Forsaken (15 page)

“
Yes,” I said simply, the
answer catching in my throat.

Amber didn’t seem to have a response
to this. At first she seemed like she was going to laugh at my
answer but her face slowly grew serious, her mind seeming to be
somewhere else.

“
Angels,” she said
quietly, her eyes looking distant. “You… you used to always tell
mom and dad about the angels. They… they hurt you. That’s why you
didn’t sleep you said.”

I had often wondered how much of my
twisted past Amber remembered or knew about. Apparently she knew
enough.

“
That was all real.” she
whispered. “Wasn’t it?”

I could only nod.

“
Mom always said you
needed help, that you were having hallucinations or something. It
was real though.”

We were both quiet again for another
moment before Amber rose from the bed and came over to me. Her eyes
were hesitant as she approached me and I was surprised to see the
tears that welled in them. I was taken off guard as she suddenly
wrapped her arms around me.

“
I’m sorry,” she said, her
voice shaky with the tears that broke free.

“
For what?” I whispered as
I wrapped my arms around her.

“
For everything. For mom,
for not believing you, for not being there for you.”

“
You were just a kid,” I
tried to comfort her. “You shouldn’t have had to deal with any of
this, no kid should.”

“
But you did,” Amber
said.

“
It’s over now,” I
whispered. “I don’t have the nightmares anymore. Alex is the reason
for that.”

Amber looked down into my face, her
eyes searching but I felt that she didn’t want to know any more
than she did now. “Can I meet him?” she asked as she wiped her
tears away. “For real? Seeing him explode into the house doesn’t
count.”

I felt the smile creep onto my face.
It felt good. It felt like it had been ages since I had really
smiled. I nodded and knowing I didn’t have to raise my voice any
louder than if I were speaking to Amber and said “Alex.”

Before the look of confusion could
fully develop on Amber’s face, a soft knock at the door surprised
her. I opened it, my heart leaping in odd ways in my chest as I
took in Alex’s glorious, now more composed face. I took his hand as
I pulled him through the door.

“
Amber, this is Alex,” I
said, knowing the smile that covered my face probably looked
ridiculous, but not caring. He was finally back. “Alex, this is my
sister Amber.”

A smile crept to one side of Alex’s
face as he extended a hand to Amber, who took it with shaking
hands. “It’s nice to meet another member of Jessica’s
family.”

Amber didn’t say anything as she
stared at Alex’s face. Her eyes, the blackness now gone, her face
totally healed, were slightly wider than normal, her jaw hanging
slightly slack. I couldn’t blame her for the way her eyes traced
downward; it didn’t mean that it didn’t bother me just a little
bit.

“
Sorry,” Alex said
clumsily. “About earlier. I didn’t mean to scare you. Kind of
couldn’t help it though.”

A knock at the door made everyone but
Alex jump and Rod’s voice was calling for Amber a second
later.

“
Amber’s not going to say
anything about what she saw or knows to anyone,” I said, my voice
low as I stared her in the face. “Right?”

Amber continued to stare at Alex for a
moment longer before she seemed to register that I had asked her a
question. “Right,” she finally said. “Right. Besides, who would
believe me anyway?”

“
Amber?” Rod called
again.

Amber stepped around Alex and walked
out into the living room, Alex and I following her.

Rod seemed surprised to see Alex and
stopped short. “Finally decided to return, huh?”

“
You know me,” Alex said,
trying very hard to keep his voice light. “I just felt the itch to
go out for a while.”

“
Well you could have told
someone about that itch. I think Jessica was about to have a mental
breakdown.”

Alex managed a small smile, wrapped an
arm around my shoulders, and gave a firm squeeze. “Sorry,” he said.
I wasn’t sure who it was directed at but it didn’t matter. “Is
anyone hungry?”

“
I’m starving actually,”
Rod said, a grin spreading on his face.

Glad for the distraction, Alex walked
into the kitchen and opened the fridge.

“
Whoa,” Rod marveled as he
looked after Alex. “Those are some nasty scars. What
happened?”

“
I got in a fight with a
really nasty guy,” Alex said, his head buried in the fridge. “Over
a girl.”

CHAPTER TEN

ALEX

“
Thanks for meeting with
me on such short notice,” I said as I sat in the leather
chair.

My lawyer, Ted Kennedy, sat at the
large desk in front of me and unbuttoned his suit jacket. “Anything
for Paul’s grandson. What can I do for you today, Alex?”

My hands gripped the arm rests, I had
to be careful not to crush them. The sick feeling that had been in
the pit of my stomach since I had exploded back into the world was
still there. What had happened had shaken me far more than I ever
wanted to admit. “I want to transfer all of my assets to someone.
Everything.”

“
Okay,” he said, drawing
out the word, his eyebrows rising. Ted was well aware of just how
much “everything” was. “To who?”

“
Her name is Jessica
Bailey,” I answered, still unable to look up. I felt strangely
hollow, like something hadn’t come back with me into this world,
had been left behind.

“
And may I ask who Jessica
Bailey is?”

I felt a little irritated at all of
Ted’s questions. What did it matter to him as long as I paid his
bill? But I supposed I could understand why he was asking them. He
was curious as to who I wanted to hand the Wright fortune to.
“She’s everything to me.”

“
But you two aren’t
married, right?” he asked, his voice unsure.

“
No,” I replied simply. “I
don’t want her to know I’m transferring everything to her
though.”

“
Well, there’s no way I
can transfer everything into her name without a lot of signing of
papers. There’s no way she wouldn’t know what was going on. I mean
there would have to be title transfers, account papers. We can set
up a trust fund if you want or we can write up a will.”

“
A will should do just
fine,” I said, feeling sick. I seriously wanted to throw
up.

“
Is something going on
that I should know about, Alex?” Ted asked as he leaned forward,
folding his arms on the desk. “You’re scaring me a little, if I’m
being honest.”

“
I’m just dealing with
some stuff right now and I want to make sure everything I have goes
to the right place,” I said as I finally looked up into Ted’s
face.

“
Are you sick or
something?” Ted asked, his face concerned.

“
I guess you could say
that.”

Ted was quiet for a moment as he
looked at me. After a moment though he was back to business. This
was the one instance when I was appreciative of Ted being such a
business man. He would act concerned over my “sickness”, and maybe
he was, but he was quick to move away from personal stuff and back
to business. He would get every penny he could out of his clients.
But it wasn’t like he wasn’t worth the bill. That was why I had
chosen him. “Well, let’s go over all of your assets and discuss
what you want to go to Jessica.”

“
Everything’s to go to
Jessica,” I said simply as I sat forward in my seat. “My houses, my
accounts, the cars, everything.”

“
Are you sure Alex?” he
asked as he shifted uncomfortably in his stiff chair. “We’re
talking about a lot of money here. Your grandfather passed quite a
lot of wealth down to you.”

“
Just do it,” I said,
again feeling irritated.

Ted looked at me with disbelieving
eyes for a moment. “I’ll pull your file,” he said, his expression
back to business.

It had taken a lot more clarifying
than it should have, but I walked out of there five hours later
with a will in hand. Apparently “everything” didn’t seem clear
enough to Ted. It felt weird working on a document that was
applicable to my death, as I had already died. But we had worked it
that even if I were to disappear, Jessica would get
everything.

My phone vibrated in my pocket,
pulling my mind out of the ominous future. I flipped it open. “Hey,
Rod.”

X

I could smell something burning
slightly as I walked through the door. That smell always made me
cringe just a little. I found Amber working at the stove. I tried
not to let it bother me, having someone else in my
kitchen.

“
I made dinner for us,”
Amber said as she poured something in a bowl. “Jessica called and
said she is going to be working late tonight.”

“
Oh, uh…” I struggled for
words as I sat at the bar. “I don’t… actually eat.” It felt
unnatural talking about the whole angel thing with anyone other
than Jessica or Emily. It was a pretty big secret to be letting
other people in on.

“
What?” she said with a
disbelieving expression, as if I was trying to make a joke. “Oh,”
she said after a second, her face turning serious. “Yeah, the whole
wing thing, right?”

I chuckled. “Right.”

“
Wish I would have known
that before I cooked up all this food. Rod is working tonight as
well.”

“
Sorry,” I apologized.
“Believe me, if I could eat it, I would.” Maybe. I didn’t trust too
many other peoples cooking than my own.

“
It’s alright, I’ll save
some for Jessica.” Amber dished up a heaping plate and sat next to
me at the bar.

“
So how are you liking
Washington so far?” I asked in an attempt to make conversation. I
hated the fact that I really didn’t know more than one member of
Jessica’s family.

“
It’s better than Idaho,
that’s for sure,” she said with a chuckle, forking some salad into
her mouth. “And it’s really nice to see Jessica again. I missed her
a lot.”

“
I bet.”

“
It really freaked me out
when she left. We didn’t know what happened to her. She could have
been dead for all I knew. She just disappeared off the face of the
planet.”

I hadn’t really considered this
before, what it must have been like for the ones Jessica left
behind. I had only felt sorry for Jessica. What must things have
been like to just up and leave like that?

“
I can’t blame Jessica
though. It was really bad. She didn’t really have any friends.
Everyone just thought she was a freak. There was a lot of fighting
at our house.”

“
Were things really as bad
between Jessica and your mom as she says?” I asked, my eyes glued
to the tiled surface of the counter.

Amber swallowed her bite. “Probably
worse than she says. Things were really bad toward the end. Did she
tell you mom was going to have her committed?”

I nodded. That was the hardest part to
believe, even though I knew she was telling the truth.

“
That tells you how bad it
was. Mom just couldn’t handle it anymore.

“
I think that’s the
biggest regret of her life though.” She paused, staring down into
her food. “Mom cried for days at a time, after the reality of why
Jessica had left set in. She was still terrified of Jessica but she
knew it was her fault, Jessica running away.”

She took a few more bites, mulling
something over.

“
She called yesterday, you
know. Our mom.”

“
Really?” I said, surprise
obvious in my voice. “What’d she say?”

“
She didn’t know it was me
who answered. I’m not ready for her to know where I am. I just
asked to take a message. She just said she wanted to talk to
Jessica. She said she wanted to make things right.”

“
Have you told Jessica
yet?” I asked, odd excitement building in my system at the
possibility of finally getting to meet all of her
family.

Amber shook her head. “I haven’t
decided if it’s the right thing to do. My mom hurt Jessica really
bad. I’m not sure if telling her is right.”

“
I think it’s up to
Jessica to decide if she wants to speak to your mother,” I said as
I looked into Amber’s face. She looked back at me, her eyes
studying me.

“
You really love her,
don’t you?” she said quietly, her eyes not leaving mine.

“
More than I can say,” I
half whispered.

She studied me silently for a few more
moments before she spoke again. “Why does she look a little sad
when she looks at you? I know she loves you and that you make her
happier than I ever thought she could be. But why does she look
like something hurts her every time she looks at you?”

My eyes finally dropped away. I
cleared my throat uncomfortably. “I was going to ask your sister to
marry me a few months ago. I even bought the ring. Things changed
really fast though. I changed. Into what I am now. I know she
doesn’t fully understand it, but I can’t ask her
anymore.”