It took me a moment to realize that it was a stack of glossy photo paper and that these images in front of me must’ve been digital prints of Olivia’s. My stomach flip-flopped. The first few photos were of woods, nothing particularly remarkable. Then there were the wolves. The crazy brindle wolf, half-hidden by trees. And that black wolf—had Sam told me his name? I hesitated, my fingers on the edge of the page, ready to flip to the next one.
Isabel had tensed visibly next to me, preparing for me to see what was on the next sheet. I knew whatever Olivia had caught on film was going to be difficult to explain.
Finally, impatient, Isabel leaned across the aisle and snatched the top few prints from the stack. “Just turn the page.”
It was a photo of Jack. Jack as a wolf. A close-up of his eyes in a wolf’s face.
And the next one was of Jack himself. As a person. Naked.
The shot had a kind of raw, artistic power, almost posed-looking, the way Jack’s arms curled around his body, his head turned back over his shoulder toward the camera, showing scratches on the long, pale curve of his back.
I chewed my lip and looked at his face in both of them. No shot of him changing, but the similarity of the eyes was devastating. That close-up of the wolf’s face—that was the money shot. And then it hit me, what these photos really meant, the true importance. Not that Isabel knew. But that Olivia did. Olivia had taken these photos, so of course she must know. But for how long, and why hadn’t she told me?
“Say something.”
Finally, I looked up from the photos to Isabel. “What do you want me to say?”
Isabel made an irritated little noise. “You see the photos. He’s alive. He’s right there.”
I looked back at Jack, staring out of the woods. He looked cold in his new skin. “I don’t know what you want me to say. What do you want from me?”
She seemed to be struggling with herself. For a second, she looked like she might snap at me, and then she closed her eyes. She opened them and looked away, at the whiteboard.
“You don’t have a brother, do you? Any siblings, right?”
“No. I’m an only child.”
Isabel shrugged. “Then I don’t know how I can explain. He’s my brother. I thought he was dead. But he’s not. He’s alive. He’s right there, but I don’t know where there is. I don’t know what that is. But I think—I think you do. Only you won’t help me.” She looked at me and her eyes flashed, fierce. “What have I ever done to you?”
I stumbled over the words. The truth was, Jack was her brother. It seemed like she ought to know. If only it wasn’t Isabel asking. I said, “Isabel…you have to know why I’m afraid to talk to you. I know you haven’t done anything to me personally. But I know people you’ve destroyed. Just…tell me why I should trust you.”
Isabel snatched back the photos and stuffed them back in her bag. “What you said.
Because I’ve never done anything to you. Or maybe because I think whatever’s wrong with Jack—I think that’s what’s wrong with your boyfriend, too.”
I was abnormally paralyzed by the thought of the photos that I hadn’t seen in that stack.
Was Sam in there? Maybe Olivia had known about the wolves for longer than I had—I tried to replay exactly what Olivia had said during our argument, trying to remember any double meaning. Isabel was staring at me, waiting for me to say something, and I didn’t know what to say. Finally, I snapped, “Okay, stop staring at me. Let me think.” The classroom door thumped as students began strolling in for class. I ripped a page out of my notebook and jotted my phone number on it. “That’s my cell. Call me after school sometime and we’ll figure out someplace to meet. I guess.”
Isabel took the number. I expected to see satisfaction on her face, but to my surprise, she looked as sick as I felt. The wolves were a secret no one wanted to share.
“We have a problem.”
Sam turned in the driver’s seat to look at me. “Aren’t you supposed to still be in class?”
“I got out early.” Last class was Art. Nobody was going to miss me and my hideous clayand-wire sculpture, anyway. “Isabel knows.”
Sam blinked, slowly. “Who’s Isabel?”
“Jack’s sister, remember?” I turned down the heat—Sam had it set to hell—and shoved my backpack down by my feet. I explained the confrontation to him, leaving out how creepy the Jack-human photo was. “I have no idea what the other photos were.”
Sam immediately bypassed the Isabel question. “They were Olivia’s photos?”
“Yeah.”
Worry was written all over his face. “I wonder if this has something to do with the way Olivia was at the bookstore. With me.” When I didn’t answer, he looked at the steering wheel, or at something just past it. “If she knew what we were, it makes her entire eye comment very logical. She was trying to get us to confess.”
I said, “Yeah, actually. That would make a lot of sense.”
He sighed heavily. “Suddenly I’m thinking about what Rachel said. About the wolf that was at Olivia’s house.”
I closed my eyes and opened them again, still seeing the image of Jack with his arms wrapped around himself. “Ugh. I don’t want to think about that. What about Isabel? I can’t really avoid her. And I can’t keep lying; I just look like an idiot.”
Sam half smiled at me. “Well, I would ask you what sort of person she is and what you thought we ought to do—”
“—but I suck at reading people,” I finished for him.
“You said it, not me. Just remember that.”
“Okay, so what do we do? Why do I feel like I’m the only one in panic mode here? You’re completely…calm.”
Sam shrugged. “Total lack of preparedness for such a thing, probably. I don’t think I know what to plan for without meeting her. If I had talked to her when she had the photos, maybe I’d be worried, but right now, I can’t think of it concretely. I don’t know, Isabel sounds like a pleasant sort of name.”
I laughed. “Barking up the wrong tree there.”
He made a melodramatic face, and the twisted rueful agony in it was so overdone that it made me feel better. “Is she awful?”
“I used to think so. Now?” I shrugged. “Jury’s still out. So what do we do?”
“I think we have to meet her.”
“Both of us? Where?”
“Yes, both. This isn’t just your problem. I dunno. Someplace quiet. Someplace I can get a feel for her before we decide what to tell her.” He frowned. “She wouldn’t be the first family member to find out.”
I knew from his frown that he couldn’t be talking about his parents—his expression wouldn’t have changed if he had. “She wouldn’t?”
“Beck’s wife knew.”
“Past tense?”
“Breast cancer. It was long before me. I never knew her. I only found out about her from Paul, and by accident then. Beck didn’t want me to know about her. I guess because most people don’t do well with us, and he didn’t want me thinking I could just go out and get me a nice little wife of my own, or something.”
It seemed unfair, that two such tragedies should strike a couple. I realized, too late to comment on it, that I’d almost missed the unfamiliar bitterness in his voice. I thought about saying something, asking him about Beck, but the moment was gone, lost in noise as Sam turned up the radio and hit the accelerator.
He backed the Bronco out of the parking space, his forehead furrowed with thought. “To heck with the rules,” Sam said. “I want to meet her.”