Finding Eden(23)

"You guys never showed," Xander said, his jaw tensing and a look of pain washing over his features. "I went back the next day, too, and I sat there and waited for you. I thought maybe it had taken you a little extra time and I didn't want to miss you. But when I realized you hadn't been able to get out of there, I knew something had gone wrong. I just had no idea . . ." He shook his head slowly as if denying his own memories. When he looked over at me, there was anguish in his expression. "I waited for Kristi and she drove me out there the very next morning—I didn't know, I had no idea. I'm so sorry." His voice caught on the last word and his expression was filled with so much pain and regret.

"Xander," I said, reaching my hand out to him. He grasped my hand in his, squeezing it tightly. "None of us knew how crazy Hector had gotten." I shook my head. "You couldn't have known. And honestly, if you had shown up any earlier, you may have very well been among all those people. You showed up to save Calder. That's what matters now."

He looked at me again, so much agony in his expression. I could see in his eyes that he carried the weight of every "what if" scenario imaginable on his back. And no one's back was strong enough to withstand that type of weight. Xander had broken just a little bit. But Acadia had broken all of us in ways both big and small.

I had left him there. I couldn't even let myself go there in my mind. At least not right then.

"How?" I took a deep breath, "How did he survive?" I asked quietly, the last word coming out on a squeak and causing Xander to glance over at me worriedly before looking back at the road.

"The cell he was in. I know you'd never been in there, and I hadn't either, but Calder described it to me as a little cement box, solid. Some water flooded in, but there was a drain in the floor and that kept it low—thankfully—because he was mostly passed out. He doesn't remember much. And of course, he hates himself for that. There's not a lot Calder doesn't hate himself for."

Xander was quiet for a minute and another tear slipped down my cheek.

"The whole thing collapsed, Eden, you know that. Flattened. When I got there, the water had receded, but there were body parts sticking up from the rubble and just . . ." He grimaced. "It looked like the depths of hell," he finished quietly. I recalled the lifeless, bloated bodies floating in the cellar. The images had haunted me for three long years. I wasn't sure they'd ever go away.

"It was," I said. "That's exactly what it was."

He squeezed my hand again, but kept looking straight ahead. "It looked hopeless. But then I heard this very small banging and I followed the sound. I pulled as much debris away as I could and there he was, half dead, shot, bloody, swollen, beaten, air-deprived, in shock, but alive, sitting in the corner where the drain was, a space barely big enough for his body. It was like a fucking miracle. He was banging a small piece of concrete against the floor, over and over again. He was mostly out of it, mumbling about springs and Elysium and you, and Mother Willa."

He lapsed into silence as we turned on to my street.

"We got him out of there and back to Kristi's friend's house. Kristi even delayed her move to help us and make sure we were okay." He paused, staring off behind me. "I was so scared of the police. After Clive . . . but now, if I had called them . . . if you had seen Calder on TV, this would have been different." He shook his head. "Kristi tried to convince me, but I wouldn't listen and Calder begged us not to, too, once he was coherent. There was so much we didn't understand then, so much that terrified us."

"Xander, I didn't call the police either. I still haven't called the police even though my mom . . . well that's another story, but, I know. I know."

He nodded and pulled behind Molly into my mom's driveway.

"He's still out there," he said.

I bit my lip. "I know." I opened my mouth to go on, but my mom swung my door open and offered me her hand, putting an umbrella over us and practically pulling me out of there. It seemed she'd been watching for us to return home. Molly must have called her from the car.

We ran through the rain into the house and after we'd dried off with a towel, Xander and I sat in the living room drinking hot tea instead of the shots we had talked about. Suddenly, I was chilled to the bone. I felt like I'd never get warm. But somewhere underneath the shock and the sadness that both our lives were so different now, there was a current of wild joy that ran through my bloodstream.

He was alive.

My mom introduced herself to Xander, but then Molly, thankfully, pulled her away so that Xander and I could talk.