chapter 6
She must have made too much noise.
Katelyn tucked the business card in her pocket and ducked down behind Mr. Henderson’s desk. Then she looked up with horror at the open filing cabinet, sure to attract attention if someone came in through the office door.
She could make up an excuse, she thought, trying to stay calm as she braced herself for discovery. She could say that she had lost something valuable. Something belonging to my best friend. With all the rumors going around about Cordelia and their history teacher, no one would blame Katelyn for trying to learn the truth.
She heard the classroom door open. Every muscle in her body tensed. Then there was silence. Her hearing snapped into overdrive and she heard a voice murmur, “Hello? Huh. Weird.”
Then the door closed.
Mike Wright. A wave of fury shot through her, and she was stunned by how fierce it was. It was like somehow he embodied everything that was wrong about her life, this place. She was sure all the kids at her old school that had seen therapists on a regular basis would know a name for it.
Breathe.
She shut her eyes and clamped her jaw. Her chest heaved. Very slowly, her emotions ebbed. She waited a few seconds to make sure she was in control of herself, then reached up and eased the file drawer shut. Then she snaked back through the caution tape, and tiptoed through her history classroom.
As carefully as a tightrope walker, she opened the door and peered into the hall. Seeing Mike and one of his redneck homies messing around with Trick’s locker, she almost took off along the hall after them. She looked down and away, overcome again with the desire to hurt Mike.
Permanently.
Mike and the other boy started snickering, then went trotting on down the hall. Katelyn hurried over to Trick’s locker. From what she could tell, they had used lipstick to write the F-bomb and the worst homophobic insult for “gay” Katelyn had ever heard. What a moron! In Santa Monica, Mike and his minion would have been expelled for what he’d just done. But here?
Katelyn looked around for something to clean off Trick’s locker. She finally grabbed some paper towels from the girls’ bathroom and set to work, smearing the lipstick until it was illegible. If she had her way, Trick would never see what Mike had done. Mike was a bully and a moron and the stereotype of every prejudice she had held about the south. He was mean and stupid. And he seemed to be getting away with more than his share of nasty pranks.
I could just kill him, she thought.
She finished, tossed the paper towels, then snuck back outside. She was halfway across the parking lot, which now had five cars in it, including one painted like the Confederate flag, when her phone rang. Startled, she glanced down at the number. She didn’t recognize it, but she answered anyway.
“Are you alone, cher?” said the voice on the phone, deep and masculine, touched with a lilt of Louisiana Cajun.
Katelyn was so startled she almost dropped the phone. It was Dominic Gaudin.
“Yes. Hello. Do you know what’s happened?” she said urgently, hunching over the phone as if to muffle their conversation. It dawned on her that someone might be watching — someone not connected with her high school. A pack member, reporting her every move to Lee Fenner. She pushed that to the back of her mind. So what? she thought resentfully, gazing around.
“Oui. She has called me,” he said. “I’m coming for her.”
Katelyn caught her breath. “Where is she?”
“She’s alone, and frightened,” he said. “She has no one.”
“Me,” Katelyn said firmly. She searched the lot. And then she felt a fillip of anger. She could see Mike Wright through the windshield of the Confederate flag car. He was smoking a cigarette and, from the way he was nodding his head, listening to head banger music. He hadn’t noticed her. “She has me.”
“She’s not sure of that. She knows that her father has threatened to kill anyone who helps her.”
Katelyn gave her head a shake. “I’ll help her.” She started to walk in Mike’s direction and realized that was a bad idea. So she slipped into the shadows of the trees, making her way toward her parked car.
“Or maybe you’ll tell them where she is, if I tell you. To get in good with your new family,” Dom said.
She was speechless. “They are not my family.”
“They are who you run with.”
“No way. They are who I run from.” She laughed bitterly.
“Ah,” he said. “Then you’ll come with her, when I come for her?”
Her stomach did a somersault and she caught herself giving another quick shake of her head before she remembered he couldn’t see her. Part of her raced ahead to how wonderful it would be to be free of insane Lee Fenner and his whole dysfunctional family. And as far away from Justin as possible. She would miss her grandfather and Trick a lot.
“What would your pack think of me?” she asked him. The mistake?
“It doesn’t matter what they think of you, cher. What matters is how they treat you. I am the alpha, and if I accept you, they will, too. We’re more disciplined than the Fenners. And I’m not losing my mind.”
All plusses. And she and Cordelia could be friends again. She had no one now.
“I’m afraid of what would happen to my grandfather.” She decided to leave Trick out of the discussion. She didn’t need to go around advertising to werewolves which humans in Wolf Springs they could use as leverage to get her to do what they wanted. “They might retaliate.”
“Did he think of you, forcing you to come here?” Dom asked her. “He knew a girl had been killed in the woods. There has been a second one since your arrival. Your teacher is missing. Does he send you home?”
“How do you know . . .?” she began, then trailed off. Had someone told Cordelia about Mr. Henderson? Did Dom Gaudin have a spy in Wolf Springs?
“He’s still my grandfather,” she said.
“And Cordelia is your best friend. She’s the only real friend you have. And you’re the only friend she has. She risked everything to keep you safe. She could have died. Her pack has been her whole life, and she’s going to be lonely in my pack, until she makes some friends.”
“Tell me where she is,” Katelyn asked.
“You say ‘please’ and ‘thank you’ when you speak to me, cher,” he said, not unkindly. “I’m an alpha. You need to show me respect.”
“Please tell me where she is.” She tried not to sound impatient. All this ritualistic manners stuff was annoying when there were bigger issues at stake. “Please.”
“I will send someone to take you to her,” he said. “Tonight. Be ready.”
Alarm bells went off. “Where? What time?”
“Your cabin. Midnight.”
“No, wait. I think they’re watching me.”
“We’ll make sure they aren’t,” he said.
He disconnected.
Lunch.
And Trick was studying her. Since it was a cold November day, everyone was crowded inside the lunchroom. She would be welcome to sit at his table — his arty, slightly nerdy crowd really liked her — but she kept to her spot in the stairwell of the unused staircase at the back of the room. She was going through the motions of eating the peanut butter sandwich her grandfather had made for her the night before. He had added an apple. It was the exact lunch he made for her every day, and she found it very touching. All she was missing was a juice box and she’d have the lunch she used to pack for herself in elementary school. But the truth was, she had no appetite. Her phone call with Dom was swirling in her mind. Could she really leave? Just go? And then what? What kind of life would she have? She’d be a runaway. A statistic in the growing population of Wolf Springs citizens who had met bad ends.
And if she went missing, her grandfather would go crazy. Could she do that to him?
The questions were drowning her, so she made a pretense of texting so she could keep to herself and try to figure out her next step.
Even with staggered lunch periods, students were packed in tightly and the place was steamy, making the wolf mural that filled one wall look like it was sweating. Beau was also looking at her from across the room, and she kept up the show of texting so she would have a good excuse for avoiding him, too.
Then Kimi actually texted her.
Yo!
Hi, Katelyn texted back. How’s it? Jane?
Left me 4 a boy! came the reply.
Abandoning texting, Katelyn called her. “What?” she said once the connection was made. “Some friend she turned out to be.”
“You know how some girls are,” Kimi said. “Girlfriends are what you have until you hook up with a guy. And, hi.”
“Ridiculous!” It felt like old times. She wondered if that was why Kimi had started texting her again. But it didn’t really matter, did it? They were talking.
“It’s no guy you know,” Kimi said. “Doesn’t go to our school. He’s a total stoner, though, so boring.”
Katelyn was nearly giddy with the normalcy of their conversation. She almost burst into tears, which made no sense, but she held onto the phone with both hands and tapped her toes happily on the stair.
“So, big news,” Kimi said. “My mom told me to tell you that she met a family court judge at Pilates who said she’d sign off on your emancipation papers if the case came before her. Which, hell, yeah.”
Katelyn was stunned. Before she had flown out to Wolf Springs, Kimi had been lobbying for her to file for emancipation so Katelyn could stay there and live with Kimi’s family. Kimi’s mom was an attorney and she’d been willing to present the case and assure the judge she would provide Katelyn a home. Until that moment, though, Katelyn hadn’t been convinced it could actually work.
“Making deals outside of court like that, isn’t that illegal or something?” Katelyn asked, as butterflies danced in her stomach. Another chance to leave Wolf Springs dropped into her lap?
She ticked a glance in Trick’s direction to find that he was still looking at her, and she turned her head slightly and cupped her mouth.
“If you could offer some proof about why Wolf Springs is a bad living environment, that would seal the deal,” Kimi continued.
“Well, there was a murder recently.”
“Right on! I mean, oh, how awful and sad. Anyone you know? Or knew?”
“I guess she was in some of my classes, but no, I didn’t. And my history teacher is missing.”
“Jeez. Is there a guy running around with a chainsaw, too?” Kimi asked, and Katelyn snorted.
If only I could tell you what’s really going on, she thought. You wouldn’t believe any of it.
Then she inhaled the mingled scents of soap and leather. Not Justin. Trick. Up close, she could see the stubble on his cheeks and chin, and the flecks of blue in his green eyes. Without warning, her vision telescoped and she felt as if she were falling into his eyes, into their depths, and she felt incredibly dizzy. Then she blinked to try to pull herself out of it.
“The missing teacher is a nice addition,” Kimi said. “I’ll tell my mom.” Then she added, “Are you okay? I mean, were you close to him or anything?”
“Close,” Katelyn ventured, testing out the idea. Then she gave her head a sharp shake. “Kimi, I need to go. I’ll call you when I get home.”
“From the cabin in the woods, wa ha ha,” Kimi said. “Kiss kiss. You’ll be home before you know it.”
“Mwah. Sounds poifect,” Katelyn said, and hung up. She closed her eyes and pressed her finger against the bridge of her nose. She inhaled slowly, then exhaled, then opened her eyes again.
The telescoping was gone. But Trick was standing right there, in living color.
“Yes?” she said.
“I’m coming over to your house after school,” he informed her. “I’m going to help your grandfather chop wood for the winter.”
“Quaint. I’ll be home later. I’m going to Cordelia’s house again, just for a little bit.” She almost added, I’m going swimming, but she doubted that Justin had been serious. It was practically sleeting outside.
“No, you aren’t,” he said. When she frowned at him, he added, “It’s not Cordelia’s house anymore, is it?” He wasn’t asking. He knew.
“Trick, I don’t have to explain myself to you.” The words came out more sharply than she had intended. How did he know?
“Your pappy told me to watch out for you.” He narrowed his eyes and pursed his lips in displeasure. “He’s trouble, Katelyn. You’re new here. You don’t know about his past.”
“I think I know who you mean, and trust me when I say this, Trick. He has a girlfriend. They’re practically engaged.”
“That’s never stopped him before,” Trick retorted.
Her cheeks went hot.
“Are you okay?” he asked, and she nodded. “You don’t look okay.”
“I’m fine,” she insisted.
“Don’t go over there this afternoon. There is absolutely no good reason for you to go.”
“Got it,” she said, and she took a big bite out of her apple. He shifted his weight on his hip, upset and pissed off, and she took another bite. Clenching his teeth, he turned on his heel and walked away. She stared at his retreating back — okay, his butt — and smiled.
I’ll get out of here, she mentally told him. I’ll take you with me.
She devoured her apple like it was a rabbit.
~
Afternoon.
Katelyn walked to the end of the high-dive and stared down at Justin. Treading water in the steamy pool, he was bobbing in the water. His hair was slicked back, accentuating the planes and angles in his face, and she felt awkward in the swimsuit he had brought for her. She wondered if it was Cordelia’s — likely, since it was so baggy on her. Cordelia was taller than she was.
“Just jump,” Justin said. “You’re not afraid, are you?”
He had no idea who he was dealing with. She backed up, ran, then sprang off the board. She executed several axial twists before she slid into the water without a splash. When she came back up, he was staring at her open-mouthed.
They were at the Y, where her grandfather had found her gymnastics lessons, and while it was almost as bad as Trick had said, there was a woman on staff who had been a gymnastics coach at Cal State Long Beach, and taught private lessons. She wasn’t in, but Katelyn took her card.
Justin had rationalized the swimming by emphasizing the need to stay in shape. Whatever condition you were in as a human directly affected your strength and stamina as a wolf.
“What about your mental health?” she had asked him, and he’d clouded over.
“You mean Lee? He’s just as unpredictable in wolf form as human,” he said shortly. “Something’s got to be done, and soon.”
She told herself that she didn’t care about any of that. It wasn’t her business. All she had to do was steer clear of Lee Fenner.
And wait until midnight, and see what happened next.
~
The hours dragged by. Her grandfather asked her if something was wrong and then offered to play a game of Scrabble. Her heart was only half in it, but when he won by 400 points she had to admire his skill. When she went upstairs she passed the time by reading more of Cordelia’s diary. After Cordelia’s first transformation, they had had a party, like a werewolf bat mitzvah, orchestrated well away from the kids who hadn’t yet changed.
Cordelia had once had her daydreams and crushes, and even tried to get her father to accept a human boy into the pack. She had been told to break up with him and wait for a mate to be selected. Selected? Cordelia had wanted to date and have a boyfriend, but it turned out werewolf teenagers — or at least the daughters of the alpha — lived much more circumspect lives than Cali girls. Or pretty much any other girl, period. Boys, too, since they were also half of the equation. So maybe Justin didn’t love Lucy. Maybe it was simply that they were facing an arranged marriage. Maybe love was supposed to come in time.
I don’t care, she told herself. I don’t want him.
Katelyn was afraid she’d fall asleep in her room — she had to get up so early every morning to drive to Wolf Springs High — so she put the diary down and did some stretching exercises. She wondered where Cordelia was. She wondered if the Fenners were watching her right now.
And what would happen to her tonight.
Finally, at five minutes to midnight, a text came in: I am coming. Porch.
She grabbed her purse, crept downstairs, and tiptoed out onto the porch. Anxiously shifting her weight back and forth, she sucked in her breath when a black BMW crept up the drive.
The passenger window rolled down and a handsome younger man who resembled Dom Gaudin silently gestured for her to approach. The door opened. She got in and shut the door, sitting beside him. The Beemer drove away.
“I’m Luc Gaudin,” he said. He was all crazy red-blond curls, heavy eyebrows, and deep-set brown eyes. “I’m Dom’s younger brother.”
“The Fenners—”
“Are not a problem,” he said smoothly.
“Where are we going?”
“There’s a warming hut,” he said. “Ma’amselle Fenner took shelter there.”
“Is it far?”
“Far enough. Are you hungry? Thirsty?” He peered at her. “Nervous?”
“I’m freaking,” she said honestly.
“You didn’t pack any of your belongings,” he observed.
She gaped at him. It hadn’t even dawned on her. Somehow it hadn’t occurred to her that they would leave immediately. But why would they stick around?
She fell silent. He looked at her kindly and said, “Cordelia told us what happened to you. That someone attacked you.”
Maybe one of the Gaudins had done it, to make Mr. Fenner look bad. Maybe Luc himself. But no, he had brown eyes. The werewolf that had bitten her had blue eyes, and werewolves didn’t change eye color when they transformed.
“Yeah, I’m supposed to be all joyous about it,” she said. “No offense, but I’m not.”
He cocked his head. “A great shock, non?”
“That’s putting it mildly.” She blew air out of her cheeks. “Is she okay? I mean, was she hurt, or—”
“I don’t know,” he said. “You must understand. For us Gaudins, being banished from the pack is a fate worse than death. I would rather have my heart torn out than suffer what she has suffered.”
She nodded, but she couldn’t imagine wanting to be a member of the Fenner pack. From what little she had seen of the Gaudins, the Fenners were kind of like the loser werewolves.
“Do you know if there’s a cure for being a werewolf?” she asked him hopefully.
He cocked his head. “Ah, I am sorry. We don’t have one. But we’ve never looked.”
She leaned her head on the back of the seat. “Why are you helping us?” she asked and then regretted it. “I mean, there’ve been hints that there’s not exactly — that maybe there’s bad blood—”
He sighed heavily. “When first our two packs settled in this country there was already a rivalry. We wanted to protect our borders, our hunting grounds. It is no different than our wild brothers or even the lion packs of Africa. And to complicate things we are human as well. We have nothing in common with one another but the fact that we change. Our culture, our heritage, our way of life are different. Over the years a thousand slights or discourtesies created more and more friction. For our part, we avoided them at all costs.”
“What happened?” Katelyn asked, sensing that there was more to the story.
“More people settled on both our territories, clearing the forests, decreasing our lands and the animals we take sustenance from. The packs have grown larger but the resources smaller. And then, about eighty or ninety years ago, before you and I were even born, some terrible things happened around here.”
Katelyn sat up straighter, sensing the importance of what was coming next.
Luc cleared his throat. “Even worse, forty years ago, it happened again: there was a string of murders among the people here. Savage. Brutal. The Fenners accused us, but we knew none of us could be responsible. Then, when we were having a pack meeting and all members were present, three more murders were committed, but this time they were on our lands. The Fenners had a rogue werewolf and it was killing, threatening the safety of all.”
She felt cold all over, as if someone had just walked over her grave. The Fenners had lied to her. Even Justin.
Unless he’s been lied to, too.
“Who was it?” she asked.
“Which Fenner? We don’t know.”
“Well, what made it stop?”
“That was the strangest part. It just did. A short while later we were informed that Lee Fenner was the new alpha and we hoped that the pack had sorted it out, and that he could keep his people in check in the future. But the intrusions onto our land had only just begun,” Luc said, his voice hardening. “They began to poison our streams with silver. As I’m sure you know, a werewolf may touch silver, though it is painful, but it must not pierce the skin and enter the bloodstream or one becomes incredibly sick and will probably die. We learned the hard way that drinking the silver would also kill us. I will never forget the day that I watched my sister die, screaming, as silver in our water burned her from the inside.”
Katelyn shuddered. “That’s awful,” she whispered.
Luc nodded. “My brother, he wishes for peace, not war. He once thought that a union between him and Cordelia could end the suffering. But now those dreams are gone.”
Which meant there was nothing else standing in the way of war, Katelyn realized. Dejected, afraid, she crossed her arms and looked out the window.
“You still haven’t answered my question. Why are you helping us?” she asked.
Luc flashed her a smile. “Why does any man do anything?”
“I don’t know.”
“Love, cher. Dom is in love with Cordelia and he would not see her come to harm.”
After countless twists and turns, the car pulled to a stop, and Luc smiled at her.
“We’re here.”
Katelyn undid her seat belt and jumped out, racing toward a narrow A-frame building sided with shingles. Smoke was pouring out of a chimney. There were no windows.
The door of the hut flew open and Cordelia stood framed in the doorway. Katelyn ran over and began to throw her arms around her, then stopped. Cordelia’s face was puffy with crying, and she looked as if she hadn’t eaten or slept in days.
“Hey,” Katelyn said awkwardly, then raised her head as Dom came up behind Cordelia and put a hand on her shoulder.
“Ma’amselle Katelyn McBride,” Dom said. “A pleasure to meet you in the flesh.”
“Thank you for finding her,” Katelyn replied.
“She found us.” He gave her shoulder another squeeze. “I’ll leave you two to talk.”
Cordelia stepped out of the hut so he could get around her. She gave her head a little bob and he inclined his head rather imperiously. He looked at Katelyn.
“You need to lower your head to me,” he said.
“Oh.” She tucked in her chin and mentally rolled her eyes. God, if Kimi or any of her old friends could see her now . . . But in her encounters with other packmates, she’d seen lower-ranked were-boys go all Geisha like this, too. Turned out you had to behave a certain way according to your rank, not your gender—aside from a certain amount of human-woman tending of the male ego that seemed more common in Wolf Springs.
He chuckled and walked to the car. “Luc and I will go for a drive.”
Cordelia turned around and led the way into the hut. A fire was roaring inside a metal fireplace, and as soon as they were both inside, Cordelia threw her arms around Katelyn and began to cry. Katelyn did, too, feeling such tremendous relief that she had to sit down on the sleeping bag stretched out on the floor before she fell down.
Cordelia moved two grocery bags out of the way and plopped down next to Katelyn, burying her face in her hands.
“Oh, Kat,” she said brokenly. “I want to go home!”
“Why?” Katelyn blurted, then caught herself and put her arms around Cordelia again, and her friend leaned her head on Katelyn’s shoulder. “I mean, oh my God, Cordelia, look at your family. Your father’s . . .” She trailed off, realizing that Cordelia already knew how bizarre her family was.
“You don’t know what it’s like to be born a Fenner,” Cordelia said. “We have the blood of the Fenris Wolf running through our veins. In the werewolf world, we’re revered. We’re like gods.”
Katelyn thought about Regan and Arial, overdressed and over made-up, slinking around like they were practicing for some Southern Gothic play. The delight they’d taken in ordering Cordelia to run away as fast as she could before they caught her. Justin said werewolves were aggressive, but the Fenners were flat out extreme. That didn’t sound very godlike to her.
“What’s it like in Dom’s pack?” Katelyn asked. “You’ll be with him, and he’s the alpha, right?”
“Kat, Kat,” Cordelia hitched. Then she lifted her head. “I’m nearly eighteen years old, the daughter of the alpha. If I join another pack, I’ll be a traitor. How would you treat an outsider who had been branded a traitor?”
The question was absurd. Katelyn didn’t live in a world where thoughts like that occurred.
“I thought you called Dom,” she said, a bit at a loss.
Cordelia wiped her face with both hands. “I did. I didn’t know what else to do. But he wants me to declare my loyalty as soon as we get to Louisiana. In front of everyone. I — I need time.” She dropped her hands to her lap and stared pleadingly at Katelyn. “I need my daddy to forgive me and take me back.”
Katelyn played with the slick fabric of the sleeping bag, unaccountably disappointed. She didn’t see leaving with Dom and Cordelia as a clearer path to her own happy ending. Cordelia might be the daughter of an alpha, but Katelyn was just a mistake.
Except . . . I’m immune to silver, she remembered.
“Maybe Daddy just needs time,” Cordelia said, reaching into one of the grocery bags. She pulled out a packet of tissues and blew her nose. “If I can just go with Dom without declaring myself, and then Daddy asks me to come home . . .” She stared at Katelyn with huge, pleading eyes. “You’ll come with me, right?”
Here it was, the time for her decision. Katelyn looked at her friend, and her mind raced.
And then it came to her.
“Cordelia, your father wanted you to find the silver mine,” she began.
Cordelia nodded. “Kat, I — I hid some stuff from you. That book Mr. Henderson wanted? I had it. And my daddy had Mr. Henderson over for dinner and asked him to help him find the Madre Vena. I didn’t tell you that, either.”
Katelyn thought of the business card she had found. Maybe Mr. Henderson is not around because he’s busy looking for the mine.
No, she didn’t buy it.
“Mr. Henderson is missing,” Katelyn said carefully. “Could something have happened to him?”
“Missing?” she asked, growing pale. “What do you mean?”
“He stopped coming to school. They don’t know where he is.” Katelyn would never tell her what people were saying about Cordelia and him.
Cordelia covered her mouth with both hands. Her eyes grew enormous and she went from pale to chalk white. “The Hellhound,” she whispered. “It guards the mine. What if it got him?”
The door to the hut opened and Dom Gaudin stood in the doorway. Cordelia visibly jerked, and she grabbed Katelyn’s hand. She looked even more terrified.
“Ladies?” Dom Gaudin said. “We can’t risk staying here much longer. Is Ma’amselle McBride coming with us?”
“Don’t leave me,” Cordelia said under her breath. “I need you, Kat. I risked my life for you.”
She did. Katelyn owed her.
Dom turned his head and spoke in French to someone who was still outside.
Her stomach in a knot, Katelyn took a breath and whispered in a rush before she lost her nerve, “What if I looked for the mine? And if I find it, you can tell your father that you found it.”
“Oh,” Cordelia murmured. “Oh, would you do that?” She looked over Katelyn’s shoulder at Dom. “Maybe I should stay. Help you. But the Hellhound . . .”
“The time’s come,” Dom said, coming into the hut. “We don’t want to linger on Fenner territory. It’s time to go. With, or without you, Miss Kat?”
“Without,” Katelyn said. “I have to stay and try to get the others to see reason, to get Lee to forgive Cordelia. Then . . .” she thought of what Luc had told her in the car. “Maybe then there can be peace.”
Dom sighed heavily. “Peace is a dream I once cherished. I would urge you to abandon it, but I can see that you have not lost hope. It is not an easy thing to leave all that you know behind. I must warn you, though, we cannot risk coming back for you.”
“I understand,” Katelyn said, even as she could hear Cordelia crying.
From a distance she heard a sort of whistling sound. Dom spun around with what Katelyn recognized as a French curse falling from his lips. “We will be found. Hurry.”
He grabbed Cordelia around the waist and ran with her, propelling her toward the idling BMW. Katelyn ran behind, but before she could climb in, Dom held up his hand.
“I’m sorry — we must go and we cannot go the way you were brought. If you are caught with us you are dead. Your home is that way,” he said, pointing through the forest. “Go quickly before they find you here.”
Then Dom turned from Katelyn and jumped into the car as well. The wheels kicked up dirt and pine needles, then disappeared down the road.