West (A Roam Series Novella) (3 page)

Oh, this one was pretty.
Too pretty.

“West Perry,” I added, sifting through the piles of debris. “Did you find what you were looking for?”

She nodded, slipping the necklace over her head. The cross was small, silver, and rested against her chest. “It was my grandmother’s. She passed away last month. This was her house… I lived here,” she turned and stood over the destruction that the hurricane had caused, her long skirt falling to her ankles. I stood as well, towering over her- she couldn’t have been more than 5’2”.

“And where will you live now?” I asked her.

When she turned back to me, her eyes were brimming with tears. It had been so very long since I saw that look in her eyes… not since Lysbette, in France.

In the first life.

So lost
.

“
West,” she breathed, shaking her head. “I don’t know you. You don’t know me. But I’ll be honest with you.” She tightened her fists at her sides, lowering her voice. “I have been dreaming about… you.
I’ve known you my entire life.
”

I stilled.
What?

“I know it sounds… crazy… but since I was a little girl, I’ve seen your face in my dreams. Some of the dreams are wonderful, and some are horrible… but every time you promised you’d come for me… and here you are,” she finished, breathless, lifting her left arm. “In my dream there are numbers on my arm. What are they?”

I could barely keep up with her.
This has never happened. They’ve never dreamed before I met them.

S
he’s dreamt of me her entire life?

I extended my arm, and she widened her eyes at the coordinates on my inner, left forearm.

“You remember?” I asked, and she shook her head, tears brightening her eyes.

“I don’t know what any of this means, but I feel like you’ve been missing my whole life.”

Christ almighty, this was new. I glanced toward the guy who’d been talking to her. “Was this your house?”

She nodded. “
My parents live in Pennsylvania; I came here to help my grandmother. I… need to go home. Jimmy’s parents want me to stay with them, but I just can’t,” she poured, glancing back toward the greaser. “He won’t keep his hands off me.” She covered her face with her hands, her shoulders shaking.

“Won’t keep his hands off of you?” I demanded, and I fought my temper. Carefully, I retrieved the handkerchief from my back pocket, making sure it was clean before handing it to her. “Here, Annie.”

“Thank you,” she accepted the cloth, dabbing at her eyes. “I don’t want to go home, either… but I don’t suppose you just wandered into my life, this handsome stranger I’ve dreamt about for as long as I can remember, ready to whisk me away,” she chuckled softly.

I stared at her, admiring her sincerity.

She was just as lost as I’d guessed, and I couldn’t help but feel like this was all too easy.

“Well
, thank you for that compliment,” I managed, continuing to grin. “And it just so happens I’m traveling onward up the path of the storm to Canada. You’re more than welcome to come along.”

She gripped the cross between her fingers, and a single tear remained on her button nose. She was absolut
ely the cutest so far- a dollface. Only twenty-one years old. “You’re offering to give me a ride?”

Too easy.
She was coming right to me. Effortless.
Maybe this is it.

Maybe this is the life we succeed in,
the love I would keep forever.

The one
who will live.

Her fair skin was rosy beneath her blush.
Her silken hair framed her face, rounding it, giving a charming curve to her cheeks.

An
angel.

“Grab what you can,” I urged, glancing again at Jimmy. She said he couldn’t keep his hands off of her. Was it possible he was the Alter? “
Or don’t. We’ll get you what you need. I figure we walked into each other’s lives at just the right time.”

She beamed, trusting, needing.

Irresistible.

My Ford
truck waited just further down the road, green and rusted but functioning. I was careful not to touch her in any way; she was leaving this town with just the clothes on her back, trusting a complete stranger.

That told me she
was telling me the truth. She’d truly dreamt about me her whole life.

This was going to be easier than I thought.

I opened the passenger’s side door for her, and she took a deep breath before climbing into the truck.

Moving around to the driver’s seat, I drove- but in the opposite direction of Pennsylvania. There was no way I was taking her back to her parents. It was time to convince her, and I’d
learned the sooner, the better.

“Mr. Perry, thank you for this,” she said quietly, glancing over her shoulder numerous times until finally settling into the seat.

Mr. Perry.
I liked that.

“You’re very welcome. Are your parents expecting you?”

She lowered her eyes before turning to face me. “No, they aren’t. They want me married, but I refuse.”

“Why?”

“I won’t just marry any man,” she looped her finger in and out of her necklace. “I won’t marry someone I don’t love. I want someone who… someone who just… just takes my breath away…,” she blushed, turning away. “Too many romantic notions, as my father would say.”

Gazing at her, I longed to take her hand in mine. This was really happening; no resistance, no questions, no struggle. She was giving herself to me, no strings attached, and I nearly gaped at her offering.

“Annie,” I swung around another tree, careful not to hit the piece of wood in the road. “I need to show you something. And if you are willing to trust me, I will take care of you. Like you said, we haven’t known each other but for a minute, but the words I have to say have waited for lifetimes.”

Her
eyes lit with stars, and her face filled with hope. “That is so…
dreamy
,” she whispered, moistening her lips once.

I tightened my grip on the steering wheel. Son of a bitch, she was so willing. I reached for her.

Effortless.

I pulled along the road near the woods.
When my fingers found hers and squeezed, she pressed back against the seat.

H
er breath caught in her throat only seconds before a scream tore through her chest.

I caught her, gripping her against me. She didn’t figh
t; her arm was on fire, I knew the feeling. It was torturous, like intravenous acid.

Pressing her face into my chest, she cried out, sobbing in a mixture of pain and confusion.

“I have them, too,” I held my arm out to reflect the coordinates for Raleigh, North Carolina. They came when
you
were born. I was marked for you. Coordinates. We were
meant to be
, and I’ve been searching for you for twenty-one years.”

The pain was subsiding; her heart rate was slowing, and she turned in my arms.
Her teary eyes blinked rapidly. “Me?”

“Yes.”

“Why? Why am I special?”

G
od, she was enchanting. Every hardened belief, every horrible memory, and every time I’d failed evaporated from my mind as I locked in her gaze. The sunshine streamed through the window, and I lifted my finger to her chin.

Tracing lightly, I tipped her face to mine.
“How did I get so
lucky
, Annie?”

The world centered on our little truck, post hurricane, along the side of the road in Raleigh, North Carolina.

She lay across my lap. I lowered my face to hers, catching her top lip softly.

She
breathed a tiny cry, sliding her hands up my arms. “Mr. Perry,” she protested, weak, holding onto my shirt as though she would fall from my arms at any moment. “This is indecent- you must think I’m…,”

“I think you’re my angel,” I pulled her more fully
into my arms, my lips returning to hers. With the other girls, our first kisses had
felt
like first kisses- all sensations, no emotions.

Now, I was sinking.

She responded, eagerly, sliding her arms around my neck. I cupped her tiny waist, her hip, her leg, memorizing ever inch of her. “Baby, I need you to sit back so I can drive. I have some things to tell you, and I can’t focus with your sweet mouth on mine.”

“I’m so embarrassed,” she covered her lips, pressing as far away from me and against the door as possible. “I can’t believe… I behaved like… what is happening? What are these numbers?
Just like in my dreams?”

It began; the confusion, the panic. I spoke calmly, the same speech I’d delivered four times before, and by the time we’d reached Rocky Mount,
she was listening to my words.

“A prophecy?”
She exhaled slowly, her fingers lingering over her stomach. “Our child will save the world? I’m… afraid,” she realized, and I reached for her hand. “I see my arm, I see your arm, and I know there is something happening here that I don’t understand. But, my whole life…
I’ve known you,
” she let me hold her hand. “I’ve dreamed about you.”

“
Some part of you remembered us. That’s never happened before, not in any other life.”

“
I believe you. I’m afraid, but I do believe you,” she nodded, resting her head against my shoulder. “I’ll do what I must, West. If that means making a child with you, then I guess I’m the lucky one.”

“Annie,” I groaned, threading my fingers through her hair. “None of the other lives have come… this easily. I know what this sounds like. It sounds
crazy.”

“
I was crazy to run from my parents. I was crazy to come live with my grandmother, and to stay even after she died. But I was drawn toward… something…
someone
. You.”

The rocking motion of the truck lulled her to close her eyes. I wrapped one arm around her, lowering a kiss to her hair.

I would keep her if it was the last thing I did.

Madison, Ohio

August 2012

Roam

She skipped my class the very next day.

I was furious.
She planned to major in history at Yale, yet she ditches my class on the second day?
She’d also left her history book behind.

I went to the office. She’d come in late, reporting to statistics second period. The secretary handed me a long, blue lanyard with a key atta
ched. “Oh, Mr. Perry, if you wouldn’t mind, would you stop in Mad Snacks and unload the shipment of chips? The custodian is running late today…,”

I forced a polite smile. “Sure.”
I have to make friends here.
I planned to be there for a while.

I knew Roam had study hall third period,
and I had my lunch break, so I rushed to the cafeteria study hall.

There she was, engrossed in her cell phone. Her sta
tistics book sat unopened. I lowered to the table, one seat away, staring at her. She was absorbed in whatever she was reading, I gave her that. Probably a text from her boyfriend- who I’d learned was Logan Rush after a quick Facebook search.

“Miss Camden.”

She jumped out of her skin, her voice shaking as she managed a small “Hi.”

“I never figured you one for skipping class and
surfing your phone in school. I’ll take that. Please come with me.”

She was mortified.

She placed the iPhone on the table, and I grabbed the device, sliding it into my pocket. Her hair was fixed into a long, thick braid, and the wet mark on the collar of her sweatshirt (combined with scent of shampoo) told me she’d just showered. Everything about her was fresh, clean, and new, and I would have been content just to sit next to her, watching her read.

When I stood, she followed
me to the football field. The late summer heat must have been so uncomfortable for her in that sweatshirt. “Where are we going?”

“Mad Snacks.
I somehow got roped into unloading the shipment of chips and candy that arrived this morning, and you can help me- since statistics seem to bore you.”

“I did not skip your class this morning, Mr. Perry. I was ill before school and was late.
Excused.”

Ill? I retrieved the lanyard with the key, my eyes sweeping over her. I liked hearing her call me Mr. Perry too much.

She reminded so much of Annie.

“I’m sorry to hear that. Feeling better?”

As I pushed open the door, I flipped a switch that turned on a fan/light combo.

“Listen, you’ll need to open the window if I’m going in there with you.”

The stifling heat was overpowering. “It’s pretty warm in here,” I agreed, irritated at the pile of boxes near the door.