19. Rory

CHAPTER 19

RORY

I took the long way home, trying to work through some of the many emotions that were rattling around inside me after leaving Katrina’s apartment. Unfortunately, I was feeling just on edge, if not more so, when I arrived home an hour or so later. The whole crew was sitting in the living room, therefore shattering any hope I had to try and calm down before explaining to them what I’d just learned. I stormed through the door, letting it swing wildly, and hit the wall with a loud bang. Nic jumped up from her place on the couch and growled, ready for action.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” I seethed. I hadn’t planned on telling them right away and was desperate for some more alone time. I needed to clear my head.

Matt laughed. “Yeah, we can tell.”

“Does it have something to do with that woman?” Cornelius asked. Despite how frustrated I was with Katrina, I didn’t like the way Cornelius said ‘that woman,’ as if she was just some rando who I hooked up with once. “Nic was just telling us that she’s not who she says she is.”

“I know.” I paced back and forth, hoping the movement would burn off some of my anger. “There are a lot of things about her I’m only just now learning.”

“She told you the truth?” Nic sounded dubious.

“She told me something.” I could feel all of them staring at me, waiting eagerly for an explanation, but I didn’t know where to begin. I had no idea how they would react, and I still felt the strong need to protect Katrina, even though I was upset with her. After a few more paces, I realized the movement was only revving me up more, so I went and took a seat on the couch next to Nic. I rested my elbows on my knees and sighed. The group was going to find out soon enough anyway, so I decided just to rip the Band-Aid off.

“She’s a fucking werewolf.”

“What?” Nic gawked.

“There’s no way she’s a shifter,” said Cornelius. “We would’ve smelled it on her a mile away.”

“I didn’t say shifter. I said werewolf.”

None of them said anything for a second, and then Matt broke the silence. “You mean she can only shift on the full moon?” I nodded. He sat back in the rocking chair and whistled low. “Woah. I don’t think I’ve ever met a werewolf before.”

“I didn’t even think they were real,” Nic admitted. “Or maybe I just thought they were a thing of the past. Are you sure she’s telling you the truth?”

“It would be a pretty weird thing to lie about,” I said. “Plus, she seemed pretty freaked out about the whole thing. Apparently, she was hit by some rogue curse while she was in Guatemala. I didn’t get all the details, but she’s only turned once. The first time she became the wolf was on the last full moon. She has no idea what she did that night, but she woke up bloody.”

“Fuck.” Cornelius, who didn’t swear very often, shot me an icy look. “This isn’t good. We’ve worked so hard to keep a low profile in this town. If she brings this kind of attention to herself…” He trailed off.

“We can’t let her do that!” Nic stood. “We can’t let her stay here. I’m going over there right now and telling her she needs to leave town.”

I grabbed her arm and pulled her back onto the couch. “Don’t do that. We can’t make her leave town; we don’t own Solara Bay.”

“But Rory, this could put all of us in danger.”

“I know. And trust me, I’m angry too. But it’s not as if Katrina asked for this. She’s scared and unsure of herself, and you busting down her door and telling her to leave won’t help the situation.”

“Does she know about us?” Cornelius didn’t even try to hide his anger. “Does she have any reason to connect all of this to the pack?”

“No. But she knows that there’s something about all this I’m not telling her. I didn’t do a great job of acting shocked when she first told me, seeing as werewolves don’t exactly scare me. My reaction clearly tipped her off.”

“We need to go,” he said.

“Go where?”

“I’ve been saying we should go back to the compound for a while now, and this is a sign.”

“No fucking way,” I said. “You know I’m never going back there.”

“We don’t have a lot of other options,” he argued. “Things are no longer safe for us here, and based on the news that trickles in from the south, I have a feeling the pack needs us.”

I put my hands up to stop this bullet train to South Carolina. “Just because Katrina potentially poses a threat doesn’t mean we should go back to the compound. They don’t want us there anyway. We never fit in with the rest of them, and I’m willing to bet most of our previous pack members were happy to see us go.”

“Not everyone.” Cornelius’s jaw tensed. “Things have changed.”

“You don’t know that for sure. Just because you’ve gotten a few sporadic letters from people back home, that doesn’t mean you have any idea what’s been going on there for the last two decades! What if the letters are a trick? What if they want us back to kill us?”

“They have no reason to do that.”

“Hasn’t stopped them before,” I sneered.

Cornelius moved like he was going to take a swing at me, but Matt was faster. He got up and put a hand on Cornelius’s shoulder. A fight was unlikely to break out, though I could tell Cornelius was angrier than I’d seen him in a while.

“Okay, everyone, just take a breath,” said Matt. “Things are heated right now, but we can’t be at each other’s throats. There are more important matters at hand. Forcing Katrina to leave town isn’t an option, and neither is us returning to the compound. Not right now, at least. So, does anyone have a different idea?”

Cornelius glared down at me, and I met his gaze. If he wanted a fight, I would give him one. I’d love an excuse to eliminate some of this adrenaline. Matt, however, wasn’t letting go, and after a few charged seconds, Cornelius backed down. “Whatever,” he grumbled. “You know where I stand on all this, but I won’t sit here and argue with you. We should’ve gone back to see how things were going in South Carolina a long time ago, and this latest development only solidifies my thoughts on the matter.”

He walked off in a huff, and nobody chased after him. We all knew better than to do that.

Once it was just the three of us, Matt sat back down and folded his hands calmly in his lap. “Okay, so Cornelius votes that we go back to the compound before your girlfriend has a chance to do any more damage.”

“Which is out of the question.”

“You’re awfully quick to throw out a good idea,” said Nic.

“Now you think we should go back?” I laughed. “I never thought Cornelius would’ve been able to convince you.”

“He didn’t… I’ve just been thinking about some of the people we left behind. I sometimes wonder whether or not we’ve stayed away too long.”

“This is ridiculous,” I said. “We’re not going back! We left that place for a reason, and I, for one, have no inclination to go back. I don’t care if they need us. As far as I’m concerned, my pack includes only the people who live under this roof and no one else.”

“Rory,” Nic said in a soft voice. “You can’t honestly say that you never think about the past.”

“If I can help it, I don’t. What’s there to think about? We saw the pack for what it really was—backward—and we chose to start over on our own. I’m happy here, and up until about three minutes ago, I thought you all were too.”

“We are,” she said. “But?—”

“But we haven’t been able to forget about everything as easily as you apparently have,” said Matt.

I looked down at my feet and tried to control the fury bubbling inside me. Did he really think that I’d forgotten? How could I forget what happened in the past when it was burned into my memory?

The taste of blood in my mouth, the sound of screams in my ears, all of it still haunted me even this many years later.

An image of the day the four of us left South Carolina flashed through my mind. Our parents, who none of us had been very close to, had banded together to celebrate the accidental killing of a human classmate of ours. They had raised us to believe that we, shifters, were a superior race who were meant to dominate human beings and run the world. They didn’t value human life at all, so when a schoolyard fight turned fatal, they had nothing but good things to say to the four of us. I, meanwhile, was grappling with a sickness that could only come from watching the life leave an innocent person’s eyes, and I knew I had to get away from the people who saw what I did as a triumph.

We stole away in the middle of the night, and I never looked back.

“What the fuck do you all think is waiting for us back there anyway?” I asked after a bit. “They’re not going to welcome us back with open arms, you realize that, right? When I said that thing about this being a ploy to lure us into our deaths, I wasn’t kidding.”

“I don’t think they would kill us,” said Nic. “I’d like to believe that my mom wouldn’t let even the pack leader hurt me in any way.”

“She’ll be outnumbered,” I said. “Anyone who has any sympathetic feelings towards us still would be risking their own lives by saying as much out loud. That’s what I don’t understand with Cornelius. He’s the smartest person I know, and yet when it comes to this obsession with going back, he’s just being so naive.”

“You know he misses his sisters,” Nic said in a low voice.

“He feels guilty about leaving them still,” Matt added.

Cornelius was the only one of us who had younger siblings whom he had to leave behind on the compound. He worried for their safety and had even considered smuggling them out with us, but he knew that if he did, the chances his parents would come searching for us would be far greater. On our compound, Cornelius was in line to take over as pack leader once his father died, and his sisters had already been promised as future brides to other powerful packs in the South. Leaving on his own accord was shameful enough, but taking his sisters with him would’ve been a crime that his father would’ve never overlooked.

“Is that who he gets the letters from?”

She nodded. “I’m pretty sure. Though I still don’t know how they get to him since he swears that nobody knows where we have been living all this time… I guess there’s some sort of transfer system. The letter goes from one person to the next to the next until they land in his hands.”

“He thinks we’re at risk because of Katrina, but really, he’s the one that’s been potentially bringing danger to our doorstep by keeping up communication with the pack.”

“Enough about Cornelius,” Matt said, cutting me off before I could really get going on my rant. Perhaps that’s why he did it. “Regardless of who he’s in contact with or how he receives his letters, he’s not what we should be talking about right now. What are we going to do about Katrina? The next full moon is just around the corner, and we sure as hell can’t let her run loose in the town again.”

“I know.”

“Did you explain anything to her?”

“Not really.” A pang of guilt nestled under my ribs. “I was just so upset. I know it’s not her fault, but you know how I feel about humans meddling in this stuff. It’s so irresponsible for people to throw lycanthropy curses around like it’s not a big deal. It took me years to learn how to control the wolf inside, and in the meantime… people suffered.”

Matt and Nic looked anywhere but back at me. They remembered who had actually taken the bully’s life that day. While all four of us had been involved in what started as just a schoolyard scuffle, I was the only one who couldn’t control myself. I was the only one who shifted.

“What I would give to find out who gave her this curse,” I said after a while. “Do they have any idea what they did to her? What they unleashed? She could’ve hurt someone and doesn’t even know it! Someone could be lying in the forest, dead by her hand as we speak. How is she supposed to live with that?”

A hand fell on my back. “The same way you live with it,” said Nic.

I scoffed. “You mean by distracting myself? By doing whatever I can to forget it ever happened? Because that’s obviously working so well, as you two just pointed out!”

“We can help her,” Matt said. “We have to help her. Before something really bad happens. If we don’t, then we are just as responsible for whatever she does next time she shifts.”

“I agree.” I looked up at him. “We need to tell her we're shifters too, so she knows she can actually trust us to help her through everything.”

Nic clicked her tongue. “Before we all jump on the bandwagon of bringing this woman into the fold, there are some things I found out about her while I was doing my research.” She glared at me. “Which, in case you forgot, you were supposed to let me do before you went and saw her again.”

“Do you really want to fight about that right now?” I said. “Because I don’t have the energy, so let me just save us some time. You were right; I fucked up. I’m sorry. Now, can you just tell me what you found out about Katrina?”

She was visibly dissatisfied by my response, but I really didn’t feel like this little broken promise needed to be the priority right now. She sat up straighter like she was getting ready to deliver a speech. “Well, for one thing, her name isn’t even Katrina. It’s Daphne. Daphne Pearl.”

Daphne? Why does that sound familiar?

“She’s a member of the Pearl family,” Nic went on. “They were wealthy and influential people living in a small town on the West Coast. That is until Daphne’s father made some shady business deals and was going to be arrested for tax evasion. He, his wife, and two of his daughters left the States and have been in hiding ever since. Nobody knows where they are, but there are individuals and government agencies that would pay a pretty penny for information leading to their discovery.”

“Daphne!” I said, recalling a memory from one of the first conversations I’d had with Katrina. “That’s what she said she would change her name to if she was given the chance.”

Nic frowned. “Huh?”

“Nevermind. It was just this question I asked her once. It doesn’t matter. Did you learn anything else?”

“Not really,” she said. “But you said something about Guatemala earlier. Is that where she was before she came to Solara Bay?”

“I think so. Why?”

“Because that’s a clue,” she said. “I’ll bet you a million bucks that’s where her parents are currently hiding out, and it gives me a lead to start with when I go digging again.”

“I don’t think you need to keep looking into her. The fact that she told me the truth about being a werewolf without even knowing how I was going to respond makes me think she’s ready to open up about the rest of her life as well. Assuming I didn’t completely close the door on that when I left her high and dry a couple of hours ago.”

“But if I was able to learn the location where her family is hiding out, then we could try to get our hands on the reward money. I say we go to the authorities with this.”

“Are you crazy?” I drew back in shock. “We can’t go to the police with this! They’ll haul Kat—I mean Daphne—in for questioning. They’ll interrogate her about her family, maybe even find a reason to throw her in jail. Aiding and abetting criminals is a crime in and of itself, right?”

“Are you suggesting we sit on this information?” She balked. “Wouldn’t that mean we were somehow aiding and abetting as well?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” I scolded. “That’s not how the law works. Katrina—” I groaned. “ Daphne most likely helped her parents avoid getting caught, which means she could be found guilty of multiple crimes. I won’t put her at risk just because there’s some money to be gained.”

“Maybe she’s trying to help her parents get back into the US,” Nic said. “Did you ever think about that? She could have a whole plan worked out to get them here, and if we get too involved with her, then we could be dragged into this mess. Not to mention, the reward money for bringing the IRS information about the Pearls could help us pay rent for months!”

“I don’t care.” I got up from the couch. “Do you hear yourself? You, of all people, should be able to understand that Daphne isn’t her parents. She shouldn’t be blamed for the choices they made. It sounds to me like she ran away from her mom and dad. She changed her name because she’s trying to carve out a new life for herself, separate from their bullshit. That’s exactly what we did.”

“I don’t know if you can compare these situations.” Nic furrowed her brow. “In fact, I would rather not be compared to that woman in any capacity, thank you very much.”

“What is your deal with her?” I demanded to know. “You’ve been snippy every time she comes up in conversation, even though she’s never done anything to you. Why do you hate her so much? What reason could you possibly have for being so fucking hostile?”

Nic opened her mouth but didn’t have a response. She stuttered through a few uhs and scoffs, but I didn’t feel like sticking around long enough for her to find the words. “While you figure out what the hell this vendetta is all about,” I said. “I’m going to go talk to Daphne. She didn’t deserve to be abandoned like that. I have to make sure she’s okay.”

If Nic or Matt had anything to say about my returning to Daphne’s apartment, they kept it to themselves, probably knowing I was in no mood to be messed with.

By the time I reached the street where Smart Choice and Daphne’s apartment was, my mind was cluttered with all the discarded rough drafts I’d drawn up regarding what I wanted to say to her. I obviously needed to start with an apology and explain why I ran out on her like I did. Then I’d get into the nitty-gritty details of what being a shifter meant, my life as a member of the pack back in South Carolina, and why I ultimately had to leave.

I hoped that by telling her my gruesome, emotionally gutting story, I would be able to impress upon her the importance of being cautious with this newfound power of hers. She needed to understand that as someone who had even less control over herself than an adolescent shifter did, she was a walking time bomb. There was a chance she would never look at me the same again once she found out I had once taken the life of another kid my exact age, but that was a risk I was willing to take. Not only did I want to help Daphne, but I also wanted to keep the wonderful people of Solara Bay safe. This community embraced me and my friends when we first arrived, and I’d always been grateful for the life we were allowed to build for ourselves here.

I couldn’t let Daphne do anything that might endanger them or herself.

Standing in front of the building, I hesitated at the bottom of the steps. There were no lights on in her apartment, so I figured she was asleep. Was this really worth waking her up for?

Yes. Absolutely.

I ran up the stairs before giving myself a chance to second guess what I was doing and raised a fist to knock. When my knuckles met the wood, however, the door swung open.

It had been unlocked and unlatched.

My stomach dropped as I peered inside the dark, empty room and realized something was very wrong.