Chapter 9
1223 Words
The Woods Again
The woods looked different in daylight. Less threatening. Less mysterious. Almost ordinary.
Almost.
Elena parked her Jeep on the narrow dirt shoulder and shut off the engine. For a moment, she sat there. Hands gripping the steering wheel, staring through the windshield. The forest stretched endlessly before her. Towering pines. Dense undergrowth. Ancient shadows hidden beneath summer sunlight.
Peaceful. Beautiful. Dangerous.
At least according to every survival documentary she'd ever watched. The irony wasn't lost on her. She'd spent an entire year avoiding this place. Now she was willingly returning. Her stomach twisted.
Not with fear. With memory. Because somewhere beyond those trees—Ronan had died. Or at least that's what everyone said. The thought still hurt. Maybe it always would. Slowly, Elena reached for the passenger seat. The investigation folder sat where she'd left it.
Alongside it are a flashlight, a notebook, a bottle of water, and Bear spray.
Lily would be proud. Or horrified. Possibly both. Elena grabbed the supplies and stepped out of the vehicle. The summer air felt cooler beneath the trees. The scent of pine immediately surrounded her. Fresh earth. Moss. Wildflowers. The smell triggered an unexpected memory.
Ronan.
He had always smelled like the woods. Not in an unpleasant way. In a comforting way. Like rain-soaked forests and campfires.
Like home.
The memory tightened something inside her chest.
"Not helping," she muttered.
The forest, predictably, ignored her. A narrow trail wound between the trees. Barely visible. More animal path than hiking route. Elena followed it.
Carefully.
The silence felt strange. Not complete silence. Nature was never truly silent. Birds called from distant branches. Insects buzzed lazily through shafts of sunlight. Leaves rustled overhead. And yet—The woods felt watchful. As though they knew she wasn't supposed to be here. The thought was ridiculous. She kept walking anyway. Minutes passed. Then half an hour. The trail grew rougher. Less defined. The trees are older. Larger. More twisted.
Elena checked the map she'd copied from the investigation report. According to the official records, Ronan's body had been found less than a mile ahead. A mile. Such a short distance. And yet it had stolen everything. The realization made her slow. The closer she came, the heavier her steps became. Eventually, she spotted the clearing.
Small. Unremarkable.
A patch of open ground surrounded by towering pines. No memorial. No marker. Nothing indicated a man had died here. Nature had already reclaimed it. The forest had moved on. Elena wasn't sure whether she hated that or envied it. She stepped into the clearing. The sunlight felt brighter here.
Warmer.
The air strangely still. For a long moment, she stood there.
Looking. Searching. Waiting for something. She wasn't sure what.
An answer. A feeling. A sign.
Anything.
Nothing happened.
The clearing remained stubbornly ordinary. Which somehow felt wrong. The official reports claimed the attack had been violent.
Brutal. Catastrophic.
Yet there was no evidence. No scars. No lingering damage. Just grass and trees. As though the forest had erased the event completely.
Elena began walking slowly around the perimeter, examining everything. The ground. The trees. The undergrowth. Looking for details that everyone else had missed. At first, she found nothing. Then—A mark. Halfway up the trunk of a pine tree. She stopped.
Frowned.
Stepped closer. The bark had been gouged deeply. Four parallel grooves carved through the wood. Not recent. But not old either. The damage looked deliberate. Almost like claw marks.
Elena's pulse quickened. She reached up. The grooves sat far above her head—nearly seven feet from the ground.
Too high. Way too high.
"What made that?"
The question escaped before she could stop it. No answer came. Only silence. She photographed the marks. Then, she measured them against her notebook. The spacing seemed wrong.
Too wide. Too deep. Too powerful.
A shiver crawled down her spine. She moved on.
Searching. Looking.
And then she found another one. And another. Each mark hidden.
Subtle. Easy to overlook.
But once she noticed them, they seemed everywhere. The forest was covered in scars as though something large had passed through repeatedly.
Something strong. Something territorial.
The thought made her uneasy. A branch snapped somewhere behind her. Elena spun around. The clearing stood empty. Sunlight filtered through the trees. Nothing moved. Nothing visible. Yet her heart immediately accelerated.
"Hello?"
Silence.
A bird launched from a nearby branch. The sudden movement nearly made her jump.
Ridiculous.
She was getting paranoid. That was all. The branch had probably broken naturally. Animals lived here. Birds. Deer. Foxes.
Normal things.
The forest wasn't haunted. The forest wasn't watching her. The forest wasn't hiding monsters. A low breeze stirred through the pines. Carrying the scent of damp earth. And something else. Something familiar. Something impossible.
Pine. Rain. Coffee.
Her breath caught. The exact scent she'd found lingering on Ronan's hoodie. The scent she'd spent years associating with him. The scent she knew better than her own.
Elena froze.
Slowly. Carefully.
She turned. The clearing remained empty. But the scent lingered. Strong enough to notice. Strong enough to recognize. Not strong enough to explain. Her heart hammered painfully against her ribs.
"No."
The whisper barely left her lips. This wasn't happening. It couldn't be. Scents didn't survive a year. People didn't linger in forests. Ghosts weren't real. Yet for one impossible moment—it felt like Ronan was standing beside her. The feeling vanished almost immediately. Leaving only confusion. And grief.
Always grief.
A sharp glint caught her eye near the base of another tree. Partially buried beneath leaves. Elena crouched. Carefully brushing away debris.
Metal. Silver.
Her pulse jumped. Another fragment. Larger than the one she'd found near her house.
Jagged. Damaged. Old.
Yet unmistakably similar. She slipped it into her pocket beside the first. Two pieces now. Two questions. No answers.
The afternoon sunlight began shifting. Lengthening shadows stretched across the clearing. Elena checked the time. Three hours. She'd been here for nearly three hours. Longer than she'd intended.
Long enough.
Reluctantly, she turned toward the trail. The walk back felt different.
Heavier.
The forest no longer felt empty. Not because she'd seen anything. Because she hadn't. Not because she'd found proof. Because she hadn't. But because something about the woods felt alive.
Aware. Watching.
The sensation followed her all the way to her Jeep. Only fading once she closed the door and started the engine. Elena glanced back toward the tree line. The shadows stood motionless beneath the afternoon sun.
Silent. Patient.
Keeping their secrets. For now.
Deep within those shadows, concealed among the pines, a massive black wolf remained perfectly still. He had watched every step. Every question. Every photograph. Every moment. Ronan waited until the Jeep disappeared down the road before moving. The silver fragments worried him. More than they should. Because Elena was finding things. Pieces of a past that should have remained buried. Pieces of a lie that was already beginning to c***k. The wolf lifted his head.
Listening. Sensing. Watching.
And somewhere deeper in the forest—another wolf answered.
Not a friend. Not pack. Not welcome.
Ronan's eyes narrowed. The growl that rumbled from his chest carried through the trees.
Low. Dangerous. Protective.
Because Elena wasn't the only one searching anymore, and that terrified him far more than she could ever know.
- Writer
