Marked (The Pack) (28 page)

I decided not to ask anymore questions in case Louise changed her mind. I bolted to the driver’s seat and had my seatbelt snapped in place before she got in.

“Does this mean I can start driving myself instead of taking the four-wheeler?”

“What? You don’t like the four-wheeler anymore?”

I started the engine and we rolled down the drive. With a wave of her hand Louise indicated a side road that led deeper into the park and I turned.

“I do still love the ATV, but it’s not so great when it’s raining or when you don’t want to mess up your hair.”

Louise laughed. “I guess you’re right, maybe next summer when you actually have your license.”

I kept driving and didn’t comment. I had already decided not to think about next summer.

Thirty minutes later, I steered into the parking lot of Aucoin’s Seafood Market and Restaurant, a really mundane name for a strange lady like Angeline. We took a seat in a booth near the back of the eating area where no other customers were sitting. A young woman took our order and disappeared.

“What will you guys do now that day camp is over? Will you stay here or go somewhere else?”

“Oh, I guess we’ll be here in Lebeaux for a month or so longer, then we’ll leave.” Louise positioned and repositioned the napkin with her silverware wrapped inside. “It will be a group decision. We’ll meet in a few weeks and decide where we need to be. Then we’ll go.”

I sat without speaking, staring at the bubbles forming around my straw in the glass of soda the waitress had brought. I opened my mouth to speak, then closed it.

“What?”

I looked up. “You wouldn’t tell me where you were going even if you did know, would you?”

The wry smile Louise gave me answered the question, but she spoke anyway. “No, I wouldn’t, and neither should Myles or Brynna, so don’t put them on the spot by asking.”

“I won’t.” I took a swallow of soda and felt a shadow fall over us. Angeline stood at the end of our booth. She stared at us for several seconds before sliding into the seat beside Louise.

“So, this one is finally learning all the secrets of her heritage.”

“Just the ones she needs to know.”

Angeline frowned. “That’s no good to her, is it?”

Louise gave the woman a hard stare. “It’s the way it’s going to be.”

The old woman met my aunt’s glare. “Maybe for today, maybe tomorrow too, but not for long. You can’t let this one go her own way, Lou.”

Choosing to ignore the woman’s warning Louise changed the subject. “What about the boy in the cemetery? I thought you were going to be able to help prevent some of the attacks. I thought you had this town protected.”

My glass jumped as the old woman banged her hand on the tabletop.

“Don’t you be puttin’ that on me,” she hissed angrily through tight lips. “I have no power in that place. Why you not askin’ this one. She was there. I saw it in the blood, saw her there and the other who led her away.”

If I could have shoved myself into the cushion of the banquet, I would have. I wanted to disappear, but obviously the woman could see me no matter where I was, so what was the use.

“I… I tried to stop them. One of them tried to kill me.”

The woman sneered at me. “Kill you? They won’t be killin’ you girl.” She turned on Louise. “You should never have brought this one here. I was wrong to think this was the best place for her. We had enough troubles without her. Now they only be gettin’ worse. It’s because of her.”

Angeline’s voice had reached a shriek. She pointed a bony finger across the table at me.

“Grandma, enough.”

The girl from the shop in New Orleans, Raina, appeared and caught Angeline by the arm. “They need you in the back. The gumbo isn’t right.”

She pulled the older woman from the seat and propelled her toward the back of the restaurant where the kitchen was. I sat in stunned silence while Louise stared at the table. Raina appeared again with plates of food in her hand. She placed the steaming boiled shrimp in front of us then pulled a chair from one of the tables and sat at the end of our booth.

“Forgive my grandmother. She’s upset and doesn’t always know what she’s saying.”

I started eating then paused. “So you guys cast spells to keep werewolves away.”

“Sort of. We can weave spells that force them to turn back to their human form.” She glanced at Louise who nodded before she continued. “The werewolves with the virus can only pass it in their wolf form. They have strength and powers in human form, but the virus only appears in them when they change. When they come to an area we have been able to place the spell on, then they change back to human form.”

“So why not just put a spell on the whole world, then they couldn’t be werewolf and could never pass the virus.”

She laughed. “It’s not so simple. The spell doesn’t last for long and there are forces in the universe that defy our spell, areas that the spell doesn’t work, like the cemetery. We are constantly perfecting the spell, changing it so it works better, renewing where needs be.”

I continued eating and decided not to ask anymore questions, simply because the more I asked the more there was to know. The voodoo women and the Lycernian pack appeared to be working together. I wasn’t sure if that was information I should have, even if Louise had given the okay. What if she was right? If I knew too much someone might want me dead.

“Oh, I brought the painting for you, Alexis.”

I’d been so intent on not listening, I jumped at the sound of my name.

“What painting?” Louise asked.

“The one in the store?” I interjected, momentarily ignoring Louise’s question. Raina nodded and I to Louise.

“When I went to New Orleans with Channing, I saw this painting of a black wolf in a shop. Raina was there.”

“It’s my store,” Raina added.

“Right. She had this painting in her store that was so amazing and at the time I was having those wolf nightmares, which turned out to not be nightmares after all.” I stopped to catch my breath. “Anyway the painting seemed so alive. But I’m not even sure if I have enough money to pay for it.”

Raina shook her head. “It’s a gift. I don’t want you to pay for it. I believe it should be yours.”

I glanced at my aunt, who was frowning. “Is it okay if I have it?”

“It sounds like a very expensive gift.”

Raina and Louise stared at each other and Louise’s frown deepened. “She should have the painting, Louise, to take home with her as a memento of her summer here.”

Louise nodded slowly. “Fine then, as a memento.”

“We’ll put it in your car when you get through eating,” she said to me. “Now enjoy your meal.”

When Raina left, I glanced at Louise. “If you really don’t want me to have the painting, I’ll tell her later that I can’t take it home with me.”

“It’s fine. I wasn’t so sure you’d want to remember this summer.”

“Like I could forget it, painting or not.”

“I guess it has been kind of monumental for you.”

I nodded. “Monumental.”

If she only knew how much more was about to be added to my summer when I tried to help find the new strain of virus. Louise might have another word for it, like horrifying, or maybe even deadly.

Chapter Twenty-Eight

The sun had started a slow descent behind the trees on the edge of the lake. There was still just enough light to do what I needed to do. I shifted in my chair and glanced at Channing and the other girls. The three of them were leaning over a magazine discussing the latest drama of a Hollywood starlet.

“So are we going to get started now or what?”

The girls sat up and looked at me.

“Are you ready now?” Channing asked, dropping the magazine to the ground.

“Even though my aunt lets me stay out after dark now, she still makes me come home early. I have to be home by ten unless there’s something special happening.”

“Your rules are really boring,” Jana said as she stood.

I shrugged. “Nothing I can do about it. I’ll be going home soon and won’t be able to do this with you guys much more.”

“She’s right. Let’s get going.”

We all followed Channing to the boathouse and went inside. My mouth felt dry and I could hardly make the words come out.

“You know I’ve been reading about different ways of changing forms. It was in a book at my aunt’s house. There were some interesting things in it.”

“You’ve been around Brynna too much with all the book info.”

Channing elbowed Jana. “Leave her alone. She may know something good. I didn’t know any type of book existed.”

It didn’t, but I did my best to believe I’d actually read such a book rather than having made this whole thing up. I needed to be convincing.

“Yeah, it’s really old. Anyway, there’s this one thing young werewolves do that’s really cool. They stand in a circle and hold hands and then change at the same time. It’s supposed to open your mind and make you more powerful when you change.”

“The blending of the group’s powers.” Channing said, nodding.

“That’s right.” I breathed deeply, deciding the story did have a mystical ring of truth to it. I’d decided to add the part about increasing your powers at the last minute, and now, even to me, it seemed plausible.

I took a step toward Channing.

“Are you going to take your clothes off so they won’t get torn?” Jana asked as she peeled out of her own t-shirt.

“No, I wore this old stuff so it wouldn’t matter.”

“I don’t care about this stuff I’m wearing either.” Celina tossed a bag with more clothes onto the pile the other girls had brought in the boathouse earlier. “We’ll all come back here to change, right, just in case we get separated?”

“Right, but let’s not get separated, okay?” Jana said.

I watched the two girls. “Why would we separate?”

Channing waved her hand dismissively. “You know, we meet others, split up and go with another group.”

“Oh.” I didn’t admit that I knew nothing of the kind. With my aunt we’d always stayed together. Anyway, I couldn’t worry about what might happen once we had changed. I had to concentrate on looking at Channing’s inner wrist.

Stepping forward, I grabbed the tall blonde’s hand leaving Jana to take a place beside me. Celina joined the circle between Jana and Channing, directly across from me. A surge of adrenaline shot through me before I’d even focused on my becoming. My vision blurred, eyes closing reflexively.
Breathe, eyes open,
I reminded myself, trying to focus so I could watch Channing morph into her wolf self. With one more breath, the power surging inside of me ebbed and I tilted my hand exposing the other girl’s pulsating wrist. On my right Jana groaned, then growled, now in her full wolf form. She spun and left the boathouse racing into the night.

In my left hand Channing’s hand was twisting, growing and suddenly there it was, on the wrist. I stared, not believing what I was seeing. But Channing’s hand fell away and became a forefoot with golden fur. My chest tightened. I couldn’t breath. A growl gurgled in my throat. Power and energy radiated in every cell of my body. I dropped to the floor giving my silky black coat a shake.

Night had settled fully onto the lake and its backwaters when I stopped for a drink. From where I was, I could see the lights of Myles house through the tree branches. A body moved in front of a window and a spicy smell reached my nose. My stomach rumbled. I realized I’d eaten nothing all afternoon. The sound of Beowulf’s bark reached me. I turned my head to look again. The little dog stood on the porch sounding much more like a one-hundred-pound Doberman than the twelve-pound min pin he was.

A tree branch crackled in the forest. I knew Channing and the other girls were back. They were waiting on me, ready to go. I wasn’t sure how I could tell, but it was true. It was like their thoughts came into my mind, not in detail, but the general idea of what they were thinking. I paused in mid step. What if my thoughts appeared in their head? Any ideas of what I was doing, of the plan we had, I immediately wiped from my mind. But of course, to do so I did think of them, for a moment. Channing was in the lead out front and hadn’t changed her gait. Hopefully, she hadn’t seen anything. Louise had told me some werewolves could read the thoughts of others. I had no idea if Channing was one or not. If so, I might have given away the whole plan. That is if we still had a plan since Channing wasn’t carrying the mutated virus. I’d clearly seen the mark on her wrist for the plain virus. Ahead of me, she shook her golden coat and quickly changed direction.

We headed away from the lake for several minutes. Just when I was beginning to wonder what they were doing, a familiar smell came to my nose. The woods ended abruptly and I found myself standing next to the other three in a well manicured yard. Ten feet away was the object of this journey. Channing gave a low growl and took a step forward the boy. Jared, my favorite little camper, stood, dropping the toy he was playing with and waited, unafraid. Run, I wanted to scream. Immediately, his eyes turned to me and he smiled. Run, I screamed at him in my mind. The smile left his face, but he didn’t move. The three wolves next to me advanced two more steps, beginning to spread apart. I growled fiercely and they paused. I knew I only had a few seconds before they attacked. I might be about to end any chance we had of getting more information about Channing, but I knew with every part of my being I would not let this happen.