Pack of Lies (Wolfblooded book 2)

Chapter 1

July 10th 2008 11:02 pm

Lorelei and I hadn't spoken to each other since my senior year of high school. Even then, it wasn't a particularly friendly conversation. There was some sort of party being thrown, in Lori's honor of course, and everyone was busy getting dressed and making sure everything was in place. My sister's boyfriend, Sam, had looked particularly nervous about the night. He should have been. He was about to ask my sister to marry him, or so I'd heard him say over the phone. He should have been downright frightened.

Or, maybe, I was just projecting my own vision of Lori, the ticking time bomb of perfection, into the situation.

While everyone else was busy thinking about her and her party, I was packing my duffel bag in my bedroom and waiting for my chariot to come and whisk me away from this hell. I figured no one would notice me slip away. As usual, their attention was elsewhere. I never thought Lori would be the one to take notice.

"What do you think you're doing?" she asked from my bedroom door. Her arms were crossed in front of her, her jaw set forward in the most accusatory look I had ever seen.

"Why do you care?" I returned to packing, brushing her presence off. After cleaning out my dresser and throwing a few pairs of shoes into my bag, I moved to my night stand and started to go through it. I didn't want to leave anything valuable behind. I wasn't planning to come back. "Don't you have a party to go to?" I asked without even bothering to look up from my drawer.

"Don't do it, Harley. Don't break their hearts like this," her tone wasn't pleading. It was commanding. All that did was make me even madder.

"Break what? They still got their golden child, don't they?"

"You're being selfish."

"Selfish!" I finally looked up at her, meeting her unmoving glare, "this coming from the 'look at me' queen. Don't you have some praise to go bask in? Get out of my room and get out of my life."

"Oh, well, I don't think I need to worry about that; you're doing a damn good job at pushing me out of it now," there was something exhausted in her voice. Like all of the years of us running headlong into one another had worn her down completely.

I didn't bother saying anything. She was right. I was pushing her out. She already had a foot out the door so this was just the last heave-ho to get her as far from me as possible.

I went back to packing and I could feel her eyes burning into my back. Well, she could stare all she wanted. My mind was made up. A motorcycle growled in the distance and I carried my bag to the window, relieving the scorching hole between my shoulder blades.

"Oh, Jesus," my sister groaned behind me. "You're running off with that loser? For Pete's sake, Harley, don't go and throw your life away to be some jackass's Old Lady! He's bad news and all he's going to do is drag you down with him."

"Well at least someone is willing to be 'with' me! God, Lori, we were inseparable! We did everything together and then just out of nowhere you turned into someone else! You became mom and dad's little lapdog and turned your back on me. You left me behind and alone and I hate you for it!"

Lori's judgmental grimace softened as I shouted at her, taking her by surprise. Mom's voice drifted from downstairs, her words indistinct. We stared at each other in silence, the bewilderment shining in her eyes and the rage seeping from my every pore. I didn't feel bad for saying what I had, I didn't regret it. I honestly felt that I hated her. I hated all of them.

The motorcycle rumbled as it grew closer and I moved, finally, to zip my bag and heave it over my shoulder.

I risked one last glance to Lorelei as I swung my legs out of my bedroom window, "Go to your party. Live your happily ever after with Mr. Perfect. You can tell mom and dad they're not losing a daughter... they're just replacing her with a son."

I left the girl who always had something to say speechless, stunned at the hate I slung towards her. I shook my head and slid over the window sill, shimmying my way down the side of the house until my feet hit the lush grass below.