The Five Deaths of Roxanne Love (16 page)

With a sigh he shut the door.

It was best he remembered that in this place, nothing—and no one—was what it seemed.

S
anto wanted to put as many miles as possible between them and the horror they’d left behind, but morning traffic and the need to avoid major roadways kept the going slow. Roxanne had grown so quiet, huddled in her seat, that he feared the worst. She’d been mauled badly, but she’d recovered from a gunshot with more alacrity than she showed now.

She was hurt and her pain rode him like his own. It made him wish he
was
an angel. One that could make this horror go away for her.

You can,
a treacherous voice whispered in his head.
Reap her and be gone.

Why did the idea fill him with dread now instead of pleasure? Was it because he suspected that Roxanne was the only thing standing between an invasion of the
human world and the most abhorrent of the Beyond? Or was it because he couldn’t let her go, even when it meant taking her with him?

His lacerated hands tightened on the steering wheel and he glanced her way. What was she thinking? It consumed him now, that query. That need to know what went on in the depths of her mind. Were her thoughts consumed by him, as his were by her? Or was he merely another passenger on a journey that, for her, had begun long before he’d stepped into Santo’s skin?

If he left without her . . . if he abandoned his goal and returned to the Beyond deprived of her soul . . . would
she
feel the loss? Would she mourn him as Santo mourned his dead wife? He almost laughed at the emotional traffic jam that thought created. He would not wish that pain on Roxanne, yet it would destroy him to know he’d been nothing more than a speed bump in her life.

“Roxanne,” he said, reaching across the seat to settle his hand over hers. As soon as he touched her, he felt better. Still, her silence bothered him. He was beginning to know her enough to guess that behind it she’d be feeling guilt. Guilt, over the deaths of two strangers.

“You did everything you could. The beasts were out for blood. You know that. No scenario would have ended with the delivery boy and desk clerk alive.”

“Really?” she said softly. “How about one where I wasn’t there?”

“
I
brought you to the hotel. You didn’t have a
choice. If you’re going to play
what if,
you’ll have to start with me.”

“You were only there to protect me.”

Shame kept him from responding. In this quagmire of emotion that trapped him, he’d found a well of guilt that was all his own. He’d lied to her from the start. Lied to her still.

She thought he was a fucking angel sent by God, no doubt, to save her.

What would she think when she learned the truth?

She stared out the window, lost in thoughts of her own.

“Talk to me,” he said, frowning at the yearning he heard in his voice. “What’s going on in your head?”

“You don’t want to know.”

Oh, but he did. Desperately.

He waited her out until she finally took a deep breath and began to speak in a halting, monotone voice.

“I was just remembering . . . After the last time . . . the last time I died . . . When I got out of the hospital, I saw this woman. Everywhere I went, she was there. In the grocery store, the mall. At work. I saw her at the library once, just sitting at a table, watching me.”

He looked away from the road to ask, “How long ago was that?”

But he already knew. Four years, six weeks, three days.

“Four years give or take. I could tell you the date, but it’s not important.”

To her, maybe. “What did she want, this woman?”

Roxanne shrugged, the gesture tight, her expression so desolate he wanted to stop the van and pull her onto his lap.

Fates help him, he was lost.

“She was just this ordinary lady. A little overweight. A bit haggard. She looked like a mom, the one who always makes a cake for the school bake sale. She was everything I’ve ever dreamed about.”

“You dream about making cakes?” he teased, but Roxanne didn’t even smile.

She cleared her throat, avoiding his eyes. “It went on like that for weeks. Seeing her, but never speaking. I tried a couple of times, but she managed to disappear before I ever got close enough to ask her why she kept following me. Then one day I turned around and there she stood, right behind me. She looked at me like . . .” Roxanne shook her head. “She said, ‘Why you? Why you and not my Suzanne?’ After that, she just walked away. I never saw her again.”

“Who was Suzanne?”

“Her daughter? Sister? Friend? Does it matter? She was someone who died when I didn’t. The look in her eyes . . . I’ll never forget it.” Roxanne paused and stared at her fingers, knotted together in her lap.

“You can’t blame yourself for things you can’t control.”

“Can’t I? Think about it, Santo. Why me? Why
me
? That young man, Chidi? He didn’t even know me, but when he thought I was in danger, he risked his life to help me. A stranger. Why not him? Why can’t he get up and go on after what happened?”

Santo shook his head, wondering at the woman’s capacity for self-reproach. She wouldn’t hear a wrong word about her brother. She defended strangers and tried to save them from their fate, then held herself responsible when she failed. She seemed to put everyone and anyone above herself. But who watched out for Roxanne? Why was there no man in her life, ready to stand between her and danger? Why was she alone?

“I’m a coward and yet
I’m
the miracle. The human Energizer Bunny.”

He didn’t get the reference, but he understood it wasn’t a good thing.

She took a deep breath and slowly let it out.

“Explain to me again about this door you felt open when Reece was shot,” she said. “You think his death caused it, don’t you? You think that’s what opened it.”

“Yes.”

“What makes you so sure?”

Not the conversation he’d have chosen, but honestly, he was surprised it had taken her this long to ask. He’d assumed shock had kept her quiet, but he’d
known she would have questions sooner or later. Roxanne always had questions.

“I’m not sure about anything,
angelita
. But I felt the barrier between the Beyond and your world go down the moment your brother died. I didn’t put it together right away, though. Not even when the hellhounds came through. But I think his death made it possible for them to cross over.”

“How is that even possible?”

“Death and resurrection, Roxanne. It’s a cycle. A birth on earth brings a soul back to its human origins. A death returns it to the Beyond.”

Her brows pulled together and her lips thinned.

“Do you remember anything about dying?” he asked in a low voice.

She shifted uncomfortably and said nothing for a moment. Then, softly, hesitantly, “The first time I was just a newborn. I don’t remember anything from that. But the second time I was ten.”

“Reece was with you then, too.”

“Yeah. A family trip to Canyon Lake. We drowned, both of us. It took thirty-five minutes for them to find us. Another ten before they had a pulse. We were both gone for a long time.” She tucked a strand of hair behind her ear, letting her fingers trail the line of her cheek.

Mask in place, he thought.

“I remember being someplace dark. I was alone. Scared. Then someone came.”

“Who?” he asked, so intent he could hardly form the word.

She lifted a shoulder. Shook her head.

“I just remember feeling comforted until I opened my eyes again.”

Comforted. He’d brought her comfort. She’d been so young, so scared. He’d been moved by her sobs, fascinated even then by the beauty of her soul, of how it changed the darkness, having her there.

“I woke up in the hospital and everyone called me a miracle. The news stations made a big deal of the twins that had come back from death twice. Strangers sent us stuffed animals and flowers. Cards that said things like
You are blessed.
”

She leaned back against the headrest. “It was almost fun, being famous. But after that . . . that’s when Reece started to change.”

“Change how?”

“He was always this sunny boy. Always smiling. But after the lake, he withdrew. Sometimes for days. Sometimes weeks. Then he’d come back and pretend nothing had happened. But I knew.”

“What did you know?”

She swallowed. “For him the darkness held no comfort.”

Something swelled inside him. He didn’t even know what to call it. It felt too big to name, too important to label.

“Did you feel your brother, when you died and went to the darkness? Was he there, with you?”

She struggled for a moment, trying to articulate whatever it was she felt. “He’s there. I sense him, but he’s not with me.” She shrugged. “I can’t explain it.”

“It’s okay,” he told her. “I just wondered.”

Santo waited to see if she’d say more. When only silence stretched between them, he tried again.

“What about the third time?” he said, his voice so husky it sounded raw.

“I was with Reece again when it happened,” she said in a low, unsteady voice. “He was on a rampage. Angry at life. He hated working at Love’s. Still does. But we’re all kind of trapped there. It’s part of who we are. Maybe if the economy were better, we’d sell. But we can’t even get out from under it right now. So Reece being an ass about pulling a few extra shifts . . . it wasn’t cool. I’d suggested we go hiking in the Superstitions that morning, hoping to talk some sense into him. To tell him that when he bitches about working, it makes it miserable for all of us. But he was in a mood and I knew better than to bring it up. We were driving back when he just . . . exploded. It was like he couldn’t help himself.”

She paused, and Santo sensed a moment of revelation for her. He could almost see her putting things together that had never quite fit in her mind before. Her breath caught, and she stared sightlessly at the passing roadside.

“He was like that last night. I remember thinking that the last time he’d been strung so tight . . .” She trailed off, her expression dumbfounded.

“What happened after the hike?” he prompted.

“He drove our car right off the road and into a ravine. Right off. And it was a long way down. It seemed to take forever, you know? Falling. And the sounds . . . Metal twisting. Me, screaming. I couldn’t stop. Later, I saw the wreckage they pulled us out of on the news. It’s no wonder that the world went nuts and started calling us freaks. There shouldn’t have been anything left to save.”

“Did you go to the darkness again?” he asked. He couldn’t have kept the question in if he’d wanted to.

She hesitated just a moment before saying softly, “Yes.”

A small smile curled her lips. She looked down and she . . . blushed. That thing in his chest? It felt like it was going to burst.

“He was there again,” she said to her fingers.

“He?”

“The one who waits for me.”

“It’s a man?”

She nodded.

“How do you know?”

“I just do. I remember him holding me and I felt so safe. So cared for. I wanted to stay there. I didn’t want to be saved.” She glanced at him and quickly away. “Do you think it was Jesus?” she asked.

It was his turn to be thunderstruck. “Jesus wouldn’t have made you blush,” he said before he could temper it.

Her face flamed at that and he knew, even when she didn’t say it, that he’d made her feel more than
safe.

“What about last night?” he asked, pushing his luck but unable to stop. “Was he waiting then?”

She shook her head and looked . . . sad. “Last night I was all alone.”

He put his hand over hers again. “Not true,” he said. “I was waiting for you to open your eyes. You were never alone.”

He knew as soon as the words were spoken that he’d made a critical mistake. The soft light in her eyes grew sharp.

“Why?” she demanded. “What makes me so important that they’d send someone from the Beyond to keep me safe? If I were you, I’d be pissed to get such a shit assignment.”

“I wanted to come. I wasn’t sent, Roxanne. I volunteered.”

He wanted her to ask
why
one more time. He even toyed with the idea that he might tell her, at least part of it. But that confession would truly be the end of it. And he couldn’t bear to let it end.

“Oh,” she said instead.

The one word caught in the air and hung like a bloated balloon, too fat to sail off, too full to sink. He caught her gaze and could almost sense the wheels and
cogs of her mind turning, moving information from doubt to acceptance, earmarking that which she still questioned.

He thought she believed him, but he had the strangest feeling he’d hurt her. Damned if he could figure out how.

She stared at her clenched hands, her face like marble. The woman guarded what went on in her head like a warden.

“There’s something else I need to tell you,” he said. “Reece’s death isn’t the only factor we need to think about. His dying might have opened the door to the Beyond. But yours, Roxanne, closed it.”