Second Nature (17 page)

BY THE TIME we got home, I was able to heal
Nate. The nice thing about healing in a moving vehicle was I didn't
draw too heavily from one place, so I didn’t have to worry about
killing anything. Sariah sat in the front seat with knees pulled up
to keep her face hidden, but the green glow of her solid black eyes
caught my attention. I put my hand on her shoulder and after a long
moment, she met my eyes. I smiled and shook my head.

“Can I say how unfair it is that even like
this, you’re beautiful?” Sariah gave me a watery smile and
awkwardly reached into the backseat to hug me.

We arrived home and walked inside as if we'd
just come from a funeral. No one spoke as Sariah made a pot of
coffee and put the kettle on for tea. I made sandwiches and brought
them to the table as the kettle whistled for attention. Xander and
Nate went upstairs and ditched the filthy toga in favor of a white
cotton tank top and basketball shorts. I didn’t want to admit it,
but the look worked for him. We sat down to eat with mugs steaming
in front of us.

Finally, I couldn't take the silence
anymore. “So does this count as a win?”

“I think we'll be seeing Peter again. Next
time, it needs to be on our terms.” Sariah's strange eyes made her
grim expression dire.

“Do you think she shared the Freon trick?”
Xander didn’t look up from his hands, and a hint of flame showed in
his too bright eyes. “I don't like the idea of anyone being able to
stop me”

“Maybe you shouldn't let them get so close
to you.” Nate smiled, but soon it faded to the hard expression he’d
worn since I unstrapped him from the table. I wondered if the Nate
I’d always known might be gone.

I would’ve given anything to get a read on
where he was emotionally. Anything other than this hard-edged
blankness that masked his face would be better. Xander grinned, but
it didn't touch his eyes. We were barely hanging on and in way over
our heads.

“So tell us what happened, Nate.” I reached
across the table to take his hand.

“Not much to it. My car crumpled as if I'd
hit a wall when I was almost here. I don’t how long I was knocked
out, but I woke up strapped to a table. When I tried to send my
panic along the bond, it wasn’t there. I figured they'd killed
you.” His eyes seemed a too little bright, but it could have been a
trick of the light. “After about a day wallowing in my misery, a
woman came in. At first, she told me about a lot of ancient
tortures she knew. Then she started showing me.”

The dead pan voice he spoke in broke my
heart. I closed my eyes, unable to imagine how I would have
reacted, alone and scared, grieving his loss. He reached across the
table and put his other hand on my cheek. “What she did to me, it
was nothing compared to thinking you were dead, Amelia. I’ve never
been good enough for you, a fact I need to change. Especially now
that I know what I'm feeling is me,
my
emotions.”

I tried not to squirm in my seat, hoping I
didn't look as guilty as I felt. While he was mourning my death,
I'd been off with Dylan. And when it came down to it, did his
declaration change anything?

“Dude, no Hallmark moments!” Xander
playfully smacked his arm. Nate didn’t even seem to notice.

“When she said you were off with another
guy, she meant Dylan, right?” I winced but nodded. “Don't feel bad,
I pushed you away. You deserve to be happy. If I'm not the guy who
can make that happen, I understand.”

My vision swam for a moment, but I had no
time to dwell on it before Xander cut in.

“Come on, you’re killing me with the chick
flick mushiness! You bonded in a cemetery; it was a decaying
relationship from the start.” I gave him a glare as he grinned,
obviously proud of himself. He looked to each of us and only
received that's-not-funny looks. ''Cause the bodies...” His face
began to fall. “It was a cemetery...” He broke off and shook his
head.

“We get it, Xan.” I shook my head. “It’s
just not funny.”

Nate rolled his eyes. “Besides, we bonded in
the garden then walked to the cemetery.”

Xander twisted his lip in mock irritation.
“You ruined my joke!'

I rolled my eyes and turned to my sister.
“Sariah, what happened on your end?''

“Well, I circled around the building as
planned but didn't see anything. I found an open door and slipped
inside. I could hear you on the stairs, so I started to follow in
case you needed help. This goon came out of nowhere and grabbed me.
I tried to fight him off, but he didn't register anything I did to
him. I think he was a lobotomy patient or something. The lights
were on, but nobody was home. Even getting his frank and beans
smashed didn't make a difference.”

“Must have been one of the Fumes. When
someone overdoses on Diesel, it burns away their humanity and
leaves them as some sort of bizarre living zombie.”

“So is Peter part of this Diesel thing?”
Xander brow furrowed and his mouth set in a hard line.

“I don't think so, but Leslie is. She told
me she had more than one employer.”

Sariah nodded and continued. “No matter how
hard I hit him—and I'm fairly certain I broke his jaw—he just kept
coming. Soon more joined in, and it didn't take them long to pin me
down. Then the guy we took down at the door walked up to me and
used the gun thingy on my arm, and I felt so weak.”

“Is this something you can recover from on
your own, or do I need to invite the garden club over again?” My
lips twitched with a barely repressed smile.

Sariah wrinkled her nose while Xander barked
a laugh. “I think I'll manage.” Narrowed eyes accompanied her dry
tone. Glaring at Xander, she asked, “And how did you get caught?”
Her voice was a dangerous purr.

“I was with Amelia up until she found Nate
in the room. As soon as I saw he was alone, I knew it had to be a
trap. I slipped back out and down the stairs. I realized how many
meatheads she'd brought with her and knew we were in trouble. Then
I saw Leslie and figured things were worse than we thought. I went
to call in some reinforcements, but as I tried to leave, Peter was
there. He looked right at me and chanted something. My arms were
bound to my side, and I couldn't move. I could only do what he told
me, no matter how much I yelled internally. He only released me
when we found you guys.”

I frowned. My siblings were so powerful, it
was hard to come to grips with the idea they had limitations. Our
time was running short.

“So is what she said true?” I asked. Nate's
eyebrows shot up and hurt washed over his face. I shook my head at
him and clarified. “Is decapitation the only way to kill a demon?”
I remembered Sariah was unfazed when she was stabbed in the heart
with a wooden stake.

“Not quite, but close. A bullet in the brain
works.” Xander held his thumb and forefinger in a gun shape against
his forehead and pulled the trigger.

“And if we don't get the energy we need to
survive, we can become a withered husk. It’s sort of like a coma,
we'd be too weak to draw energy and brain dead. If that ever
happens...” She drew her finger across her throat, repeating the
Librarian's gesture for emphasis.

The topic reminded me of my thoughts at Aunt
May’s and I figured it was the best opportunity I was going to get.
“Grandma explained how long
I’d
live, but she never told me
how long you two would.”

Xander shrugged. “Well, typically demons
live until someone kills them. Not sure how I will be affected
since I’m half human.”

Sariah gave me a sad smile. “Since all
succubi are half human, there’s a precedent, which we suspect will
be the same for Xander, though we aren’t certain.”

I processed that thought for a moment before
prodding her on. “But how long is that?”

Xander grinned at me tenderly. I was always
fairly transparent, so my fear of losing them must have been
written on my face. “Oh, round about a millennium.”

Sariah shrugged with a gentle grin. “Give or
take a century.”

Relief flooded me. If we could somehow make
it through all of this, we would have plenty of time together. It
was good to know. But first we had to survive. I sighed. “So what
now? Peter's not going to stop because we escaped his little
trap.”

“We're going to have to stop him.”

“How do you propose we do that?” Xander
scowled at Sariah's overly simplistic answer.

“I'm working on it. For now, I think our
best bet is to stay together. That way we can’t be used against one
another, and maybe trouble won’t find us.”

Somehow I doubted it. If there was one thing
our strange little family had plenty of, it was trouble.

WE TRAVELED AS a group to Nate’s ratty
apartment to move him to our place. Everything he owned fit into
two suitcases and three cardboard boxes, so it didn’t take long. I
led him upstairs to the bedroom I designed for him. Swinging the
door in, I nervously captured my lip with my teeth as he brushed
past me. The walls were a warm brown, and a massive four-post bed
with a velvety brown comfortertook up a large chunk of the room. A
potted palm stood against the wall. I flipped the switches on the
wall and light filled the room including underneath the bed. More
time had been spent perfecting his room than my own. Nate’s head
twisted and craned trying to take it all in.

“It’s perfect, Amelia.”

I smiled and nodded but didn’t say anything
before retreating to my own room. Sitting on the fainting couch, I
called the nursery with every intention of just taking some time
off. When I told Mr. Peterson I had a family emergency, he grumbled
and whined. At that moment, something inside me snapped. I was fed
up with people not appreciating me.

“You know what? Don’t worry about giving me
time off. I quit.”

My former boss sputtered. His voice kept
rising in pitch as his desperation grew. “I’ll give you a raise.
More hours. Less. Whatever you need, I’ll give you. Did another
company offer you more money? I’ll double it. Triple it. Why don’t
you come in and we can talk?”

I sighed. “It’s not the money and no one
else hired me. I’m better than this job and we both know it. I’m
done, Mr. Peterson. I’m sorry.”

I hung up the phone and set it beside me,
staring at it blankly. My fingers drummed against my cheek. Free
from the emotional bond, I was able to contemplate the idea of
being with any man I chose. I had loved Nate, but I wasn’t certain
how I felt about him now. He wasn’t the same person he was back in
Lincoln. Just because he was my first love, didn’t mean he had to
be my last. I couldn’t deny I felt something for Dylan, though I
wasn’t sure what that was either. I think the first thing I had to
figure out was whether or not I could be free of the bond with
Nate. And I had a feeling my sister might know someone with some
details.

I found Sariah floating on a raft in the
pool, soaking up the sun in a white polka dot bikini with beaded
straps. Russell leaned on the edge with his fingers laced through
hers and their heads close together. It was very sweet, and I hated
to interrupt, but who knew when I'd get another shot? “Can I talk
to you?”

Sariah pushed her large tortoise colored
sunglasses on top of her head and met my eyes. “What's up?”

“What do you know about the Life Bond?”
Sariah and Russell exchanged significant looks, but I plowed on.
“Leslie said there was a witch who experimented with it. That there
could be a way out without killing us.”

Sariah sighed and looked at Russell who
shrugged. She gave me a sad smile but didn’t hold anything back.
“I've read the research too. Some psycho sadist who didn't care how
many innocents she killed in the name of ‘science’ conducted horrid
experiments on Gaia. However, she was able figure out all sorts of
things. There's actually three parts to the Life Bond: emotional,
physical and spiritual. The spiritual bond is something you're born
with, which is why you've always been drawn to Nate. It doesn't
make what you feel for him any less real.”

“Theoretically—” Russell stopped and glanced
at Sariah. When she nodded approval, he began again.
“Theoretically, it's possible to severe the bond with the tool
Broomhilda created. We know the emotional bond can be toyed with
pretty easily, but severing the bond is more complicated. It takes
a witch's magic and a special ritual.”

Sariah gave me a sympathetic look and took
over the explanation. “The Life Bond is under tension at all times,
like a rubber band around a wrist. If something makes the rubber
band break, it’ll snap the arm it's wrapped around. The same basic
thing happens with Gaia. When the life bond breaks, it snaps back
on the living survivor. Now with this ritual, it's like pressing
your hand over the area that got snapped— it still hurts but not as
much. Does that make sense?”