Blaze (2 page)

She offered her hand, doing her best to
ignore the electric jolt his touch caused, and helped pull Luke to
his feet. He dusted his khaki shorts off and tugged his navy
t-shirt back down below his waist.

“Happy birthday,” he said after a
moment.

“Thanks,” Kira responded, briefly glancing
at his disheveled blonde locks and slightly strained gaze.

“So, Sonnyville tomorrow? I challenge you to
get through an entire meeting with the Council without burning
their completely wooden dais to the ground,” he joked, trying to
lighten the mood.

“Yeah, can’t wait,” Kira hurriedly replied
before heading for the door. She couldn’t stand lying to him. At
least that would end tomorrow. Even if he hated her for it, at
least the lying would finally end. “Everyone’s waiting, I better
get out there.” Kira nodded in the direction of the kitchen
window.

Luke followed her gaze to the spot where
Dave, Emma’s silent but loveable boyfriend, and Miles, their geeky
on-his-way-to-Harvard friend, stood next to her father around the
grill. “Yeah,” Luke agreed and walked outside behind her.

“Happy birthday!” Everyone shouted when Kira
stepped into the sunlight. It was a small party, but it was
perfect. Kira smiled at the streamers hanging in the trees
surrounding her backyard and the freshly painted sign wishing her a
happy eighteenth birthday. Chinese lanterns hung from the porch
railing, ready for the sun to set so they could sparkle in the
darkness, and raspy strains of the local radio station struggled to
be heard from an old boom box sitting on the table.

“Thank you!” Kira smiled and stepped lightly
down the porch stairs, practically dancing with her movements.

“Now, Kira, we know you’re the chef in the
family but tonight the men are making steaks,” her dad said while
standing beside an already smoking grill. Even though Kira knew he
was really just her uncle, not even related by blood, the familiar
image of him behind their family grill made it seem like old times,
before Kira had known anything about the conduits or her real
parents. “Luke, did you grab the aprons?”

“Got ‘em, Mr. D!” Luke said, stepping past
Kira to rush over to the grill.

Kira was more than happy to let the men do
the work tonight. She loved cooking, but on her birthday she was
allowed to relax. Especially since all she had been doing since she
got home was make food—cooking was a serious stress reliever and
all of the lying had her pulling her hair out. The Dawson family
fridge was currently full to the brim with praline pecans,
chocolate mousse, patience-trying risotto, and, one of Kira’s
favorites, homemade spaghetti. Her fingers needed the night
off.

Kira turned towards the foldout table her
adoptive-mother had put up in the backyard. She was really her
aunt, her birth father’s sister, but Kira tried to forget that
sometimes. Especially on a day like today, with everyone around,
Kira wanted to feel happy, not anxious about how much her life had
changed in less than a year. She had gone from being a normal
teenager to a mystical half-breed conduit who could potentially
mean the end of the world. And the recent events at the Red Rose
Ball had changed her again—she felt that in her bones even if she
didn’t know what it meant yet.

A moment later Kira blinked, pushing old
memories to the side to look back at the table where Emma was
setting out the silverware and her mother was arranging a vase
filled with fresh flowers. She stepped forward to help.

“Luke, you didn’t!” Kira’s mother gasped and
put a hand to her mouth to cover her laughter. Kira stopped walking
and turned just in time to see Luke finish tying an apron around
his waist—the apron no one in her family ever used, the one her
mother bought her father as a joke years ago, the one that had a
life-sized photograph of Michelangelo’s
David
… in the
nude.

“Luke,” Kira whined with a grimace, but the
semblance of a smirk tugged at her lips.

“Just trying to get this party started,”
Luke grinned. He reached for the raw steaks and started dropping
them on the grill.

Kira shook her head at him, but couldn’t
shake the small curve of her smile.

She looked around for Tristan, noticing he
wasn’t grill-side with the other men, and spotted him at the far
side of the yard with Chloe. The two of them sat in the middle of a
ring of Barbie toys and Tristan was pretending to listen intently
to whatever Chloe was trying to explain about her dolls. He looked
up, as if sensing Kira’s gaze, and flashed her a dimple-filled grin
followed by a roll of his eyes.

“Should we go save him?” Kira’s mother
whispered in her ear, but Kira shrugged.

“Let him suffer,” she laughed and out of the
corner of her eye, she saw Tristan shake his head at her. He
definitely overheard. Good, Kira thought, let him know I’m totally
calling the shots. But her brief moment of power passed when a wad
of napkins was shoved in her face.

“I’m going inside to work on the potato
salad and coleslaw. Can you girls finish setting the table?”

“Sure, Mom,” Kira said and took the napkins
from her mother’s arms before walking over to Emma.

“How is it possible that I’m wearing a dress
and you’re not?” Kira asked, eyeing her blonde friend’s relaxed
shorts and polo shirt attire.

“You’re allowed to out-dress me one day a
year—consider it my gift to you.” Emma smiled and sat down in one
of the vacant seats around the table. Kira sat next to her and
dropped the napkins onto an empty plate.

“Want to learn how to fold these?” Kira
asked. Years of working in a restaurant had taught her this nifty
trick and she quickly folded the first napkin into a simple, yet
elegant, pyramid. Kira spent a few minutes showing Emma the steps,
but it became obvious that there was something on her friend’s
mind.

“Is everything okay, Emma?”

“Of course,” she said, but Kira didn’t buy
it.

“Really?” She pressed.

“Yeah… I was just thinking about how sweet
it was that everyone came back for your birthday. I mean, Tristan
came all the way back from backpacking around Europe just for the
weekend—talk about dedication! I’m going to miss this… you know,
having the gang together.” She ended softly, concentrating on her
napkin rather than the people around her. Kira pulled the linen
from her friend’s fingers, forcing Emma to concentrate on her
words.

“I thought we got all of that talk out at
graduation! We’re still going to be ‘the gang’ no matter what.”

“I know, but it won’t be the same. You and
Luke were only gone for what? Three weeks? And still, things felt
off. Sometimes I just don’t want things to change, you know? Like I
don’t really want to grow up.”

You’re telling me, Kira thought but quelled
her inner-monologue. Emma was almost never like this. Sure, was
emotional at times. But normally she was the calm, collected
one—not the vulnerable, nervous one. Only one thing would bring
this side out in her.

“Did something happen with Dave?” Kira
asked, taking Emma’s hand to comfort her. Dave and Emma were the
perfect couple: they were classic southern sweethearts and they
would both be going to college in Texas come Fall. Kira couldn’t
even imagine them apart.

“No… I don’t know. I’m just nervous I guess.
People always say that when you grow up you grow apart, but what if
I don’t want that to happen?”

Kira couldn’t suppress a sidelong glance at
Tristan, who was still trapped by her sister Chloe. She couldn’t
deny that her birthday had made her think the very same
question—for her and Tristan, growing up literally meant growing
apart.

“If you don’t want to grow apart, you
won’t,” Kira urged, turning her attention back to Emma and leaving
her own thoughts for another time. “Nothing will change if you
don’t want it to. I mean, Dave is head over heels for you! You’re
all he ever thinks about and that won’t change.”

Both girls took a moment to look over
towards the grill where all four boys—yes, including Kira’s fully
adult father—were taking turns dropping lighter fluid into the
flames to make them explode. Definitely Luke’s idea, Kira assumed.
“Well, when he’s not playing with lighter fluid, all he does is
think about you…”

“I know that,” Emma said, “it’s just that
we’ll be going to different colleges… they’re only two hours away
from each other, but still, it’ll be different. And people always
say that high school relationships never last, that they are sort
of your first taste of love before the real thing comes
around.”

A sudden tingle stirred at the base of
Kira’s neck and she knew, before shifting to meet his gaze, that
Tristan was watching her. His eyes were hidden beneath the shadow
of his hair, but the tense muscles in his neck told Kira he was
listening—waiting to hear what her response would be. She loved him
and he her, but both of them had sensed the change in their
relationship. He was a vampire. She was a conduit. They were
supposed to be enemies, and the more prominent Kira’s powers
became, the more impossible their future seemed. That wasn’t enough
for Kira to give up on them and forget her feelings, but it was
enough of a crack for a few small, almost imperceptible doubts to
seep through.

“I don’t believe that,” she finally answered
her friend. “Love is love, no matter how old or young you are.”

“You’re right,” Emma said and let a slow
smile spread across her face, lighting her features. She broke her
long stare in Dave’s direction, ready to tackle napkin folding
again, but saw the gloomy expression on Kira’s face. “Oh God, I’ve
totally ruined your birthday! I don’t know what came over me!”

“You haven’t ruined anything,” Kira said,
casually waving the air away. “It’s my party and I can cry if I
want to!”

“Cry?” Luke’s voice interjected from above
Kira’s shoulder. Kira spun in her seat, completely forgetting the
apron Luke had on, and came face to face with the exact part of a
nude male she did not want to be staring at.

Quickly shielding her eyes, Kira muttered,
“Can you take that thing off? I can’t take you seriously.”

“You never take me seriously,” Luke laughed,
stepping even closer to Kira, who leaned further away. Do not
blush, she thought, do not blush.

“Luke.”

“Fine, fine. Ruin my fun,” he said and
untied the apron before slipping it over his head. “I came over
here to talk anyway.”

“And that’s my cue,” Emma said, ducking out
of the way and over towards Dave and Miles by the grill. Luke took
her vacant seat and Kira instantly felt the space around them
thicken. Her throat tightened and she took a deep breath, letting
the air out slowly to calm her speeding pulse. She felt nervous
around him—something she had never felt, not even since the first
time they had met.

“What’s up?” Kira said, hoping her voice had
come out calm and strong.

Luke reached in his pocket and pulled out a
small black box decorated with a white satin ribbon. “It’s not
much, but I got you a birthday present,” he said and clumsily
shoved his arm in her direction.

Slowly, Kira reached out and lifted the box
from his hand. Using the power Kira had only discovered a few weeks
before, she skimmed his thoughts, unable to stop the impulse to dip
into his mind. The buzz of his nerves calmed her. His mind was
hesitant, stopped on a breath and waiting. An expectation hung in
the background, surrounded by a glimmer of hope and a tinge of
excitement. But Kira could tell by the bright green hint in his
eyes that he was energized—she didn’t need the mind reading for
that and she retreated from his thoughts to tug the ribbon free
from its bow.

Kira lifted the lid and sitting inside,
gently resting on a white satin cushion, was a tiny golden sun
sparkling in the daylight.

“Luke,” Kira said, breathing the word out
like a sigh.

“I saw it in a store and thought you might
like it.” He shrugged.

“It’s perfect,” Kira said and set the box
down on the table. Reaching around her neck, she unclasped the thin
chain holding her father’s wedding ring, an heirloom her adoptive
mother had given her months ago when Kira had found out the truth
about her star-crossed parents. The locket with her family portrait
was still with her grandmother back in Sonnyville and the chain had
felt uncomfortably light recently.

Kira untied the charm and slipped it through
the chain, letting it fall to the bottom where it easily landed
inside her father’s ring. The two golden trinkets fit together
perfectly, one slightly more aged than the other, but both
brilliant against the late afternoon sky.

“So, you like it?” Luke asked quietly. His
head was bent towards the ground and he looked at her under hooded
eyebrows.

“I love it,” Kira told him and pulled him in
for a hug. Maybe things could get better between us, she thought
hopefully. He wrapped his arms around her, holding her close, and
breathed deeply into her hair. Kira willed herself to ignore it and
not ruin the moment, but when she opened her eyes they met a hard,
blue stare and she instantly retreated from Luke.

Kira knew Tristan couldn’t help overhearing.
His magnified senses were hard to turn off, but sometimes she
wished he wouldn’t listen in on conversations he knew would hurt
him. The downturn of his eyes and straight line of his mouth told
her all she needed to know, even if they disappeared a moment later
when Chloe pulled him back to her toys.

“Food’s ready!” Kira’s mother called from
the kitchen.

“The steak is being taken off the grill as
we speak,” her father added.

Luke quickly stood and put the apron back on
to help her father, and Tristan walked over to take his place. She
grabbed his hand, lacing her fingers through his, and pulled him
down into the seat next to her.