Page 13 of Calling Quarters

He'd captivated me the moment our eyes met across the street at Tabitha's hotel on my first day, and I haven't been able to stop thinking about him ever since. He wasn't like anyone else who lived here. A darkness followed him—it haunted his entire being.

I'd been warned about the Quarters from Tabitha and Blaire. They were completely off-limits to the townspeople. No one ever spoke to them, and they liked it that way. But they hadn't ever told mewhothe Quarters were. Never pointed them out on the street so that I knew which faces to avoid. I'd assumed they stayed away from town if they didn't want to be bothered.

Yet, Remy had practically thrown himself at me. He had insisted on taking me on this silly tour and showing me around.

Why?

Was he confirming what I suspected from the beginning? That I was a Counter, and he only wanted me dead? Even if I weren'thisCounter, surely he'd take the opportunity to help one of his own and eliminate their threat. Because that's all the Quarters saw their Counters as: a threat.

A cool chill ran down my spine. I hadn't realized how far we walked into the woods before. I couldn't see anything but thick trees and dense foliage all around. We were surrounded by nothing but nature without any other living being around to help. I could hear ocean waves somewhere in the distance and tried to picture the map I'd used to get here. I couldn't remember seeing water anywhere near Beacon Grove—just woods and mountains.

“Where are we?” I failed at my attempt to keep the fear out of my voice. It shook just like the rest of my body.

If he noticed, he didn't make it obvious. “The west end of town. Technically, we're on my family's property.”

My mind spiraled.

Why would he want to take me to his family's secluded woods if he didn't want to hurt me?

“I thought you were supposed to show me around Beacon Grove,” I accused weakly.

He shrugged. “I guess I got carried away with all the Watchtower talk. I wasn't really thinking about where we were going.”

A stick snapped a few feet away from us and both our heads whipped around to see what it was. Nothing appeared out of the ordinary, but I was officially spooked. When I glanced at him from the corner of my eye, he was wearing the same dark scowl as before, his eyes still surveying the forest. I didn't want to be alone with him for another second longer.

“I think we should go back.”

When he turned toward me, his brows pinned farther together in suspicion. I instinctively took a small step away from him and the sound of my feet shuffling in the dirt was practically deafening.

His shoulders tensed.

“I just really want to go back,” I insisted breathlessly, turning back in what I thought was the direction we came from.

Or was it? I was completely turned around. Why did the waves sound closer now?

“Okay, okay,” he soothed. His hands lifted in front of his chest in a calming manner, as if he were approaching a wild animal and couldn't predict its next movement. “It's this way.”

A long finger stretched in the opposite direction I would have guessed.

I'd been wrong. Hopelessness weighed deep in my stomach. What was I thinking, coming out into the woods with a complete stranger? I had better instincts than that, didn't I? But for some reason, all logic flew out the window when I was near him. I couldn't even run to safety if I had to—my sense of direction was nonexistent.

I kept a large gap between us as we trekked back to town in complete silence. Remy appeared to be battling his own conflicting thoughts about the last twenty minutes. His pushy and upbeat mood had shifted into the morose, thoughtful disposition that more closely matched the way Quarters had been described. He also didn't seem to care about the change in my mood and he wasn't surprised when I bid him a rushed goodbye and practically ran to the hotel.

Blaire was occupied with someone in the office, so I took the opportunity to rush past her window and shut myself into my room to recover from the odd feelings Remy had just stirred up.

I knew I should have stayed away.

Chapter 9

Storie

Each of my mornings were spent at the library since learning of their odd hours. The librarian's name was Esther. She was a small, mousy woman who wore her silver hair tied back into a tight bun and the same brown cardigan each day.

Outside of me asking her to point me in the general direction of what I needed on my first day there, we never spoke. After about a week of showing up as soon as she unlocked the large front doors, she started waiting and holding them open for me. She never bothered with a greeting, and I found comfort in her cold nature. I hadn't felt it since leaving the city.

Every morning, I'd march up the stairs to the third floor where all the town records were held and she'd shuffle behind the desk that sat in the center of the first floor, never speaking a word.

I made a point to get up and out of bed before the sun and didn’t return to my hotel room until Blaire was just getting done with her morning shifts at the front desk. We'd walk to the secret locals-only diner and have lunch before she went back to work, and I went back to my hotel room to mull over whatever I found. The days easily blended together, and each one was more infuriating than the last, leading me down nothing but dead ends.

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