Chapter 74

Days passed like that, blending into weeks. Winter loosened its grip on the valley one muddy inch at a time, melting into gutters, dripping from eaves, pulling back from the roots of trees until the world beneath it showed through in the colors and textures of dark mud. The cold did not disappear so much as thin. It lingered in the mornings and under stones, hiding in the shadows of the trees, in the water, in the places the sun still could not quite reach.

Somehow, life learned how to continue around all the things that should have stopped it.

Dad sat at the kitchen table more often now, stable enough that Hailey could run past him without him flinching, fragile enough that everyone still listened when he breathed in too deeply. Jack started teaching me the difference between noises a car made because it was dying and noises it made because they were part of its character. Elise baked more lemon cookies than anyone could eat. Hailey began drawing trees and dogs which looked suspiciously like wolves standing on two feet and smiling. Elise would simply stick them to the refrigerator with a magnet. Nobody commented, although I grew slightly suspicious that Hailey was beginning to understand more than she let anyone know.

Ethan and I, on the other hand, learned how to steal time. On rainy days, it was the attic after lunch or during class. When the weather was kind, it was the old spring. But no matter where we went, we were always careful. Ethan did his best not to stand too close to me in the hallways. I washed my hands, wrists, throat, and face whenever the spring was cold enough to make my teeth ache. He made sure the wind was right every time. I kept a bottle of cheap, strong perfume in my bag even though I hated the sharp, artificial sweetness of it. We didn't touch where anyone could see. We didn't look too long at one another unless we were hidden. And for the time being, it had worked.

The school had changed too, or maybe it had only learned to pretend better. Jason Greystone's order still hung in the air, invisible and absolute. No one crowded me. No one brushed past too close. No one stood in my path with dilated pupils and breathing that changed when I moved. But the shadow of the wrongness that had wrapped itself around me the moment I stepped into the school had not gone away. It simply became better hidden.

At first, the things were silly and small. What had begun with the broken pencils and a drawing continued with other little things here and there. A torn textbook page. A missing pen. My notebook shoved somewhere I didn’t want to think about, because it was returned damp at the corners. Such unimportant, irritating things. Things that sounded ridiculous even to myself every time I tried to imagine telling them out loud.

I had so little time with Ethan that belonged to us. I did not want to poison that space with stupid little cruelties. I didn't tell Nell because she'd make it a problem. I didn't tell Ethan because Ethan would start asking for names. I didn't tell Dad because Dad was still learning how to hold a coffee mug without accidentally breaking it if Hailey suddenly squealed too loud. And I didn't tell Jack because Jack had the kind of silence that hid blades and axes underneath. So I said nothing, and the time went by.

***

Spring pushed farther into the valley, and the small things started getting meaner.

It happened on a grey, humid Wednesday that smelled of rain and mud. The morning had already felt wrong, though not in any way I could have explained without sounding like a crazy person. Everyone in school seemed louder than usual, voices bouncing off lockers, sneakers squeaking against linoleum floors.

Lara passed me near the front doors with Irene at her side. She barely spared me a glance.

"Hey, Blackwell," she said, cool and smooth.

"Lara."

Her gaze moved over my coat, the strap of my bag, then returned to my face. "You look good today. Like you're almost settled." Her grin widened, teeth glinting. It didn't reach her eyes. But the way she said almost made me flinch.

"I do my best."

"I'm sure you do."

Her smile fell like an empty shell, and then she made a sharp turn, moving past me without slowing. Irene gave me one bright glance over her shoulder. That was even worse. Irene's smile always looked like it was made of knives.

I went inside and told myself I didn't care.

***

The day moved on in fragments. English, where someone had written herald in the condensation on the window beside my desk and wiped it away badly enough that I could still see the ghost of the letters when the light caught right. History, where someone behind me whispered rabbit under their breath and then looked straight ahead when I turned. Lunch, where I sat with my food untouched while Ethan kept public distance from across the room and still managed to make me feel him like a warm hand pressed gently against glass.

That helped. It also made everything worse.

By the time I reached my locker after fourth period, my patience had worn paper thin. I was digging for my chemistry textbook when Tess appeared at my side. Not too close. They never came too close. That was part of the rules now. The line had been drawn and everyone understood exactly where it lay, which meant they had also learned how to dance along it without technically stepping over.

Irene stood half a step behind her, flicking idly through something on her phone.

"Hey, Kelsey," Tess said. "You look tense."

I closed my locker slowly. "Gee, I wonder why."

Her mouth twisted. "Maybe it's guilt."

That made me blink. "Excuse me?"

She didn't blink. "For all the damage you leave behind."

For a second, I just stared at her. Then I cracked a bitter laugh. "Wow. Just wow. Isn't that a fascinating interpretation of events?"

Tess's eyes sharpened. "You walk around here like you're innocent."

I simply raised an eyebrow and stared her down hard. Something beneath my skin screamed danger , don't , but I was too angry to care. The air between us seemed to crackle.

Irene touched Tess's sleeve lightly. "Tess," she said softly. There was warning in it.

Tess ignored her. "Everywhere you go, things break. People break. But you just keep strolling along like it's not your damn business. Like nothing has ever happened. And they want us all to keep pretending the same!" A low noise tore out of her chest, something dangerously close to a growl.

My hand tightened around the strap of my bag. For weeks I had swallowed it. The looks. The little traps. The careful cruelty that hid behind the fact that no one was technically touching me. Maybe if she had picked any other subject, I would have swallowed this too. But she said it like the people who had cornered me, wanted me, hunted me, had been unfortunate victims of a dreadful, evil bloodkin.

Something in me snapped clean through.

"Funny," I said, my voice dropping before I could soften it. "Because I don't think it's really me that's been bothering you all this time. I think," and I leaned just a half a step towards her, "what truly bugs you is that your ex-boyfriend actually seemed pretty interested in me."

I watched her jaw tense. "Stop it." She growled through clenched teeth. The sound was low, guttural.

I should've stopped. Stupidly, I didn't.

"He was interested enough to fight Matt for me. And you know it and you can't let it go. Even after all this time."

The hallway seemed to shrink around us. Tess went still. I kept going because apparently some ugly, wounded part of me had been waiting for permission to vent.

"Do you know what he said? That you weren't bonded. That you didn't even matter—"

She moved. Her hand flashed high in the air. Irene caught her wrist an inch before it landed on my cheek. Her fingers curled inward, but not before I saw that her fingernails had lengthened into sharp, black claws.

Every bit of bravado drained out of me at once. Shock, relief and terror hit me all at once. My throat went dry. My heart seemed to stop, then resume so fast and strong that every beat landed like a punch against my sternum. Sweat beaded across my hairline.

"Don't," Irene said quietly.

Tess made a sound low in her throat. For one terrible moment, I saw exactly how much she wanted to ignore the warning.

Then Irene leaned closer, her voice dropping into a hiss I could still hear. "Alpha veto. Don't forget yourself."

The words hit Tess like cold water. She clenched her jaw and wrenched her wrist free, but she stepped back.

"This isn't over," she whispered.

Irene, who had still not taken her eyes off me, smiled very slightly. "You should be careful, Kelsey."

I looked at her. "With what?"

"Thinking protection makes you untouchable."

The way she said it raised the hairs along my arms. Then she turned, taking Tess with her through the cluster of students who had slowed just enough to notice something was happening while pretending very hard that they hadn't.

I stood there until they disappeared around the corner. Only then did I realize my hands were shaking.

***

The rest of the day passed in the unpleasant blur that comes after adrenaline with nowhere to go. I avoided the cafeteria and ate half a granola bar in the bathroom, which felt pathetic enough that I almost texted Nell out of spite, then didn't.

Ethan sent one message during sixth period.

You all right?

I stared at it for too long. Then I answered: Yeah. Long day. Nothing major.

His reply came after a pause. You sure?

I typed: Yes, Ethan. Thanks for worrying, though.

It was not quite a lie if one defined major carefully enough.

My phone buzzed. I'll always worry.

I closed my eyes, let out a long breath, then pushed my phone into my pocket.

***

By last period, I had almost convinced myself the day was over. I could go home, shower, sit at the kitchen table, let Dad ask about school with that careful look in his eyes, and say fine so convincingly he might actually believe me.

Then I opened my bag.

The smell hit first. Not strong enough to fill the classroom, thank God. But close to the bag, when I leaned over, it was there.

My stomach turned before my brain understood. I went still. Everyone else was packing up. Chairs scraped against the floor. None of the students were looking at me. It was avoidance that felt deliberate. The teacher gathered papers at the front desk, and then suddenly his head snapped toward my bag. He sniffed once, his mouth flattening for a second, and then he looked away.

Carefully, slowly, I parted the top of the bag with two fingers.

On top of my history folder lay a little dead mouse.

For a moment, my mind simply refused the image. It was small. Grey-brown. Limp. It had been placed carefully enough that it would be the first thing I saw when I opened the bag.

I couldn't breathe. Not because of the mouse, not only. It was disgusting, yes. Horrible in that intimate way dead small things always were. But worse than that was the intention inside it. The fact that someone had carried it, hidden it, waited for the right moment to tuck it among my books like a message.

I closed the bag too fast. The zipper snagged, and for a second I thought I might lose my mind over a zipper in the middle of a classroom. I shoved the books I still held under one arm, grabbed the bag by the very top, and got out before anyone could ask me anything else.

The hallway was crowded enough that no one noticed me moving too fast. I kept the bag held slightly away from my body, as if twelve inches could protect me from the thing inside it. My throat kept trying to collapse. My eyes burned. I hated that most of all.

I made it to the exit, then the lot, then the far row where Dad's car sat between an old pickup and a sedan with a cracked bumper. Only when I reached it did I let myself breathe properly. The air outside was damp, the ground full of mud and thaw. It helped enough that I could think.

I opened the trunk, found an old plastic grocery bag under the emergency blanket Jack had shoved in there with a flashlight, jumper cables, and other emergency supplies. Then I unzipped my bag, turned my face away, and used a wad of wet wipes from the glove compartment to lift the mouse by its tail and drop it into the plastic. I tied the bag so tightly my fingers hurt.

Then I stood there with it in my hand and realized I had no idea what to do next.

For a split second, I imagined taking it to Ethan. The image came so clearly that I almost laughed. Ethan's face. The silence. The terrible, immediate stillness. The names he would ask for. The names I didn't know. And then he would go searching. Hunting. Exposing himself and us both.

No. Absolutely not.

I threw the plastic bag into the dumpster near the maintenance shed and came back to the car shaking. The inside of my backpack still smelled faintly of rot. I wiped everything I could with wet wipes and hand sanitizer until the chemical smell burned my nose. I put the worst notebook into another plastic bag and shoved it under the spare tire cover in the trunk because I could not bring myself to take it home yet.

Then I stood behind the open trunk, hands braced on the metal lip, and stared at nothing.

No one had touched me. No one had broken Jason's order. No one had done anything that would look like anything if I tried to explain it. And that was the point.

When my phone buzzed, I almost screamed. Ethan again.

Kelse? What's happening?

I stared at the screen until something beneath the panic pulsed warm and soothing. He was near. I didn't have to look up to know. But he shouldn't be, not now, not when I was drenched in the smell of disinfectant, dead rodent and fear.

My head snapped up.

He was standing near the double doors, turned sideways, phone in hand, seemingly inspecting the forest. He turned and his gaze met mine for half a second before he turned it away.

But in that half a second I saw everything.

Worry. Fear bordering on anger.

He knew. He knew something was going on even if he couldn't put his finger on it.

I knew I had to thread this very, very carefully.

So I typed with fingers that still shook. Sorry. Phone was buried. I'm fine. Going home soon.

The lie sat there, plain and ugly.

He glanced at me again, barely, and although he was far enough I couldn't tell for sure, the muscle in his jaw might have twitched. He began typing.

I turned away before anyone could notice this exchange.

My phone buzzed.

Then why do I smell a dead mouse coming from your direction?

I gulped. Froze. He knew. He knew.

I don't know what you're talking about. See you tomorrow, Ethan , I typed quickly.

Such a pathetic, blatant lie, but it was all I could muster.

I locked the phone, without looking at him. Then I got into the car, closed the door, and sat there until I was sure I could drive without crying. Because if I cried, I might call him. And if I called him, this little ugly thing would become a spark. And a spark would explode into a fire that could burn my family and half of Cold Creek down.

So I drove.

But when I came to the place where the road turned right toward my home, I didn't follow it. I turned left instead.