Read the First Two Chapters

Chapter 1

It started with a whisper of wings. If Cara Ransome wasn’t in such a rush, if it was any other day, she probably would have managed to ignore it. She would have kept her head down, put one foot in front of the other, and reached the other side of the park without reacting, the way she did every day, to and from school.

But it was the last day of class, and between Cara’s hurry to leave that school for the final time and her eagerness to start a summer free from all the familiar taunts of her old classmates, she lost focus. The little park was a dangerous place to lose focus.

The whisper drew her eyes upward before she could catch herself, the slight breeze from beating wings close enough to ruffle her wavy brown hair. Long, sharp talons swept across her vision, their deadly points wrapped around a dark lump of fur.

With her heart jumping to her throat, Cara couldn’t stop the shriek that burst out of her. The huge owl attached to the talons swooped so low that feathers brushed across the arm she threw over her head.

Stumbling sideways to avoid the impact, all Cara managed to do was trip right off the side of the path. Her leg went out from under her in a chaotic split as a pine cone rolled beneath her heel, and there was no saving herself. She hit the grass in an unceremonious heap of limbs and backpack.

With wild, wide eyes, Cara looked up to find the owl. It was ten feet away already, dropping its prey at the foot of a large evergreen. The furry creature it had been carrying turned out to be a squirrel, and it shook itself off and scurried over to two other squirrels who stood waiting under the tree. She blinked.

Waiting? That couldn’t be right.

Owls didn’t keep prey alive. They didn’t drop them off to meet their little squirrel buddies. Wrong, wrong, wrong.

Stop it, Cara.

Someone laughed softly, and Cara shook her head, blushing.

Right. She was not supposed to see impossible things. Not when she’d vowed to be normal. Now here she was, in a public park, surrounded by people witnessing her flailing and falling like a lunatic, probably all wondering what was wrong with her.

Later, she would tell herself it wasn’t her fault—that anyone would react the same way if they saw and heard the things she did. Unfortunately, when she searched the little park for the source of the laughter, she only found concerned looks all directed at her. Everyone stared as if it were her causing the disturbance, not the gigantic owl in their midst in broad daylight. Not a single person gave the bird a glance.

Her stomach clenched.

Not again.

When Cara was a child, this park had seemed magical. With its groves of densely packed trees on either side of the path, it created its own world, cut off from the surrounding houses. Now, at almost fifteen, she only knew that weird things happened here too often, and she’d be happy to avoid it permanently…starting now, thank you very much.

Cara had bolted at the early bell, done with middle school at last, but that meant it was midday, and it seemed like the first real sun in weeks had brought half the neighborhood out to the park to eat and stroll. So many people…all of them staring.

A man in a dark suit carrying a lunch bag hurried over and offered a hand.

“Are you okay?”

“Fine,” she mumbled, her face glowing hot.

Since it was the normal thing to do, she gritted her teeth and let the man pull her to her feet, then brushed grass from her legs as if nothing had happened. It wasn’t as if she could tell the truth. No one else noticed the owl spreading its wings and taking off for the treetops, just like no one had noticed it diving at Cara’s head. No one but her.

Adults never believed that kind of thing. Her whole life, grown-ups had explained the things she saw right out from under her. A line of beetles marching outside the zoo? Fanciful. The hawk that always watched her from the back fence? Her mom never came to the window in time. A rabbit riding down the road atop the Antons’ old dog? Surely that had been a dream.

Overactive imagination, her mom called it. Hallucination was the scary word Cara tried not to think about.

At least adults were gentle about it. Kids were crueler. She’d learned that lesson in fifth grade, when she’d spotted an actual, live wolf trotting across the school playground toward a wild hare. When she’d gasped and turned to alert someone, some jerk had shot a spitball clean into her open mouth. She still cringed whenever she thought about it.

Luckily none of the kids from school were here now. Although, there were witnesses her own age, Cara noted with a groan. Two boys had turned into the park, close enough to have heard her scream and see her being helped up off the ground.

Fantastic.

Worse, the tall, athletic one was seriously cute, all blond hair and sunshine. He practically glowed, the grin on his face looking like a permanent fixture. It was probably the look that immediately preceded him pointing and laughing at her. Luckily, the smaller guy beside him said something before Mr. Sunshine could burst into laughter. That guy was the blond’s complete opposite; slight and wiry, with shiny black hair, dark features, and an expression that could have been sculpted in red clay for all it revealed.

Her stomach lurched when he looked her way. She wished everyone would just politely ignore her and mind their own business. Years of seeing things she couldn’t explain had left a mark, and with no one to talk to aside from her dog, Cara tried her best to be invisible. As invisible as the owl.

She fought to compose herself and focus again. She knew how to do this. She could ignore the owl and the squirrels like everyone else in the park.

Except today, not everyone ignored them.

The shorter boy tracked the path of the owl across the sky. When it vanished into the distance, he leaned in to mutter to his blond friend. Then he looked right at her.

Cara snapped her mouth shut. Cheeks burning, she waited for their mocking to start. Instead, the serious one pulled the blond guy away, heading toward the tree where the squirrels had disappeared. She tore her gaze away, hoisted her backpack over one shoulder, and hurried in the other direction.

The boy must have been watching something other than the owl. Whatever they were doing in the park, bitter experience had taught her they weren’t seeing what she had seen, no matter what she’d thought for a brief moment. It was time to leave that wishful thinking behind once and for all.

That was what she’d promised herself. In the fall, she’d be starting at a new school, where no one knew her and she could finally be normal and make actual friends aside from her dog. No more noticing strange animals, no more reacting to imaginary threats, no more being the weird girl.

All she had to do was stick to the plan.

Jenner met her at the door the way he always did, his whole back end wagging, and for the first time since the park her chest loosened.

“Hey, buddy.” She dropped to her knees in the front hall and let his slobbery kiss land on her chin. “Thank you for that, just what I needed after what just happened.”

Jenner flopped down in front of her, exposing his soft belly in clear invitation. The dog was a great listener, but it came at the cost of belly rubs. Cara chuckled and gladly paid the petting tax.

“About a hundred people just saw me fall flat on my face because a giant owl dive-bombed me.”

A slight exaggeration, but Jenner wouldn’t mind. He never dismissed her fears or told her she was imagining things.

“You don’t judge, do you, boy? You’re the only one I can tell without getting teased or accused of making it up for attention. That’s because you’re perfect, aren’t you? Yes you are.”

With one last pat, she stood. Jenner jumped to his feet, gave a shake to smooth out his brown and black fur, and followed her up the few steps to the main floor.

“At least I’m done with that school. Well, I will be after the stupid graduation ceremony tonight that Mom won’t let us skip. But the point is, I never have to go through that park again.”

The little whine from Jenner made Cara look down. Her dog loved that little park for some reason, and sometimes she swore he understood her words.

“You need to go out, don’t you?” Cara asked, because that obviously made more sense.

She let him out into the backyard and sat on the step, figuring they should both enjoy the sun while they could. It was never guaranteed in Portland, Oregon.

Jenner made his rounds, sniffing under every bush like there might be a secret message waiting for him there, then he returned and flopped against her leg. Automatically, her fingers found the silky, triangle ears that flopped over at the very tips. The adrenaline of her fall and the ensuing embarrassment had worn off, and it left room for Cara’s thoughts to turn back to the owl, which opened the door to more.

With Jenner’s chin settled on her knee and his big, brown eyes gazing up at her, the smile slipped from her face. Because the owl wasn’t even the scary part. There was much more she never said out loud.

The scariest experience happened two years ago. She had gone hiking with her mom and uncle to Kings Mountain Trail in the nearby Tillamook State Forest. Josh and her mom had started talking about her dad, and she had fallen way behind, not wanting to hear the sad notes in their voices. She was about to run to catch up, when she spotted the cougar.

The big cat was perched on a branch above her head in one of the huge trees, tensed and ready to pounce. She was pretty sure she had stopped breathing then. Everything had slowed down. An entire unfulfilled life had flashed in front of her eyes. For some reason she never understood, when time started again and she was still standing under the beast, she had looked right at it and, in a voice she didn’t know she still had, just said, “No.”

It shouldn’t have done anything. She couldn’t explain why she had said it, but the cat settled back on the branch, and she knew. With one word, she knew she could pass safely by. There was no way to explain it to her mom or uncle when she couldn’t understand it herself. Ever since then, she’d stopped telling anyone about the things she saw, with the exception of the dog currently drooling on her knee.

“At least I’ve got you,” she murmured.

She pushed herself up. There was a graduation to survive, and her mom would be home soon. With a sigh at the thought of the purple dress her mom had bought her (covered, to Cara’s horror, in butterflies), she began to tug off her sweatshirt as she headed inside.

For a split second, just before the fabric covered her head, a green gleam flashed across Jenner’s eyes. Cara yanked the shirt the rest of the way off and snapped her head back around to him. Brown eyes gazed back. His head tilted to one side.

Nothing…there’s nothing there. Stop it, Cara.

It must have been a weird reflection of the afternoon light through the trees. Her mind was playing tricks on her, that was all. She shook her head and went to get ready.

The graduation ceremony that evening was every bit as dreadful as she’d expected—gold balloons, a too-warm auditorium, standing awkwardly in front of everyone, and a single raucous cheer when her name was called that could only have been her mom’s best friend, Marjorie. Then it was over, and Cara was finally free.

To celebrate, they went to Lily’s Diner afterward, a nearby place she and her mom liked to eat. Marjorie came, and so did Lydia, a new friend of her mom’s who had recently joined her law firm. Cara got her favorite macaroni and cheese, baked with the crispy crumbs on top, and felt herself finally start to unwind.

She and her mom often came here and played a game while people-watching. They’d make up backstories for everyone in the diner, explaining all the tragic, amazing, weird, or wonderful ways they’d come to end up there that day. Cara picked out a harried waitress and an old man eating pie alone, and her mom laughed at her inventions in a way that loosened something behind Cara’s ribs.

Then her mom went quiet, watching her over the rim of her coffee cup, and her eyes went soft in that way they did when she was thinking about Cara’s dad.

“He’d be so proud of you tonight,” she said. She reached across the table and tucked a strand of hair behind Cara’s ear. “Your dad always said he’d send you to Scovell Academy when the time came, just like him and your Uncle Josh, and he’d be so excited for your next steps. I wish he could have seen this.”

“Me too,” Cara said, and meant it, around the familiar ache.

Blinking away the prickle of tears, Cara brought her gaze to another customer. She might have noticed him because he wasn’t much older than her, and he was alone. His dark blond hair (nothing like the sunny blond from the park) was a bit poufy, like maybe he hadn’t bothered to do anything with it after showering. It certainly wasn’t all slicked back and crispy-looking like some of the boys in her class styled their hair. She found herself imagining what it would feel like between her fingers.

Whoa. Pull yourself together, Cara.

Where had that come from? She yanked her gaze away and told herself she only felt bad that he was all by himself. She probably wasn’t staring because he was so cute. Probably. From the corner of her eye, she saw him stand to leave.

“Earth to Cara,” her mom said. “I said we’re ready to go.”

Oops.

She slid out of their booth to let the others out.

The cute boy paid at the counter and headed for the door, walking right past their table. He was a head taller than her, something none of the boys in her class could claim yet. She stared at her shoes.

His arm brushed hers as he walked by.

“Oh, sorry.” He looked at her for the first time.

“No, um…” Cara’s hand fluttered in dismissal, but no other words came out.

Yep, smooth as usual.

Her arm tingled where he’d brushed by her, and she kept her eyes down as she passed by him when he stopped to hold the door open for her group.

“Thanks,” Cara muttered, hurrying past.

“Such a polite young man,” Lydia said to the other women.

The door banged closed behind them, and she risked a glance over her shoulder. The boy headed for a maroon van, pulled out keys, and climbed into the driver’s seat. Apparently he was at least sixteen.

Her arm was still tingling.

Maybe someday, when she had the normal life she’d been planning—real friends, a school where no one called her crazy, a version of herself who didn’t flinch at every shadow—she’d be the kind of girl who could smile back at a boy like that. Say something easy. Hold his gaze for longer than half a second.

But not today.

Today she’d fallen down in a park and screamed at an owl only she could see. Today she’d talked to her dog because she had no one else, and then stood awkwardly on a stage full of classmates who’d never accepted her. Today she was still the weird girl.

Today didn’t count.

Chapter 2

Cara woke the next morning with the tail end of a dream still clinging to her. She’d fallen asleep with her anxieties swirling about whether the owl had even been real, and why she’d let her guard down when she knew better. In her dreams, giant squirrels had morphed into the two boys from the park, pointing and laughing, their eyes flashing a sharp, impossible green. She blinked the lingering image away, but the unease stayed, pooling in her stomach with everything else.

Because there was plenty else. The party was tonight. Technically, it was Cara’s graduation party, but since it was all her mom’s friends and some neighbors, it meant a house full of adults who would all ask her the same questions and tell her how grown up she looked. She could hardly wait.

Sitting up, she started the little ritual she’d adopted over the past couple years, taking an inventory of the perfectly ordinary things around her. It helped stamp down any memories of bizarre things she’d seen, either awake or asleep, and convince herself she was perfectly normal. Her bed, her tidy maple desk and matching chair, the navy-blue beanbag in the corner with the stack of her favorite books beside it. Check, check, check.

Her gaze roamed across the photos of Jenner pinned to the weathered wood hung above her desk, and it snagged, the way it always did, on the only other picture in the room. It was a silver-framed photo of her as a toddler, perched on her father’s shoulders, both of them grinning like fools, two sets of golden eyes sparkling.

Looking at photos of her dad was the only time Cara ever liked her eyes. The rest of the time, the peculiar golden hue was just one more thing that made her different. Aside from her dad, she’d never seen anyone else with quite the same color.

Jenner lifted his head from the foot of the bed and thumped his tail against the covers, and that was the signal for Cara to put her ritual and the dreams behind her and face the new day.

“Time to get up?” she asked the searching brown eyes.

Her mom would be at the cemetery already, visiting Cara’s dad, Jordan Ransome, like she had every Saturday for over ten years now. Sandra sat at his grave, told him all about their week, then came home, and the two of them got on with the day. They never discussed it.

Jenner landed on the floor with a thud, and immediately nudged Cara’s hand with his wet nose. At least someone in this house was uncomplicated.

By afternoon, the knot in her stomach had wound itself so tight she couldn’t sit still. Guests were due around six, and her mom was deep in a frenzy of appetizers and candle-arranging, so Cara clipped on Jenner’s leash and slipped out the front door before anyone could put her to work. She needed to clear her head before she had to be pleasant at people all evening. At least she had her dog. She’d always be grateful to her mom for letting them adopt the stray she’d found two years ago…gratitude she’d have to remember while she suffered through this party.

The afternoon was warm and bright, with poplar fluff floating on a light breeze, and for a block or two the walk helped. Her mind wandered, imagining the future she wanted so badly she could taste it: the new school, friends, a great roommate, her own new, outgoing personality that she would somehow develop this summer. Maybe one day, she’d have a best friend she could actually confide in about the weird stuff she saw, but she was probably getting ahead of herself in her daydreams. One step at a time.

They’d rounded a corner to a quiet street lined with lilacs, their blooms finally gone as they slid into summer, when Cara spotted a pretty little grey cat. The cat was picking its way along the top of a fence, and Cara and Jenner’s sudden appearance must have startled it. It spun, crouched, and looked right at her.

Its eyes flashed green. The exact same green she’d told herself she hadn’t seen in Jenner’s eyes.

She was moving before she’d decided to. Jenner’s leash jerked taut as she lunged for the fence, and the cat startled, dropped down the far side, and bolted. No…wait!

Had she imagined it this time, too? What did this have to do with Jenner? She had no idea what she planned to do if she caught up to the cat, but it didn’t matter. She had to know. She sprinted past the house, wheeled around the corner, Jenner scrambling beside her…

…and slammed straight into a warm wall.

The breath went out of her. She rebounded, and a hand shot out to catch her arm before she could land on the dirt for the second time in two days. Her cry of alarm didn’t make it past her lips, because she couldn’t breathe with her heart bursting out of her chest.

The person she’d crashed into didn’t have the same problem.

“Whoa! Hey, easy.”

When Cara looked up at the owner of the slightly amused-sounding voice, her heart dove right back to the bottom of her belly.

Of course. Of course it was him. None other than the golden-blond boy from the park stood before her, Mr. Sunshine himself, his dumb grin directed right at her. He was still steadying her by the elbow like she couldn’t be trusted to stand on her own. His friend stood a pace behind him, no trace of a grin in sight. Instead, his eyes scanned up and down the block, fast and searching, and then glared at her like the whole thing—whatever was making him frown that way—was her fault.

She yanked her arm free and looked past them. The grey cat was gone, vanished into the maze of yards and fences as if it had never existed. Disappointment landed harder than it had any right to.

She nearly apologized out of pure reflex, but then something shifted. The heat in her cheeks from yet another humiliation curdled into something hotter. She was so tired of it. The shame, the apologizing, the endless outcast feeling of being the freak who fell down and made scenes. The grumpy guy didn’t even have the decency to look surprised at her careening around the corner like a crazy person. Why should she be embarrassed in front of these idiots twice in two days? She was done with it. For once, anger felt better. Easier.

“Watch where you’re going,” she said instead, hitching Jenner’s leash up and brushing past them.

“Us?” the blond said behind her, that laughing undertone following her down the block.

She didn’t answer. Her face stayed hot the whole way home, and a tense, prickling feeling, like she was missing something or forgetting something, needled at her every step. Something about those guys made her feel like a balloon about to pop.

She arrived home to find two extra cars out front and her stomach dropped.

Crap, the party.

After that mess, she still had an entire terrible party to get through. She took a deep breath and walked in.

“Cara, you’re home.” Her mom barely paused. “Hurry up and get changed, everyone’s going to start arriving. Marjorie offered to walk—oh, you took Jenner. Good. Go on, hurry. Lydia, can you pop these in the oven, please?”

She fled upstairs to the sanctuary of her room. Half an hour later, washed and changed into the purple butterfly dress again (at her mom’s insistence), she trudged back down.

Her plan was simple. Greet the guests, make a few rounds of polite small talk, then escape with a plate of food and hide out with Jenner. It didn’t quite work out. Every time she aimed for the food table, someone caught her.

“Cara! How was your graduation?”

Boring, dumb, as expected. Out loud, she managed a polite, “It was good, thank you.”

“Do you feel more grown up now?”

What kind of question is that?

“We hear you’re off to boarding school in the fall.”

“Are you excited to go to Scovell Academy?”

“Do you have plans for the summer?”

Don’t scream, she told herself. Don’t scream, don’t scream.

It became her mantra for the night. She smiled through the endless questions and the expected answers, growing pricklier by the minute, until she thought she might actually burst.

Then at nine o’clock, her uncle appeared as if by magic in the middle of the party. Cara cut off whatever well-meaning adult was talking at her and hurried to throw her arms around the only person she actually wanted to see, like he was the last life vest in this shipwreck of a day.

“You’re here!”

“Hiya, Care Bear,” Uncle Josh said.

She hated that nickname, and her uncle was the one and only person who could get away with it. She stuck out her tongue.

“That good, huh?” he asked with a laugh while he ruffled her hair. “Come on. Let’s go sit by the fire and you can tell me about it.”

He carved a path for them out to the backyard, where a fire crackled in the pit and a few last guests milled in its glow. They sat, and she unloaded everything: the awful last few weeks of school, how much she couldn’t wait to leave it behind, even her worries about going to boarding school.

“You’ll love Scovell Academy as much as your dad and I did,” Josh promised. “But I know you. This is more frazzled than your usual.”

“Sure, just tell me I look like a hot mess at my own party.”

Josh laughed. “You look beautiful as always, darling niece, but underneath that ethereal beauty…”

She rolled her eyes.

“It’s nothing. Stupid stuff. I ran into these two guys earlier, and they just…”

Her uncle turned serious. “Cara, are you okay? Did they hurt you?”

“No, no. I mean I literally ran into one of them. Went around the corner too fast, and, yeah. They didn’t…do anything. They were just annoying, and I got so mad that they made me lose—”

She caught herself before mentioning the cat she’d only been following because of some impossible green gleam in its eye.

“Uh, nothing. Doesn’t matter. I’m fine, just…frazzled, apparently. I’ve been feeling all tense, and this day is endless, and people keep asking me dumb questions. Nothing weird happened.”

His expression shifted, and he shook his head a little the way she sometimes did when she was forcing herself to stop thinking about some peculiar thing she’d seen. Her eyes narrowed. Then his easy smile came back, and he reached into his back pocket for a small, flat box.

“Here, I brought you something,” he said. “You don’t have to wear it, but you should have it.”

She hesitated, curiosity growing.

“Go on, open it.”

Cara lifted the lid and found a watch inside. It was a man’s watch, but the strap was soft leather and not too chunky. She almost never wore jewelry, but she loved the way this one looked. Its large face would nearly cover her slender wrist, but the details were delicate.

She carefully lifted it from the box and turned it over in her hand. There was an inscription on the back.

J.Ransome

For the first time, she noticed her uncle’s watch gleaming in the firelight on his wrist. It was identical.

“Is this one my dad’s?”

“It’s yours now. We both got them for our high school graduations. I remember being so jealous until I got mine. He’d want you to have it, and I didn’t want to wait four more years to give it to you.” He undid the strap of his own watch, turning it over and holding it out to her to see. “Same inscription, see.”

J.Ransome, she read in the firelight.

Jordan and Josh. Josh and Jordan.

It was too much, at the end of an exhausting day. Her eyes prickled, tears threatening as the tense feeling stretched tight through her whole body. The watch was suddenly heavier than its size. Her uncle watched her face and, as he always seemed to, saved her.

“I think the party’s starting to die down,” he said gently. “You might be able to make your escape.”

“Will you be here for a few days?” Cara asked.

“Nope, sorry, Cara-lina.” He faked a tip of a hat to her. “This is just a quick stopover I squeezed in on my way to Haiti. I’ll be there for a month, and then, who knows?”

“Then I’m glad you were here for tonight. Thanks for my gift.”

Much as she wished she saw him more than a couple times a year, the aid organization he worked for did important work for people who really needed help, so she didn’t resent the time apart. She held it together long enough to give him a fierce hug and start for the stairs. She almost made it.

A booming voice stopped her at the base. “Ah, Cara, there’s the guest of honor.”

Noooo.

She turned back slowly.

“Hi, Mr. Jackson.”

He was her mom’s boss at the law firm. A nice man, really, but her patience was worn down to nothing.

“Congratulations on your graduation, dear. Your dress is lovely. Really brings out your honey-gold eyes.”

If only she could melt into the floor before she said something regrettable. Someone pointing out her eyes was her pet peeve. She hated it.

Don’t scream, don’t scream, don’t scream.

“Thank you, sir. Have a good night.” It was all the politeness she had left, so she spun on her heel and sprinted up the stairs before anyone could say another word.

The anger had taken over again, which at least meant she no longer felt like crying. She shut her bedroom door, safely inside with Jenner, fell backward onto the bed, and dragged a pillow over her face.

She finally let herself scream.

Aside from Jenner pushing his nose into her neck, nothing happened. The music kept playing downstairs. She screamed again. Her heartbeat slowed a little, her breath came a little easier. It wasn’t enough. The tension still pulled her limbs tight, irritation twisted her stomach, her skin stretched like an overfilled balloon. The feeling was awful, and she just wanted to go to sleep and hope it was gone by morning, but sleep felt like a distant fantasy.

“You don’t get it, boy,” she mumbled into the pillow. “You like everyone. People are so annoying, though. Stupid people with their stupid questions. Stupid honey-gold eyes…”

“Pixie-gold, not honey-gold.”

The voice came out of nowhere.