Unforgiven (Wanderers #3) (32 page)

I thought for a minute, but nothing came to mind.
“No, why?”

“Just checking,” she said, letting out a small
breath. I laid there with her, my head in her lap, until I feel
asleep.

When I woke up in the morning there was a letter next
to my pillow. I froze for a second afraid to read it.

My precious bumble bee,

You gave me great joy being able to spend the past
two days with you. I forgot how beautiful you are inside and out. I
have never been so proud of you and I know whatever you do you will
amaze us all. Never let anyone tell you you can’t do something. I
believe in you Ella, always. And don’t forget to believe in
yourself. You can do anything.

Love, Grandma Bea

I placed the letter against my chest and inhaled her
scent that was left on the page. The sweet smell of honey and
vanilla tickled my nose. I checked my alarm clock and I had two
hours before I had to leave. I decided to get up and shower to wake
myself up. Oh how I missed my shower.

I stood under the stream, letting the water absorb
into my skin. It felt so good to be in my shower again. As I washed
my hair the bracelet got caught. I carefully tried to untangle the
mess only to end up cutting my wrist on one of the charms.

I cussed to myself and looked at my wrist. It was
just a small nick, but the blood was trickling down my arm as if I
sliced it open. I watched it fall slowly, hypnotized. I just stared
at the blood, watching it drip down. I wiped my hand over the
crimson red liquid, smearing it. I saw a small flicker of blue
light. I flinched, but didn’t take my eyes off of it. I flashed
back to the engagement party right when Jasa asked me to be her
maid of honor. Then something else, something I didn’t remember.
Jasa grabbed my wrist and then pulled her arm back, holding it
tight to her chest. She hissed and then when her eyes opened they
were glowing.

I jumped, slamming my back into the tile wall,
nailing my head at the same time. I knocked everything off the
shelves creating a loud crash and almost slipped. I looked back at
my wrist which was no longer bleeding. It didn’t even look like
there was anything there to begin with.

I just kept staring at the nonexistent mark. Was I
just imagining things? Did any of that really happen?

“Ella? Are you okay?” my mom called.

“Yeah…sorry.”

“What happened? What was that noise?”

“I accidentally knocked some stuff off the shelves.”
I learned that if I danced around the truth I could lie to my mom.
As long as I didn’t flat out lie, she couldn’t always tell if I was
speaking the truth.

“Okay sweetheart. When you’re done I have breakfast
for you.”

“Hey, mom?”

“Yes?”

“What happened at the engagement party?”

“What do you mean?”

I decided to just keep it to myself. No use worrying
her. Didn’t want her to think I was losing my mind and force me to
stay home so she could smother me. “Never mind,” I said, finishing
my shower.

After I dried my hair and got dressed, I met everyone
downstairs for breakfast. I couldn’t stop staring at Jasa wondering
if I imagined it or not. Dean noticed and projected to me,
“Hey
Ella, if you’re jealous about Xander marrying Jasa and not you, try
to make it not so obvious by staring.”

“
Shut up dick,”
I replied back, but in my
head. Dean stopped mid bite and looked at me. “What? Why are you
looking at me like that?” I said out loud.

“What did you say?”

“I said, why are you looking at me?” I repeated like
he was slow.

“No, before that.”

“I didn’t say anything.” He just looked at me.
“God Dean, you need to stop drinking so much,”
I said to
myself.

“Shut up, Ella.”

“I didn’t say anything?”

“What’s going on?” my mom asked.

“Dean’s losing it,” I replied.

“No, Ella keeps saying shit, but she’s pretending
she’s not.”

“Dean, language,” my mom chastised.

“
Ha-ha,”
I laughed in my head.

Dean dropped his fork and pointed at me. “She just
did it again. She laughed at me.”

“I think everyone is laughing at you,” I said, making
Xander chuckle. Dean glared at him and then turned back to me,
scrunching his brow and trying to figure out what the hell was
going on.
“And he says I’m the crazy one.”

“I’m not crazy,” he snapped.

“No one said you were, but I’m sure now we’re all
thinking it.”

Dean started snapping his fingers in the air like
crazy, like he just had an epiphany. “That’s it. You were thinking
it and I –” Xander coughed and nodded toward Jasa and the
conversation ended just as quickly as it began.

After breakfast Dean pulled me aside. He gripped my
arm and stared at me. “Why do you look like you’re constipated?” I
asked.

“I’m concentrating, ass.” He stood there, looking
like he had to poop. It took everything I had not to laugh. Having
enough I shook my head and walked away.
“Why does my family have
to be so weird?”

“If anyone in this family is weird it’s you,” he said
and I snapped back around.

“Wait, how did you…?”

“Because you just said it.” He rolled his eyes.

“I didn’t say it out loud.” He stopped and turned
around, then slowly walked over to me. “Wait, you can read
minds?”

“No. I tried it at breakfast and I couldn’t get
anything, but I think you can now project thoughts,” he sighed.

“Are you serious?” A wide smile spread across my
face.

“That would explain why only I could hear you and no
one else and I’m not losing it,” he narrowed his eyes at me.

I laughed. “How do you know for sure?”

“Let’s test it out. Call Cameron.” I took out my
cellphone. “Not on the phone. And you call me a moron.” I glared at
him. “Project to her,” he said.

I gave it a shot. I projected to Cameron or so I
thought. When it didn’t work I tried screaming at her in my head.
Dean gripped the sides of his head and covered his ears. “Stop
yelling!”

“Sorry, wait, you heard me?”

“Yes, maybe you weren’t thinking right. Picture her.
Picture her long, soft brown hair. Her big beautiful, steel gray
eyes and the way –” I cleared my throat. “Well, you get the
picture,” he said looking away. I eyed him skeptically before I
tried again. Like he said I tried to picture Cameron in my head and
projected a thought to her.

When nothing happened I sighed. “It’s not working.
Maybe I can only do it with you because you can too.”

“Or maybe it only works with family. Try mom or
Xander.”

“Why not dad?”

“Because he can project thoughts too. You want to try
someone who can’t.”

I shook my head and concentrated. “What are you guys
doing?” Xander asked.

“
Seeing if I have a new power,”
I projected to
him.

He took a step back. “Did you just project that to
me?”

“So you heard it?” he nodded.

“Well there you go,” Dean said.

“Yeah, but apparently it only works if the person is
in the room,” I said disappointed.

“Try mom,” Xander suggested. “She’s upstairs in your
room.”

“What is she doing up there?”

“Why don’t you ask her?” Dean said.

I turned to go upstairs and Dean stopped me. “From
down here, god Ella, seriously?”

“Shut up,” I said, embarrassed at my own stupidity. I
closed my eyes and pictured my mom.
“Hey mom, what are you doing
in my room?”
I could imagine her turning around and pretending
to be doing nothing, expecting to see me in the door way.
“Mom?”

“Ella?” she called from the top of the stairs
confused.

“
Down here,”
I projected.

She came running down the stairs and looked at me
with wide eyes. “Did you just?”

“Project a thought…yep,” I said. “So you heard
me?”

“I thought you were right behind me, but you were
down here the whole time?” I nodded. “Oh Ella, a new power. That’s
wonderful,” she cheered, hugging me.

“Yeah, but we think I can only do it with family,” I
pouted.

“Did you try calling Cameron?” I nodded. “Maybe it
just needs to grow and besides what’s wrong with it only being
family?” she said.

“Well, it is kind of nice I can now actually answer
Dean back. That was so annoying to have him in my head and not able
to yell back.”

“Great, just what I need. Not only can you get in my
head, but you can also talk to me in there too,” Dean whined.

“I can only read your mind if you let me,” I told
him.

“I think it’s wonderful,” my mom said.

“So do I,” Xander said, patting me on the back.

I followed my mom back up to my room where she was –
as always – packing stuff for me she felt I needed to take with. If
she could I was sure she’d pack herself. “Mom, I don’t need all
this. It’s summertime and school is over. I’m sure I’ll be back in
a week after I smooth things over.”

She looked away from me. I knew she had something she
had to tell me and didn’t want to. What good was this power to read
thoughts if everyone could just block them from you? “I already
called the school and in order for you to be reenlisted next year
you have to stay through the summer and make up your courses.”

“Are you serious?”

“Ella, you left without telling anyone. You know
there are consequences for your actions.”

“So I have to go to school for the rest of the summer
and straight through till fall semester?”

“Don’t worry. You won’t be alone. Your partners in
crime will be there with you too.”

I fell back on the bed wishing I could run away
again, but that won’t fix my problems and now that it was summer
and everyone left for home, I’d have to wait and face my friends
and Roman in the fall. Maybe this wasn’t a bad thing after all,
give them some time to cool off or more time to get pissed off.

“Ella honey, don’t worry I’m sure it will go by
fast,” she smiled reassuringly.

“So how bad you think it’s going to be?” Cameron
asked as we pulled into the school gates.

“I guess we’re about to find out,” I said. Gabe was
waiting for us. He was standing there with his arms crossed and a
not so happy expression on his face.

I stepped out of the car and looked right at Gabe. I
tried to think of something witty to say to ease the tension, but
nothing came to mind and the expression on his face told me joking
would not be my best approach. “You can drop your stuff off at your
rooms and then meet Mr. Callahan and I in his office in fifteen
minutes,” he said and walked away. He didn’t even look at me which
felt like a punch to the gut. I wanted to run after him and tell
him I was sorry. I wanted to tell him how much I appreciated all
he’s done for me and I never took anything he taught me for
granted. His cold brush off told me a simply sorry wouldn’t cut
it.

I bit my lip and tried to keep myself from losing it.
I was only there five minutes and already I wanted to hop back in
the car and tell them to take me to the airport. I knew coming back
to school and facing everyone would be hard, but I never expected
it to be this hard.

The three of us hurried to our rooms to drop off our
luggage and then headed to Aidan’s office. Aidan and Gabe were
there waiting for us, both wearing stern and unpleased expressions.
“Have a seat,” Aidan said.

“I rather stand,” I replied. On my way over to the
office I decided I wasn’t going to let them intimidate me. I was
going to stand my ground and defend my actions the best I could.
Dean and Cameron, on the other hand, decided to sit. I knew they
weren’t looking forward to this conversation any more than I had,
but they definitely were not going to argue with what they were
going to throw at us.

“Suit yourself,” Aidan said, adjusting himself in his
seat. “I’m going to save the speech and just get right to it. You
will have class every day from eight to three. Then you will be
helping with maintenance and grounds keeping as part of your
punishment.”

“Why are we being punished? I thought this school was
a choice?” I asked, a little annoyed, especially since I never
really had the choice.

“While yes you choose to enroll here and it is not
mandatory, this school is still a privilege and you should be lucky
we’re even letting you back in.”

“I’m lucky to be let back in?” I said with a bit of
an attitude.

“
Ella
,
shut
up,”
Dean said in my head.

“After all the trouble you caused it took a lot of
convincing parents –”

“The trouble I caused?” I interrupted, taking a step
forward. “What in the hell are you talking about? You mean when
Jack attacked the school? Or the first time he got in here? This is
my fault how? If I remember correctly you were one of the first
people to stand up and agree we fight,” I yelled, letting my temper
get the best of me.

Aidan seemed unaffected by my attitude. He looked as
if he expected it. “I’m not arguing that and I’m not saying any of
that is your fault. I’m talking about how you left after the fact.
Just leaving had a lot of parents believing you were behind this in
the first place,” he said calmly.

“What?” I gawked.

“Ella, your actions have consequences and in order to
keep this school open and make parents feel that their kids are
safe again we had to promise that you would be punished,” I opened
my mouth to comment but he continued. “Regardless of whose fault it
was,” he finished. “In addition to helping out around the school
you three will also be in charge of helping the new students in the
fall.”

Gabe stepped forward. “You are also to continue with
your training while you are here. We will train every day in the
morning and the evening until school starts back up in the fall.” I
could see the smallest glimmer of a smile on Dean’s face. “This
also includes you two as well,” Gabe told Cameron and Dean making
his smile fade.