Page 20 of Hateful
I let out a strangled sound of mild rage and tighten my hoodie sleeves around my waist. I shouldn’t even be talking to Heath. I’m supposed to be avoiding any and all contact with the Wicked Brotherhood.
“Don’t follow me out here again,” I say to Heath. “Just leave me alone.”
I turn and run off, my feet pounding on the trail beneath me.
“You can’t run from The Brotherhood!” Heath yells, but it sounds … different. Last semester, hearing that called after me as I ran away would have chilled me to my core and sent fear shooting down my spine. Now it just sounds sad, almost desperate.
Maybe it’s not that I can’t run away. Maybe it’s that Heath doesn’t want me to.
* * *
The dorm room is dark,so I’m startled when Rafael sits up from his bed, and I let out an inadvertent shriek as I stumble back against the door.
“Oh, calm down,” Rafael sighs. “You woke me up.”
“And you scared the shit out of me, so I guess we’re even.” I untie my hoodie sleeves and toss it in the pile of dirty laundry by my dresser. “Why were you even asleep?”
“I’m bored. So, I was napping.”
I turn on the light and Rafael lets out a hiss as he rubs his eyes. “You okay? You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”
I laugh bitterly as I shake off my sweaty clothes. “I would’ve preferred to have seen a ghost.”
“Run into the headmistress again?”
I pause a second, remembering that I still haven’t told him the details of our last encounter. Or even that therewasan encounter.
“No,” I say, after a moment. “It was Heath.”
“Heath?”
I nod. “I’ve been running out on those hiking trails, and he saw me there the other day. Today he caught up to me.” I start gathering my shower things. “Started telling me that he and Jasper and Beck have been talking about me.”
Rafael frowns. “The hiking trails in the woods?”
“Yeah. So, Heath found me—”
“Those are pretty secluded trails,” he says, cutting me off. “You know there are wolves out there, right?”
Wolves.This is the second time I’ve heard them mentioned, but never so much as heard a howl.
“Sounds like stupid rumors to me,” I say. “The kind of stuff Beck would make up to scare the new kids.”
“Think what you will,” Rafael says, “But the dean warned us about it during assembly. Weren’t you listening?”
“No,” I admit, tucking my hands into my pockets. I still haven’t sat down. My shower things sit in their basket on my dresser. “I don’t care about the competition thing, so I got bored and started watching you draw.”
Rafael sighs heavily. “You shouldn’t be out there by yourself anyway.”
I shrug. “I’m more concerned about the wolvesinsidethe walls than outside them.”
Rafael stares at me flatly until I feel myself getting antsy. He holds my gaze for a moment before turning away to grab his phone from his nightstand.
“I guess my nap is over,” he sighs.
“And I smell like an entire gym class, so I’m gonna shower.”
He wrinkles his nose. “I know. I can smell you from here.”
