Page 194

THE “OW” CAME TOO LATE

For one terrible second, I still believed I could fix it.

The silver coin lay in my palm, dull and harmless against my skin. Aunt Karen held my wrist high enough for everyone to see, her thick grilling glove wrapped around my arm while the entire pack stared.

Nobody moved.

The music had stopped. The children had stopped running. Even Trevor, who could normally produce commentary during a natural disaster, stood silent beside the collapsed cardboard house.

Hudson stared at my hand. Not at me. At the coin.

I looked at it, too, pretending I’d only just noticed it. The metal sat in the center of my palm, warm from Karen’s glove and completely ordinary.

Silver.

It was silver.

Shit! I should’ve known. I should’ve understood the glove and Karen’s strange behavior. She’d been watching me all night. I should’ve noticed the trap before I held out my hand without looking.

My thoughts scattered in every direction at once.

Drop it.

React.

Do something.

I let the coin fall. It hit the grass with a soft thud that sounded impossibly loud.

I jerked my hand toward my body and sucked in a breath. “Ow.”

The sound came too late. Everyone knew it. I knew it the second it left my mouth.

Still, panic shoved me forward. “It burned me,” I said, cradling my hand. “I didn’t understand what it was at first.”

Karen released my wrist. “It sat against your bare skin for nearly ten seconds.”

“I was distracted.”

“A wolf wouldn’t be distracted at the touch of silver.”

“It hurt,” I lied, gripping my hand.

“Then show us.”

My fingers curled instinctively over my palm.

Karen tried to grab my hand again, but I backed away.

“There’s nothing to see yet,” I said. “Maybe it takes a minute.”

The lie sounded worse than the first one.

Somewhere behind me, someone whispered my name. I glanced at Patty. She had gone pale. One hand covered her mouth, and the other gripped the table.

It was over.

Hudson remained several feet away. His face had emptied of everything I knew. There was no affection. No patience. No quiet amusement in his eyes.