the stairs as quickly and quietly as she could, wincing when the floorboards creaked beneath her. A bolt of lightning outside threw everything into sudden relief and she jerked as the eyes of the animal heads flashed, staring at her. She squeezed her eyes shut tight and made it to the bottom.

Coals glowed in the fireplace. Suddenly she was back in her house, with her mom. She remembered how soft her mother’s hair was, the lilt of her French accent. How she had fallen apart after Daddy died.…

It’s happening to me, too
, she realized. Then she took a deep breath.
No. I’m okay
.

She stumbled into the kitchen. Moonlight filtered in through the half-open drapes above the sink and illuminated the heavy rains reflected on the peeled counters. She fumbled for the light switch, but it wasn’t where she thought it would be. Feeling along the wall, she still couldn’t find it. Remembering all the dead animal heads, she jerked back her hand, afraid she might run into one she hadn’t noticed during dinner.

Lightning crackled, making her jump. She thought of the mudslides that happened in L.A. when it rained this hard. The road to the cabin was unpaved, little more than a trail. Would she even be able to get to school on Monday? It was Friday now. Would she be stuck in this cabin, eventually running out of food?