Mrs. Price gave us a free period after she composed herself. Most of the class sat and talked about the damage done around town and the rumors they had heard about the rest of the school. The gym had been damaged so much that the Board of Health had condemned it and no one was allowed inside for safety reasons. Luckily, it was football season and not basketball; otherwise we might have had a riot on our hands.
We met up with Jodi after class on our way to French. She’d told us the lab tables and counters had been high enough to escape unscathed so the science classes wouldn’t be affected. She didn’t sound too happy about that though. French class was on the second floor and we didn’t expect too much damage there, but we were an open-air school, so we weren’t too surprised to see a thick line of dirt and water stain along the bottom edge of the walls in the room. Madame Beaumont seemed happy enough with the minimal damage her classroom sustained. It seemed that most of the teachers weren’t too interested in teaching today. Just as in our first class, Madame Beaumont decided to give us a break from our usual studies and we played a game of Bingo. In French, of course.
The bell rang to release us from second period and my stomach clenched and knotted up like it was trying to curl around my spine. My mouth was suddenly very dry and I had to swallow to get it working right again. I knew I was both worried and anxious to see Jensen. My face must have betrayed me because, as we were slinging our bags onto our shoulders, Jodi gasped and hit herself in the head with her palm. “I forgot to tell you!” she said in a hurried whisper. We leaned towards her, “Ian wasn’t in Chem this morning.”
“What?” Steven said a little too loudly, attracting the attention of a few passing students.
“C’mon, let’s go,” I said, grabbing a hold of Jodi’s wrist and pulling her along with me as I left the classroom. Steven said a quick good-bye and headed off for Life Drawing. Our math class was on the second floor as well, so I didn’t expect any serious damage and I doubted an 8.0 earthquake could make Mr. Davis deviate from his lesson plan. Sure enough, when we walked into the classroom, there on the board were our ten problems for the day. We both sighed, having let our hopes get too high that maybe the whole day would be an easy break. I immediately looked over to Jensen’s usual seat and a small part of me was unsurprised to see it was empty. I decided not to let my imagination run off with itself until the tardy bell rang, giving him the full opportunity to get to class. But he never showed and, though I knew after ten minutes into class he wasn’t coming, I couldn’t help but continue to look at the empty chair every few moments.
Hey, I felt Jodi’s cold fingers through the fabric of my sweater, he’s not here babe, let it go. I sighed, pushing her yellow thoughts out of my mind. I knew he wasn’t here, but there was no way I could let it go. I shook my arm free of Jodi’s grasp just as the bell rang. I grabbed my things and stood up quickly, not waiting for Jodi.
“I’m gonna go, I’ll try to be back in time to pick you and Steven up after school.” I said as I slung my bag over my shoulder and shoved my chair out of the way, already two steps away from her when my words sunk in.
“Whoa, where are you going?” she called after me, but I was already at the door and just waved over my shoulder at her as I raced against the tide of bodies going in all directions. I managed to get to the stairwell without killing myself and had to resign myself to the slow tread of the crowd moving down the stairs. Finally, I hit the last step and took off at a run, catching up with the crowd of students making their way for the front gates that had fourth period free for a two-hour lunch. I blended in with them seamlessly and acted as natural as I could so as to not get stopped and asked to see my student ID to see if I really had permission to leave.
I made it safely out to the parking lot and set off again at a mad dash for my car. I threw my bag into the backseat and slid in, turning the key and gunning the engine to life. I normally would have given the engine time to warm up and cranked on the heaters, but my stomach was so torn up that I thought I would be sick if I delayed any longer than necessary.
I tore out of the parking lot faster than I ever would have if I had been thinking clearly. I sprayed a few cars with water as I hit the puddles in my rush to get out and I even fishtailed for a few terrifying moments when I turned out of the parking lot onto the main road. I forced myself to slow down; knowing the streets were still slick with oil and water and the fear of getting pulled over and caught for ditching was enough to remind me of my speed.
I drove without really thinking, letting instinct and reflexes take over. I was turning down a road I had only ever been on once in all the time I lived in this city. The night Jensen had told me I didn’t have to hate him. Well, I thought to myself as I pulled along the curb in front of his house, now was his chance to prove that. I cut the engine as soon as I was in front of his house, not wanting to let the loud engine idle and give me away before I was ready.
I took slow even breaths, concentrating on slowing my heart rate down to a normal pace, closing my eyes and listening to my pulse racing in my ears until it calmed. Despite all the terrifying things of this weekend and the daunting task of confronting Jensen, I still allowed myself a girlish moment to check my face and hair in the rearview mirror before I stepped out of the car.
The sound of the car door closing was too loud in the deserted street. I walked up to the front door with as much confidence as I could muster and balled my gloved hand into a fist, raised it, and knocked. I stood back and waited for what seemed like far too long and when I was ready to give up and turn around, I heard the lock in the door turn. I stopped short, suddenly aware of the sweat on my forehead despite the forty-degree weather. I was gnawing on my bottom lip when the door creaked open and I saw the face of a woman just old enough to be my mother with eyes red and puffy and cheeks streaked with fresh tears. I forgot how to speak in that moment, my mouth opening and closing without a sound and I blinked rapidly like I was trying to clear my vision.
“Yes?” she asked in a small, terrified voice.
“Um… I uh…” I cleared my throat and swallowed. “I’m sorry to bother you. I was just looking for Jensen?” I said the last like a question, suddenly worried I had gotten the wrong house. The woman opened the door wide, exposing her whole figure. She wasn’t dressed warm enough for the weather, but that didn’t stop her from stepping out and trying to reach for me.
“Do you know my sons?” She lifted her hands towards me, they trembled visibly. Her worry and anxiety were like fire ants on my skin, biting at me.
“What?” I asked before I could stop myself.
“My boys, do you know them?” She asked again, sounding more desperate with every word.
“I, uh, I go to the same school as them, yeah.” I had taken several steps back without thinking about it.
“Do you have any idea where they could have gone?” She reached out to me again and before I could do anything to stop her, she gripped my left forearm like a drowning victim, her nails biting into my jacket. Her fear swirled through my head. I felt my stomach do flip-flops when she grabbed a hold of me. I took shallow breaths, trying to block her out.
“Um, well, no… that’s why I’m here.” I hoped I didn’t sound sarcastic, but it seemed obvious that if I knew Jensen wasn’t here that I wouldn’t be here looking for him.
“Oh…” she said pathetically, not letting go of my arm but her grip did loosen enough that I knew I could get away if I wanted to.
“You don’t know where Jensen is?”
“No… Ian, either.” Fresh tears spilled down her cheeks. She sniffed, closing her eyes for a few moments to compose herself.
“They’ve been gone since Thursday.” She looked up at me desperately and in that moment I saw where Jensen got the shape of his eyes from and the sharpness of his lovely cheekbones. “I’ve called the police, but they say since they’re almost eighteen and they left voluntarily as far as they can tell, they can’t do much to help.”
It felt like t
he bottom of my stomach had fallen away and my heart was in my mouth. I had been the last person to see Jensen in four days. Had he come to see me just to say good-bye?
Chapter 15
I was sitting in the school parking lot waiting for Steven and Jodi as the final bell rang. I had to promise Jensen’s mom that if I heard anything from Jensen or anyone else that I would tell her immediately. She’d given me her house and cell phone numbers, insisting that I put them into my cell phone while she watched before she was satisfied and let me leave.
She had confessed to me that Jensen hadn’t been very happy about their move to California; they were from a small town in New Mexico a few hours outside of Albuquerque. Ian had been very excited to get out of the heat and into a town with a “real population” as he called it. She’d said she was terrified that Jensen had run away to go back to New Mexico and that maybe Ian had followed him to bring him home. Somehow that didn’t sound right to me.
I was so lost in my thoughts that when Jodi opened the passenger side door I jumped in my seat. My right hand shot to my chest, as if trying to keep my heart from bursting out of my ribcage.
“Sorry,” Jodi said with a laugh. Steven crawled in back. Jodi slipped in easily next to me, pulling the door closed and adjusting the heating vents. After they were buckled into place and I pulled out of the space and merged with the line of cars trying to escape the parking lot, Jodi turned and looked at me with an expectant look on her face, waiting.
“Sorry I took off like that. I just, I dunno, when I saw Jensen was gone I just couldn’t stop myself. I think it actually pissed me off.” I said in a rush, glaring out the windshield.
“So? Where did you go?” Steven asked, reaching over the seat to shake my shoulder with each word.
“To his house. I had to see him. See his arm.” My voice was desolate, even to me.
“Let me guess,” Jodi said darkly, “He wasn’t there, was he?”
“No, but neither was Ian.” I turned onto the main road out of the parking lot, not totally sure where I was going, I didn’t know if I wanted to go home yet. “But his mother was there and she was practically hysterical.”
“Why?” Steven asked.
“I guess neither of them have been home since Thursday.” A fresh wave of nausea hit me as I spoke. I closed my eyes against the sickness, thankful for the red light we had come to.
“Are you serious?” Jodi’s voice was pitched too high and it hurt my ears. I cringed, not trusting my voice, so I just nodded in answer. “Dude, that’s four days, almost five now,” Jodi said and I was grateful to hear she was speaking in a hushed voice now. I opened my eyes just in time to see the light phase to green and I accelerated slowly into the intersection.
“Has she reported them missing?” Steven asked, sounding genuinely worried.
“Yeah, but since they’re almost eighteen and to the cops it looks like they left voluntarily, they say they can’t do much.” My mood was growing darker with every word. I had desperately wanted to see Jensen and clear his name.
Everything was completely out of control now and I felt lost and desperate. Just to look into his eyes for one of those stolen moments would have been enough. Now I didn’t know what to think. I gripped the steering wheel wishing I was holding onto him. I didn’t understand this overwhelming feeling for having known him such a short amount of time, but there it was.
“Good to know people our age matter so much,” Steven said sarcastically. I saw Jodi shift uncomfortably in her seat. Her father was a local cop, but I wouldn’t hold her or her dad responsible for the policies of the whole police department.
“Well, it’s not like they don’t have enough to do without chasing after two guys that are practically legal adults. I’m sure if it were two seventeen year old girls gone for five days they’d say something different,” I said in defense of Jodi’s father.
“Yeah, definitely,” Jodi said defensively.
“Oh good, so just me then,” Steven said, folding his arms over his chest and falling back against the back seat, brooding.
“Dude, just shut up. Can we focus for one freaking second?” My temper was so close to the surface these days that sometimes it was just easier to let it out in spurts rather than hold it all in all the time. I caught Steven’s glare in the rearview mirror and before I could stop myself I stuck my tongue out at him, crinkling my nose and brow. Steven mimicked me, adding a shake of his head. It was all so serious but we had totally regressed ten years in that moment.
I turned the car then, pulling into a parking lot and driving up to a Starbucks. I eased into a parking space and put the car in park and waited, unbuckling my seatbelt and sighing into the seat, trying to relax my shoulders. I looked at Jodi. Her face was lost in thought, lines creasing her forehead, and her eyes looked like they were focused on my hip, but really, she was just lost.
“So, what now?” I asked no one in particular.
“Jodi, you’re forgetting to tell her something,” Steven said with no inflection to his voice.
“What?” Jodi asked, coming back to reality.
“Tracy,” he said simply.
“What about Tracy?” I asked, sitting up suddenly, looking back and forth between them. Ever since I had saved her from Nick that horrible Friday night, I felt the desire to keep her guarded, like my baby chick to protect.
“She wasn’t at school today, either,” Jodi said, rejoining the conversation totally.
“So?” I asked.
“It could be nothing,” Jodi said, “but we thought it was a little suspicious with Ian missing today.”
“But he’s been gone since Thursday and we’ve seen Tracy since then,” I said.
“Which is why I said it could be nothing,” Jodi said, finally undoing her seatbelt too.
“You think it was Ian in the clearing? I thought you two loved him?” I was totally confused now.
“Isn’t the best bad guy the one you want to be the good guy?” Steven asked a little sarcastically. But something clicked in my memory and with that simple question I realized why Jodi had kept pressing me to think of Jensen as the bad guy. She thought I was too into him to think of him as anything but a good guy.
“Do you know what Ian feels like?” Jodi asked, looking me in the eye.
“Not really. He was so nervous and pent up at the store I couldn’t get a good read on him,” I said, disappointment leaking through every word.
“Too bad,” Jodi said simply, looking out her window at nothing in particular.
“I need coffee.” I grabbed my purse and opened my door, not waiting for the other two to follow, knowing they would anyway. I almost ran to get into the store. I felt my cheeks sting when the warm air rushed over me as I pulled the door open and stepped inside. I felt Steven and Jodi behind me and I walked straight to the counter, grateful the after work rush hadn’t started. I considered all the lovely, sugar infused concoctions, but talked myself into a healthier choice and took a strong, large cup of drip coffee, doctoring it with raw sugar and real cream. I sat at a corner table, waiting for Steven and Jodi to get their drinks, cradling the warm cup between my hands, letting the heat relax my fingers and arms. The whole coffee ritual was one that I loved to indulge in.
Steven and Jodi came eventually, cradling their thousand calorie drinks and sat across from me, enjoying the first few sips before any of us broke the silence. It was more than tempting to just revel in this moment of normalcy, but guilt tugged at the corners of my consciousness and I sighed, knowing we had to get back to work.
“Ok,” I said reluctantly, “so you have a bad feeling about Tracy’s absence. But it’s totally possible it’s just your normal teenage shenanigans and she ditched for the day with her boyfriend.”
“Shenanigans,” Steven repeated with a low chuckle.
“Yeah, that’s possible,” Jodi nodded at her coffee cup.
“And it’s also possible that Ian has nothing to do with any of this and whoever is doing all this i
s using the twins as a red herring,” I continued.
“Another possibility,” Jodi nodded again, but she was being too agreeable for me.
“And you don’t buy any of that, do you?”
“Not a bit.”
“You are so stubborn.” I didn’t sound nearly as harsh as I meant it.
“Hey, give me a better, more concrete alternative and I’ll consider it. Right now, this is all we got.”
“But it could still be coincidence,” I pressed, setting my half empty cup on the table and sitting up, I could feel my impatience rolling off of me and saw Jodi’s face react to its bite.
“Fine, it could be coincidence,” she conceded, albeit reluctantly.
“Now, I won’t dismiss Tracy’s absence, I’ll give you the benefit of the doubt on that,” I said, watching her face relax. “Let’s see if she comes to school tomorrow. If she doesn’t, then we’ll start to worry. Fair enough?”
“Fair enough.”
We both nodded and I felt Steven relax, he had been waiting for us to fight. We finished our coffee in silence, but it was a comfortable silence. There wasn’t much more we could do right at this moment and I felt resigned to allow us a few minutes of peace. We would need to start searching for the next ritual spot if we wanted any hope of rescuing the next victim and stopping whatever the ritual would release into our world.
I suddenly had an overwhelming sense of loss. I was terribly depressed and felt my shoulders slump and the edges of my mouth pulled down. I had the desire to cry right then and there. I realized I really missed Jensen. I flashed on the scene in his car and felt the rush of excitement and heat as I relived our first kiss. Jensen was reaching out to me. I didn’t know how, but I knew it all the same.
I reached for the chain of the necklace hidden under my sweater and pulled it out through my collar and grabbed the pendant, squeezing it in my right hand. I could taste wet earth in my mouth and fallen dead leaves; I could almost feel them crunch under my teeth. I could smell the dense foliage only an old forest has. A breeze lifted my hair, pushing it away from my face, and it was almost intoxicating. I blinked and couldn’t see the coffeehouse anymore and, though I knew they were next to me, I couldn’t even see Jodi and Steven now.
Elemental Series Omnibus Edition Books 1-4 Page 20
