All Hallows' Moon Read online

  “What do you parents do?”

  “They own half the crappy farms around here. My mom’s the county commissioner.” Tate sounded like he cared about it as much as he would have cared about a sobriety program.

  His living space was covered in piles of clothes and marijuana paraphernalia, some of which was arranged on his walls like glass-blown works of art. Cans of empty Red Bull were scattered everywhere, and everything felt like it was covered in a thin layer of grime.

  Beneath his mess, though, were platinum fixtures, and he had a chandelier and a baby grand piano that he looked to be using as a laundry hanger.

  “This is all yours?” she asked, running a hand over an antique table with a giant sticker of Bob Marley pasted to the surface.

  “Yup.” He opened a box on his bookshelf, which was full of classic literature that looked well-read. He took a joint and lighter out of the box and shut it again. “My parents are on some trip to Singapore, so you can do whatever.”

  “Thanks,” Rylie said. “Really. Thank you.”

  “Yup.” He plopped in a chair in front of a flat screen TV wider than Rylie was tall. “Want to watch a movie and smoke?”

  “Actually… is there somewhere I can sleep?”

  “Sure. Guest room.” He waved in the direction of the piano.

  The room was cleaner than the rest of his living space, other than a couple of guitars propped against the wall. It looked like he never went inside. The bed was clean and curtains kept it dark, so it was all Rylie needed.

  She dropped on the bed and immediately fell asleep.

  Fourteen

  The Tate Zone

  When Rylie woke up, it was dark outside, and she felt stiff and dirty. She got out of bed to find Tate unconscious in front of his TV, which was looping a menu on his Star Wars Blu-ray.

  She was starving, although the clock showed her it wasn’t as late as it felt. It was barely dinnertime. Aunt Gwyneth was probably starting to wonder what had happened to her, but she wasn’t sure if it would be safe to call.

  Rylie didn’t want to call her aunt, who wouldn’t be able to do anything about the hunter on her trail. She wanted to call Seth. She was pretty sure he didn’t have a phone, though.

  Searching for a bathroom, Rylie found one near the stairs with a tub the size of a small swimming pool. It was totally gross. The sink was full of hair, and it looked like Tate didn’t have very good aim around the toilet.

  She fidgeted uncomfortably in the doorway for a good three minutes before deciding that her need to use the bathroom wasn’t as bad as her need not to sit on that disgusting toilet seat.

  Tate snorted in his recliner when she came out.

  “Hey,” she whispered, touching his shoulder.

  He jerked awake. “Who? What?”

  “It’s me. Sorry. I need to know…”

  “What are you doing here?” He wrinkled his nose. “We didn’t have sex, did we?”

  “What? God, no!” Rylie pulled up on the neck of her tattered dress self-consciously. She tried not to look repulsed by the thought so she wouldn’t hurt his feelings, but unfortunately, Tate looked relieved at her answer.

  “Oh. Cool. What’s up?”

  “Do you have another bathroom?”

  “Yeah. And don’t take this the wrong way, but you could seriously use a shower. You look horrible,” he said.

  It was hard to be offended when she knew he was right. She looked like she had been dragged for ten miles behind a motorcycle—which she had.

  Tate led her upstairs. It was gorgeous. Rylie’s family did pretty well, but his parents must have been millionaires to afford a house with so much marble. They had the kind of art that needed to be kept behind glass. It looked like they had a maid, too, because there was no hint of Tate’s squalor from the basement.

  He took her to a bathroom that was like his, but much cleaner. “Thanks,” she said.

  “I think my mom’s about your size. Want something clean to wear?” he asked. When Rylie hesitated, he said, “She has a closet bigger than my basement. She won’t notice.”

  “Sure.”

  He ducked into his parent’s room and came back with a blue dress that looked like it had been tailored specifically for his mom. It was really pretty, but cut for an older woman with a high neckline and three-quarter sleeves. Rylie fingered the beadwork around the waist and wondered how much it cost. She liked to wear designers, but having people make clothes for her would have been something else entirely.

  “I’ll be downstairs,” Tate said, disappearing.

  She scrubbed herself clean in the shower, using every type of body wash. The dirt and blood swirled around the drain in red-black clouds. She had to shampoo her hair three times to get all the sticky stuff out, and by the time she was done, her entire body glistened red from having been rubbed too hard.

  Rylie tried not to remember being dragged behind the motorcycle. It made her want to start crying again, and she was done crying.

  What was wrong with Eleanor? Who would do something like that?

  Her chin trembled with the beginning of tears, but she closed her eyes and took deep breaths until it stopped.

  The towels on the shelf were so fluffy that Rylie could have slept in them. By the time she combed out her hair with her fingers and pulled the dress over her head, she almost felt human again.

  Tate’s mom was shorter than Rylie, and her chest was bigger too. The skirt was a little too short and it was baggy at the top. It was still a pretty dress. There wasn’t even a mark on her leg where she had gotten shot earlier.

  She plucked at the beads as she studied herself in the mirror. Seth had told her the only way to escape his family would be to run. But where was she supposed to go? Going to live with her aunt had been how she ran away from her old life. She didn’t have any other ideas.

  Tate was moving around the kitchen when she got out. It looked like he had showered, too. He was wearing a clean polo and khakis, and his eyes weren’t as red as usual.

  “You hungry?” he asked, grabbing a loaf of bread and sandwich meat out of the fridge.

  Her stomach gave a sharp cramp at the mention. “Starving. But could I borrow your phone first?”

  “No problem.” Tate took a phone off the wall and tossed it to her. “How high was I this morning?”

  “Pretty high.”

  He laughed. “I must have been a ten. I think that new stuff was laced with something. My head weighs, like, a million pounds.” He dropped the food on the counter and went back for more. “Are you John Connor? Why did she want you dead?”

  “It’s probably better if we don’t talk about it.”

  “Cool. Whatever.”

  Rylie took the phone out to the garden to call. Gwyn picked up on the first ring.

  “Rylie?”

  “It’s me,” she said. “I’m okay.” Gwyn sighed with relief, and Rylie immediately felt guilty. “I’m sorry I disappeared.”

  “Where have you been?”

  “It’s a long story. I’m with one of my friends now.”

  “A boyfriend?”

  “No. Um, something kind of bad has happened, and I don’t want you to panic or anything, but I don’t think I should come home right now.”

  Her aunt’s voice sharpened. “What is it?”

  “It’s really hard to explain.”

  “Did you get into trouble with that stoner friend?”

  “No, it’s… I don’t know. You wouldn’t believe me,” Rylie said. “I want to tell you. I do. But I can’t come home. I’m going to hang out here for the weekend, and I’ll…” She swallowed. “I’ll give you a call later.”

  “Tell me where you are right now. Don’t hang up.”

  “I’m sorry, Gwyn,” she said.

  She stared at the phone in her hand long after she disconnected. The truth was, she hadn’t given a lot of thought to what she would do after the call. Rylie couldn’t stay with Tate forever. His parents would come home eventually, a
nd it wouldn’t be a safe place to transform on the next moon anyway.

  Inside, Tate had set up a sandwich factory on the counter, and he was in the middle of constructing his third sandwich. There were crumbs everywhere. He handed Rylie a plate without asking any questions, for which she was grateful. She had been on the verge of tears since she woke up, and she was afraid that talking would get her sobbing.

  Rylie got a heaping serving of meat, and they sat at a dining room table that looked like it was meant for fancy dinner parties to eat.

  It was the first time she had ever seen Tate sober. He actually looked like a normal guy.

  “I hate this room,” he said. “I’ve had to go to a hundred stupid fundraisers here. Politics is my mom’s whole life. I think she wants to be president someday.”

  “Sorry,” Rylie said.

  “They think I’m embarrassing. They don’t invite me to their parties anymore. I’m supposed to shut up and stay downstairs.” He laughed. “It’s probably better like that.”

  “I don’t think I’d enjoy dinner parties with politicians anyway.”

  “No kidding.” Tate put the rest of his second sandwich in his mouth and swallowed it down. He practically inhaled his food. It was the one thing that all of her guy friends had in common— they all ate like starving hyenas. “You’re really weird.”

  Rylie paused in the middle of shredding some turkey. “Uh… thanks?”

  “I just downloaded some new games. Want to play?”

  The idea of doing something so casual in the middle of hiding away from a murderous hunter was so ridiculous she had to laugh. “Yeah. Sure.”

  They took their food downstairs. Rylie had never played a video game in her entire life, so she died about a hundred times in the first hour. They connected with Tate’s other friends online, and all three of them proceeded to tease and insult her for hours. The controls were awkward. Rylie’s hands felt more like paws, so she was too clumsy to maneuver properly.

  She had to admit she was really awful and gave up around the time the sun rose, but Rylie hung out on one of Tate’s leather couches with a headset to watch and laugh with them.

  It was dumb, but it was so relaxing. It let her forget about silver bullets and black motorcycles for a couple of hours.

  By the time they signed off, Rylie was perfectly comfortable in the Tate Zone. She half-wished she could hide in his basement forever.

  But dawn reminded her of Gwyn, and all the work that needed to be done around the ranch.

  Tate noticed that she was getting antsy. “Maybe you should call your aunt again,” he suggested. “You can stay here and all, but I bet she misses you.”

  “Yeah. I guess.”

  “Want me to take you home?”

  Rylie nodded reluctantly. She didn’t want to go back—she imagined Eleanor waiting for her there with those black ropes. But if she was going to have to leave, she needed to pack some of her clothes. She couldn’t run off with all of the county commissioner’s wardrobe.

  Tate was yawning as he drove her out to the ranch. Gwyn met them at the bottom of the hill.

  “Thanks for everything,” Rylie told him before opening the door. “You can go. You don’t want to face my aunt’s wrath.”

  “All right.”

  He was practically gone before she could shut the door.

  Gwyn took off her hat and studied Rylie’s unfamiliar dress with a twisted mouth. “I found a bloody towel in your room and half-cooked food in the kitchen. Looked like you left in a hurry. Want to tell me what that’s about?”

  “No,” Rylie said.

  “Let’s get inside where it’s warm,” Gwyn said. She didn’t look angry. She looked as tired as Rylie felt.

  “No. I can’t stay for long. I have to leave.”

  Her aunt dusted her hat off on her knee. “And where do you think you’re going?” she asked, concentrating very hard on a smudge of dirt near the brim.

  “I don’t know, but it’s not safe here.”

  “Why?”

  “That’s the problem. I can’t tell you.”

  Gwyn put the hat on again, studying her niece with a grave expression. “It seems we have a trust problem, babe. I know something is happening with you, but you won’t tell me what. I know you’ve never gotten along with your mom, but I thought it’d be different with me. Guess you’ve never had an adult you could trust.”

  “I did once,” Rylie admitted. “Her name was Louise, and she was a counselor at Camp Silver Brook. She wanted to help me.”

  “This is about camp?”

  “Yeah… and no. Everything in my life is kind of about camp now.”

  “Is Louise one of the counselors who got killed?”

  She nodded. “She kept giving me chances, and I kept screwing them up. I let her down. I wish I could fix it, but I didn’t even get to apologize to her before she…” Rylie swallowed. “Camp was awful. This whole summer was awful.”

  “I know,” Gwyn said. “Those bear attacks did a lot of harm.”

  “There weren’t any bears. Not a single one.”

  “That’s what the news said.”

  “The news lied,” Rylie said. Her aunt watched her, waiting for her to go on. “It was… something else. Something even worse.”

  The wind blew around them. Gwyn folded her arms. Rylie couldn’t tell if she believed her or not, because her expression had gone stony.

  “What was it?” she asked.

  “It was a werewolf.”

  The silence got much, much heavier.

  “A… werewolf,” Gwyn said.

  Rylie went on in a rush. “It bit me, so I’m a werewolf now too.” She couldn’t stand to see the disbelief on her aunt’s face. “I’ve been turning into a wolf every new and full moon for weeks. There’s these people, these hunters. They’re out to get me. One of them came to kill me and I had to run. That’s why I have to leave.”

  “Rylie…”

  “I’m serious, Gwyn. I’m not making it up.”

  Her aunt rubbed her face. “I know you’re not trying to lie to me. This is… well, not what I expected. I thought you were going to tell me you got into drugs or pregnant or something. That’s something I could handle. But… werewolves?”

  She looked down at her hands. “Yeah.”

  “And… do you have any proof?”

  “Sure. On the next full moon.”

  Gwyn fanned herself with her hat. She was taking a lot of deep breaths. “Jesus, Rylie. Are you trying to tell me you killed those people at camp?”

  “No! That was the guy who bit me. It was this counselor named Jericho. I was out wandering one night, and he attacked me, and after that…” It sounded so stupid that she couldn’t finish the sentence. “He killed everyone.”

  “And now you want to run away.”

  “I don’t want to,” she said. “But the hunters will get me if I don’t.”

  “Okay,” Gwyn said. She took out her keys. “Let’s get in the truck and get going.”

  “Okay? You believe me?”

  “Sure,” she said very, very gently. “I believe you.”

  “We have to hurry.”

  “I know.”

  They got into the truck. Rylie couldn’t believe it. There was no way Gwyn could accept that she had become a werewolf so easily. She had been bitten months ago and she still didn’t believe it sometimes. But she didn’t care as long as they got on the move and stayed away from Eleanor. She could help convince Gwyn later.

  “Where are we going to go?” Rylie asked as they left the ranch.

  “Somewhere safe. It sounds like there’s a lot you need to talk about, babe.”

  They didn’t go toward town. They turned the other way instead. Rylie felt better as they got further away from the ranch, and being with Gwyn again helped too. There wasn’t much more comforting than having her tough aunt and a shotgun on a rack in the truck.

  Staying up with Tate all night left her drowsy, so Rylie dozed in the front seat as t
hey drove for an hour.

  The farms and countryside began to turn into suburbs. It was after noon when they reached another town. It was bigger than the one where Rylie attended school. There was a real mall, a ten-screen movie theater, and a lot of restaurants.

  “I’m hungry,” Rylie said.

  “We’ll get lunch soon.”

  Gwyneth pulled up to a white building with a big sign in the front. It said “St. Philomene’s Regional Hospital” in tall letters. She was so confused when her aunt stopped in the parking lot that she didn’t move at first.

  “What are we doing at a hospital?” she asked.

  Her aunt took her hand. “Listen to yourself, Rylie. You’re talking werewolves and assault and conspiracies. I think… I think what hit you this summer hit you hard. You’re having a tough time with reality. Jessica should have put you straight into counseling.”

  The meaning of what she said struck Rylie. “You think I’m crazy?”

  “No,” Gwyn said forcefully. “No. You’re not. But you said it yourself. You saw something awful this summer, and I think it confused you. You need to talk to some kind of professional and get yourself sorted.”

  “So you’re going to put me in the psychiatric ward?” Rylie’s voice rose in pitch until she was almost shrieking. “I’m not crazy, Gwyn! I can’t get locked up! What if I—I mean—” A tear rolled down her cheek, and she swiped it away with a hand. “I trusted you!”

  Rylie threw open the door, but Gwyn’s voice stopped her. “Where are going to go?”

  “I don’t know. Somewhere else! You can’t lock me up!”

  Her aunt hopped out of the truck and followed her as she ran across the parking lot. Rylie stopped when she reached the street. Tears rolled freely down her cheeks.

  “Babe,” Gwyn said gently. “Think about it. If what you said is true, you can’t go home anyway. There’s people to watch you in the hospital. Nobody can hurt you there. I’ll stay with you, okay? I won’t leave you alone.”

  “This is stupid. I won’t do it.”

  “Just talk to someone. Please.”

  Her aunt was right. She couldn’t go back to the ranch, and unless Rylie wanted to stay with Tate forever, she had nowhere to go.