Silence (15 page)

“Ah, but they do,” Hank corrected. “They lost when your kind fell. They lost again when you created the Nephilim race. They can lose again, and they will. All the more reason you should act now. We have one of their own, giving us the upper hand. Together, you and I can turn the tables. Together, boy. But we must act now.”

I sat against the wall and hugged my knees to my chest. I let my head tip back until it rested on concrete.
Deep breaths.
I’d gotten myself out of a hallucination before, and I could do it again. Wiping
away the sweat beading my forehead, I concentrated on what I’d been doing before the hallucination started.
Go back to Jev—the real Jev. Open a door in your mind. Walk through it.

“I know about the necklace.”

At Hank’s words, my eyes flew open. I looked between the two men standing in front of me, ultimately focusing on Hank. He knew about the necklace? The one Marcie was looking for? Was there any way the two necklaces were one and the same?

No, they’re not,
I reasoned.
Nothing in this hallucination is valid. You’re creating every detail of this scene with your subconscious. Focus instead on creating an exit.

Jev raised his eyebrows in inquiry.

“I’d rather not reveal my source,” Hank replied dryly. “Obviously all I need now is an actual necklace. You’re smart enough to know this is where you come in. Help me find an archangel’s necklace. Any one will do.”

“Try your source,” Jev said simply, but with a trace of derision.

Hank’s mouth compressed into a severe line. “Two Nephilim. Your choice, of course,” he bargained. “You could alternate between them—”

Jev waved him off. “I don’t have my archangel’s necklace anymore, if that’s where you’re going. The archangels confiscated it when I fell.”

“That’s not what my source tells me.”

“Your source lied,” he said blandly.

“A second source confirms seeing you wearing it as recently as this past summer.”

A moment ticked by before Jev wagged his head at the floor. He tipped his head back and laughed, almost disbelievingly. “You didn’t.” His laughter died abruptly. “Tell me you didn’t drag your daughter into the middle of this.”

“She saw a silver chain around your neck. This past June.”

Jev’s eyes sized up Hank. “How much does she know?”

“About me? She’s learning. I don’t like it, but my back’s against the wall. Help me, and I won’t use her again.”

“You’re assuming I care about your daughter.”

“You care about one of them,” Hank said with a sardonic twist of his lips. “Or used to.”

A muscle in Jev’s jaw twitched, and Hank laughed. “After all this time, you’re still stoking the fire. A pity she doesn’t know you exist. Speaking of my other daughter, I also heard she was seen wearing your necklace in June. She has it, doesn’t she,” he stated rather than inquired.

Jev returned Hank’s even stare. “She doesn’t have it.”

“It would have been a genius plan,” Hank said, not sounding in the least like he believed Jev. “It’s not like I can torture its whereabouts out of her—she doesn’t know anything.” He laughed, but the sound didn’t ring true. “Now that would be ironic. The one piece of information I need is buried deep in a mind I effectively erased.”

“A shame.”

With a flourish, Hank yanked the canvas off the cage. He kicked the metal box into the light, the base scraping over the floor. The girl’s hair was tangled across her face, her eyes ringed in black and darting wildly around the warehouse, as though trying to memorize every detail of her prison before the canvas blinded her again.

“Well?” Hank asked the girl. “What do you think, my pet? Do you think we can find you an archangel’s necklace in time?”

She turned toward Jev, and there was no mistaking the recognition widening her eyes. Her hands squeezed the bars of the cage so tightly her skin turned translucent. She snarled a word that sounded like “traitor.” She glared between Hank and Jev, then her mouth snapped open with a piercing, howling scream.

The force of the scream hurled me backward. My body smashed through the walls of the warehouse. I flew through darkness, tumbling over and over. My stomach roiled, a great wave of nausea crashing over me.

And then I was sprawled facedown on the shoulder of the road, my hands curling into the gravel. I scrambled into a sitting position. The air was thick with the smell of cornfields. Night insects droned all around. Everything was exactly as it had been.

I didn’t know how long I’d been out. Ten minutes? Half an hour? My skin was covered in a sheen of sweat, and this time my shivers were from the cold.

“Jev?” I called out hoarsely.

But he was gone.

F
OLLOWING JEV’S INSTRUCTIONS, I WALKED TO
Whitetail Lodge. From the reception desk, I called a taxi. Even if I hadn’t known my mom was at dinner, I might not have called her. I wasn’t in any condition to talk. My head was filled with too much noise. Thoughts whizzed past, but I made no effort to pin them down. I felt myself shutting down, too overwhelmed to sort through everything that had happened tonight.

At the farmhouse, I climbed the stairs to my bedroom. I
stripped down. I stretched a nightshirt over my head. I curled into a fetal position under my blankets and fell asleep.

I was snapped awake by the sound of shoes moving at a brisk clip outside my door. I must have been dreaming of Jev, because my first foggy thought was,
It’s him,
and I clutched the sheet to my chin, bracing myself for his entrance.

My mom flung the door open so hard it slapped the wall. “She’s here!” she called over her shoulder. “She’s in bed!” She crossed to me, clutching a fist over her heart as though to keep it from leaping out of her chest. “Nora! Why didn’t you tell me where you’d gone? We’ve been driving all over town looking for you!” She was panting, her eyes wild and frantic.

“I told the hostess to tell you I called Vee for a ride,” I stammered. Thinking back, it had been an irresponsible move. But caught up in the moment, seeing how my mom glowed in Hank’s company, all I could think of was how my presence was an intrusion.

“I called Vee! She didn’t know what I was talking about.”

Of course she didn’t. I’d never made it that far. Gabe had come along before I’d had a chance.

“You can’t do that again,” Mom said. “You can’t ever do that again!”

Even though I knew it wouldn’t help, I started crying. I hadn’t meant to frighten her or send her chasing randomly after me. It was just that when I saw her with Hank … I’d
reacted
. And as much
as I wanted to believe Gabe was out of my life for good, his implied threat that he wasn’t finished with me was fresh in my thoughts. What had I gotten myself into? I considered how different the night would have turned out if I’d kept quiet and left the 7-Eleven when Gabe had given me the chance.

No.
I’d done the right thing. If I hadn’t stepped in, B.J. might not have survived.

“Oh, Nora.”

I let my mom gather me against her and pressed my face into her blouse.

“This was just a bad scare, that’s all,” she said. “We’ll be more careful next time.”

The boards in the hall creaked, and I looked over to see Hank leaning on the door frame. “You gave us quite a fright, young lady.” His voice was light and calm, but there was something almost wolfish in his eyes that caused a chill to tiptoe up my back.

“I don’t want him here,” I whispered to my mom. Even though I was sure there was no validity to my most recent hallucination, it haunted me. I couldn’t stop picturing Hank tugging the canvas off the cage. I couldn’t shut out the words he’d said. Logically, I knew I was projecting my own fears and anxieties on him, but either way, I wanted him to leave.

“I’ll call you later, Hank,” Mom said reassuringly over the top of my head. “After I tuck Nora in. Thank you again for dinner, and I’m sorry about the false alarm.”

He gestured it off. “Don’t fret, darling. You forget I have my own hormonal drama queen under my roof, though at least I can say she’s never done anything this rash.” He chuckled, as if he genuinely found any word he’d said amusing.

I waited until I heard his footsteps retreat down the hall. I wasn’t sure how much to tell my mom, especially since Jev said the police couldn’t be counted on and I feared that everything I said now would reach Detective Basso’s ears, but too much had happened tonight not to tell anyone.

“I met someone tonight,” I told my mom. “After I left Cooper-smith’s. I didn’t recognize him, but he said we knew each other. I must have met him sometime in the last five months, but I can’t remember.”

Her hold on me grew taut. “Did he tell you his name?”

“Jev.”

She’d been holding her breath, but now a little slip of air escaped. I wondered what it meant. Had she expected a different name?

“Do you know him?” I asked. Maybe she would be able to shed light on my history with Jev.

“No. Did he say how he knew you? From school, maybe? Or when you worked at Enzo’s?”

I’d worked at Enzo’s? This was news to me, and I was about to get clarification, when her eyes snapped back to mine. “
Wait.
What was he wearing?” She gestured impatiently. “What did his clothes look like?”

I felt my forehead crease in confusion. “Why does it matter?”

She stood, then paced to the door and back to the bed. As if suddenly aware of how anxious she looked, she parked herself in front of my dresser and nonchalantly examined a perfume bottle. “Maybe he was wearing a uniform with a logo? Or maybe he was dressed entirely in one color? Like … black?” She was clearly leading me, but why?

“He was wearing a white-and-navy baseball shirt with jeans.”

Worry lines formed clear parentheses around her mouth, which was tightly pursed in thought.

“What aren’t you telling me?” I asked.

The worry lines spread to her eyes.

“What do you know?” I demanded.

“There was a boy,” she began.

I sat up a little taller. “What boy?” I couldn’t help but wonder if she was talking about Jev. And I found myself hoping she was. I wanted to know more about him. I wanted to know everything about him.

“He came around a few times. He always dressed in black,” she said with obvious distaste. “He was older and—please don’t take this the wrong way, but I couldn’t figure out what he saw in you. He’d dropped out of school, he had a gambling problem, and he worked as a busboy at the Borderline. I mean, for goodness’ sake! I have nothing against busboys, but it was almost laughable. As if he thought you were going to stay in Coldwater forever. He couldn’t
begin to relate to your dreams, let alone keep up with them. I’d be very surprised if he had the determination to go to college.”

“Did I like him?” Her description didn’t sound like Jev, but I wasn’t ready to give up just yet.

“Hardly! You had me make excuses every time he called. Eventually he got the picture and left you alone. The whole thing was very short-lived. A couple of weeks at most. I only brought him up because I always thought something about him was off. And I always wondered if he might have known something about your abduction. Not to be dramatic, but it seemed like a dark cloud settled over your life the day you met him.”

“What happened to him?” I realized my heart was pounding in double time.

“He left town.” She shook her head. “See? It couldn’t have been him. I panicked, that’s all. I wouldn’t worry about him,” she added, coming over and patting my knee. “He’s probably halfway across the country by now.”

“What was his name?”

She hesitated only a moment. “You know, I don’t remember. Something with a
P
. Peter, maybe.” She laughed louder than necessary. “I guess that proves just how insignificant he was.”

I smiled absently at her joke, all the while hearing Jev’s voice rumble through my mind.

We knew each other. We met five months ago, and I was bad news from the moment you laid eyes on me.

If Jev and this mysterious boy from my past were one and the same, someone wasn’t giving me the full story. Maybe Jev
was
trouble. Maybe it was in my best interest to sprint in the opposite direction.

But something told me it wasn’t because he was the hardened and indifferent person he was trying so hard to convince me he was. Right before the hallucination, I’d heard him say,
You’re not supposed to be in this anymore. Even I can’t keep you safe.

My safety meant something to him. His actions tonight proved it.
And actions speak louder than words,
I told myself grimly.

Which left only two questions. What wasn’t I supposed to be involved in anymore? And given the two—Jev and my mom—who was lying?

If they thought I was quite content to sit with my hands in my lap, the perfect model of a sweet, uninformed little girl, they weren’t as smart as they thought.

S
ATURDAY MORNING I WOKE EARLY, TUGGED ON
cotton shorts and a tank, and went running. It felt strangely empowering to pound my feet against the pavement and sweat out all my immediate troubles. I was doing my best not to think about last night. So much for testing my courage by wandering around alone at night—as far as I was concerned, from now on, I’d be perfectly happy to stay locked up in my house the
moment the moon showed its face. And if I never had to visit that particular 7-Eleven again, so much the better.

Strangely enough, it wasn’t Gabe who was haunting my thoughts, though. That job belonged to a pair of sinfully black eyes that had lost their edge when they studied me, turning as soft and sultry as silk. Jev had told me not to go looking for him, but I couldn’t stop fantasizing about all the different ways we might bump into each other again. In fact, the last dream I recalled before waking up this morning was of going to Ogunquit Beach with Vee, only to discover that Jev was the on-duty lifeguard. I’d pulled out of the dream with my heart thumping, and the strangest ache shredding me up inside. I could interpret the dream well enough myself: Despite the infuriated, tangled way he’d left me feeling, I wanted to see Jev again.