“Officer Parker, I don’t know how much help I can be on that sort of thing,” I said.
“Let’s find out. If it doesn’t work, then you will have wasted a few minutes talking to me over the phone and maybe half an hour at the station.”
Oh no. It was seeping in. My guilty conscience was coming in for a joy ride. The inner voice that loved telling me it was just one afternoon. What if I could actually help? No. Not what if. I could. My particular set of skills is why many of our kind collectively decided not to go into any kind of criminal work. It was risky if one of us performed our jobs too well. Or caught onto something normal humans ordinarily couldn’t.
No. The risk was too high. I had other people to think about. Not just myself. Madison instantly shot to the forefront of my mind. Her kids. Her husband. It might have been just me and her for a time before Caleb came around, but I wasn’t so selfish as to place her and anyone else in unnecessary danger. Or was that my mother’s words lurking in my memory? Who knows?
“I’m sorry, Officer,” I said with a stammer. If I had to play the grieving widow card, I would. “I can’t. I just can’t. It’s too hard. At least right now. Please understand, I just can’t right now.”
I was met with silence. If he knew I was playing it up, he didn’t let on. If anything, I think I might have made him feel guilty.
“Alright. Well, if you change your mind, you have my phone number,” he said, his disappointment apparent in his voice.
“Goodbye Officer. Best of luck on your cold cases.” And with that, I ended the call, rolled over, and threw the covers back over my head. I tried to forget about the call altogether. To fall back asleep. To go back to a place where my mind could just drift away and forget that the world was trying to reach inside my room and pull me out into the bright sunshine where I didn’t want to be. To get me moving again. To lure me out like a mouse being lured toward cheese in a trap. Because it was a trap. Or at least it felt that way. A trap that would only lead me to move away from my grief. And if I moved away from my grief, I would move away from Caleb. Away from his memory. I would be forced to go on living like everyone wanted me to. And I couldn’t yet.
Wishful thinking. My phone buzzed again. I was starting to wonder if I was capable of reaching the same level of irritation that the guy in the cafe standing behind Officer Parker had all those years ago.
I grabbed my phone and looked at the number calling, expecting it to be Officer Parker again. It wasn’t.
Good lord. It was worse. So much worse!
Madison. God love her for trying to be a good older sister, but damn her for trying to be a good older sister all the same. It meant she would constantly bug me with invites to go out or let me know she was stopping by to drop off some of my favorite loose leaf tea. Or some food she prepared for me. Even if her spaghetti was the best in town, I wouldn’t be bribed. Not again.
I let her roll to voice mail, then begrudgingly listened to the message.
“Hey, Harper. Listen, the kids have already gone off to school. It’s the first day of kindergarten. Well, it’s an introductory thing. They don’t really start until Monday, but I guess I have the first-day blues a bit early. Or empty nest syndrome. I thought I would be relieved with finally getting a break. But it’s kinda the opposite. I could really use the company. Would you mind coming over for a cup of coffee? Anytime this morning would be fine. They don’t come home until around noon. You can pop by whenever.”
Ugh… another request. The only problem was I didn’t think I could get away with ignoring this one. I had been avoiding Madison for weeks. My classic ‘I just can’t’ wasn’t going to work much longer. At least on her. If I didn’t go, she would more than likely come by my place tomorrow. And when she was at my place, I couldn’t control how long she stayed. She always found reasons to stick around and help out. At least if I went to her house I could leave whenever I felt like it.
I stirred from the bed and finally sat up. My legs weren’t ready for the sudden change. An ache surged through my feet to my back. As though my body was silently yelling at me for sleeping in the same position for too long.
‘Damn you, Maddie. Using the kids as an excuse is low. Even for you.’
My method of ignoring her wasn’t going to work anymore. She was onto me.
Chapter 2
“Thanks for dropping by,” Madison said with a smile on her face. “I didn’t realize until I got home from dropping off the girls that I’d be this lonely. The house is just so quiet.”
“Sure,” I said with a hint of an attitude.
Madison opened up the fridge as soon as the coffee pot dinged to let her know it was done. She took out 2% organic milk from the fridge and started pouring some into my cup.
“What’s that?” I asked.
“Just some milk.”
“Yeah, I know it’s milk. Why do you have it?”
She turned her head to look at me, knowing I was catching on faster than she had anticipated.
“You don’t drink milk, Maddie,” I went on. “You hate it. You say it tastes like chalk.”
“It’s for the girls.”
“You’re girls drink 2% organic milk, do they? Just like their Aunt Harper?”
She ignored me and brought the coffee over to the kitchen table. She just happened to have the kind of milk I like to put in my morning coffee. Back when I drank coffee. All the time. All day long. Like a drug I couldn’t get enough of. My personal weapon of choice. She knew how I liked it. Meaning only one thing. She planned this. She even went to the store to accommodate me before calling. She wanted something.
“What is it, Maddie?” I asked her.
“What’s what?”
“What do you want to ask me? Because if you’re going to ask me if I’m alright for the billionth time, you already know the answer. I just need some time to process things.”
Madison looked downright guilty after taking a small sip of her steaming coffee and gulping it down. “Can I just enjoy having a morning cup of coffee with my sister after my kids go off to their first day of kindergarten?” she asked.
“I thought you said it was an introductory thing,” I muttered.
“Whatever.”
Now it was my turn to feel guilty. Maybe I was reading too much into the situation. Or maybe I was getting the same feeling from her as I always did. Bonds between kruxa sisters are weird like that. If people think that regular human siblings argue and get on each other’s nerves, try being a kruxa. It was like having a direct thread tied between us. I always knew when she was genuinely upset, when she was happy, and most of all, when she was being deceitful. In ways that only sisters can.
“Sure, Maddie. Sure you can.” I took a sip of the coffee, figuring she would get to what she actually wanted to talk about eventually. I was probably on her list. Those lists she constantly kept to make sure she got through all her tasks for the day. It was probably written down on there, ‘talk to Harper.’ Or maybe ‘take care of Harper.’ One of the two. I was another task to be completed by my type A neurotic sister.
“I just want to know how you’re doing,” she said. “It will distract me for a few minutes. So humor me. What have your days been like? Are you back to your regular routine? Are your clients coming around?”
“A few,” I answered.
“Good. That’s good. Getting back into a routine will make a difference. Even if it is that… stuff.”
I couldn’t help but roll my eyes. I knew I was acting like a snot, but I truly couldn’t help it. After months of people asking how I was, wanting to know how I’m getting along, and having to answer that I’m okay while knowing they are perfectly aware that’s not true was starting to really wear on me. And then there was the small jab at my readings.
“Yeah, maybe,” I said, taking another sip of coffee.
“I got a strange phone call from Officer Parker this morning,” she said randomly.
Oh shit. Here it was. The ask. She definitely wanted
something. Or to talk about something very specific. I was definitely on her list. Without a doubt. I let down my coffee a little too hard and the sides began to move back and forth, spilling over the edge.
“Oh, I’ll get that,” she said, grabbing a paper towel from the counter as she continued speaking. “He said that he talked to you about helping him with some cold cases. One from Sealing and maybe some near here. He actually thought that calling me and asking me to encourage you to do it was a good idea.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
She shrugged her shoulders. “I just don’t know where he got the crazy idea that you should be getting involved in that kind of work.”
“He didn’t say anything about paying. He just asked for help.”
“Well then, you definitely shouldn’t do it. What’s that line?” she asked as she took a moment to think. “Oh, right. If you’re good at something never do it for free.”
“You’re quoting the Joker now?” I asked in jest. It was actually rather funny. She didn’t even like superhero films.
“That’s not the point. I just don’t feel comfortable with it. And I don’t know what he was thinking, asking me to discuss it with you. You’ve got so much on your plate right now. You don’t need more unnecessary drama.”
“I honestly have nothing on my plate. I’m just at home most days.” She knew I was getting money from Caleb’s life insurance. I was his sole beneficiary. It wasn’t a crazy amount that would last me forever, but it would get me through long enough to figure out what my next move might be. If I’m ever ready for that.
“If you’re bored there you can always come by here in the afternoon,” she said. “The girls would love to see you more. They miss you.”
Now here was the person who knew me too well. She knew the guilt trips I send myself on for no good reason. And using the kids as a motive to get me out of the house so she could look after me a bit more wasn’t beyond her usual level of deception. The kind that can be justified as a sister’s love. I knew she cared. I knew she worried. But the hovering routine simply didn’t work on me. It didn’t help me to heal. It only made me feel even more caged.
“I could come by a little more, I guess,” I mumbled. “To see them.”
“And you can always stay overnight in the extra bedroom upstairs. Alissa and Claire love their sleepovers with friends. I bet they would love it if you spent the night once in a while.”
I didn’t say anything. I just sipped my coffee and acted as though it was a sweet idea without agreeing to anything.
She took a deep breath. Here it was. She was going to ask something else. Maybe the real reason she wanted me to come by. “You could even move in if you wanted. I know Caleb was paying the mortgage on the house. I mean, you were bringing in some money, I’m sure, but Caleb was the breadwinner.”
I sat back in my chair. I should have known that this was coming. She never considered my clients to be real work. Just the musings of a young girl who did some silly psychic readings as a child. Nothing more. Only it was a habit that I should have abandoned once I left high school. Or at least that was what she thought.
“Maddie,” I said with a groan, “I’m not quite that desperate. I’ll get back to seeing my clients more regularly and maybe Lexi will let me work some hours at the cafe like I used to.”
“So that’s the future you want? To be a bartress forever?”
“No, the future I wanted was with Caleb. As a wife and mother!” I snapped. I couldn’t believe she was using this opportunity to talk about my job prospects. “You don’t have to like my life choices, but I expect you to respect them. And I don’t have to make any life altering decisions right now. I don’t want to and I don’t have to.”
She let her thumb graze over the side of her cup, trying to gauge if she had gone too far.
“One minute you say that I shouldn’t help out Officer Parker, and the next you say that working at the cafe is beneath me,” I said. “What do you want from me?”
“For you to be happy,” she said. Her expression told me she meant it. She did want me to be happy. But by doing what? “I don’t think working with the police department with cold cases concerning the dead will be good for you. But I also don’t want you wasting away in a cafe. You could do so many things. Go to college, get a degree, and maybe even travel one day. You and Caleb got married so young. You still have so many opportunities.”
“I’m fine here in Dilton,” I stated, getting up to go over to the coffee pot and pouring myself some more. “And I’m not moving in. I’ll find a way to make the mortgage each month when the time comes and the money starts drying up.
I waited before going to sit back down. I could easily make an excuse and head for the door, but I didn’t. I stayed. That was my first mistake.
“Okay, fine,” she said, conceding too easily. “It’s for the best that you find something that’s meaningful to you, I guess. Officer Parker can handle his own teenage girl murder cases.”
“Teenage girls?” I asked. My second mistake.
“Yeah. Some girl in Sealing was killed a few months ago. I swear when Officer Parker told me about it, I got chills. It’s definitely them. Definitely the vampires by the way he described it. They’re nearby. Or at least they were. I don’t think they caught onto us by any means, but it still made me uneasy.”
“Why do you think it was vampires?” I asked.
“Same old story, but the ones normal humans like Officer Parker can never wrap their heads around. The body was mostly drained of blood, but just enough to keep her heart beating a slow and steady pace toward death. A deep slice to the throat. Since vampires stopped biting a century ago to avoid suspicion they can easily make most of their murders look like a common mugging.”
This time it was my turn to sip my coffee uncomfortably. A murder in Sealing? That was only thirty miles away. And it had a smaller population than Dilton. Mostly old folks no less. Not teenage girls.
“If our kind start helping cops to solve every murder of a pretty teen girl killed by a knife across the country, the vampires will know it’s us,” she said. “And there’s nothing to stop them from coming after you, or me, or my girls.”
“You know I would never let anything happen to your girls,” I said calmly. I felt bad now. I mean, don’t get me wrong. Nothing would convince me to let my sister become a hover parent the way my mom was by moving in, but she also worried the same way any mother would. Her kids were already showing signs of kruxa abilities. Abilities proving that they would continue our kruxa bloodline. Meaning they would always be at risk of revealing what they are. Meaning they would always need to be on their guard. And meaning they would always be sheltered by Madison in the same way our mom sheltered us. They would soon start to have visions at the most random (and often inappropriate) of times. They would be able to sense the emotions of others. They would receive messages from the other side. They would touch objects and people only to learn details they really wish they didn’t know (or maybe that’s just me). They would feel their magic coursing through their veins, begging to be let out and not always able to stop it. And most of all, they would be hunted. If they ever made the slightest mistake it could be the end of all of us. Or so my mother always told me and my sister every time we did something she thought was a bit too risky.
I lifted the cup of coffee back up to my lips only to stop halfway. My eyes must have gone vacant for a moment because before I knew it Madison was staring at me like I had gone pale.
“What is it?” she asked.
“Nothing, not a thing. I just don’t want you to think that I would ever put your girls in danger. I told Officer Parker no and that’s all you need to know. So rest easy.”
She sighed and let the topic die. I let her continue talking about her girls and the plans they had for that weekend. Then I made an excuse and left twenty minutes later. She was a big girl. She could handle being alone for a couple more hours until she had to pick up her daughters
from kindergarten. Or at least that was what I told myself because as soon as I went to the front porch and grabbed my bike, I started cycling in the direction of my house. But only for a block or two. I went down the opposite street and back across because the police station was east of Madison’s house. And my house was west.
Officer Parker let one detail too many slip out of his mouth. And whether or not it was intentional wasn’t exactly clear yet. But I had to find out.
He stated on the phone that one of the murders hadn’t been public knowledge. It didn’t get reported in the media. And then Madison told me that he informed her of how a young woman was murdered. By a blade to the throat but with very little blood remaining at the crime scene. If he knew about the vampires, he had a hell of a reason to keep the case quiet. And if he didn’t know about them, he could never find out. I was the only person who could make sure that he didn’t end up on a trail chasing something he didn’t know could get a ton of people killed.
It’s odd how life turns out sometimes. I told Madison that I wouldn’t help out Officer Parker with his cases. But if he did pursue this girl’s death, it would inevitably bring vampires to Dilton. And that I could not have. I would protect her girls. Just not in the way I had promised her. The only way to prevent Officer Parker from knowing too much was to help him. Or make him believe I was helping him by steering him as far away from the truth as possible.
Chapter 3
The Georgia heat was scorching on my back. I could feel the sun’s rays drilling into my skin, leaving marks that I would inevitably have to put lotion on later that night. But biking was better than driving. Not only did I not want to spend the gas money, but I thought of Caleb’s car wreck every single time I got into a vehicle. The vision I had earlier that god-awful day of him in his car turned completely upside down from rolling several times and his limp body hanging out of the broken side window with his arms over his head was stained on my memory and would never leave it to the day I die. But when I tried calling him that morning after I had the vision, his line was busy. I couldn’t get through to him. Not even his voice mail. Twenty minutes later I got the phone call from the police. There was nothing I could have done.
Witchling Wars Page 2
