Unleashed (20 page)

She reached over and found her bear. Feeling foolish, she pulled it close and rested her chin on it. She wanted to go home. She wanted to go now.

On Monday afternoon, she was back in the forest next to her grandfather, who handed her the rifle. Just touching it made her stomach flip.

“Hold it steady,” he urged her. “Pull the trigger.”

Katelyn exhaled and let the rifle droop.

“I’m sorry,” she said miserably. “I’m just not getting it.”

He clicked his teeth and tipped the barrel of the rifle back up toward the sky. “You’ve got a birthday coming up.”

She was a little surprised he remembered.

She nodded. “November sixth.”

“What do you usually do to celebrate?”

“Oh, different things.” For her sixteenth birthday, she and her mother had gone to a performance of the New York City Ballet when it was on tour in L.A. The Cirque performance of
Alegría
had been their last outing.

“Well, you mentioned something about that circus you like.”

She bit her lip. She wanted to say more, but she didn’t want to push her luck and risk his going on again about setting her sights on a career in the real world.

He reached into the pocket of his denim jacket and pulled out two tickets. “The Cirque du Soleil?” he said. “They’re putting on a couple of shows in Little Rock. I saw the ads. I’ll take you for your birthday.
If
you can learn to hit that target.”

“What?” she asked, not sure she’d heard right. She reached out and touched the tickets. Her past and her future were colliding in her present, making her head spin.

“We can go?”

“If you can get a bull’s-eye.”

He stood aside. She steadied the gun and held her breath. Then she fired a shot. The shell casing made a chinging sound as it hit the ground.

They both looked. She was nowhere near the bull’s-eye, but for the first time ever, she’d made it onto the paper.

“Ed,” she said breathlessly. “
Look
.”

“I am. And it makes me want to howl like a banshee,” he replied.

Then she raised the rifle and pulled the trigger again.

8

T
he next morning Katelyn was in a great mood. She’d hit the target three more times, but her real target was the Cirque tickets. It meant so much that Ed had bought them. All was not lost after all. She’d been right when she’d told Kimi she was more likely to get her way if she was nice. As her grandfather hadn’t shown in the kitchen yet, she made the coffee and smiled when she heard Trick’s Mustang roll up outside.

She made sure she had all her school stuff, then poured him a cup of coffee and laid a piece of toast on top. Juggling everything, she opened the door. He’d already gotten out of the car and was heading up the steps leading to the porch. She went out into the chilly morning air and waited for him.

When he reached her, he didn’t say a word. The dark brows, which furrowed above his deep green eyes, were nearly matched by the black circles underneath them. His mouth was pressed into a thin line, and there was a pallor to his usually warm bronze skin that made him look like a different person—someone related to Trick, but not Trick. There was something
nearer
about him, even though his seriousness made her step back.

She glanced down at the left sleeve of his dark gray hoodie. A black armband of duct tape was wound around his bicep.

“Trick?” she said. “What’s wrong?”

He gave a strange kind of gasp and took a step toward her, then stopped, as if holding himself in check. Then he took the coffee and toast with one hand and closed his other hand over hers. His fingers were cold.

“Trick? You’re scaring me.”

He shook his head and walked her to the car. She slid in, and he walked around to the driver’s side. Music started immediately. She recognized “Pavane for a Dead Princess” by Ravel. The music caught her off guard. Her mother had danced to this, dressed as a sixteenth-century Spanish princess. Katelyn had seen a video of her performance.

He was playing it loudly, driving slow, as if he wanted to drag out the time it would take to get to school.

“What happened?” she shouted over the music, but he couldn’t hear her. She wanted to reach over and turn off the music but, at the same time, wanted just as badly for him to delay whatever bad news he had for her.

Just before they entered the tree tunnel, he put the car in idle, turned, and put his arms around her. He was shaking and he pressed her head into his chest. Katelyn felt the muscles against her cheek. His heart was pounding as the music swelled around them.

“Trick?” She choked on her own fear, but he let go and began to drive again.

When they finally arrived at school, Katelyn realized immediately that whatever was wrong wasn’t affecting just Trick. She saw students clustered in small knots talking quietly. A blond girl was sitting in her car, sobbing with her head against the steering wheel, one foot on the ground outside and one inside. Katelyn’s stomach tightened as she recognized the all-too-familiar signs of grief.

Trick turned off the car.

“Tell me
now
,” she ordered him.

He exhaled, eyes fixed straight ahead through the windshield, not at her. “Becky Jensen wasn’t at school yesterday. Turns out she went missing a couple of days ago. Her body was discovered early this morning.” The muscle in his jaw worked as he shifted, locking his gaze on hers, fighting for calm. “Just like Haley.”

Horror surged through her. Had Becky Jensen screamed? In the woods? On Friday night? And could Katelyn have done something to save her?

Her stomach twisted and she struggled not to be sick. She glanced up at Trick, who looked the same way she felt.

“Did you know her?” she whispered.

He nodded. “I told you. Everybody knows everybody out here. She was probably in a couple of your classes.”

“Oh, God,” Katelyn said, suddenly suspended in a strange sort of languor. Part of her still felt the intense horror, the shock, but another part detached, as if she were hearing of it from a great distance in time and space.

“Trick, that story I told you…,” she began.

“Not now,” he said, so quietly she almost didn’t hear him.

Trick climbed out of the car and she caught up to him as he started to cross the lot. It was chilly, but as she passed the girl crying in her car, she began to sweat. She remembered the shock and pain she’d felt when she had heard her dad had been shot. Unlike with her mom, she hadn’t been there to see it happen. Somehow that had made it even harder to believe.

I touched my mom’s face just before she died. She died. My mom died
.

Two girls are dead. Death followed me
.

She walked into the building and everywhere she turned there were stunned, tear-streaked faces. Trick was right. In a town as small as this one, everyone did know everyone.

And her grandfather was right.

Going out into the woods at night
could
get you killed.

She shivered and wrapped her arms around herself.

That first scream …

Cordelia was in history, looking pale. Mr. Henderson attempted to review his grading system for their projects, but no one was listening. Throughout class Katelyn tried to get Cordelia’s attention, but the other girl refused to look up, and when the bell rang, she bolted from the room.

Katelyn hurried to follow her and finally caught up to her in the hallway just before they reached the gym. She grabbed Cordelia’s arm and spun her half around.

Cordelia looked up at her, eyes brimming with tears. Her mascara had run all over. “Oh, Kat!” she wailed. “First Haley and now Becky. We used to be so close.”

Katelyn felt helpless; she didn’t know what to say, but she reached out and hugged Cordelia. The other girl clung to her, sobbing as if her heart were breaking.

“Maybe you should go home,” Katelyn said.

“I don’t want to. There’s no one there and then I’d have to think too much.”

“Think?” Katelyn echoed.
About what we did and didn’t do?

“Please come with me,” Cordelia begged. “I’ll get you home before dark.” She smeared her makeup even more. Then she looked hard at Katelyn. “What?”

Katelyn licked her lips. “Friday.” Cordelia just stared at her blankly, which frustrated Katelyn, because she didn’t want to have to say any more. “The scream.”

Cordelia caught her breath. “Oh. Oh, no, Kat. She wasn’t anywhere near the cabin. We for sure didn’t hear her. Oh, I’m sorry you were worried about that.”

Katelyn’s intense, high-inducing relief that Becky’s blood was not on their hands, combined with the way Cordelia kept smearing her makeup, made her reflexively smile.

“What? Do I look awful?” Cordelia asked, suddenly self-conscious.

“A little like the Joker.” She bit her lip. It wasn’t funny, but the relief was so great she couldn’t help herself.

Cordelia burst out with a choked, crazy laugh. She glanced down at her hands, and her eyes widened at the streaks of mascara, eye shadow, and blush covering her fingers. “I did not just laugh,” she said.

“It’s just nerves,” Katelyn said grimly, painfully familiar with the cycle of crazy emotions. “Laughing, crying, and in between … numb.”

“Please come home with me,” Cordelia pleaded again. “I need someone of my own there.”

Her phrasing was odd, but Katelyn understood it.

“I need to be home by dark,” she reminded her.

Cordelia nodded, then, wordlessly, stepped forward and kissed her cheek.

Katelyn texted Trick that she had a ride home, but he didn’t reply. Luckily, on their way out, she bumped into a girl she’d seen sitting at Trick’s lunch table and the girl promised to let him know.

When Katelyn and Cordelia stopped at the office to get permission to leave, Mrs. Walker said the principal told her to excuse anyone who asked to go.

The two girls headed for the parking lot. Once they were inside Cordelia’s car and heading away from the school, Katelyn felt herself relax a little. Cordelia’s grief was raw and fresh, but better to deal with one person feeling that way than five hundred.

For a long time they drove in silence and Cordelia cried off and on. Her makeup was completely gone by then and she looked much younger. A wave of protectiveness rushed over Katelyn. She wished she could say something to make Cordelia feel better, but knew there wasn’t anything. People had tried that with her and it had only made her feel more alone.

When they finally pulled up around the back of the house, Katelyn noticed another black truck in the small gravel lot, this one bigger and shinier than Cordelia’s. The other girl turned the engine off and sat for a moment, looking at it, without moving.

For a second Katelyn thought of Justin and a shiver went through her. She tried to remind herself that he was a lying, cheating jerk and she had no desire to see him ever again.

“Dad’s home,” Cordelia said. There was something odd in the way she said it, like she was catching her breath.

Katelyn was taken aback.

“Is everything okay?” she asked.

“What? No, it’s good. You should meet. It’s good for him to meet my friends.”

And still Cordelia sat, hands wrapped around the steering wheel in a death grip.

“We can go somewhere else if you want,” Katelyn said, her friend’s trepidation communicating itself all too well.

But it was too late. The back door to the house opened, and out stepped a very tall man with a shock of white hair. His face was tan and leathery, like a cowboy’s. He was older than she had expected, but looked strong. His amber eyes were flecked through with gold, and she felt as if he were staring right through her. A chill ran up her spine.

Then he moved his attention to Cordelia, breaking into a broad, welcoming smile. She got out of the car and headed toward him, and after a moment, Katelyn trailed behind.

“My youngest! So what brings you home so early in the day?” he asked, throwing open his arms to embrace her.

Cordelia’s voice was muffled against his chest. “Kat and I got time off to work on our history project.”

Katelyn blinked at the lie. Why not just tell her father the truth? It wasn’t every day you found out a friend of yours had been killed. Surely he would understand that.

Cordelia turned and gestured to Katelyn.

“Kat, this is my father, Lee Fenner.”

“Kat,” he said, biting off her name. He wrapped his hand around hers and shook, then leaned forward as though he was going to kiss her cheek, and she jerked. He took note of her reaction and moved slightly back as well. She didn’t know what to think of him.

“So, you and my little Cordelia have become pretty close,” he said.

Behind him she saw Cordelia flush. Parental types. They would embarrass you. Some things didn’t change no matter where you went.

“Yes, I’m lucky to have her as a friend,” Katelyn replied, feeling awkward.

“And she you.” He released her hand. “Always nice to welcome a new face into our home.”

His tone was warm but the look he shot Cordelia was distinctly not happy. Cordelia dropped her head, and Katelyn felt sorry for her and even more awkward. Her entire family was weird. No wonder she’d hesitated about having Katelyn over.