Howl of the Sequoia (Secrets of the Sequoia Book 1)

by Deidre Huesmann

This time she did hang up.

  An uncontrollable burst of rage inevitably lead to Holden throwing the phone at the wall with a satisfying wham-crack! Too much raced through his head: the call, Roxi was Delilah, Nathan loved Delilah and her lies, a woman was going to kill Jackson, Delilah was Roxi, Rachael was scared of someone named Delilah, I had to say goodbye. . . .

  When he turned, Aaron was watching him expectantly, one eyebrow cocked in that infuriatingly mild fashion he always upheld. A split decision stayed Holden just then; to either scream at Aaron for being an idiot, or strangle the truth out of Nathan before it was too late.

  The scars on his stomach burned.

  Holden pinned the cowering Nathan with the coldest, hardest stare he could muster. “No more games. What’s Roxi doing, why is she going to kill Rachael’s brother, and more importantly, why did Rachael sound like she was ready to die?”

  Nathan didn’t even bother making excuses. He backed away from the men, eyes on his feet. Disbelief colored Aaron’s face as the truth sank in, and his fury turned the room’s temperature arctic instantly. “Nathan. What—did—you—do?”

  Eyes wet and tail figuratively between his legs, Nathan finally began to confess.

  Between the call and leaving her father a brief note, Rachael had wasted ten precious minutes. She couldn’t afford any more, not when Jackson’s life hung in the balance of those brief acts. Yet something deep in her gut had told her to do it, and Rachael had long ago learned to trust that bellyache instinct.

  First, she needed transportation. She had no time to dig up a phone book. Her bedroom had no internet access. If she asked anyone downstairs her father would find out and stop her from leaving.

  Rachael dialed 411, requested a nearby cab company, and made arrangements to be picked up five blocks away. Almost subconsciously she grabbed an old pocketknife from her nightstand. She hadn’t used it in years and hoped today would be no different. Rachael stuffed it into her back pocket anyway.

  Now that was done and her second problem was acquiring fare. She was broke but Henry kept his wallet on his nightstand when he wasn’t at work. Thankfully nobody saw her slip from one room to the next; the wake took place entirely downstairs, as though her mom’s ghost lingered upstairs. Rachael actually hoped that was the case.

  Mama, if you’re watching, please forgive me, she thought as she opened her father’s wallet. He had $67 and some odd change. It would have to do, she decided.

  Third issue to tackle was her escape route, and that was going to be both tricky and precarious. Fervently praying to her mother for safety, Rachael opened the window beside Henry’s bed, dragged the nightstand over, and used it to climb out. It took some wriggling, grunting, and scrabbling for handholds, but Rachael managed to hang from the windowsill with her feet dangling two stories from the ground. Then, bracing herself, she let go.

  The impact shot daggers from her feet to her core. Stunned, Rachael collapsed to the ground.

  Somebody shouted from inside. Rachael softly swore—she’d forgotten about the kitchen window. Now that she was caught, she had even less time to spare, so she picked herself up and sprinted. She was no track star, but her legs were tough from years of hiking and her strides were long.

  Breathless, she found the cab waiting for her on the corner of Quinn and Jordan. A mailbox covered in stickers and chalk sat adjacent, the colors cheerful and childish compared to how she felt. Rachael had barely scrambled and buckled herself into the cab before saying, “Douglas Park, please.”

  The driver scrutinized her in the rear view mirror. “Why the running? I wasn’t going anywhere.”

  Forced calm permeated her long enough to reply, “Oh, I’m just late is all. Supposed to meet my friends over an hour ago, brother’s car broke down, you know.”

  How easily the lie slipped from her lips. More surprisingly, she had barely stammered or babbled at all. It was a shame her one moment of bravery and aptitude was on the day she was going to die.

  And that’s all there was to it, really. Jackson was threatened, but Rachael was hurrying headlong into a trap. She would be stupid to believe Delilah meant neither of them any harm.

  Aside from her imminent demise, the worst Rachael could have imagined was the cabbie driving too slowly or cautiously. Instead he took turns like he was navigating Seattle, blasted through stop signs as though he were in New Orleans, and gave red lights the same courtesy as a New Yorker might. For the third time that day Rachael prayed to her mother.

  Even with the driver’s recklessness the ride dragged. Each second that ticked by on the cabbie’s timer was a second Jackson might lose from his life. Rachael rapidly blinked her eyes dry.

  In the end the sight of Douglas Park had never brought her such equal parts relief and apprehension. Mumbling her thanks, Rachael threw the money into the front seat and was out of the car before the driver had even rolled to a full stop. She dimly heard sounds of his protest; whether it was over her safety or the potential she had short-changed him, Rachael neither knew nor cared to find out. She made an immediate dash for the forest.

  She knew these woods so well that she didn’t waste time paying attention to her surroundings. Everything was still damp and springy from midwinter rain, reducing the pounding of her feet to the occasional wet smack.

  Her lungs burned. Her legs ached. Dark fuzzy shapes formed in her periphery.

  In spite of her desperate gasps for air, Rachael began to make out the sound of a girl singing. The lyrics were the same few lines repeated over and over, and the crescendo of the sweet voice gave Rachael chills as she absorbed the words.

  You’re not his sunshine

  Only I’m his sunshine

  You’re only pretty when your lips are blue

  Oh you won’t know, bitch, how much I hate you

  ‘Til I snap your spine and tear you in two

  All she could do was follow the singing until the sequoia came into view. When it did Rachael skidded to a stop, all but crumpling to the forest floor as she struggled to regain her breath and vision.

  Eventually the spots stopped swarming. What she saw was of little comfort. Here was the sequoia, just as massive she remembered it, with the gaping maw of a hole, yet there was no sign of either Delilah or Jackson.

  He’s in the trunk.

  Desperately she crawled on her hands and knees like a toddler. Jackson was inside, she knew it, the hole was big enough now, he had to be there, because if he wasn’t then she was wrong and Delilah had lied and all hope for Jackson’s future was lost.

  Before she reached the opening something lunged at her from within. Rachael’s arms flew up to protect her face. Her attacker collided with her chest, making her breathless yet again. Rachael wildly believed she was simply going to die from oxygen deprivation at this rate.

  The strong hand pinning and ferociously squeezing her windpipe didn’t help.

  Delilah peered down at her from beneath her bleached hair. It had clearly been some time since the roots were touched up, and Rachael could see the girl was naturally an ashen brunette. Delilah leaned in until Rachael had the insane need to sneeze from the girl’s hair tickling her nose. All Rachael could see was her hair, the glittering green eyes with the same golden flecks as Holden, and her wide, sharp smile.

  “One hour and twenty-eight minutes,” said Delilah lustfully. “Congratulations.”

  To Rachael’s amazement Delilah allowed her hand to go lax. The tiny girl sat on Rachael’s stomach as the teenager did her best to gulp in as much painfully cool air as possible.

  “Now,” Delilah continued, her eyes hardening. “Let’s talk business. Item number one and only: you’re going to die one way or another, so give me a damn good reason not to kill your family anyway.”

  Rachael was utterly out of her element. She was one normal girl up against a brand of insanity and inhuman she had never before experienced. Delilah was toying with her, she knew, and all Rachael could do was blindly play her cards and hope they were right
. Since Delilah was stronger than her and one hand was pinned under her back, Rachael had to make do with her words.

  Voice hoarse, she asked, “What did your song mean?”

  Delilah rolled her eyes. “Like you don’t know,” she sneered.

  “Pretend I don’t,” Rachael tentatively suggested.

  Impatient, Delilah said, “Aaron wants you to be part of the pack. He just doesn’t realize I’m better for him than you.”

  Was this all because of misplaced jealousy? Incredulous, Rachael said, “I don’t want any of that. The lycan thing, Aaron—I don’t want—”

  “God, you’re unbelievably stupid,” scoffed Delilah. “It’s not about what you want. My darling Aaron wants it. You can’t exist if he’s going to see the truth.”

  Rachael had the sense to be terrified of this girl. At the same time, she was furious. People were always making decisions for her. Jackson controlled who she kept as friends, her father practically forced her to be a shut-in, Vera pushed her to feel and think the ways she thought were best, Aaron had decided she was a good candidate to become a freaking werewolf, and even Holden had decided to handle a large chunk of Rachael’s personal problems.

  Once, just once, she wanted to decide what was good for her.

  Perhaps that resolve was what she’d needed all along. Rachael’s arm was going numb beneath her, but she could feel enough to discretely wriggle her fingers toward her back pocket until she felt metal.

  Rachael spoke to distract Delilah this time. “If you’re supposed to be Aaron’s, how come he never mentioned you?”

  She thought the idea would have angered Delilah; instead, the girl beamed with pleasure. “Because my real name isn’t Delilah. It’s Roxi.”

  “He is a lycan, what you know as a werewolf. Roxi is. I am. Holden is.”

  And that was the last piece of the lycan puzzle, thought Rachael. The mysterious fourth member of the pack had been on her trail from the beginning.

  She needed something else to talk about. While Rachael slowly pried the chunk of metal from her pants, she spoke louder in a desperate attempt to keep Delilah-Roxi occupied. “Why didn’t you just say so?”

  Roxi-Delilah wore an expression of utter blasé. “Where’s the fun in that? There’s no point having a hunt if there ain’t a chase involved.”

  “Chase?” repeated Rachael stupidly.

  “Oh, come on,” the girl complained. “I went to your school to warn you. Told you to back off after my darling exposed you to us. I scared your mom, even.” Rachael’s shock and palpable fury didn’t escape her. “Guess she didn’t like watching lycans any more than you. I admit I didn’t expect her to die, but c’est la vie.”

  Her tone was cavalier, yet the dangerous edge in Roxi’s expression returned. Cursing inwardly, Rachael knew she had only one shot at doing what she should have done from the start.

  She had to fight for her life as well.

  Rachael opened her mouth like she was going to say something and struck at the same time. The chunk of metal was her personal pocket knife, the blade was already out, and she wrenched her arm free to stab Roxi. The girl was appropriately surprised.

  And that was where Rachael faltered. Roxi looked so much the part of a naïve, stunned little girl that Rachael hesitated to sink the blade into her flesh. Roxi recovered quicker than her, knocking Rachael’s arm aside. The knife flew from her hand.

  Infuriated, Roxi landed a solid punch to Rachael’s head. Bursts of stars and sparks dazzled her, but Rachael wasn’t completely deterred. She wrenched hard to the side, not enough to throw Roxi off, but enough to dislodge the girl a little. Roxi’s lack of immediate action was strange, as though she were continually upset and taken aback at Rachael’s unwillingness to lie down and die as she was told.

  Roxi was strong, but she still weighed far less than Rachael. Rachael managed to kick and shove her off. She scrambled to escape, still half-dazed from Roxi’s punch. The lycan girl responded by raking sharp, hot nails down Rachael’s leg, ripping fabric and drawing spurts of blood. Rachael kicked again, harder, and caught the girl in the face.

  Close range was Roxi’s forte, it seemed. The girl clamped down on Rachael’s ankle with both hands and threw her. Rachael didn’t go far, but her tumble across the earthy floor forced her back to catch a protruding rock.

  Ignoring the pain didn’t even occur to Rachael; she was barely aware she was injured. She fumbled for the rock she’d hit, but it was too large and slippery to grasp one-handed. Within seconds Roxi was on her again with both hands around her neck, squeezing with unmatched ferocity. “Know what I’m gonna do now?” she shouted. Rachael could only gurgle. “I’m gonna snap your spine, and hopefully you’ll be paralyzed while I eat your brother. You’re next. Do you hear me? You picked the wrong—”

  A resounding, bone-shattering series of cracks made Rachael scream. Roxi had broken her neck, and now she was after Jackson, and there was nothing Rachael could do about it.

  Except Roxi’s head was twisted in an unnatural angle, her mouth hanging open like a stupefied fish. The grip on Rachael’s throat went slack, and then Roxi was pulled off her with devastating delicacy.

  Towering above her was Aaron. He said nothing, merely watched Rachael with what could only be described as heartache. Before Rachael sat up and scrambled away, she caught his eye and realized that for the first time in her life she was watching a grown man cry.

  The small swell of pity for Aaron diminished as Rachael realized the gravity of the situation. She shot to her feet, trembling on her damaged leg, and gasped, “Jackie!”

  Before she could move Aaron grasped her shoulders and pushed her back. “I will get him,” he said firmly. “Wait here.” He ignored Rachael’s protests and made for the sequoia. It was the only time Rachael had ever noticed he was seemingly unaware of his appearance, dropping to his knees and crawling into the hollowed trunk with no thoughts toward his crisp, previously clean clothes.

  Rachael hugged herself and shuddered. It was beginning to sink in that she had miraculously survived a fight with a lycan. She couldn’t bring herself to look at Roxi’s body.

  When Aaron emerged it was feet first. His crawl backward was agonizingly slow. When Jackson’s head inched out it was all Rachael could do not to cry. He was pale but still breathing, though raggedly. Grunting and shifting, Aaron finally pulled her unconscious brother into the sunlight. Rachael started to stumble forward but Aaron held up a hand, effectively halting her in her tracks. Then she saw why.

  Jackson’s throat and shirt were smeared and spattered with his own blood. Barely visible beneath the mess were jagged teeth marks.

  Softly, Aaron said, “She infected him.” He glanced up, eyes drier than before but deeply wounded. “I am sorry.”

  Whether due to relief, shock, or capitulation to injury and blood loss, Rachael blacked out.

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Holden saw Rachael’s knees buckle before she collapsed. He had strict orders to stay put until told otherwise. Every instinct shoved those orders aside the moment she wobbled, and he burst out from the bushes to catch her before she hit the ground. Unfortunately he was too far.

  Aaron was not. His leader was swift; moving from Jackson’s barely breathing form to prevent Rachael’s head from smacking anything on the forest floor. He caught Holden’s eye and, rather than rebuke him, silently handed the girl over.

  “Tend to her wounds,” he ordered.

  Holden didn’t have to be told twice. Before the command had left Aaron’s mouth he had his shirt off. Rolling Rachael’s pant leg up revealed two long gouges and a third slash that had already clotted over. Blood oozed from her injuries. She would need stitches. Holden tore his shirt down the seams and wrapped a makeshift tourniquet around Rachael’s calf. Weird, he thought, that her injuries now mirrored Coleen’s from a few months ago. This damnable sequoia tree had to be a curse.

  Off to the side Aaron was inspecting Jackson, wiping the blood from his throat with the
extra half of Holden’s shirt. Quietly he said, “We have to take him away.”

  Holden didn’t look up from his work longer than a second. “I know.”

  “We will have to leave. Preferably with passports, but we may have to make do without. There is not much time to prepare.”

  Flatly Holden replied, “What do you need me to do, then?”

  “Take Ms. Adair home, first.”

  “She needs a hospital.”

  “She needs her father,” Aaron grimly corrected. “Her injuries will not kill her.”

  Holden’s scars were burning again. He had to bite his tongue to keep from making the first remarks that came to mind. Once Rachael’s leg was appropriately wrapped, he looked up. “I could have saved her sooner.”

  He fully expected Aaron to lash back with a snide comment. Instead the man just looked at him blankly.

  When the stare became too uncomfortable, Holden broke eye contact. He rolled up Rachael’s other pant leg. Discerning there were no injuries, he breathed a sigh.

  At last Aaron broke the quiet. “The keys to the Lexus are on the kitchen counter. Take her home.”

  Holden began to gingerly gather Rachael’s limp body into his arms. “And you’ll do what?”

  “I will take her brother somewhere safe while Nathan buries Roxi’s body.”

  The last half of his sentence was so unexpected Holden almost lost his grip on Rachael. He remained crouching with her half in his lap, gaping at his alpha in disbelief. “You’re making him do it? Why?”

  “Because it is his fault this fiasco got so far.”

  “What, for being a dumb kid?” Holden hated Nathan for the hell he’d put him through, but it was hard for him to imagine forcing the boy to bury the girl he had been smitten with. After all, just moments ago Holden was certain he would have to do the same with Rachael. “This is Roxi’s fault. She’s the one who made all that crap up. She’s the one who made him keep quiet.”

  Aaron nodded. “Roxi manipulated him, true. But Nathan lied to me. He must understand consequences.”

  “Are you kidding me? None of this would have happened if you hadn’t bragged about how special Rachael was. If you hadn’t gone after her like—like some creepy—”