Twisted Heart (23 page)

‘So I say we tell the Randles the whole story,’ Jude said as he sat beside me in his grey hooded jacket and black jeans. ‘As Holly’s parents they’re entitled to know what’s happening to their daughter out at New Dawn.’

‘Then what?’ Grace argued. She reminded us she of all people was in the best position to judge how Holly’s mind would be working right now. ‘Holly is convinced heart and soul that she wants to stay with the community and nobody, especially not her parents, can argue her out of it. Anyway, look what happened when mine tried.’

I remembered the Montroses’ doomed visit to Black Rock. They hadn’t even got beyond the security gate before Brancusi’s security team had used shotguns to blast the air out of their tyres. ‘I agree with Grace – I don’t think Mr and Mrs Randle can hack it.’

‘So let me try,’ Aaron said. ‘This time I promise I won’t break any laws, OK?’

I shook my head and turned to Jude for help. ‘He’s one guy,’ I pointed out. ‘And he doesn’t know what he’s up against.’

‘OK, dude, we have to sit down and figure this out.’ Jude’s analytical brain was what we needed right now. ‘Tania’s right – you’d have zero chance of getting Holly out of there by just knocking on their door: “Hey, we’re here to collect our buddy.” So how else can we make it happen?’

‘We could wait until tomorrow night.’ With a bad feeling screwing up the pit of my stomach, I threw in the new factor that changed the whole equation.

‘Why? What’s happening tomorrow night?’ Grace spoke and all three looked to me to clear up the mystery.

‘A party. To celebrate Amos’s fiftieth birthday and Jean-Luc’s leaving.’

‘You have an invite?’ Jude asked.

‘Me and you, Aaron,’ I confirmed. ‘In fact, Aurelie said to bring as many friends as I liked.’

I hear the drumming of a hundred hooves over dry earth, a cloud of dust, buffalos with heads down and galloping, driven to the cliff top, kettled and forced over the edge. Running in blind panic, falling to their deaths
.

‘No, forget that,’ I said to Grace, Jude and Aaron as my skin suddenly began to crawl. ‘It’s a really bad idea. I don’t think we should go.’

It’s like forest fire – set a spark to dry grass and let the wind get at it, drop one single cigarette butt in a fire hazard area and the whole mountainside goes up in flames – shrubs, thorn bushes, junipers, pinon pines.

‘We’re going to the party,’ Aaron had decided. Like a force of nature, he’d dragged the time and place out of me, made the others promise to be there too.

‘Then what?’ Jude had asked, always the cautious one, the planner.

‘Then we hijack Holly out of there. No talkie-talkie-nicey-nicey, no trying to persuade her – we just grab her and get her out.’

‘Yeah, right,’ Grace had sighed. How many X-Men movies had Aaron watched lately, she’d wanted to know.

‘So what’s your idea?’ he’d countered.

We didn’t have one, we’d admitted. It had to be the party – in the end we’d all agreed.

I drove home from Grace’s house with the buffalos still on my mind, competing for my attention with Jarrold on the run. I was in the usual inside-your-car bubble, cut off from what was going on in the streets, barely noticing a change of lights from green to red when I glanced in my mirror to see a guy on a Harley pull up behind me, way too close. His visor covered his face, but there was something familiar …

The lights changed, the Harley guy swerved wide and overtook me on the junction, glancing over his shoulder as he picked up speed.

‘Costume!’ Grace’s text reminded me after I’d driven up Becker Hill and pulled up in my drive. ‘You need to go Native American and if Orlando plans to come along, so does he!’

‘Will get on to it,’ I texted back with a pressure around my heart. It was only when I got inside the house and turned on the TV for background noise that I recognized the oppressive sensation. Call it reluctance about the party. Heighten that and it grows into dread. Yeah, big-time dread was what I felt.

The sun went down that night in a spectacular blaze of red. You could almost see it melt on to the black horizon.

I sat in the garden, comforted by the call of Zenaida in the tree above my head. She perched high up, raised her tail and ducked her head forward, shuffled her pink feet along the silver branch.

‘Jarrold – good or bad? Dark or light?’ I mused without expecting an answer. I tried Jude’s method of applying logic. I was thinking hard, building up the negative column. He’s New Dawn, so he has to be in with the dark angels. He’s arrogant, he keeps secrets. Grace called him a psycho and compared him with Brancusi’s henchman, Daniel, which makes him covert, manipulative, dangerous. Maybe he even killed a guy in the lake. Dark side – no contest. Zenaida sat on her branch puffing out her grey chest feathers to keep out the cold. She prepared for the night.

On the positive side, Jarrold had saved my life. This was a biggie. I recalled how he’d lowered himself down the sink hole, risked death to save me. He’d written me a note to say he loved me. Besides, it was clear from the start that Jarrold didn’t follow the New Dawn rules. He was an Outsider. And now he’d gone on the run.

Zenaida called softly through the falling darkness. The very last leaves fell from the aspen trees and settled around my feet.

‘That must mean he’s on our side,’ I murmured, looking up. Jarrold was a foot soldier for the angels of light.

There was silence from above.

‘Eat,’ Dad said. He’d made breakfast of blueberry pancakes before he set out for work. ‘Tania, you hear?’

‘Yeah, thanks but no thanks.’ My stomach was churning so badly that I would definitely throw up if I tried a single bite.

‘Too strung out?’ He took away the plate, tried me with a glass of milk instead.

‘All good when Orlando gets here,’ he promised. ‘How long now?’

‘A few hours.’

Dad picked up his car keys. ‘You’ll call me?’

I nodded.

‘I worry until I hear.’

‘I’ll text.’

‘All good,’ he said again as he left the house for Paloma Springs.

I filled in the gap before lunchtime by buying stuff from the art shop to create costumes for Friday’s party – beads, feathers, some soft suede material, fabric dyes, et cetera. Then I worked in the garage which Dad had converted into my studio, complete with easels and a large table where I stretched canvases and made silk-screen frames for printing. I played music as I worked – which is why I didn’t hear the sound of the motorbike coming up the hill and I only noticed my visitor when he was actually standing in the studio doorway, shiny black helmet under his arm.

‘Jarrold, don’t do that!’ I almost staggered under the weight of the shock when I finally saw him, recognized the broad face and square jaw, the Viking locks.

‘Did you get my note?’ he asked.

‘Yes. Stay where you are. Don’t come any closer.’

‘What I said is true,’ he insisted. ‘I can’t get you out of my mind, Tania. I had to come.’

‘Are you even listening to me?’ I’d been working with a craft knife and I kept it in my hand as I advanced towards him. ‘You can’t keep on showing up like this. Just turn round and leave.’

His gaze didn’t falter. ‘Give me a reason.’

‘One – I didn’t invite you. Two – I promised Aurelie I’d tell her where you were if I found out. Three – my boyfriend will be here any minute. How many reasons do you need?’

‘You didn’t give me the one that matters,’ he said, looking steadily at me and reaching out for the knife.

I glanced down at my hand, surprised it was there, not resisting when Jarrold took it from me and put it down beside his helmet on the table.

‘Tania, the only way I’d walk away and never come back is if you told me you didn’t love me.’

It happened again – he walked all over my reasons, trampled them into the dirt. He was standing close enough for me to read the passion in his eyes.

‘Tell me you don’t love me,’ he whispered.

I shaped the words, had them on the tip of my tongue, in spite of the way he drew me in and made my heart hammer, my palms sweat.

He didn’t wait for me to speak. He reached for me and put his arms around me. His lips were on mine. I felt his warm breath, his tongue, his fingertips on my cheek, his eyes searching my soul.

‘Say it!’ he whispered through smiling lips.

He was tall, strong. His physicality overpowered me.

He felt me submit. ‘You do love me, don’t you?’

A breeze blew in through the studio door. Over Jarrold’s shoulder I caught sight of two thin white trails from jet planes criss-crossing an immense blue sky, and in the garden a grey dove rose from a tree.

‘You have to go,’ I told Jarrold, somehow finding the strength to push him away though my skin, my lips, maybe my heart wanted him to stay.

His eyelids drooped, his thick lashes brushed my cheek as he pulled back.

‘This doesn’t alter anything,’ he said softly. ‘My feelings for you don’t change.’

‘Go,’ I sighed.

I couldn’t watch him leave, just turned away and heard his footsteps retreat. When I risked a glance over my shoulder, I saw that he’d left his helmet on the table. Instinctively I ran after him.

He stopped, waited.

‘You forgot this,’ I told him, handing over his helmet and watching the sudden glint of victory in his eyes fade.

He left, this time for real. He climbed on to his bike, started the engine, lurched from the sidewalk into the street, sped away.

Ten minutes later, Orlando’s truck pulled up in the space Jarrold had vacated.

We were in my room. I was lying on my bed, watching Orlando in the shower. His head was tilted back, he was turned away. His beautiful body glistened as white foam washed away. When he reached out of the cubicle for a towel, I was there to hand it to him.

He grinned then shook his head, spraying me with droplets from his wet hair.

‘Hey!’ I twisted the control to turn on fresh jets, pushed him back under the shower and let him drag me with him. Together we felt sharp needles prickle our skin. We kissed with wet lips, together again.

I was with Orlando, filled with warm joy, relief, thankfulness. The dread of my dark angel had eased.

‘I don’t know what happens inside my head,’ he confessed when we were dressed and sitting in the kitchen. ‘I just have to look at you and my brain turns to mush. All I want is you – I can never get enough.’

‘Mush – is that good or bad?’ The pizza in the oven smelled great. We were both hungry and totally happy. ‘It doesn’t
sound
good!’

‘It’s you’re fault – you’re so beautiful.’

‘So good.’ I decided with a smile. I took out the pizza, sliced it and put it on the table.

‘Especially naked,’ he added with an exaggerated sigh.

‘I hear you.’ Leaning over his shoulder as I put down the plate, I kissed him.

‘So if we want to have a serious conversation we have to stay fully clothed.’

‘Seriously – do we have to?’

‘Eventually, I guess.’ We were both smiling and laughing, I was giving him small kisses on his cheek and neck.

‘So you think we should talk?’

‘You’re the one who texted to say that, remember.’

‘I was worried about you – about
us
,’ he said hesitantly. Then he stopped kissing me back and narrowed his eyes. ‘Should I be?’

‘I don’t know.’ I sighed as straight away I thought of Blondie always in the background when we Skyped and of Jarrold’s lips so recently on mine. Deflecting this last image, I turned it back on Orlando. ‘Should you?’

Orlando gave an irritated shake of his head. ‘We don’t need to do this.’

‘What don’t we need to do?’

‘Play these games. Don’t you see the pattern – we get close then we start to pick-pick-pick at each other. Why do we do that?’

‘I’m not picking.’ My stubborn shield was up. I wasn’t behaving well.

‘OK then. We put up barriers.’ He stood and walked out through French windows into the garden where the bare trees stood stark against a heavy grey sky. ‘We have to get through this, Tania. We have to say what we really mean.’

Following him out, I stood beside him. I didn’t feel edgy or scared but for some reason incredibly sad. When he next looked at me I was crying.

‘I love you.’ He whispered our mantra as he pushed stray locks from my face. ‘And I’m sorry.’

‘What for?’

‘For whatever it is I do.’

‘You don’t do anything. I do it to myself.’

‘When we’re not together I get incredibly insecure,’ he confessed. ‘That’s why I put too much pressure on you to come with me to Dallas.’

I was shocked. Why would this gorgeous guy feel this way? No way would you look at him and think Orlando was anything except gifted, confident, relaxed in his own skin. But love does this to a person – it makes you fly and fall, soar and plummet. ‘It’s OK, I understand.’

‘You do?’ He pushed on, determined to get through a list of things he’d prepared in his head. ‘I adore you, Tania, and I put you up there on a pedestal. But sometimes I don’t listen when things get tough for you. Like now.’

I nodded. ‘Tell me about Natalie,’ I said suddenly.

He blinked and jerked his head back. ‘Natalie?’

‘Yeah – gorgeous, funny, flirty Natalie.’

Orlando began to laugh then stopped himself. ‘Whoa!’

Screwing my eyes tight shut, I groaned. ‘I know. I shouldn’t have said that.’ What an idiot.

‘Natalie’s not my type. You are.’ Lots more kisses, lots of tender smiles.

Slowly we were hugging and talking ourselves into a good, safe space. I felt braver. ‘There’s this guy called Jarrold,’ I told him.

My God, it was like I’d flicked a switch. The smiles vanished.

I grabbed Orlando’s hand to stop him pulling away. ‘We’re being honest – yeah? He was one of the triathletes – the one who tried to save Conner Steben, remember?’

‘I know who he is. Don’t tell me – he was in your group when you did the stupid hike and almost got yourself killed.’

‘That “stupid hike” told me everything I needed to know about Antony Amos,’ I reminded him. ‘Now I know who my enemy is, and it’s not Jarrold, believe me.’

‘Yeah, just like it wasn’t Amos until a couple of days back.’