Chapter Four Thus with a kiss I die #2
There were hundreds of dollars on the ground. If I just grabbed a few and dipped, maybe I could stay in Virginia. The fact that the thought had even crossed my mind, especially after witnessing the stabbing in the vision, drew knots of shame in my stomach.
I at least had to try something.
“He’s not moving,” I said finally, leaning close and whispering into the phone. “You need to get him help.”
The girl on the other side of the line gasped, as if she hadn’t truly believed that he or anyone else would answer.
“We’re in an alleyway behind Center City Mall. I found him behind a dumpster. He’s been stabbed,” I said. Quickly, I gave the girl directions on how to find him. But his chest was still. By the time any paramedics would arrive, it might be too late.
“Stay on the phone,” the girl begged. “Please.”
But I was already moving. I knelt beside him. Then I pressed two fingers against his neck to search for a pulse.
I couldn’t move him much because of the knife protruding from his lower abdomen, so I carefully laid him on the ground and tilted his chin up, pinching his nose and bringing my mouth to his. His lips were soft and cool against my own.
I took a deep breath, gathering air in my own chest. Then I breathed oxygen into his mouth.
His chest didn’t move. I couldn’t give up, though.
Even if I wanted to. Even if every desperate piece of me wanted to bolt from this alleyway and pretend this night had never happened.
I could do this. I could try to save him.
Again, I passed the air from my lungs into his, pressing my hands against his chest and pushing up and down, up and down.
Suddenly, it felt like my mind was splitting.
A vision rose to the surface, but I couldn’t stop it. It kept pushing against my mind, trying to take control.
I fought against the force of my powers, desperate to stay in the present, to help him.
But the rapid skin-to-skin contact drew me closer and closer to a vision.
Pain ripped through my skull and the cold sensation returned, consuming all of me.
When I brought my lips to his once more, I finally felt the gentle rise of his chest. I pulled back, just as he began gasping for air.
His eyes fluttered wildly. His hands trembled, and he choked back a cry against the pain of the knife lodged in his body.
In the distance, the sound of sirens blared. The girl had called an ambulance to our location after all.
He was going to be okay.
Knowing that, hoping it desperately, I grabbed handfuls of the scattered bills and shoved them into my bag. It wasn’t my proudest moment, but I needed the money just as much as the Westfield University heir—Kasem—needed the air in my lungs.
“We’re even now,” I said, but even saying the words made me burn with guilt.
I was about to reach for the last few bills, when I felt something cool against my hand. I looked up. His hand brushed against mine. The moment was so intimate, so vulnerable, that I almost dropped all of the money I’d stolen then and there.
But then, just as his fingers grazed mine, the vision I’d been fighting overtook me, and I was transported into the looking glass once more.
I was surrounded by white lilies. But in this vision, I was looking at myself. I lay on my back and the Westfield heir carried me in his arms. I could see him clearly, as if I were looking into the night sky. He was trembling, and a voice in the distance snapped him out of his reverie.
“Let her go,” a voice said. “You have your inheritance. What more do you want, Kasem?”
This vision was different from the others.
It wasn’t taking place in the past. Not like the other ones always had.
This vision was of the future. It was the only explanation for seeing myself with a man I’d just met earlier that day, in a garden I’d never set foot in before.
A garden I somehow knew would be in Westfield University.
I jolted forward, and I was back in the alley, kneeling over Kasem.
The vision was gone. Kasem’s voice drew me from my trance. When he spoke, his words were a light whisper.
“I told you I would die,” he said. He was teasing me. Even in this state, he had the nerve to be glib. If he hadn’t already been stabbed, I would have shanked him myself.
“You’re not going to die. You’re going to survive.”
“You’re making me doubt you.” He shot me a weak smile, one with the faint trace of a dimple. “No one lives forever,” he said. “You can’t promise me any different.”
“You’re not going to die now,” I said. “Is that better?”
His lashes fluttered and the light drained from his eyes as he began to lose consciousness.
“Wake up,” I said, bringing my hands to his cheek, my voice panicked, my own breath catching in my throat.
The thought of him closing his eyes and never opening them again sent a current of dread through me.
“You lost a lot of blood, and I know you’re in pain, but you need to keep fighting. The paramedics will be here soon.”
Their sirens drew closer and everything inside of me screamed for them to hurry.
But I couldn’t stay. If the paramedics or the police found me here, I’d have to explain why I’d taken Kasem’s money.
Or worse, I’d have to explain why I had the victim’s bracelet and where I’d found it.
I could try to describe the attackers from my vision, but I doubted the police would believe a “psychic.” No one would.
Kasem tugged at the hem of my shirt as I made to stand.
“Don’t leave me.”
After everything, he was asking for my help. And with those three syllables, my heart broke.
The sirens were getting closer. Time was running out.
I moved away from him, zipping my bag stashed with the money as I crawled to the other side of the alleyway.
“I’m sorry. I need to go.” Faltering, I managed to stand. “I saw your future,” I said. “You’ll survive this. You’ll get that inheritance you wanted. You’ll be okay, Kasem.”
I slipped away, just before the paramedics raced into the alley. I watched from afar as they brought their equipment to his side, tending to his wounds before lifting him on a stretcher and away to safety.
I’d saved him. But the sinking sensation that something was wrong anchored me in the alley. Instinctively, my hand reached for him. But he was gone.
The moment my lips had found his, I’d brought him back from the realm of the dead into the realm of the living. But in the future I’d witnessed, surrounded by lilies and carried in his arms, a trace of death lingered in our kiss. Like a promise, like we’d sealed our fates with it.