Forgotten (16 page)

“It was probably someone playing a cruel joke, so I’m in no more danger than you,” Katrina said dismissively.

“I would rather let Mom and Dad be the judges on whether we’re in danger or not,” Jessica replied stubbornly.

“Jess, I overreacted. I shouldn’t have even said anything. You’ll just worry about me constantly now.”

“Damn right I’ll worry! What if the person who attacked you last year has come back to finish the job?” Jessica protested. “I know that you want to handle this alone, but who knows who this is or what he’s capable of?”

“Okay then, answer me this: Why now?”

Jessica sighed, frustrated. “I don’t know.” She raked her slender fingers through her long blonde hair. “Maybe – and this is only me speculating – but maybe whoever thought that you wouldn’t remember anything because of your injuries somehow found out about the cheerleading try-outs today and thought that if you’re well enough to try-out to be a cheerleader then you might be well enough to be able to identify him.”

“But I don’t remember anything!”

“
We
know that, but obviously he or she doesn’t, and now that you’re going back to school and stuff, maybe you’ve got him or her running scared.”

“Jess, I seriously doubt that.”

Jessica stood and took Katrina by the shoulders to stop her from pacing and to turn her so they faced one another. “I really think we should tell Mom and Dad.”

“No! Promise me that you won’t breathe a word of what we’ve talked about to another soul.”

“Okay, if that’s really what you want then we’ll keep it between us. But I will be keeping a closer eye on you from now on,” Jessica replied reluctantly.

Katrina’s posture relaxed, and some of the tenseness ran out of her. “Thank you. It means a lot to me.”

“It’s getting late; we should really get some sleep.” Jessica let go of her foster sister and returned to the door. At the threshold, she turned and said, “I’m going to go now before I say something stupid that I’ll end up regretting. I just want what’s best for you, even if you can’t see that right now. Night, Katrina.” She left and closed the door.

Katrina watched the door long after Jessica had gone, running through the past few days’ events: the nightmares, the threatening messages, and her general unease.

Why is this happening to me?
Katrina wondered.

Katrina sat down at her dressing table and took off her heart-shaped pendant. Gripping it tightly in her hand, Katrina felt her eyes burn with tears.

“Suzanne, where are you?” she whispered into the night.

Finding Suzanne on the porch swing with Flopsey on her lap, Emily asked, “You okay?”

“Hmm.”

“You look pensive,” Emily continued, sitting down next to Suzanne on the swing. Emily handed her friend a chicken salad sandwich. “I thought you might like a snack.”

Suzanne smiled, the appreciation not quite reaching her eyes. “Thanks. I’ve just been thinking about stuff.”

“Want to talk about it?”

“Not really,” Suzanne sighed.

“Suzanne, all this pent up anger isn’t good for you. When was the last time you hunted?”

“What has that got to do with anything?”

“Because you need to feed.”

“Feed?” She picked up the sandwich and waved it, bemused. “I’ve got this.”

“I meant as your wolf self.”

“And what will happen if I don’t?”

“If you don’t feed soon you’re going to get more and more aggressive until the wolf completely takes over! You’ve been a werewolf long enough to know that!”

“Emily, stop with the scare tactics.”

“Suzanne! You know I’m telling you the truth.”

“Okay, I admit that I do feel more edgy than usual – but that is because Marcus has been acting like a jerk lately, not because I haven’t been feeding.”

“Suzanne,” Emily said sternly, moving from the swing to the porch step. “You need
blood
.”

“I’m not a vampire!”

“
Animal
blood.”

“It’s a common misconception, perpetuated mostly by vampires, that werewolves only drink an animal’s blood. We actually normally go for the liver, but we would eat the heart and lungs too, as well as drink blood.”

“Ewww,” Emily wrinkled her nose in disgust.

“That’s no worst than what you do when you feed.”

“That’s different.”

There was a silence for a while, before Suzanne asked, “Emily?”

“Yes?”

“When you followed Starr last night, did she lead you anywhere?”

“I wish I could give you good news, but when she hit the wood at the edge of town she changed into a wolf and we lost her.”

“You’re probably going to think I’m crazy, but I’m going to go after her myself!”

“Suzanne, she nearly killed us yesterday and we still don’t know why you couldn’t change. Please reconsider this!”

“I need to do this.”

For a moment Emily stared at her. Then she shook her head in disappointment and returned to the house.

They don’t understand, but I’ll show them
, Suzanne thought as she ran a hand over Flopsey, stroking him gently. She stood and placed her rabbit back in his hutch.

Sniffing the air carefully, Suzanne detected the faint lingering scent of Starr’s cheap perfume carried by the breeze. Looking at the fence that surrounded the backyard, she gauged its height. There would be no need to change into a wolf to climb over the eight-foot high fence this time. So, taking one final look and giving a heavy-hearted sigh toward the house, Suzanne ran at the fence and scaled it in one jump, swung from an overhanging branch, before landing, and heading through the neighbors’ backyards in the direction of the woods.

“Where’s Suzanne?” Marcus asked as Emily walked in alone.

“Probably still on the porch swing,” Emily replied.

“She’s not,” Jonathan said from the doorway.

“What?” Emily raised her eyebrows in surprise.

“She’s not out there. I was out there a moment ago and she’s gone,” Jonathan clarified, walking into the room and sitting down.

“Then where is she?”

“The hell if I know!” Jonathan put his feet up on the coffee table in front of him. “I thought that she was grounded or something.”

“She probably came in and went straight upstairs,” Marcus said, attempting to reassure Emily.

“No, Marcus. We would have heard her; it is Suzanne we’re talking about here,” Emily reasoned.

Marcus leaned against his desk, his brow furrowed. “You’re right. So if she’s not outside and she’s not upstairs, where else would she be?”

Emily bit her bottom lip apprehensively. “Well, she did mention that she wanted to go after Starr. But Suzanne is not that stupid, right?”

*

Jessica was in the kitchen, sat at the table eating her breakfast, when Katrina arrived. Katrina ignored her; instead she went to the fridge to her milk for cereal, and the cranberry smoothie she had had to have twice a day since leaving the hospital.

“So have you reconsidered telling Mom and Dad?” Jessica asked.

“I haven’t changed my mind.”

“But …”

“Jess, you promised!”

“I know, but you’re in danger! You’re being
stalked
.”

“I got one note and one crank call. I don’t count that as being stalked and neither will the police.”

“But you got attacked!”

“Change the record, already! All I want to do is forget about it and get on with my life. The only thing from my past that I care about is finding Suzanne.”

“I meant it when I said that I want to help you,” Jessica said, “but we don’t have anywhere to start from. She could be anywhere.”

“Well.” Katrina paused and sat down at the kitchen table to think. “She’s younger than me, so she’d be in school.”

“How do you know that?”

Flustered momentarily, Katrina’s mouth flapped before she managed to say, “I can’t explain how I know; I just do.”

Jessica frowned. “How much younger?”

Katrina rubbed at her temples uneasily. “I wish you would stop asking me these questions that I can’t answer.”

“Are you okay?”

Katrina took a sip of her smoothie. “Er, yeah. Sorry. I’m just trying to remember Suzanne’s age and it’s giving me a headache. And I never feel like myself in the morning.”

“You remember what Doctor Clairmont said about remembering stuff, right?”

“I know, I know; I’ll remember when I’m good and ready, so I shouldn’t strain myself.” She sighed, got to her feet and began to pace the kitchen. “Jess, what am I going to do?”

“I’m here for you, okay? No matter what,” Jessica reassured her. “Right, enough with all this negativity and tears! If we want to find Suzanne we need two things!”

“And what are those?” Katrina asked, sitting back down.

“A positive attitude and a small army.” Jessica grinned. “Seriously, though. You need to keep upbeat.”

“That’s easier said than done. Where do we start looking?”

Jessica frowned. “I suppose where all this began …”

“The football field at Clayton Falls High School,” Katrina finished.

“Yep. Do you feel up to going back there?”

“No, but if going back will help me find Suzanne then I’ll go. I’ve got to!”

“Okay. Well in that case, let’s go now.”

Katrina felt a knot develop in her stomach.

“You okay?” Jessica asked as she saw the look of discomfort in Katrina’s face.

“Yeah, I’m fine.”

Jessica stood up and headed for the door. “I just need something from my room. I’ll meet you outside in ten.”

After Jessica had left, Katrina quickly finished the rest of her cranberry smoothie and added their used breakfast things to the growing stack of dirty dishes in the sink. She stopped to look around, noticing how safe and normal everything was. Her eyes moved from the sink to the milk that she absentmindedly found herself putting back in the fridge, to Shelby sleeping peacefully in his basket, to the two squirrels she watched scampering across the backyard through the kitchen window.

Everything’s normal apart from me
, Katrina thought. Then:
Stop it! Jessica said be to be upbeat and that’s what I’m going to be.

Shaking away her thoughts, Katrina collected her favorite denim jacket from the hall closet and went outside to wait by Jessica’s car, an chili pepper red pearl 1998 Jeep Wrangler Sport 4x4, that was parked in the driveway.

As Katrina waited for Jessica, she felt the small hairs on the back of her neck stand on end and had the feeling that she was being watched. Nervously, she looked up and down Ridgefield Drive, the tree-lined street that the Sinclairs lived on; it was almost deserted apart from a large gray dog that was looking at her from across the street.

Jeez, I’m so paranoid! No one’s watching me or going to jump out from behind a bush to attack me
, Katrina thought.
I wish Jessica would hurry up though!

Looking again, she spotted the dog further up the street. It had gone behind a tree.

“I can see why you would find that tree across the street so fascinating!” a voice said gently in Katrina’s ear.

Katrina jumped and let out a little yelp in surprise.

From behind her, Jessica laughed, “I’m sorry.”

“Don’t sneak up on me like that!”

“I didn’t sneak up on you,” Jessica replied with a grin.

Katrina gave herself a mental shake. “I guess with everything that’s happened recently I’m still jumpy.”

“I know that you’re nervous; you always overthink things. But I’m with you every step of the way and the sooner we start looking, the sooner we’ll find Suzanne,” Jessica said. She climbed into the driver’s seat of the car and wound down the passenger side window. “Are you coming or are you just going to stand there all day?”

No reply.

“Katrina!” Jessica called, more loudly this time.

“Um – sorry, I guess I wasn’t listening.” Katrina opened the passenger door and climbed in.

Jessica pursed her lips and eyed her foster sister, her car keys in her hand as she paused before turning on the ignition. “You’d tell me if something was troubling you, right?”

Katrina turned from the window back to Jessica. “It’s nothing.”

“Katrina?”

Katrina bit her bottom lip. “You’ll think I’m crazy.”

“I already think that!” Jessica joked.

“Jess, just look out of the window.”

Jessica fixed Katrina with a puzzled look, but she obliged, and angled her rearview mirror to point where her foster sister had been looking, searching for the cause of her angst.

“What am I suppose to be looking at?” she asked.

“That dog across the street. Right outside the Shepards’ house!”