Hemlock 03: Willowgrove (18 page)

Once I started laughing, I couldn’t stop. I tried clamping my hands over my mouth, desperate to silence the sound in case someone wandered upstairs and heard the noise, but the laughter kept bubbling up from deep inside my chest, so hard that breathing became a struggle and tears streamed down my face.
Maybe this is what people mean when they talk about hysterical laughter
, I thought, and that just set me off all over again.

Kyle was staring at me as though I had lost my mind. He shot a nervous glance at the door and that small gesture helped me regain control.

“I’m okay,” I managed, lowering my hands from my mouth as the laughter finally subsided. “It’s just funny, y’know. Of all the times to sneak a peek . . .”

“Sorry,” he said, but the grin that crossed his face looked anything but contrite.

On impulse, I leaned over and kissed him.

I meant it to be a quick, light peck, but Kyle pulled me close and I found my lips parting under his. His right hand slid up the back of my neck to tangle in my too-short hair as my own hands slipped under his jacket.

I kissed Kyle hungrily, greedily, as though I could borrow some of his warmth and use it to chase away the cold sting of everything we had seen and heard over the past few minutes.

“Everything will be okay,” he whispered, minutes later, somehow knowing they were words I desperately needed to hear. He pulled back and tucked a stray strand of my hair back into place.

“How?” I asked, trying not to cringe at how small and weak the single word sounded.

Kyle trailed his fingers along my temple. “I don’t know,” he admitted, “but it will be.”

He lowered his hand and then reached past me to begin slipping Amy’s things back into their hiding place.

“Wait.” I grabbed the second key before he could tuck it away with everything else. It was small—not as small as the key to a suitcase, but smaller than the key to any door. There was something slightly familiar about the size and shape of it. A locker key, maybe? Or the key to a desk drawer.

“What is it?” asked Kyle.

I shook my head. “I don’t know. But Amy only kept things in here that were important. It was with the key to the study; maybe it opens something in there.” I slipped the key into my bra with the other one, rolling my eyes when he smirked.

I fitted the small section of the window seat back into place as Kyle stood. He reached down and I let him help me to my feet, teetering a little on the dreaded heels.

“Ready?”

I nodded. We crossed the room and Kyle cracked the door, checking the hallway before stepping outside.

I shot one last glance back at Amy’s room before following.

She wasn’t here, not anymore, and that somehow made it easier to walk away.

I pulled the door closed and headed after Kyle, pausing for a moment to check my makeup—makeup I had borrowed from Jason’s mother—in a mirror with a gilded frame. Kyle stopped and waited for me, and I shook my head, amused, as I walked toward him.

I wiped away a small smudge of lipstick at the corner of his mouth. “Jason will never let either of us hear the end of it if you go down there wearing lipstick.”

I expected Kyle to laugh or blush, but something dark and uncertain passed behind his eyes. “C’mon,” he said, the single word soft and gruff, as he headed for the staircase.

Confused and a little off-balance by the sudden change in his mood, I followed.

The sound of voices stopped us on the landing.

A trio of silver-haired men in suits were locked in conversation at the bottom of the stairs. Amy’s grandfather walked by. They called out to him, but the senator waved them off and continued to the hallway on the far side of the stairs, a hallway that wound past the billiard room and the study before eventually leading out to the pool.

The group gave a collective shrug and went back to their conversation.

“It’s like I told her: if you lie with wolves, you’ll get fleas.”

“Or have puppies.”

They broke out in alcohol-thickened chortles.

I glanced at Kyle and slipped my hand into his. His expression was studiously blank, and his hand felt hard and
unyielding, almost as though metal ran beneath his skin.

“Are you okay?” I whispered.

“Why wouldn’t I be?” He slid his hand out from mine and turned. “We’ll have to take the back stairs and go through the kitchen.”

I watched his retreating form for a moment. I wanted to tell him that I was sorry, but I didn’t know how. There would always be men like that; there would always be people who hated and feared Kyle for something that wasn’t his fault. Any apology I gave would be useless and inadequate.

In the end, I said nothing and trailed him down the hall.

The back stairs were located behind a door that had been cleverly camouflaged to look like part of the wall. A casual visitor would walk right past it, but Kyle and I were not casual visitors. He pulled it open and held it for me as I stepped through.

The narrow passage was just wide enough for one person. Bare lightbulbs hung from the ceiling at regular intervals, but they didn’t do much to dispel the gloom. The space had been a servants’ stairway when the house had first been built, and no one had ever tried to make it look anything other than plain and functional.

The din of clanking dishes and the shouts of caterers drifted up from the kitchen below, more than masking the noise my heels made on the wooden steps.

Kyle put a hand on my shoulder when we were halfway to the first floor. “Mac, hold on a sec . . .”

I paused and turned. I was standing two steps below, and even with the advantage of heels, the difference in positions
accentuated Kyle’s height. I looked up into his eyes and saw that same blend of darkness and uncertainty I had noticed moments before.

He ran a hand through his hair. “Did something happen between you and Jason. Back at Thornhill? Or in Denver?”

My heart skipped a beat and the hand I placed on the railing to steady myself shook slightly. “Why would you ask that?” There was a catch in my voice, one that I hoped sounded more disbelieving than defensive.

“The two of you have been avoiding each other since we got back from the camp. And earlier—up in Jason’s room—it felt like I walked in on something.”

“You didn’t.”

Kyle stepped down a stair, closing some of the distance and making it easier to meet his gaze. “I’m used to the way Jason stares at you—I don’t like it, but I’m used to it—but there was something in the way you were looking back. It was like there was a charge in the room.”

I hesitated. In a way, telling Kyle about the kiss would be easy. I knew he would eventually forgive me and I could stop feeling like I was keeping something from him. I could stop feeling guilty and I could stop worrying that someday, somehow, Kyle would find out about what had happened in the town car.

But while I was certain Kyle would forgive me, I wasn’t so sure he would forgive Jason. I wanted to believe their friendship was stronger than the feelings each of them had for me, but I had seen enough talk shows and movies to be scared to put that to the test.

All I knew was that I couldn’t be the thing that came between them—not permanently. I would never forgive myself, and in the end, they would both end up resenting me.

Besides, what had happened with Jason would never happen again. It had been a mistake. I had chosen Kyle. I would always choose Kyle.

He was staring at me, waiting for an answer.

I reached up and placed a hand against Kyle’s neck. I could feel his pulse jump under my palm, his heart beating so much faster than mine. “I tore down an entire prison to get back to you,” I said, throat tight. “There will never be anyone else for me.”

I met Kyle’s gaze and held it, letting the depth of the feelings I had for him flood my eyes.

After a long moment, he nodded. Leaning down, he folded me into a hug.

A
N ARMY OF CATERING STAFF FILLED THE WALSHES’ CAVERNOUS
kitchen as trays of food and drinks came and went with the precision of a military operation.

Kyle and I tried not to get trampled as we made our way to the open door at the far end of the room. A trickle of perspiration ran down the back of my neck, and I wondered how it was possible for all of the waitstaff to look freshly pressed when the room had to be 110 degrees.

“We need more champagne. There should be at least two more cases.”

I shot a startled glance over my shoulder. Amy’s mother stood ten feet away, her face slightly flushed as she consulted with one of the caterers. She should have been in her element—Mrs. Walsh had always lived for throwing parties—but there was a tightness around her eyes and mouth. She looked pinched and spread thin.

Blushing, I thought about what Kyle and I had seen and heard upstairs. Amy’s parents had always seemed happy—well, as happy as anyone. I knew there were a lot of reasons
people cheated, but looking at Mrs. Walsh, I couldn’t think of a single excuse that would be good enough.

She half turned in our direction and my heart lurched.
Don’t look this way. Don’t look this way.
I repeated the words under my breath as Kyle and I quickly crossed the rest of the kitchen.

I didn’t think Amy’s mother would throw us out, but she would definitely wonder what we were doing here. She would ask questions and maybe tell Amy’s father—or Stephen—that she had seen us.

It was as though my thoughts had some sort of strange, summoning power.

“Stephen! Where have you been?” Mrs. Walsh’s voice rang across the room. I looked back just in time to catch a glimpse of a blond head as Amy’s brother ducked through a door that led to the sprawling backyard.

Mrs. Walsh called after her son a second time, but he was already gone.

“Because that’s not at all suspicious,” I said.

“He’s bleeding. I can smell it over the scent of the food.”

I resisted the urge to say
eww
. Werewolf supersenses were handy, but there were times when they walked the line between beneficial and kinda gross.

“Come on,” said Kyle, starting after him.

I caught his hand. “Wait—” The longer we stayed at the party, the more we were pressing our luck. “You go after Stephen. I’ll find Jason and we’ll check the study.”

“You can’t seriously think splitting up is a good idea.” Kyle stared at me in disbelief.

“We’re running out of time. People are going to start leaving soon to avoid breaking the curfew. The fewer people in the house, the less chance we have of getting in and out of that room.”

Kyle hesitated. He shot a glance at the door Stephen had slipped through, and I could tell from the frown on his face that he knew I was right.

“I’ll be fine,” I promised. “I’ll be with Jason.”

“You know that’s not as reassuring as you think it is, right?”

I grinned and pressed a quick kiss to his lips. “Be careful.”

He nodded, the gesture tight and reluctant. “You too.”

I eased into the shadows along the side of the room and watched as Kyle gave Mrs. Walsh a wide berth before disappearing through the back door. Trying to tell myself that the big, strong werewolf would be all right on his own, I made my way out of the kitchen and back to the party.

Conversations engulfed me as I wove past groups of guests. You couldn’t have a fund-raiser attended by the LSRB and the Trackers without plenty of werewolf slurs, and while I tried to tune them out, the worst ones slipped through.

“None of this would have happened if they would just treat those creatures like the vermin they are.”

“When you have a pest problem, you don’t wait to call in an exterminator.”

“My husband hunts big game. Can you imagine the thrill he’d get from hunting one of them?”

Heat flooded my cheeks and crept down my neck. Walking by in silence felt like cowardice, but I couldn’t afford to draw attention to myself. I forced myself to stay quiet and kept walking.

My eyes roamed over the crowd, searching for Jason as I moved from room to room. I only spotted two dagger tattoos, neither of them his.

He had told me once that most of the influential Trackers—the ones who were high up or wealthy—didn’t get the brand. It made it easier for them to mingle with politicians and attend fund-raisers. No matter how popular the Trackers became, some people still found the tattoos unnerving. It reminded them too much of the group’s early roots as an offshoot of white supremacy organizations—a past the Trackers had spent a lot of money trying to make people forget.

I tried not to think about the fact that the tattoo had been optional for Jason. As someone who was both wealthy and politically connected, he could have forgone getting marked. Instead, he had voluntarily gotten the tattoo—or at least most of it.

I finally spotted him just past the entrance to the living room, surrounded by a group of laughing girls who all looked as though they had stumbled in from an episode of
The Bachelor
. All Jason needed was a rose to hand out.

Relief flashed across his face as he caught sight of me but quickly changed to confusion when he realized I was alone. He doled out apologies and parting smiles before breaking away from the gaggle of groupies and making his way to me.

“We leave you alone for twenty minutes and you pick up an entourage?”

“Being blond and ridiculously rich is a heavy burden. Where’s Kyle?”

“Following Stephen. We saw Amy’s father upstairs.” I bit my lip, unsure how to tell him what we had found. Of all of us, he had been the closest to Amy’s family and the most reluctant to believe in a possible connection between CBP and the camp. “Mr. Walsh was talking to one of the women who tortured Serena at Thornhill. He seemed to know her
really
well. Like, intimately.”

“Shit,” muttered Jason. He grabbed two drinks from a passing tray as we made our way across the foyer. He downed the first and ditched the glass before starting in on the second.

“Tell me you at least found the key to the study.”

No one was looking our way. I nodded and slipped the key out from my bra.

“Safer than Fort Knox.” The joke fell flat and he took another drink.