Grace of a Wolf - Chapter 245
Chapter 245: Grace: Coin (I)
Andrew rubs at the back of his head, staring at the hole in the ground with a frown. “Who would have done this?”
I shrug, even though I’m pretty sure I know the answer. “Wouldn’t it require some heavy machinery to dig up this dirt?”
“Not just to dig it up—the dirt’s gone,” he points out with a sigh. “Why would they take the dirt?”
Huh. Now that he mentions it…
But the mystery of the missing dirt is also not my problem. I’m sure Caeriel had his bizarre reasons, assuming he’s the one behind Jebediah Wulfric’s missing body.
The sky’s still cloudy, though they’re thankfully white and puffy without a storm in sight. Still, uneasiness creeps its way across my skin as I take a step closer to the open grave.
“I need to go down there,” I tell Andrew, deciding to go with blunt. It isn’t like there’s a reasonable explanation for wanting to scour the bottom of a robbed grave, anyway, and he’s been cooperative thus far.
His head whips around, eyes widening. “You want to what?”
“Go down there.”
“…into the empty grave?”
“Yes.”
“You?”
I nod. “That’s what I said.”
“Why the hell would you want to do that?”
“I just want to check something.”
Andrew’s eyes dart between me and the hole, one brow raised. “Grace, it’s just dirt in there—never mind. At least it’s just dirt in there. Better than a corpse, I guess.”
“Zombies can’t exist without a body,” I agree, watching his face go from quizzical to blank.
“Zombies?”
Oh. I guess we were on very different wavelengths. “Never mind,” I mumble, not wanting to explain my semi-real fear of a horde of zombies appearing.
He shakes his head and looks me over, then the hole again, before letting out a long sigh. “Fine. Let me get something to help you down. You’ll probably sprain your ankle if you jump.”
Rude. On point, but rude. “Thanks.”
I watch him trudge back to his car, muttering under his breath. Something about me being insane and how this wasn’t what he signed up for.
Just in case, I step a few feet away from the edge, not wanting to fall in before he returns. I’m may not be sure how strong the edges of the ground are, but I know exactly how bad my luck has been lately.
Andrew returns moments later with a coil of thick rope slung over his shoulder, and I have no idea why I was imagining him coming back with one of those tall ladders instead.
“You just… happen to have rope in your car?” I ask curiously, even though rope seems slightly more normal than a random super tall ladder.
He shrugs like it’s the most normal thing in the world. “Why wouldn’t you have rope in your car?”
“I don’t know, maybe because most people aren’t preparing to dispose of bodies on the regular?”
Andrew’s lips twitch, and my eyes narrow with suspicion.
“Wait, were you planning to kidnap me later? Is that why you’ve been so helpful?” I’m half-joking, mostly because he would have tried doing so a long time ago if that was his goal.
This time he actually laughs out loud. “Believe it or not, rope has far more practical uses,” he says, kneeling at the edge of the grave. “Towing, camping, makeshift clothesline…” He works quickly, tying several knots at regular intervals along the length. “Though I guess ‘lowering humans into empty graves’ is now on that list.”
His fingers work deftly with the rope, creating proper handholds, and I vaguely recall learning something about tying different knots several years ago. I’ve already forgotten them all, though. Outside of tying the occasional bow, I haven’t had much use for the knowledge.
“You’re surprisingly good at that.”
“You should be, too. We learned it in the same class.” He pauses. “Then again, I guess Rafe did everything for you, so you never needed to remember it.”
His name coming out of nowhere is a little jarring, especially how casually Andrew throws it into the conversation. “Yeah, I guess so.”
“I never agreed with him,” he adds, finishing the last knot. “Told him it was better for you to learn how to do it all yourself so you could survive if it ever became necessary, but he said you were too weak to survive without relying on the pack anyway.”
I blink a few times, a little floored. “He said that?”
“Yep.” He throws the rope down the hole, and it dangles a foot or two shy of the ground. “Said you only ever needed to learn how to get back to the pack.”
What a dick. Hearing this only makes me more frustrated with younger, oblivious Grace, who thought everything Rafe did for her was romantic and sweet.
“And why were you friends with him?” I ask curiously as he wraps the other end around his waist.
“Why were you dating him?” he counters. “You couldn’t possibly be blind to all the flaws in his personality.”
Coughing lightly, I mumble, “Well, you know, love is blind.”
“Betas don’t question their alphas. The hierarchy isn’t just taught. It’s instinctual, something we can feel in our blood. I’m not and will never be an alpha, but Rafe was from the start.” He shrugs. “It didn’t matter if he was an asshole or a saint. He chose me, and I followed.”
Putting it that way casts their friendship in a horrifying light. “Surely you have a choice.”
“It’s not a big deal,” Andrew says, sounding indifferent to the truth of his past as he motions for me to get moving. “Hurry up with your zombie-summoning ritual before someone reports to the Lycan King I’ve thrown his mate into an unmarked grave.”
I roll my eyes a little, even though his suggestion is mildly horrifying. Imagining Caine’s response to that report is… less than pleasant.
Well, for Andrew. It’s quite heart-warming for me.
Grabbing the rope with both hands, I eye it skeptically before glancing back at Andrew. “You sure you can hold this? I’m not exactly a featherweight.”
His face shifts into exasperated tolerance. “No, but you’re not as heavy as a car. I think I’ll manage.”
Do they regularly move cars…? Then again, he has shifter strength to fall back on, so I guess it’s maybe a reasonable comparison.
“Such a gentleman,” I mutter, stepping to the edge. Loose soil crumbles, and my heart jumps a little. It’s only ten feet, perfectly safe even if I was thrown in, but for some reason it feels like twenty. “If you drop me, I’m haunting you forever.”
“You’d haunt me even if I didn’t drop you. Also, you’re not dying from this height.”
My heart pounds as I lower myself over the edge. I’ve climbed ropes before, and if I recall correctly, I was pretty shit at it.
Sweat coats my hands as I make it down a few knots. For whatever reason, the air down here already feels several degrees colder. And thicker somehow, making it hard to breathe.
Am I having a panic attack over only ten feet?
“We don’t have all day, Grace.”
My hands slip, and I shriek as I fall, my feet hitting the bottom with a dull thud.
Miracle of miracles, I don’t sprain my ankle.
“Made it,” I shout up, feeling a little silly for being so scared. After a moment, Andrew’s face appears at the edge of the hole.
“Well, are you done yet?”
“I just got down here!” Making sure to roll my eyes with a little extra exaggeration, I turn to observe the space, wrinkling my nose a little at the strange, pungent scent permeating the area.
My lungs burn, and I pull the collar of my shirt over my nose, coughing at a sudden tickle in the back of my throat.
“What’s wrong?” Andrew calls from above.
“It smells weird down here!”
“I mean, it held a dead body for how many years…”
True. Considering I haven’t made it a point to hang out in dug-up graves, I’m not familiar with the general scent of, well, grave.
But I kind of feel like maybe it shouldn’t smell like anything at this point, what with decomposition and all…
Still uneasy over the scent lingering here, I hurry to the center of the grave, trying to find the source of the glinting. There’s a gold coin almost completely covered in loose dirt, with only the barest hint of it peeking out; it only takes a few swipes of my fingers to uncover it. Rather than an old treasure being unearthed, it’s as if someone planted it.