Authors: Jen Naumann
Gabe drags his hand across my back leisurely, causing wild tingling to erupt in every inch he touches. “Has he told you what he sees in your future?”
I shake my head with a heightened level of curiosity. “Can you see it? I thought guardian angels were the ones that could see the future of their humans.”
The dark brows above his eyes almost seem to pulsate. “I’m not like guardian angels, Lily. I can know the fate of anyone I want, and there is nothing keeping me from sharing it.”
Whatever it is Gabe knows about my future, I really want to learn, whether or not Eli wants me to. I lean in so close to Gabe I can feel his breath on my lips.
“Tell me,” I whisper with urgency.
“That man who tried to kill your mother? He knows you have his money and he will return for you, Lily. Unless you know how to defend yourself and your little sister…”
My eyes grow wide with fear. “Johnny? He will try to kill us?”
He brings his arms around me and rests his mouth on my shoulder so his lips are just above my ear. “Your sister will be killed in the near future.”
I stagger away from him and my entire body grows numb.
Eli had warned knowing my future would be dangerous. Was this the secret he refused to tell me? But why wouldn’t he want to warn me if Rose’s life was in danger? Doesn’t it go without saying that you would do anything you can to protect those you love? He had saved me from dying—why wouldn’t he step in now for Rose’s sake?
Gabe pulls me close. “If you learn to control your abilities, you can prevent it from happening. She doesn’t have to die this way.”
It is amazing how my mind is able to totally shut down any compassionate thoughts of Eli the longer I am with Gabe. I start to wonder if Eli really has been using his influence on me. I had just asked him to fall so that we could spend our lives together, yet here I stand, allowing myself to be held by another man and pressing my lips up against his.
CHAPTER 10
To my complete amazement, Eli still comes to see me just moments after Gabe leaves. I know he has seen everything that happened with Gabe and he can’t seem to look at me when he walks onto the patio. He looks especially handsome in dark, scuffed jeans with a black button down dress shirt, which makes it even harder to see the look of displeasure on his face. He glances at me only for a moment, but it is long enough that I can see all tenderness in his eyes is gone.
“Go get your swimsuit on.”
“Why?” I ask.
He pulls off his shirt to reveal the tan, svelte muscular chest that had been hidden underneath. I can’t keep my lips from curling up into a grin when my heart begins to do a happy dance at the sight of him.
“We’re going swimming,” he answers, now removing his pants to show the swim trunks underneath.
I stand to remove my own shirt and capris to reveal the swimsuit I am still wearing and take Eli’s hand that he holds out behind him. The guilt seizes hold of me when our skin makes contact. I had just recently confessed my love to him and then kissed someone else—someone who wants the total opposite things that he does. I am ashamed and don’t understand why he still wants to be with me.
We walk down into the sand together, our words held in. Although I have never wanted to try any alcohol in my life after seeing what it did to my mother, the time I spent with Gabe today feels much like I imagine a drunken night would. I hardly remember consciously wanting to kiss him and the whole thing is one big blur, like it had happened to someone else.
“Would you believe me right now if I said I don’t know what came over me today?” I ask, the shame overwhelming me. “I don’t know why I kissed Gabe like that.”
“You were under his influence,” Eli answers flatly. “It’s like I told you, Lily. He will do whatever it takes to win you over.”
I shut my eyes, fighting off the tears that want out. “And I fell for it.”
Eli whirls around to face me, the whites of his eyes standing out in the darkness. “Lily, today is your birthday.”
Eli and Gabe are the only two people in California that know about my birthday as Rose is too little to have any clue what day it even is. I had been looking forward to spending the evening with Eli, but the magic of any special moments have been lost to my stupid actions.
“I’m sorry,” I say, my voice cracking.
“Today you became an adult and the angel part of you has surfaced.”
I shrug my shoulders. “Yeah, I know. You told me that already. We’ve established the fact that I can move quickly like other angels.”
He lifts his hands up to my face but drops them before they reach it. I have not seen him quite so frustrated before now. “I can’t tell you everything Lily, but you need to be…careful. Just remember you promised you wouldn’t do anything reckless.”
“I don’t love him.” We both know it but I feel like I need to say something to try and erase my latest mistake. “When I first got here I was scared and all alone. This stranger appeared out of nowhere and was really kind to us. I may have developed some feelings for him and I wish I would have told you sooner. I’m sorry. I messed up, Eli.”
He turns to me, his expression starting out as gentle. “Did you hear yourself just now? You said yourself that a stranger appeared out of nowhere. What part of that sounds like the same Lily that busted her butt to provide a safe life for her little sister? You put your fate in someone else’s hands so easily but didn’t even stop to think of what that could mean.”
The frustration is seeping from him now and his eyes are glowering.
I narrow my eyes back at him and tighten my jaw. “Correct me if I’m wrong, but isn’t that exactly what I am doing with you?”
He runs a hand through his hair, blowing out a puff of air. “That’s different.”
“Only because it has to do with you, right? But when we are talking about Gabe, it’s wrong. So I shouldn’t have trusted him when he was a total stranger, but it’s okay to trust you. That is what you’re saying.”
He turns back to face the ocean that looks like some kind of mysterious black liquid without the sun and very little moonlight cast over it. “There are more things going on you don’t know about, Lily—things much bigger than a little teenage crush.”
I stomp my foot, embarrassment flooding me the minute I realize what I have just done. But there is something deep in his eyes telling me he is holding back another secret—one even bigger than that of Rose dying. However, I can’t imagine anything more earth shattering than the death of my little sister.
“I know that, Eli!” I yell. “Maybe now would be a good time to fill me in on this other big secret you’re so insistent on protecting! Maybe then I could understand everything you’re trying to tell me a little better!”
He continues to stare into the distance, seemingly un-phased by my little fit. “Don’t ask me things you don’t want to know the answer to.”
I huff angrily. “What is that supposed to mean?”
His cold body language tells me he is done with our conversation. The little girl in me wants to curl into a little ball and cry with the overwhelming amount of pent up frustration, but the older and more worldly me knows that it wouldn’t solve anything. It is a crappy end to my eighteenth birthday.
* * *
Monday morning at school Gabe is beyond friendly, trying to take my hand and giving me zero personal space. I do not return any of his romantic gestures, however. Although I can’t actually see him anywhere, I know Eli is watching nearby. It is not until just before lunch that I finally see him. He is leaned up against my locker, waiting for me. Our eyes meet and I instantly wish we were alone. He would not kiss me last night other than on my cheek before he left. Our kisses from the other night had replayed through my mind a million times and I am aching for more.
“What time is your hearing?” he asks. From the stiff way he stands beside me I know he is trying his hardest not to get too involved with my emotions.
I look straight ahead at his chest so he won’t see the despair on my face as I answer, “four.” There still remains an air of tension between us after our conversation from the night before, so he does not reach for me as I wish he would. Annoying tears spring into my eyes.
“You can do this, Lily. I will be there. Whatever happens, I’ll help you get through this.”
His sympathetic words cause a lone tear to escape down my cheek. “It’s not the court hearing that I’m worried about.”
I lift my eyes to meet his. The cold demeanor almost literally melts from his face when he realizes what I am talking about—I am afraid I will lose Eli forever after my foolish kiss with Gabe.
All of a sudden, Gabe is standing right beside us.
The panic of finally seeing the two of them together has my tongue literally tied. With my heart pounding wildly, I wipe my tears and try to push aside the overwhelming feeling that I may vomit. My eyes dart between the two of them, wondering how the whole scene is about to play out.
“You ready for lunch?” Gabe asks me casually.
His eyes don’t acknowledge Eli but there is an edge of annoyance in his tone making it clear that he is well aware of his presence. Gabe watches me closely, waiting for my answer.
I balk at his casual attitude. He had ignored me for weeks on end, but after kissing me in the alley he thinks things are back to normal? I do everything in my power to resist his influences that I can feel bouncing off of him.
“I…um…actually, I am going to eat with Eli,” I say in a small voice.
Gabe finally turns to Eli, his dark eyes silently sizing him up. Eli holds his jaw taut, holding back something I know he wants to say about the situation. The intensity in the air is so thick I fear I will begin to suffocate from it. I wonder if it is this nerve wracking every time two angels with different intentions are together.
I finally burst out into a loud snicker that surprises even me. “Really? You’re both going to just stand there and pretend like you don’t already know each other? Like we all don’t know what is really going on?”
My panic escalates when I consider I may have to deal with both of them beside me for an entire meal, but from the way in which Eli’s entire body tenses up I can guess it won’t happen.
“I can’t stay,” he says, his voice blunt.
He probably isn’t lying—it could quite possibly kill him to sit at the same table with me next to Gabe. We all know he is only in school for my benefit and is always watching me from a distance anyway, but then again, Gabe is probably only in school for my benefit as well. I love Eli but can’t imagine forcing myself to go back to school if the situation was reversed.
“Another time then,” Gabe replies, his expression hard.
Eli’s expression is not any softer. “You can count on it.”
The whole scene playing out before me is just too much to take and I don’t know what to say or do. Gabe takes the opportunity to slip his hand into mine but I pull away. My eyes turn to plead for Eli’s forgiveness, but he is already looking away.
“I’ll see you later,” I tell Eli in a hopeful tone.
“Last period, Earth Science,” he answers, nearly causing me to chortle out loud. He just happens to be in the two classes Gabe had not been able to get into. In the blink of an eye he is gone, having disappeared among the hoard of students.
Gabe turns to me the second we are alone. There is an odd little smile playing on his lips that is anything but kind and his influences take over me, just like that. “What do you say we skip lunch and see if you are able to enter the realm of angels?”
* * *
We stand alone in behind the school where the grassy knoll of campus meets the industrial area. It is filled with large machines of various purposes that hum noisily as they work. The area is surrounded by tall chain linked fences that keep it inaccessible to curious kids. Most of the students are hidden around the corner in the center of campus, enjoying their lunches. The sun is hidden behind a slew of clouds and the dark afternoon seems to be rather fitting for the situation.
“I have to be back for court at four,” I say to Gabe, my nerves on high alert.
“Don’t worry. Time up there is not like time down here on earth,” Gabe tells me. “No matter what, it will be like we were gone for only minutes here.”
What we are about to do scares me nearly to death as I have no idea what to expect. The need to see my father again has taken over any rational thoughts that try to talk me out of doing this. Gabe’s warm, dark eyes do their job of calming me and he takes my hands in his. All at once I am overly aware of the slower pace my heart has taken on and my now shallow, uneven breaths.
The innocent and uncomplicated friend I had trusted just a few days ago reappears as he looks back at me. “You have to totally concentrate on nothing other than my voice. I will lead you there if your mind is completely open.”
Shutting my eyes with a wistful movement, I try to do as he says. But it proves difficult to push aside the visions of myself floating through an empty space to my parents who are waiting for me with arms wide open. I imagine them being young and handsome again, like they were when I was a little girl. My mind gets carried away with what I would say to my parents and how they would react to seeing me. Nothing is happening to me physically, however-I can feel the concrete still firmly beneath my feet.
“No!” Eli’s voice unexpectedly yells out, breaking my line of concentration.
When I open my eyes we are still standing behind the school as I had suspected, but Eli is now standing beside Gabe, his face flooded with worry. My heart soars at the sight of him, but he doesn’t even look in my direction. He forcefully pulls my hands out of Gabe’s reach.
“You can’t take her there, Gabriel. She’s not a pure angel. It could be dangerous for her. Don’t you get that?”
Gabe glares at Eli so intensely I feel the anger bouncing off of him. This is more of the heated reaction I had been expecting when seeing them meet before my eyes for the first time.
“This is her choice,” Gabe tells him. “I’m not making her do this. You’re the one that’s so big on free will. Isn’t that one of the rules you straight laced angels have to follow? Doesn’t the big guy upstairs preach how important it is for you to let humans follow their heart?”