Fading Amber (20 page)

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Authors: Jaime Reed

BOOK: Fading Amber
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Before he traveled too far, I tipped my head to the street. “The light's green.”
Ruiz let the car cruise along and stared out to the road ahead, but his thoughts were elsewhere. “I don't know what's worse, almost dying or having your spirit snatched from you. It's part of you; it's fused into every cell, every molecule. It grows up with you, feels everything with you. I fell into a depression and had to leave my position on the force when I couldn't feel him anymore, and it took years to function in normal society. I never felt so relieved and empty at once.”
“So it just left the body?” I leaned closer. “I thought they only left when their host dies.”
“I
did
die,” he clarified with a note of dread. “For three minutes and forty-six seconds. The doctors brought me back and they were amazed that I didn't suffer brain damage.”
“You
can
get rid of it?” I whispered, excitement charging through me. If there was a procedure to remove the spirit from the body without killing us, then I could go back to normal. I could revert to the original canon where I operated under my own decree. No more hungry stares from strangers, no more weird cravings, no more memories to store. No more Tobias. “There is a cure.”
“The risks are high, Samara. I know that this is new to you, but you have people around you who care about you and can offer support—Caleb most of all.”
“Yeah,” I mumbled, not allowing that little snag to ruin this new development.
I felt Ruiz watching me carefully, trying to follow the path of my thoughts. Not liking where they led, he cut the conversation short. “You should get some rest when you get home. We'll have a lot to deal with in the next few days.”
“Can you guarantee that Caleb and I won't get hurt if we help you find him?” I asked.
I could tell he was choosing his words carefully as he said, “The odds are higher than they are now.” And that was as close to a promise as I was going to get.
He pulled up to my house but kept the engine running. I opened the door then stopped to look at him. “You're not coming in?”
“I gotta get back. I know if I go in there I won't want to leave,” he replied.
I wasn't sure if he meant for me to see the raw rush of emotion, but I did and I couldn't despise him entirely, so I settled for mild contempt. He treated my mom pretty well, but there were still things that needed to be resolved, namely my mortality. And on a completely serious note, the idea of the Cuban Necktie as a future stepdad didn't sit well with me. I doubted it ever would.
“Do what you gotta do, man. I'll tell her you say hi,” I said as I got out of the car, but he called me back.
“Actually, tell her ‘
Estoy pensando en ti.
' ” He pronounced the words slowly enough for me to remember. “She'll know what it means.”
Three years of remedial Spanish taught me what the words meant, but I kept that fun fact to myself. I couldn't take handling someone else's mush—I had my own to stomach. So I nodded, closed the door, and trudged across the grass to my porch.
The house was quiet and blessedly free of chaos. I dropped my bag at the door and moved to the kitchen. I found Mom at the table, drinking her customary mug of tea.
“Hey, Mom.” I went to the fridge and went straight for the orange juice. Michael ate my breakfast and I needed a vitamin fix somethin' terrible.
“Hey sweetie. How was the party?”
I stopped. With everything going on, I'd completely forgotten about the party. I mean, come on, that was
so
last year. “It was cool. Mia got drunk and Dougie kissed her at midnight.”
“Aww, that's sweet. Do you think they made up?” she asked.
“Here's hopin'.” I saluted her, then drank the orange juice straight from the carton.
“Use a glass, Samara.” Mom sniggered in distaste then searched the entryway. “Where's David? Thought he would come inside with you.”
“Naw, he had to run back to the hotel. Cambion business.” I relayed his message, which made her blush and twirl her hair. “You really like him, don't you?”
She leaned back in the chair to ponder her answer. “Yeah. I think I do. He's sweet and so charming—a true gentleman. I just feel funny whenever he looks at me. You told me that the Cambion allure is through eye contact, right? Well, he's got it too, but without the ‘I wanna suck the life force out of you' part. So intense.”
“Yeah.” I didn't want to tell her about Ruiz's excommunication, so to speak. That was his story to tell and it was better if she heard it from him. But that wouldn't stop me from dishing the dirt to Caleb. I took the carton with me to my room, plopped on my bed, then called Caleb and did just that. He was rightfully surprised and threatened to tell Mom about the olive oil incident if I ever decided to get any bright ideas.
He filled me in on the latest news since I was gone. Michael told him that Tobias was hidden in a storage unit across town. Caleb didn't go into details, but he explained that no one could destroy it just yet, not until they knew Tobias was in his own vessel. Plus, the storage place was closed until tomorrow. There was only one problem: the unit was in Haden's name. We needed his security code, which was why Caleb's end of the call took place in the hospital waiting room.
Haden was still in bad shape and had to have a blood transfusion, but he was able to breathe on his own. The bullet was removed and it was a miracle it missed his lung. He was drugged up pretty heavy, so he kept going in and out of consciousness.
The call lasted for several hours while I caught up on work, recounted the love quarters in my coin jar, and discussed everything with him except our night together. That peculiar tension hung in the air, thick and solid enough to reach through the line and slap us both. Minutes would go by with neither of us saying a word and that was great. Sappy, but great. Corny as hell, but great. Caleb's rapidly dying cell phone battery was the only reason we hung up. After taking a long bath, Mom called me to come downstairs.
She was sitting in the kitchen exactly where I left her. She hadn't moved in five hours and the only difference was she had the phone in her hand and tears in her eyes. This was a bad sign. Either Dad was on the phone, or it was...
“Evangeline called,” Mom spoke before I could complete the thought.
Yep, that was my second guess. Knowing this would be a long, heavy talk, I stepped into the room and took a seat on the bar stool. “I take it you heard about Olivia.”
“Angie told me. My question is why you didn't.”
“I don't want you worrying.”
“I'm a parent. I'm supposed to worry,” she snapped and pushed away from the table. “That's it. I'm done! This whole thing with demons and energy feeding—all of it. I'm done! And you're grounded!”
I jumped back and almost fell off the stool. And she wondered why I didn't tell her anything. “What? What did I do?”
“Do you need a list? I don't want you involved in this. If that means I have to lock you in your room, so be it.”
“That's gonna be pretty hard since all this involves me. Not to sound full of myself, but I'm kind of a big deal. If you do put me on lockdown, Caleb could still get hurt and it'll affect me. You can't exactly ground him too.”
“I can sure as hell try, even if I have to call the police on him. You're too young for all this responsibility. You both are.” Her anger made it hard to tell whether or not she was bluffing, but I knew she was grasping at whatever control and reason that she could hold.
I kept my face blank, my nerve iron clad, but inwardly, panic gnawed at my flesh.
Going into lawyer mode, I said, “You could. Maybe the police can actually find a charge that will stick this time and lock Caleb up. But where would that leave us? Caleb would be surrounded by criminals that could hurt him, and I'll feel his pain and loneliness. I'll go through withdrawal and possibly hurt innocent people to get the energy only he can provide. I know you're scared and want to protect me, but that's not a good way to go about it. As angry as you are, you care about Caleb, too.”
Mom leaned back in her chair, crumbling into herself and weighing her options. She looked so wounded and forlorn, like all hope in the world was lost. “What about you and Tobias? Can he be killed now that he's, well, disembodied? Will it still hurt you if he dies?”
“We're working on that,” I dismissed, not wanting to lie more than I had to. The truth was I still didn't know how my bond with Caleb would affect Tobias, and I wasn't going to tell Mom about that part. There were some things you just didn't do and discussing your sex life with the folks was on top of the list. “We need to focus on finding Olivia first. Angie is going crazy.”
“Yeah. She said that they found her bracelet but she's still missing. Tobias must've removed it.”
I shut my eyes and held back a curse. “I knew it. But Cambions have a connection with all of their children. Angie will be able to find her. Might take longer, but there's no need to give up hope now,” I assured, but the doubt crept in anyway.
“I don't want the same thing to happen to you, baby.”
“I don't want that either, but that's my life now. And there are some things that are gonna suck real hard, but I gotta be a big girl and handle it.”
The bad part was that that policy went for Lilith as well. I thought of Ruiz's story, and as tempting as it was, it wasn't worth risking my life again. I had Caleb to think about now and he mattered more to me than revenge.
Speaking of Lilith, she seemed agitated all of a sudden. She had been lying low all day, virtually purring in the afterglow of the bonding, but now she had perked up in alarm. There was a presence nearby, someone she knew, someone she was connected to. Whoever it was, they were scared.
Before I could concentrate on the sensation, there was a knock on the door. It was a soft, weak tap, but I heard it all the same. I looked at Mom and she slowly rose and moved to the counter. She gave me a curt nod then pulled a knife from the rack. With Mom right behind me, I went to the door and pressed my back against the wood. “Who's there?”
“Olivia,” a small voice answered from outside, then broke into a sob.
Mom and I looked at each other with wide eyes. I touched the knob but Mom stopped me.
“Are you alone?” Mom asked.
“Yes. Please help me.”
“Where's Gunner?” I asked.
More crying came from outside and then, “
Prosze, wpu
mnie.”
Okay, so Mom was paranoid on a good day and more so due to recent events, so I didn't find it odd at all that she greeted our guest at the door with a butcher knife pointed in her face. When Mom saw that it really was Olivia, she pulled her by the arm and dragged her inside and closed the door behind her.
Olivia stumbled into the foyer, and I got a good look at her. She was still wearing her black party dress. Dirt and scratches tracked her bare feet, legs and arms. Leaves and dirt tangled in her ratty hair. She trembled in the middle of the foyer, hugging her waist. She must've been freezing and I wondered how long she'd been walking in the cold.

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