“I know of one other place where the Vampires are underground. I can help with that. I’ll show it to you on a map.”
The other stuff, well, it made my head spin. They were really going to need a lot of help. Guilt ate at my stomach. When I left to be with Jason, they were going to be a man down.
“It would be more useful if you could show us, considering none of us have your Vampire radar.”
He pointed at my cheek, which made Chad rub it again. This time I did push his hand away.
“I get it. The mark is ugly. It makes me look strange. Feel free to take back all the things you said earlier.”
Chad’s eyes got huge. “That’s not why…”
I interrupted, looking at Keith. “I have four days to get to where I’m going. It’s going to take me twenty-four hours to make the trip, at least. That means if we’re going, we need to go tonight. Can you be ready?”
“What’s going on in here?”
We all turned but only I knew the sound of that voice. Deacon. He grinned as he saw me and walked into the room like he owned it. For someone else, it might be odd to simply stroll into this situation but Deacon struck me as the kind of person who went where he wanted. Well, at least when he wasn’t stuck in a cage.
Patrick looked at us. “Who is this?”
I moved over to Deacon. “This is Deacon Evans. He and I rescued the humans trapped with the Vampires together.”
“And I had to see for myself that they’d finally freed you.”
Deacon spoke to me as if we were the only two in the room. As he stared in my eyes, my treacherous heart sped up. First Chad and now Deacon. I had to get out of the habitats and back to Jason as soon as possible.
Deacon went on. “If they hadn’t gotten you out, I was going in myself.”
Keith stood up. “We need to get the boy tested. I would bet you he has the gene.”
Patrick nodded. “I’d agree. I’m usually pretty good at telling if an untested person is going to turn out positive.”
Chad stepped forward. “It’s your sixth sense. You were born to find Warriors.”
Deacon’s eyes left mine as he looked at the people in room and then back at me. “What are they talking about?”
“They’re speculating that you’re one of us. A Warrior.”
“How could they possibly know that?”
I looked at the group in Icahn’s office with us. “Why don’t you ask them? I’m not really good at this kind of thing.”
Chad walked forward and stood across from Deacon. I wasn’t sure, but I really felt like they were having some sort of unspoken communication, sizing each other up or something. I’d never been popular. I’d never even been on a date, and now they both wanted to steal me from the one guy who had ever shown the least bit of interest in me.
Where were they when I was single and available?
“Is this guy your boyfriend? The reason I can’t hold your hand.” Deacon nodded toward Chad.
“No, he’s not.”
Keith interrupted. “Rachel, we need to talk about this before you go back to the wolf. It’s really not a good idea.”
Deacon’s eyes got huge. “You’re dating a Werewolf? Are you crazy? They’re the sneakiest of the monsters. The Vampires are at least straightforward but the Werewolves, man, they’d tell us one thing and then—boom—they’d betray us. You can’t trust a wolf to keep his word.”
“Stop it.” I was so angry. Not one of them knew Jason. Not one of them had the right to continue to talk about him like they did. Even listening to them made me feel disloyal.
“Rachel, I think everyone is concerned.”
“I get it, okay?” I tried to stay calm even as the tears that rushed down my cheeks betrayed me. Why did I have to be a crier? Why couldn’t I keep it together all the time? “I get that you all have an opinion. If I was standing in your shoes I’d feel the same. But I’ve felt his soul. You haven’t, so you don’t get to judge, you don’t get to decide. My father, my only real legal guardian, is gone off to wherever he went. Unless you’re prepared to find some sort of social services in the midst of all this mess to come and lock me up again, I’m going to suggest you get out my way before I flip out.” I sniffed. “I’m going to find Tia. Then I’m leaving. If you want me to show you where I felt the Vampires, be ready then.”
Patrick answered me. “We’ll be ready, sweetheart. Tia is at the house being guarded by her mother. She thought she should be allowed to fight too, but she’s not sixteen yet.”
Oh God, he’d used an endearment. Now I felt about two feet tall and like a child who’d just had a temper tantrum. Keeping my head down, I walked from the room fast.
A large crowd had gathered outside the Icahn hallway. They stood, silent, like they were waiting for someone to come out and tell them what was going on. As I approached, a hush came over them. Most people looked pretty battered. If they were here and not being rounded up, that meant they had been on our side and just finished a small revolution.
Violence was never easy, even when you were on the right side.
Up at the front of the crowd was a face I recognized immediately. I stepped toward him and smiled. Frankly, I was shocked to see him there.
“Teddy?” What was my lawyer doing here?
He grinned, and I saw he was missing a tooth. “Rachel, I’m so glad to see you. I went to the cell and I saw, well, the man dead. I feared the worst had happened to you.”
“I didn’t kill him.” It felt important to say that. “Um, did you fight? Were you part of all of this?”
Keith had said the non-Warrior humans had hidden at home.
“Yes.” He grinned again. “It felt good to help out. I’m not a Warrior, but I can throw a punch as well as anyone else. I let the Warriors handle the big stuff. I’d like to think I did my part.”
I pointed at his mouth. “You’ll need to find someone to fix your tooth situation.”
“I know.” He rubbed at his mouth. “You were right. No one in the Warrior town was anything but nice to me.”
“We get a bad reputation.”
He raised an eyebrow. “Maybe because you start revolutions and uncover hidden agendas of world leaders.”
“That must be it.” It still felt like the crowd was staring at me. “Why are they all looking at me like that?”
I felt like covering up my scar with my hand so all the eyes that bore into me couldn’t see it. Instead, I stuck my hands in my pockets. The scar was there. Eventually they would all see it. I had to learn to live with it. I couldn’t be one of those women who got rounded shoulders because I spent the whole of my life with my head hidden from view.
Besides, I was leaving here. What did I care what they all thought?
“You don’t know why they’re staring at you? Um, because you’re the girl Icahn tried to kill who came back from the dead and prompted a Warrior revolution. You’re pretty special, kiddo.”
“I’m not, Teddy.”
I’m really not.
***
I managed to get to Tia’s house, although the journey was a little bit like walking through a war-zone, which I supposed, it kind of was. Stepping over bodies, which I couldn’t bring myself to look at, broken weapons, and downed street signs, I could really see that most of the fighting had happened right here. It wasn’t surprising. It had been Warrior fighting Warrior.
And even if I hadn’t really caused it, I still kind of felt like I had. How was I going to live with this?
I closed my eyes as I knocked on the door. I had to do a better job of controlling my emotions or Tia would see my pain immediately. Then she would try to comfort me, and I was sure there was no way anybody could make this okay. It was better to not have the conversation at all.
So much destruction…
“Rachel!” In seconds, Carol Lyons swung open the door and pulled me into a hug that knocked the wind out my lungs.
I closed my eyes and let her hold me. Up until recently, she was the
only one who ever did. That was before all the boys had gone nuts.
Still, this was different. This was mothering, and even if she wasn’t mine she was the closest I ever got.
“We thought we’d lost you.” Her voice was a whisper. “And it was like I’d lost my own daughter.”
I pulled back to look at her. “What?”
“Patrick never let me tell you, because it always came to naught, but I petitioned every year to have you move in here with us. I took care of you as a baby, until Tia was born, and then my sister did it. We love you.”
“I’m, um…” My throat was tight. It was easy to cry when things made me mad or someone didn’t understand me. Now, however, in this moment when Carol was saying things I’d always wanted to hear, I could find the words to speak or the tears to show her what she meant to me. “I couldn’t have gotten through any my life without you. Without all of you. I’m sorry what happened to me made you all worry or caused you any grief.”
“Rachel,” the shriek from around the corner could only be Tia. Carol let me go as Tia slid into me with such force we both toppled into the hall.
My best friend since birth wept in my arms as we both sank to the floor. “Don’t you ever-ever-ever do that to me again. Do you understand?”
Her words were muddled, but I made them out fine. “I’m sorry.”
“It’s not your fault. It’s not like you asked for any of this.” She wiped her tears on her sleeve as she let go of me. We sat side-by-side against the hallway wall. “I could kill Dad for letting you go up there like that. He should have sent Micah and Chad after you earlier.”
“It’s not his fault. No one knew what would happen, and I highly doubt anyone was prepared for this turn of events.”
“I wanted to go up and get you. I tried to go with the boys but they wouldn’t let me. The jerks.”
“Oh, Tia.” I closed my eyes for a second before I opened them. “In some ways, it’s so beautiful up there, but I wish you never have to go. Ever.”
“Tell me what happened to you.”
So I did. Leaving out nothing. From the moment I left until the moment I walked through her door, I told her every small detail of my adventure. At some point, Carol joined us, sliding down onto the floor leaving only when one of the younger children needed her and then immediately coming back.
When I was finished, they both stared at me in silence.
Tia cleared her throat. “Let me get this straight. We just got you back and now you are leaving. Tonight. To go be with a Werewolf that you are in love with?”
I nodded. “When you put it like that…”
She interrupted me. “How is there any other way to put it?”
Carol sighed. “Tia, Rachel has to be allowed to live her life and make her choices. Even if we happen to think those are not the ones we would make for her.”
I looked at Carol, tapping my leg with my hand. “What choices would you have me make?”
I’d never actually had an adult tell me before. They always tell you what you shouldn’t do. But what you should do, they never told you that.
She laughed. “Why fall in love with Chad, of course, and move next door in four years when you get married. Have lots of babies and help us rebuild society while never ever seeing another dead body again.”
Tia narrowed her eyes at her mom. “What world do you live in? Doesn’t sound like one I know.”
They looked so much alike it was scary. Same honey-brown hair, same eyes. If I wanted to imagine what Tia would look like in thirty years, I took a look at Carol.
“Exactly. It’s a fantasy. Even if you could give up the Werewolf and love Chad, it wouldn’t end up like that.”
I liked her version. I really, really did and that made me feel badly about Jason. It felt like my heart turned over in my chest. There was so much wrong with me, and apparently I could add to that list an ability to be completely faithless in my heart for brief moments to my boyfriend.
It’s okay; you’ll make it up to him when you see him. When you get to Jason, this moment will be undone.
Tia wasn’t finished yet. “So if what you want for her is impossible, what do you want for her that’s possible? Help me out here, Mom.”
“I guess I want Rachel to live a wonderful life doing whatever she desires no further than ten minutes away from me.”
Tia raised her hand. “I’ll second that!”
I laughed. I always did when I was with them. This moment right here in the hall, and all of them like it, they were so easy for me. I wish I’d been born into this family so I could have stayed and been part of it. But I wasn’t.
And that’s why it was okay for me to leave.
I needed to make my own dreams and my own family.
In four years, I hoped I would be married. To Jason.
“So,” I sniffed looking at Tia, “what’s new with you?”
“You know the usual.”
Something about that was so funny that we both laughed uncontrollably. Carol rolled her eyes and got up to make dinner. I hadn’t eaten in a long time, and dinner did sound fantastic.
When we finished laughing, we cried.
I couldn’t explain the tears any better than I could the laughter. They were what they were. When I was around Tia, we did things like that. I guess it was fair to say that when I was with her I really felt sixteen.
Her mother poked her head around the corner of the kitchen. “You know, ladies, I was reading in that handbook on the Before Time that it used to be that girls your age didn’t talk about marriage until you were thirty, at least.”
Tia stood up. “Are you suggesting we wait?”
“I’m not getting married,” I supplied. “I’m just going to live with them.”
“I’m not suggesting anything, Tia.” Her mother smiled at me. “I think it might, however, be okay it Rachel waited two more years to make any life altering decisions.”
Except it wasn’t.
Because they were leaving in four days, and I had to be with him.
Chapter Nineteen
We walked through the cold night together. It was nice to have the company of Keith, Patrick, and, surprisingly, Deacon, with me. Keith had thought Deacon’s in-depth knowledge of the underground Vampire lairs could come in handy. Chad had objected, but he’d been left behind to help handle things. Someone still had to go up in Icahn’s elevator and see where it led. We weren’t going to be fighting; it was more important for him to stay behind.
We needed to scout. Then I needed to leave.
Whether they liked it or not.
“So let me get this straight”—Deacon shook his head—”If I test positive for this— what is it called?”
“Gene,” I answered for him.
We were walking four in a line. Patrick and Keith on both sides, flanking us as if they could keep the monsters at bay. I didn’t need them to do that, and I didn’t think Deacon did either. We’d taken on a Vampire lair all by ourselves. Still, I kept quiet. I wasn’t going to turn away help or someone wanting to keep the bad guys away. I’d have to be crazy to say no and I wasn’t. At least I hoped I wasn’t.
Deacon continued. “Then I have no choice but to go and fight the monsters? That’s it? That’s my whole future.”
Patrick sighed. “This is the life we have to live right now. Truth is, I don’t know what’s going to happen now. Icahn made the Warrior program while at the same time leading the monsters. I don’t know what to think of anything. We were supposed to be keeping humanity alive.”
“Not to sound selfish about this, but I’d like to focus on me for the moment.”
Patrick gave him a sideways glance. “Okay.”
“I just got out of an existence were I was always locked up and controlled by the monsters. Even when we weren’t in cages, we were always monitored by one of the Werewolves. After nearly dying, I don’t think I want to enter another cage. I’m not saying I don’t want to help. I’m happy to. On my own terms.”
br /> I laughed. I couldn’t help it. “Lucky you weren’t here as a baby. I don’t recall anyone asking me at two days old if I wanted that particular blood test or not.”
He looked at Patrick. “You take them as babies?”
Patrick was silent, and I wondered if he would answer. All I could hear was the slight sound of our feet on the snow-covered ground or the occasional movement of an animal in the distance. My monster-radar was not going off.
“Dr. Icahn set up the system. All children are tested at two days old. It's mandated. If a parent resists, they go to jail and their child is still tested.”
Well. What was there really to say about that? Nothing apparently, because we all stayed silent for another few minutes. Eventually, Deacon took my hand. I pulled it away, staring at him in the darkness.
“I’m not going to not hold your hand because you’re with a Werewolf.” He shook his head. “I’m just not.”
“That’s not for you to say. He’s my boyfriend. I’m his. You don’t have to understand it.”
“Oh no?” He laughed. “Ever seen a human try to get it on with a Werewolf?”
“Ah, no.” And my cheeks heated up at the thought. I was so uncomfortable talking about sex and never more so than when I was around adults. Keith and Patrick qualified for that adult category.
“Obviously not.” He rolled his eyes. “They shift during sex. Did you know that? It’s horrible for the poor human involved. Some of the women don’t survive it.”
“I can’t believe that’s true. No. Jason’s mother was human.”
“Maybe she liked it a little…”
Keith cut him off. “Deacon, don’t be crude. Whatever you’re going to say, watch your language. Rachel is a lady.”
“A lady who took down a Vampire holding facility all by herself.”
Keith and Patrick both grinned at me. I had a little bit of pride about it. Of course, it was much less impressive than it sounded. They’d been pretty pathetic Vampires.
I rolled my eyes at Deacon. “Not by myself. You helped me.”