Lie to Me (A Touched Trilogy) (9 page)

BOOK: Lie to Me (A Touched Trilogy)
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Turning the corner was all it took to bring back reality.
Under the streetlight, Dylan leaned against the hood of my car, Lily standing
before him, his hand clutched between hers. She was working her magic.

Dylan’s face was devoid of pain, relief sagging his
shoulders. Lily, though, was beyond pale. Even from three houses down I could
see her shaking, the grey tinge to her complexion.

“Lily!” I cried out, rushing forward, Nathan forgotten as I
watched my sister crumple. Dylan tried to hold her up, but the drinks he’d
consumed showed in his lack of balance, and she hit the grass lining the
roadway.

I reached her side as she struggled to sit up. I sank to my
knees and lifted her head, cradling her in my arms. “Lils? Are you okay?”

She cleared her throat, somehow managing to look deathly ill
and mortified at the same time. “I’m alright. Just help me up.”

Nathan took one of her arms, helping me get her on her feet.
She pressed into the side of the car.

“Hold her up,” I told him and let go of her arm to take my
keys from my pocket. Once the doors were unlocked, Nathan helped her into the
back, while Dylan managed to get in on the other side, smiling and giving the
occasional drunken giggle, having turned into a happy drunk. I wanted to shove
my fist in his face, but then Lily would feel the need to heal him again.

I started the car and Taylor Swift’s voice filled the small
space at an ear-splitting volume. Three cringing faces glared at me and I
fumbled with the control until it was blessedly silent, making a mental note to
avoid that station from now one.

“He’s gotta get his hand checked out. It looks pretty bad,”
Nathan said, gesturing back to Dylan. I nodded and put the car in drive and
pulled out, heading for the hospital.

“Hey, you’re going the wrong way,” Dylan complained after a
few blocks. “I live the other way.”

“I’m not going the wrong way, because I’m not taking your
stupid ass home,” I said. “This is the way to the hospital.”

“I don’t need to go to the hospital. I’m fine.” He waved his
hand through the gap between the seats practically shoving it in my face. I caught
a glimpse of his mangled fingers and nearly puked.

“Dude, your hand’s broken.” Nathan stared at the crooked
digits in fascinated horror. He glanced at me and whispered, “He must be in
shock.”

“Nope, Lils here just fixed me up. Right, babe?” He tried to
wrap an arm around her, but she sat squished up against the door as far from
him as possible, her eyes already closed in a deep sleep. I was surprised she’d
lasted even that long. Her reactions to healing were erratic. Sometimes she
seemed to be uplifted and energized and then there were times like this - when
her body was almost drained of life. She’d probably sleep straight through till
morning. I had no idea how I’d get her inside without Nanna or Dad noticing.

Nathan twisted in his seat to check on her. “You sure she’s
okay? Maybe she should get checked out, too.”

“She’s fine, just dandy,” Dylan said with a slur. When he
saw Nathan’s doubtful look, he laughed. “Don’t tell me you don’t know?”

“Know what?”

My hands tightened on the steering wheel. “Shut up, Dylan.”

“Oh, no way.” He laughed again. “This is too good. How could
you live here for this long and not know about the freaky Matlins?”

“Shut the hell up, or you’ll walk to the hospital.” I forced
the words through clenched teeth. That Nathan didn’t know about us was one of
the things I liked about him.

“I already told you to take me home.” Dylan shot me a dirty
look and leaned between the seats so he could talk to Nathan easier. “Ever
since kindergarten they’ve done weird shit - well at least Lily and Chloe did.
Phoebe’s only one of them ‘cause she’s just plain freaky.”

Nathan gave me a smile. He didn’t seem to be taking it
seriously, but still, I didn’t want Dylan to tell Nathan anything else, not
when I was just getting a shot with him.

“Weird, huh? Like what? Voodoo stuff?” He cocked an eyebrow
at Dylan, clearly trying to play along with what I hoped he saw as Dylan’s
drunken ramblings.

“No man, like Chloe can see the future and shit. She told
Andrew once that his dog was gonna get hit by a car and POW! Two days later the
dog’s dead.”

“You’d think he would’ve put the thing on a leash.” Eyes
rolling, he obviously didn’t believe anything Dylan said.

“Whatever. Now, Lily...” He reached over and stroked her
cheek with his unbroken hand. “She’s a healer. She can heal people. Like she
did with me tonight.”

“Yeah, have you looked at your hand, bro? It’s still looking
broken.”

“But I ain’t feeling it. I ain’t feeling it.” He waved the
hand in front of Nathan’s face to prove his point. “That’s how she works. I’m
tellin’ ya, a freaky Matlin.” He opened his mouth to say something else, but
was cut off when I slammed on the breaks and he jerked forward, smacking his
face into the back of Nathan’s seat.

“Get out.” The trembling in my hands transferred to my
voice.

“What the hell, Phoebe?” Dylan rubbed the pink spot on his
head from where he’d banged it.

“I said get out of my car, asswipe. My sister may not know
what a prick you are, but I do. Get out.”

“Come on, Phoebe. I was just joking. You know I love Lily.”

I stared at him in the rear view mirror, refusing to
respond. Finally, he got the hint, opening the door to climb out and then
slamming it shut behind him.

He began his stumbling trek home, flipping me the middle
finger from his good hand as he passed by the front end of the car. Anger
burned my insides, and I sat there a few minutes watch him walk away. He’d been
a nice guy once, but now I wished Lily could see the dick he’d become. He
reached the end of the block and turned the corner, disappearing from view.
Maybe I should have taken him home at least. No. He deserved to suffer.

Nathan stared at me and I was starting to feel like a freak.
Pulling the car back onto the roadway, I took a quick glance back at Lily. She
was seriously out of it. Whatever she’d done to Dylan had drained her.

“That was really awkward,” Nathan said in a drawn out voice.
I shrugged, exaggerating my attention to the road as I drove a winding path
back out of the neighborhood, hoping he’d drop it. But my luck sucked, because
he kept staring at me. Waiting. I sucked at the waiting game.

“He deserves to walk,” I said, cracking under the pressure
of his curious gaze. “Too bad Lily wasn’t awake to hear him. I hate it that she
does this to herself for him.” I stole another look at her and was glad to see
she’d slept through it.

“What do you mean?”

“Over the past couple months, every time she’s healed him,
she crashes like this.”

“Heals him? You’re playing me, right? To see if I fell for
his crap?”

He leaned away from me, slightly, but I saw it. Not for the
first time, I wished my sisters had kept their mouths shut and hands to
themselves. But no, they’d never seen the problem with helping people out, even
if it meant some stupid nickname. I never wanted to be included in it.

“It’s not a big deal. Chloe’s just really good at predicting
what people will do. And Lily, well, she only makes people feel better.” Down
playing it always seemed to work best, and made people a little less freaked
out. “You saw Dylan’s hand. It’s still broken. He just doesn’t feel it.”

“So why’d he call her a healer?” He’d relaxed a bit and
wasn’t giving me strange looks anymore.

I debated on how honest to be. Having people make
assumptions about us or even benefiting from us was one thing, but to actually
explain it was entirely different.

“Lily’s gift is mainly emotional and sensory. She can stop
pain and sometimes she can heal minor physical problems, like a little cut. But
the big stuff she can’t do. If you’re dying, then you’re shit out of luck,
unless you want to go with a smile on your face.”

“So, Lily heals and Chloe can guess the future, but what
about you?”

I shifted in my seat, wishing for some distraction on the
roads, but no other vehicles appeared to save me. “I’m supposed to be able to
tell when someone is lying.”

“Supposed to?”

“Yeah, well it doesn’t seem to work right for me. I’ve only
been able to catch a couple of people and it didn’t work out so well.” I
flashed a wicked grin his way as we waited for a light to change. “But you
really shouldn’t try lying to me anymore.”

“I haven’t lied to you,” he said, but his blush called him a
liar before any voice in my head did.

“Uh huh, if you say so.”

He said something in response, but the light changed and I
revved the engine, drowning out his voice. We passed by Nadine’s place again
and a few blocks down, I turned at the corner, planning to take a short cut
through Tonya’s neighborhood to the other side of town. There were flashing
emergency vehicles ahead of us and as the lights grew closer I slowed down,
initially for safety, and then because of my uncontrollable urge to rubberneck.

A silver pickup truck was curved around a tree, its entire
hood bunched up. Glass sparkled on the black pavement, glinting red and blue
with each turn of the emergency lights. I hit the brakes when I saw the figure
sitting on the ground near the ambulance.

Tonya.

The streetlight above her shone down, highlighting the blood
that matted her dark hair and trailed down her cheek, mingling with tears. I
shoved the car into park and practically leapt out.

“Tonya! What happened? Are you okay?”

“Oh my God, Phoebs. I...I don’t know. Everything happened so
quick.” She trembled violently, and I sank down beside her, wrapping an arm
around her shoulders, ignoring the paramedic who squatted beside her making
notes.

“Are you hurt? Was anyone else hurt?” I asked.

“They said I just scraped my forehead, but Trevor hurt his
foot.” She lifted a hand to her head and her fingers grazed over a bandage
hidden beneath her curls.

I glanced back at Nathan who had gotten out and stood
watching us, his arms folded on the roof of the car. Lily still slept in the
backseat, her head against the window. Even from here, I could see her restless
movements. She could feel something wasn’t right. I didn’t want her to get any worse,
but this was Tonya.

“Are you in pain? Lily could...”

“I’m fine now. They said it looks worse than it feels. But
Trevor’s foot looked pretty bad.”

I didn’t volunteer Lily for that one. Helping my best friend
was one thing. Expecting Lily to heal the guy who’d beaten the crap out of her
boyfriend would be too much, even if Dylan was a dick and deserved it.

“I thought you guys were gonna call a cab?” I tried to keep
the accusation from my voice, the judgment that she’d get into a vehicle with a
drunk driver.

“Spare me the lecture, Phoebs. Trevor wanted to spend some
time with just me, so we left right after we talked to you.”

“How could you get in the car with him?” I blurted out,
unable to hold it in any longer. “You knew he’d been drinking.”

She pulled away from me, crossing her arms over her upraised
knees. “He wasn’t driving. I was.”

Liar.

My stomach clenched and I fought the urge to vomit. I wanted
to call her out. I couldn’t believe that she would cover for this guy. Her eyes
shifted between me and one of the cops with panic I couldn’t ignore. For
whatever reason, she was lying and I couldn’t betray my best friend. Not after
just fixing up our last fight.

“Do you want me to drive you home?” The words choked out of
me, burning my throat like acid with the lingering taste of her lie.

She shook her head. “I’m going to go with Trevor to the
hospital and wait for his parents to pick him up. I’ll call a cab. Hopefully
Gran will be sleeping when I get back.”

“You don’t think she’s going to notice that on your head
tomorrow?” I asked, gesturing to the bandage.

“I’ll just tell her you dragged me into some girl fight over
Nathan.” She cracked a smile and I tried to do the same, but it was hard with
the knowledge that she’d lied to me again.

“Didn’t you blame your last fight on me?”

“Phoebe, I’ve blamed you for all of my fights.”

Did she find lying to me as easy as she did with Gran? It
wasn’t a question I really wanted the answer to, so I gave her an awkward pat
on the back. I didn’t know how to deal with the fact she was lying to me and
the police about what had happened. We stood as the paramedics loaded Trevor
into the ambulance. “I’ll call you tomorrow.”

Lily was awake by the time I got back in the car. Nathan
slid in to the passenger seat, and we shared a glance before putting on our
seatbelts.

“Who’s hurt?” Lily asked, her normally sweet voice filled
with dread.

I pulled away from the accident, peeking into my side mirror
to see Tonya joining Trevor in the ambulance.

“Nobody,” I said. She snorted and I sighed with resignation.
“Nobody who needs your help. We’ll drop off Nathan and then head home, okay?”

She gave a slight nod, staring out the window. I was
surprised that she didn’t ask about Dylan, and possibly it was my wishful
thinking, but maybe she was so glad he was gone that she didn’t want to ask
about him.

“Hey, aren’t you crashing at Dylan’s?” I asked Nathan.

“Not now. He’s so smashed he’ll wake his parents up, and I
don’t think I want to be around to see that. I’m safer facing my dad than
worrying about Dylan’s parents calling him at the station. So, what happened
back there?” Nathan asked.

“The truck they were in smashed into a tree.”

“Who was driving?” He was starting to sound like his father.

“Tonya said she was.”

Nathan raised his brows. “She said she was? Does that mean
you don’t believe her?”

“I think she’s covering for Trevor because he’d been
drinking.” As soon as I said it, I wanted to pull the words back into my mouth
and swallow them. Why would I tell the police chief’s son that my best friend was
lying to the cops and her boyfriend should be arrested for DUI?

BOOK: Lie to Me (A Touched Trilogy)
9.22Mb size Format: txt, pdf, ePub
ads

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