The Truth About Cats And Wolves: A Nocturne Falls Universe story

  The Truth About Cats and Wolves

  A Nocturne Falls Universe Book

  Alethea Kontis

  Contents

  A Note from Kristen Painter

  1. 1

  2. 2

  3. 3

  4. 4

  5. 5

  6. 6

  7. 7

  8. 8

  9. 9

  10. 10

  11. 11

  12. 12

  13. 13

  Acknowledgments

  About the Author

  Also by Alethea Kontis

  The Truth About Cats and Wolves

  A Nocturne Falls Universe Story

  Copyright © 2017 by Alethea Kontis

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced in any form or by any electronic or mechanical means, including information storage and retrieval systems—except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles or reviews—without permission in writing from the author.

  This book is a work of fiction and was made possible by a special agreement with Sugar Skull Books, but hasn’t been reviewed or edited by Kristen Painter. All characters, events, scenes, plots and associated elements appearing in the original Nocturne Falls series remain the exclusive copyrighted and/or trademarked property of Kristen Painter, Sugar Skull Books and their affiliates or licensors.

  Any similarity to real person, living or dead, is purely coincidental and not intended by the author or Sugar Skull Books.

  Published in the United States of America.

  Cover design by Keri Knutson

  A Note from Kristen Painter

  Dear Reader,

  Nocturne Falls has become a magical place for so many people, myself included. Over and over I’ve heard from you that it’s a town you’d love to visit and even live in! I can tell you that writing the books is just as much fun for me.

  With your enthusiasm for the series in mind – and your many requests for more books – the Nocturne Falls Universe was born. It’s a project near and dear to my heart, and one I am very excited about.

  I hope these new, guest-authored books will entertain and delight you. And best of all, I hope they allow you to discover some great new authors! (And if you like this book, be sure to check out the rest of the Nocturne Falls Universe offerings.)

  For more information about the Nocturne Falls Universe, visit http://kristenpainter.com/sugar-skull-books/

  In the meantime, happy reading!

  ~Kristen Painter

  To all the extraordinary individuals who have ever donned a costume on Labor Day weekend in Georgia and walked with me in the parade.

  You know who you are.

  “Love…love takes time.”

  —Ivy Kincaid Merrow, The Werewolf Meets His Match

  “To flaming youth let virtue be as wax,

  And melt in her own fire: proclaim no shame

  When the compulsive ardour gives the charge,

  Since frost itself as actively doth burn

  And reason panders will.”

  —Hamlet, Act III, Scene IV

  1

  “Are you sure this was the best choice?”

  “Does it matter? At least I was given a choice. The only wrong decision would have been not making one.” Kai Xanthopoulos stopped what she was doing and froze. Took a deep breath. She had to knead the dough gently for it to come out right, not pummel it into oblivion.

  Thanks to Owen’s insistence on discussing this topic again, she really, really wanted to pummel it into oblivion.

  Kai dusted her palms with flour and patiently rolled the dough out into a long, snakey tube. “When the children in my family turn sixteen, they are allowed to get a job that has nothing to do with the restaurant business. I chose Delaney’s Delectables. End of story.”

  “And when they’re thirteen, children in your family also usually know what their powers are.”

  Another topic Kai loathed: her complete failure when it came to magic…beyond being able to have this conversation with Owen, that is. For a while, she suspected that Owen might be her familiar and that her powers would turn out to be witch-like in nature. But said powers—whatever their nature—still remained dormant.

  “So what?” said Kai.

  “So…I’m just saying, you might need a bit of guidance,” said the cat. “I’m a fabulous guidance counselor.”

  “Yeah, I’ll bet,” Kai said dubiously. The only guidance Owen ever gave included suggestions that inevitably made his life better. “I’m a late bloomer. It’s happened before. What, you think if I turn out to be a naiad or a marsh witch I’ll ruin the candy? Or I’ll lose it completely and start making a house out of gingerbread?”

  “I’m being serious, Kai. If you had stayed at the diner, you could have been a manager. Here you’re just a…”

  “Cook? Servant? Dogsbody?” Kai punctuated the last word with a grin. If Owen was going to push all her buttons today, she was going to push right back.

  Out of the corner of her eye, she saw Owen make a face. “Essentially. Your yiayia’s a baker, Kai. Not you. You don’t even like sweets.”

  Her melted butter had separated, so she used the paintbrush to stir it up a bit. “Doesn’t mean I’m not awesome at making them. And I do like sweets. I like chocolate.”

  Owen sighed. “Everybody likes chocolate. Normal chocolate. You only like that dark, bitter stuff. With acorns in it.”

  One laugh burst out of Kai but she held the rest back. Owen always made her laugh when they were arguing; undoubtedly why she indulged him with these ridiculous discussions. “They’re called hazelnuts, moron. Food of the gods.”

  Owen made a noise like a game show buzzer and hopped up on the counter to watch her work. “Wrong. Anchovies. Those are the food of the gods.”

  “Riiiiight. If I was a naiad, maybe. Or a cat.” Kai painted the butter onto the dough-snake with one hand. She used the other hand to liberally sprinkle it with a mix of cinnamon and sugar. The actions helped her mind focus beyond the verbal sparring, on the message Owen was actually trying to convey to her.

  “Oh. Mygosh.” Kai lifted the buttery brush and pointed it at Owen. “J’accuse.”

  Owen’s pale green eyes shifted away from her level gaze. He was suddenly very interested in everything in the sweet shop that wasn’t her. Kai suspected that if the cat had been able to whistle innocently, this was the moment he would have done it. “I have no idea what you’re talking about.”

  “This has nothing to do with me! If I’m not at the diner looking out for you, then the quality of your dumpster diving is severely diminished.”

  “I’m a carnivore, Kai. The best you can offer me here is a fallen cake.”

  Exasperated, Kai tossed the brush back into the butter and began twisting the cinnamon dough-snake in, out, and around itself. “No one’s forcing you to be here, Owen.”

  “But, Kai, my darling…” His tone of voice had completely shifted. Now he was going to try and warm up to her? No way.

  “Enough. I have work to do. Out.” Owen didn’t budge. Kai snapped her fingers. “You shouldn’t even be in here. And you definitely shouldn’t be on the counter. Are you trying to get me fired?” She snapped her fingers again and pointed at the door. “Out!”

  In his own time, Owen yawned and lazily leapt off the counter, as if leaving were something he’d meant to do all along. He sauntered toward the front door, just in time for a woman to open it for him. The bells tinkled like a fairy’s laugh. “We’re not finished, Kalliope,” he said as he walked away.

  “We
’re finished for today!” Kai yelled after him, and then realized how ridiculous she sounded. She closed her eyes and took another deep breath to calm herself. When she opened them up again, she was face to face with Verity Mercer.

  “I have lots of friends who talk to their cats, but…girl, you take the cake.” She waved her hand to indicate the refrigerated case full of beautifully decorated cakes beside them. “So to speak.”

  “Oh, wow.” Kai felt her face flush. She’d always been a terrible blusher, but the embarrassment of being caught in mid-debate with a cat—by a human, no less—set her cheeks burning. “I am so sorry, Ms. Mercer. It will never happen again, I promise.”

  Verity Mercer was one of Roxy St. James’s writers-in-residence. Roxy, a bestselling novelist herself, had fixed up her guest house for the express purpose of inviting her friends to Nocturne Falls for writing retreats. Roxy also happened to be the shop owner’s best friend, Mrs. Delaney Ellingham Herself.

  Ms. Mercer must have recognized Kai’s obvious distress, because she moved to the pitcher on the counter and poured Kai a cup of water. “Now, sweetie. Don’t fret. Delaney will never know your cat was in here…well, not from me, anyway. And please, call me Verity.”

  “Yes, Miss Verity. Thank you.” She gulped the water down, hoping it would go straight to her flaming cheeks. With her face like this and her unruly brown curls constantly trying to escape from her bun, she must look like a harpy. Not exactly the “delectable” appearance Delaney Ellingham would have wanted of her hired help. Kai had such a short fuse lately…it seemed like everything was setting her off. Especially Owen. “He’s not my cat anyway. He doesn’t belong to anyone, least of all me. He’s just a stray that hangs around the diner.”

  “Really?” Verity raised an eyebrow. “Could have fooled me.”

  “My parents aren’t into pets,” said Kai.

  “Well, I must say, for a stray, that is one well-groomed pixie cat.”

  Kai wet a napkin with the water and put it on the back of her neck. “Is that what breed he is? My little sister calls him Alien Cat.”

  “What do you call him?”

  Kai shrugged. “Owen, the Pain in My Neck.”

  “Seems like a fine title. Ooh, what are you making?” She pointed to the glistening, serpentine mounds of dough. “They look kind of…”

  “Disgusting?” Kai offered.

  “Well, yes, if I’m being honest.”

  “Perfect! That’s what I was going for. Miss Delaney said that I was welcome to experiment when there weren’t any customers and this is my creation. Aren’t they brilliant?”

  “What are they?” Verity asked skeptically.

  Kai leaned in to share the secret. “Sweetbreads,” she whispered. “Get it?”

  Verity put her hands on her hips and furrowed her brow.

  “Technically it’s just Monkey Bread,” said Kai. “I tried to make them in the shape of a pancreas or a heart, but they just came out like giant thick blobs, so I decided to go the lumpy-intestine route. They’ll cook more evenly this way too. I thought they’d be the perfect thing to sell in the shop during the Scaresgiving Parade.” Now Verity was staring at her. “You think it’s a terrible idea.”

  “No, I agree with you,” said Verity. “They’re positively brilliant. In this fabulous town full of Halloween-crazed nutballs, the tourists are going to be eating these up. Literally!”

  Kai clapped her hands together in a puff of flour. “Really? You think so?”

  “I do,” said Verity. “And I look forward to sampling this first batch. You go pop those in the oven, and I’ll set up over here. Is that all right?”

  Kai nodded. Verity often came into town to write. Roxy’s guest house was cozy enough, but the costumed residents and visitors inspired her, she said. The random splashes of color and cheeriness “pleased her Muse.” Little did she know that most of those costumes weren’t costumes at all.

  Verity Mercer was a guest in this town, and human, and therefore not privy to the fact that all of Roxy’s friends and neighbors who spent their days acting like gargoyles and witches and werewolves were actually gargoyles and witches and werewolves. As long as Verity kept drinking the local enchanted water, she’d be none the wiser. So Kai kept her mouth shut and delivered a fresh glass of water to Verity’s table. As far as Verity knew, Kai was just a crazy teenager who talked to cats.

  She would never know that Kai heard this cat talk back.

  Kai slid the cookie sheet in the oven and then stopped in the bathroom to wash her hands and splash some water on her face. She took off her flour-covered apron and changed into a fresh one. She felt much more composed when she walked back out to the sales floor. “I’m going to check the sweetbreads in about fifteen minutes,” she said to Verity. “Can I get you anything in the meantime? Besides water?”

  “A coffee would be great,” Verity said into her laptop, her fingers already flying across the keys.

  “The usual?” asked Kai.

  “Mmm-hmm.”

  Kai walked to the front door and stood by the clear glass. Nocturne Falls was a year-round tourist destination, and Black Cat Boulevard was one of the main drags…but for some reason, this sunny Wednesday afternoon was deader than usual. There was no traffic on the road or cars parked in the street, just Verity’s sea-foam-green Vespa on the sidewalk. For the first time in a very long time, Nocturne Falls looked like an actual ghost town. With no ghosts in it whatsoever.

  It also meant that Bellamy would be bored to tears.

  Kai waved her arms, trying to get her bestie’s attention. She could have abandoned her post for five minutes and walked across the street, but communicating from one store picture window to another was so much more fun.

  Bellamy had her elbows planted on the counter of Hallowed Bean, head in her hands, wings drooping sadly at her back. It was not the fairy who noticed Kai’s wild gesturing but Maya and Kaley, the teen witches who just so happened to be sitting at a table right by the window.

  Kai smiled, waved, and pointed to Bellamy. She could have texted, but she wasn’t supposed to have her phone on at work.

  Maya and Kaley waved back. Maya walked to the counter and said something to Bellamy, who perked up immediately and ran to the window.

  Kai pointed to Verity, even though Bellamy couldn’t see her, and then pantomimed frantic typing.

  Bellamy also pantomimed typing and giggled. She made a sign for drinking.

  Kai nodded, and then held up two fingers, placing an order for both Verity and herself. Unless some miracle occurred in the next couple of hours, there wouldn’t be many more customers today, which meant that the time would pass by incredibly slowly. A coffee would certainly help with that. Especially one made by Bellamy.

  Bellamy nodded back cheerfully, the colorful locks in her honey-blonde hair bobbing like a drunken rainbow. She gave Kai two thumbs up, did a little dance, and blew her a kiss.

  And then a cloud went over the sun.

  It was as if all the color drained from the world, and only a strange blue tint was left. Out of nowhere, the wind picked up. In the distance, Kai could hear sirens. A tornado in November? Totally not the right time of year. Besides, before a tornado the sky usually tinted green or yellow, not blue.

  Without opening the door, Kai strained to look as far as she could down one end of the street, and then the other…and that’s when she saw him. He tore out of the alleyway like a dark streak and sped down the middle of the boulevard. She heard a whistle now, and more sirens. This was bad news.

  Keep running, she said inside her head. Keep running. Don’t stop here. There is nothing for you here.

  But he did stop. Dead in the middle of the street between Delaney’s Delectables and Hallowed Bean. He put his hands on his knees to catch his breath. Chunks of long, black hair fell forward, covering his face.

  Danger. She felt the word in every fiber of her being.

  Kai looked to her friends at the window of Hallowed Bean. Maya was standing
now; the chair where she’d been sitting had fallen over on its side. Kaley’s eyes were wide, as if she wanted to scream, but Bellamy’s hand was over her mouth.

  The guy in the road stood up. Seemed to sniff the air.

  Not them, Kai’s inner voice went on. If you need a place to hide, it’s not there.

  He turned his head to stare right at Kai.

  He was the most magnificent boy she’d ever seen. Man. Young man. Like a rock star. Or the son of a rock star. He was swathed in black: his hair, his jacket, his shirt, his jeans, his boots. As he came closer, Kai could tell that the boots were scuffed. The jeans and shirt were torn. The jacket was held together in places with safety pins. Closer. And closer.

  He stalked to the door like a death wish.

  Kai stepped back, but she could not look away from him. Would not. If he lost interest in her, he might go across the street and hurt her friends. She couldn’t risk that.

  His skin was deeply tan. His jaw was square and hard with a shadow of stubble. His nose was cut on the bridge. It might have been broken, and one eye looked like he’d been punched. His eyebrows were thick and shot with a streak of silver. All of this was framed by a mane of wavy, shoulder-length hair.

  The bells tinkled as the door opened, but no one was laughing.

  Kai stopped moving backward and stood her ground. His eyes were all she could see now. Gray and gold. Hunted. Haunted. The heel of his boot scraped against the polished hardwood floor as he stepped nearer. The air smelled like lightning.

  Verity wasn’t tapping on her keyboard anymore, but Kai didn’t dare look away from his eyes. He could have had a knife or a gun…but she couldn’t look away. She heard muffled voices outside the shop: people running in the street, calling out to each other. A lot of people.

  There’s no escape for you, buddy, Kai’s inner voice said. Not in this town.

  He lifted a hand to her cheek—his knuckles were bloody—but Kai remained as still as stone. One corner of his mouth turned up in what might have been a smile…but before she could decide, he was kissing her.