Hot Blooded (Wolf Springs Chronicles) - By Nancy Holder Page 0,35

she asked, growing pale. “What do you mean?”

“He stopped coming to school. They don’t know where he is.” Katelyn would never tell her what people were saying about Cordelia and him.

Cordelia covered her mouth with both hands. Her eyes grew enormous and she went from pale to chalk white. “The Hellhound,” she whispered. “It guards the mine. What if it got him?”

The door to the hut opened and Dom Gaudin stood in the doorway. Cordelia visibly jerked, and she grabbed Katelyn’s hand. She looked even more terrified.

“Ladies?” Dom Gaudin said. “We can’t risk staying here much longer. Is Ma’amselle McBride coming with us?”

“Don’t leave me,” Cordelia said under her breath. “I need you, Kat. I risked my life for you.”

She did. Katelyn owed her.

Dom turned his head and spoke in French to someone who was still outside.

Her stomach in a knot, Katelyn took a breath and whispered in a rush before she lost her nerve, “What if I looked for the mine? And if I find it, you can tell your father that you found it.”

“Oh,” Cordelia murmured. “Oh, would you do that?” She looked over Katelyn’s shoulder at Dom. “Maybe I should stay. Help you. But the Hellhound . . .”

“The time’s come,” Dom said, coming into the hut. “We don’t want to linger on Fenner territory. It’s time to go. With, or without you, Miss Kat?”

“Without,” Katelyn said. “I have to stay and try to get the others to see reason, to get Lee to forgive Cordelia. Then . . .” she thought of what Luc had told her in the car. “Maybe then there can be peace.”

Dom sighed heavily. “Peace is a dream I once cherished. I would urge you to abandon it, but I can see that you have not lost hope. It is not an easy thing to leave all that you know behind. I must warn you, though, we cannot risk coming back for you.”

“I understand,” Katelyn said, even as she could hear Cordelia crying.

From a distance she heard a sort of whistling sound. Dom spun around with what Katelyn recognized as a French curse falling from his lips. “We will be found. Hurry.”

He grabbed Cordelia around the waist and ran with her, propelling her toward the idling BMW. Katelyn ran behind, but before she could climb in, Dom held up his hand.

“I’m sorry — we must go and we cannot go the way you were brought. If you are caught with us you are dead. Your home is that way,” he said, pointing through the forest. “Go quickly before they find you here.”

Then Dom turned from Katelyn and jumped into the car as well. The wheels kicked up dirt and pine needles, then disappeared down the road.

7

Katelyn had never been a fan of conspiracy theories, but as she watched the car disappear, she began to believe. The Gaudins had told her the Fenners were nowhere near, but had they simply lured her to the hut, then dumped her there? Alone?

She realized she had no way home. All she had was her cell phone. She stared down at it, wondering if she dare call Trick or Justin. Now that she knew where Cordelia was going, she wasn’t sure if there was anything to be gained by bringing Justin into the picture. Handsome and charming when he wanted to be, not entirely to be trusted. She was certain he would be able to tell that Cordelia had been in the warming hut — and that the Gaudins had been, too.

But if she called Trick for a ride, she’d have to explain what she’d been doing out there alone. Maybe he’d come anyway, if she could even manage to describe where she was. She tried her GPS function, but it wasn’t working. Maybe the warming hut was a known landmark.

It was a bad idea to go into the woods by herself. If this were a horror movie, she’d tell that moronic girl on the screen that she deserved to die a hideous death because she was too stupid to live. But Gaudin had said the members of her pack were coming — and they would kill her.

Swallowing her pride and her anxiety, she texted Trick, but it didn’t send. She winced and tried calling him. Another fail. So, no calling for help.

That left the “dying in the woods” option.

Her heartbeat picked up as she stared out at the vast expanse of trees, and jerked. There were some blotches on the trees and they were glowing a