“The universe has a wry sense of humor,” Bish muttered and scoffed in anger. “I don’t like this. I don’t understand it and don’t like it but it doesn’t seem like I have a choice.” He sent a blazing gaze to Caleb, making me step closer to my significant protectively. “And I don’t like you. Let’s be clear on that. I promised Maggie that I’d let you and her be and I will. But I don’t have to like you.”
“Fair enough,” Caleb answered and he hated it that Bish was still angry. He was hoping everything would work out completely. “But my only concern right now is your sister. Her safety is the most important thing to me.”
“I understand. I won’t stand in the way but don’t get in mine.”
Bish took one last look over at Jen, and she squirmed under his gaze, before leaving and heading to his room for bed. We all kind of stood in a lump of exhaustion and release. Caleb walked to me, took my hand to calm me and I sighed, laying my head to his shoulder at the release of tension.
“Well,” Dad spoke finally. “I guess it went well?” he asked.
I twisted my lips in thought. I wasn’t sure if ‘well’ was the right word.
“It went better than expected.”
“I’m glad. I’m glad you told him and that whole mess is done. Now we can focus on all this other stuff.”
That reminded me of Marla and her message to us at the club.
Caleb and I looked at each other in unison and thought the same thing.
Crap.
This was going to be a long night.
~ Sixteen ~
The next morning I was awakened by knocks on the door. I peeked up from the igloo of blankets we’d made last night and glared at the door. Peter and Dad had been furious last night when we explained about Marla’s little visit. They yelled, they chastised, they paced. They asked the same questions over multiple times.
How come we didn’t call them? How could we not tell them the second we got home? How could we be so calm?
I told them that Caleb and I had agreed to be more careful and would probably be leaving the beach house the following Monday, after the weekend gig and concert we had already planned. They thought we were nuts and insisted we leave that moment. We declined, advising them that we were in control of the situation. We were ascended and weren’t helpless.
That didn’t go over well and we were up, with Jen and Bish and Rachel as well on our case, forever. The hours ticked by and eventually, I stated I couldn’t stay awake another second and dragged Caleb with me to save him. Dad was spouting and sputtering as we left the room but I didn’t care anymore. I went and put on Caleb’s Death Cab for Cutie shirt and climbed into bed with him.
They wanted to treat us like adults, pretend like they were ok with us and everything that needed to be done with me being the Visionary but at the first sign of trouble, they baled on that and a parental takeover ensued.
Now, glaring at the door, I realized it was not our room door but the front door and someone was pretty angry. They weren’t using the doorbell and the knocks were becoming more insistent. A glance at the clock showed 6:45. What?
“Ah! Make it stop,” Caleb growled and pulled me to him back under the covers.
“I better get it. Everyone else is upstairs and can’t hear it.”
He huffed and pushed the blanket down, looking at me in a cute daze of annoyed sleepiness. His mind flashed with scenes of Marla and Marcus.
“No. I’ll get it. Stay put,” he slurred and climbed over me to the door.
“Ok,” I said, noticing he had no shirt on with his Vols fleece pants but figured that he didn’t remember or just didn’t care.
He opened the door and I saw through his mind it was Amber. She looked scared and had been crying.
“Hey…Amber, what’s up?” he asked, crossing his arms self-consciously.
“I…I’m…please, I just can’t….I…” she mumbled and wrung her hands.
Caleb was at a loss as to what to say to her as she shook and sobbed uncontrollably. I slipped from the bed and padded my way there. “Amber?” I asked and came around Caleb to see her, fully broken and in a state of hysteria. “Amber, what’s wrong?”
“Not you,” she insisted and backed away. “Anyone can help me but you?”
“What?” I asked, bristling as to why she didn’t want my help.
“Where’s Kyle?”
“He’s asleep, it’s really early.”
“Good. I can’t ever see him again.”
“Amber-” I started but was hit with a vision, her past.
I saw bits and pieces of her as a child in school being picked on for having glasses, then having no friends to sit with at lunch. That all changed in high school. I saw her standing at lockers, laughing with friends. She hated it all, pretending to be happy about anything they did. A guy pinched her behind on the way to the bathroom and inside she cringed and wanted to slap him, but on the outside she gave him a coy little smile and winked at him. It was her role in the play, her fake enthusiasm for being a puppet and popular and she hated it all.
Then she was talking to someone in her backyard. They had her pushed up against the backdoor, catching her coming home one night. I couldn’t see his face but he was big and brawny and he spoke harshly into her face.
“You will do this or I will kill every person you know. Understand?”
“Yes! Yes! Just stop, please.” She started sobbing. “Let me go.”
“We’ll be watching to make sure you do as we say. Get the blood and give it to us.”
“Ok, Ok, I’ll do it.”
“There’s a cottage on the beach by the pier; an old run down place behind the dunes. Leave the blood in the mailbox and then call this number.” He shoved a piece of paper into her jean front pocket. “Leave a message saying you’ve done your job.” He patted her cheek condescendingly and she squeaked and turned away. “And then, you’ll be free and never hear from us again, deal?”
“Yes,” she whispered.
He released her and she sank to the floorboards with a thud. I saw it all. They wanted her to get the blood of someone to them and he had shown her through the window her father and brother watching television. He had threatened them. He gave no names and I never saw his face but I saw whose blood they wanted.Mine.
From the first time she met me at the pier, they’d been after her. She had apparently gone home sometime that night she stayed with Kyle but came back after they cornered her on her back porch and took the napkin with my blood on it from the trash can. It all came together. The trash all over the floor, Kyle cleaning it up the next day, her strange behavior ever sense.
“Did you give it to them?” I asked softly and Caleb, seeing my thoughts, moved forward to my side, taking my arm.
“No,” he growled his hopes.
“I’m sorry, I had to,” she answered but I’d already seen her answer.
“It’s ok,” I assured her as she leaned on the doorframe in defeat.
I bit my lip and tried to remain calm. They had my blood, again. Marla had said Sikes was looking for a way to get more of my blood. And he found it by torturing people I barely knew. Was no one around me safe?
As my breaths accelerated the doorknob rattled beside us and Caleb rubbed my arm. My lungs reached for a ragged breath and I felt Caleb’s arms come around me, my face pressed into a warm wonderful smelling neck and a flood of calm all around me. He kissed my forehead and placed his palm on my cheek. I looked up to him and he shook his head a ‘no’ to me.
Nuhuh, you’re not doing this. You’re not gonna play martyr. I’m here and will keep you safe.
But everything is falling apart. I didn’t even know her and yet she was threatened; because of me.
We’ll figure it out. We’ll send her away somewhere for a while to keep her safe, just in case.
What about everything else, everyone else? Every time I think we might get a few minutes to breath something else happens. I don’t think I can do this.
Yes you can. Look at everything we’ve been through. We’re still here.
I shook my head, not knowing what else to say. I looked back to Amber when I heard a shuffle and saw she was turning to leave. Caleb’s hand whipped out and he gripped her wrist gently but quickly, with speed I’d never seen from him before. It was inhuman and it made me wonder but he never said anything to my internal wondering.
“Wait, Amber, come inside. We’ll help you.”
“How can you help me?” she asked as he pulled her inside and we all walked into the den.
“Do you have family you can stay with that‘s not here?”
“I have an aunt in Cincinnati.”
“Ok, great. I’ll make some calls and you can get your stuff and your family and get on a plane to go see her for a while, ok?”
She gave him a look that was as incredulous as it was stupefied.
“Why are you helping me after what I did?”
“You were protecting your family.” He looked back and me and squeezed my hand. “I know what that’s like.”
“I’m sorry, I am,” she pleaded,
“We know. Just sit tight for a bit. Go lay down, you’ll be safe here.”
She nodded and curled up in the chair like a child scared from a nightmare.
“What are we gonna do?” I asked a little hysterically after he shut the door. “That could’ve been anyone coming to get my blood, Sikes put the reward out and people are apparently coming to collect.”