I winced. I knew I should, but the thought of seeing her again made my insides curdle with dread. I suddenly realized she hadn’t made any effort to contact me since I’d left. Her apathy stung, but I’d been so preoccupied with my own issues, I’d barely given her a thought, either. What kind of daughter did that make me? A leaden sack of guilt stooped my shoulders. Who was looking out for her now that I was gone? Was she eating? Staying out of trouble?
“Have you… talked to her?” I asked.
Linda shook her head, her face soft with pity. “No, but I saw her at Hinkleman’s the other day. She was with someone — a man. She looked… okay.”
I sighed. Of course. She’d found another boyfriend to take care of her. She didn’t need me.
Linda laid an arm on my shoulder, but the weight of it eased some of my burden instead of adding to it. “She’s not your responsibility, Lexus. She’s a grown woman, and she can take care of herself if she needs to. It’s time for you to worry about yourself now.”
I nodded, too emotional to speak, and decided that, if time allowed, I would stop in to see her. But finding my father was the more important thing.
Half an hour later, the boys and I climbed into the Mustang and headed off for the address Anders had listed for my father. Phoenix was driving, and Griffin had taken the back seat, leaving the front for me, but instead, I climbed in the back and curled up next to him. My nerves were ramping up again, and Griffin caressed me softly and nuzzled my neck, igniting tiny bolts of electricity.
When he lifted his head to look at me, I stared into his crystal grey eyes, moving a lock of dark hair that swooped over his brow. His gaze bored into my soul, revealing every insecurity.
“I don’t know what’s going to happen today, Lexus, and I can’t promise that everything will be okay, but I want you to know that you’re not alone. We’re here for you, and we love you.”
“Thank you, Griffin.” I beamed up at him, and he smiled back with a gorgeous, heart-stopping grin, shaking his head as he chuckled.
“And you look more beautiful than ever, if that’s even possible.”
His mouth came in for a kiss, and I tensed as Phoenix’s eyes caught mine in the rearview mirror, but Phoenix just smiled, and I let myself relax in Griffin’s embrace.
Too soon, Phoenix pulled in to a gravel driveway. I couldn’t believe my father had been less than an hour away from me all this time. The coarse rocks crunching under the tires alerted us that we had arrived. I sucked in a deep breath and looked up at the home in front of us, a modest one-story with tan siding, a row of bushes in front, and an older pickup truck in the open garage.
The hood was up, and a man came out from behind it at the sound of our approach. I gasped as the familiar figure registered in my memory. He was older, but still the same, even down to his faded, black jeans. He scrunched his brow and ran a hand through his long, bronze hair as he stared curiously at the Mustang.
Phoenix parked aways behind the pickup and swung his door open without hesitation. He came around the front of the car and opened the passenger door, his body blocking my father’s view. When he held out a hand to me I took it, my body trembling as I climbed from the back seat. Griffin was right behind me, and they both wrapped an arm through mine in a show of solidarity. Phoenix shut the door and turned, finally revealing my face to my father.
I heard him gasp as we closed the distance between us.
“William Wren?” Phoenix asked, but he needn’t have bothered. I recognized him instantly.
“Lexus?” His voice was shaky, hoarse, weak with uncertainty. I’d changed a lot in the last seven years, even if he hadn’t. “What are you doing here?”
“The real question is, what are you doing here? Shouldn’t you be in prison?” Phoenix glared at him.
My father shifted his gaze from me to Phoenix and back again, then quickly over to Griffin, silently taking in their identical appearance. His eyes dropped to their arms, entwined with mine, and questions brewed in the silence. Electricity crackled between me and the twins. Could my father sense it?
“This is Phoenix, and Griffin,” I nodded my head towards them in turn, “My… Conduits.”
His eyes widened at the term, and he sucked in a breath through flared nostrils.
“So you know what you are.”
“No thanks to you,” Phoenix snarled.
My father scrubbed a hand over his face then pinched his brows as he looked at me. “I was hoping to keep you away from all this, Lexus. That’s why I didn’t come back for you. I thought it would be better that way.”
A gust of wind blew his scent towards me, and the memory of it overwhelmed me. My knees buckled, and the twins simultaneously stiffened their arms to support me.
“How long have you known?”
“Just a few months. I met Griffin and Phoenix, and…” I shrugged, and he nodded.
Griffin spoke up, and my father’s head snapped towards him, concern etched across his face at his words. “A Guardian Ad Litem named Anders Grant found Lexus when our foster parents sought custody of her. He encouraged the three of us to enroll in Magna Virtus Academy.”
My father’s eyes widened at the mention of the school, and Phoenix raised an eyebrow. “You know about it?”
William snorted and nodded. “I guess as long as you know about us, you might as well get the right training.”
“What do you know about Anders Grant?” Griffin asked.
My father shook his head. “Nothing. I’ve stayed away from that world for a long time now.”
“He runs the school. He had a list of Specials with your name and address on it,” Griffin said.
William tilted his head in curiosity. “Someone else ran it last I knew, but like I said…” He shrugged his shoulders.
Griffin pressed him for more information. “Some of the names had codes next to them, things like CO, MIA, and POW. Do those mean anything to you?”
“Not besides the typical meanings — Missing In Action, Prisoner of War. Not sure what CO stands for.” William stuck his hands in his back pockets and tilted his head as he stared at Griffin. “You don’t trust this Anders guy?”
“People are missing, people like us — our parents and a few others. Something hinky is going on, and we’re pretty sure Anders knows more than he’s letting on. We were hoping you could help us.”
William stiffened. “I’m not your guy. I told you, I’m not part of that world anymore, and I have no intention of going back.”
Griffin pursed his lips and narrowed his eyes, and Phoenix scowled. “Did you know our parents, the Eastons?”
William shook his head.
“What about Mark and Lucinda Merritt?” I asked.
He shook his head again. “Look, the Special world is dangerous. The power is addictive, and there’s no telling what someone might do to get more. You need to run at the first sign of trouble, not dive headfirst into it. I wish you’d never found out about it.”
Sometimes I felt the same way, but I couldn’t bring myself to regret the thing that led me to Griffin and Phoenix.
“Lexus, are you… okay?” My father asked, taking a step towards me. I tensed, but stood my ground, letting him come close enough to touch me.
“I am now,” I whispered.
Pain wrinkled his face. “Why…,” he glanced at Griffin, “…were their foster parents trying to get custody of you?”
Phoenix puffed up his chest and leaned in, shoving his face in my father’s. “Because you left her to fend for herself with that lousy excuse of a mother.”
“Jade? She didn’t… take good care of you?”
Phoenix snorted. “Sure, if you think it’s okay for a parent to spend all their money on booze and leave their kid hungry and neglected. If it’s okay to let their boyfriends have their way with her.”
William lifted a hand to his gaping mouth, his eyes tearing. “Oh God, Lexus. I had no idea. She promised to take care of you. That was the arrangement. I sent her mone
y every month.”
“The arrangement?” Phoenix asked.
William sighed and rubbed his face again, burying his head in his hands. When he spoke again, my whole world fell out from under me.
“Jade isn’t your real mother, Lexus.”
I gasped, and my knees gave out from under me. The next thing I knew, I was lying on a rough, tweed couch inside my father’s living room, the twins kneeling beside me. Griffin wiped a cool, damp washcloth across my brow, and my eyes fluttered open. My father sat in a chair on the other side of the room, his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands.
“You okay, Lex?” Phoenix asked, and Griffin put a hand to my back to support me as I tried to sit up. I nodded even though I still felt light-headed.
Griffin jumped up and grabbed a glass of water, holding it out to me. I reached for it and took a few sips, waiting for the world to right itself.
“Where’s my real mother?” I asked when my head stopped spinning.
My father sighed and stared at me for a long moment.
“I don’t know,” he finally answered.
“Tell me about her.”
His eyes stared off in the distance as his mind went back in time, a wistful look on his face. “She was… so much better than me.” He shook his head and smiled. “Renee was a Conduit, and our connection was incredible. From the moment I met her, I knew we were meant to be together. She could wipe someone’s memories. She should’ve wiped mine.”
I gasped, wondering if she’d wiped away any of my memories.
He stood to his feet and started pacing. “But the power went to my head, and after a while, I wasn’t satisfied with a normal life. I wanted more. I wanted to use our powers to get ahead, make a better life for us, especially after you were born. But Renee didn’t want that. She didn’t think it was right to use our powers that way. We fought about it all the time, and I used to threaten her if she didn’t do what I wanted. Eventually, she tried to take you and leave me, but I wouldn’t let her have you. I knew how special you were, even then. I threatened to kill her, and she ran. I never saw her again after that.”
He looked at me with hollow eyes, a broken shell.
“I found Jade soon after. You were still a baby. I needed someone to take care of you, and she needed someone to take care of her. She was young and sexy, and I was rich and powerful. The arrangement worked for both of us. I’d amassed a lot of money, most of it illegally, and she was willing to turn a blind eye to it. We got married, and we were happy. She was a pretty good mother to you when you were little. I really thought she cared for you.” His eyes begged me to understand.
I frowned, trying to remember a time when I thought she might have loved me.
“When I was sentenced, my world blew up on me. I hated myself for what I’d done, what I’d become. I felt so guilty for using you. I knew it would be better for you if I wasn’t around, if you never knew anything about all this. Jade was clueless; she just thought I was a good con artist. I promised to keep the money flowing if she took care of you. And I promised myself I’d stay away from you.”
He stopped his pacing, his body in front of me, and looked down at me with regret and longing.
“I’m not proud of the man I was back then, Lexus. I wasn’t a good person, or a good father. But I’m different now. I walked away from all that the minute I got out of prison, and I haven’t used my powers since. I was only trying to protect you… Can you ever forgive me?”
I stared at him, absorbing the story, and slowly nodded.
He dropped to his knees at my feet and took my hands in his, the calloused skin rough and dry against my tender flesh. He looked up at me, his features so similar to mine, but creased with age and worry, and my heart ached for what might have been. Slowly, his hand lifted and cupped my cheek.
“You’re so beautiful, Lexus. I knew you would be. Just like your mother.” I shook my head. I didn’t know what she looked like, but all I saw in myself was him.
“Do you have a picture of her?” I whispered.
He shook his head sadly.
“How are you doing in school? Do you make good grades? You were always so damn smart. Smarter than me, even when you were little.”
I blushed and dropped my head.
“She’s frickin’ brilliant,” Phoenix muttered, and my father chuckled.
“Do these two goons take good care of you, Lexus?” His face grew serious as he looked at them.
I nodded and reached for them. They squeezed my hands, and my father glanced curiously at us but didn’t ask the question that hovered between us.
“The school’s a good place for you, Lexus. I’m not the kind of person who should be responsible for a kid.”
I wasn’t sure what kind of relationship I wanted from him now, but I was hoping for a better response than that. Did he ever even miss me?
He stood up and grabbed a pen and a scrap of paper. “Here, take my number. Just in case.”
I nodded and took the paper, slipping it in my back pocket.
“We need to go soon, Lexus. Anders will be waiting to pick us up,” Griffin said, offering me an escape. I still had so many questions, but I wasn’t sure my father would give me the answers. I was just discovering this hidden world, while he was trying to escape it.
Did I even want a relationship with him again? He’d dirtied my memory of him with his admissions, but left me with a glimmer of hope for him, too. I believed he was trying to be a better person. Did I want to be part of that journey?
After a moment, I nodded, and the boys and I headed for the door. I could tell he wanted to reach for me, but he didn’t, and I didn’t either, choosing instead to give him an awkward wave and a stiff smile. He stood at the door and watched us as we got in the car and drove away.
18
My stomach rolled like I’d had tacos for breakfast as William Wren’s house disappeared behind us. Meeting Lexus’ father stirred up questions about my own family that I realized I’d been avoiding for years.
How much did they know about our powers? Why hadn’t they ever told us about them? Why had they disappeared? Were they trying to protect us by leaving, or had they been taken against their will?
Every time I’d started to analyze these questions, my mind had always frozen up, afraid of the answers. It was a lot easier just to push it out of my mind, chalk it up as a mystery I’d never be able to solve. But now, I couldn’t stop thinking about it, and the possibilities warred in my mind, attacking all my carefully constructed mental defenses with flaming arrows of self-doubt.
I didn’t want to believe that they’d purposely abandoned us, but if not, that meant something bad had probably happened to them, and I couldn’t bring myself to imagine what. The fact that Anders had them categorized the same as Jaxson’s parents, who were presumably still alive, meant that mine probably were too, and Anders knew something about them. I had to figure out just how much he knew.
I’d stayed up late last night, scouring every file I’d copied from Anders’ computer. I’d needed something to distract me from the sounds coming from my brother’s room, distract me from the feelings of jealousy that threatened to devour me. After watching Lexus and Phoenix pretend to be boyfriend/girlfriend all day, I was already struggling. I thought maybe she’d come spend some time with me since she’d spent so much time with him, but instead, she’d given him the one special thing that, until then, she’d only given me.
Had pretending to be his girlfriend made her realize that was what she really wanted? She’d acted like everything was normal between us this morning, even cuddling with me on the ride to her father’s, but Lexus wasn’t one to divulge her true feelings easily.
I hadn’t found anything else useful in Anders’ files, either, and my self-confidence was in the toilet. I needed something to go my way today.
We made it back to the Lewises’ just a few minutes before Anders was due to arrive, and the three of us went upstairs to pack our stuff. I dawdled in my r
oom for a few extra minutes, straightening the bedding and looking at the posters I had on the wall. I grabbed a few books off my desk and noticed the layer of dust that surrounded the spot where they’d been. I started to swipe the desk clean but stopped when I realized it didn’t matter. It would be dusty again by the time I returned.
I longed for the simple, stable life the Lewises offered us, but my life was never destined to be normal. Even loving Lexus meant embracing a life most people couldn’t accept.
I heard a car pull into the driveway and grabbed my bag, taking one last look at the room before leaving. Dust must’ve gotten in my eyes, because water pooled in the corner, and I quickly wiped it away with my sleeve. Downstairs, Lexus was wrapped in Linda’s arms, and Becca was hanging on Phoenix’s leg.
Linda let go of Lexus then reached out her arms to me. I went into her arms willingly and let her soft body and unconditional love envelop me, if only for a moment.
Afterwards, Stan patted me on the back before wrapping his arms around my shoulders. “There’s always a place for you here, Son. I hope you know that.”
I nodded, unable to squeeze words past the lump in my throat.
Finally, I knelt down in front of Becca. She curled her skinny arms over my shoulders. “I hope you had a good birthday, kiddo. I’m glad I could be here for it. I’m sure gonna miss you.”
She frowned at my sad tone. “Don’t worry, Griffin. Thanksgiving is next month. You’re coming home for that, right?”
I really wanted that to be true, but for some reason, I doubted it. I felt like my world was balanced precariously on an invisible scaffold of deception, and my attempts to reveal the truth were destined to bring everything crashing down around me. “That’s the plan,” I said carefully, trying to avoid making a promise I wasn’t sure I could keep.
Anders rang the bell, and we headed out to the SUV. “Why don’t you sit in back with Lexus?” I told Phoenix, who looked at me strange but didn’t care enough to question it. They cuddled up together like she and I had on the way to her father’s, and I tamped down my feelings of jealousy. I had something else to focus on at the moment. I needed to get Anders talking.
Taking Flight (Teen Paranormal Romance Series) (The Caged Series Book 3) Page 10
