Emanare (Destined, #1)

by Browning, Taryn

  “Did you sleep with him?” Chase asked bluntly, his large body still blocking her passage.

  Sam rotated her arm back and forth, noticing her skin no longer resembled an iridescent pearl. All of the color had drained from her body. Her light had blown out, leaving her sheet-white. At the moment, she looked more like a ghost than an angel. She swallowed her uneasiness and tried again to pull strength from within. It was useless.

  “Answer me!” Chase demanded.

  “Yes,” Sam whispered. Her eyes darted everywhere but to Evrik and Chase, who were both staring at her.

  “How dare you?” Chase grumbled. “You were so angry with me when you thought I’d slept with Vicky, when all along you’d had sex with Cale.” Chase’s face became florid and his blue eyes widened with anger.

  “I’m sorry. I didn’t have any control over my actions. If I was myself and not under his control, I never would’ve done it,” Sam cried.

  “Did you sleep with Evrik yesterday too?”

  “That’s uncalled for.” Evrik spoke for the first time since Chase had started his interrogation.

  “What, Evrik?” Chase cocked his head, placing his strong hands on his hips. “You didn’t know about me and Sam—yesterday in my dorm room?”

  “Chase don’t,” Sam begged.

  He glanced down at her. “Evrik has a right to know what happened.”

  “Leave Evrik out of this.” She put her hands on Chase’s chest, looking up at his hard chin. “Please.”

  “I’m already in it.” Evrik slid his hands over Sam’s shoulders and turned her so she faced him. “What happened yesterday with Chase?” he asked calmly, but she could see the storm brewing in his eyes. The green had already started to fade.

  “We got caught up in the moment, and I kissed him,” she said quickly.

  “Tell him everything, Sam.” She heard Chase’s angry voice behind her. “It was so much more than a kiss. If my roommate hadn’t come home we would have made love.” His voice lowered. “I thought I knew you better.” Without another word, he took off.

  “Is what Chase said true?” Evrik said, a deep gray hurricane swirling in his eyes.

  “I’m sorry. I swear to you. I wouldn’t have made love to Chase. I would’ve stopped.” Sam buried her face in her hands and cried. She lifted her head and Evrik was gone. She stood on the pathway, alone.

  Sam stumbled to the ground. Her hands caught her fall. The coolness of the concrete stung her palms and the pain ripped through her mind. Another memory hit…

  Sam finished dinner at Evrik’s house. She glanced at her watch and noticed it was just after ten.

  “Would you like me to drive you home? I understand if you don’t want to stay,” Evrik said.

  “No, I think I’ll stay a little longer…if that’s alright with you?” She reached over to take his hand.

  “Let me think.” He tapped his finger on his chin with his free hand. “A beautiful girl wants to stay with me—hmmm—tough decision.” He smiled and squeezed her hand lightly. “Stay.” With that one word, “stay,” she could have melted into the floor.

  “What would you like to do? Are you tired?” Evrik asked.

  “Not really.”

  “We can go out to the reservoir,” he suggested.

  At the reservoir, they sat on a large rock, high above the calm water. The cliffs plummeted into a dark abyss. Evrik sat behind her, his arms stretched around her, hugging her tightly against his massive body. The water seemed so far away. Sam could hear the soft current below her feet. She lay against Evrik’s muscular chest. She could feel his sweet breath tickle her ear; his musky male fragrance made her go limp. If he weren’t clutching her tightly, she feared she would have fallen off the rock into the water below. Sam sank deeper into his embrace.

  “You’ve asked me so many questions about my childhood. Tell me something about yours,” Sam said, imagining how adorable he must have been as a little boy.

  Evrik inhaled deeply, stalling while he thought of a memory to share. She could feel him draw in the scent of her pomegranate-almond shampoo. “My mom and I used to catch butterflies. I always thought they were fascinating. As a child, I was so intrigued when she told me how the insect started out as a caterpillar before forming a chrysalis, then emerging as a flying wonder.”

  His words were so descriptive. Sam could picture him looking at butterflies with wonder and awe, much like she looked at him. “My mom and I would spend every afternoon outside. I would catch a butterfly and then she’d tell me the name of it. We would do this for hours.”

  “I can tell you really love your mother. She sounds wonderful.” Sam put her head on his bicep and traced his forearm with her fingers. “What is your favorite kind of butterfly?”

  “The Western Tiger Swallowtail. I used to live in California. The Tiger Swallowtail is a very common butterfly on the West Coast. As a young boy, I thought they were brave because their colors and stripes resembled a tiger’s.” His tone became nostalgic. “There was a grove of cherry trees in our yard. I could always count on seeing the butterflies in the late spring. My mother told me they fed from the leaves.”

  “It sounds like a wonderful memory.” Sam smiled.

  “How about you? What is one of your favorite childhood memories?”

  Sam exhaled. “During the fall, after my parents divorced, my Aunt Rose took me to this orchard close to my house. Even though I was still upset over the divorce, she made everything seem like it would be okay. We’d take a hayride over to the pumpkin patch and I’d get to choose my own pumpkin. And the orchard had the most delicious apples.” Sam licked her lips at the thought. “I loved to pick them off the trees. Aunt Rose would lift me up to pick the highest apple I could reach.”

  Sam thought about her aunt. They had an amazing relationship. However, she and her mother, Emily, didn’t always get along. Her mother always wanted the best for Sam, but only as long as it worked out well for her. They were too much alike, so they’d clash, like two shades of black. It was the root of all their arguments.

  Sam took in a reminiscent breath and continued. “Aunt Rose was different. She let me be who I was and encouraged my originality. Aunt Rose was always eccentric and a lot younger than my mother. My mom treated her more like a daughter then a sister. She used to say that Rose marched to the beat of her own drum.”

  “Where is your aunt now?” Evrik asked.

  Sam felt her eyes moisten. “A tractor-trailer hit her car head-on. She died on impact.”

  Evrik squeezed Sam tighter. “I’m sorry. That sounds terrible.”

  Sam accepted his comfort, sinking into his warm embrace and admiring the wooded scenery around them. Their chests moved in unison. They could easily melt into one.

  Sam tilted her chin to find Evrik’s emerald eyes. They fixed onto hers. His lips were only inches away. Her heart started to beat rapidly. She looked down at his soft lips, imagining what they would feel like against hers. His lips parted slightly and he advanced.

  CHAPTER 17

  Sam returned from her confrontation with Chase and Evrik. Lauren was in the room. She immediately noticed Sam’s puffy, red-blotched face. “Are you okay?”

  “No.”

  Lauren offered Sam a seat on her bed. “What happened? Did you and Evrik have a fight?”

  “Lauren, I have to talk to you about something.” Sam scooted next to her roommate. “You’re probably going to think I’m nuts, but I can’t keep it from you any longer.”

  “Go ahead, sweetie. You can tell me anything.” Lauren stroked the back of Sam’s hair as she spoke. “Is it about Friday night?”

  Sam tapped her foot apprehensively. “It kind of has to do with Chase and me, and Evrik and Evrik’s friends.”

  “Wow…what did I miss?” Lauren crossed her legs.

  Sam’s phone rang. She glanced down at the caller ID. “It’s my step-father.”

  “Go ahead, answer it,” Lauren insisted.

  After a quick conversation,
Sam hung up, her heart racing. “Lauren, do you think Ryan would let us borrow his car?” Sam’s hands shook.

  “Probably; what’s wrong?” Lauren stood to retrieve her purse from her desk.

  “It’s my mom. She fell down the steps. She’s in the hospital.”

  “Is she okay?” Lauren pulled her Blackberry from her Louis Vuitton.

  “She’s in intensive care.” Sam scrambled for her purse.

  A moment later, Lauren threw her phone back in her purse. “Let’s go. I’ll take you to the hospital. Ryan’s meeting us downstairs with the keys.” After a two-hour car ride in evening rush hour, Sam and Lauren finally arrived at the hospital.

  Walking through the hospital doors brought back a rush of childhood memories. When Sam had fallen off her bike or incurred injuries that required stitches or X-rays, her parents would put her in the car and drive the twenty minutes to the hospital. She was somewhat of a tomboy, so trips to the ER had become old habit.

  The front desk clerk directed Sam and Lauren to Emily’s hospital room. After they were allowed admittance through the electronically activated double doors, they walked down the long corridor. The walls were the usual, bright hospital-white, highlighted by the glow of overhead florescent lighting. They passed a small waiting area with drab royal blue carpeting. Sam noticed the hospital had at least updated the furniture. They continued passed patient rooms. She heard multiple televisions playing different stations and the random beeping of medical machines.

  Taking in the “hospital” smell, she involuntarily covered her nose. Sam couldn’t stand the smell of hospitals. They gave her a queasy, nauseous feeling. When she was six, her grandfather had stayed in the hospital for a week before he died. He was painfully skinny and gaunt, not the grandfather she had remembered—the man who had babysat her for six years.

  They rounded the corner at the end of the long corridor. Sam saw her step-father, Jack, standing outside the hospital room. Jack was handsome for an older man. In his mid-fifties, about ten years older than her mother. He had salt-and-pepper hair, and his attractive blue eyes peered at her under his sagging, wrinkled skin. Jack had spent many years out in the sun playing golf. Now a retired golf pro, Jack and her mom enjoyed taking monthly golf vacations. Sam liked Jack. He was good to her mom. He never seemed to mind when Emily insisted everything go her way. Sam’s dad hadn’t been as accepting of Emily’s controlling personality. Her mother had spent many years alone before she married Jack, when Sam was in high school.

  “Jack, how’s my mom doing?”

  “She’s going to be fine. The nurse is in there with her right now.” Jack looked exhausted. The closed door held the weight of his tired body.

  “How did she fall?”

  “I don’t know exactly what happened. She was coming down the steps and suddenly lost her balance, slipped, and fell down half the flight of steps.”

  “That’s like eight or nine hardwood steps. Did she break anything?” she asked, taking Lauren’s hand in hers.

  “She has a broken leg, a few cracked ribs, and some bumps and bruises on her head and face.” Jack exhaled. “Don’t worry, Sam. She’s tough. She’s going to be okay.” He opened his arms and embraced her.

  “Thank you for getting her to the hospital and for calling me.”

  “She’s been very eager to see you.”

  The door handle clicked and Jack straightened his body, letting the thick metal white door open behind him. A nurse stepped out of the room. “You must be Sam,” she said in a sweet voice. She looked just like Mary Poppins. Sam waited for her to pull out a spoonful of sugar. “Your mom has been asking for you, dear.”

  “You go in. I’ll wait out here,” Lauren encouraged.

  Emily looked like she’d been beaten with a Louisville Slugger. One eye was swollen shut and decorated in various shades of purple and blue. The other eye was barely open, and her brown iris looked black. Sam touched the thin skin below her own eye. She and her mother shared the same light-brown eye color. A large butterfly bandage stretched over a two-inch line of stitches across her mother’s forehead. Emily’s broken leg hid below a layer of sheets and a white knit blanket.

  Emily smiled. “Hi, baby.”

  “Are you in any pain?” Sam sat on the edge of the bed and held her mother’s hand.

  “They have me on some really cool pain meds, so I’m okay. How did you get here?”

  “Lauren.” Sam knew her mom was loopy because she never used the phrase, “really cool” in a sentence. “How did you fall? You’ve been going up and down those stairs for at least twenty years.”

  Emily became serious, even with the morphine drip. “Sam, there’s something I need to talk to you about.”

  “Mom, just rest. We can talk when you’re better.” Sam squeezed her hand lightly.

  “No—” Emily’s weak voice grew louder, then faded back to a whisper. “It has to be now, before the nurse comes back.”

  “Okay. Go ahead.”

  “There’s something I should have told you years ago, but I didn’t think it was necessary.” She paused, planning her words carefully. “You know how your Aunt Rose died when you were a little girl?”

  Sam nodded. She had no idea why they were talking about Aunt Rose.

  Emily cleared her throat, undoubtedly preparing herself to form her next words. “Rose didn’t actually die in a car accident. While it appeared to the outside world that she had, she actually left the earth for a different purpose.” She exhaled. “The women in our family are different. For as long as our family tree goes back, we have lived for a higher purpose.” She paused again; making sure Sam was still following her. “Your aunt started to change a few weeks before she ‘died’ in the accident. We knew what was happening to her. She was turning into what she was destined to become since birth. It only happens to one of us every other generation. My great-aunt died at the age of eighteen, but my mother was spared. Sam, your aunt, and my great-aunt—they became angels.” She sighed painfully and said, “I know you think I’m hallucinating, but this is true, Sam.”

  “It didn’t skip a generation, Mom.” Sam leaned in closer to her mother so that she didn’t have to strain to speak.

  Her mother continued to talk as though she hadn’t heard Sam. “Your Aunt Rose and I knew it was going to be one of us. Your uncle would not have been chosen, and my cousins were all boys. When I didn’t go through the change at eighteen, we knew she was the chosen one.”

  “Mom, if it skips a generation, then why am I an angeling?”

  Emily’s mouth fell open. “Angeling—how do you know that word? I’m the only relative who could’ve told you.”

  Sam wondered how her mother knew that she was going through the change, especially since she had assumed it had skipped Sam’s generation. Why did she have the sudden urge to tell her now? “For now, let’s just say I’ve had quite a bizarre college experience,” Sam said.

  Still confused, Emily removed her hand from Sam’s. “Turn around, let me see your back.”

  Sam did as her mother asked. “They are forming. You’re getting your wings.” Emily once again seemed unable to speak, as if seeing Sam’s wings pained her. Emily dropped her hands to the bed, clearing her throat. She twisted the white knit blanket uneasily. “And as I suspected, you have six wings. You are a Seraph. How long has your transformation been happening?”

  Sam lowered her shirt and sat back down next to her mother. “I don’t think very long. I just noticed the bumps.”

  “How did you know what the bumps were? I’m so sorry I didn’t tell you. I didn’t think you would have to worry about it. It usually skips a generation. If you had had a daughter, I was going to tell you. But this wasn’t in your cards. They were dealt to you by a power greater than I could resist. For years, I didn’t remember—” Emily exhaled slowly. Tears welled in her eyes. Sam felt that Emily was holding back something—like the reason that it hadn’t skipped Sam’s generation.

  “I will never have childre
n.” The realization suddenly upset Sam. She hadn’t thought about what was going to happen after she changed. She would have to leave her mother, Evrik, and Chase, and she’d never get married or have children of her own—all the things girls dreamed about. “Mom, what’s going to happen to me when I change?”

  “You’re going to leave this earth as a powerful immortal. You will spend eternity fighting for good. There is much evil that exists. Without divine angels, the fallen angels…”

  “Like Lucifer?” Sam asked. He was the only fallen angel she’d heard of, but even so, she’d only thought of him as a myth, not as being real.

  “Lucifer himself is a Seraph, a fallen angel, but still a Seraph. His light was so magnificent that even the divine angels couldn’t look at him. Seraphs are said to be ‘living flames’—beings that emanate love.” Chills ran up and down Sam’s skin. From what she had always understood, Lucifer didn’t emanate love. “Remember, demons stay in the Infernus because the beings that fight for good, like the divine angels, are powerful enough to destroy them if they step on to human soil.”

  Sam rocked back and forth in uneasiness. “Mom, something happened to me Friday night. I lost my memory of anything ‘supernatural.’”

  “What do you mean?” Emily’s brows furrowed in confusion.

  “Remember Evrik, my boyfriend, and Chase, my best friend?”

  “Yes. You brought Evrik home over Christmas. He was a nice young man. And Chase, I never met him, but you talk about him a lot.” Emily smiled.

  “Well, they aren’t exactly ‘normal’ humans,” Sam said uncertainly.

  “Go ahead,” Emily pressed, as she always did, which caused most of their arguments.

  “I lost my memory of them Friday night. Evrik found me at a bar in Baltimore. When he approached me, I didn’t recognize him. When I saw Chase, I didn’t recognize him either, but I recognized everyone else—Lauren and Ann, and, unfortunately, Vicky.”