Page 6 of The Wolves of Forest Grove

Jared and I didn’t speak for most of the drive.

He’d made a lame attempt at conversation during the long walk through the woods to where he parked his jeep in a small lot at the edge of a hiking trail, but my mind was elsewhere.

And I needed to focus to keep my eyes from tearing at the pain in my sprained ankle.

I had the walking stick from the night before, and luckily the shoes fit, but it still hurt to put weight on it.

I wanted to ask Jared why he didn’t have a proper driveway leading up to the cabin, but I could guess the reason.

Couldn’t have visitors showing up when you could be caught morphing into a fucking oversized dog.

Jared pulled his Wrangler up to the front of the shop, putting it into park in one of the many empty spaces along the street.

“Where will you go?” He asked, his hands gripping hard on the steering wheel.

I opened my mouth to say something but ended up closing it again.

The truth was that I had no freaking idea where I was going to go, and I was a shit liar.

I licked my dry lips and pulled the backpack from the back seat, slinging it over my shoulder as I stepped outside.

“Thank you,” I told him, meaning it. I’d had the time to think on the drive into town and I realized that even though the hours since I awoke this afternoon had been some of the most fucked up I’d ever experienced, he’d still saved me.

Even if he had been watching me out in the woods. Even if he was a wolf in human skin.

Without his help, I might be dead. “Thank you for saving my life,” I said earnestly.

His jaw tightened.

“Your secret is safe with me. I won’t ever tell.”

“Allie, I don’t—”

“Please,” I interrupted him, that panicky feeling rising again. “I need you to go now.”

Before he could answer, I closed the door to his Jeep and did my best to hurry into the shop, but I barely managed a waddle, cursing the entire way as my ankle protested.

The bells inside the door jingled as I entered, the familiar sweet, musky scent of paper and ink greeted me like a warm embrace, and I felt my nerves calm. I didn’t turn around as I heard the Jeep’s engine purr back to life as Jared pulled back out onto the road.

Jacqueline squinted up from the front counter, her small glasses perched low on the tip of her nose. “Oh, Allie. You made it. I wasn’t sure if...” she trailed off, and something registered in her eyes. “Is everything alright?”

She eyes me from bottom to top, taking in the torn jeans and the limp.

Jared managed to rescue several clothing articles from Dad’s hunting blind, so I at least had a clean sweater over my tattered tank top.

But I knew I looked half dead. Much as I tried to avoid it, I’d seen my reflection in the mirror at Jared’s cabin.

“Sprained my ankle,” I said with an impish grin. “Hurts like hell, but I’m fine.”

“Oh,” she said, pushing back her graying dark auburn hair from her face as she came around the counter. “What happened? If you would prefer to take the night off and keep it elevat—”

“No,” I blurted, reeling myself back in. “No, I—I want to work. It’s not even that bad.”

She seemed to consider and then nodded. “Alright. Just don’t overdo it. I haven’t gotten around to scanning in today’s deliveries, if you want to do that, I’ll get them on the shelves in the morning.”

“Okay,” I replied, knowing full well that I would get all the deliveries scanned in and shelved before I left tonight.

I needed this job, and I wasn’t about to shirk any of my duties, sprained ankle or not.

The book shop wasn’t just my only source of income.

There was an apartment above it. Occupied, but only until December.

Then, when the guy moved out, I was hoping Jacqueline would let me rent it.

It was what I’d been saving for. I’d have first month’s rent and a deposit ready to go.

Who better to rent the space than your only employee, right?

I hadn’t asked her yet, but only because I wanted to have the deposit ready to give her when I did.

And now, after losing almost everything last night, that might take longer than I had planned. I sighed.

“Is everything alright?” she asked, leaning over the counter to pull her purse and jacket from the coat rack.

“Huh?” I blinked. “Oh. Yeah. Just a little tired.”

“The coffee in the back room is still pretty fresh.”

“Thanks, Jacqueline.”

“Oh!” Jacqueline exclaimed, pulling a folded slip of paper from her purse. “I almost forgot. Devin was here earlier. Around the time your shift normally starts. I told him you were going to be a bit late and he said he couldn’t wait.”

She held the note out to me.

“He left this for you. Said he was worried your phone wasn’t working.”

She lifted a brow when I didn’t immediately move to take it but made no further comment. Jacqueline knew my phone was working just fine. I’d sent her a message that I’d be a bit late today just a few hours ago.

I gritted my teeth as I limped the three steps between us and gingerly took the paper from her slender fingers with a tight smile. “Thanks.”

“Right,” she said, snapping back into motion. She tugged on her coat and belted it in the front. “Well, I’ve got about a million errands to run. Take it easy on that ankle, hey?”

“I will.”

“Good.”

I crumpled the note in my fist as the door shut behind her, the sound of the bells loud in the quiet shop. I chucked the balled-up note onto the desk and slumped into the tall stool behind the counter as the bells jingled again, signaling the entry of the first customers of the evening.

I pressed my palms into my eyes and yawned. It was going to be a very long night.

I finished scanning the new stock into the system and had it all shelved and the entire store dusted and swept before seven, as usual. It was simple work, and even with a bum ankle, it wasn’t so hard.

But I’d almost hoped the work would take me longer tonight, now I had two hours to sit here and contemplate my bleak existence. I should’ve been using the time to think about where the hell I was going to stay tonight. Or, you know, until December when the guy upstairs hopefully moved out.

Sighing heavily, I continued going through the fall catalog from Random House.

It was my job to keep the young adult section up to date on all the newest releases, and I took that responsibility very seriously.

It showed in the surgency of teen clientele the store had gained since I started here last year.

Unconsciously, my gaze slipped to the crumpled note atop Jacqueline’s desk behind the main counter. I clenched my jaw, trying to distract myself with options for places to stay.

I could go back to the blind in the woods. Jared said it was destroyed, but how destroyed was destroyed? Was it salvageable? If I brought a tarp and some duct tape, could I make it work?

My heart ached for the last place I had that reminded me of him. After the house sold and my aunt and uncle boxed up all his things, all I had left was that one photo and the old blind. Now I had neither.

My chest ached.

What else? I asked myself, trying to distract from the pain. Where else could you go?

Not Viv’s or Layla’s. Then you’d have to explain that you’ve been lying to them for months.

I was just glad that Layla had to watch her younger brothers and sisters on Thursdays, and Viv always went to visit her Nona at the senior’s home.

Otherwise, they’d both be here demanding answers I didn’t know how to give.

I groaned, dropping my head into my hands.

This was all getting so out of hand.

My gaze flitted back to the paper on the desk and before I could change my mind, I leaned over and snatched it up, huffing before I uncrumpled the page and flattened it against the counter with my palm.

Allie, I’m sorry for what happened. Please stop ignoring me. You know it wasn’t really me. I wasn’t myself. You know me. You know I’d never hurt you. I love you. -Devin.

My hands began to shake as I read the words over again. My fingers curled in, my stubby nails like talons as I tore the note to shreds, letting the anger chase away all the other ugly thoughts.

You know I’d never hurt you… What a joke.

My fingers absently went up to trace the line of tender flesh along my collar. It was almost healed. It barely hurt to touch now, but that didn’t erase the memory of how I’d gotten it. What he did.

Little tremors raced up my spine and I took another sip of warm coffee to subdue the rise of anxious energy. The first flash came, and I winced.

An image of Devin in the dark of the basement at his Dad’s house. In the middle of the night.

I’d been asleep. Peacefully dreaming while he was going through my phone.

I had no idea what awaited me when I awoke to the sound of his heavy breathing. Barely able to see save for the strange greenish glow of my cell phone like a halo framing his head.

“Devin, what are you doing? Come back to sleep,” I’d murmured, my voice breathy with a yawn.

I pulled myself out of the flashback, and a small whimper made my bottom lip quiver. I wiped the note confetti from the desk into the recycling bin, some of the pieces scattering to the floor in my haste.

We only dated for three months, but I thought I’d loved him.

He was handsome, in a devil may care sort of way.

With a shock of dark hair and arresting green eyes.

He was tall and lean. He thought my love for books and anime was silly and childish, but we both loved hockey and shared the same taste in music.

I couldn’t even listen to those songs anymore. Preferring deafening silence to a single note of any song we once sang together.

It was only three months. So then why did this hurt so much?