A Radiant Sky (5 page)

The search turned up eleven Aaron Wards in Colorado, which seemed like the best and most likely place to start. But how to narrow it down?

I’d been getting better at controlling my visions, when they struck. Could I make one happen on purpose? What if I could use one to figure out where in Colorado Aaron Ward was living?

I printed out the page and folded it into the pocket of my jeans. I still had half an hour until the bell and needed to go someplace private, someplace where I could have complete concentration and focus. Someplace where I could use my angelic powers, and still be back in time for class.

Out of the corner of my eye, I could see Blond Pixie still watching me. I couldn’t let her think I was up to something. I walked slowly to the library door—but once I was through it, I ran like lightning to the staircase that led to the roof.

The air was heavy; it was about to rain some serious spring showers if I didn’t act soon.

Did you forget you can control the weather?
I reminded myself.

That bought me a little more time. I propped the door open with a brick and walked around to the side of the entrance. The ledge where Asher stood with his back to
me, the place where Devin first showed me his wings, the water tower that I accidentally burst in a fit of uncontrollable power—everything about this roof held a special, supernatural memory for me.

If anyplace had the right energy to help me see the future, this was it.

I dropped my bag to the ground and sat cross-legged under the water tower.

Putting my hands in my lap, I closed my eyes and concentrated on an image—the photograph of Aunt Jo and Aaron. A stolen moment captured on film.

Thunder rumbled above me, but I didn’t want to break concentration to stop it. I let the mercurial silver slip through me, filling me with a bright, glowing energy. On the backs of my eyelids, my vision went cloudy. And then, as the edges of my sight began to take shape, to shift into clarity, I began to see things. A house. It looked a little unkempt, with paint chipping off the railings on the porch, window frames that looked like they needed replacing. It was shabby and worn, and not in the cozy, homey way. In a way that signified neglect. That made me think the owner no longer cared.

The image in front of me shifted, and I saw a girl sitting on the bottom step. She looked about six or seven, with
light brown hair that was pulled up in two messy pigtails. Her chin rested in her hand, her elbow propped up on her knee, and she sighed a bored, comically dramatic sigh. I had an urge to toss her a book or something.

I heard the noise at the same time she did. The bushes along the side of the yard rustled. The girl’s head snapped up, scared. And my own heart pounded. Because I had seen what the girl hadn’t. A flash of white, between the leaves.

The wing of a Guardian.

“Look out!” I tried to yell to her, before realizing it was pointless to call out to a vision of the future. Besides, my visions never worked like that. I couldn’t interact with them. I could never change what was happening. All I could do was watch. Helplessly.

An engine roared in the driveway and the girl jumped to her feet.

“Dad!” she called. And then a man swooped into my sight. He put a brown paper takeout bag down on the porch steps, and lifted her up in his arms. She looked a tad too heavy and a bit too old to be held like that, but the way the man’s eyes darted protectively around the yard—lingering on the bushes where I’d seen the white wings—made me think he’d do anything to keep his daughter safe.

He turned to face me, and I caught my breath. His hair
was dark, a perfect tangle of waves that fell into his slate gray eyes. Eyes that were locked directly with mine. For a brief moment, my heart stopped.
Can he see me?

But as quickly as the thought popped into my head, I realized it was impossible. There was no way. His gaze shot straight through me, to something moving through the trees. He tracked it with his eyes until he must have felt satisfied that it was moving away.

“What did I tell you about waiting outside?” he said. I could tell he was trying to sound tough, mask the fear in his voice. “Come on, let’s go in.” When they got to the front door, he looked behind him one more time.

Something was out there.

Then he and the little girl disappeared into the house.

The edges of the picture dissolved into static, and I opened my eyes to find myself back on the roof of the school. Thunder cracked, but I held up my hand to silence it, and the sky went quiet. The clouds whispered away into nothingness.

That was him—Aaron Ward. It was the same guy from the picture. He had the same dark hair, the same Rebel attitude gleaming from his eyes. And he was definitely being watched by the Order.

I tried to pick out distinguishing features, to figure out which of the Aaron Wards I’d found on the white pages
matched this one. The house and the neighborhood looked run-down, but they could have been from any number of run-down neighborhoods in the area. The number on the mailbox was obscured by bushes. There weren’t too many clues, other than the man, the little girl, and . . .

The takeout bag! It had writing on the side, and I closed my eyes again and tried to pull back the memory of what it said. He’d been carrying it, put it down on the front steps. I’d been more focused on the two of them than I’d been on the brown paper bag, but I focused hard and tried to remember what the writing had said. The letters were small, but a T and an R jumped out at me.

Could it be
Tabula Rasa
? That was the name of a café that Aunt Jo and I had stopped into once on our way home from Denver. It was about two hours west of River Springs, in a town called Rocky Pines.

My heart in my throat, I took the folded-up printout from the white pages out of my pocket and opened it.

Third from the top:

Aaron Ward, 144 Sycamore Street, Rocky Pines, CO.

There was a phone number listed next to it. I took out my cell phone and dialed. The phone rang a couple of times, and then a little girl’s voice picked up.

“Hi, you’ve reached the Wards. We’re not here right
now . . .” In background, I heard a man’s voice prompt:

“But if you leave a message . . .”

“Oh, right. But if you leave a message,” she continued, “we’ll call you back!”

I opened my mouth to leave a message, but thought better of it and hung up quickly. What exactly was I planning to say?

As I stood up and slung my bag over my shoulder, a thought suddenly occurred to me. What if the girl had a mom? How could I not have thought of it before? What if Aaron Ward had a whole new family out in Rocky Pines, and was perfectly happy to never see Aunt Jo again?

What if he didn’t want to come back?

Below me, the bell rang for the end of the period. That meant I had ten minutes until the next one began. I had the whole rest of the day to figure out what to do about Aaron. I didn’t have to have an answer right now.

I kicked the brick aside and let the door close behind me, then snuck back down the stairs and into the crowded hallway.

Someone grabbed me from behind.

By instinct, I elbowed them in the stomach and turned around.

“Jeez,” Ian panted. “I was going to tell you to watch your
back, but it looks like I didn’t need to warn you after all.”

“Sorry!” I cried. “Are you okay?”

“You might have broken a rib. Other than that, some wounded pride maybe. Nothing a little flattery won’t fix.”

“Your freckles are looking especially handsome today, Ian.”

“That’s a good start.”

“How about this? I think I know where Aaron Ward is. Will you come with me to find him?”

Ian batted his eyelashes. “Li’l old me?”

“I haven’t asked anyone else. Not even Cassie.”

Ian grinned. “Okay, my pride has totally healed. I’ll definitely come.”

“You’re the best!”

“Hey,” Ian said, his face growing serious. “Speaking of that, can I talk to you for a second?”

I glanced at the clock. “I’m going to be late for—”

“Just a minute.”

“Okay,” I said. “What’s up?”

“It was driving me crazy all night. The name James Harrison—it sounded so familiar. I thought he was a politician. A president or something.”

“I think you’re thinking of James Madison,” I said.

“Yeah, I realized that. I was racking my brain. Finally
when I got home, I asked my mom if maybe he was an old doctor or a family friend or something.”

I paused. Suddenly, my heart was pounding.

“What did she say?” I asked.

Ian took a deep breath and met my gaze.

“He was my dad.”

5

“W
hat?”

The white noise of the hallway was ringing in my ears.

“That was my dad’s name,” Ian said. “He left, you know. I don’t know if I ever told you. I had just turned seven. The timing works.” No, he had never told me. And he knew it.

“How come you never said anything?”

“Look, the third Rogue you’re looking for—that could be my dad.”

Ian never talked about his family. I knew he lived with his mom, but he never talked about her. We hadn’t been friends since kindergarten like me, Cassie, and Dan. We’d all started at Northwood freshman year, and he and Dan had become buddies through track. We’d been to his house
a couple of times, but mostly we all congregated at mine.

“I—I didn’t know that,” I said. “I guess I—”

“Don’t worry about it,” Ian cut me off quickly. “I just thought you would want to know, in case it helps.”

I hesitated before asking the next question. “Ian,” I said. “You know this means . . . that you could be part . . .” I wasn’t sure how to finish the sentence. How do you just blurt out to someone who has spent his whole life thinking he was just a normal human that he . . . well . . . might
not
be?

Asher and Devin did the same to you
, I reminded myself.
And look how it changed your life forever.

“I know what it means,” he said quietly. He looked up at me and smiled grimly. “I gotta get to class.”

Before I could say anything else, he started to walk away.

“Ian!”

“What?” He turned around.

“You’d be okay if . . . we looked for him? If we found your dad?”

The look on his face was hard to read. “I kind of have to be, huh?” he said. “I’m not going to get in the way of your plan.”

I caught up to him and threw my arm around his neck. “Thank you. You really have no idea how much this means to me.”

“No problem, Skye. It’s cool.”

I narrowed my eyes, again wondering if he was telling the truth. But he just patted me on the back and dashed off down the hall.

“So, after school?” I called.

“I’m working at the Bean,” he shot over his shoulder. “Tomorrow?”

I nodded as he ran off, but I couldn’t help feeling uncomfortable.

First Aunt Jo’s ex-fiancé, then Ian’s dad. Two guys with a
lot
of unfinished business back in River Springs. And why River Springs? What was it about this place that drew my parents, that seemed to draw so much angelic activity? My heart fell into my stomach. I had my work cut out for me—getting these guys back to town was going to be harder than I realized.

What if the universe didn’t want me to bring these three powerful Rogues back together, after all?

I was so lost in thought that I didn’t pay attention to where I was going, and knocked into someone on my way to class. When I looked up, I was staring right at Devin.

“Oh,” I said. He looked down, and our eyes met. His were blue pools of light. Like Raven, the frosted layer of ice that usually shut him off from me, from the world, had
all but melted. And when he looked at me, I could see the confusion that he felt, too.

“Skye,” he said. “Hey.”

He seemed so uncharacteristically at ease, so comfortable in his own skin. He looked radiant, his face glowing and warm, his hair even blonder. He wore a plaid button-down flannel and khaki-colored work pants that hung off his hips. Such a contrast to Asher’s olive skin and dark hair, thermals and jeans, boots and beat-up army jackets. Everything about Devin now exuded light.