Page 67 of Winter’s Teeth

A seventh figure bounded through the trees then, a man I recognized as having been in the woods the night I found Fox and his cousins tied up to trees for some twisted family tradition.

His eyes glinted gold despite the white light reflecting off the water.

“Gavin!” his cousins greeted him. “Took you long enough.”

A whimper lodged in my throat.

Gavin shrugged, arms out for a mock little bow. “Had to take care of the truck. Don’t worry, it’s currently at the bottom of a ravine on our land. We can pick it apart later.”

“What’d you do with the driver?”

The chuckle that broke out of Gavin was bubbly and light, a complete paradox to the words he said next. “I suspect they just found a headless corpse in the rest stop bathroom.”

Nervous chuckles rippled through the group, one of them coming from Brett at my back, but I thought I was going to be sick. As barely stifled retching sounds came from the back of my throat, the traitorous bastard at last released his tight grip on my mouth, allowing me to lurch forward and gulp down clean air. I tried not to throw up as his arm shifted to brace me tight across the chest.

With fresh air in my lungs, I cried, “Let him go!”

Gavin stomped over to the creek’s edge and grabbed Fox by the neck, forcing his face up while another cousin kept a tight hold on the back of his head. “Did you tell her?”

“I didn’t tell her a damn thing,” Fox growled through his pain. “She doesn’t know anything.”

“You sure about that?” Gavin taunted. “Arthur says otherwise.”

“If our cover’s blown, it’s Arthur’s own fault,” Fox retorted.

I knew exactly what they were talking about. They wanted to know if Fox told me the whole truth—which he did—and if I knew what they were—which I also knew.

“Arthur says you shifted in front of her, and we need to get the whole truth out of you so we best know how to punish you.” Gavin chuckled, practically giddy with bloodlust.

“I didn’t. He’s lying. He’s—”

With no warning, Gavin plunged Fox’s head into the creek’s cold current.

Too stunned, too numb, I could do little more than weep in Brett’s clutches as the agonizing seconds passed. It was only ten seconds, but every awful beat they held his face under the water ripped a new jagged gash through my bleeding heart.

“Shut up,” Brett seethed, his breath hot by my ear. “You’re to blame for this, you nosy bitch.”

When Fox came up sputtering, Gavin asked again, “Did you tell her?”

“I didn’t tell her anything,” Fox said on a hoarse exhale before gulping down another breath, water dripping down his face in rivulets. He knew what was coming. So did I.

Gavin shoved him back down while Fox braced against it, trying to drown his cousin in only a foot or two of water at the creek’s edge.

I sagged against Brett’s vice grip that squeezed my lungs, too tight, barely able to breathe as I waited for them to let Fox up again. I didn’t know how long Fox could hold his breath. I didn’t know if he could shift into a fish and get away. Not that he would... It would put me in danger all over again. If he shifted, that would be their confession. He couldn’t deny it any longer since I stood by as a witness.

I just wanted this all to be over.

“Stop it!” I cried.

“No can do, sweetheart,” Gavin said, entirely casual while Fox strained against him in the freezing creek. “Arthur was explicitly clear that we need to get him to confess and take care of the girl problem.”

Me. I was the girl problem.

Fox would be forced to confess soon if they made him shift in front of me. Or they would wind up killing him.

I didn’t want to know what the punishment for telling an outsider without permission was. If an innocent truck driver had to be decapitated for all this, then I most certainly wouldn’t like what the punishment for this was.

“Gavin, you think that’s enough?” asked another who had liberally shoved and roughed up Fox a minute ago.