Bo tried to include me by explaining little tidbits that he could remember about each person they discussed, but his efforts were for naught. Cade and I were outsiders to their reunion and I had a feeling that that was exactly how Annika wanted it.
It seemed like hours had passed when my phone rang, and, in fact, they had. The day had come and gone, and evening was upon us. The instant I heard the voice on the other end of the line, however, time stood stil .
The screen on my phone had identified the cal er as my mother so I excused myself to take the cal in another room. I had just scooted up onto the countertop in the kitchen and settled in for a long argument when the familiar voice froze my muscles like only a sub-zero blast of terror can. The voice, though familiar, did not belong to my mother.
“Hey, Ridley. Long time, no see.”
It was Trinity.
I was speechless as my mind scrambled to make sense of the incongruity—Mom’s phone, Trinity’s voice. Mom’s phone. Trinity’s voice.
Trinity had my mother’s cel phone.
I rocked between fury and terror like a sailboat being tossed to and fro by a hurricane. I was so caught up in the furor of it that I nearly missed her next words.
“I’m not going to hurt her. I just want to talk to you. Alone.
At your house. If you bring anyone with you, you won’t like what happens next.”
Without hesitation, I hopped off the counter and ran to the door.
“I’l be there in two minutes.”
Flipping the phone shut, I flung open the door, ready to blow through town like the wind. It was Bo that stopped me.
“Ridley, what are you doing?” He was standing just behind me.
Overwhelmed by emotion and concern for my mother’s safety, I struggled to make sense of his question. It seemed as though my mind could only wrap itself around one crisis at a time. My focus was complete, just as it was when I was hungry.
Until I met Bo’s eyes.
As if I’d been weightless, drifting off into oblivion, Bo was like gravity, pul ing me back down to earth, anchoring me.
“Bo, she’s got my mother.”
“Who?” he demanded, gripping my upper arms urgently.
“Trinity.”
“Let’s go,” he said, pushing me out the door and pul ing it shut behind him.
“No, wait. You can’t come. She wants to see me alone.
She’l hurt her if you come, Bo.”
“She won’t have to know.”
“But what if she does? What if she finds out and does something to my mother? I can’t risk that.”
“Surely you don’t expect me to just sit here and wait while you go meet Trinity by yourself.”
“You don’t have a choice, Bo, and neither do I.”
We stared at each other for a few more seconds. I could tel that Bo was far from convinced that he should let me go alone.
“She’s my mother, Bo.”
I poured al the emotion—al the fear, al the love—into my eyes, hoping he’d see it. And he did.
Bo sighed. “I won’t be far. Just cal out if you need me. I’l hear you.”
“Thank you,” I said, stretching up on my toes to touch my lips to his. When I would’ve pul ed away, he slipped an arm around my waist.
“I love you,” he whispered, tucking his face into my neck.
I closed my eyes for just a second, savoring the sound of those words. I felt my heart spread wide to take them in like a flower blossoming under the light of the sun.
“I love you, too.”
“I’l give you a minute or two head start and then I’l fol ow.
Stick to the backs of buildings and houses, and stay in the trees and shadows whenever you can. Remember, you can run as fast as the wind.”
“Got it.”
With a tight smile more for Bo’s benefit than mine, I turned and took off like a shot, racing down Sebastian’s driveway.
On any other evening, I might’ve enjoyed flitting from yard to yard, through the trees and within the shadows, making dogs bark at the wind and children puzzle over it.
It was amazing that they seemed almost to be standing stil as I sped by. I even paused, ever so briefly, to help one little girl.
I was darting through her back yard just as she was screwing up her face to cry because her puppy had managed to wrestle a dol from her arms. As I breezed by, I snatched the dol from the puppy’s mouth and tossed it back at the child’s feet. The look on her face was so comical I had to laugh, a sound that I imagined drifted back to her like the rustling of the leaves in the wind.
Beyond that, however, there was no joy in my quick trip.
After leaving the little girl’s back yard, my mind returned its singular focus to Trinity and my mother.
When I arrived at my house, I was confused to see that Mom’s car wasn’t in the driveway. I couldn’t decide if that was alarming or comforting. I gave it only a passing thought, though, choosing instead to focus on the girl that lay just beyond the brick wal s of my home.
The door was unlocked, which caused a chil to wiggle its way down my spine. I slipped through and closed it snugly behind me.
I stopped inside the foyer to smel and to listen. Absolute silence greeted me, as did the familiar smel s of home. In a layer of scent just beneath those I’d always found inside the house, there was the dark, dank aroma of earth. It bounced around in my head like a key without a lock until it slid effortlessly into a memory, releasing a realization that surprised me.
I had smel ed that strong scent before. I’d smel ed it in the woods the night of Summer’s pre-Hal oween party, right before I’d been attacked. A voice had whispered “T” and I had assumed it was Drew. But Drew smel ed of pine; I would always remember that, too. It was etched in my mind along with the terror of him biting into my flesh and the heartbreak of him begging for Bo to kil him.
I didn’t think it was possible for my muscles to hold any more tension, but I felt them squeeze in response to my thoughts, as if preparing for the battle of a lifetime. When my sensitive ears final y picked up on a tiny noise, I sprang into action, moving soundlessly toward my bedroom from whence the muffled thump had come.
When I rounded the corner, my bedroom door was open.
Trinity was sitting on the end of my bed, flipping through an old photo album of a cheer camp we’d attended together in the ninth grade. She didn’t even bother to look up when I stepped into the doorway.