The Inner Circle, Book 3 of the Glass Wall ( A YA Urban Fantasy Romance ) (3 page)

“You didn’t ask him?” I asked.

He snorted. “We don’t talk. Haven’t you
noticed?” He began to curse angrily under his breath. “Melody sent
me down here earlier to make sure Rafael never set foot on Earth.
Now I see why. This is the biggest mess …” His voice trailed
away.

“Who cares what Melody thought … or thinks,”
I couldn’t resist saying. She’d clearly been evil for a long
time.

The conversation lulled for a moment, and
then I remembered Rafael’s Blue Thread. Hooking my thumb over my
shoulder, I pointed to the garage. “Was … that Rafael’s Blue
Thread?”

It was dark, but it was still light enough
for me to see Jareth’s cocked eyebrow. “His Blue Thread is alive
and well.”

I don’t know why, but that made me feel
better. “Then there’s hope it can all work out for the best?”

“If you want to believe so.” Jareth’s mood
was only getting darker. And then suddenly striking the tree, he
raged, “What’s happening here?”

My head was beginning to pound. “This is a
job for the army or something,” I said. “Not me.”

And then Jareth stepped close and, gripping
my shoulders, shook me a little. “What am I, Sydney?”

His face was close to mine, the impressive
purple welt under his eye made the entire side of his face look
black in the darkness.

“What am I?” he repeated.

I knew we were both thinking of the images
we’d seen in the Hall of Mirrors, the images of the white-cloaked
figure experimenting with needles and injecting something into the
dark-haired Fae that had given birth to Jareth.

“Just because you might have some of their
DNA doesn’t mean you’re one of them!” I said.

He reacted violently to that and blanched.
His fingers dug into my shoulders. “Are you saying I’m one of
them
?” he hissed.

Clearly, he couldn’t bring himself to name
them.

Neither of us could.

“I’m saying you’re not.” I shook my head.
“I’m saying you can be anything you want to be—”

He cut me off. “I’ve always been different.
From the start.”

I knew that was true. He didn’t react to
iron. And on Halloween, he’d made the scissors fly into the floor
when he’d gotten angry.
And
he’d accessed the blue strand in
Avalon to reach the decryption codes, something none of the Fae
could do. But then, I suddenly recalled his strange reaction to me
in the parking lot when we’d first encountered the Mesmers, his
response to my sarcasm about dreaming. Abruptly, I asked him, “Can
you dream, too?”

The Fae couldn’t dream because they couldn’t
access the second dimension.

Clearly, he
could
.

He jerked back involuntarily.

“If that isn’t a ‘yes’, I don’t know what
is,” I observed dryly.

He recoiled even farther from me at that. And
then his shoulders hunched down and he just looked like a massive
ball of misery.

“I’m sorry,” I said, reaching out to him.

“This is the cruelest revenge,” he grated.
And then without any warning, he shifted, disappearing from my
sight to leave only a small wisp of mist where he’d been
standing.

I scowled.

“Thanks!” I shouted, waving my hands in the
cold air. “I’ll just manage the Mesmers by myself.”

I honestly expected him to pop right back,
but after about ten minutes, I realized he really was gone.

Refusing to let myself even
think
about being afraid, I trudged back into the house and headed for
the bathroom.

Splashing water over my face with shaking
hands, I rested my hands on the edge of the sink and stared at the
person looking back at me. I analyzed the dark-haired girl with
bright green eyes, dressed in faded jeans and a crumpled
Bean
There, Baked That
coffee shop T-Shirt. She looked pretty
normal, except she still had a thin gold Fae bracelet stuck on her
wrist, a bracelet she couldn’t get off.

This girl was caught in some kind of unending
nightmare. She was dealing with things that some government agency
should be handling.

She was in way over her head.

But I couldn’t do anything for her. Beyond
slapping her face and pinching her arm on the off-chance that she
was dreaming.

I tried it. But as expected, I didn’t wake
up.

Instead, I closed my eyes and concentrated on
slowly breathing in and out.

I was scared. Afraid.

But I couldn’t let myself dwell on that,
because I knew that it only made the Brotherhood stronger and
cemented their control over me.

I slammed the faucet off.

Rafael.

I couldn’t understand it. Why hadn’t I seen
any signs of this evil side before? Had I been that blind? Or
love-struck?

I didn’t want to think about him. It hurt too
much.

I should have known I would never have a
fairy tale romance, and I didn’t even want to acknowledge the
bitter humor of that thought.

Instead, I forced myself to think of the road
ahead of me.

What was I supposed to do now? The mutant
tulpa was in the hands of the bad guys.

And what about that gnome on the porch? The
one that had turned into the man with the black top hat. He’d
apparently been trying to warn me of the danger inside the
house.

I shivered.

Was that gnome still there?

I didn’t have the guts to look.

Not yet.

And then I heard the sound of a car, and I
ran to the window to see Al’s yellow pickup truck with the
oversized wheels zoom up the driveway.

With relief, I watched his shiny bald head
get out of the cab.

Al.

All at once, I felt safe.

I ran to the kitchen to see him standing
there in his army fatigues and black boots. He was scratching his
head, and there were two lines carved between his eyebrows.

“What happened, kiddo?” he asked, pointing to
the missing door between the kitchen and garage.

I was such a bundle of tense, knotted nerves
that I had a hard time replying at first. Finally, I moved my lips
in what I hoped could pass for a smile.

“I dunno,” I lied. “I came home and it was
missing.”

I was rescued from his piercing blue eyes by
Betty joining us from the living room, absently sipping a mug of
tea.

“What happened, Betty?” Al asked, turning to
her.

“I fell asleep,” she said, drawing her brows
together in faint confusion. “I swear the day just flew by!”

Al’s frown deepened. “And the door?” he asked
curiously.

“Door?” Betty repeated.

He pointed.

“Oh, what happened to the door?” she gasped.
The tea splashed out of her mug.

Al’s face flooded with concern. And then his
gaze locked onto me for several long moments before he turned back
to Betty and kissed the top of her head.

“Go take a nap, Betty,” he suggested. “You’re
just tired. Maybe you’re coming down with a cold. I’ll fix this
door right up. Tigger probably did it.”

“Oh, Tigger! Where is he?” Betty asked,
nearly dropping her mug. “I swear, this has been such a strange
day!”

She continued to chatter as Al gently guided
her from the kitchen and down the hall.

I stayed where I was. I wasn’t sure what to
do. And I sure couldn’t see how Al possibly thought Tigger had done
anything to the door. The old brindled bloodhound exhausted himself
just walking from the living room to the kitchen.

And then Al returned.

His blue eyes zeroed in on mine as he said,
“Your Alien Time-Catcher watch is blinking again, kiddo.”

I looked down
at the plastic digital watch that Al had given me for my birthday.
The blue light was blinking, signaling that another alien Time
Event had occurred. I didn’t have the heart or the energy to
lie.

So I didn’t say anything.

Al stared at me a moment. “Maybe we should
send it back to Jack,” he said. “I’m not sure that thing’s
working.”

Still silent, I hit the reset button. I’d
assumed Al’s friend, Jack, hadn’t really known what he was doing
because he sounded a little kooky, and he was just a janitor at an
Air Force base.

How arrogant I’d been.

Both of his devices had worked
flawlessly.

Al clearly knew I was hiding something, but
he didn’t press me for explanations. Instead, he walked toward the
garage, pausing along the way to give me a reassuring pat on the
head.

“We’ll figure this mystery out, kiddo,” he
said. “There’s nothing to be scared of.”

“Yeah,” I mumbled, trying to sound calmer
than I felt.

Al eyed the open doorway and then inspected
the holes where the hinges had been. “The door’s clean gone,” he
announced, crossing his arms emphatically. And then angling his
head, he cautiously peered into the garage. He was quiet as he took
in the mess.

A couple lids had popped off several of the
paint cans, leaving white and green puddles of paint on the floor.
His white PVC plastic pipe tent was knocked to one side and the
hamster cage that had housed the tulpa was lying empty on the
floor.

I wished I could hear what he was
thinking.

Nodding thoughtfully to himself, he returned
to the kitchen and to his Neighborhood Watch drawer. Whistling
between his teeth, he rummaged around for a bit and then pulled out
several pairs of goggles and a roll of wide yellow tape.

“Wear these, kiddo,” he said, tossing me a
pair of goggles as he pushed his own up the bridge of his nose.
“And grab that flashlight and notepad on the counter, will you?
We’ve got work to do.”

I wasn’t sure what the goggles were for, but
I put them on all the same and followed him into the garage.

Al’s blue eyes brightened as he unrolled the
tape with great care. He looked utterly thrilled to be using it. I
took a closer look and saw that the words ‘Crime Scene’ were
printed every few inches. I wondered how long he’d had the tape in
the drawer.

“Help me contain the area, kiddo,” he said
with a crisp nod.

I held each end until he’d cordoned off the
entire garage. And then taking the flashlight from me, he began a
slow sweep of the area. When he neared the paint cans, the beam of
his flashlight froze.

“Strange.” His voice was excited. “Take a
look at those, Sydney.” He pointed. “Got your cellphone? Why don’t
you take a few pictures?”

I leaned close and shuddered, recognizing the
small tracks on the concrete floor. They were Blondie’s
footprints.

“Maybe we should call the police,” I
suggested, fumbling for my phone.

“I’m afraid it’s up to us,” he told me. “This
is such a small case that they won’t have time to do it
justice.”

Small? I hardly thought so. It was the
biggest case of the century, if not in
centuries
. I wished I
could tell Al what was really going on. But it was getting so
crazy, I hardly believed it myself.

As I lifted my phone to snap a picture,
Blondie’s cackle snaked through the air.

I gasped and whirled, dropping my phone.

It shattered on the concrete floor.

“Whoa there,” Al said as I asked, “Did you
hear that?”

Knitting his brows into a frown, he bent and
scooped up my phone. “Hear what?”

We held still, straining to listen, but there
was only silence.

“Never mind,” I mumbled.

He held out my phone. The screen was
completely cracked.

“I’m afraid this one’s toast now. I’m sorry,
kiddo,” he said sympathetically.

“It’s old anyway,” I said, annoyed with
myself for breaking it.

A bit of glass embedded itself into my
fingertip as I took the phone from Al’s outstretched hand. But I
hardly noticed. I was concerned about Blondie. Was he watching us
from the shadows?

Jamming my hand into my pocket, I reassured
myself that Jareth’s protection rune was still there. It was. It
felt warm against my skin.

“I’ll pick you up a new phone tomorrow,” Al
was saying as he gave me another friendly tousle on the head.
“How’s that for a Christmas present?”

I smiled, distracted.

A flicker of light caught my eye. One of
Jareth’s protection runes under the window was glowing. My relief
that it was working was short-lived when I realized that it
probably meant Blondie really
was
trying to get in, after
all.

“What is it?” Al asked me kindly. “You’re as
jumpy as a kangaroo, kiddo.”

“Nothing,” I lied again. I felt terrible. I
wanted to tell him the truth. I needed an ally. And if anyone in
the world was going to believe me, I knew it would be Al. But I
wasn’t sure if it was a good idea. What could he do?

“OK, then,” Al said after a moment. “Let’s
get this investigation wrapped up.”

Once again, he returned to the kitchen to
rummage through his drawer, and finding the camera, he returned to
snap pictures of Blondie’s footprints.

After that, he put me to work collecting
various hairs that he found on the floor. The hairs were all black,
beige, and orange and clearly belonged to Tigger. But Al had me use
a pair of tweezers to carefully store them in plastic sandwich
baggies anyway. And by the time we’d finished our crime scene
investigation, we must have had over a hundred little baggies.

Somehow, that tedious task calmed me.

That and listening to Al softly hum under his
breath.

And in that moment, I came to the conclusion
that it was time for me to follow Al’s example. He didn’t wait to
be told what to do. He forged ahead, looking for answers, and he
didn’t really care what others thought of him. He shaped his own
destiny.

I looked at his bald head and realized that
he was actually a very brave man.

And it was high time that I took charge of my
own destiny, my Blue Thread.

I couldn’t wait around for others to solve my
problems. Who knew where Jareth was, and Rafael … I didn’t really
want to think about him. Not yet.