Chapter Two
1800 Words
Chapter Two
Knock knock.
Right on time. Eliza rushed over and swung the door open. Theo looked surprised.
“Do you often open the door without seeing who it is first?” Theo slowly walked into the apartment.
“Not as a habit, no. But I knew you were coming.” Eliza followed behind Theo into the living room. Theo walked around the room. He appeared to be looking for something or someone.
“So what questions do you have?” Theo finally turned his attention to Eliza.
Eliza nodded, pulled out her notepad and sat down on the sofa. “So how did you become werewolves?”
“We were born that way,” he answered quickly.
“So you weren’t created?” Eliza wasn’t sure why Theo was staring hard out the window.
“No, that’s not how it works. We are just born into it. It runs in bloodlines; we can’t create new werewolves like they do in the movies.” He glanced quickly at Eliza and then back out the window.
“Can you only change on a full moon?” Eliza was checking off the questions as Theo answered them.
“Usually that’s how it goes. But if faced with rage, we have no control over it. When we are young and just learning, we can only change on the full moon. As we get older, we learn what our triggers are and we can avoid them, or bring them to the surface. But like I said, for the most part we only change on the full moon. That is where we draw our power from.” Theo moved the curtain aside to look out the window at a different angle.
“Theo? Is something wrong?” Eliza set the notepad and pen down on the end table.
“What?” Theo turned to Eliza with a questioning look on his face.
“You’ve been staring out the window like you’re waiting for someone to jump out from behind a bush or something.” Eliza stood up and walked over to Theo. “What’s going on?”
Theo looked at her as if he was debating whether to tell her a big secret but wasn’t sure if he should. He turned toward her and let out a sigh as he tilted his head slightly.
“There have been sightings of other wolves around Birkbridge.” Theo waited and watched for her reaction.
“Well, I naturally assumed that there were more wolves around here than just you and Hayden.” Eliza smiled, but a little seed of worry started to develop in the pit of her stomach.
“No, our pack is here, working in the mines. But there are others here; a pack of werewolves that have no conscience and do not follow the treaty between the wolves and hunters... a treaty that was made to keep peace and separate our world from yours.” Theo looked out the window again, his eyebrows furrowed.
“So what do I do?” Eliza touched Theo’s arm to get his attention. That little seed of worry was growing at a rapid rate.
“I don’t know exactly. Just be careful.” Theo turned from the window and started walking toward the door. “I should get going.” He opened the door and looked back at Eliza with a smile. “You should probably start making sure you know who’s on the other side of this door before you open it.”
Eliza nodded and smiled, then closed the door behind him. She looked around her small apartment and turned the deadbolt. She walked into the living room and collapsed on the sofa, grabbing the notepad from the end table.
She didn’t get to ask all the questions she wanted to but she did manage to get answers to the main ones. She let the notepad fall to the couch by her side. Maybe she should leave town. Just for a few days. Just until she could get things sorted out in her head. She can avoid this new pack of wolves by not being in Birkbridge. She could stay at a hotel in the city. Maybe there she could relax and clear her head.
She picked up her phone and called Melissa and Brienne to let them know that she was leaving town. She didn’t tell them where she was going or for how long but at least they would know that she was not in town and they wouldn’t worry that she wasn’t home.
She started packing after she finished her calls.
>>
Eliza had taken a few days to process the recent current events, hiding out in a hotel room, out of town. Jim was beside himself with grief and had agreed to give her a few days off, but she felt bad for not being there for him. He had Feline, though, and she would do her best to keep him together. After all, wasn’t that what a spouse was for?
She felt like she should be there, but even if she had, her mind wouldn’t have been. She was so caught up in finding out what exactly a werewolf was, and whether or not she should stay with Andrew or switch sides and be with Hayden.
To make matters worse, Eliza also hadn’t told Melissa about the Naomi development. That would require some delicate work. Eliza would have to deal with that first. Her crisis of men was not all that important. The fighting and the possible war between the two factions could be devastating to the entire town. She had been incredibly calm in the face of men changing into wolves and with the knowledge that Andrew knew about them and hunted them, that his whole family hunted them. Her head was swimming with the information pouring through her mind.
Eliza lay down on the bed and closed her eyes. She finally had the chance to let her mind wander. She let everything free, rehashing everything that had happened since Hayden and Theo made an appearance in their tiny town.
Her seemingly good life had just taken a very complicated turn. From the appearance of her old friend turned enemy, Freddie, and his attempt to r**e her, to the discovery he had been killed by the person she had called to save her, Hayden. That also had been a nagging bother in her mind, that she called Hayden and not Andrew or the police. That alone was enough to send a person reeling. To add to the pile, she had discovered some connection between the arms plant and the mines and their flurry of hiring, a pattern her father had found and that she had expanded on when the year 1994 had triggered a thought and completed most of the puzzle.
When she had connected the dots herself, she had rushed to see Hayden to get some answers, ignoring her father’s frantic phone calls in the process, which had nearly cost her father his life. If she had just called him, she could have told him she was on her way to meet Hayden and asked him to meet with her or assured him she would get to the bottom of it. Instead, she ignored the calls, confronted Hayden and wound up in bed with him.
However, the conversation with Hayden, who was very forthcoming, was eye opening and the most interesting part was Naomi’s involvement. Eliza couldn’t quite wrap her head around the werewolf issue that had cropped up, or the fact that Hayden was one. The idea didn’t scare her; it intrigued her.
She decided that thinking things over this carefully all at once may not have been the best idea. Overwhelmed, Eliza decided to watch some TV for a bit of a break.
Before she could turn on the TV, her cell phone rang – it was Melissa. “Hey, Melissa, is everything okay?” she asked into the phone. Resting her head back against the headboard, she let herself slide down into the encompassing comfort and warmth of the bed.
“Well, the actual question is, are you okay?” Melissa asked, her voice clear on the other end of the line.
“I’m fine, really.” Eliza clicked the phone to speaker and set it down.
“Hayden and Andrew are both looking for you. They keep calling me asking me where you are. Andrew is getting a little flustered when I tell him I don’t know. Hayden has been a bit kinder, but they still call wondering. Are you sure you’re okay? Can you tell me where you are?” Melissa pleaded.
“I’m sorry, I can’t. I really need a little bit of time to wrap my head around what happened,” Eliza answered, shaking her head.
“About that...” Melissa said cautiously. “What did happen? Hayden wouldn’t tell me anything, just that you went to talk to him, you guys heard a gunshot and found Andrew with a g*n and your father somehow injured and a few other people standing around at the scene...” Melissa paused. “Andrew didn’t shoot your dad, did he?!”
“No, it was nothing like that. It’s just hard to explain to you over the phone. As soon as I gather my wits about me and learn a little more about the situation, I will call you, okay? We can meet and talk about what is going on. It’s important you don’t force it too hard. Please promise me that you’ll wait to talk to me before you do any digging, all right?”
“Can you tell me anything? I’m so worried. Every time my mom sees Theo or Hayden, she goes stiff and utters things that make no sense. I’m losing my mind,” Melissa sighed into the phone.
Eliza squeezed her eyes shut, rubbing her forehead. “I’m sorry, not right now, not until I have some more answers for you.”
Melissa agreed to her terms and hung up the phone. Eliza still hadn’t figured out what Melissa and Naomi’s role in all of this was. All she knew was that they were needed to keep the pack under control. But she didn’t know why and she didn’t know how. At the very least, she had to figure these things out before she could explain to Melissa or anyone else what was going on.
Eliza walked across the room to close the curtains. She had asked for a room that faced into the courtyard of the hotel, making sure that anyone who wasn’t registered at the hotel couldn’t sneak around to find her. She turned from the window and double-checked her door to make sure it was locked.
Theo didn’t really seem overly worried when she talked to him the other day and he told her to be careful because there was a new pack in town and they were very unpredictable. But there was something nagging in her mind that told her he was only trying to keep her from panicking and that she had to stay on her toes.
Satisfied she was safe for the evening from the new werewolves, she climbed back into bed and turned out the light. Sliding deeper into the bed, she settled in for a restless sleep full of bad dreams.
Outside in the courtyard, a dark figure loomed in the shadows.
- Writer
