Taken (4 page)

“It’s not,” I say. “Tell them you’re done. Tell them you’re stopping.” I reach into my bag and hold up the iPad she just gave me. Raine gasps.

“How the hell did you get that?” She stands up and reaches for it, but I pull it away, out of her grasp.

“You just gave it to me.”

“No, I didn’t.” But a half second later, understanding dawns on her face.

“Yes, you did,” I say. “Just a second ago.”

She sits back down on the bench. She’s glaring at me, but her shoulders have slumped, and she looks a little bit defeated.

“Look,” I say, sitting next to her. My voice softens. “I’m not sure what your stake in all of this is, but don’t you want to go back to living a normal life? I don’t know who that boy was I saw you with is, the one in your memory, but I have a feeling that – ”

“Don’t you ever talk about him,” Raine says quietly. “You don’t know anything about him.”

“Fine,” I say. “I don’t know anything about him, you’re right. But don’t you want to squash this? Get back to your life? I thought you were mad at everyone, remember? At both sides? You said they would use us for whatever they wanted. But we can stop it. We can refuse to participate.”

She gets a far away look in her eyes, and she’s quiet for a long moment. “So that’s it?” she says. “It’s over?”

I nod. “I have your necklace,” I say. “I could have killed you last night, the same way you could have taken me out on the beach. As far as I’m concerned, we’re even.”

“If we’re even, then give me my necklace back.”

I shake my head. “No,” I say. “I’m not giving it back. You’ll just have to trust me that I won’t use it.”

She laughs. “Why should I trust you? You just used mind control to make me give you the iPad!”

“The iPad that was mine to begin with,” I remind her.

“What are you going to do with it?”

“Give it back to Brody.”

She’s quiet for another moment, then pulls her knees up next to her on the bench and rests her chin on them. “Fine,” she says finally.

“Fine what?”

“Fine I agree to the truce.” She looks small, sitting there like that, and kind of lost. For a moment, I feel sorry for her.

“Good.” I stand up. I trust that she’s telling the truth, mostly because she has no choice. I wonder if I should say something else, but instead, I just say, “Take care of yourself, Raine.”

And then I walk back to the car.

“What the hell was that all about?” Adrianna asks as she glances out the window to where Raine is still sitting on the bench. “What were you guys talking about?”

“I’ll explain everything, I promise,” I say. “But first can you take me to Brody’s?”

The sooner I give him the iPad, the sooner this whole thing will be over.

Chapter Four

Campbell

The first thing I notice when I wake up is that there’s music playing downstairs.

It sounds like bells or chimes and maybe a violin or flute playing the same five notes over and over again.

I sit up in bed and rub my eyes.

My mom has always listened to stuff like Barry Manilow, Lionel Richie, songs from the ‘80’s. The song playing downstairs is more like what you might hear if you were in the dentist’s office waiting to get your teeth cleaned.

I slowly get out of bed, stretch, and sigh. I’ve got football practice at one o’clock, and I’m dreading it. Coach is going to bust my balls about missing so many practices and most of my teammates will hate me for being able to skip so much time and still be first string for the game tomorrow.

Not to mention that I’ll have to see Brody. Brody, who thinks he’s so superior and special and deserves whatever he wants. Including my girlfriend.

The music downstairs swells to a new level and then the floor vibrates below me with a few loud thumps. Shit. My mom’s probably hammered, and she might have fallen down or something. I bolt out of my bedroom and run downstairs, imagining the worst – my mom on the ground with her head opened up like a busted watermelon, blood everywhere.

But when I get to the living room, there’s no such thing. Instead I find her dressed in some crazy bright blue leotard and standing on a pink yoga mat, watching an exercise video.

The woman on TV is silver-haired but clearly in great shape. She smiles broadly.

“Now take a deep breath,” the woman says, “a clean deep breath from the bottom of your belly up to the top of your chest, and throw your arms to the sky. Really put them up there and reach for those puffy clouds.”

Both she and my mom reach skyward at the same time, although my mom looks unsteady on her feet as she arches her back and stands on her tiptoes. Her legs wobble and she stumbles out of position, then rebalances herself and reaches up even higher.

The lady continues. “With your exhalation, imagine that all the toxins and frustrations—all your inner tension—is pouring out of your body and filtering out to the universe where it can be purified. Now breathe in and go into your downward dog asana.”

With that command, my mom drops down into some crazy yoga pose, her butt sticking in the air, palms pressed against the mat, head down like she’s kissing the floor, legs jittering crazily as she stretches.

The last time my mom did any exercise that I can remember was probably like five years ago. She was doing step aerobics to a video kind of like this one. Maybe that’s where the blue leotard is from.

The woman on the screen looks like a pristine statue and my mom, by contrast, looks like a cheap toy that’s about to fall to pieces any second. Meanwhile the bells and gongs and new age music is playing loud enough to make my ears bleed.

“What’s going on?” I ask.

My mom cranes her head up to look at me and her face is almost purple. “Hi, honey,” she gasps.

“You might want to take it easy with the yoga, Mom. Go slow.”

Her arms give out and she drops to the floor, huffing and puffing like a four-pack-a-day smoker after a sprint. “Phew. Now that’s a workout!”

“Looks like it.”

“I bet yoga would help your team,” she says. “You should show this DVD to your coach and see if he wants to incorporate it into practice. You’d be surprised how difficult these poses are, and they really help with your core strength.”

Just imagining the words that would come out of my coach’s mouth if I tried to play him a yoga DVD is enough to make me grin. “I’m not sure the team is ready for this kind of cutting edge stuff.”

“Well, give it some thought, honey.” She wipes her face with a towel. “I am spent.”

I glance at the DVD player and note that it’s only ten minutes into the DVD.

“Should I get you a glass of water?”

“Yes, please.”

I walk into the kitchen, put some ice in a glass and begin filling it. “Since when are you into morning yoga anyway?”

“A co-worker recommended it to me the other day. And that’s when I realized that I need to make some big changes.”

I raise an eyebrow. “What kind of changes?” Walking back in to the living room, I hand her the glass and she gratefully chugs from it before responding.

“I need to get healthy. I’m out of shape and I’m not getting any younger. I need to start exercising.”

“Don’t forget about watching what you eat,” I say. And drink. But those words go unsaid for now. I don’t want to piss her off. And besides, I’ve seen enough of her

“getting healthy” phases in the past. They usually include trying to cut back on the booze for a week or two, but it never sticks.

“I’ll be buying a juicer later today,” my mom says. “The woman at work juices at least once a day in place of breakfast or lunch.”

I laugh a little before I can stop myself.

Mom shakes her head. “You know, Cam,” she says, “I could really use some support.”

“I’m sorry. Of course I support you getting healthy. It’s just that I’ve heard this before.”

She shakes her head. “This time is different.”

“I hope it’s -- ”

Just then the doorbell rings.

“Who could that be? Are you expecting someone?”

“No.” I walk quickly to the door, and open it. There’s a girl standing on my front steps, and for the smallest moment I think it’s Natalia. But then I realize it’s Kaci standing there and my smile fades. “Hey,” I say.

She looks at me with a somewhat wounded expression. “Nice to see you, too.”

“Is everything okay?” I stand there, purposefully not inviting her in.

“Um, well.” She sighs. “Not really.”

My stomach sinks. “Why, what happened now?”

She glances around nervously like she’s worried she’s been followed. “Don’t be annoyed with me, Cam. I didn’t even want to come here, but I felt like you should know.”

Already I feel more annoyed.
Just say whatever it is you need to say,
I think,
and
stop beating around the bush.
“Okay, well you can tell me. I’m listening.”

Kaci sighs. Her hands are clasped together, fiddling and fidgeting. “Derek came to my house late last night,” she says finally.

“Please tell me again why you hang out with that clown? Is it because he’s really nice when you get past the whole crazy jerk attitude or is it that you just like hanging out with psychopath stalkers?”

“Don’t give me a hard time. I’m trying to help you.”

“Well, hanging out with the guy who stalked me and my girlfriend isn’t really helpful, Kaci. But go on.”

“Ex
-girlfriend,” she reminds me helpfully.

“Whatever,” I say, my tone sharper than I intended.

“Forget it.” She turns to walk away.

I roll my eyes behind her back. “Kaci,” I call. “I’m sorry. If you have something to tell me, please say it. I don’t want to do get into a bunch of drama.”

She turns back around and her eyes are almost tearing up. “He was just saying some stuff that made me worried about you, Cam. He said that some people are going to come to Santa Anna to try and set things right.”

“And? What else?”

“He was laughing about how stupid you are, and he claimed that you’re going to regret talking to him like he’s beneath you. He said you’re going to go down hard and that if he were me he wouldn’t get within a mile of you. He said you’re going to be radioactive by the time it’s all over.” She wipes a strand of hair from her cheek and tucks it behind her ear.

I exhale, trying to piece together what she’s telling me. It could just be Derek trying to talk tough to impress her. It could just be that he’s crazy. Or maybe he actually knows something. Either way, until I know something concrete, I’m not going to let that asshole get in my head. “Look, Kaci, I appreciate you coming by to tell me— ”

“To
warn
you.”

“Fine. To warn me. But seriously, I’m fine. I’m not going to let that idiot scare me, not after everything I’ve been through.”

She takes a step back toward me. “I just… I know that I can help you Cam, if you’d only let me.”

“That’s really nice of you, Kaci,” I say. “But I can take care of myself.”

She stares into my eyes. “Is this about Natalia? You don’t think she’s going to get back with you, do you? Because she’s not. She’s with my brother now. And anyway, she doesn’t understand you the way I do.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?”

“It just means that I’m here because I care. And where is she?”

“Look, I appreciate you coming over. I really do. But I have practice in a little while and I need to get ready.”

Kaci nods, a defeated look on her face. “Okay. I’m sorry I bothered you.”

Part of me feels badly that I hurt her feelings, but the other part is just relieved that she’s going away. I’m about to say my goodbyes and walk back inside, when my mom suddenly bursts out of the doorway. “Kaci! I thought I heard you out here!” She throws her arms around her.

“Mrs. Elliott,” Kaci says, taking in her outfit. She laughs. “Did I interrupt an aerobics class or something?”

“Yoga,” my mom announces with pride.

“Oh, yoga!” Kaci’s whole attitude instantly changes and now she’s cute and confident and playing up to my mother. “I’ve actually been doing Iyengar Yoga for about two years,” she confides.

“Really?” My mom can barely contain herself. She grabs Kaci by the hand.

“Come on inside. I’d love to get some tips from you.”

And with that, the two of them disappear into the house.

My house.

I slide my hand across my face. This is a disaster. I don’t want Kaci in my house.

Nothing good can come of it. But there’s nothing I can do now. My mom’s dragged her into the living room and I can hear them talking.

“Let me help with your posture, Mrs. Elliot,” Kaci’s saying.

Soon the new age flute and bells are playing again.

I’m about to close the front door and go take a long shower—like an hour and a half long shower.

And that’s when I see him.

Aidan. He’s walking down the middle of the street. Weaving, actually. He looks strange. Like stranger than normal, even. I watch as he walks across to the curb and I figure he must be heading back to his own house, although I’m not sure where he could be coming from. Then he suddenly changes course and weaves back to the center of the street.

I jump down the steps and cut across my lawn. “Aidan!” I yell. “What the hell is going on, man?” When I reach him, I see that he’s a mess. His hair is tousled and there’s dirt all over his clothes. His pant leg is ripped, torn nearly in half, and there’s blood dripping down his ankle. His neck has a long bloody scratch running down below the collar of his shirt.

“Hey, Cam-o,” he says, but his voice is faint. He looks like he’s going to pass out or something.

I can’t believe he’s been in another fight. “Come on, let me get you inside.” I guide him to my house.

“I just need to sit down,” he tells me.

We get up the steps and into the front hallway of my house and Aidan sits down heavily on the stairs leading to the second floor. “I just need to rest,” he says. That’s when I notice his hands.

“Aidan— ”

His hands are bloody. Like, disgustingly bloody. He sees me staring and his eyes widen. “I know this looks bad,” he says.

“You’re hurt, dude. I need to call an ambulance.”