Hemlock (12 page)

“I want you to recount your story. You were savagely attacked.

No one wil blame you for being confused. It’s best not to muddy public opinion with ridiculous stories about benevolent werewolves.”

“For the Trackers,” I said, trying to wrap my head around the man in front of me. His nephew had nearly been kiled and he was man in front of me. His nephew had nearly been kiled and he was thinking about damage control. Cause above family.

Derby’s gray eyes glinted. “For everyone.” He stood and crossed to the window. “People count on my group to keep the wolves in check. The police can’t do it—they don’t have the resources and they’re constrained by the law. That’s why they caled us in. We’re here on the personal invitation of Senator Walsh.”

He stared down at the parking lot. “I understand you’re claiming not to have seen the wolf before it shifted. That realy is quite unfortunate. And difficult to believe.”

A chil swept up my spine. I had the distinct feeling that very bad things happened to people who withheld information from him.

“I didn’t see anything.”

Derby turned and crossed his arms. “Miss Dobson, I have a problem. And I do not like problems. I can’t keep the media from reporting that there was an attack last night and that my nephew was bitten and infected, but I can keep the details to a minimum.

And I can make it so that your name stays out of it. Completely.

Alexis Perry has already agreed not to tel anyone what she witnessed.” He frowned. “It realy is unfortunate that she wasn’t more observant.”

He sighed and shook his head. “But that is neither here nor there. The point is, I can keep the press away from you—provided you keep quiet. Do you realy want them constantly hounding you, asking you to relive last night over and over?”

Bile rose in the back of my throat. “And your nephew?”

Bile rose in the back of my throat. “And your nephew?”

“There’s nothing I can do for him. It was obvious to both the police and the hospital staff that he was bitten. He’l be sent to a rehabilitation camp.”

My surprise must have shown on my face because he added,

“Nephew or not, he’s one of them now.” His mouth twisted around his next words. “A werewolf.”

Derby shrugged. “In a way, you actualy did me something of a favor—or that wolf did. My nephew has been difficult to control.

Now I’l no longer have to worry about his lack of judgment.”

Jimmy would spend the rest of his life behind a fence. It was a harsher sentence than he’d get from the regular justice system. And I was betting that very bad things happened to Trackers who found themselves on the inside of the camps.

Of course, nothing would happen to Alexis. I’d stil have to see her every day at school.

It wasn’t right, but maybe Jimmy being locked away could be enough. Maybe it had to be.

The way Derby shrugged off his nephew’s interment made me certain he wouldn’t hesitate to hurt anyone standing in his way.

Besides, if my name got out to the press, there could be a chance I would accidentaly say something that could endanger Kyle.

“Fine,” I said, throat dry. “Keep my name out of it and I’l keep quiet.”

Derby raised an eyebrow, surprised, probably, that I hadn’t argued. “Very good, Miss Dobson. Unfortunately, I wasn’t finished.”

A lead weight dropped into my stomach.

A lead weight dropped into my stomach.

“I also want you to keep last night a secret from Jason Sheffield.

I know he was with you prior to the . . . incident. When he asks you about last night—and he wil—tel him you went straight home.”

I bit my lip. Lie to Jason? About being attacked?

Derby’s eyes bored into me. They were cold and hard, like shale slick with rain. “I have plans for Jason Sheffield. I don’t want any childish affection he has for you to cloud his judgment, to make him question his place with the Trackers.”

I swalowed. “I think you’re overestimating how much he’d care.”

Derby shook his head and moved toward the bed. He stared down at me the way cruel boys studied flies before puling off their wings. “Actualy, I think you’re one of the few things he does care about. Maybe almost as much as revenge.” He shrugged. “As I said, I have plans for Jason. If his feelings for you were to get in the way of those plans, he’d be useless to me. He might even become a liability.”

Derby leaned down, so close that I could smel stale coffee on his breath. “Do you know what I do to losses and liabilities, Miss Dobson?”

I shook my head.

“I cut them loose. Permanently.”

The curtain was suddenly thrust aside and I let out an embarrassingly loud shriek. I had been so intent on Derby that I hadn’t heard anyone else enter the room.

“What’s going on?” The glare Ben leveled at Derby was hot

“What’s going on?” The glare Ben leveled at Derby was hot enough to scorch. Like everyone in the country, he knew who the man was. His gaze flicked to me. “Are you al right, Mac?”

I nodded. “Mr. Derby was just leaving.”

“Of course.” Derby gave my hand a smal squeeze, carefuly twisting my wrist in just the right way to exert pain. To the casual observer, it would have looked like a caring gesture.

Ben was not a casual observer. He read the pain in my eyes and took a step forward.

I gave a smal shake of my head—I could stand a little pain and I didn’t want Ben to get on the wrong side of the Trackers. It was bad enough that I had managed to end up on it.

Derby increased the pressure for a heartbeat and then released my hand. “I just wanted to check on the girl who was lucky enough to survive a werewolf attack.” He turned and walked out of the room, calm, confident, certain that I wouldn’t contradict him.

Al of the air burst out of my lungs in a relieved rush.

I swung my legs over the side of the bed and tried to stand. Not good. Ben darted forward to steady me before I fel. “What did he want?” His voice was laced with anger and the look in his gray eyes sent a chil through me. Ben almost never got angry.

“Nothing,” I lied, steadying myself and stepping away. “He just wanted to folow up on some of the questions the police asked me.”

Ben weighed my answer and then nodded, swalowing the lie.

Lying to Ben was easy. Lying to Jason was going to be harder.

Much, much harder.

But I didn’t have a choice.

I was pretty sure Derby had just threatened Jason’s life.

UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

HarperCollins Publishers

.....................................................................

“SO THAT WAS BRANSON DERBY. HE WAS SHORTER than I thought he’d be.” My stomach clenched. It was night and we were back in the aley.

Amy shivered and wrapped her arms around herself. “Relax.

This isn’t your place. It’s mine.”

She was right. The wals were closer together and the color of the bricks and the shapes of the puddles were slightly different.

There was a chain-link fence blocking off the back of the aley from an adjacent vacant lot. The graffiti on the wals suggested doing several things I was pretty sure were physicaly impossible.

I had been avoiding this part of town for months. I knew people left flowers and teddy bears in the aley as a makeshift memorial—

left flowers and teddy bears in the aley as a makeshift memorial—

Tess had even suggested that going might give me some closure—

but I hadn’t been brave enough to visit the place where Amy died.

“It’s okay,” she said as she kicked a bottle cap. She was wearing a short, gray dress over a pair of pink leggings and black high-tops. It was what she had been wearing when I canceled our plans so I could stay home and study.

“What’s okay?”

The bottle cap went flying down the aley and made a soft ping as it bounced off the brick wal. “You not coming here sooner.”

I swalowed. “How did you—?”

“Doesn’t matter. Anyway, the whole murder-scene-memorial idea is kind of morbid. Kyle comes, you know.” She was quiet for a moment. “I wish he’d stop. Al it does is make him sad.”

I did know. Kyle’s mom had told me because she was worried about him: she thought he was stil blaming himself for not answering Amy’s cal the night she died.

“Derby won’t find it, you know. Him.” Amy glanced up at the stars, just for a second, and let out a frustrated sigh. “If he finds the wolf too soon, it’l be game over.”

“He’l be a hero.”

She shook her head. “He’l be obsolete. He’s playing the long game, and round two hasn’t even started yet.”

I took a deep breath and counted to ten, praying for patience. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

Amy smiled. It wasn’t a happy smile. A smal line of blood trickled out of the corner of her mouth. “You wil.”

And then I was staring at my bedroom ceiling, at the smal spot And then I was staring at my bedroom ceiling, at the smal spot where paint had begun to peel away.

In life, Amy had liked keeping secrets. She loved knowing things other people didn’t. My dreams were magnifying that quality, turning her into a nightmare version of the Cheshire cat.

I roled over and glanced at my alarm clock. Noon. Almost exactly. I had three seconds’ worth of panic before I remembered it was Sunday.

It took me two tries to climb out of bed, and my body kept trying to convince me it was too stiff and sore to move as I walked to my closet. I puled on a pair of ancient jeans—washed so many times that they were almost as comfortable as pajama bottoms—

and a green-and-white long-sleeved T-shirt that had the Kennedy Coyote on the back.

I tugged the sleeves down to hide the bruises on my arms and the bandage wrapped around my wrist. Out of sight, out of mind.

Ben glanced up from a paperback when I walked into the kitchen. “Hey, comatose girl.”

I roled my eyes. “Teenagers are supposed to sleep late. We’re kinda known for it.” The rest of the apartment was weirdly quiet. It was never quiet when Tess was around.

Guessing my thoughts, Ben said, “Tess figured you’d be up soon. She went to get you a new cel phone, and then she was going to swing by the deli to grab sandwiches.”

I felt a smal pang of guilt: I was the one who had lost the phone.

She’d probably come home with something about ten times better than what I’d had—Tess always let salespeople talk her into things

—and she probably wouldn’t let me pay her back.

—and she probably wouldn’t let me pay her back.

“I’m not sure I feel like eating,” I admitted as I slid into the chair across from him. “So you’re my designated babysitter while she’s gone?”

Ben shrugged. “If I say yes,, you’l tel me that you don’t need a babysitter and kick me out. So, no, I’m not your designated babysitter. I’m a guy whose apartment has no running water.”

“Again?” There were a few nice things about living in a building that was practicaly a historic landmark. Reliable plumbing was not, unfortunately, one of them. “Did you cal the super?”

With impeccable timing, Ben’s phone went off. He took it out and glanced at the display. His face darkened and he let it go to voice mail.

I raised an eyebrow.

“Family stuff,” he said.

“Oh.” I didn’t push. I knew Ben didn’t get along with most of his family. He’d been in Dayton for a funeral the week Amy died.

When he got back, he’d been quiet and withdrawn for days. Al he’d tel Tess was that he’d fought with his father.

The intercom buzzed. “Wow,” I muttered, “we’re more popular than a pretty girl at a
Star Trek
convention.”

I started to get up, but Ben waved me back down. “I’l get it.”

I tugged at a thread on my jeans, praying it wouldn’t be Kyle. I knew I was going to have to talk to him—I wanted to talk to him

—but first I needed to figure out what I was going to say. Before heading to bed last night, I’d looked online for a FAQ that told you how to have the “so you’re a werewolf” conversation with your friends. The first page of search results had been filed with links for Tracker blogs and articles about Amy’s grandfather and his new anti-werewolf stance.

My head snapped up as Jason’s voice came over the intercom.

I opened my mouth to tel Ben not to let him in—that I didn’t want to see him—but I was too late: he had already pressed the button to unlock the main door.

“I’m gonna run down to my apartment for a minute, okay?”

I nodded, fighting the urge to beg Ben to stay. He opened the door and I heard him greet Jason and tel him I was inside.

And then Jason was in the apartment. It had been a day and a half since I had seen him, and the bruise on his face from the fight with Trey had taken on a yelowish-green tinge. He was wearing a gray coat that made his pale skin and blond hair look almost ghostly. His eyes were bloodshot and I was pretty sure he was hungover but not catastrophicaly so.

For a second I wondered if he had gone out again last night and how he had gotten home.

Then I told myself that I didn’t care.

I pushed my chair back and stood. The movement was a little too fast and I had to grip the edge of the table to steady myself.

Where were you?

How could you have left me alone?

Do you have any idea what happened to me?

The questions tried to force their way out, but I shoved them down. Al but that first one. “Where were you Friday night?”

Jason crossed the living room. “I’m sorry. I saw you talking to Jason crossed the living room. “I’m sorry. I saw you talking to Ethan at the club and . . .” His voice trailed off as he got closer. He closed the remaining distance in three quick strides.

He reached out and I froze, my heart pounding like a bird beating itself against the bars of a cage. His fingertips traced the gash on my temple, his frown deepening as he touched each stitch.

“What happened?”

The two words were so ful of concern that I almost crumbled.

But then I remembered the empty table at Bonnie and Clyde and the feeling of Jimmy’s hands on my shoulders and the smel of Derby’s breath as he leaned over me in the hospital.