“I don’t care about the hand or whose turn it is right now. You wanted us to share and get to know each other better, so I’m sharing.” Tony nodded, and Alex looked up at me with pain in his eyes.
“I watched you eat mac and cheese at every meal, trying to get her attention, but she wouldn’t give you the time of day. And when it came down to choosing sides in the end, your own father put a knife in your chest.”
“Is this supposed to make me feel better?” Alex asked.
“I’m sorry. I’m trying to tell you you didn’t deserve that. You didn’t deserve any of it.”
“So your big secret is that you feel sorry for Alex?” Chase asked.
“No!” That was the last thing I wanted Alex to think. That I was with him out of pity. “My big secret shouldn’t be a secret at all. My big secret is that I think Alex is the greatest Ophi I’ve ever met, and I wish his own parents could’ve seen him for who he really is.”
I sat back down, worried that my outburst had only hurt Alex. I hadn’t meant to go off like that, but I couldn’t handle listening to Randy forgive Victoria for what she’d done.
Alex stood up. “I’m going to call it a night. See you all in the morning.”
“Alex,” I said.
“In the morning, Jodi.” He walked away, leaving me staring after him.
Chase got up and sighed. “Well, if Alex gets out of sharing, I’m going to bed, too.”
“I think it’s best if we all turn in for the night,” Tony said.
I turned to him. “Sorry. It was a nice idea to get to know each other better.”
He nodded and picked up the severed hand. I followed him up the stairs and said goodnight when I reached my floor. I saw Chase walking down the hall to his room, and I ran after him. It wasn’t too late to get the answers I was looking for.
“How did you do it?” I called after him.
Chase stopped and turned around. “Do what?”
“Mason was dead set against coming. How did you change his mind in a matter of minutes?” I stopped dangerously close to him. Something told me Chase wouldn’t be willing to shout the answer or risk anyone overhearing us. I had to be close enough for him to whisper.
He leaned into me. “Chase Baxter charm, I guess. You know all about that.” He inched closer until our faces were almost touching. I tried to turn away, but I couldn’t. Being this close to Chase was making my blood go crazy. My arms tingled with the desire to touch him. My brain told me to stop him, but I stayed frozen as he leaned in to kiss me.
Alex’s bedroom door swung open. “What’s going on?”
Chapter 8
“Alex!” I jumped, breaking free from my trance. “What are you doing?”
“I was coming to talk to you.” He looked back and forth between Chase and me. “The question is what are you doing? Because it sure looked like you were going to let this creep kiss you.”
I backed away from Chase and shook my head. “No! I wasn’t. I mean, he wasn’t.”
“Oh, I was.” Chase smiled at me.
“Jodi, go to your room. I don’t think you’re going to want to see this.”
“Go to my room?” I shook my head. “Alex, you can’t send me to my room.”
“Fine. Please, go to your room. I’d rather you didn’t see me kick this guy’s ass.”
Chase laughed. “Jodi, stay. This should be funny to watch.”
Alex lunged at Chase, but I stepped between them, putting my hands on Alex’s chest. “Enough.” I leaned into Alex, hoping my touch would have some sort of calming effect on him. “He didn’t do anything. He only made a stupid comment to get a reaction from you. Let it go. You’re better than that.”
Alex backed off slightly, but not much.
I reached up and kissed him softly on his lips. “Let it go.”
Alex wrapped his arms around me, kissing me harder. He pulled me through the open door and into his bedroom. The second we were both inside, he slammed the door on Chase, locking it tight.
“What are you doing?” I asked, breathing heavily.
He shrugged. “Nothing.”
“Nothing? Oh, really? So, you didn’t pull me in here because you wanted Chase to think we’re…” I couldn’t say the words. I really liked Alex—loved him—but well, our relationship hadn’t exactly reached the level of spending the night in each other’s rooms.
“Let him think what he wants.” Alex moved closer and kissed me again. The kiss was so passionate, my head spun. My body tingled. No wait. Not my body. My blood. My blood was mixing. Why was kissing Alex making me use my powers? I tried to control it, tried to calm my blood, but something was wrong. I pushed my hands against Alex’s chest and forced my way out of his arms. Out of the kiss.
“What’s wrong?” He looked hurt.
“I don’t know.” I stared at my hands and arms. “My blood is mixing, but I’m not doing it on purpose. It just happened when you kissed me.”
Alex raised an eyebrow and smiled. “I knew I was a good kisser, but man.”
If I hadn’t been so freaked out, I would’ve rolled my eyes. “I don’t think it was you.” I couldn’t tell him this happened every time I was near Chase. The power was overwhelming me, bringing me to my knees.
“Jodi!” Alex helped me up, supporting most of my weight. “What’s happening? Can’t you stop it?”
“No. It’s like I have no control over it.” Mumbled voices filled my head, like screams of agony. I pressed my hands to my ears to drown it out, but the sound wasn’t coming from outside my body. It was literally in me. My mind was tuned into something. What was it? “Medusa,” I called out with my thoughts. “Can you hear me?” Sometimes she popped into my mind. I couldn’t make her do it, but if she wanted to communicate with me, she could. Was this her?
“Jodi, let’s get you over to the bed so you can lie down.” Alex was practically dragging me now. The second I felt the bed, I fell forward onto it. I couldn’t support my own weight. I couldn’t do anything.
I watched my veins ripple under my skin, looking like a bunch of snakes slithering down my body. Then, it stopped. All of it. My blood calmed. The voices hushed. I was me again.
I sat up slowly, expecting to feel dizzy or drained of energy, but I didn’t. I felt normal.
“Take it easy.” Alex put his hands on my shoulders and looked into my eyes. “Are you sure it’s over?”
I nodded. “Whatever it was, it stopped.”
Someone pounded on the door. My immediate thought was that it was Chase, looking for a fight, but Leticia shrieked, “Jodi! Are you in there?”
She sounded scared. I got up, but Alex held me back. “I don’t think you should be moving around yet. Not until we figure out what happened to you.”
“I’m okay. Really. Leticia sounds totally freaked.” I rushed to the door and turned the knob. Leticia’s face was white. “What is it? What’s wrong?”
“The cemetery. You have to come see.” She grabbed my arm and pulled me down the hall. I nearly fell down the stairs because she wouldn’t ease off the pace or let go.
“Leticia!” I complained.
Alex ran after us, staying close to me. Obviously, he wasn’t convinced I was okay. We hurried past the Medusa statue and out the front door. I didn’t have to go much farther before I saw the problem. All the bodies in the cemetery had crawled from their graves. At once. And I knew I was the one who had raised them.
Alex looked at me, obviously thinking the same thing. My powers were out of control. The only thing I could think of was that it must have happened when I was kissing Alex. My blood had boiled, and I’d heard screams in my head because I was summoning all these souls.
“How did this happen?” Leticia struggled to catch her breath.
“I—”
“We’ll figure that out later,” Alex said. “Right now we need to put these souls back, and fast. Before Hades thinks we’ve summoned an army.”
He was right. Hades would view a raising of this s
ize as a personal attack. It didn’t matter how quickly I released the souls. Something this big was going to get Hades’ attention. I was sure it already had. Still, I didn’t want to have all these zombies hanging around if Hades decided to show up in person.
“Jodi.” Leticia tugged on my sleeve.
The zombies had seen me and were coming straight for me. I wasn’t sure if I could command them all at once. It would require too much power, and even though I felt okay after raising all of them, I’d still used a bunch of my energy to do it.
“I can’t do this by myself.” I whipped my head around. “Leticia, go get Arianna and Tony. I need them to help me control the bodies while I work on releasing them.”
She nodded.
“And hurry. These guys are angry, and I can’t hold them all off.”
Leticia took off. I glanced at Alex, but his eyes were already shut. He was calling on his own powers to help me. Unfortunately, Alex wasn’t nearly as good at controlling souls other people had summoned. He wouldn’t completely master the ability until he was an adult Ophi.
I willed my blood to mix and started commanding the souls closest to us. Some listened, and some didn’t. It was too much. Alex grunted as a zombie slammed into him to get to me. Distracted, I got hit from the side. I fell to the ground with the zombie on top of me. I commanded the soul to release, and it slumped forward on me, but another zombie was already there to take his place.
I could hear Alex struggling. Something silver flickered to my right. Alex’s knife. Bodies fell to the ground next to me. All it took was one drop of Alex’s blood. The zombie on me opened his mouth, ready to take a chunk out of me. I lashed my forearm across his teeth, slicing my skin open. The second my blood touched him, he fell over. Someone pulled me to my feet. I turned to see Chase. He took my hand in his, squeezing it tight.
The zombies were still all over Alex, but Chase had managed to fend off the ones near me. Together we combined our powers. My body trembled as Chase’s power flowed through me. I wasn’t sure how long I could take this, so I sent out commands in waves, releasing soul after soul, hoping I’d get to them all before I collapsed under the power. I stayed focused on the zombies, but it got harder and harder to release them. The power was too much, and I couldn’t control it anymore. My body shook, and my eyes rolled back. Warm blood ran down my face. It was like last time in my room, only this was worse. I could barely stand.
“Stop!” Alex yelled. “You’re hurting her!”
Chase let go of me, and I fell into Alex’s arms. My vision was blurred, but I could see there were only a few zombies left. I heard Arianna and Tony. They were here now, taking care of the rest. I could relax.
Alex sat down on the grass with me in his lap. “Jodi, can you hear me?”
I tried to nod, but couldn’t tell if my head was actually moving. My veins throbbed, still feeling the effects of the power. My eyes weren’t bleeding anymore, and the crisp air was drying the blood on my cheeks. Alex stroked my hair, and I tried to concentrate on his touch, letting it soothe me.
“Why doesn’t it affect you when you two combine powers?” By the tone in Alex’s voice, I knew he was talking to Chase.
“Because we’re not truly combining our powers. I’m giving Jodi my power. Transferring it to her so she gets an extra boost.”
“Why didn’t you say that before?” Tony asked. He lifted each of my eyelids. I didn’t know what he was looking for. Signs of life, maybe. I still couldn’t form words or even move.
“I didn’t want you guys to think I wasn’t powerful.” Chase’s voice was small. “It was nice having everyone suddenly interested in me. I didn’t mean to hurt her, though. She’s so strong. I thought she could handle it.”
“It took a lot of power to release all these souls,” Tony said. “More power than any one Ophi should have.”
“I can work on holding back. Not transferring so much at once.” Chase sounded desperate. “I only let her take that much because there were so many zombies. I thought I had to. I had no idea it would do this to her.”
My vision was getting better…clearer, and I could finally swallow.
“What do you mean, you had no idea?” Alex’s voice was full of venom. “It happened when you did it last time, too. You knew exactly what would happen.”
Tony held his hand up to silence Alex and Chase. “We’ll talk about it later. Right now, I want to get Jodi inside. I think she needs another visit with Medusa.”
Alex carried me inside. I had just enough energy to hold onto the statue’s hands. Medusa’s image came rushing to me as soon as I made the connection.
“Dear child, what happened?”
“Medusa, I need your help. I can’t control my powers. I accidentally raised the entire cemetery. I didn’t really know I was doing it, either. I felt my blood mixing, and I heard screams, but I wasn’t trying to summon anyone.” The words rushed out of me in a panic.
Medusa nodded. “What were you doing when it happened?”
My cheeks must have been the color of a fire truck. “Kissing Alex.”
“Is that all?”
“What? Medusa, yes! We were only kissing. I swear.”
“No, child. What I mean is, did anything else happen? Maybe right before you kissed Alex.”
Chase. Chase had almost kissed me. He’d made me feel the blood in my veins, too.
“So, that’s it.” I hadn’t said a word, only thought it, but Medusa could access my thoughts, too. “You have feelings for Chase.”
“No, I like Alex. I love Alex. Not Chase.”
“Your blood is telling you otherwise. Your emotions are extremely conflicted. You have feelings for both these boys. You know your power is tied to your emotions. You need to figure out how you feel about Chase or this won’t stop happening, and we both know what that will lead to.”
“Hades coming for me.” I was kind of surprised he wasn’t already here.
“You are one of mine, Jodi. I don’t want to lose you to Hades.”
“I don’t want to be conflicted. I don’t want to like Chase.”
“The heart doesn’t always listen to reason.”
“What do I do?”
“Explore those feelings. See if they are really there. It may be the only way to get past this. And, Jodi, do it quickly. You don’t have much time.” Medusa vanished without another word, leaving me to wonder if she knew more than she was saying.
I had enough energy to make it until bedtime, so I let go of the statue. I still had to get my arm bandaged and clean up my face.
“Any better?” Alex asked.
“Yeah, a lot.”
He hugged me tightly before letting me stand on my own. “Arianna said she’ll meet you in your room to bandage your arm.”
Normally, connecting with Medusa healed any cuts I had, but apparently the power overload had taken all of that healing power, because my arm was still a mess. “Okay. I want to get this blood off my face first.”
“I’ll help you.”
We walked up the stairs, slowly. It was the only speed I could handle right now. Alex got me into bed, carefully positioning my cut arm so I didn’t bleed all over my covers. Then, he went into the bathroom for water and washcloths. I closed my eyes and thought about what Medusa had said. I couldn’t get past one thing. How could I explore my feelings for Chase without losing Alex? I knew he wouldn’t let me date Chase while I was still his girlfriend. What guy would?
Alex came back and sat down next to me. He had a bowl of warm water in his hands.
“Is that the bowl from the hallway? The one that always has potpourri in it?”
Alex shrugged. “I couldn’t find anything in the bathroom, so I had to improvise. I’m sure Arianna will understand.”
I managed a weak smile.
Alex started washing the blood from my face. “You know your power overdoses give new meaning to putting a little color in your cheeks.”
I knew he was trying to act normal, make me sm
ile the way he usually did, but I was spent. I was scared I was losing control. Scared I was losing him. Scared I was losing this war with Hades. Because I was at war. I understood that now. The deal I’d made with him wasn’t fair, and he knew it. Hell, it’s why he’d gone along with it. He knew I’d screw up. He knew he’d ultimately get what he wanted…all the Ophi in the underworld, dead or alive.
“Hey.” Alex dabbed more water on my face. “What did Medusa say?”
My breath caught in my throat. What was I supposed to say? If I told the truth, it would crush him. He’d get angry and dump me. With everything else going wrong right now, I needed Alex. I had to lie. I remembered what Tony had told Chase about giving me too much of his power.
“She said I couldn’t handle that much power all at once. I have to ease into this.”
“Makes sense. You know, Chase told us he doesn’t really have this big power. He’s just giving you his power on top of yours.”
“His power is different. I can feel it. I know when we join powers, it’s more of me taking from him, but his abilities are greater than an average Ophi’s. I’m sure of it.”
“If you say so.” Alex shrugged, dismissing the thought. It wasn’t easy for him to sit back and watch Chase work with me in a way he couldn’t. He was taking it as a major blow to his ego.
“I wish it were you.” I verbalized what I knew he felt.
He gave me a small smile. “While you were connected to the statue, Tony said he wants you and Chase to start training together, learning to transfer power little by little.”
Train with Chase? Not at all what I wanted to do. “I’m scared of trying this again.”
Alex put the bowl of water on my nightstand and placed his hand on top of mine. “I know. I promise I’ll be right there with you when you train. I won’t let you out of my sight.”
I shivered at the thought. How could I hide my feelings for Chase and the way his touch affected me with Alex watching us so closely?
Chapter 9
I had to find a way to tell Alex that he didn’t need to watch Chase and me, but was there any way to do that without looking suspicious? I was mentally preparing some lame excuse about Alex missing out on his own training to babysit me, but before I could even attempt to get the words out Arianna walked into the room. She didn’t even knock, but then again she’d said she’d meet me here and my door hadn’t exactly been closed.
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