Chapter 38
TWO MORE
Ihurry after him—down the corridor, through the upper hall, into his bedroom suite.
He stands near his four poster bed, gripping one of the columns with his back to the door, his shoulders rising and falling.
His leather suitcase sits beside the tree we decorated a couple weeks ago.
The sight of it wilting in the corner makes me want to weep.
“You’re back,” I say, not knowing what else to say. My voice is still hoarse, my hair still damp. I curl my bare toes. “Did the specialist know how to help?”
Jude turns around, and the shadows beneath his eyes are all the answer I need.
Despair digs into my shoulders like the talons of those psychotic birds. The specialist didn’t help. Jude’s soul is still bound to that ruby.
“Why are you in Rafe’s clothes?” he asks, his attention roving down the length of my body, then back up again, pausing briefly at the bundle in my arms.
Despite the state of my voice, I launch into the story. I tell him everything that happened, starting with the pearl. He stands as still as a statue, taking in every word. When I get to the bit about Caleb falling in and me going after him, his jaw tightens.
“I fled the scene of a crime,” I say. “I just left. But I guess—I didn’t leave. I was taken. Rafe took me while I was unconscious.” The talons dig deeper, only this time they feel less like despair, more like panic. “Which means I have to go back. I have to talk to the police.”
I’m half surprised they aren’t already here.
Surely by now, Brady has told them that I was at the quarry, too.
That I went after Caleb. That Rafe pulled me from the water and drove me away.
But one look toward Jude’s private balcony shows me a night that is calm and quiet—not a single flashing light in sight.
“Selah,” Jude says, his voice steady as he takes the bundle of clothes from my arms and sets them on his bed. “You need to breathe.”
But how can I do that when I almost drowned?
When Rafe saved me?
When Jude is back but not any better?
And standing so close.
The ache in my heart throbs.
I’ve missed him so much, but now he’s here and I can’t touch him, because my touch is poison.
Is this how he felt before the curse was broken?
Desire and longing tangled into an overwhelming knot of terror?
My attention dips to his chest, where the black tendrils have spread, where they will continue to spread if I don’t get a handle on my emotions.
I take a step back.
But Jude stops me halfway.
With one hand, he takes my elbow. With the other, he cups the side of my face. His thumb traces the ridge of my jaw, and my self-control crumbles. With my eyes closed, I lean into his palm. I can feel him drawing me closer, inch by delectable inch. And I can’t stop him. I don’t want to stop him.
His phone buzzes so sharply I startle.
With a look of utmost irritation, he lets go of my face and glances at the screen alight on his nightstand.
“It’s Twig,” he says.
He picks up the phone and presses it against his ear.
I can only hear Jude’s side of the conversation, but it’s obvious by the quick cadence of Twig’s voice that he’s freaked out.
“She’s here with me,” Jude says.
He nods, then nods again as Twig talks fast in his ear.
Jude’s eyes meet mine. “Can you call him back, let him know she’s fine, and she’ll be home shortly?”
My heart jumps into my throat.
I spin in a circle like I might find my phone lying randomly on Jude’s floor, when in fact, I left it in my bedroom before racing out of the house to the quarry.
Hours ago.
My dad must be frantic. I’m sure he called Mrs. Calloway, which means she will be frantic, too. Undoubtedly on the verge of reporting another missing person to the police.
“It’s breaking right now?” Jude asks, his brow furrowing.
The question is so odd, my panic hiccups.
Jude makes a few sounds of ascent. Then hangs up his phone and turns on the television. He flips to a local station, where a news banner scrolls at the bottom of the screen.
Two teens missing after falling through the ice
“Two?” I choke.
Karen Foster sits behind her desk staring soberly into the camera as Caleb and Brady’s school pictures appear on the screen.
“Two teenage boys fell through the ice at the Foggy Hollow quarry earlier this evening. Authorities report the boys were with friends when they went under and failed to resurface.”
My ears start to ring.
Brady never fell through.
The footage pans to a reporter bundled in a scarf and hat, standing at the quarry with police cars and floodlights and search crews in the background.
“Tonight’s search comes as Foggy Hollow remains under scrutiny following the unresolved disappearances of Sienna Clark and Emma Collins, two teenage girls who went missing last month.
The case comes on the heels of an earlier tragedy on Halloween night, when a Foggy Hollow High student drowned after fleeing a cemetery party, a death authorities later ruled accidental.
Police say there is no indication at this time that tonight’s quarry incident is connected to either case, but it certainly adds to a string of troubling events that have left this community shaken. ”
“They lied,” I say, my voice quivering. I suck in a sharp breath and shake my head. “I need to go to the station. I have to tell them what really happened.”
“Which was what, exactly?”
The question belongs to Rafe, who has apparently been eavesdropping from outside Jude’s bedroom. He saunters inside, his eyebrows lifted as though in a dare.
Jude glares at him while I think through his question.
The answer is obvious. “They opened a rift with the glowing dots on their wrists and pushed Brady through.”
Rafe taps his nose. “If I had to guess, I’d say they had no intentions of calling the police at all, but then you showed up.”
A witness capable of reporting the incident.
“Which is why I need to go to the police,” I say, gathering my clothes from Jude’s bed. “We can go together right now and tell them that Griffin and Lainey are lying.”
I move to walk past him.
But Rafe grabs my arm. “I never saw Caleb, Selah. Or Brady for that matter.”
I yank my elbow free. “What are you talking about?”
“It was dark. I was focused on you. By the time I pulled you out of the water, your lips were blue. Call me crazy, but I didn’t stick around to take note of our audience.”
“Why are you telling me this?” I ask.
“Because,” Jude says, “it would be your word against theirs.”
I look from him to Rafe. “Not if you back me up. Then it will be our word against theirs.”
“What would be the point?”
“What would be the point?” I splutter. “The point would be the police taking Lainey and Griffin into custody, where they can’t hurt anymore of my unsuspecting classmates.”
“You think the police will take them into custody for watching while their friends fell through the ice?” Rafe looks unimpressed, like my logic is disappointing him. “It’s not exactly a crime.”
I open my mouth, a ready retort lashing across my tongue.
But Jude speaks before I can argue.
“He’s right,” he says bitterly, like the taste of those words are rancid. Like there’s nothing he wants to do less than agree with Rafe. But here he is, doing exactly that. “From what you told me, Selah, Griffin didn’t force Caleb onto the ice. Neither did Lainey.”
I shake my head, because I can’t accept it. I can’t do nothing. Anger and helplessness swirl inside me as I round on Rafe. “You just left him there. You left Brady behind, knowing the danger he was in.”
He scoffs. “I could care less about Brady Keller.”
They are heartless words.
Cruel words.
With unspoken sentiment simmering beneath them.
Rafe left Brady because he doesn’t care about him.
But Rafe didn’t leave me.
Rafe rescued me, which can only mean…
He folds his arms and leans against one of Jude’s bedposts. “Going to the police, trying to convince them of what really happened, will do nothing but waste our time and make your poor father even more worried than he already is.”
I stand between them—Jude and Rafe—longing for one, hating the other. All too aware that his logic is sound. What Rafe is saying makes sense, as much as I don’t want it to. Going to the police won’t help Brady or Caleb. They are with Vorat now.
The town Hollow Walker is escalating quickly.
The question is why? And how do we stop him?