Hunted (27 page)

"Open
the door, Cindi."

"Go
to hell!"

I
wanted to yell at her. The anger that had been slowly simmering
before the party was at a roiling boil now and it took all of my
willpower to take a calming breath instead of coming unglued on her.

"Open
the door or I'll call Tristan up and have him come put his foot
through the door."

It
was a bluff. I didn't have his phone number, but it did the trick.
Two seconds later Cindi had the door open and was in my face.

"How
dare you even threaten to get him back over here. I can't believe
that I felt sorry for you. I thought it would be fun to have a sister
I could do things I liked with instead of one who just sat around
like some kind of depressed lump all of the time."

I
started to respond, but she'd already moved into my personal space
and I realized that this could escalate beyond just words.

"I
had this childish dream of us being best friends, but instead you've
done everything you could to ruin my life ever since I got you on the
team. It's just like Mom said."

My
rage hadn't disappeared, but between one second and the next it went
from hot and frothy to a frozen anger that I could feel corroding
everything it touched.

"What
do you mean just like Mom said?"

"You're
just like Dad. You make everything about yourself, you push people
around, you take and take from them to get yourself ahead and then
when they finally start to stand up for themselves, you pull the old
'woe is me' card."

"Mom
told you that?"

"She
told me that and a lot more. Dad knew that we were home when they
were fighting, he knew that I was listening when he called me a
spoiled brat. That's what he does, he hurts people in order to get
what he wants. That's the truth, Adri. That's the truth that Dad
doesn't want you to know."

I
reached up and slapped her, hard. I didn't even think about what I
was doing, but I hit her with enough force that she stumbled into the
wall behind her.

"Let's
talk about the truth, Cindi. The truth is that you
are
a
spoiled brat even though Dad never actually said that. How much have
he and Mom spent on your clothes just over the last year? Two
thousand dollars? Three? How much did they spend the year before that
or the one before that?"

She
tried to get a word in edgewise but I just yelled louder. "That's
Dad's money, Cindi. He slaves away year after year trying to put
something away for retirement, but you just keep sucking him dry. Mom
doesn't help, she just keeps buying more and more crap that doesn't
do anything to actually make her a better photographer. The truth is
that you're a spoiled brat because Mom's a spoiled brat. She doesn't
even bother to cook dinner anymore and half of the time you and I
have to do all of the cleaning too."

"She's
good and you know it, Adri. She's going to be rich and famous and
then you and Dad are going to be sorry that you doubted her."

"I
don't care whether she becomes rich and famous or not. I know that's
hard for you to believe, but that's the
truth
. Tonight I
finally realized something that I should have realized years ago. I
stopped trying in school, stopped trying socially because of you and
her. I stopped working for any kind of worthwhile goal because I let
your example convince me that the only way to get ahead in life is to
use people like the two of you have used Dad. I was wrong, that's not
actually the case, but it doesn't change the fact that I'd rather be
a dirt-poor failure than succeed by knocking the people who love me,
the people who I should love back, into the dirt and walking across
their backs to get what I want without ever thinking about the cost
to them."

Cindi
ran down the hall without looking back. I heard the front door slam
and thought about going after her, but in the end I just waited a few
minutes to see whether or not she'd come back before locking both the
front and the back doors and going to bed.

She
knew where the spare key was hidden. I was done sacrificing to keep
her happy.

The
next few days were surreal. The house was still a mess because I
refused to clean up after Cindi and she hadn't come back after
leaving the night of the party. Our room and the kitchen were both
fine and I did clean up the bathroom, but Cindi was the one who had
planned the party and she was the one who was going to be in the most
trouble if the house was a disaster when Mom and Dad got home.

Some
clothes disappeared out of Cindi's side of the closet sometime
between when I left for school on Thursday and when I got back home,
so she must have ditched school to come back for just long enough to
get some of her things.

Tristan
had pleasantly surprised me by continuing to be helpful without
pushing for some kind of payback for his assistance the night of the
party. He slipped a note into my locker telling me that Cindi was
staying with Missy. I'd been starting to get worried about her by
that point, so it was nice to know, even if it did feel like she was
escaping the consequences of her actions yet again.

Things
with Jackson were still strained at practice on Thursday night. He
still pretended like everything was okay, but he spent most of
practice with Wendy and didn't walk me to my last class. I'd nursed
some kind of childish hope that I'd been wrong, that he hadn't really
been freaked out by my inviting him to Cindi's party, but it was
obvious that I hadn't misread that particular set of signs. Seeing
him nearly every day at cheerleading practice hurt a lot more than I
expected it to.

It
wasn't even the whole almost-boyfriend part of things either, it was
the simple fact that I didn't have anyone to talk to about all of the
craziness that was going on with Cindi. I probably would have even
started opening up a little to Tristan if he'd been around more, but
apparently his coach was extra worried about the game on Friday
because by the time we made it out onto the field they were already
practicing and they kept going until after Miss Winters released us
to go home.

The
rest of the cheerleaders were as bad as I'd expected them to be. I
heard an almost constant stream of whispered insults whenever I was
around any of the other girls on Thursday, but apparently they were
still wincing from having to pay for my new clothes because nobody
did any more than just talk.

It
was pretty clear that the battle lines had been drawn and it was
Missy, Cindi and everyone else against me. Sheree was the only one of
the girls who didn't actively hate me, which meant that the rest of
the cheerleaders were starting to exclude her too. She was too good
of a person to just turn on me because everyone else was being mean
to her now, but I could see that it was taking a toll on her. Sheree
was so nice that usually everyone couldn't help but respond in kind,
this was probably the first time she'd ever had real enemies.

It
took all of my strength just to make it through Thursday so that I
could go home and curl up in my bed. As I drifted off to sleep I
realized that the only positive thing that had happened all week was
the fact that I hadn't been dream walking.

**

It
seemed like not having dream walked for the last few nights had
recharged my metaphysical batteries, because as soon as I fell asleep
I found myself in another dream that was too vivid to be a normal
one.

I
turned in place, taking in my surroundings. I was in a reddish-brown
wasteland of a desert that was different than my home in almost every
way, but as I blinked it became even more different. There wasn't
much in the way of vegetation, a few cacti and some scrubby brush,
but every living thing seemed to be giving off a faint white light
that was only visible due to the fact that the sliver of a moon above
gave off almost no light.

I
tried to manipulate the dream, tried to create a tree just in front
of me, but the result was ghostly and short-lived. Now that I was
positive I was in someone else's dream, I looked around for somewhere
to hide, but before I could start running towards the dry streambed
that I'd identified, a huge black wolf came bounding up out of it.

I
knew I should be scared. The wolf was way bigger than any dog I'd
ever seen before. It looked like it could easily tear me in half with
a single bite, and yet there was something other than just wild
savagery in its eyes.

A
cool breeze kicked up between one second and the next, but even more
incredible was the fact that the wolf was gone now, replaced by a guy
who was about the same size as Jackson. He was looking away from me
at first, as though worried about someone following him.

I
started to take a step backwards in an effort to get somewhere I
could hide, but he turned before I could get very far. My breath
caught as I saw his face for the first time. He was gorgeous with
wavy dark hair and piercing blue eyes, but it was more than that.

In
a way that I couldn't explain, this guy was the piece that had been
missing from my life. It was like having a dislocated shoulder put
back into place. This whole time I'd been feeling an almost
irresistible draw towards Jackson and it had all been because
physically Jackson looked like this guy.

It
was like I'd been wowed by a child's watercolors for months only to
now see a Monet. I couldn't go back to just being happy at the
prospect of being with Jackson. I was pretty sure that I'd never be
satisfied now unless I was with this guy.

The
resemblance to Kaleb was clear, but where Kaleb was somehow
unfinished, somehow lacking some critical ingredient, the guy looking
back at me now was a kind of perfection that went beyond just the
physical. I'd never before realized that you could see someone's
character in their countenance, but with him I could.

He
was dangerous. The mere fact that I was sharing his dream would have
told me that even if I hadn't just seen him transform from a wolf,
but I somehow knew he wouldn't hurt me, not casually, not without a
reason, and not if there was any other option.

"You're
Kaleb's son, aren't you?"

The
words slipped out without conscious effort on my part, but they
didn't seem to alarm him.

"Yes,
although I'd give a lot to have it be otherwise. Who are you?"

"My
name is Adri."

It
was a reckless risk, but it never even crossed my mind to refuse him
my name. I wasn't sure that I was capable of refusing him anything.

"Why
do I feel like I know you, Adri? Why do I look at you and wonder when
you cut your hair? It should be longer than that."

My
heart was in my throat. For a second I thought I wouldn't be able to
manage anything more than a shrug.

"I'm
not sure, but I think I know what you mean. I feel like I know you
from somewhere, like I should be incredibly happy to see you, like
you're a long-lost friend of some kind or another."

He
didn't look satisfied with that answer, but it was the only one I
could offer to him. We stood in silence for several seconds before he
shook himself and then looked back up at me.

"Curious.
You'd think that I'd become immune to the surprise of having the
world drop impossible things into my lap, but so far that hasn't been
the case. Why have you brought me here, Adri? You're not one of us,
are you?"

"One
of you?"

"The
moonborn, a shape shifter."

"No,
I'm not. How did you know?"

His
smile was sad. "You didn't respond to my transformation with a
flare of power from your own beast. That's a pretty good sign that
you're free from my curse."

"Is
it really a curse?"

"Most
of the time. You don't know what it's like to have something alien
inside of you, something that has its own ideas of right and wrong,
its own ideas of how things should be handled."

It
wasn't something that I'd ever considered. The movies made werewolves
and the like seem so glamorous. Maybe not as cool as vampires, but
still something awesome.

"It's
got to be pretty awesome though to be stronger and faster than normal
humans though, right?"

He
seemed to consider my question for several seconds.

"I
suppose. There are a lot of times in my life where my beast's speed
and strength were the only things that kept me alive, but then again,
I wouldn't have been in those situations if I hadn't been a shape
shifter in the first place."

"I
guess that makes sense. The truth is that I didn't actually bring you
anywhere. This is your dream; I'm just sharing it with you."

He
looked around at our surroundings. "This isn't like any other
dream I've ever had before. It's more real, more vivid than it should
be."

I
looked over at him in confusion. "This is more vivid than
I
can
usually manage. That's odd, but it has to be your dream because I
can't change our surroundings."

A
frown of concentration briefly spoiled his expression, and then a
large rose bush grew up out of the ground like we were watching some
kind of time-lapse photography.

"I
guess you're right, this is my dream, but you being here has somehow
made it more than I can manage on my own."

A
second later he made a black, wrought-iron bench shimmer into view.
He sat down on it like he'd been carrying the weight of the world on
his shoulders, like he'd been dying to put his load down and rest,
but hadn't been able to do so in longer than he could remember.

"Well,
Adri, I guess the proper question isn't why you brought me here, but
rather why you've brought yourself here."

"Does
there have to be a reason?"

"Not
necessarily, but I'm starting to believe that gifts like the one
you've displayed tonight operate out of need more often than not.
It's possible that we met here on this particular night out of
nothing more than chance, but I doubt it. I suspect that you have a
need greater than any you've ever before known, and that some part of
you thinks that I can help you."