(Blood and Bone, #1) Blood and Bone (13 page)

I walk to the small patio and open the door. Of course it opens. It’s a smaller city, with trusting people. I hurry to the kitchen, making no noise in my slippers. The fridge is filled with all kinds of options, making me nearly giggle as I take the first bite of the apple I steal. The juice bursts in my mouth. I don’t know the last time I ate so I fill up on pepperoni, cheese slices, and yogurt cups. I drink from the juice jug like a savage, spilling the orange juice down my face a little.

My stomach is overly full when I put everything back and wipe down the cupboards and floor where I spilled. I hurry, exploring the house silently but stopping when I find the mudroom and open the dryer, taking a pair of yoga pants out. They’re a bit big, but it doesn’t matter. I drag them on with a T-shirt and a sweater and pull on socks before closing the dryer. Holding my dirty clothes, I contemplate bringing them before I shrug and place them in the hamper.

The closet has a dozen jackets, all for a woman a touch larger than me, but it’s perfect for the extra layers. I put on a coat and hiking boots; at least they fit perfectly. I leave through the garage next to the mudroom and out the side door into the front yard.

I don’t know how long it’ll take me to walk to the downtown area; not knowing Spokane well is a bit of a hindrance. We’ve come here twice since moving to Seattle. But I believe I know where the bus station is, having seen it once. We parked our car behind a building across the street from it.

I head down the hill, back to the overpass and bridge area. The traffic is slower than when I arrived, as midmorning has hit and the rush is over. The sidewalk on Sunset Boulevard is cracked and broken. It isn’t at all like the other Sunset Boulevard I’ve walked on. It’s a bit sketchy, and I’m glad it’s midmorning and not late at night.
West Sunset isn’t much of an improvement. It’s all very underdeveloped and messy. It makes me miss Seattle.

I miss me. I miss being blind.

When I get onto West Second, the street becomes a touch more inviting. My heart races a bit less as I make my way into what feels more like the start of the downtown area.

No matter how unfamiliar and foreign the place is to me, I hate that I feel his eyes on me at every turn. I don’t know if I will ever feel safe again. Seeing the pictures of me, I realize he won’t ever stop looking for me. If I want this to end I have to kill him or bring him in, but I don’t think I can do either. So my only other option is to run, even when I want to go back so badly it hurts.

There is a sick longing for him inside me, but I run my fingers along the scar on my head and remind myself of the lengths he went to in making me his. Not to mention the frightened look in my eyes on the video. Something was very wrong there. Worst-case scenario, in his drive to be with me, I have to assume there may be a possibility he would murder me to prevent me from leaving.

I don’t understand why I am here. Why Samantha Barnes would have ever chosen this as a fate. Why she would have ever agreed to a near lobotomy. There is a chance Samantha Barnes didn’t agree to any of it. I have to see that.

But any way I try to solve it, the only way to the answers is in going back.

The bus station takes me a half hour to get to. It’s easy to find when you spot the bus drivers in their uniforms walking about, to and from work.

I lean against the wall in an obscure corner of the bus station, like a panhandler, and wait. My eyes never stop looking for him. The conflict of his finding me is too much for one person to struggle with. I want him to and I don’t. It’s not an even tie. The rational side of my brain agrees he’s insane and I am on borrowed time as far as
being with him is concerned. But the hopeless, feeble dipshit I was with him wants him back. I want to be loved and protected. It was easy with him, always.

And he had a point when he said that his actions for years should have outweighed the words spoken against him.

If he is sick, his disease is clearly managed by his work with the CIA. Unless he’s been killing people Rory doesn’t know about. It’s scary that he obviously thinks he needs to kill people, but it’s even scarier that I’m trying to look past it. Yet he has never done anything but love me.

My butt aches nearly as badly as my mind and heart do, but I don’t move. I just watch as people come and go in hordes. Boarding and departing buses and trams. It’s a crowded place.

A man comes and sits next to me, grinning broadly. “Hey, Jane!”

I almost smile when I see Antoine in a hoodie and sweats. He looks gangsta but he’s still sexy as sin on a stick.

“Ready to get out of here?”

I nod, getting up and following him out into the crowd. My legs are cramped and aching, but it feels good to be moving. He walks to a small black SUV with tinted windows. The back door opens as we near it. I climb in to find Rory sitting in the backseat.

“Hello, love.”

I scowl, not completely convinced he’s the right person to be trusting. He offers me a bag with donuts in it. I stuff a whole one in my mouth, savoring the sweetness of the glaze as I devour it.

Antoine gets into the driver’s seat, starting and driving off. I turn to the right to look out the window and see Derek standing in the doorway I have just come from, watching me. He wanted me to see him, or I wouldn’t have. I don’t say a word, just swallow my lumping mouthful and force my aching heart to shut the hell up, even if my brain won’t.

He followed me the entire way. Was he protecting me?

9. BAD JUJU

T
he house is small and dumpy, one of the worst in the tiny little town of Geneva, Alabama. I had demanded that they take me back before I would help them. Rory was certain my father’s house was as far back as everything went. In fact, he was insistent we come here. Now I’m not so sure. I glance at Rory skeptically. “You sure?”

He nods. “This was your dad’s house. You brought me here once, drove past it. Your dad had just died, terrible way to go. You refused to go to the funeral but drove me past the house.” His words feel like lies. Why wouldn’t I have gone to the funeral? He was my father, even if he was a sucky one.

I climb out of the SUV, closing the door quietly, I think so I won’t stir the ghosts sleeping here. I get the distinct feeling this house is haunted.

My footsteps sound like they echo as I approach the dirty little house. It’s pale blue, with only one window in the front by the door. There’s been a “For Sale” sign in the window for years, but it’s never sold. I still own it, technically. I have for seven years.

My fingers clutch the filmy, rusted handle on the porch door, holding it back so Rory can insert the key. The real estate office has been the caretaker for it since I was gone. The lock clinks like an old chain, and when he gets the door open I nearly gag on the smell. “No wonder it never sold. It’s dank and musty in there.”

He glances back at me with a story playing out in his eyes, but I don’t know it. I just recognize the look of it. We enter the small living room, and instantly something bad happens to my body. Something crippling and suffocating. There are ghosts here, memories that haunt the house, and I know now I don’t want them back. There is something here that made me the girl I was. The girl with the cherry in her mouth, the bleached-blonde hair, and the haunted eyes—she is a product of this dank and haunted house. I take as many steps backward as I had taken forward until I am again on the stoop.

He looks back at me, tilting his head. “Still a no then?” He sounds annoyed with me.

I nod, backing up even farther. I would never have hidden any answers in this place. I wouldn’t have come here. I can feel that truth pumping through my blood and body. When we get back in the car he doesn’t speak, but I know he plays out an entire conversation in his mind. There is something I’m missing. “Where does my aunt Pat live?”

He glances at me. “North Carolina. She’s still there, but you never saw her, ever.”

I nod. “I want to see her.”

“It’s going to take all day to get to Charlotte.”

“I don’t care. I want to go.”

He sighs, nodding. “Fine, but you’re driving at least some of the way. I’m exhausted.”

“Fine.” It dawns on me that we sound like an old married couple. I have some level of comfort that’s subconscious with him. I see
it now. I don’t act on my best behavior, and I say far more than I ever would with anyone else. Maybe even with Derek.

The drive isn’t as long as he said it would be; it’s just less than seven hours. We stop and get coffee twice and gas once, but it isn’t so long that I’m dying or twitchy from sitting.

I worry more about meeting my aunt than anything.

“Does she know my memory is gone?” I ask, after letting it all plague me for hours. He stirs, not opening his eyes, but answers. He’s been trying to sleep since I started driving at the halfway point.

“No. She thinks you died.”

“WHAT!”

He nods sleepily and stretches. “We told her you had been in an accident.”

“She thinks I’m dead, and you didn’t tell me?”

He opens one dark-blue eye like a cat might. “Ya didn’t ask.”

I swat him. It’s a knee-jerk reaction, and I regret doing it the moment my hand makes contact with his arm. But he laughs like I’ve hit him a thousand times. “I can’t believe you were going to let me go there and not tell me.”

He nods at the road, adjusting himself in his seat. “I woulda said something down the road a little ways. She’s going to be excited to see ya. She loved ya something fierce.”

When we drive into Charlotte he points. “This road, take a right, and drive to the end.” The road is long and straight through an industrial section and then leads us through an older section of town. “Left at the stop sign.” The moment we are sitting at the stop sign at the end of South Mint Street, my mouth goes dry. Woodcrest Avenue rings so familiar in my head that I glance up the road, knowing I can see the house.

“Second house on the right.”

It’s small and green with broken front steps and a small porch
out front. I park on the road in front of the house, not sure if I should move or not. The broken planters in the grass make me sad. “She must be depressed to let it look this way.”

He nods. “I imagine she has been sad for years.” I leave the car running and climb out. I hurry to the front door, skipping the first step like always. I know what her face will look like. Her lips are puckered from smoking. She’s the lady who sang in the car. She’s the only real memory I have from before. I knock, not worrying if she will be angry with me.

I know she will understand. It’s who she is.

There’s movement in the tiny house, and the door cracks slowly, as if she’s nervous about who might be there. Her eyes are the same as I recall, dark blue and light like mine. She and my mother both had it.

She looks confused at first, lost in the face she sees. But the moment she realizes what is happening she steps back, clutching at her own throat. She gasps and pushes the door open, jumping at me like a crazy person would. She hugs me so hard it stings. It doesn’t hurt as much as the instant expansion of my heart. We tremble and shake, clinging to each other. She mutters things I don’t comprehend, and I die a little inside, realizing how much she has aged. I have aged her. She feels frail in my arms, and I know that’s not the truth of it. She was strong once. Strong for me. I may not remember anything, but I know that. It’s just a fact that sits inside me, like the sky is blue and the grass is green. My aunt Pat was strong for me.

She pulls me back, shaking her head. “They said—”

“I know. It doesn’t matter.”

Anger replaces the worry and excitement on her face. “Where was you?” she asks in her thick Alabama accent, but more bitterly than I recall it being—like I might have controlled the circumstances in which I have been gone.

I swallow hard. “Injured in an accident. I don’t remember anything from before. Everyone thought I was dead.”

She sniffles, gasping for air as slight whimpers leave her parted lips. The dramatic cry she isn’t releasing seems stuck in her throat, lodged. We hug again, just standing on the porch, attached to each other. Finally, she pulls me inside, closing the door. “How far does your memory go back?”

“Three years.”

She winces. “How do you remember me?”

“You’re all I remember.”

A smile crosses her thin lips, spreading the crease lines from her cigarettes. She sits, lighting up a smoke. “Sit; ignore the mess. I want to know everything.”

I sit across from her on the smoke-coated floral couch and nod. “There isn’t much. I’ve been in Seattle. I didn’t know I wasn’t from the West Coast all this time.” I sigh, finding my strength. “I need to know some things about me, from before.”

Her eyes narrow. I can see her not wanting to go back there. “There ain’t nothing in the past worth finding, my love.”

My love.

My love
was her pet name for me.

“I still need to know. Even the bad stuff.”

She butts the smoke out and leans forward. “He’s dead, so it don’t matter none now anyway.”

“How did he die?”

“He took a stroke. It was real slow, they figure. Paralyzed in his house, slowly dying of thirst and hunger and eventually fading away.” Her fierceness weakens, but there is a grim smile on her face when she speaks. The story burns inside us both, but I still need to know it. “When your father was found, his cats had—well, it was real nasty.”