Waken (The Woods of Everod Book 1) Read online

  It was weird for us when Tim and my mom got married, two ten-year-olds at opposite ends of the personality spectrum. Justin adapted quickly, like he does with everything. For him life stayed pretty much the same except a quiet little girl stared at him from the shadows. His outgoing personality and vivacious attitude towards life, so contradictory to my own, captivated me.

  The car jerked to a stop as Justin pulled into the library parking lot behind an old jeep.

  “I thought we were going hiking?” I asked.

  “Yeah, but I guess it’s a hard trail to find. We’re gonna follow some of them up there.”

  He waved to a couple girls as they hopped into their ride. The parking lot was full of people. Two weeks ago, heck, two days ago I would have sunk into my seat. Now I was preparing to thrust myself into their midst. I closed my eyes, and pictured how glorious the view would be at the top, only to have the guy from the library pop into the picture. Maybe it wouldn’t be so bad. Yeah, right. If my reaction to him was anything to go by, I was doomed to humiliate myself in front of half the town.

  We followed the convoy of cars, curving through the mountains until we turned onto a dirt road. The suddenly bumpy road disrupted Justin’s grin. An ancient economy car wasn’t the best choice of transportation up a mountainside.

  Everod, Colorado hadn’t been my idea of a grand plan. Almost a month ago, Tim packed us up and we moved to the middle of nowhere, forty minutes from the closest town, Telluride, which didn’t say much. Tim thought nothing of moving. Since Elin left, we’d moved countless times. I think part of him was searching for her, hoping that with each new city he’d spot her in a crowd.

  Maybe that’s why we finally ended up here. This was her town. This was where she’d lived in the years before she had me and the only place she’d ever stayed for longer than a few months. It was where her mother had lived. Tim probably thought she’d come back here some day. I’m pretty sure he was also holding out the hope that if I connected with her roots I’d come to forgive her for leaving like she had. I couldn’t tell him that her leaving was the best thing that ever happened to me.

  Bouncing around, my hand gripped the panic handle, white knuckled. We rounded a bend and saw a small parking area already lined with a handful of vehicles. Justin pulled up and I slid down in my seat. People wandered over to greet him as he got out. Doubts engulfed me. I wanted to crawl into the back seat and huddle behind my book. Cooking wasn’t so bad. I could handle it for a month.

  A knock on the window refocused my attention. Justin stood there, his eyebrows raised in question.

  “Relax. They won’t bite,” I muttered to myself as I reluctantly climbed out of the car. I didn’t go far, just leaned against the door, hunched over with my arms wrapped around myself. It was a position Elin had taught me well. I straightened up and banished all thoughts of her. Justin was preparing to throw me to the wolves this morning and I needed to be ready. Sixty-seven days. I could make it.

  From my spot by the car, I could see Justin’s new gang of friends perfectly. Justin strutted along, a girl on either side, with another couple behind clamoring to take their place if one should fall off. I could almost see them elbowing each other in a vain attempt to move up.

  Poor Justin. No, scratch that. Poor girls. I watched him work the crowd, but didn’t bother trying to hear what crazy story he told them. His tales usually wound a tight path around the reality of the story, twisting with embellishments.

  A car pulled up beside me and I moved out of the way, going around to the front of the car. The driver stepped out. I froze when I saw who stood there – the guy from the library. He looked as gorgeous as I remembered. His brown hair, a mix of dark and light streaks, bordered on being too shaggy. He was shorter than I’d guessed, maybe a few inches shy of six feet, but he had a solid frame with broad shoulders that made him look larger. He walked over to the group of guys and joined in on their conversation.

  From the other side of the car a girl stepped out. Her hair flowed softly around her, and she smiled, showing off her perfect teeth like a living magazine cover. She waved her fingers at some friends, heading towards them.

  “Janie... Janie!” Justin’s voice penetrated my thoughts and I realized that he and everyone around him were staring at me. Mild curiosity filled their eyes and I smiled weakly. “Come here.”

  So, this was how it was going to be. He wanted to push me to the edge of our deal until I surrendered. Well, he was shit out of luck on that. I forced my feet to move toward them, with each step ignoring the quivers of my muscles, the clenching of my stomach screaming at me to run and hide.

  Justin ran through introductions, but the thundering of my heart drowned out their names. I nodded numbly and stared at the ground wishing I had been smart enough to stay home. Then Justin got to him. Tristan. His name was Tristan and it fit him perfectly. This close I could see his eyes were a startling crystal blue. Humor gave them a twinkle and I wondered if he was thinking of my wild dash through the library.

  At my lack of response, the group dismissed me as irrelevant and moved towards the path. Relief pulsed through me. There was a chance I’d make it through the day unscathed. I trailed behind them, giving myself plenty of space. Towering pine and aspen trees lined the path. Through the shadows of their presence, wildlife surrounded us, deer and squirrels scattering as we came near. I took another step along the trail, my gaze fixed on a squirrel, when I ran face first into a cushy wall.

  I bounced back, the weight of my pack providing the momentum to carry me down to the ground. My nose throbbed. Please don’t be broken. Please don’t be broken! With a hope that the chanted plea would make it true, I looked at my hand - no blood and the burning sensation was fading. Definitely a good sign.

  “Sorry! I wasn’t looking where I was going.” My hand muffled my words.

  “It’s okay.”

  Standing, I looked at the human wall that had fallen victim to my wandering mind. She towered a good six inches over my own five-foot-two frame. She’d been the one to arrive with Tristan.

  She carefully looked at me rubbing my nose, an obvious attempt to figure out if she should know me from somewhere other than the parking lot this morning. “Have we met before? You look so familiar.”

  “Um, no. Janie Moore, Justin’s stepsister.”

  “I’m Rachel Hogan. So, did you just move in with Justin and your dad?” She started walking and I just followed along, unsure how to walk away while she was still talking to me.

  “Umm, no, I’ve been here a couple weeks.”

  “Wow, I can’t believe I haven’t seen you around town!”

  “I’m kind of a homebody.”

  “Oh.” She was struggling to find something to talk about. I wanted to tell her that I’d rather not talk at all, but I couldn’t seem to work up the courage. “So, where’re you from?”

  “New York,” I answered, naming the last place we’d lived.

  “Oh, I am so jealous! I’d love to live in New York! Well, I’d love to live anywhere with some decent shopping!” She had a tinkling laugh.

  “Have you always lived here?” I asked.

  “Yeah, but I’m so outta here next year. I’m already planning my move to L.A.!” Her words were passionate, but a dull glaze screened her green eyes.

  Rachel talked nonstop as we headed up the trail. I wondered how it would take her to figure out that nobody talked to me. How soon would she realize I wasn’t really interested in talking with her? I listened to her animated chatter and strived to really hear what she was saying, but my mind was racing with possible ways to murder Justin without getting caught.

  “So how do you like Everod?”

  Jolted by the change of conversation, I scrambled to comprehend her question and form a reply. “It’s…quaint.”

  Rachel laughed at that. “You mean boring.”

  “It’s not bad,” I assured her. “Just not as busy as I’m used to.” There weren’t as many places to hide out. In a ci
ty, I could sit in the middle of a mall and be alone for hours without a single person wondering about me. Here I had to hide at home, because really even the library was too small to blend in.

  “So, why’d your parents move here?”

  “Tim, my stepdad, is a wildlife photographer and decided he wants to focus on Western Colorado for a while,” I explained, not exactly the truth but not a lie either.

  “Cool.”

  She threw her head back, tossing her hair when she laughed, as if every eye around was on her. My secret longing to have that same confidence kept me at her side, listening to what I would normally consider drivel.

  I’d always been leery of talking to girls like her; they possessed the power to intimidate me just by walking around looking so perfect. Rachel, though, was amazingly easy to talk with. Well, Rachel talked and I listened, which was fine by me. I took the time to study her. She looked like a beauty queen. She had long wavy caramel hair, not a strand out of place, and her make-up was flawless, although I doubted she needed it.

  We made the summit only minutes behind the others. Justin looked from Rachel to me and I could almost see the panic fill him as he made his way over to us. I flashed him an evil smile and went on listening to Rachel.

  “Janie.” He leaned around Rachel. I ignored him, although my grin now stretched across my face. “Janie, I’m sorry.” His voice held a bit of desperation. My smile must have been very convincing. Usually I actually had to do something to him before he began backtracking, but I suppose the thought of being my personal chauffeur was finally sinking in. “I shouldn’t have forced you to take the bet.”

  I waited a minute, just to watch him squirm and debated dragging it out to make him suffer, but thought better of it when I realized he could leave me to walk home. Besides, I had somehow managed to make what could actually be a friend.

  “That’s all right,” I said. “You can drive me into Montrose this weekend.”

  He’d begun to smile, but it disappeared with the realization that I wasn’t going to let him off the hook. Giving me a nasty look, he wandered off. Rachel went to sit with the large group of friends and I watched them both enviously. They all knew each other. Not just in a ‘go to school together’ way, but in a ‘known each other since birth’ way. How could I put myself into that? That was what I wanted. The comfort in knowing I could talk to someone other than Tim or Justin.

  My eyes fell on Tristan. I found in nearly impossible not to look at him, as if he were a magnet for my eyes. He, on the other hand, had only thrown me a curious glance before the start of the hike.

  Rachel stood and walked around their semi-circle and sat down by his side. Her hand slid along his thigh. He pushed it off, but didn’t move away from her. It was impossible to tell if they were together or not, but I couldn’t stomach the idea of subjecting myself to any more displays of touchy-feely stuff.

  I finished my lunch and wandered over to the edge of the summit. A cool breeze rushed by me, blowing strands of my hair loose from the silk scarf holding my hair back. No one could say I was an outdoorsy kind of girl, but it was impossible to deny the beauty of the Rocky Mountains.

  I approached Justin from behind and tapped him lightly on the shoulder. “I’m heading back down. I’ll meet you at the car, okay?”

  “We’re all leaving in a few.”

  “I know. I just need…” My words trailed off as he turned back to Rachel.

  “Yeah, sure,” he said distractedly, gazing at Rachel, who seemed oblivious to his interest.

  While Rachel’s continuous chatter had dominated the walk up, the journey back down was quiet. Halfway down the mountain, I stopped at a fallen tree resting beside the path and dropped my pack, enjoying the ray of light that fell across me. I sat on the rough wood and moisture dampened my jeans, but I didn’t care. Having a wet butt wasn’t going to hurt as much as my legs if I didn’t rest. Sipping water from my bottle, I leaned back to gaze up at the sky peeking through the tree branches.

  Ten minutes later faint voices echoed from up the trail, I stood and stretched my legs, already feeling the muscles tightening. I pulled my hoodie from my bag and wrapped it around my waist covering the wet spot on my butt. The voices were getting louder so I slung my pack over one shoulder, moving swiftly to keep a bit of distance between the others and me.

  I rounded a bend and stopped abruptly. Blocking the path was a white wolf, its milky fur broken only by a gray patch at the base of its head. But unlike the other animals I’d passed along the way, this animal stood his ground. Its lips curled up revealing sharp teeth and a savage growl rumbled from it.

  I couldn’t move. Of all the stupid times to not be able to run and hide.

  The wolf’s head lifted and it sniffed the air, testing my scent, then it lowered slowly. With hooded eyes, its back arched and its muscles tensed in preparation to spring. I screamed silently at my legs to move, hell even a twitch would have helped, but nothing.

  Voices drifted closer and I might have been able to understand what they were saying if the pulsing sound of blood rushing through me weren’t drowning out everything else. The wolf froze and we stared at each other while he contemplated my fate. From the corner of my eye, I could see a small group of the others come around the bend and stop. The wolf vibrated with intent as if still trying to decide whether or not to attack.

  “Don’t move, Janie,” Justin said softly. “Whatever you do, don’t run.”

  I almost laughed at the absurdity of it. At this point, I couldn’t even feel my legs and he thought I was going to run? One of the guys stepped in front of me. At his movement, the wolf straightened up, shaking its head and giving another snarl. Another few people stepped up and the wolf turned and darted into the woods.

  No one spoke. They all just stood there staring wide-eyed at me in confusion. I couldn’t decide if it was because I’d almost died in an animal attack or because the wolf hadn’t liked me as much as they’d expected it to. Silence surrounded us, until Justin threw his arm across my shoulders, squeezing tightly.

  “Damn, Janie, now I know why you stick to the library.” His laugh was forced, but the joke worked and I slumped against him, the ice draining from my veins and an uncontrollable chuckle burst from me.

  This time as we continued walking, I didn’t linger at the back of the crowd. Instead, I was safely entrenched in the center with Rachel trying valiantly to distract me with some Hollywood tabloid story. Her voice was strangely familiar and drowned out the quietness the wolf had left in its wake. No one else seemed to know what to say. They moved quickly down the trail, occasionally glancing at me.

  Rachel’s constant chatter also gave me the freedom to follow Tristan’s movements. His bobbing head was the only thing that actually worked in making me forget the near wolf attack. I stared at the back of his head, wishing I could run my fingers through the thick curls.

  When we reached the lot, I took Justin’s keys and I threw my bag in the trunk. I leaned against the car, unwilling to wait in its confining heat while Justin finished his flirting, but unable to stand on my own. Despite the twenty minutes that had passed since I’d run across the wolf, I still had to force my body to follow the simple command of stepping forward and standing.

  Tristan wound his way through the group and began walking towards me. Not me, his car. I scooted around to sit on the front bumper as he came around to his car’s driver side. He gave me a curious smile and opened the door. Tossing his pack into the back seat, he looked up at me again. Shivers ran down my back.

  “You okay?” he asked.

  “Yeah, I...I-”

  Whatever idiotic comment I was going to make went unsaid as Rachel bounded up to us. She looped her arm through Tristan’s and smiled like she’d won the lottery.

  “God, I’m so exhausted. Let’s get out of here.” She tugged on his arm before dropping it and going around to her door. She pulled it open. “Janie, you should come to the diner sometime. It’s about the only place for any o
f us under fifty to go.”

  I nodded, but not with any real intention.

  “No need to worry about wolves in town,” Tristan said, a half smile tipping his lips up. He slid into the car and I shifted to watch them pull away. For just a moment, I met his blue eyes in the side mirror.

  I spent the ride home convincing Justin that I was fine and by the time we pulled into the driveway, it was back to our normal quiet acceptance of each other’s presence. I didn’t want to think about it anymore. Maybe it was denial, but I didn’t do strange well. After the whole necklace thing the other day, I wasn’t willing to spend my precious sanity debating what was so wrong with me that a wolf would willingly eat me and not the others.

  Later that night, Tim and I sat on the couch watching a rerun of our favorite medical drama.

  “How was the hike?” Tim asked as the credits rolled.

  “It was alright. I think I even made a friend.” I threw that in knowing it would make Tim beyond happy.

  “Wonderful! So tell me about this friend.”

  “Hmm… her name is Rachel and she didn’t fawn all over Justin. It’s nice to know that I’m not the only one who doesn’t think he’s God’s gift to women.”

  Tim laughed. “I’m really impressed, Janie. You’re usually miserable anytime you have to be around people.”

  I rolled my eyes at him and stuck out my tongue. “Thanks, Tim. I love you, too!”

  Laughing at my expression, he switched the TV off and gave my head a pat goodnight. “Night, sweetheart.”

  I swatted at his hand, loving that Tim constantly ignored my protests to his rare and random parenting motions. “Night, Tim.”

  A faint pulsing grew behind my eyes as the stress of the day brought on a headache. One of the therapists I’d been to suggested that the physical pain was my mind’s way of expressing the emotional pain I was feeling. No duh. I closed my lids and began slowly breathing, counting each inhale and exhale, using meditation to stop the progression of the pain.