Falling (The Falling Angels Saga) (7 page)

“It’s a trick!” I gasped. “Or a mistake!” I was staring at Maudrina, my eyes wide and frantic. “Are you sure it was
me
?” I asked, looking back at Aunt Jaz.

A wariness came over her face as she processed what I was saying. “No,” she said softly. “I told you girls we needed to stay vigilant.”

Maudrina moved across the room and snatched up the teddy bear. She turned it over and over. “I don’t see anything.”

“Rip it open,” I called.

“Wait!” she said. “There’s a slit in the back.” She worked her fingers into the tiny slit cut into the back of the bear. “I feel something.” Slowly she began withdrawing her fingers. When they emerged, a colorful gris gris was nestled between her middle and forefinger.

Tears were streaming down my cheeks as I moved to Maudrina. “I’m … I’m … It wasn’t … It was an imposter!” I spluttered. “It had to be. I’d never hurt Aunt Jaz.”

“I know,” whispered Maudrina, staring at the thing in her hand as if she were clutching a miniature monster.

I slept late
, I thought. It was so unlikely for me to sleep through the alarm:
you were sleeping the sleep of the dead,
that’s what Suze’s note had said. She decided to let me sleep in. She thought I was up late doing homework. No wonder I slept through the alarm. I must have been up all night doing my evil work.
Oh, my God!

I reached Maudrina’s side. “I … I …” In Maudrina’s hand was a tiny bag made of cloth and tied off at the top with string. I recognized the bright green fabric. It was from the dress Aunt Jaz was wearing the first time I’d met her. “But how could I get my hands on that? I don’t have a key to her apartment.” I shot them both a look of appeal.

“Let me see it,” called Aunt Jaz. I slumped in a chair, my head in my hands. I couldn’t look her in the eye. Maudrina brought the gris gris over to the bed. “I haven’t seen that dress since last summer. I was wondering where it went to.”

My head jerked up, like a meerkat on the African plain. “There! That proves it wasn’t me.” I jumped to my feet. “Aunt Jaz, I’ve never been in your bedroom.”

“You were once, deary. Remember? When you were putting on your disguise to attend Erin’s wedding.”

I shuddered. It was as if I’d been punched in the chest. “I… I couldn’t have been planning this since last summer.”

“No one’s blaming you, Sweetie,” said Maudrina. She had the saddest look in her eyes—worse than pity-eyes.

“I wasn’t me!” I screeched. “I’ll prove it. Put it on the floor!” I demanded.

“What? Why?” asked Maudrina.

“The gris gris always returns to its maker,” rasped Aunt Jaz. “If she made it, we’ll know it soon enough.”

I stooped. “Put it on the floor!” I repeated gruffly. “If I made it, it will come to me.” I was like a crazy person, or a man on death row, desperate to prove my innocence.

“We don’t have to do this, Megan. We believe you,” said Maudrina.

The problem was I didn’t believe me. Silently I pointed to the floor. Maudrina sighed and placed the bag on the floor by her feet. We stared at it for several seconds that seemed to stretch on forever.

“You see!” I called triumphantly. “It’s not—”

The gris gris moved.

It was a tiny quiver at first, nearly imperceptible, as if someone had nudged it with their toe. Yet the moment it moved, I felt as though someone had placed a block of ice on my back and was rubbing it up and down. I began to shiver uncontrollably.

The knotted top of the gris gris bag lifted up, like a small animal sniffing the air. The head of the bag swayed from side-to-side then, pointed toward me. The gris gris lurched forward.

“No,” I whispered. “No,” the second
no
coming out in a horrid, wordless breath. The gris gris began inching along the floor in my direction. I collapsed to my knees, my hands slapping against cold tiles. I craned my neck upward at Aunt Jaz lying in bed. “I’m so, so sorry.” There was anguish in my words.

“It’s not your fault. You’re a victim here, too,” she said.

I nodded. Yet, no matter what she’d said, I didn’t feel like a victim. I felt like the most horrible person on the face of the earth. Aunt Jaz was one of my favorite people. So was Maudrina. I wondered how deranged a person had to be to do something so despicable to the ones they loved.

I crawled along the floor toward the gris gris as it wormed toward me. With every inch it moved, I felt my anguish increase. Sensing me nearer, the gris gris’s movements sped up, as if it were a beloved pet coming home to its master. I reached the gris gris, snatched it up and tore open the bag. Rather than breathe it in, as Matt had done with the gris gris he made for me, I got to my feet, dumped the contents onto the floor, and began stomping them.

I have no idea how long I stomped the evil thing. I was screaming when Maudrina pulled me away. “Stop it, Megan. Enough!” she cried, corralling me in her arms, dragging me away from the mess on the floor.

“Is everything all right in here?” Hearing the commotion, a nurse had stuck her head in. I yanked myself free from Maudrina’s grasp, brushed past the nurse and bolted out into the corridor. I stumbled toward the elevator. My thoughts were coming so quickly, smashing together. Nothing stayed in my mind long enough to congeal and make sense. I was a raw nerve.

“Megan!” I heard Maudrina call. I started running. With my thought process in shambles, I had become an animal, acting on instinct alone. Fight or flight.

I reached the elevator and punched the button with my fist.
Bam!
Again,
Bam!
Again,
Bam!

“Megan!” She called louder. My frantic eyes bounced around the waiting room like a crazed animal looking for escape. I saw the exit sign a few steps away. I slammed through the exit door into the stairwell, and fled down the stairs. “Megan, come back!” I heard Maudrina call out from several floors above.

I careened out of the building and into the hospital’s parking lot where I wandered aimlessly. The setting sun reflecting off the cars in the lot cooked up a wall of heat. It felt as if I were in hell.
Perfect.

My mind was an untidy heap. Looking back, I now realize I was afraid to think, afraid that once my mind settled, I’d be forced to swallow the bitter pill of truth and admit to myself that I was a monster.

As I continued through the lot, a rudderless ship adrift at sea, I spotted a white car turn the corner and start down the aisle toward me. Something about the car caught my attention. It was a Mustang. I stopped and stared at the car moving slowly in my direction. I didn’t know why this car was significant to me, and then a thought fired through.
Guy has a Mustang
.

The thought of Guy relaxed my mind, helped settle the jumbled mess in my head. I squinted at the car. The sun was glinting off of it and at first I couldn’t make out who was behind the wheel. As the Mustang got closer, I recognized the driver—Harrison. Another clear thought emerged from the confusion—
Harrison is my protector
. My heart did a summersault in my chest.

“Harrison,” I whispered. “Harrison,” I called louder and started running toward the Mustang. The car jerked to a stop, mostly I think, to keep from hitting me because it was clear I wasn’t going to. Harrison emerged from the car wearing a white shirt that hugged his athletic frame along with his trademark red jeans. Lines of worry were etched into his gorgeous face.

“Megan, are you okay?” I fell into his arms and clung to him, breathless. “I don’t know what’s going on,” he said, “but I brought someone I thought might cheer ya up.”

It was then I noticed a man exiting the passenger side of the car. Guy. I released Harrison and stood staring at him, afraid to move forward, afraid this was just another one of Satan’s tricks. There had been so many.

He appeared tired. He seemed smaller than I remembered. His jet black hair was disheveled in a way that made him seem sexier than I remembered, his eyes dreamier than I recalled. He smiled his smile. “I’m back,” he said and began moving toward me. There was a slowness to his gait.

He reached me and drew me into his arms. I closed my eyes, breathed him in, and was instantly transported to our stairwell, our kissing stairwell where we’d spent so much of our wayward time. This was not a trick. I knew it was Guy. Guy was holding me in his arms. I
knew
it. I wasn’t being fooled again. Guy had actually returned to me.

“Oh, Guy,” I said, my head buried in his chest, my fingers digging into his shoulders.

“Whatever it is, it’s okay,” he said softly. “I’m back now.”

I wagged my head slowly against his chest. “You’re too late,” I replied, as relentless tears fell from my eyes.

*

We didn’t go back inside the hospital. How could I? Once I’d regained my faculties, we drove to a small diner nearby. We sat in a booth in the back, Harrison seated across from Guy and me. I hadn’t seen Guy in so long, I wanted to sit across from him and look into his eyes. But that would have seemed strange.

The diner smelled of coffee and hamburgers and French fries. I was reminded of Erin and my favorite curly fries from the food court at the mall. Erin. I was wrong to think that she could have been behind Aunt Jaz’s illness.

“I feel like this is all my fault,” said Harrison.

On the ride over, I’d told them much of what had happened since I woke up Tuesday morning. Harrison banged his fists against the steering wheel. He felt he’d let me down again. He, too, had been fooled by Satan with the demon uprising that took him away to Australia last summer. The uprising was a ploy to get him out of the way since Harrison was a demon tracker. No way could the demon Orthon have fooled me for so long if Harrison had been around. He felt like an idiot for falling for it.

“This is no one’s fault,” said Guy, seated next to me in the booth, his leg brushing against mine. “Satan is a master strategist.” He looked into my eyes and smiled. “But he won’t get you. You’re my girl. Right?” His smile widened.

A few days ago I would have reveled in his words. Yet, how could I now, knowing that Satan had just manipulated me? I was growing closer to Satan by the minute. My hand had been resting atop Guy’s on the table. I gave his a gentle squeeze. That was the best he could get from me. I wanted to be Guy’s girl, but I was Satan’s girl now.

“This is a bad idea,” I said. I removed my hand from Guy’s.

“What?” he asked.

“This!” I said, gesturing toward him and Harrison. “If only it had actually been you who rescued me last summer and not Orthon. My life would be so different now.”

I looked into Guy’s eyes. They flashed anger. “That demon needs to be destroyed.”

“Agreed,” said Harrison in his sexy, Australian lilt.

I stood up. “I can’t do this right now.”

“What?” Guy asked again, and I could see anguish replacing the anger that had loomed in his eyes. He reached for my hand and I pulled it away. “Megan!”

“I can’t love you anymore, Guy. The die has been cast and loving you will only make it harder when I have to go.”

He looked at Harrison, confused, and then back at me. “What do you mean
go
?”

“Don’t you get it? I tried to kill Aunt Jaz, Guy. Yesterday I nearly hurt a roomful of my classmates. Who’ll be next—Maudrina? My mother? You?” The words were dust on my tongue.

“Guy is an angel,” Harrison said, raising his voice in appeal. “Angels have ways of fixing things mortals can’t.”

“Can he fix that Satan’s power is growing inside me? Can he stop it?”

Harrison looked to Guy who shook his head, a slight, woeful tic.

“That doesn’t mean all is lost,” said Harrison.

I gazed into Guy’s eyes. “I’m going to walk out that door,” I said pointing. “Let me go. Please. I don’t know how many more heartaches I can stand. If you truly love me, let me go.” I shot them both a smile I hoped reflected my love and gratitude. Then I walked out of the diner, my heart crumbling a little bit more with each step. I did not look back.

I needed to get my house in order—meaning, I needed to square things with the people I cared about before my departure.

I was back at home, lying on my bed, Amanda snoozing on the pillow next to me. The rhythmic sound of her breathing soothed me, allowed me to focus. My thoughts were clearer now, and with clarity came the truth: it was evident that Satan had won. He had manipulated me to the point that I was his puppet. A short time ago I thought I’d never use my abilities again. I now realized I couldn’t be sure. Once I was asleep, I was capable of anything—even attempted murder.

On the way home from the hospital, I decided to make a list of the people I needed to talk to before it was too late. The first name on my pad was Aunt Jaz. She was the person to whom I’d done the most harm—so far. What I’d done to her was still a fresh wound. I had to tell her how sorry I was before it was too late. Next on my list was Maudrina, my dearest friend. I was still finding it hard to believe that I’d almost taken Aunt Jaz away from her. It dawned on me that Maudrina was the first person I needed to talk to. I moved her name to the top of the list.

Next came Erin. I’d wronged her again, this time by thinking she was capable of such a dastardly act when, in fact, the culprit was me. Tears appeared in my eyes.

As I moved to get a tissue, I heard Suze and Tony come in. They were creating quite a commotion downstairs, squabbling loudly. I could tell it was a playful argument. Between their words were waves of laughter.

I dried my eyes, lay back on the bed and picked up my pen. Suze. I was happy she’d found Tony. Tony would take away some of the sting of losing me. While I knew I needed to talk to Suze, I wondered how much I could tell her. Right now she was oblivious to the existence of angels and demons. If I told her the truth, I’d have to bring up Armando and open that wound again. But if I didn’t tell the truth, what would I say before I walked out of her life forever?

I was wrestling with the idea, doodling onto the page, when I heard Suze call my name. Then both of them were calling me and laughing.