Forever

Why had I said it? Maybe Rachel was right with her bitch comment. I wished I knew how to set my weapons to stun instead of eviscerate.

It took what felt like half the night to realize that I couldn’t stand myself if I didn’t try to do something about the hunt.

I tried Cole’s number and then Sam’s one last time — nothing — and then I headed downstairs. In my head I rehearsed what I would say to my father. First the arguments, then the pleas, and finally, the justification for my concerns that wouldn’t lead it back to Sam and Beck, because I knew that would go nowhere with my father. This was going to go nowhere anyway.

But at least I could tell Cole that I’d tried. Then, maybe, I wouldn’t feel so sick.

I hated it. I hated this. I hated feeling so terrible because of someone else. I pressed my hand to my right eye, but the tear there stayed safely inside.

The house was dark. I had to flip light switches on as I went down staircases. There was no one in the kitchen. No one in the living room. Finally I found my mother in the library, reclining easily on the leather sofa, a glass of white wine in her hand. She was watching a hospital reality show. Normally the irony of such a thing would have amused me, but right now, all I could think about was the last thing I told Cole.

“Mom,” I said. I tried to sound casual. “Where’s Dad?”

“Hm?” Something about her hm focused me, made me feel more solid. The world was not collapsing. My mother still said hm when I asked her questions.

“My father. The creature that mated with you to make me. Where is he?”

“I wish you wouldn’t talk like that,” my mother said. “He’s gone to the helicopter.”

“The. Helicopter.”

My mother barely looked up from the television. There was nothing new in my tone to alarm her. “Marshall got him a seat. Said because he was such a good shot, it wouldn’t be wasted. God, I’ll be glad when this whole thing is over.”

“Dad is riding in the helicopter that is shooting the wolves,” I said. Slowly. I felt like an idiot. Of course my father would want to ride on the front lines with an elephant gun. Of course Marshall would make that happen for him.

“It takes off at some terrible hour,” Mom said. “So he headed out now to meet Marshall for coffee. So I get the TV.”

I was too late. I had spent too long debating with myself and now I was too late.

There was nothing I could do.

Cole had said, You owe it to me to try.

I still didn’t think I owed him anything. But, taking care not to signal my clawing distress to my mother, I slid out of the library and back through the house. I got my white jacket and my car keys and my cell phone and I pushed the back door open. Not that long ago, Cole had stood there as a wolf, his green eyes on mine. I’d told him that my brother was dead. That I wasn’t a nice person. He’d just watched me, unflinching, trapped in that body he’d chosen for himself.

Everything had changed.

When I left, I hit the gas pedal so hard that the wheels spun in the gravel.

CHAPTER SIXTY-FIVE

SAM

I am Sam Roth. I am finding Grace. Finding the wolves. Bringing them to the lake. I am Sam Roth. I am finding Grace. Finding the wolves. Bringing them to the lake.

I burst into the woods at a gallop. My paws pounded the rocks; my strides ate the ground. Every nerve inside me was on fire. I was holding my thoughts like an armful of paper cranes. Tight enough to keep them. Not tight enough to crush them.

I am Sam Roth. I am finding Grace. Finding the wolves. Bringing them to the lake. I am Sam Roth. I am finding Grace. Finding the wolves. Bringing them to the lake.

There were one thousand things to hear. Ten thousand things to scent. One hundred million clues to countless forms of life in these woods. But I didn’t need countless. I needed one.

She was leaning back against me, breathing in the scent of a candy shop. Every color that I couldn’t see now was painted on the walls and labels around us.

I am Sam. I am finding Grace. Finding the wolves. Bringing them to the lake.

The night was bright underneath a half-moon; the light reflected off a few low clouds and ragged strands of mist. I could see endlessly ahead of me. But it wasn’t sight that would help me. Every so often I slowed, listening. Her howl. It was for me, I was certain.

The wolves howled; I stood at her window, looking out. We were strangers and we knew each other like a path we walked every day. Don’t sleep on the floor, she said.

I am Sam. I am finding Grace. Finding the wolves. Bringing them.

There were other voices now, responding to her calls. It wasn’t difficult to pick them apart. It was difficult to remember why I needed to pick them apart.

Her eyes, brown and complicated, with a wolf’s face.

I am Sam. I am finding Grace. Finding the wolves.

I faltered as my paws slid on wet clay, sending me slithering. I heard something drop into water, close by.

A voice hissed at me in the back of my head. Something about this was dangerous. I slowed, cautious, and there it was — a massive pit, water for drowning at its base. I minced around it before listening. The woods had fallen silent. My mind tripped and stumbled, aching for — I tipped my head back and howled, a long, trembling bay that helped ease the ache inside me. A few moments later, I heard her voice, and I set off again.

I am finding Grace. Finding the wolves.

A flock of birds exploded in front of me, startled from their roost by my progress. They burst into the air, white against the black, and something about the multitude of their forms, the identical stretch of their wings, the way they suspended above me, fluttering in the wind, stars lit behind them, reminded me of something.

I struggled and struggled to grasp it, but it slid away from me. The loss seemed crushing, though I could not think of what I’d lost.

I am finding Grace.

I would not lose that. I would not lose that.

finding Grace.

There were some things you could not take from me. Some things that I just could not bear to give up.

Grace

CHAPTER SIXTY-SIX

COLE

Two thirty-four A.M.

I was alone.

The lake stretched out beside the parking area, the still water reflecting a mirror-perfect image of the imperfect moon. Somewhere on the other side of the water was the Culpeper property.

I wasn’t going to think about that.

Two thirty-five A.M.

I was alone.

It was possible that Sam wasn’t coming.

ISABEL

It was three twenty-one A.M. and there was no one at Beck’s house. I found a pile of clothing and an abandoned syringe by the back door, and inside, Sam’s cell phone sitting on the kitchen island — no wonder my call hadn’t been picked up. They were gone. They’d done just what I said to do — gone through with Cole’s plan without any of my help. I walked through the rooms downstairs, my boots clicking on the hardwood floor, though if there was anyone there, I was sure they would’ve answered me.