That was the worst part of all. It was as if Bingo had reached right into the darkest, most disturbing part of his mind and ripped his fears clean out like a still-beating heart so he could play with them. How could he possibly describe Jughead’s dream about chasing Miss Grundy so accurately? Or even know about the one with Dilton in the cemetery? Bingo’s explanation landed like a gut punch, and everything seemed to spin around them.
“We’re werewolves, Jughead,” Bingo went on, saying the word as easily as he might have said bookworms or Scorpios, gripping his cousin by the lapels of his jacket. “Thanks to the full moon and the blood of the Jones family, we are something far better than a bunch of pitiful, sad-sack humans. It usually kicks in after puberty, and I’ve been waiting a full year for you to come into your gifts.”
“There’s something wrong with you.” Jughead could hardly breathe. “If this is some kind of sick, twisted joke—”
“You know how I knew you’d show up here tonight?” Bingo’s voice was smooth as cream. “Because the full moon is up, and your instincts kicked in, telling you to seek out the rest of your pack.”
“I came here because I woke up naked in a graveyard this morning, and the only guy who knows what happened to me last night was leaving all my texts on read!” Jughead struggled to break the iron grip his cousin had on his jacket. “But obviously your brain is broken, because people I know have died and you’re joking about … about—”
“I get it, buddy. You don’t remember anything yet. I freaked out, too, when I first started to change, and for months my brain blocked out everything that happened on the full moon.” He brought his face closer, that light in his eyes burning brighter. “But you feel it, right? The way your skin doesn’t fit right tonight? The way you’re hungry for something but all this junk food just makes you want to hurl?” Bingo pressed his lips right up against Jughead’s ear, murmuring, “It’ll come back to you soon, cousin, I promise. And just wait till you remember how good it felt when you tore Dilton Doiley’s throat out with your teeth.”
Emitting a strangled shout, Jughead swung his fist at Bingo’s face; but the boy danced back out of reach on nimble feet, laughing with delight as the punch missed his jaw by inches. Jughead was just taking a step forward, confused rage building in his chest, when a figure burst suddenly out of the trees. Leaping at Bingo, the blond girl wrapped her arms and legs around him from behind, shrieking wildly.
“BINGO WILKIN!”
Without missing a beat, Jughead’s cousin did a graceful spin, while Betty Cooper hooted and giggled, something splashing around in her red plastic cup. When they stopped, she slid to the ground again, her steps unsteady and her face flushed. Reaching up, she ruffled Bingo’s hair, and the boy grinned down at her.
“Well, hey there, BC.”
“It’s my favorite musician!” Betty warbled happily, her drink spilling as she swept her arms out. “Look, Juggie, it’s my favorite musician!”
“I see him,” Jughead snapped, breathing hard. He wanted Betty to go away so he could shake some answers out of his cousin, but all his words were knotted up in his throat.
“I like it when a pretty girl calls me her favorite.” Bingo took Betty’s hand and guided her in a neat little pirouette, the moonlight making her hair shine.
“And this girl likes it when she gets a compliment from Wingo Bilkin.” Making a face, Betty tried again. “Binko Wigpin. Wiggo Pigpen.”
She dissolved into paroxysms of laughter, and Bingo deftly slipped the plastic cup out of her hands, dumping the rest of its contents onto the rocks at their feet.
“Hey!” Betty yelped, watching the remains of her drink vanish. “Awww.”
“Sorry, Betty, but you’ll thank me in the morning,” Bingo said, tugging gently on her ponytail. “I think you’ve probably had enough of whatever was in there already.”
“It was a libation.” She winked at him conspiratorially, and then patted his face.
“So it was.” With another deft move, he reached into Betty’s pocket and slipped out her car keys, tossing them at his cousin without warning. Jughead swiped them out of the air single-handed, scowling furiously, while Bingo said, “Cuz, I believe the lovely Miss Cooper could use a driver to see her home safely.”
“But the party’s not over yet!” Betty protested with a pouting frown, twisting a ring around her middle finger.
“But your favorite musician’s about to leave, so it won’t be fun for much longer anyway,” Bingo returned smartly.
Jughead was rooted to the ground as his cousin headed for the trees, calling back in a playful voice, “You look a little pale tonight, Jughead. Maybe you and Betty should stop for a bite on the way home.”
And then he was gone, leaving Jughead all alone with Betty beneath the full moon—and the faintest beginnings of a hungry growl building in his stomach.
THE MUSIC SHE’D PICKED tonight was bass-heavy, the beat relentless, thudding like an external heartbeat as she stretched her limbs. The obstacle course had been rearranged from the night before, with new targets and a few extra challenges thrown in for good measure—because despite the late hour, Elena Cooper was antsy, and she needed to blow off steam. Jacob had shown up ten minutes past sundown, sullen and drunk, and she could practically smell the beast fighting to surface inside him as she’d taken him to his cell.
He wouldn’t return at the next full moon; she already knew it. She could see the conflict in his eyes—the shame over what he’d become warring with his fear over what would surely happen if he made the wrong move while under her watch—and before long, he’d be making plans to run. Which meant she would have to go after him. Taking a swig from her water bottle, Elena started the timer and launched into the course.
She was halfway through—a dozen targets down—and not even out of breath yet, when she heard it: an insistent pounding, so loud it broke through both the pulsing music and the thick membrane of her concentration. For a moment, Elena thought it was Jacob, having finally lost his last bit of self-control, trying to break out of his cage. But then she oriented herself in the center of the obstacle course and realized the sound was coming from the front door.
Two heartbeats passed as she stood there, thinking. Aside from Jacob, the only people with any business walking onto the warehouse lot—who even knew this place was here—already had keys to that door. Whoever her uninvited guest was, they had circumvented a padlocked gate, and they hadn’t called ahead to say they were coming.
Swiftly, Elena Cooper cast aside her harmless paint pistols and reached for her real sidearm—the Smith & Wesson Model 500, loaded with custom silver bullets, that was never more than a few paces away from her at all times. It was a bear of a gun, capable of stopping anything up to and including a werewolf with a single shot, and not for the inexperienced or faint of heart. The first time she’d fired it, the recoil had nearly dislocated her shoulder.
Leaving the music on, Elena crept almost silently through the shadows to the front entrance, the pounding getting louder. A computer screen beside the door showed the view of a night-vision surveillance camera mounted outside, and Elena’s eyebrows hitched upward when she took in the identity of her mysterious visitor. Tossing open the locks, she greeted him with the barrel of her weapon, glaring down the length of her nose. “Hate to break it to you, but your girlfriend’s not here tonight, Coppertop.”
“I know,” Archie Andrews said, his face cast half in shadow by the light of the full moon. To his credit, he barely flinched at the sight of her gun. (This time.) “I came to see you.”
“Oh?” She arched a brow, taking in his hunched shoulders and nervous body language, lowering her weapon. He wasn’t a threat. “Well, I guess I’m flattered, but you’re not exactly my type.”
“Not because of—” The boy caught himself when he seemed to realize she was joking. Setting his jaw, he grunted, “I want you to teach me. About werewolves. I want … I want to be able to do what Betty does.”
Both of
Elena’s eyebrows went up this time. “She’s been training most of her life to do this stuff—it doesn’t just happen overnight. And anyway, have you really thought this through, kid? We don’t fight werewolves for the laughs, you know. We do it because they kill people if we don’t. Sometimes they kill us.”
“Two people I know are dead already,” Archie replied, his tone grave and considered, “and the monster that did it is still out there. What if the next victim is someone I can’t bear to lose? What if … what if it’s Betty, because she’s the only one who knows how to face these things?” Squaring his shoulders, he lifted his chin, meeting her eyes. “I want to help.”
Elena grinned, running a hand through her dark hair—deliberately pulling it out of her face so he could see the three jagged lines of scar tissue that cut across her cheek. It was a souvenir she would always have from her first kill. She’d let the beast get too close and learned an agonizing lesson. “You make a persuasive case, Archie Andrews. Come on in.”
The drive home from Reggie’s party seemed to take twice as long as it should have, the car filled with uncomfortable silence, and Betty spent most of the ride staring out the window at the bright eye of the moon. Just as he had been the previous morning at the Chock’Lit Shoppe, Jughead was distracted and fretful, his knuckles white around the steering wheel. She wanted to ask what was on his mind, but she was afraid to hear what his answer might be.
The only reason she went to the party in the first place was to hunt for a killer, to protect her friends, and now she felt like she was failing in her mission. All she’d managed to do was confuse herself and risk compromising the very objectivity that she’d preached to Archie about the night before. She had always taken pride in her ability to think of werewolves as monsters, first and foremost; but how could she now, when all the suspects were her friends?
Reggie Mantle was undeniably an ass—but he’d completely surprised Betty with his behavior that night.
When one of her favorite songs had started playing on the speakers by the water’s edge, Betty had whooped with glee, charging for the makeshift dance floor. Eyes closed and drink aloft, she’d twirled and swayed to the music, letting it wash over her, losing herself in the melody. And then she felt someone’s hands touching her waist, and when she opened her eyes, she found some creep from Midville—a guy she’d never even met before—trying to grind up against her. Grossed out, she shoved him away … which made him mad.
Before the moment boiled over, however, Reggie had intervened. Red with rage, he’d gotten right in the face of the Midville kid, shouting at him for trying to take advantage of a girl who’d been drinking, and then he threw the creep and his friends out of the party.
When he was sure they were really leaving, he turned, looping his arm around Betty’s shoulders and giving her a side hug.
Still breathing hard, Reggie shook his head. “Hey, I’m sorry you had to deal with that. Are you okay?”
“Yeah. Yeah, I’m fine.” She mustered a smile, putting her hand over his. “Thanks for sticking up for me.”
A strange look passed over the guy’s face. “Of course. That’s what friends are for, right?”
It had been harder to look Reggie in the eye after that; and her encounters with the rest of her potential suspects hadn’t left her feeling any better about eventually facing one of them in a no-holds-barred fight to the death. She would barely even call Cheryl Blossom a friend—and certainly not a close one—but the redheaded girl had surprised Betty, too.
Not long after the incident with the Midville guy, Betty had been singing and laughing with some of the other cheerleaders, and Cheryl had approached them.
“Betty. I’m trying to be understanding, because clearly you’re going through something tonight, but your voice is giving me a migraine.” Smiling sweetly, the girl added, “Would you mind putting a cork in it?”
“CHERYL!” Betty squealed instead, lunging forward for a hug—but Cheryl stopped her with a stiff arm.
“I don’t do hugs.” Then, pointing at the cup in Betty’s hand, she pursed her lips. “What number is this for you?”
Betty screwed up her face and thought. “Uh … I don’t know. Three? Four?”
“Okayyy …” Pursing her lips, Cheryl pried the drink out of the blonde’s hand and passed it to one of the other girls—without asking. “You need to pace yourself, Cooper. You’re not some knuckle-dragging frat boy at his first Mardi Gras; you are a River Vixen, and a lady does not drink until she pukes.”
“Don’t be such a portypot, Blossom,” Betty groused in return—but then she froze, eyes going wide. Clapping a hand on Cheryl’s shoulder, she made a tremendously disgusting urp noise, and her shoulders hunched.
“Ohmygosh.” Cheryl’s face went pale. “Are you going to puke? Are you going to puke right now?” When, in response, Betty dropped to all fours on the ground and started to gag, the redhead began barking orders to the other girls. “Maria, go get her some water. Veronica, look for snacks, preferably something with carbs. Lisa, stop playing that song, or I swear I will stuff your phone sideways down your throat, so help me!”
Then she got down next to Betty, stroking her back soothingly, holding the girl’s ponytail out of the way while the blonde belched and spit into the grass.
When the episode was over, Betty straightened up again, offering a weak smile. “Thanks, Cheryl.”
“Don’t mention it.” The girl shifted uncomfortably. “You’d have done the same thing for me, right? Team spirit, and … you know, all that stuff.”
This time, when Betty wrapped her arms around Cheryl, the cheer team captain didn’t resist; in fact, after a moment, she embraced the blond girl back.
Happily, Betty mumbled in her ear, “See? You do do hugs!”
“And if you tell anyone,” Cheryl muttered back through her teeth, “I’ll drown you right here in the river.”
Moose Mason was probably the most outwardly intimidating guy at Riverdale High, pretty much built like a werewolf already, with his broad shoulders and towering stature. He was known to have a short fuse, too, and had picked plenty of fights at school over the years. However, even he turned out to have a softer side.
At one point in the evening, Betty had been chasing a firefly—possibly one of the last of the season—over an uneven stretch of earth close to the trees, and she’d tripped while passing a group of guys from Riverdale. For one horrible moment, she’d been completely out of control and headed for a hard landing … but she never touched the ground. A pair of huge hands had snatched her right out of the air, swinging her around and lifting her up.
“Whoops!” Moose exclaimed, effortlessly adjusting her body weight in his arms, his biceps straining against the sleeves of his T-shirt. It was definitely not warm enough for a T-shirt, but Betty wasn’t going to complain too much. “Be careful, Betty, it’s kinda dangerous over here.”
“Now you tell me,” she rejoined, wrapping her arms around his neck and gazing down at the faraway ground. “I think I dropped my libation.”
“That’s okay, we’ll just get you another.” Moose grinned at her, and then he spun around, carrying her toward the little makeshift drink station that had been set up on the flats. All the way there, he asked her a series of concerned questions, making sure she hadn’t hurt herself, and only when they reached their destination did he finally set her down, light as a feather. “No more chasing fireflies, okay? I might not be around to save you next time.”
“I promise,” Betty said, and she blew him a kiss before he ambled away to find his friends again.
She’d barely gotten to see Bingo Wilkin at all, but he’d been kind and sweet when she’d stumbled across him and Jughead by the river. He’d taken her drink away—which, honestly, had been the right thing to do—and he’d made sure she had a safe ride home.
And then there was Jughead himself. They’d known each other since kindergarten, and he’d always been shy, kind, and generous—with everything except his F
rench fries. He’d never picked a fight in his life, rarely had a bad word to say about anyone … He was a sweetheart. How could she possibly separate all of that from the beast inside, if he turned out to be her quarry?
Was she really ready to kill one of her friends?
The car came to a stop and Betty blinked, startled out of her reverie, surprised to see that they were at the curb outside her house. Yawning, she worked the kinks out of her neck. “Thanks for driving me, Juggie. You’re my hero.”
“Can I ask you a weird question?” he blurted, staring out the windshield at the moon. His fingers flexed anxiously, still wrapped around the wheel. “What if you did something … bad—really bad—but you couldn’t remember ever doing it? Does it still count against you?”
“That depends on what you mean, I guess,” Betty murmured, her hand frozen on the buckle of her seat belt. “Legally, it’s kind of a gray area. Like, if you snap and do something drastic, the consequences are usually lighter than if the crime is premeditated. But morally?” She studied his profile carefully, his tangle of dark hair, the row of points that crowned his trusty hat. “If you’re not in control of your actions, then … well, maybe that’s kind of a gray area, too.”
“Oh.” He let out a breath, his shoulders dropping. Clearly, it wasn’t what he’d hoped to hear.
“Can I ask one?” Betty twisted the ring on her middle finger, its opal setting giving a shimmer when it caught the light. “What if you had to do something bad, to make a choice you weren’t sure you could live with, in order to stop someone else from doing something even worse?”
After a long moment of silence, Jughead gave a hollow laugh. “I don’t like this game anymore. Let’s play astronauts instead.”
In spite of herself, Betty giggled. Once upon a time, they had played astronauts together, turning her backyard into the universe and exploring its farthest reaches. While she battled aliens and conquered other planets, Jughead adopted martian orphans and learned how to grow flowers in space. Her laugh ebbed away as the memory finally tugged at something sad in her heart, and she leaned across the center console, squeezing the boy’s hand and pressing her lips to his cheek. “Thanks for driving me home, Juggie.”
A Werewolf in Riverdale Page 9
