Moon Crossed (Werewolf Hunter Series): Season 1 (Episodes 1-6) (Crescent Hunter) (53 page)

Twenty-two days

No word from Locke or
the boys, other than Tor stopping by once. Lili doesn't answer her
texts and, big surprise, I haven't heard from Cole. Zane and Ben
check in on me. It's nice, takes the edge off the silence. Honestly,
he and Aunt Rain are the only reason why I know that my phone is
still able to receive texts or calls. Trust me, I wondered.

Hunters are still
keeping watch, but there hasn't been any activity for days. Even the
wolves that want to kill me have abandoned me.

I haven't been in my
lab, or my office. Having missed the registration deadline for
school, I'll be taking the semester off.

Today, I should really
shower and run a brush through my hair. Maybe later. I hoist myself
out of bead and head downstairs to get a cup of coffee. I sit at the
empty table, envisioning that my boys are sitting around it with me.
Poking fun at one another, laughing, filling my house and my soul
with life. But there's nothing but silence. Grinding, bleeding,
unbearable silence.

I go out onto the porch
and nod at the hunter who is stationed in the backyard. I pull Cole's
lighter out of my pocket and light a cigarette. Yeah, I've taken up
smoking. I figure it's par for the course in my poor life decisions
of late.

Smoke billows and plays
on the currents in the air, but there's little satisfaction in it. I
inhale again in vain, then go to the railing on the porch. In the
graveyard, something colorful catches my eye. I hike my pajama pants
up and walk down the steps. There are several handfuls of
wildflowers, in varying states of decay to freshly-picked today.

“Hey, there.”
Zane's voice cuts through the backyard.

I turn to him with a
blank stare. He has a pizza and a two-liter of soda. “I thought
you might be hungry.” He smiles, giving me the sad head tilt. I
must look like I feel: shit.

“Hey.” I
hang my head and meet him on the porch.

He eyes the cigarette
in my hand. “I didn't know you smoke.”

“Yeah.” I
sit in my rocking chair, staring vacantly toward the yard.

“I'm going to put
this inside.” He disappears in the house momentarily and
returns. “So how are you?”

I look at him as though
I could kill him for asking. I should try to be nicer, but I don't
have it in me. Maybe I just want to drive him away, too.

“That good?”
He nods slowly. “Here's what we're going to do. You're going to
go upstairs, get dressed, and we're going for a run. I bet it's been
days.”

“I don't know
that I'm up for it.” I light another cigarette.

“I'm not taking
no for an answer. We're going,” he insists.

“What about
them?” I move my hand toward the woods. “My babysitters.”

“I've already
cleared it with my dad.” He smiles knowingly.

“Fine, let me
finish this.” I hold up the cigarette.

“And you have to
eat at least one piece of pizza.” He throws that in.

“I'm not really
hungry.”

“You have to
eat.” He leans in. “We're all worried about you.”

“I appreciate
that, but I'm fine. You know, being semi-immortal and all.” I
blow out a puff of smoke.

“Look, torturing
yourself over Cole Jackson is foolish.” He just lays it out
there. I can respect that.

I give him a look that
says he doesn't know shit.

“That's what this
is about, right? Cole?” He shakes his head in disgust. “He's
an asshole, totally not worth it.”

I'm reminded of what
Locke told me, and it now seems like a good time to ask about it.
“What's the beef between you and Cole? Or is it just your
natural aversion to assholes?”

His entire expression
changes, becoming dismal. “His sister was moon-touched. I had
to put her down.”

“Oh, that'll do
it. They really take that shit seriously.” I'm mocking a
little, but it's more about the bitterness of what I am. There's a
slight pang in my heart for Cole having lost his sister, but we've
all racked up the losses.

“Yeah, they
really do. Another reason why Pike's no fan of mine either.” He
ticks his head to the left.

“What does Pike
have to do with it?” I'm not getting the connection.

Zane studies me for a
moment, then his mouth falls open with shock. “You don't know.”

“Know what?”
I lean forward, awaiting his answer.

“Oh, Claire.”
He shakes his head.

“What?” My
voice reaches a higher register. “Spit it out.”

“How could you
not know that Pike is Cole's father?” He says it quietly.

I'm stilled by his
words, yet I feel like I'm falling. My ears are ringing, my head is
spinning with the memory of Cole jumping in front of Pike at the
hunter meeting. All this time, I thought he was protecting me, but he
wasn't. He was protecting his father.

“His stepmother
was one of the casualties at the hunter gathering.” He comes to
me and puts his hand on my shoulder. “I'm so sorry.”

I'm shaking. “What?”
It comes out on a whisper.

My whole life is
shattered in that one sentence. Everything is a jumble, but part of
it makes sense. I pull my knees to my chest, rocking myself and
shaking Zane's touch away. I can't cry. I can't breathe. I can't
anything.

“What's wrong?
What happened?” Aunt Rain runs up the steps to the porch.

“I didn't know
that she didn't know,” Zane sputters defensively.

“Know what?”
Aunt Rain demands.

“About Pike.”
Zane is reeling with having been the bearer of this news.

“What about
Pike?” she asks cautiously.

“How is it
possible she doesn't know? Why hasn't she been told anything about
the family history between you and the Jacksons?” Anger flares
in his voice.

“Because the who
was never important; it's only about the why.” I chant what's
been drilled into me for my whole life. We've never really socialized
with anyone or discussed any family ties, always being told that was
something we'd do when we were older. Secrets are all I've ever
known.

“No, Claire. The
who
is
important.” Zane kneels down in front of me. “You
could have saved yourself so much pain if you knew the who.”

He puts his hands on my
shoulders, trying to calm me. I'm catatonic; this is too much for me
to handle. The droning silence for weeks, the loneliness, the loss of
my boys and Cole. I just want to die. Fade away into exactly what
Cole thinks of me. “Nothing.”

“What?”
Zane asks.

“Zane, I think
you should go,” Aunt Rain suggests, but it's more of a demand.

“I'm not going
anywhere. I think maybe
you
should.” Zane stands in
challenge.

They argue over who
should go or stay. I want to go back to the silence, so I push past
them into the house. They follow behind me, still arguing. I'm trying
to access my anger, and when I finally clear my vision, the only one
I see is Zane, who is looking at me with sympathetic eyes. Rain is
fuming and screaming about knowing what's best for me.

All of the isolation
from humans and the society makes sense. We weren't allowed to
socialize with anyone because they might expose one of her secrets.

“I want you to
go.” I say it so quietly that it's barely heard.

“What was that?”
Zane asks, shushing her.

“I want you to
go,” I repeat calmly.

“Okay, you know
how to contact me,” Zane concedes, heading for the door.

“I wasn't talking
to you.” I look straight at Aunt Rain. “I was talking to
her.”

Her expression falls
into shock. “Please. We're family.”

A thought, a memory,
comes into my mind's eye. The day my father died. “Who killed
my father?”

“Honey, really –”

“Who?” I
screech it so loudly that it vibrates through the empty house.

Aunt Rain hangs her
head; the scar on my arm burns as I absently rub it. Quietly, through
gritted teeth, I say it again. “Who.”

“Pike,”
Zane answers after a long silence.

I already knew the
answer, but hearing it affects me on a deep and troubling level.

“Claire, you're
hurt.” Aunt Rain tries to approach me, but I hold my bloody
hand up to stop her. “Claire?”

Moisture on my hand
draws my attention to the scar; it is bleeding. Blood drips onto the
carpet. The nightmare, the memory of that day, cycles in my head on
repeat. The wolf, the young wolf from that day. “It was Cole.”

“No, honey, Pike
killed your father,” she insists.

“Cole was there.”
I collapse to the floor. The playfulness, the familiarity, the blue
eyes. “My God.”

“Claire, let’s
look at your arm.” She tries to come to me.

“Get out,”
I scream.

“Claire –”

“I said get out.”
I look her squarely in the eye. The realization that not only was I
just a conquest for him, but that Cole
never
cared about me,
hits me in the pit of my stomach. It was all an act. It was nothing
but a ploy to get information to take me down. He was working me the
whole time. “He just wanted to fuck me in every way.”

I hoist myself off the
floor, go to the basement, and lock myself in. The empty corridor
burns my heart. I take out my tattoo kit
and begin to scrawl on my left arm around the scar, thinking the
whole time about everyone who has left me. That no matter what I did
for them, they all left. And what Cole did? I let him into my heart
and soul. I let him into the most sacred parts of my body. I trusted
him, and all this time, he didn't so much as care even a little.

I dig the needle in
much harder than I need to. I want it to hurt; there's a desire to
really feel the pain. I can barely see through my tears; it needs to
be jagged and mangled just like my soul. The blood coming from the
tattoo mixes with the ink, forming a black filigree flowing on my
skin.

When I'm done, I wipe
the blood and excess ink away to survey my sloppy work. A satisfied
smile rises to my lips as I read the words aloud. “No Mercy.”

Twenty-seven days

Tomorrow is the full
moon. Hayden has said that I can finally get out on patrol again.
Probably because from the intel they've received, we're going to need
as many hunters as possible in the Chattahoochee National Forest to
help contain the Amicalola pack. Of course, Hayden is keeping me at
Red Top. I'd rather be in Chattahoochee. I'm ready.

“Whoa.”
Zane stands at the bottom of the porch steps.

“What?” I
say, a little irritated with myself for not hearing him coming.

“You're wearing
something other than PJs.” He smiles, coming up the steps and
carrying some kind of fast food bag.

“Yeah, well.
Hayden is letting me out of jail, so I thought I'd head to the
training grounds today to dust off the cobwebs.” I blow out a
puff of smoke and take my feet down off the railing.

“Sounds like a good idea.” He sits in Cole's chair. “Want
some company?”

“Sure, why not.”
I would usually prefer to go alone, but I'm so thankful for whatever
company I have these days that I'm not saying no.

“Awesome.”
He pulls out two burgers. “Here, eat.”

“I don't eat fast
food.” I scrunch my nose.

“I don't care,
you're going to eat,” he insists.

“I already ate.”
My eyes roll as I speak.

“Really? What did
you have?” he challenges.

“Fruit.” I
jut my head forward, sneering at him playfully.

“Good girl.”

“Don't patronize
me,” I say, insulted. “It could be a long night
tomorrow.”

“True.” He
unwraps the burger, taking a big bite.

“So have you
heard anything?”

“Yeah, actually,
I've heard a couple of things.” He nods with his mouth full.

“Care to share?”
I look at him expectantly.

“Oh, yeah.”
He wipes his mouth. “Pike has rented some sort of laboratory
space up in Ellijay.”

“What?” I
sit forward, very interested to know if they know why. “Do they
know what he's working on?”

“Not yet, but
he's telling the pack he's working on something to strengthen the
wolf-borne race against hunters.” His eyes widen.

“What the hell
could he be working on?” This is a serious problem. “This
is very concerning.”

“Yeah, Hayden's
got his panties all in a wad over it.” He takes another bite.

“He should. We
all should.” I shake my head. “If I thought he was
working on a cure, I would be relieved, but I think it's more likely
he's working on a delivery system for infecting healthy wolves with
the moon-touch.”

“Oh, I hadn't
thought of that,” he says with a pained expression.

“Yeah, it could
be devastating to everyone.” The thought makes me sick to my
stomach.

Zane and I both stiffen
at feeling the presence of a wolf-borne. We exchange a look. “I
don't have my weapons.”