Howl (Howl #1)

by Jody Morse

  “Samara, how about you? What are your concerns or worries?”

  “Umm, I, umm,” Samara stuttered. “I’m afraid to get pregnant,” she lied. From across the room, she heard Emma laugh. Samara knew it was because Emma knew the truth – that Samara was a virgin.

  “Maybe if you could get pregnant by kissing,” Emma whispered to the girl next to her, laughing.

  Your best friend’s a bitch, she heard the voice say. And she’s not as hot as she thinks. I think if it weren’t for her boobs, she’d have nothing going for her but a parrot nose and stringy Barbie hair.

  Samara held back a laugh. She looked at Luke and nodded before saying, that’s why we’re not best friends anymore.

  As your Alpha, I must say that I approve.

  Samara shook her head, angry that Luke (assuming he was her Alpha) thought that he could have any control over who she was friends with just because he was the Alpha of the wolf pack that she hadn’t even met yet and wasn’t even sure she belonged to. Samara realized that the whole class had watched her shake her head, and she felt like an ass.

  “What is it that makes you worry about pregnancy?” Mrs. King pried.

  “I – I just . . . protection’s not always effective,” Samara managed to say.

  “Class, does anyone share Samara’s concerns?” Mrs. King asked. When no one raised their hand or said anything, she moved onto the next person.

  When Mrs. King got to Jason, he just stared at her. “I don’t have any questions or concerns.”

  Mrs. King laughed. “Everyone has questions and concerns about sex, Jason. Surely there’s something that you wonder about.”

  “Nah, I’m good.” Jason looked over at Samara and shot her a dark stare that sent goose bumps down her spine. She looked away, but she could still feel him looking at her as the next few people in the circle talked.

  “Colby?” Mrs. King asked. “Let’s hear what you have to say.”

  Colby ran a hand through his blonde curly head of hair before looking down at the desk. “I wonder how to find the right condom size.”

  Around the room, people burst into giggles. Samara looked up at Colby and smiled at him. As usual, she was finding herself feeling sorry for him again.

  I feel sorry for him, too.

  “Okay, then,” Mrs. King replied, obviously unsure of what to say. Aside from not knowing what to say to a teenage boy about condoms in front of an entire class, she had also heard them making fun of him. “Luke?”

  Luke looked up at her and his shoulders. “I don’t know, but I gotta be completely honest. This is really lame.”

  Just then the bell rang. Samara breathed a sigh of relief. Sex Ed itself didn’t seem all that bad, but it was way awkward to have it with her former BFF, a guy who liked her but didn’t want to be with her, and a guy who really creeped her out.

  As she got up to head towards the door, Samara heard a voice talking to her again. You look really pretty today.

  Samara froze. The voice didn’t belong to her Alpha. It was someone else. There were two other werewolves in the classroom with her. But who?

  *

  As she walked down the hallway at the end of the day, Samara’s breath caught in the back of her throat. Luke was standing at one of the lockers, grabbing a load of books from the top shelf.

  Samara turned away and began walking in the other direction, trying to keep her boots from clacking against the tiled floor. She didn’t want to draw attention to herself. Confronting him wasn’t something that she was in the mood for today, not after what had happened at Emma’s party. Luke had made it crystal clear that he wanted no part of her right now, and that was exactly what she was going to give him.

  Beautiful, a low voice whispered inside her head.

  Slowly, Samara spun around and looked behind her. Luke was standing there, staring back at her with a sheepish grin.

  Can you hear my thoughts? Samara asked in her head, unsure if he could even hear what she was thinking. It made sense if he could hear her since she could hear him, but then this situation didn’t make sense at all. If she had been told that she would find out that she was a werewolf and could communicate with other wolves through her head, she never would have believed it.

  Yep.

  Realizing that Luke’s voice was not the same voice she heard when she talked to her Alpha, Samara tried not to gasp.

  Luke Davenport was her mate. That was the only way she could possibly communicate with him while they were both in human form.

  Samara wasn’t sure how she should feel about him being her mate. She felt a little bit happy and excited. Her mate, the guy she was supposed to spend the rest of her life with, was one of the cutest guys in school . . . a guy who she had already had a crush on.

  On the other hand, Samara felt weird about it. Luke hadn’t been one hundred percent honest with her, even though she didn’t know what he wasn’t telling her. He had even been a bit of a jerk. If things didn’t work out, she was destined to be stuck with him. That was not cool.

  Instead of demanding to know if he was her mate, Samara turned around. This time, she ran down the hall and turned the corner so that Luke was out of sight and (she hoped) out of her mind.

  *

  After the first ski club meeting of the year, Samara walked home from school. Her brain was beginning to feel like an overly ripe cantaloupe. Every ounce of logical reasoning was gone, and all she could think about was how Luke could hear her thoughts. For all she knew, he could be listening in on them right now.

  Samara was beginning to hope that Luke was her mate. Otherwise, something far stranger was going on. She wondered what the limitations were on this weird mind thing that they had going on. Could he only hear her when they were standing within one hundred feet of each other or something, or could he listen to her when she was far away from him? Since she couldn’t hear him at the moment, Samara guessed that he couldn’t hear her either. They probably had to be within standing or staring distance of one another to communicate with each other mentally. Just the idea of this type of communication seemed so bizarre that Samara was still having a hard time accepting it.

  If Luke was her mate, it would also explain why Samara had felt such an unusual attachment to him so early on. She thought she just didn’t handle rejection as well as she had thought she would, but Samara was so independent that it wouldn’t even make sense. She usually didn’t care if boys didn’t like her back.

  She’d felt a special bond with Luke, and that was probably for a reason.

  Samara tried to review everything that she knew about Luke in her head. It wasn’t much since he was the new guy in school. He had moved to Grandview just as school was ending last year, which Samara had always thought seemed like an odd time for his family to drag him to another state and a brand new school. At the time, she had assumed that his parents must have needed to make an urgent move for work (not that she knew anything about either of them or their careers, but it had seemed like the most logical of reasons).

  Luke and Samara really hadn’t spoken all that much since he had moved to Grandview, either. Sure, he’d been staring at her since August when he began coming to Emma’s parties, but they didn’t actually start talking to each other until the night she had played beer pong with him at Emma’s house. It was the night before she had been bitten by the wolf.

  As Samara walked up the driveway that led to her house, she got the feeling that she was being watched. Deciding that she was just being paranoid (which was probably true since her life had been so crazy lately), she walked in through the front door.

  Almost immediately, Seth began shouting at her, “Careful! Get in the house! The wolves are out there again.”

  “I’m sure they’re not harmful,” Samara said gently, remembering that her Alpha had said that the other wolves weren’t going to hurt her. “They’re probably just as afraid of us as we are of them.” This was the first time in a while that Seth seemed like he really cared about Samara. It made
her feel like she still mattered to him.

  Seth paced back and forth, looking out the kitchen window and into the backyard. “I don’t know . . . I don’t think they should be there. I think we need to call animal control. Wild animals aren’t supposed to be out during the day, right? They might have rabies or something. What if they give it someone?”

  Samara put her tote bag down and sat on the beige plush sofa. “If they had rabies, they probably would have attacked someone already. Besides, it’s starting to get dark out. I’m sure they’re fine. Let’s just ignore them.”

  From the way Seth was pacing back and forth and his obvious shakiness, she knew that he wasn’t going to be able to ignore the wolves. Samara couldn’t really blame him, though. If she wasn’t a werewolf and if her Alpha hadn’t told her that the other wolves were mostly harmless, she would probably be really freaked out herself. Even though they often saw deer, bears, and sometimes even coyotes and foxes, it just wasn’t normal to see wolves lurking around in a backyard in Grandview.

  “So, umm, Seth, I wanted to talk to you about something,” Samara said, trying to sound as casual as possible.

  Seth looked over at her. His eyes were bloodshot again. Samara wondered if he might be using drugs. That would explain his temper. She decided that she was going to mention the idea to her parents later, but she didn’t want to bring it up to her brother. He would probably flip out on her if he was or just at the suggestion of not being able to trust him if he wasn’t. Either way, it was a lose-lose situation.

  “Mom, Dad, and I were thinking that maybe you would like to go to counseling. We could even do counseling together as a family. That way, a counselor can help us work out all of the problems that all of us have so that we can improve on being happy as a family again,” Samara said, grateful that she had come up with the idea right then and there.

  Seth looked at her blankly. “No. I don’t need counseling.”

  Before Samara could say anything else to him, Seth ran off to his bedroom and slammed the door behind him.

  Chapter 12

  ****

  Are you awake?

  Samara bolted up in bed and brushed away a sweaty lock of hair from her forehead. Luke’s voice inside her head had woken her up. Samara groaned. She must have been thinking about the situation too much before she had gone to sleep. Now, she was dreaming about it and imagining that she was hearing his voice inside her head, too.

  You’re not dreaming.

  Samara got up and looked out her bedroom window. She didn’t see Luke. How could he get inside her head if he wasn’t even around? She had to be imagining things.

  I don’t have to be near you in order to hear your thoughts if that’s what you’re wondering, Luke said.

  How long have you been listening to me? Samara asked.

  There was a brief pause. Tonight or in general?

  Both, Samara frantically shot back, trying to quickly rummage through her memory to see if she had thought about anything embarrassing.

  I’ve been able to hear you ever since the night of our date, Luke replied.

  Samara groaned out loud. Seriously? You’ve been listening this whole entire time?

  Well, I try to tune you out most of the time, Luke replied. Most of your thoughts are very boring, to be completely honest with you. I do sometimes listen if I hear my name, but even that starts to get old after a while. You seem to think about the same things over and over . . . I don’t know how you don’t tire yourself out with all of the thinking you do.

  Samara thought back to all of the times she had thought about Luke since the night of their first date. It had to have been, at the very least, several times throughout the day. He was probably beginning to think that she was obsessed with him.

  She heard Luke chuckle. No, not obsessed. I understand how confusing your life is right now.

  So, are you saying that you understand because you’re a werewolf, too? Samara asked. She already knew the answer, but for some reason, she wanted to hear him confirm that she was right and that they weren’t just communicating for some other reason. Samara also figured that it would make her feel less crazy.

  I’m not supposed to tell you this, but yes, Luke said slowly. Just don’t tell anyone, okay?

  Okay, but why aren’t you supposed to tell me? Samara asked, confused.

  Luke hesitated. You’ll find out why eventually. Don’t worry.

  Don’t worry? Don’t worry? That’s all you can tell me at a time like this? I just found out that you can hear my thoughts and – wait. If you’ve been able to hear my thoughts this whole time, why haven’t I heard any of yours? Samara questioned. She thought it seemed unfair for him to be able to hear her when she hadn’t been able to hear him. Werewolf culture seemed like it might be male-dominated, though, since there weren’t that many females and there was always an Alpha male. She wondered if male wolves could hear their mates, but females couldn’t hear theirs.

  Luke laughed. I assure you, it’s not because I’m a male. Stop thinking that all werewolves are sexist. It’s because I’ve been blocking you from hearing my thoughts.

  How can I do that? Samara asked. There were definitely going to be times when she wouldn’t want Luke having access to her mind.

  It’s really simple. All you have to do is think about the fact that you do not want me to hear what you’re thinking, and I won’t.

  Will you still be able to talk to me like you are now if I do that?

  Yes, Luke replied. We will always be able communicate with each other when we need to do. I just won’t be able to hear what you’re thinking if you don’t want me to hear it.

  Samara somehow found that reassuring. Just knowing that she would be able to talk to him or ask him a question whenever she wanted to made her feel slightly relieved. She wouldn’t ever have to worry about losing him. It was going to be like having a built-in cell phone to communicate with each other at all times, which was really convenient because Samara had a habit of losing her cell phone often.

  Laying back down, Samara closed her eyes. Just as she was about to drift off, she thought, Luke?

  Yeah?

  Are you my mate?

  Yes. Luke paused. I think so.

  *

  When Samara woke up the next morning, she was surprised that she hadn’t changed into her wolf form overnight. It sort of disappointed her, but it was probably for the best. She felt so much more energized with a full eight hours of sleep.

  Samara climbed out of bed and shrugged into a dark blue denim skirt and light pink sweater. She normally didn’t dress up for school (especially in winter), but she felt like she had to today. Everything felt different now that she knew she had a mate.

  She wondered what it really meant to be mated to someone. It must mean that they were soul mates. Luke and Samara hadn’t chosen each other, so it must have been predetermined by destiny. What did it mean they were supposed to do, though? Were they supposed to get married and have werewolf babies? And if they did ever have babies, would they be born as humans or as . . . dogs? Samara decided that it didn’t really matter right now. She wasn’t even sixteen years old yet. There was no way she wanted to be like one of those teen moms on MTV, but wasn’t the whole point of mating to reproduce?

  Samara decided that she was going to have to find out more about mates from her Alpha. She was starting to get sick of referring to him as her Alpha. It would be nice to be able to put a name to him. It would be even nicer to be able to put a human face to him because it was driving her nuts not knowing who he was.

  As she went into the living room, she heard a loud groaning. She looked around to see if her brother or father had made the noise, but neither of them was in sight. Samara peered into the open crack of her brother’s bedroom door. He wasn’t there.

  Sorry, it was me, Luke said. I hate waking up early. Good morning, though. I enjoyed our conversation last night.

  Samara smiled to herself. Me, too. That was the truth. If she had been m
ad at Luke before, she wasn’t now. All of her anger had faded, and she was beginning to develop an even bigger crush on him than she thought she had before.

  Once she was out the front door, Samara began walking to school. She felt her stomach growl.

  Every day that she was a werewolf, Samara’s hunger seemed to grow even more. If she didn’t eat a lot and often, she began to feel sick. Samara had grabbed a sausage patty before she left the house, but she knew that there was no way she was going to be able to make it until lunchtime with the way her stomach felt right now.

  Turning the corner, she went into Williams’ General.

  “Samara!” Edda said, smiling brightly when she saw her. “You want the usual? A cinnamon bagel and –”

  “Actually,” Samara interrupted, checking her wallet to see if she had enough money. “I’ll have a bagel with Canadian bacon instead. In fact, make that double the bacon.”

  Edda raised her brows, but didn’t say anything about the sudden change in her order. “Did you hear the news? They found that girl,” Edda said, as she gathered Samara’s food.

  “Yeah, I heard.”

  “I told ya. She musta just wanted to run away from home. Her parents are lucky that she even came back. My son, Eddie, never came home.”

  Samara gave her a sympathetic look. “I’m sorry about that, Edda. I’m glad that they found Lilly, though. Her family must feel so relieved.” When Edda handed her the food, Samara said, “I’ll see you around.”

  As she opened the door to the store, she nearly collided with a girl with messy chestnut brown hair. Taking a closer look, Samara realized that it was Lilly.

  Trying to close her mouth, which was hanging wide open, Samara just stood in the doorway. She wanted to say something, but she didn’t want to sound like a total weirdo.

  “Don’t talk to me, Samara,” Lilly snapped at her. “There’s nothing you could say to me that I don’t already know. I’m not going to change my mind, no matter what anyone says.”