Howl (Howl #1) (13 page)

Something about being a wolf wa
s beginning to feel . . .
right
.
When she had questioned her Alpha about if she was destined to become a wolf, he had quickly changed the subject
.

Samara didn’t know for sure, but something told her that she was meant for this.
She was destined.

When she fell asleep that night, s
he had a smile on her face.
 

*

During first period
class
on Monday morning, Samara got the cold shoulder from Emma. She knew that Emma was waiting for her to apologize, but she wasn’t going to. She hadn’t done anything wrong. Besides, maybe she would be happier to not be Emma Taylor’s best friend anymore.
She would finally have the
opportunity to be herself again, which was something that she hadn’t been in a long time.

When Emma tapped Ethan Miller on the shoulder and showed him the new blue sapphire ring that Jason had given her, Samara knew that she was just trying to prove a point. Emma couldn’t stand Ethan or his friends. She thought they were l
osers,
and Miss Social Butterfly wasn’t about to sacrifice her popularity by talking to people who weren’t of
the same social status as her unless it was to put someone in their place.

“What do you think?” Emma
squealed,
waving her hand in front of him and
tilting her nose up higher in the air.

“Is it real?” Ethan asked, grabbing her hand and
pulling it close
r
to his face to examine
the ring. Next
to him, Mark Klein snickered.

“Yes, of course it’s real,” Emma snapped back
, pulling her hand away and brushing it off, as though he had given her low social status cooties
. “Why would you even ask that? I wouldn’t wear fake jewelry! Besides, Jason
Masterson
gave it to me. He wouldn’t dare
give a girl fake jewelry.”

Etha
n shrugged. “I was just asking.
No need to
get your panties in a knot.”

Emma scoffed and
settled
back
into
her seat. As she began text messaging away on her cell phone, Ms. Shay came into the classroom. Today, she was sporting a
mustard yellow
pants suit with a magenta camisole
and matching scarf. Samara knew
Emma was probably trying to resist offering their teacher that makeover that she
so desperately wanted to give her.

“Well, I
just had the most
wonderful weekend! As many of you probably already know, my niece, Lilly, has returned. She won’t be coming back to school for at least a few days, but the most important thing is that she’s home,
safe and sound,
” Ms. Shay said, beaming a wide smile as she handed out
the blank exams.

With everything else that had been going on with her own life, Samara had nearly forgotten that Lilly had came back home. She still wanted to find out what had happened, but she also wasn
’t sure how likely that was. Samara
also wasn’t sure why she even cared so much
. It wasn’t really any of her business, and she generally didn’t like to intrude on anyone’s personal stuff.

She still felt
like she had to know what happened, though.

When Samara
skimmed through the questions on her test
, she drew a complete blank. If she had been taking an algebra test, it would make sense
for her to forget all of the formulas to do the problems
, but bio
logy was her strongest subject. Most girls Samara’s age had no idea what they wanted to do when they grew up, but she had known for years that she wanted to major in zoology or marine biology so that she could work with animals. She often felt like she could relate to them more than humans, which was iron
ic
; now, she had just as much in common with
animals as she did with humans.

Samara tried to focus on the test, but the answers just weren’t coming to her. It was like she was staring at a piece of paper with words on them that held no meaning.
Deciding that there was nothing that she could do but guess, Samara ended up filling in circles to make a pretty
swirly
design.
Grabbing her
tote bag, she tossed her test
face down
on the teacher’s desk an
d hurried out of the classroom.

Her next period was gym class, and she was glad that she was a little early. Her gym teacher, Mr. King, had an emergency so their class was going to
have to sit with Mrs. King, his wife and the school’s Sex
Ed teacher, for the next hour.

Samara breathed a sigh of relief. She wasn’t really in the mood to participate in gym today, anyway. She
wasn’t sure if she would be able to stop herself from whacking someone with a ten
nis racket if they annoyed her.

When Samara walked into Mrs. King’s classroom, her excitement about not having gym class was quickly replaced by disappointment – and nervousness. Apparently,
Luke had
Sex Ed this hour.
He was sitting in the back of the room next to Colby. Samara wasn’t sure if he had seen her, but she turned around quickly to make it seem as though she hadn’t noticed him.

As she glanced on the other side of the classroom, she realized that Jason was also in this Sex Ed class. Jason was staring in Luke’s direction, with an angry look in his dark eyes
, which made Samara wonder again what their fight
at Emma’s house had been about.

Things got even worse when Emma
came into the classroom. Tossing her Coach bag onto her desk, she plopped down
onto her seat
and glared at
Samara from across the room.

Samara turned her head in the other direction, just in time to see Declan come into the classroom. He sat down next to her. “S
ince when are you in my class?”

“Since Mr. King couldn’t be here f
or gym class,” Samara shrugged.

“Well, that’s cool,” Declan replied. “I feel like we don’t get to see each other that much anymore.”
He had a sad look on his face.

“I don’t know what you mean,” Samara said. “We just hung out. Are you tr
ying to imply something?”

Declan shook his head. “
Nah, I just miss you lately. T
hat’
s all.”

Mrs. King came into the classroom just then. She was wearing a red low-cut dress that Samara thought was a little inappropriate for school. Even though Samara hadn’t had Mrs. King yet,
rumor had it that she was nice to the boys.
A little
too
nice.

“
Since we have some extra students,
I think we’re going to do things a little bit differently
today, class,” Mrs. King said, pulling
a chair to the center of the room. “Move your chairs so that you’re si
tting in a circle.”

As the sound of chairs being drug across the tile
d floor
filled the room, Samara
moved her own chair. Declan bumped into her from beh
ind, and Samara glanced at him.

“Sorry,” Dec
lan said. “I’m such a klutz.”

Samara gave him
a small smile, but ignored the weird feeling that had formed in the pit of her stomach. Something about bumping into Declan made her feel
. . .
good
. It was almost comforting. Deciding that she was probably just imagining it because of all of the other crazy things that were going on in her life right now, Sam
ara shrugged the thought away.

“I want us to have an open class discussion,” Mrs. King went on. “Sometimes, many of the questions and concerns that we have about sex and sexuality are ones that are shared by our peers.
It can also help to know that we’re not alone.
So, we’re going to go around the circle, and you’
re each going to tell us something that is bothering you or something that you are curious about.
Emma, we’ll start with you.”

Well, we know that she has a lot of problems. I wonder which one she’
ll talk about first
. Samara recognized the voice that fil
led her head; it was her Alpha.

She glanced around the circle. Luke was staring at her intentl
y. He smirked.

Samara’s breath caught in the back of her throat. Luke
was
her Alpha. He had to be. All of the other guys in
her class were looking at Emma
as she began talking, or were off in their own little worlds, text
messaging or making spitballs.

Samara quickly grew angry. When she had talked to her Alpha last nig
ht, he had said he wasn’t Luke.
Well, he hadn’t said that he
was
Luke, either. He had just ignored her question altogether. Still, she felt as if she had been lied to – and she hated liars.

I hate liars, too. We have something in common.

Samara gritted her teeth, casted an angry look at Luke, and ignored him. She
wasn’t going to play his games.

“Samara McKinley?” Mrs. King asked, reading her name from the clipboard. “I’d like to hear your feelings about this.”

“Huh?” Samara asked.

Mrs. King looked at her over the rim of her glasses. “I would like to hear how you feel about Emma’s
problem.” When Samara didn’t say anything, Mrs. King went on. “
She’s afraid that guys will be . . . turned off . . .
once they hear the number of people who she’s had sex with. D
o you share a similar concern?”

Samara glanced over at Emma, who stared back at her. She couldn’t believe that Emma would say something like that in front of two entire classes of students, especially since Jason was in the roo
m. “No, I don’t feel that way.”

Are you a virgin, too?

Shocked by what Luke had asked, Samara found herself coughing, choking on air. When she glanced over at him, he grinned
at her. She clenched her fists.

“Samara, are you all right?” the teacher asked her, worried.

“I’m fine,” she replied, sinking lower into her seat and feeling her cheeks grow hot in embarrassment. She ignored the rest of the classes snickering.

Mind your own business
, she thought.

OK,
OK, I know how to take a hint.

She couldn’t believe that Luke would ask her somet
hing like that, especially when he was a jerk to her. She also felt s
urprised that he had said ‘too.’
She hadn’t thought that Luke was a virgin because he was a cute boy, even though she hadn’t heard any rumors about him having sex with anyone sin
ce he had arrived in Grandview.

“I’m
afraid that I’ll get a disease or something if I have sex with anyone,” Declan admitted next to her, snapping Samara
back to reality. “It gives me . . .
anx
iety whenever I’m with a girl.”

Samara bit her cheek. Sex Ed was really like a tell-all, wasn’t it? She had never known that Declan was afraid of getting STDs and, even more importantly, she
didn’t know
that he had ever been with a girl.
For some reason, it surprised her. Why hadn’t he told her? They we
re supposed to be best friends.

Reminding herself that she hadn’t told Declan about everything
that
happened with Luke or with her becoming a werewolf, she realized that it was somet
hing else
that was bugging her
. It made her sort of . . .
jealous to know that Declan had been with anyone else. She didn’t ever think about how she would feel if he dated someone because it hadn’t happened yet, but it just felt weird. She couldn’t pict
ure him with anyone . . .
Not that she could pi
cture him with herself, either.

“Samara, how about you? What
are your concerns or worries?”

“Umm, I, umm,” Samara stuttered.
“I’m afraid to get pregnant,” she lied. From across the room, she heard Emma laugh. Samara knew it was because Emma knew the tr
uth – that Samara was a virgin.

“Maybe if you could
get
pregnant by kissing,” Emma whispered to
the girl next to her, laughing.

Your best friend’s a bitch
, she heard the voice say.
And she’s not as hot as she thinks. I think if it weren’t for her boobs, she’d have nothing going for her but a parrot nose and
stringy Barbie hair.