When the fog cleared, so did the visions. But St. Neuri was changed forever. In the months that followed, people began to move away. Homes went up for sale at an accelerated rate. Businesses shuttered. Whatever happened that summer leading into fall, people were too scared to stick around.
Nothing like it had happened since but it seemed to be something the town couldn’t shake. It changed it forever. The town seemed to be stagnant now. Janelle understood why Cheryl would want to leave.
But Janelle didn’t. The silence that descended across St. Neuri was good for her, her visions, her mental health. It made dealing with the strangeness of her existence easier. There was a pull to her hometown that she couldn’t quite explain. But she knew that she wouldn’t be leaving any time soon.
“You’re right.” Janelle remarked. “I understand why you want to go. But I’ll just miss you.”
“Don’t worry too much yet. I’m still stuck here for now.” She shot her a smile and looked at her phone. “We should get back. I want to show this to Eliza.”
They finished off their food, leaving the coffee shop behind. Janelle shivered in her jacket, unsure if it was from the cold or the memory of the fog.
Chapter Two
Janelle’s first vision came when she was five years old at her birthday party. A large group of people were in the back yard. Some for her – most for her parents. At the time, her parents were well established college professors at the tiny college in St. Neuri. Before Janelle was born, they had traveled the world, giving lectures at different prestigious universities before settling in St. Neuri.
Her parents claimed they liked the comfort of this quiet place nestled in the mountains. Janelle always assumed that once her mother got pregnant, they just wanted a place to settle down in and St. Neuri was close enough to the city that they got the best of both worlds. Her parents never spoke much of their life before Janelle and she had never thought to ask.
It was too late now. Her parents had died when Janelle was eighteen, after taking a friend’s plane to the mountains. Something went wrong with the plane, leaving everyone inside dead.
But on that sunny day, the events of the future of her parents wasn’t given to her. Instead, she was in the kitchen, trying to sneak a peek at her presents, which had been left on the counter. Her best friend at the time, her name lost to time, was attempting to help. Her parents were too engrossed in the backyard to notice Janelle snuck off.
The counter was too high up for either of them to reach and they were dragging a chair across the dining room. Janelle climbed on it, her tiny legs wobbling a little as she attempted to lean forward and take the first one.
As she reached for it, there was a strange swooping feeling in her stomach, as if she was being pulled forward. Gasping, Janelle tried to steady herself but the images were flickering across her brain like an old VHS tape.
Her friend, exclaiming that someone was coming. Janelle, quickly pushing the present back. Her friend, scurrying backwards. Her shoe caught on the table leg and she toppled backwards. Janelle yelped in surprise. Her friend smacked into the wall, hitting her head, bursting into tears –
She was thrown back into herself, gasping in shock. Her friend was telling her to hurry up. Janelle struggled to understand what she had just seen. Her head suddenly ached. She turned to tell her friend what just happened.
But then her friend was saying that someone was coming. Janelle, shocked, pushed the present back on the counter, her head swimming. Her friend was moving backwards, her eyes wide, afraid of getting into trouble. Janelle yelled out for her to stop –
But her friend stumbled and hit the wall. Her head struck it with a solid thud and she burst into tears. As she did, Janelle’s mother came in. They were caught red handed, scolded immediately after Janelle’s mom saw that her friend was fine.
But she didn’t care that they got in trouble. She was having a difficult time understanding what just happened. It was exactly how she saw it her head. How could something like that be possible?
Like any child, it soon became a distant memory. If one didn’t understand what just happened, as a child it was much easier to file it away and eventually forget about it. Time healed all wounds – and visions.
It wasn’t until much later that Janelle realized the importance of that moment.
Janelle worked in peace and quiet two days after Cheryl met with Eliza about her article. Most of the staff left for the weekend already, leaving just a few people quietly sitting at their desks. After the massive migraine from a few days ago, she was finally able to focus on work without the throbbing in her brain. Besides a minor vision this morning – a woman spilling her coffee just outside the shop – things were quiet for once.
Naturally, that silence was shattered by the front door of the newspaper office slamming shut. The bell that signaled people entering clattered to the floor as if pulled off the hinge. Alarmed, Janelle looked up. The receptionist desk was blocked from her view but she could hear a man angrily talking to Eliza’s niece, Tara, who worked there part time.
Pushing away from her desk, Janelle went into the lobby. “Lobby” was a generous term. It was a small area with a few seats and old magazines. They didn’t have very many visitors. Even the receptionist didn’t ever work full time nowadays. There simply was no point.
As she walked into the room, she could hear the man arguing with Tara. As she stepped into view, the man looked up at her and glowered.
“Are you Cheryl?” He snapped.
“No. May I help you?” Janelle asked coolly, looking at Tara, who was fresh out of high school. She was looking scared at being scolded by a man twice her size.
Twice Janelle’s size too. The man was wearing a button up shirt that looked like it would rip at any moment from the sheer size of his muscles. She didn’t think there was an inch of fat on the man. His hair, jet black, was slicked back. His eyes were a bright green, a sharp contrast with his tanned skin and black hair. Janelle had never seen him before, this well-muscled and well-toned man, and there was something compelling about him that she couldn’t explain.
“I want to see Cheryl.” The man slammed the paper down on the desk and stabbed his finger at it. “She wrote a bullshit article about me in this shitty paper and didn’t even call me for a quote, to defend myself, nothing. Is that how this paper runs itself? Where is she?”
The realization this was Jake Masters dawned on Janelle. Great. The reclusive bad boy billionaire was currently in their office, screaming about the article – why had no one seen this coming? Cheryl and Eliza appeared at this point. Eliza went pale almost immediately but not Cheryl who crossed her arms and stared at him.
“I’m Cheryl.” She said.
Jake walked over, looming over her. “This article is slander.”
“It’s an opinion piece,” Cheryl replied tightly, “I don’t need to ask you for a statement.”
“It’s full of assumptions about me, my company, and why I am here. I want you to issue a retraction.”
Eliza attempted to interrupt and play peacekeeper. “Sir, if you would like to have a seat in the meeting room, I’m sure we can discuss –”
“We don’t need to discuss anything. Print a retraction.”
Cheryl shook her head. “We aren’t doing anything like that.”
But Janelle was having a difficult time focusing on the argument. Something about Jake was different and it nagged at her. She took a step towards him, trying to figure it out. The conversation faded to the background, slipping through her head like water.
There was an absence – that was the word. Normally, Janelle spent most of the day shielding herself from being overwhelmed by visions. The bigger the crowd, the more time spent around someone, the more prone she was to them. But with Jake, it felt as if there was a blank wall in the room.
At the risk of triggering an onslaught of visions, Janelle mentally peeled down the walls she worked so hard to keep up. As she did, she could feel waves of e
motion rolling off Eliza, Cheryl and Tara and the visions began to brim like boiling pots of water.
Tara, coming home, stubbing her toe on a stack of books in her bedroom –
Eliza, getting a warning light on her car dashboard, groaning in irritation. It is summer and she is sweating, eager to get home –
Cheryl, looking at places to live in the city with her parents –
Janelle batted them away, sifting through them for the one she was looking for. But there was nothing.
Jake was silent. His presence was muted. There were no visions from him. How could such a thing be possible? Never in her life had she met someone shuttered off like this. Her heart began to hammer in her chest as she stood there, staring at him.
Who was he?
“I’ll buy this entire paper, you realize that, right?” He was saying to Eliza. “I could buy you out in two fucking seconds. Fire all of you. Fix whatever gossip site you think you are running here.”
Eliza blanched, babbling as Cheryl mouthed off. The situation had quickly spiraled out of control but all Janelle could focus on was how she wasn’t getting any visions from this man.
“Sir, please, if we could just take a moment to figure this all out.” Eliza was pleading.
But Jake shook his head in disgust. “A retraction. Or I will buy this paper up so fast your head will spin.”
“What makes you think we would sell to you?” Cheryl snapped.
Jake’s eyes fell on Eliza. “I’m sure I could buy you out.”
Her face flushed. Cheryl made a noise of disgust. As Jake turned to leave, he looked at Janelle. She could only stare at him, unable to speak, floored by meeting someone that didn’t give her visions. His eyes were green pools, fathomless, no expression behind them. In the next second, he left, slamming the door shut behind him.
Silence descended among the group. It was uncomfortable, covering the room. Cheryl turned to stare at her.
“Thanks for the back-up.” She snapped, disgusted, before storming off to the back offices.
Janelle realized how she hadn’t said a word during the entire fight. Even Eliza looked at her confused before leaving her in the lobby with Tara, who was already getting her things to leave for the day. She sighed, running her fingers through her hair. Good job, she thought to herself. She should have said something to Jake, put him in his place. Once again, the visions threw her off, made her look like an asshole.
Even so, she couldn’t help but want to run after Jake and find out more about him. How could such a thing be possible? How could he truly not be able to give her visions?
By Monday morning, a retraction was printed in the paper, much to Cheryl’s chagrin. She was furious the entire day – at Eliza, at Jake, and at Janelle, for not defending her. Janelle couldn’t blame her. She should have.
But the entire weekend, she couldn’t get Jake out of her head. She wanted to see him again, discover if it was a fluke or something else that was at play. Janelle never met someone simply so blank before. To think that someone could offer her a respite from visions – that would change everything.
Even though it was wrong, and even though she should be put off completely by the way he barreled into the office, demanding a retraction and threatening to buy the place up, Janelle still needed to know more about the man that was so blank.
It occurred to her as she walked into work that perhaps he was unreadable because he was dangerous. Janelle lingered on this for a moment, wondering if there was something about Jake Masters that was going to get her into trouble. But he seemed like what she imagined most billionaires were: assholes who could pay their way out of any situation.
Cheryl ignored her when Janelle sat at her desk. She sighed inwardly, knowing that what happened next was going to piss her off more. Even so, she had to find out more about this guy. It was that question that propelled her forward into Eliza’s office.
Her boss looked tired today, typing up something on her computer. She looked up at Janelle when she entered and leaned back in the chair.
“Can I help you, Janelle?”
She sat down, playing with the hem of her skirt. “I had an idea about the whole Jake Masters thing.”
Eliza groaned. “I am already incredibly sick of hearing about Mr. Masters. The next time I have to talk about him will be too soon.”
“I know we printed a retraction but I was thinking maybe I should interview him.” Before Eliza could interrupt she kept going, “Something from his point of view. Something just to put his point out to St. Neuri.”
In a stroke of good luck, Eliza didn’t look irritated and instead sighed. “I was thinking something similar, actually. I’m glad you volunteered since I can’t put Cheryl on it and no one else would want to head over there.” Her eyes narrowed slightly. “Why do you want to? You were terribly quiet during that fight.”
At least here she didn’t have to lie. “Cheryl did have a point. We don’t know much about him. I’m curious to know more about the richest man in St. Neuri. What he is like, what the mansion of his looks like. This would get him off our back about the paper.”
Eliza chewed on the edge of her pen. She never wore any makeup and today her greying hair was thrown up in a messy ponytail. “He said his offer to buy it still stood.”
Janelle blinked. “You aren’t actually thinking about selling are you?”
“I’m getting older. Have my own share of my money issues. Selling the paper would allow me to put my affairs in order.”
“You can’t. You’ve been on the paper for almost forty years!” Janelle protested. “The paper wouldn’t be the same without you.”
Eliza held up her hand to silence her. “Right now, I wouldn’t worry about it. I’ll reach out to Mr. Masters and see if he would be open to an interview. You’ll be in charge of the rest. Please make sure the article is presentable.”
“Right. Of course.” Janelle replied, standing. “And I won’t say a word about…”
“Thank you.”
Clearly dismissed, she left the office only to bump directly into Cheryl. Her face scowled and Janelle wanted to say something but knew it didn’t matter – whatever she said now would seem false when Cheryl discovered the article.
Her friend brushed past her into Eliza’s office and Janelle wondered if finding out more about Jake was going to be worth all of the trouble.
Chapter Three
Jake’s mansion was in the mountains of St. Neuri, overlooking the town like a king overlooking his kingdom. It was a sprawling house, gorgeous even though it stood out like a sore thumb in St. Neuri. No one else lived like this and the fact that Jake kept to himself besides getting into fights only made him more mysterious.
And the fact that Janelle couldn’t read him, of course, made him fascinating.
She pulled up to the gate that blocked the mansion from view. There was a guard house here. A man waved her through after checking her ID. It no longer felt as if she was in St. Neuri anymore but almost as if she stepped through into another world.
As Janelle drove down the pathway towards the mansion, she tried to keep a clear head. Maybe their last encounter was a fluke. Perhaps today she would meet Jake and her head would be filled with visions. In that case, she would do the interview and leave as quickly as possible.
Her thoughts stopped once the mansion came into view. Actually seeing it caused her to catch her breath. The place was massive – bigger than anything else she ever saw in St. Neuri. It was modern and bright, sticking out among the darkened forest.
She drove up to the entrance which had a fountain in the middle of the circular driveway. Ridiculous. All this money…Janelle couldn’t imagine such a thing.
The doors to the front opened and another man came forward. Janelle parked her car in front and got out of it as the man came over.
“I’ll park it for you, miss.”
“Really?”
“Mr. Masters doesn’t like cars left in the driveway.” The valet replied, pluc
king the keys from her fingers.
She blinked, looking around. Honestly, it didn’t look as though he got many visitors. But she was beginning to understand why Cheryl had researched him. It struck her just how much wasn’t known about Jake.
“Please, go to the door, someone will be there to escort you.” The valet said as he got into her car.
Another person? How many people worked here? She shivered in her jacket and walked over to the entrance, up a few steps. The door was still open and she gingerly stepped inside. Janelle was in the foyer now. The floor was marble, paintings that probably cost thousands of dollars on the walls. In the middle was a winding staircase to the second floor. Was that an elevator?
There were lots of windows here, allowing the overcast sky to shed a little bit of light. In another place, it would look beautiful, filled with natural light. In St. Neuri, especially in the winter, the sun didn’t appear too often.
Instead of an escort, however, Jake appeared around the corner. Today, he wore all black. His t-shirt was long sleeved and a perfect fit. She could see how in shape he was, his muscles evident through the thin fabric. He was wearing black sweatpants. Completely casual. His face was serene, a far cry from the irritation that crossed it at their last encounter.
“Did you make it alright?” He said by way of greeting.
“Yes, I did, thank you.” She wanted to add that it was hard to miss but decided against it.
“You can follow me.” Jake said, turning back around.
He didn’t seem very chatty. She wondered how this interview was going to go. Already, she couldn’t sense him. That feeling of being hitting a wall returned. It wasn’t a fluke – she truly couldn’t read Jake.
The Billionaire Werewolf (Werewolves of St. Neuri Book 3) Page 2
