Wake for Me (Life or Death Series)

by Irons, Isobel

  Sam knew his mom was silently berating him in her own way—not for letting a half-naked girl take over her kitchen, or for going full-monty on one of her school teacher friends, but for keeping his charming new girlfriend hidden away from her. Because, from the way Viola made it sound, they’d been dating for more than twenty-four hours.

  It was a classic misdirect, which Sam was beginning to suspect was one of Viola’s favorite and most powerful weapons. Somehow, she managed to come out of almost any situation smelling like a rose. Metaphorically speaking.

  Confident now that Viola could hold her own, Sam excused himself to get dressed. Which he did, as quickly as he’d ever done anything in his entire life. When he came back out of his room—fully clothed now, including shoes—he found Viola sitting at the dining room table, ankles primly crossed, with a cloth napkin in her lap. She and his mother were having tea. Tea, for Christ’s sake.

  Shaking his head at the mysterious ways of women, Sam cleared his throat.

  “Oh, sit down, Sammy,” his mom said, gesturing casually to one of the empty chairs.

  He knew he probably shouldn’t ask, but…. “What happened to Caroline?”

  His mother shot him a disapproving look, while Viola delicately cleared her throat and hid a tiny, evil smile behind her tea cup.

  “She remembered that she had an urgent appointment.”

  “Right.” Sam shook his head. Well, at least that solved the problem of his mom trying to set him up with anyone she personally knew, ever again. After only two dates with Caroline, Sam had caught his mother looking at wedding invitations online. Though he felt a little bad that Caroline had found out the hard way that there would be no first kiss or third date for them, secretly the whole situation was feeling more and more like a blessing in disguise. “Well, please apologize to her for me, the next time you see her.”

  Viola shot him a warning look. “Sam, your mom was just telling me the funniest story about how they got to Connecticut and realized that their timeshare was full of Swedish ski instructors. Why don’t you ask her about it, while I go change?”

  “Oh, relax,” his mom said. “You’re fine just the way you are, sweetheart. From the smell of the kitchen, it’s obvious that you slaved over a very nice dinner for the two of you. I almost feel like I’m the one intruding.” She looked at Sam pointedly. “Maybe I’ll take myself out to a movie.”

  “Oh no, Mrs. Philips. We wouldn’t dream of kicking you out of your own house.” Viola stood up, smiling brightly, and walked into the kitchen. “You have to eat with us. I made coq au vin and chocolate soufflé.”

  “Please, call me Barbara,” his mom said, looking seriously impressed.

  At that moment, Sam had the strongest impulse to fall to his knees and beg Viola to marry him, right then and there. But he stifled it, because his mom probably would’ve taken him at his word and run out the door in search of a justice of the peace, before Viola could say no.

  Still, a small part of him couldn’t help wondering: what if he was wrong about her? What if she actually said yes?

  CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

  “No one who, like me, conjures up the most evil of those half-tamed demons that inhabit the human breast, and seeks to wrestle with them, can expect to come through the struggle unscathed.” –Sigmund Freud

  “Tell me about your mother.”

  Viola raised her head a few inches off the pillow, just enough to give Sam a face-melting glare of warning. “Are you serious? I thought I was done with that kind of crap when I busted out of Psych.”

  Instead of withering back in fear, Sam just tightened his arms around her, bringing her closer to his body.

  “I’m sorry, I didn’t mean for that to sound so clinical. What I meant was, you just spent the evening making my mom fall in love with you, and I barely even met yours. I was just wondering what she was like.” He paused, smoothing his hand over her hair. “But if it’s too painful to talk about, that’s okay. We can talk about something else.”

  “Sam, I’m tired.”

  Burying her head in the hollow between Sam’s shoulder and his neck—which was quickly becoming her new favorite place in the world—Viola tried to figure out why she felt so uncomfortable talking about that particular subject. Strangely, it wasn’t because it was too painful. Or if it was, it wasn’t because her mother was dead.

  After a few seconds, she turned her head to the side, just enough to breathe.

  “My relationship with my mother is very—I mean was—very complicated. She was a good person, but we just weren’t that much alike. The only thing we ever really had in common was shopping. And we used to have the same nose, but…” she hovered on the edge of telling him about her plastic surgery, but then decided against it. He already knew way too many of her flaws. “I grew out of it. Now, most people say I favor my father.”

  Sam didn’t seem to notice the evasion—he was too busy tracing her spine with his fingers. It felt deliciously good, and Viola didn’t want him to stop. Maybe that was why, against her nature, she continued sharing.

  “My parents met in Boston,” she said. “My father was a traveling salesman at the time—or at least, that’s what he liked to tell people. In reality, he was working as a wine rep for my grandfather’s vineyard in Bellemonte, France. He was trying to secure new distribution deals with some of the four-star restaurants in the area.”

  Viola wrinkled her nose, skipping the part of the story she hated the most. The fact that Jacques had been traveling with her father, that he’d been the one to introduce him to her mother for the first time. It made his betrayal of their family feel that much more disgusting.

  “My mother’s maiden name was Argyle,” she continued, mimicking Brady’s Dr. Bel-Air voice. “Of the Boston Argyles. Basically, she had a really big trust fund, and she wasn’t really interested in much of anything. But when she met my father, she said he was everything she’d never known she always wanted. She would’ve followed him anywhere.” Viola smiled sadly. “But then, everyone felt that way about him. He just kind of…inspired devotion, you know?”

  Sam nodded slightly. “I can imagine.”

  “Anyway, after they got married and moved to France, my mother’s money ended up funding the creation of Bellerose Co. Before, it had been a small family vineyard with limited production. Now, we have five vineyards all over the world, and we’re the second largest distributor in the United States. My father used to say that he’d always dreamt of expanding his family’s legacy, but it wasn’t until he met my mother that his dream grew wings.”

  “Wow.”

  “Yeah, I know,” Viola said, interpreting his tone. “He was so French.”

  Hooking a finger under her chin, Sam brought her face up to meet his. The look in his eyes was sad.

  “You don’t have to joke,” he told her. “It’s okay to miss them.”

  “I know.” Kissing Sam quickly on the lips, she burrowed back down. It made her so antsy when he saw through her like that. “But missing them won’t bring them back, will it?”

  “No, it won’t.” He kissed her on the top of her head, pulling the blankets up to cover her bare shoulders. “But it’s normal to wish it would.”

  Normal. For a brief moment, Viola considered telling him the truth. About how, earlier that day at the pool, when he’d asked her what she wanted, the first thing that had popped into her mind was answers. The second was revenge.

  Based on everything he’d told her about his brother, Ben, and how he’d spent all those years at school, searching medical textbooks for answers, she thought he might understand her reluctance to accept the ‘official’ version of what had happened.

  But he would never understand her need to find someone to blame, and to punish that person. Because unlike her, deep down, Sam was a good person. His tragedy had led him toward a path of redemption, instead of revenge. And no matter how much Viola wished she could be that forgiving, or that evolved, it just wasn’t who she was.

&n
bsp; ***

  I’m so cold.

  Colorless vines stretch ahead of me, seeming to go on for miles. I kneel in the snow, digging for something between the rows. Thorns tear at my hands.

  The grapes are dead. The flowers are dead. Everything is dead.

  Above me, I can hear the sounds of birds screeching. Hungry. Starving. Soon, they’ll start to die. Then they’ll start to fall.

  I dig faster, ignoring the blood that covers my hands as I finally reach the deep brown earth beneath the snow. There’s a face beneath that dirt. A body. It’s someone I love, but I don’t know who. I need to find out, desperately, before the dream changes.

  In front of me, I see a pair of feet. Expensive shoes. I look up, and my father is standing in front of me. But he’s not my father, not the way I remember him. He’s thin now, pale. Starving.

  “Ce n’était pas mon coeur.” It wasn’t my heart.

  My eyes fall to his chest. There’s a gaping hole where my father’s heart should be.

  “No….” I shake my head at him. “No, it isn’t possible.”

  The world fades away.

  I’m standing in a wooded clearing. It’s dark all around, but a light winks at me through the trees. It seems to beckon to me, telling me that if I can just reach it, I’ll be safe.

  But this time, I’m not so easily fooled.

  I know these woods, and I know the little stone cottage that rests in the middle. There’s something waiting for me inside, something shattered and locked up in a closet. If only I can get to it, I’ll be whole again.

  I don’t walk toward the cabin. I don’t have to. I’m always inside, standing on the threshold, before I can even blink.

  “Hai aspettato troppo a lungo, Viola,” the old woman tells me. “La zuppa è fredda.”

  You’ve dawdled, Viola. The soup is cold.

  “Che cosa e nella minestra?” I ask her, for the first time, in Italian. What’s in the soup?

  She smiles, beckoning me closer. I stand in front of the hearth, reaching to grab the fireplace poker with my far hand. The pot is full of wine. No, not wine, I realize. Blood.

  “Is my father’s heart in there?” I turn to see that her face is starting to melt away. She’s becoming someone else. Someone with bushy, caterpillar eyebrows and a white coat. At my question, the witch turns and tries to run away, but I won’t let her go.

  I run after her, tangling my fingers in her coat as I stab her with the poker, over and over. Blood runs across the floor, staining my feet. But it smells like wine. Wine, and something else. Something bitter. Burned cedar and spices.

  As the witch’s remains melt away, there’s a howling outside the door.

  It’s now or never, I realize. I’ve never fought back before. But now that I have, I realize that this is what was supposed to happen all along. This is what the monster was waiting for.

  Before the monster can come inside, I run to the closet with the thick wooden door. The lock is covered in ice. It burns my hands, but I crush it with the force of my anger. The door swings open, and I’m inside the dark room. There’s a pool of yellow light. A bed. My father’s body. A man stands in front of it, with his back to me. I think it might be Sam.

  I run to him, screaming at him to help me. The monster is breaking through the door. Another minute, and he’ll burst in to devour me.

  But when the man turns around, it isn’t Sam. It’s Dr. Chakrabarti.

  His hands are covered in my father’s blood. He smiles, and his mouth is full of sharp teeth, like a wolf’s.

  “You shouldn’t be here,” he says, and his face changes, until I’m staring at Uncle Jack.

  I know now, with absolute certainty, that this isn’t a dream or a delusion. It’s a warning.

  Everyone—including me—wants me to believe that I’ll be safe, as long as I stay with Sam. As long as I forget about my parents, and the life I should’ve had. But I know now that I’ll never be safe, even if I keep forgetting who I was and what I know. I’ll never be safe, until it’s over. And it won’t be over, until I end it.

  Because he’s still coming for me.

  ***

  Viola woke up slowly, quietly.

  Although her hands were still shaking from the intensity of the dream, she managed to carefully disengage herself from the warmth of Sam’s arms, without waking him. Quietly, she dressed in the clothes she’d laid out to wear to her lunch date with his mother the next day. Grabbing Sam’s keys off the dresser, she silently left the room.

  As she started Sam’s car and slowly backed out of the driveway, the voices in her head seemed to scream at her with a new urgency: Hurry, go now. Don’t wait. Don’t lose your nerve. Don’t let yourself be lulled into a false sense of security. Not again.

  She still might be going crazy. Some part of Viola knew that. But another part—the stronger part, the part that was her father’s daughter—told her to trust her mind, because it was the only thing protecting her from the whims of her treacherous heart. Since the day she’d first woken up, her heart had been distracted by Sam. Meanwhile, all the while, her mind had been trying to tell her she had missed something. Something important.

  Just close your eyes, and everything will be fine….

  It wasn’t my heart….

  You shouldn’t be here.

  Pulling onto the main road, Viola turned Sam’s car toward the city, and put the pedal to the floor.

  CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHT

  “Dogs love their friends and bite their enemies, quite unlike people, who are incapable of pure love and always have to mix love and hate.” –Sigmund Freud

  Sam woke up feeling colder than he should.

  Breathing shallowly in the strange silence, it took him several heartbeats to realize what was missing: Viola. She was gone.

  Don’t panic, he told himself. But it was too late—he was already panicking.

  After searching the house, he realized why it was so quiet. Not only was Viola gone, but his mom had already left for work. It was still mostly dark outside, but the clock read 6:00 AM. Was it possible that Viola had gone out with his mother? Maybe they’d decided to do a very early breakfast, instead of lunch? That seemed a little too bizarre to believe, even for how crazy his life had been lately.

  Padding through the living room, Sam looked out the front window: his car was missing.

  Any chance of him remaining calm, of not panicking, went out the window right then. Grabbing the phone off the kitchen counter, Sam dialed Viola’s new cell phone number. Heart in his throat, he listened as the ringtone died almost instantly, giving way to an automated message. Okay, so Viola had turned off her phone, but maybe she hadn’t gone far.

  But then, his darker imagination kicked in. What if he waited? What if, as always, he erred on the side of caution? She could be halfway to the airport by now, or halfway to anywhere else. It would be too late.

  That realization clinched it—Sam was done playing it safe. For good.

  Pulling on his sweats, he flat-out ran to the middle school three miles away. His mom’s car was parked in the lot, right in front. She must’ve needed to come in early for some reason, because the school buses hadn’t even started to arrive yet. Without stopping, Sam ran into the building and down the hallway, toward the teachers’ lounge. The lockers and classrooms he passed were familiar, but miniaturized, like a weird dream.

  When he pushed open the door, he found himself face to face with half a dozen startled school teachers—including Caroline. Awesome.

  “Mom,” he panted, gesturing to his mother, who was apparently in the middle of a department meeting. “I need to talk to you for a second.”

  After a muttered apology to the others, his mom followed him out into the hall.

  “I hope there’s a good reason for this,” she said, after the door had closed behind her. “I already had a hell of a time convincing Caroline that my son wasn’t some kind of reprobate player. Now you show up looking like you’re on the lam or something.”r />
  “I’m sorry,” he told her, and he meant it. “I don’t have time to explain. Viola took my car, and I need to borrow yours.”

  Instantly, his mom’s expression turned from concerned to reproachful. “What did you do?”

  “Nothing,” he shook his head. “At least, nothing that I know of. I just can’t shake the feeling that she’s about to do something dangerous.”

  “Dangerous, how?”

  “It’s complicated,” he hedged, not wanting to go into Viola’s stay in the psych ward, and not knowing where to start with her complex family drama. “I’m just worried.”

  After staring at him for a few seconds, his mom reached into her purse and handed over her car keys. Sam took them and thanked her, planning on racing off to wherever he could think of to look first. If he had to make an educated guess, she was probably on her way to a lawyer’s office, but maybe she was on her way to buy a gun instead, to mow down her untrustworthy uncle. Because her pre-daylight disappearing act hadn’t included a note or any kind of warning, anything seemed like a possibility. His mom stopped him with a hand on his elbow.

  “Son, before you go, there’s something you should know.”

  “Yeah?” He quailed under her English-teacher glare. “I mean, yes?”

  “I’ve taught hundreds of young women in my career. After a while, you start to realize that there are some girls that just have something about them, something that sets them apart from the others. As a teacher, you hope they’ll use their talents for good. But that’s not always the case.”

  “Okay….” Sam waited for her to continue.

  “Those girls, they don’t see the world as a place to fit themselves into. They see it as a place that can be made to fit them. That makes them a powerful force, either for good or bad, depending on what they decide they want to be.”

  “Alright,” Sam nodded. “But what does that mean? What should I do?”

  His mom smiled. “Honestly? If you knew what was good for you, you’d stay out of her way until she figures herself out.”