Siren's Song

by Heather McCollum

  The door flies open, making me start. Matt and Taylin run in. Matt slams the door. His fingers rake through his hair. “Wooo!” he yells and slaps his thighs like he’s just thrown a touchdown pass.

  Taylin slams into a seat, breathing heavily. Her smile makes my stomach lower back down into its normal bodily position. “We did it,” she says, her voice lowered as she glances through the plexiglass separating us from the boxes on either side of us.

  “You cut the wires?” I whisper.

  “Two of them,” Matt says. “Luke took out the third.”

  Taylin walks back to Matt so we’re away from any possible eavesdroppers. “There was a guard by the Versus van. But we saw Luke creeping around in the dark. He motioned to us and we gave him a diversion.”

  “A diversion?”

  Taylin grins. “I screamed like a banshee and Matt acted like he was attacking me.”

  “But when the guard came over,” Matt continues, “we just acted like I was tickling her. While he lectured us on not hanging around the parking lot, Luke took out the third satellite.”

  “Ripped it right off the top of the van,” Taylin says. “Then he took off.”

  “How?”

  Taylin’s smile fades. “He had to go on foot or it would have called attention to him.”

  “So…there is no way he got six miles away before I started singing.”

  Taylin’s lips purse tight and Matt shakes his head.

  “Then, where is he?” I ask and glance out into the crowds cheering for the Blizzards, who just won the face-off. Several pairs of uniformed police walk up and down the aisles. “Look.”

  “Is it Luke?” Matt asks from behind.

  “Cops,” Taylin says and sinks into a chair. “I bet they’re looking for us. They didn’t see Luke at all.”

  “Just stay in here,” I suggest. I head for the door.

  “Where are you going?” Matt asks.

  I toss him another soda from the mini fridge. “Act casual. I’m going to look for Luke.”

  “Jule,” Taylin warns, “he might not be completely back to normal.”

  “I’ll just walk around a bit. See if he’s in the building. Maybe I can find out who the cops are looking for.” Truth is, I can’t just sit in this little room wondering what’s going on. My adrenaline is pumping too hard. I need to walk some of it off. I need to see Luke.

  I circle the loop of vendors. The police seem to be asking generic questions to see if anyone saw anything outside. I only hear one asking about a goth girl and a big guy. I’m about to check back at the box to see if Luke returned when I catch a movement outside the stadium doors. I check my back pocket to make sure I have my ticket to get back in. There’s a policeman by the door. Maybe if I act like I have a mission in mind he won’t stop me. I stride up to the door to push through.

  “Are you leaving for the night?” he asks.

  “Uh, no, just have to get something from my car.” I flash him my ticket. “I can get back in with this, right?”

  “What are you getting?”

  I stare at the young officer and wonder if he’s being overly suspicious because of the vans, or if he’s just bored and figures he’ll harass me.

  “A tampon, so I’m kind of in a hurry.” I stare back into his eyes even as I feel my face flame. God, have I ever said “tampon” to a guy before? First singing in front of thousands of people, and now talking about feminine hygiene products to a man. I barely recognize myself.

  “Okay,” he says. “Hurry back. And you’ll have to come back in through the south entrance.” He points to the right.

  “South, got it.” I push out into the dark, cool night. The cop watches me, so I stride out into the parking lot until I think he can’t track me anymore.

  As my eyes adjust to the shadows beyond the bright lamps beaming down, I scan the mosaic of cars, trucks, and vans. I find Taylin’s car and lean against the discolored side panel. “Where are you?” I say aloud to myself.

  “Jule.”

  I gasp and twist. Luke stands on the other side of the car. I start to come around, but he holds up a hand, palm out, the universal stop sign. His perfect features catch the white reflection of the autumn moon. Shadows emphasize the hard lines of his face, his clenched jaw, before he glances down, his head dropping between his shoulders. He grasps the roof of Taylin’s car. He’s breathing hard, like he’s been running.

  “Are you okay?” I ask.

  “No.” He looks up. His eyes burn with an internal light that backs up his clipped warning.

  “Can I—”

  He breathes heavily. I wonder if the car roof will be ripped off when it’s time to drive home. “Go. Back. Inside.”

  “You didn’t eat the cookies?”

  A deep growl comes from him.

  I turn without any further questions and start walking. Goosebumps that have nothing to do with the crisp breeze speckle my arms. “Nooo…” he calls out. The sound is the sorrow-engulfed wail of the tortured. Will my death stop it? I fling the thought away from me like a live grenade. I take another step and hear his breath catch. “You,” he says in a deep, wavering voice, “need to run.”

  I see the door I exited, and way to the left is the south entrance. The growl behind me forces the decision and I sprint toward the closest door. The cop will have to let me in if I’m pounding on it. I dodge cars, graze mirrors, tripping over those stupid cement barriers between rows. My legs pump, feet skidding on the loose pebbles. My arms and hands catch me, keeping me on course through the slalom of cars. I try to concentrate on the crunch and pounding of my sneakers against the blacktop, and not the smash of Luke’s body as he plows through obstacles behind me. The door’s ahead, lit like a glowing beacon, but no one stands at it anymore. Is it locked?

  My knees and thighs strain to extend my stride, but I know. As I huff in and out, dodge and swing around hoods and tailgates, I know that Luke is faster, even without the curse adding to his strength.

  “Go, Jule!” he yells from behind, but he’s close, too close. There’s no way. I veer off toward the dark shadows of a loading dock without allowing my conscious thought to take over. I can’t outrun him. And I won’t lead him to where a crowd can witness his insanity. I throw myself against the cinderblock wall. My chest hurts as I drag in breath after breath. He’s there before I can take two.

  The light of the moon slashes down. I watch his sculpted chest heave through his T-shirt as he stands before me. With the last amount of courage I possess I look up into his eyes. They burn. Light from within swirls in the darkness, like hot oil.

  “You won’t hurt me, Luke.” I swallow hard as I gulp air. “You love me.” God, is that the wrong thing to say? Will it fuel the demon trying to control him? What do I do? There’s no fighting his strength, no escape. We stand on the precipice. My shallow breaths mark the passage of seconds.

  “You won’t hurt me.” I take a step closer so that I’m mere inches away, showing him that I trust him. I breathe him in, and I realize that I do. I do trust him. Somehow. We are cornered in this dark hole, away from any rescue. But I know Luke is in there and regardless if this is the end or the beginning, I surrender to the stronger emotion. Beyond scared and resistant, beyond worry and denial.

  Luke’s breath feathers across my forehead. “You’re stronger than the curse,” I say with renewed calm. I tilt my head up to him in the dark. The only thing I have left is the truth. Will it mean the end, the end of the curse, the end of me? “I love you,” I whisper.

  16

  “You know that when I hate you, it is because I love you to a point of passion that unhinges my soul.”

  ~Julie de Lespinasse

  Luke steps into me, his body forcing me back against the wall and into the darkest shadows. Before I can say anything more he grabs the sides of my head, tilting it. I don’t resist. His lips descend onto mine with ferocious intensity. The hands holding me captive rake through my hair as his kiss consumes me. My legs wobble, but his
strength holds us both up. He shifts, and his body smashes against mine pushing me into the cinderblock wall at my back. I steal a breath against his mouth, but his lips continue to devour me. Still numb, I surrender to it.

  His hands slope down my neck to rub down the skin of my arms. I am sandwiched between the wall and his hard body. Sensations soak into me with every touch, burning a path into my very center, and then igniting me from the inside out. I lose track of the wall at my back and the ground beneath my feet. I feel only Luke, smell only Luke, taste only Luke.

  My heart beats a fierce tempo, the sparking heat surging within me like an electric symphony. He presses his lips along my jaw, my neck, my mouth. Hot bubbles of joy fill my revved body as I pour my own fierce response back into him. Tears press against my closed eyes.

  His lips move back to my jaw, kissing a path of passion toward my ear. “I hear it, feel it,” he rasps, his warm breath against my skin. I haven’t said anything out loud. “The passion sings to me.”

  I pant and feel his hands bite into my upper arms. I gasp softly. My eyes blink open to meet his smoldering gaze. Pain and passion mix in his features and I know they reflect my own.

  Luke’s hands open to slap against the wall at my back. With his release, I sag against the cinder block, waiting, breathing so fast stars begin to dance in the darkness that still shrouds us. Crack! The block next to me shatters. Concrete rains to the ground as Luke leaps backwards across the space to the rear of the black alcove.

  “Go!” he yells. He grabs what looks like a length of chain hooked into a loop of steel cemented into the loading dock. I watch as he coils the heavy links around his arms, moonlight glinting off the metal. “Go, Jule,” he growls.

  I shove away from the wall and walk briskly toward the south entrance. I hear the chain rattle and a series of curses in English, French, and some other languages. My numb legs stretch out before me and I jog the rest of the way to the lights and crowds of cheering fans.

  They scan my ticket again and I move like a stunned fish floating in the current of red. Laughing, high-fiving fans jostle around me. Beer dots my sneakers. I veer around the line stretching out of the ladies room and find the luxury box door. It’s locked.

  I stare at the artificial wood grain and release a long breath, careful not to pass the air along my vocal cords. Softly I lean my forehead against the cool door, letting my heart find its natural rhythm. I flatten my hand, about to slap hard on the door.

  “Jule! What the hell?”

  I jump and twist around to press back against the door. Eric Ashe looms over me, scowl in place. His gaze scans up and down my body, and I wonder if my clothes are still on. I’m pretty sure someone would have said something if I’d walked in topless, but I look anyway. Rumpled, but yes, on. Eric grabs my arm, lifting and turning it until the pale underside is fully exposed.

  “That bastard did this to you,” he hisses and I try to yank my arm back, but he’s too strong.

  “Let go of me,” I demand.

  “Where is he?”

  “Not here, so leave. Now.”

  Eric moves closer, finally releasing my arm. His gaze roams my features, and I watch as the hard planes of his face tense into stone. “Luke Whitmore is trouble, Jule.” He raises his thumb up as if to touch my face, but I turn away.

  “It’s none of your business, Eric.”

  “Yes, it is.”

  “What are you doing here, anyway? Are you following me?”

  He blinks. Isn’t that an indicator that someone’s planning to lie? “I saw you on TV about to sing. Then we lost the channel. I wanted to make sure you were safe.” His lips pull thin, tight. “Apparently, you were not.”

  “I’m fine. Go home.” I try to see around his large frame, but he’s blocking me. Where are those nosy cops now? Although if I look as bad as Eric’s expression indicates, they might start asking questions, too.

  “I’m taking you home.”

  Yeah, right! A surge of panic squeezes through my already tensed body. “Uh…no, you’re not.” Someone will stop us if he throws me over his shoulder, kicking and screaming, right?

  He shakes his head as if thinking the same thing. His eyes dart left to right, as if trying to find a secluded place to abduct me. “Sorry, Eric, I have to get back to the game.” I knock loudly on the door behind me. “A little help here,” I yell toward the door just as Eric grabs my wrist. But before he can drag me off, the door yanks open. Matt jumps out while Taylin grabs my other arm. I ignore the soreness as she pulls. For a few seconds, I become the rope in a tug of war.

  A few people slow down near us, eyes suspicious. Eric suddenly changes direction, and I nearly fall into the luxury box as both he and Taylin pull me inside. Matt follows, slamming the door.

  “What are you doing here?” Taylin hisses. We might be in a box with a door, but the front is open to the crowds. She glances at me and her black-lined eyes open wider.

  “I’m taking Jule home,” Eric growls.

  “No, you’re not,” Matt responds calmly.

  Eric throws his hand out toward me. “Look at her! Luke did that to her.”

  I cross my arms around me. Matt’s eyes widen. “Are you okay?”

  I nod.

  “Shit,” Taylin curses.

  “We’ll take care of her,” Matt says.

  Take care of me? Do I look that bad?

  “The hell you will,” Eric insists and reaches for me. Matt grips Eric’s arm. Matt’s a big guy, but so is Eric. If this was a back alley, switchblades would be snapping open.

  I back into the wall, letting it support me. Matt twists Eric’s hand up and Taylin gasps.

  “Oh my God, Mathias,” she whispers. I follow her line of sight to Eric’s hand. His ring stands out on his finger, a shield over a dragonfly just like on the book in his car. Taylin steps back with me against the wall.

  She is frozen. Fear changes her face to that of a frightened kid, despite the heavy goth makeup. I’ve never seen her like this. The sight sends chills along my already brittle spine.

  Matt curses in some other language. “You’re a guardian.” He hisses the title like it is a curse itself.

  Taylin is actually trembling. “Leave here! Now!” Her voice is still strong, even if she’s letting the wall hold her up.

  An abrupt knocking hits the outside of the door. “Open up! What’s going on in there?” It sounds like the cop from the door. Someone must have alerted the police about the hostile tug of war.

  Eric stares at me even though he addresses Matt and Taylin. “If anything happens to her, I will hunt you all down and kill you.” His eyes flick up to Matt. “Slowly.” My tongue dries to the roof of my mouth and I can’t swallow, can’t breathe. Eric’s words are no idle threat. They are an oath.

  With that, Eric turns. Matt lets him walk away. Eric flings the door open. “Just making sure my sister calls home. Had my parents worried.” He shakes his head. The cop from the door pokes his head in. I finger-brush the hair around my face.

  “Everything okay in here?”

  “Yeah. He was just worried,” Matt says casually with a shrug. “A bit overprotective.”

  The cop peers a little closer at me. “You okay, miss?”

  “Yep.” I force my face into something of a relaxed smile. It’s apparently sufficient. He nods and looks closer at Matt. He points a stubby finger between Taylin and him.

  “Where were you two,” his gaze goes to Taylin, “during the national anthems?”

  “With me,” I say. “I couldn’t have sung without my friends backing me up.”

  “Hmmm…” The cop’s eyes narrow in suspicion, but he finally nods. “No more trouble tonight,” he warns.

  “Yes, sir,” Matt says with just the right amount of respect, and the policeman turns to talk to Eric as they leave the room.

  Taylin’s legs give out and she slides along the wall to the floor. Matt locks the door and comes over to her. The floor suddenly looks very comfortable. I slide dow
n, too. Taylin’s head is against her knees. Matt lays his hand over it and strokes her hair.

  “It’s going to be okay, Tay.”

  She shakes her head across the ridge of her knees. “He’s a bloody guardian.”

  “A guardian?” I ask quietly, not really sure if I want to know what horror reduces the toughest girl I’ve ever met into a trembling mess. “What exactly is that?”

  Taylin lifts her eyes to mine. “Our executioner.”

  Matt squeezes Taylin’s knee. “Maximillian’s guards.”

  “One of the men who helped Maximillian?” I ask incredulously. “Eric’s not two hundred years old.”

  “He’s not an original,” Matt answers. “But he’s probably a descendant. Through our lifetimes we’ve run into only one other, a woman. When we all came together, she tried to befriend Taylin. She revealed a lot to Taylin when she was about to kill her.”

  “Kill her?”

  Taylin pushes herself up and pulls toilet paper from the small bathroom. She blows her nose, then crosses her arms over her chest. Instead of the usual tough-looking barrier, it looks more like she’s hugging herself. “She knew the rest would then die soon after, because of our link. And she wasn’t taking a chance that a Siren might show up. If one did, one of us might kill him or her and be free of the spell. But Mathias and Lucas got to me first.”

  “What…” I stop. I don’t want to know what happened to the guardian. “What did she say?”

  “There’s a secret society of guardians,” Matt answers. “They are descendants of the original four that witnessed the curse and then killed us the first time. Maximillian made them swear to protect his daughter and her children and all their blood. If Maximillian’s bloodline ends, then so will the curse for all three of us. So they banded together and recruited more to guard Maximillian’s family, watch for our resurrection and make sure none of us finds a Siren to escape the hell Maximillian created for us.”