Hyacinth - By Abigail Owen Page 0,16

of the house.

Everyone was quiet for a few moments.

“Ugh!” Ellie finally exclaimed, throwing up her arms. “Stubborn. Idiotic. Obstinate… Grrrrr… Darn brother!”

Lucy paused in her stitching. She reached over and patted Ellie’s hand soothingly. “Just give him time, sweetheart.”

“He has to get to know her to change his mind.” Ellie angrily hopped up from the couch and started pacing. “Time won’t help that if he’s avoiding her.”

“Don’t force him yet,” Adelaide said.

Alex got up and wrapped his arms around Ellie, pulling her close. His embrace calmed her in a way she so desperately needed right then.

“Listen to Adelaide,” Alex whispered in her ear.

With a big sigh, Ellie nodded her acquiescence. “Okay… I’ll try. He’s just so dang stubborn I could scream.”

“Come on, love…” Alex linked their fingers together and gave her hand a squeeze. “Let’s go home. Give Griffin some time to cool off.”

Ellie smiled up into Alex’s twinkling silver-blue eyes. “Okay… okay. ‘Night everyone.”

They received a chorus of goodnights as they headed out the door.

Chapter 10

Selene wandered through a wooded area. She was dreaming…. She knew this. But it was different than before. The soft snow blanketing the forest floor hushed the sound of her steps. She heard gurgling and realized that she was close to a river. She could almost feel the chilly mist that rose up as the water bubbled over stones rounded smooth by the passage of time and elements.

She felt as though she was looking through a dense, grey fog. Her vision cleared a little, but not much. Night blanketed the forest, almost swallowing it, but was pushed back by the brightness of a near-full moon dropping through the tree branches and casting silvery rays of light on the snowy ground.

Selene moved stealthily, silent as a shadow. She entered a small alcove where the water was still, not quite frozen. She leaned over to look and then recognized that it was not shadow that she resembled, but moonlight. She was in her wolf form, silver white.

She bent to lap from the mountain-fed waters. But something was wrong. There was some dark substance in the water as she drank. Looking down, Selene saw that her white fur was covered in something darker. As a wolf she was colorblind, and it was night, so she couldn’t see what it was. But she could smell… and she knew that she was covered in blood.

Tons of blood.

Horrific screams split the night air.

Selene shot up straight in bed, gasping for air. Frantically, she ripped the covers away and ran her hands over her body. There was no blood on her. Anywhere.

Another damn nightmare.

These were too real. As much as she tried to convince herself that it had just been a dream, Selene knew deep down that something was terribly, terribly wrong.

*****

Ellie jumped as something slapped the kitchen table, just barely missing her bowl of cereal.

“That,” Griffin pointed accusingly at the newspaper in front of her, “is why we can’t trust her.”

Alex, freshly showered from his and Ellie’s morning run, was toweling his black hair dry when he entered the kitchen and caught the offending headline.

“Oh, shit!”

Ellie picked up the paper and carefully read the entire article, while Griffin paced back and forth like a caged animal. “This doesn’t prove anything,” she insisted once she’d finished.

Griffin was incredulous. “A white wolf attacked and killed a group of campers in that motor home park at the bottom of Big Thompson canyon, and you think it doesn’t prove anything?”

“I’m with Griffin on this one, Elle,” Alex murmured, taking the seat beside her. “It’s too much to be a coincidence.”

Ellie glared at her fiancé and received an unapologetic shrug in return.

“Fine,” she said after a few moment’s contemplation.

“Fine?” Alex asked suspiciously, crossing his arms over his chest. “What does fine mean, exactly?”

Ellie fished her cell phone out of her purse. The two men watched as she searched for a number, dialed, and waited for it to connect.

“Hi! It’s Ellie,” she eventually said. “Have you seen this morning’s newspaper?” She listened for a moment as whoever was on the other end talked for a bit.

Griffin grimaced. “She’s blocking me from listening,” he muttered to Alex.

“Huh, well you’re right about that,” Ellie continued, disgusted. “I have an idea on how to handle this. Can you meet me at Hugh and Lucy’s place?” There was another brief pause. “Trust me on this, okay?… Yeah… An hour? Sounds good. See you then.”

Ellie snapped her phone shut and turned to Alex and Griffin with a self-satisfied smile. “We’ve got