Savage by Nancy Holder Read Free Book Online Page B

have to tell Cordelia all this , she thought. These guys really could be dangerous .
    “We’re nearly there,” Magus said. “And someone’s coming toward us.” When she jerked, he looked at her warily. “Don’t you hear the motor?”
    “You startled me. I was just about to tell you that when you started talking,” she said defensively. The truth was, she hadn’t heard it. Her heightened senses came and went, but there was no need to tell him that. She almost shook her head in exasperation. She was a terrible liar.
    Then they rounded a curve and she saw a car bouncing toward them. Fenners, most likely.
    “Shit,” Katelyn said, ducking down out of sight.
    Magus squinted through the windshield. “There’s a young woman and a man,” he reported.
    Lucy and Jesse, it had to be. Katelyn realized he didn’t know who they were. So the Hounds of God didn’t know everything about Wolf Springs — or at least, Magus didn’t.
    Katelyn listened in anxiety to the sound of the approaching motor. Then it was passing by them and slowly fading into the distance.
    “Gone,” he reported. “You can sit up.”
    Katelyn did; fifteen minutes later they pulled up outside the Fenner home. There didn’t seem to be anyone else around, and she practically jumped out of Magus’s truck.
    “You know how risky it is for you here,” he said shrewdly. “You should come with me. We can protect you.”
    “Not now,” she said. Not ever , she vowed.
    “We’ll be in touch,” he said.
    She didn’t respond. The best news she could have on that score was never hearing from the Hounds of God again. As he idled, she made it to her Subaru and heaved a half-moan of relief when it started right up. She waited for Magus to go up the driveway and back onto the road, and then she followed, torn between putting distance between himself and her, and avoiding any returning Fenners. Magus might already know where she lived, but she had no intention of leading him there if she could help it.
    A few minutes later he turned west off the country road. As he disappeared down the dirt path, half a dozen enormous black wolves with hair tipped in red trotted across in a line, turned, and stared at her. The wolf in the middle of the line snarled at her and snapped its jaws. Though her windows were closed, she could hear the sharp clack of teeth. It was a warning. She knew enough to tell that. They would have let her through with Magus, but not following him.
    “We’ll do it your way for now,” she said.
    She hit the gas and continued on her way, eager to put as much distance between herself and the sinister new pack as possible. Finally she slowed down, convinced that she’d clocked enough miles to be safe.
    Exhaustion was setting in, and as she struggled to keep herself awake, she blasted some music at full volume and that made her think of Trick, whose whole life seemed to be accompanied by a soundtrack. Thinking of Trick was good. It kept her busy, occupied. She hoped he’d been cleared of suspicion in Mike Wright’s murder and freed, and that he would be at her grandfather’s cabin when she got there.
    She glanced down at herself and realized that she had forgotten that her clothes were ruined, covered with soot and muck from the poisoned bayou. Pulling over to the side of the road, she got her duffel bag from the backseat and quickly changed into fresh clothes. She found a large bottle of water and cleaned off her face, neck, and arms, then poured it over her head. Snow was falling, but she relentlessly washed herself, then ran a comb through her hair and grimaced as it caught on knots. She hoped she looked like someone returning from a sleepover, and not a war.
    Katelyn reached for her phone, remembering that she’d gotten a call from L.A. from Detective Cranston, the man who had investigated her father’s murder when she’d been twelve, and was looking into the fire that had destroyed her home and led to her mom’s death less than six