Prince of Wolves

chapter 7





Jacque’s eyes snapped open at the revelation that was causing her to hyperventilate. Fane! The voice was Fane! Once he had answered her, she believed without a doubt that she wasn’t just hearing a voice made up by her subconscious. It was someone real, tangible, and...well, hot! Not that him being hot is important, Jacque thought to herself. But it seriously didn’t hurt.

No longer able to lie still, Jacque got up and went over to her window. She opened the blinds and looked across the street at the Henrys' house, wondering what Fane was doing. Wondering if he was wondering about her. Oh, good grief, she told herself. You just met him, you don’t even know him, and you’re wondering if he's thinking about you? Do yourself a favor - get a Kit Kat and give yourself a break.

She closed the blinds and leaned back against the wall, shutting her eyes. After taking a deep breath, she decided she needed to do something to keep herself occupied until Sally and Jen came back over. There was a pile of dirty clothes on the floor next to her closet, she grabbed the empty laundry basket, filled it, and carried it downstairs to the laundry room. Still not operating on all four cylinders, she didn’t even bother to sort them out, she just threw her whites and colors together and tossed some detergent on top of them. She shut the washer lid and headed back into the living room.

“Okay,” she said out loud. “What next?” She turned in a complete circle, letting her eyes roam over the room. The only thing she could see was that the living room needed to be dusted. She went into the kitchen and got supplies from under the kitchen sink and headed back to the living room. Trying to drag things out, she sprayed each item and carefully wiped them with the dusting cloth. By the time she was done, Jacque was sure the living room had never been so clean.

She put the dust cloth and spray away and then her clothes were ready to go into the dryer.

When she finally looked at the clock, she moaned as she realized it had only been an hour since she'd come downstairs. What was she going to do now? I could go over to the Henrys' and see if they were done with mom’s dishes, she told herself. Yeah, Sherlock, that wouldn’t be obvious at all.

Jacque headed back up to her room, wracking her brain for things she could do to keep her mind off you-know-who, at least until Sally and Jen were back. When she shut her bedroom door, her hand brushed up against the bathing suit she had hanging on the doorknob. “Okay, sun tanning it is,” she said to herself.

Jacque grabbed the bathing suit and went to the bathroom to change. She ran a hand down her legs and decided they were smooth enough for just laying on a towel in the backyard. She looked in the mirror at herself, pleased enough, she supposed. She was a little on the short side at five foot one and a half inches, slender and muscular from playing on the girls' tennis team. She wasn’t Beth from Dog the Bounty Hunter in the chest department, as Jen had so nicely pointed out, but she wasn’t Grace of Will and Grace either. She figured a C cup wasn’t anything to complain about. Her hair was her favorite thing about herself: auburn, curly, and wild. Most of the time she didn’t attempt to tame it, but for sun bathing she decided to put it up in a ponytail.

The bathing suit was a bikini that she'd let Sally and Jen talk her into. Though, she did get her two cents in by buying a mismatched bottom and top. She figured if she liked two different bathing suits, why not buy half of each? With that reasoning it's no wonder I'm hearing voices, she told herself.

Overall, Jacque thought, I don’t look too shabby. She slipped on her pink flip flops, grabbed her cell, iPod, towel, and sunglasses, and was out the back door.

Her backyard was very simple, just a square, and it didn’t even have a fence around it. They didn’t really need a fence. They didn’t have a dog, or little kids to corral in, so when her mom had bought the house she'd never bothered to have one built. There was a single tree growing smack dab in the middle of the backyard, so depending on the time of day Jacque either had to lie on the left or right side of the backyard.

The right side it is.

Jacque took her towel and laid it on the grass. She'd already put her ear phones in and set her iPod to shuffle – Pearl Jam was the band playing at the moment. She slid her sunglasses on and turned to sit down on her towel. It was then that she realized in choosing the right side of the backyard, she was directly in front of the Henrys' house. Wait folks, it gets even better. It’s the side of the house where Fane’s bedroom window is.

Bad, Jacque thought. This is very, very bad. I can get up and go lay on the left side of the back yard…in the shade…which makes no sense. Or I can lay here and look like I totally planned to put a bikini on and plaster myself in front of Fane’s window like a centerfold. For the love of pigtails, could someone throw me a bone? Jacque’s mind screamed.

She sat there debating for a minute or two, then threw her hands up and said, “To hell with it, I’m already down here. He can get an eyeful if he wants, and if he wants to know if I did it for his benefit he can just ask me.” With a decided humph, Jacque laid back on the towel, arms by her side, feet flat on the ground, and knees slightly bent.

As she closed her eyes, she began to feel the warmth of the sun seep into her skin and calm her. She took some deep breaths and focused on the lyrics to the song now playing in her ears. It was “Untouchable” by Taylor Swift. She'd heard it a couple times before but had never really listened to it. Now as she heard the words, something inside her awoke.

Untouchable like a distant diamond sky

I'm reaching out and I just can't tell you why

I'm caught up in you, I'm caught up in you





Untouchable, burning brighter than the sun

And when you're close, I feel like coming undone





In the middle of the night when I'm in this dream

It's like a million little stars spelling out your name

You gotta come on, come on, say that we'll be together

Come on, come on, little taste of heaven





It's half full and I won't wait here all day

I know you're saying that you'd be here anyway

But you're untouchable, burning brighter than the sun

Now that you're close, I feel like coming undone





Jacque didn’t really understand how she knew it, but she believed without a doubt that her future was with Fane. She wasn’t sure how or why, or when, and at that moment he seemed very untouchable – she sure as hell was coming undone.

The song stopped and her phone started vibrating. For a moment she was a little disoriented, then she realized she was getting a phone call. She looked at the screen on her phone and it was Jen.

“Hello?”

“Got good news, got bad news. Won’t charge you for either so which do you want first?” Jen answered.

“Slap me first, pat me on the back last,” Jacque told her.

“Bad news it is. I won’t be back over to your house until nine at the earliest. My mom and dad are in one of their ‘we’re a family, we need to eat at the table together, blah blah blah’ moods. So naturally, being the sweet little thing that I am, I didn’t argue with them for twenty minutes or slam my door and tell them how 1950s they were being. Nope, not me. I smiled sweetly.”

“Jen, you don’t do anything sweetly. How did you manage a smile?” Jacque retorted.

“Oh, shut up. That was the slap. The pat is I get to come over, even after the little fit that I didn’t throw,” she said with smug satisfaction.

“Try to keep your mouth shut between now and then so that you don’t have to call me later with something worse than a slap, okay?” Jacque told her.

“Okay, okay. Geez, who spit in your pizza?”

“I’ll give you the full details tonight, but suffice to say at least one piece has made its way into the puzzle.” Jacque thought about her words for a moment, then remembered a question Fane had asked her when he was “talking” to her. He had asked where she got her odd way of speaking. Did she speak oddly?

“Jen, do you think I speak oddly?” Jacque asked.

There was silence for a moment at the other end of the line. Jacque assumed either Jen was thinking or she had found something more interesting to pay attention to. Jacque was just about to ask again when Jen answered, “You do realize who you're asking, right? ‘Cause I just asked you who spit in your pizza and you knew exactly what I meant. So, I’m just saying I might not be the best judge of any oddities you may possess.”

“True dat,” Jacque responded.

“I’ll see you tonight. Try not to do anything too crazy without me. You know how I like to watch,” Jen said, cackling as she hung up.

Jacque shook her head, laughing to herself about her friend’s sick, twisted sense of humor. She didn’t bother to turn her music back on, she just listened to the sounds around her. For the most part the only noises were the occasional bird or dog bark. Other than that it was a quiet summer day. As beads of sweat ran down her collar bones she thought, Let’s qualify that. It’s a quiet, hot, summer day.

Jacque rolled over onto her stomach and closed her eyes, letting the heat and the sounds run over her. Before she realized it she had fallen asleep.