As luck would have it, Will didn't have any neighbours, so there was no-one for us to worry about. Unfortunately, like the guys, Will lived on the edge of town. It was a confusing drive, and it took us forever, but we found it. A little cottage, just on the outskirts of Vienna Downs. It sat just before a mass of fields.
Frowning, I wondered how he even got into town. It took us at least half an hour to drive out here. How did he manage to get into town so frequently, and so fast? There were no tyre marks outside his house. No garage. Nothing to suggest he owned a drive – and I'd never seen him drive.
This is on the opposite side of town... How could he manage to follow me around all day, almost twenty-four seven, and live here? It made no sense.
Parking up next to the cottage, the four of us (Jo, myself, Mason and Vincent) got out. We'd left Dylan behind, just in case anything happened. I doubted anything would, but it was our fail-safe. Plus, I had hoped that if Beau had decided to take Thom and Tristan to Liam's, to stop us, that he could somehow flirt and distract them. Just until we got back.
"I didn't imagine Will living out here." I said, ignoring the goosebumps rising on my arms. Even though it had been sunny earlier, it still wasn't sunny enough to keep the warmth going throughout the day. "I imagined something less..."
"Quaint?" Jo piped up. I nodded.
"I thought it would be like... I don't know." Admittedly, I'd never actually thought about Will having his own house. I'd no idea why. For some reason, I thought that he just camped out in the woods, like a wild animal. "Just not this."
We stood outside for a couple of minutes, all of us deciding how we were going to get in. Vincent had checked the back, and there was no door. It was either the windows or the door. We'd discussed the idea of an alarm but I'd said that this place was too far out. There was no point in coming out here, just to rob someone's house. So much effort, so little gain.
I took the plunge, and walked straight to the front door. Everyone shouted, panicking behind me. They quietened down, when I pushed the handle down and the door swung open. My eyebrows were raised.
"There we go. No alarm. And clearly, he doesn't care who walks in or out." No one had wanted to smash a window. Yes, Kelly said Will had left and that they had apparently checked out his house but we didn't want to leave a mark. Just incase.
Walking in, we decided that Vincent and I would take downstairs and Jo and Mason would take upstairs. Luckily for us, downstairs was just one room. There was one door, which led to a bathroom. Vincent looked at the in-room kitchen, while I took the living room. I heard Vincent opening drawers carelessly, I was hoping he was being careful.
On the other hand, there was literally nothing for me to look at. It was odd. Plastic sheets covered the sofa, as if they'd never been used. There wasn't a TV or any bookcases. And there was no dining table or chairs. There was no home-y smell either. It sounded odd, but everywhere had a place that smelled like them. But there was nothing. In fact, it smelt a little stale.
Fingering the plastic sheet, I said, "Vince, what's in the drawers?"
"Nothing. There's literally nothing." He sighed. I heard his feet shuffling, and within moments he was next to me. "Did you find anything?"
"Does it look like it?" I motioned to the sheets. "It's like he didn't even live here."
We heard Jo shout my name, and we walked up the stairs, taking them two at a time (well, I tried but failed). Getting to the top of stairs, I was shocked at the sight. Downstairs, there was no sign of any disturbance but here was a different story. The wallpaper was clawed at, almost as if someone was trying to grip it but failed. The cupboard behind the stair gate was trashed and split into several pieces. The wooden floor was scuffed with long white marks. Frowning, I focused on them, and was tempted to bend down and check it wasn't chalk. Luckily, we were called by Jo.
"In the bedroom!"
We had no idea what to expect when we walked in, but it wasn't what we'd guess in a million years.
"Holy shit!" Vincent exclaimed. I was speechless, my jaw was slack and my mouth was open.
The bedroom... was not a typical bedroom. The only thing that made it a bedroom, was the small bed in the corner of the room. But on the wall in front of us, was a mess of paper and photographs. All of me.
"Is this some shrine?" I asked. I shook my head. "I mean, what the hell is all that?" I didn't want to walk over to it. I didn't want to see the words he'd scribbled over some of the pictures.
"It's not just about you." Mason said, his face was full of anger, disbelief and disgust. In his hand, he held a used notebook, the cover falling off. Angrily, he pointed to the wall to the left of us. "He's got your family tree up there! There's all sorts on there that we can't make out. But it's just... he's been following you. There's pictures of you from when you were fourteen, fifteen. Samara, this guy isn't just creepy – he's a psycho."
Turning from them, I waddled over to the wall that Mason had pointed out. My eyes widened. It was a family tree, but mostly of my father's side. It went really far back, further than I'd ever thought to think about. Yes, I knew who my grandfather was but he'd died when we were young. I'd never thought of all the great uncles or aunties but there were a lot. In fact, before my father's generation, it seemed that his family tree was enormous – most of the families had at least five children.
A whole family I never knew about.
"I... I don't understand. Why would he have all this? And what the hell does alpha mean?" I frowned, wondering why some of the names had 'alpha' scribbled under, but some of the siblings hadn't. It seemed to have followed down until it got to my grandfather. He was the last to have the word. There were question marks under Liam and my father's names. What the hell was this?
"God knows. The guys a psycho." Jo said. "He's definitely not getting your baby."
I nodded, agreeing with her. After seeing this, as soon as I saw Will, he was getting hurt. I'd make him feel a world of hurt he'd never felt before. Fury coursed through me. Who the hell did Will think he was? Stalking me, as if I was prey? Researching me as if I was some sort of experiment?
The longer I stared, the more angry flames swirled around my body. And then I realised something: Kelly had said they'd checked out Will's house. Why leave this up? Unless they didn't want to disturb anything, they were lying. And I hated liars, with a passion. It was one thing to cover secrets, but another to lie.
My shoulders started to move in rhythm with my heavy breathing. And then I snapped, completely.
Standing on my tiptoes, I reached up as far as I could before ripping the paper off the walls. I grabbed as much as I could and stormed out the window. I heard everyone suck in air, and they moved back as I stormed past them.
It was when I slammed the door shut, the windows vibrating and running risk of breaking, that they probably realised I was heading for the car. It was a couple of seconds later that they came outside (running after me most likely).
"Mara?" I heard Vincent cautiously call my name. They knew what I was like when I was angry, but I don't think they'd ever seen me like this. I'd never felt so much rage, so much hatred in my sixteen years of life.
Twirling to face them, they flinched. "Take me to Thom's."
"Your eyes..." Jo sounded shocked, and if I was in any other mood I probably would have listened to her. But not tonight. I had one thing on my mind, and I was getting answers.
"Now!" I barked. Everyone jumped and got into the car. Vincent and Jo sat in the back, hoping to stay far from my anger. Mason didn't say anything, just drove.
The tension was thick in the car. No-one knew what to say and I couldn't blame them. Obviously, I'd made it a little awkward but I think what they saw had also started to sink into their minds. On the dashboard was the little notebook that Mason had originally been holding. Snatching it off, I flicked through it. I didn't know what I was hoping for. My mind was all over the place.
Inside the notebook were names. Hundreds of names. I was pretty sure they were all girls. The last name was mine.
"The fuck is this?" I was half-shouting. My hands shook, wanting to collide with something, anything. I was so tempted to rip the notebook but I needed it. It was going to be thrown at someone though that was for sure. Who? Most likely the first person I saw.
~ * ~
I slammed Thom's front door open, ignoring the fact that his parents could have been in. Did I care? Not really. However, Thom wasn't on my mind.
"Kelly?" I screamed. I forced all the doors open that I passed, I scanned the rooms before leaving. Luckily, I had jumped out of the car just as Mason had parked up. They hadn't caught up to me yet. Which was surprising, considering I was pregnant and was holding extra weight.
It wasn't until I got to the kitchen, that I found my target. My eyes narrowed, and Kelly looked shocked to see me. I stomped over to him, threw the pieces of paper and notebook onto the table in front of him. He flinched at the viciousness of it.
"What is this?" I demanded. He just shrugged.
"You tell me."
I grabbed his shirt, and pulled him off the seat and threw him against the counter. To say he was surprised was an understatement.
"No." I spat. His eyes grew wide as my fury increased. "No, you tell me, Kelly. What the fuck was that doing on Will's bedroom wall, hm? Or were you lying to me when you told me you checked his house?"
"We-"
"I swear to God, Kelly, that if a lie comes out of your mouth, I'm going to make you regret ever meeting me." I stared into his eyes, and there was a glimmer of amber. My hand immediately went to his throat and I heard a low growl. My mind didn't register it though. "Why does Will have my family tree?" At this point, I was pretty much screaming.
"I don't know!" He shouted back. It wasn't good enough. I tightened my grip on his throat.
"Tell me!"
As Kelly was about to answer, I felt myself being ripped away from him. My hands tried to scratch thin air, and I struggled against my captor. I let out a loud, frustrated scream.
"Mara!" My body was spun, and I came face-to-chest with Tristan. I looked up at him, my hatred growing. It wasn't aimed at him, but once I'd become angry and hateful... it tended to stay for a while. "Calm down, this isn't good for the baby."
"You lied to me." I growled, and poked his chest hard. I heard him let out a tiny cry of pain. "You said you checked out Will's house. Let me tell you, if you had, why didn't you mention the fact that I had been stalked?"
From the look in his eyes, he had no idea what I was talking about. The anger grew even further. Its flames were threatening to fully engulf me. Nothing was going to get through to me.
"Tristan, you need to leave her." I heard Mason warn him.
"She's going to hurt herself." He protested.
"It's better she hurts herself, than she hurts you. You haven't seen her angry." Jo said. "She'll be uncontrollable."
"Did you know, Tristan," I spat out his name and he flinched at my tone, "that Will has my name in a notebook with other girls?"
"No."
"No?" I laughed bitterly. "So then why did you think it was okay to lie to me?"
"Ma-"
"Would you care to explain, why you lied? Why you said you'd been to Will's house, when you clearly haven't?" The anger was slowly coming down, luckily. "How do I know he's not roaming out there, waiting for me to be alone?" Although, if Will thought I was going down without a fight, he had another thing coming. When I got my hands on him...
"He's not around. Look, I can't tell you, but it's complicated."
And that was it. I lost it completely. And let me tell you, the one and only time before this, I had gone insane. While Mason had once smashed a car in a fit of sadness, I had destroyed my own room in a fit of anger. And by destroy, I mean obliterated. The room was in pieces. It was not my finest moment.
Unfortunately, it was the kitchen that was now the target of my rage. I was blind to what I was attacking, although nothing felt like a body, which I was thankful for.
Like they say, hell has no fury like a woman scorned.
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A very drama filled chapter... however, there is a hint to Samara's heritage and it becomes very important very soon!
And if anyone is worried about Tristan, or Kelly or any people, let me put your mind at rest and say that Samara doesn't hit them thankfully! Her rage is taken out on inanimate objects!
So, like before, please please please vote & comment! Don't be silent!
Also, dediacated to supermansaveme as she's stuck with me since the beginning and is still around!