Wolf #1: The Pack [COMPLETED]

Chapter 9

Chapter 9

I'm struck by ingenuity a couple hours after the party to check Steph's piano. Perhaps she hadn't hidden anything in her bedroom, but her room isn't the only place had she to hide things.

Under the cover where the keys are strung up, I find a notebook. It's been slid under the mechanisms so the piano would still play normally.

The book is exactly what I'm looking for. Steph has written all her notes from Dorothy's books in the pages, filling the journal from front to back. It's detailed all the way down to where to find the plants she had journaled.

Still, as I leaf through the notebook for the umpteenth time, I can't help but feel like this isn't it. One journal wouldn't have been enough for her. I'm still trying to figure out what she did with the plants once she had found them. This book only describes what plants she needed, what their purpose is, and where to find them.

Dorothy said that she had a garden...where was it?

If Steph had been exploring magic, she would have had notes on how and why she harvested the plants. The first notebook I found detailed her beliefs, but it gives no clue where they had come from. Even after I search the internet for some of kind of hint, I can't find anything that was remotely like what she was practicing. Am I thinking too far out of the box?

My phone rings and I see it's Richard again. He's been calling ever since the kiss. I don't feel like reiterating what happened the night of the party—him kissing me had made me too uncomfortable and I don't feel like talking to him. Perhaps my persistence on silence wouldn't have been so intense had it not been for the fact that I had kissed Jace too.

"Never drinking scotch again, Steph," I murmur, though I highly doubt that scotch had anything to do with the events of the other night.

Besides the revelation of Richard's feelings and the close encounter with Jace at the party, I have several other matters prodding my conscious. Jace and Stephanie knew one another. I hadn't seen that one coming.

It doesn't take a genius to gather that they had probably hung out outside of class if they had spoken about family—but were they friends? They appear to run in two different circles but maybe not. Steph wasn't exactly who I thought she had been so who's to say that I didn't know everyone she hung out with.

It's crossed my mind that Jace came into her life around the same time she began to grow distant. It's also crossed my mind that they maybe had been more than friends...

And those wolves in the forest...my skin crawls at the thought of them. They were massive! I have no clue how they had gone undetected or unchecked by any of the forest rangers or hunters. I hadn't expected creatures so large to scare so easily and be chased off by Jace. The smaller of the two could have easily fit his head in its jaws.

I'm perplexed, and my throbbing headache isn't helping much either. I set the notebook aside and decide to drop it for now. I need to sleep.

But I stare at my pillows with hesitation after pulling my blankets back. I've been having such strange dreams of late and with everything going on in my waking life, I'm afraid of what else my mind can conjure up.

My phone goes off again and I see that it's my mom. Picking up, I head downstairs and decide to make myself a cup of coffee, "Hey, Mom."

"Feliz cumpleaños!" She trills and I hear my dad echo 'happy birthday' in the background, "How are you doing, my big girl? I hope I didn't wake you up—the time differences always have me muddled up."

I slump in the counter seat, "You didn't. But I'm good. Just reading through Steph's books."

"Your father and I are hoping to be home this weekend. Maybe we could grab dinner?"