Hot Blooded (Wolf Springs Chronicles) - By Nancy Holder Page 0,84

of their house.

Her mother’s voice, penetrating the fog of the painkiller Katelyn had taken to ease her injury. Katelyn, so out of it she’d barely been able to function. Slowing her mother down, ruining her chance to escape. Killing her.

Wheezing, she spun around on her bed and came face-to-face with the bust that Trick had made for her. She stared into the cold, unseeing eyes and felt the dam inside her break.

“Mom, what did you tell him?” she whispered. “Please.”

Rage, fear of the unknown dragged her under. Tears rolled down her face. Barely breathing, she stared at the article.

“No,” she whispered, over and over and over again.

~

Full sunshine roused Katelyn and she bolted upright. A glance at her phone told her it was nearly ten. Moving like someone in a dream, she dressed and stumbled downstairs.

I can’t ask Grandpa about the article, she thought. I’ll say the wrong thing.

And she couldn’t face him, either. She had to get away, be alone, make sense of this, make sense of anything.

She stepped off the last stair and fixed her eyes on the front door. She didn’t know where he was, but if she could go—

“Hey, sleepyhead.”

She jumped. Her grandfather was standing in the entryway to the kitchen, sipping coffee with a look of amusement on his face.

“Didn’t mean to startle you. Want some scrambled eggs?”

“I have to go over to someone’s house to study,” she blurted. “I have to leave now.”

“You can’t work on an empty stomach. C’mon. I’ll whip ’em right up.” He gave her a wink. “That’s an order, Private.”

Defeated, she joined him in the kitchen, plopping down at the table.

He opened the refrigerator and pulled out the egg carton, the butter dish, and a quart of milk. “I’ve still got some coffee left.” He opened the cabinet for a cup, and she spotted another one on the counter. “I could use some more myself. I couldn’t sleep last night.”

Alarm bells clanged. Had he heard her go into the garage? She hadn’t been very careful about how much noise she’d made when she’d come back in, because she’d been so upset.

“Want some milk in your coffee?” he asked her. “It’s a mite on the strong side.”

“I was going to leave early, stop by the library and grab some research books,” she said. That wasn’t what he had asked her, he’d asked about milk. A normal, rational girl would have just answered yes or no. But she wasn’t normal and the whole world was irrational.

“I’ll make it quick.” He grabbed the other mug from the counter, filled both mugs with coffee, and poured a dollop of milk in one.

She bit her lip, really wanting to leave, but she took the cup and held it, tracing the swirl of milk that hadn’t been mixed in. Maybe it would be good to have a late breakfast with him.

Because . . . maybe she shouldn’t leave.

Maybe she should ask a few questions.

Don’t, she warned herself. Stop.

“You okay?” he asked, cracking an egg into a bowl and dropping the shells into the trashcan under the sink. “You seem a bit jumpy.”

“I had a bad dream,” she said, gaze fixed on the coffee.

He grunted and she heard him moving around, then whipping the eggs.

“Dreams are your brain’s way of telling you stuff that you’re too busy to pay attention to during the day.”

“I didn’t know that.”

“Yeah, we see and hear so much during the day that we don’t consciously think about and our brains just catalogue it all when we go to sleep.” He got out a pan and put it on the stove. She heard the whoosh of the gas as he lit the burner.

She took a sip of coffee. It was as strong as an espresso.

“I didn’t dream about anything from yesterday.”

“Not in any way you would recognize normally. The brain’s all about metaphor, imagery, when you’re asleep.” He added a pat of butter to the pan.

And suddenly she had an in for asking him what she wanted.

“I dreamed about my dad and playing in the snow with him in Tahoe.”

“Happier times,” her grandfather said with a grunt, pouring in the egg mixture.

Much happier.

“I remember he and mom used to love to go up there. Sometimes they took me. But sometimes they left me home.”

He nodded. “Moms and dads need some alone time now and then. It didn’t mean they didn’t want you around.”

“No, it was all good,” she assured him, glancing up, then back down as her resolve began to waiver. “I always