by Shelly Crane
He grabbed my bag and his and we made our way to stand in line. Bella was somewhere in the back with the luggage. Beck came right up behind me and sniffed in a way to get my attention but to show me she was peeved as well. I couldn’t help it. I turned around to face her.
“Beck, look, there are so many things going on right now that you don’t know about and I can’t tell you about. But know that I love you and I wanted to spend time with you but there are some things I have to do first. Please don’t be mad at me.”
“You kissed Kyle,” she hissed quietly to me. “The Maggie I knew would never have kissed someone she wasn’t dating and then drag some drug addict home with her.”
“Beck, please. It’s not what it looks like.”
“Says every person ever caught doing something they shouldn’t,” she sneered.
“Lynne was in trouble but not the drug kind. We’re taking her with us to keep her safe.”
“Uhuh. And kissing Kyle? The same Kyle that you promised me nothing was going on with.”
“That’s it isn’t it,” I realized. “You’re mad because you think I kept it from you that I was seeing Kyle, which I wasn’t.”
“You kept everything from me!” she yelled but bent her head when everyone looked at us curiously. “You cut your hair and didn’t tell me, you slept with your boyfriend and didn’t tell me, your dad lets you sleep with your boyfriend and you didn’t tell me! You left for California and didn’t tell me until you were already here. I was the last person you called when you got back form being kidnapped and you haven’t even tried to tell me about it. You barely speak to me anymore.”
“You didn’t ask anything about it,” I rebutted lamely.
“I shouldn’t have to. I’m your best friend, or I was. Now I guess you have a cuter more male version,” she said and rolled her eyes at Caleb’s back.
“That’s not fair, Beck, you have Ralph.”
“Yes, but I don’t talk to him!” She turned to him. “No offense, babe.” Then she turned back to me. “I have plenty of things to tell you about but now I’m going away to school and you’re gonna go get married or something and have babies and I’ll have no part in it.”
I took a chance and pulled her to me for a hug. She resisted for a split second before she gave in with a begrudged sigh.
“I was taken by some jerks who wanted something I didn’t have. I’m not traumatized about it but they’re still after me. That girl right there,” I pointed to Lynne who was oblivious and still talking to Kyle, “her father is a drug addict and she was looking for a way out. I know that sounds crazy but I had to help her. I just sleep with Caleb, nothing else.” I lifted my eyebrows to accentuate my point. “And as for kissing Kyle, it was stupid, I thought it was helping. I know that makes no sense but… I’m sorry.”
“You know you really didn’t answer any of my questions. Not one,” she said but her steam seemed to be dissipating.
“I know but I’m trying.”
“Are you in trouble?” she asked and grabbed my arm gently. “You’re not pregnant or are you? You’re sure?”
“No,” I whispered so I wouldn’t yell.
“So you and Caleb are seriously serious.”
“Yes,” I said and heard the laugh entering my tone.
“Are you going to marry him?”
“Yes.”
Her eyes bulged slightly but she kept it together.
“Are you still going to college?”
“Mmhmm.”
“Will you promise to tell me everything one day?”
“If I can,” I said carefully. “So you and Ralph, are you seriously serious?”
She cracked her first smile.
“I think I love him,” she whispered and looked over her shoulder at him as he talked to Caleb. “I’ve never said that to anyone and it’s a little scary but…I do. I love him.”
“Have you told him?”
“No, are you crazy!” she said incredulously.
“If it’s true, you should tell him.”
“Do you love Caleb?”
“Beck, I just told you I was gonna marry him someday.”
“That is so not an answer.”
I laughed in exasperation.
“Yes. Of course I love him.”
“Have you told him?”
“Yes.”
“What?” she said loudly. “It’s been like a couple weeks or something.”
“I know, but it is what it is.”
“Aww… Mags. You love him,” she crooned.
I scoffed.
“So marrying him is no problem but my loving him is something to shout about?”
“Yes! Oh, I love you, Maggsie.” She hugged me again. “I’m sorry I got mad. I just want to be in your life. I’m gonna be your maid of honor right?” She looked at me with a look of horror with the thought that I could not choose her.
And I wasn’t going to have a real wedding so I just smiled.
“I love you too, Beck.”
“Rebecca, it’s our turn, babe,” Ralph called back to us.
“Ah, I love it when he calls me Rebecca,” she groaned and we giggled as we made our way to the boys.
“I see you’re back in her good graces,” Caleb said into my ear from behind me. “I guess I was wrong to tell you not to try.”
“It was a whim and I went with it.”
“Well, I’m glad. I hope it lasts.”
“Me, too.”
The plane was similar to last time except for there was no sweet confessions or story time for Caleb and I, and I didn’t freak out about the plane taking off. Caleb and his family had once again opted for First Class and we were all piled into the left side together in rows of three. Lynne was next to me in the aisle seat and was going on and on about how First Class was so awesome as she drank her third glass of free orange juice. In truth, I just wanted to sleep but it didn’t look like that was going to happen. Caleb on the other hand was dozing next to me, his seat back with one arm behind his head and the other in my lap as Lynne talked endlessly to me.
“This is the best orange juice I’ve ever had, I think.”
“It’s pretty good,” I told her and I tasted the sweet/sour of the pulp in her mouth in her mind to mine.
“I know I’ve been saying that a lot but you guys live the life!” she said and laughed in genuine happiness.
She was in complete awe of her surroundings.
“It’s not all glamour,” I muttered under my breath.
“I can’t wait to get there,” she said absently. “Kyle’s family sounds awesome.” She turned to me. “Thank you, you saved my life.”
“It was nothing,” I said and she grabbed my hand.
“Yeah, it was. I know you’re tired and I know you checked on me all night. Go ahead and go to sleep. I’m going to watch the movie. They’re about to show ‘Airplane’.” She laughed hard. “Hilarious, right?”
I just laughed as I leaned over to lay against Caleb. He sighed when I did and pulled me closer, kissing my forehead in his sleep. I closed my eyes and couldn’t wait to be home.
~ Twenty Four ~
We all parted when we landed. Dad and Bish went back to his house and Beck and Ralph went to theirs. Bish and Jen’s goodbye was bittersweet. It was strange to have everything out it the open and yet it such a sad and sticky situation.
“I guess I’ll see you later?” Bish asked her.
“Mmhmm,” she answered. “I’m sure you will. Maybe I’ll see you before we leave for London.”
He swallowed painfully.
“Yeah,” he said gruffly and rubbed his upper arm self-consciously. “I’ll come by your place and see Maggie, maybe.”
She waved and went to wait in the car with her parents.
I hugged him and Dad. Dad wasn’t happy that I wasn’t coming home with him. I explained that we’d spent every night with him so far and had never spent time at Caleb’s home.
He let me go but I figured it was only becau
se he didn’t think he could stop me.
We put Bella in the SUV and I climbed in with Kyle, Lynne, Caleb, Peter, Jen and Rachel. We would drop Lynne and Kyle off at his house after someone explained everything to his parents.
I checked my phone messages in the car and was surprised to find one from Chad. I listened to it and he told me about getting his apartment ready and how much he missed me, asked me to call him soon. I closed my phone and bit my lip.
I glanced at Caleb and saw him trying not to look annoyed. I just didn’t say anything. When we pulled into the driveway Uncle Max came out and greeted us. I hoped that they didn’t make a huge fuss about me being the Visionary.
As soon as I got out Uncle Max greeted me with the bow. Ugh. Caleb immediately told him to stop but Max’s eyes were glued to the mark on my neck. I begged them to please not treat me differently and after some persuasion, they agreed.
After introductions, I showed Lynne where the bathroom was and when we were coming back down the stairs, she tripped on the bottom step and grabbed my arm to stop her fall.
And I was blasted, to my dismay, with yet another vision for her.
The vision was of her and a guy. They were standing in a kitchen together but the background was fuzzy and I couldn’t really see it that well. He was wiping something from her face, flour I thought. They were laughing hard and grabbing onto each other as if they would fall over if they didn’t. The guy was turned and I couldn’t see his face but as they got serious I saw in her eyes that she loved him. He pulled her closer and kissed her gently. She dropped her bowl of flour from her fingers to the floor to grasp his arms. Then when they pulled back they both said ‘I love you’ at the same time.
I gasped as I came back to myself. Caleb was already there behind me holding me up, as was everyone else. Lynne had fallen to the floor and Peter was helping her up. She looked at me with expectations.
“What was that?”
“I saw you…you were imprinted too,” I said in quiet awe.
“Too?” Peter asked. “What’s going on, Maggie?”
Don’t, Maggie. Caleb begged and Jen did her own begging at the same time.
Please, no, Maggie.
“What’s imprinted mean?” Lynne asked me.
“You imprint with your soul mate. I saw Lynne imprinted with someone but I couldn’t see his face.”
“She’s going to imprint with someone?” Kyle asked almost angrily.
I looked at him and he was seething. Jen beside him was discreetly wiping her eyes.
“That’s what I saw.”
“Great,” he muttered. “Awesome, frigging awesome.”
“Kyle,” Lynne said softly, having no idea what we were talking about but knew he was upset about something.
He just shook his head and left the room.
“What’s going on?” Uncle Max asked. “What’s wrong with Kyle? What has he done?”
“Nothing, Uncle Max, they just met,” Caleb assured him knowing exactly where he was going with it.
Neither of us mentioned Amber though.
Lynne leaned against Peter in her shock. I could see her shaking and went to her.
“I’ll take her. Uncle Max, where can I put Lynne for the night?”
He didn’t say anything so I turned to look at him and he was smiling.
“You called me Uncle Max.”
I felt my grin spread at his enjoyment of it.
“Yeah.”
“Put her in the room you stayed in with Caleb,” he said and came to stand next to us. He rubbed her arm soothingly and kissed my forehead. “It’ll be alright, girls. We’ll figure this out.”
I nodded and took her to lie on the bed. She seemed to be in shock or something. I tried to explain as best as I could what imprinting was and how it all worked. She listened but didn’t say anything for a while.
“You kissed Kyle at the club but you’re in love with the beefy one.”
“Yes, I kissed Kyle for a reason but I don’t love him, we’re just friends. I was trying to control my ability.”
“But he likes you. He watches you.”
“He seems to like you an awful lot too.”
She scoffed.
“Boys like that don’t like girls like me.”
“What does that mean?”
“He knows about me, my family, where I come from. I’m trash. He’s a nice guy. They ride in on their white horse, nurse you back to health and make you fall for them, then move on to the gorgeous girl to spend the rest of their life with. That’s just the way it is.”
“I saw you in the vision. You were imprinted with an Ace,” I argued.
“Yeah, well, maybe we’ll do something to stop that vision from coming true, too,” she said dejected.
I left her there to sleep and went downstairs.
When I came back down and heard them talking, I stopped on the steps to listen.
“So the Imprints are returning,” Uncle Max said and I heard the relief in his voice.
“It looks that way, if Maggie’s vision is correct,” Peter said. “I wonder who it will be.”
“Well, she’s a darling girl,” Rachel explained. “Anyone would be lucky to have her. She’s just had a rough time lately.”
“So, any news on this ransom business?” Max asked.
“No, nothing. The Reunification is in two days. We just have to keep her safe until then,” Peter said. “Surely the Watsons wouldn’t have the gall to show their face there.”
“But they will be under protective sanction. If they do come, you can’t harm them, you know that. Just like you couldn’t harm them when they kidnapped her the first time.”
“Well,” Caleb cut it, “I think that’s bull. None of this would be happening if we’d taken care of them the first time.”
“Son, we have to follow the rules. We aren’t allowed to harm other clans.”
“But they aren’t following the rules!” he yelled. “And they harmed her!”
“I know, but we aren’t like them,” Peter said with conviction. “We are nothing like them and I don’t ever want to be. We’ll do this the proper way. We’ve never had a clan denounced before but once they are, they’re fair game. And they probably know it and will run like scared children.”
“It’s not supposed to be like this,” Caleb muttered and I heard his footsteps. He found me sitting on the stairs and grabbed my hand to tow me. “We’re leaving,” he called. “See you at the house, Dad.”
He took me outside to the garage, to his bike. I smiled looking at it and laughed out loud when he ran a hand down the length and crooned to it.
“Ah, I’ve missed you, Lolita.”
We climbed on after he put on my helmet. When it rumbled to life I felt giddy. I’d missed the bike, for sure. He pulled out of the driveway and we rode all the way to his house in comfortable silence. He drove slowly to savor the feel of the ride.
When we pulled onto his street, I noticed his gate was open. He stopped the bike in the middle of the street and looked around.
The gate is never left open.
Nothing looked out of order. He pulled into his driveway and stopped. He got off the bike and took off his helmet to look around. We heard whining motors coming down the street. I cocked my head to figure it out but Caleb tensed.
He ran to the call box and pressed the button, calling for Randolph but he never answered. Then two riders all in black pulled up in the driveway on motorcycles. Caleb pushed me further back behind him and stood straighter.
I had a sudden feeling that I needed to stop them. I pushed my hands forward to command the gates. They closed in a frightfully fast swing, knocking both the men from their bikes and sending them skidding on the asphalt.
They came to the gate, one of them shook it angrily but the other one just grabbed the mad one by the collar and jumped, clearing the fence and gate in one quick leap. They landed on their feet in a graceful pounce on our side.
We waited for something to happen. T
hey never spoke but then all of a sudden, without warning, they ran towards us.
Caleb turned and pushed me.
“Get in the garage!”
“I’m not leaving you!”
“Go, Maggie,” he demanded harder.
I obeyed…halfway. I didn’t go to the garage but I ran further away from them and watched as the horrific scene unfolded. One of the men took his hands palms up and made the ground beneath Caleb lift and shake making a little hill that eventually opened up into hole under Caleb. He jumped and reached for the edge just in time and clung for his life as the mound raised higher and higher and the hole got bigger and bigger. Then the other one huffed and pushed the one working in aggravation. His mind said he was mad because he should have taken care of Caleb already and he was ready to take me for his reward money. I saw it in his mind what he was doing before he did it but him pulling the gun out of his jacket pocket shocked me into shivers.
