Authors: Erica O'Rourke

Bound (26 page)

BOOK: Bound

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C
HAPTER
32

I
’d never been the kind of girl who got so caught up in drama that I ignored school. But the drama in my life these days went beyond the usual worries—what had happened at someone’s party, the latest round of dating musical chairs, who’d been gossiping about whom—so maybe it was understandable that I’d let homework and journalism and all my other responsibilities slip without realizing it.

Realization hit me full force the next day at school, when I had no lab report written up for Chemistry, no Spanish translation ready, and I left at least a third of my calc test blank. I could explain it away as senior slump, maybe. Or the lingering effects of being out sick. But the fact was, nothing at school held the kind of weight it used to. It didn’t even have the appeal. I still found the puzzle of differential equations and molar reactions engaging—I liked working my way through the problems, seeing the elegance of the solution forming in front of me. Constant. Orderly. Reassuring. But they were no longer enough to distract me from the other problems in my life.

Which didn’t stop me from freezing, deer-in-the-headlights style, when I logged into my e-mail during Journalism and found a reply from NYU’s admissions department.

Lena slid into the seat next to me as the final bell rang. “Bad news?”

“Don’t know.” I held the mouse in a death grip but couldn’t seem to click on the message.

She peered at the monitor. “You have to open it,” she said.

“Do I?”

“Mo. It’s NYU. You’ve been waiting years for this.”

“It doesn’t matter,” I said, throat tight. “I’m stuck here either way.”

“But don’t you want to know? Even if you have to decline, don’t you want to know—”

“What I could have had?” The words sounded bitter, even to my ears. “I’m not sure that’s such a great idea.”

“Then focus on what you
can
have. Either way, open the damn e-mail. The not-knowing will make you crazy. It’ll hold you back.”

I didn’t move.

“You want me to open it for you?”

“No.” Slowly, deliberately, I pushed the pointer across the screen and clicked the link.

“Dear Ms. Fitzgerald,” I read, voice shaking, “We are pleased to offer you a spot in New York University’s class of... .”

Lena squealed and threw her arms around me. “You did it! Please, please,
please
let me be there when you tell Jill. I’m begging you. She’s going to lose her mind.”

I didn’t say anything.

She let go, million-watt grin fading. “You’re not happy. You should be happy, Mo.”

I was. I wanted to call Verity, jump up and down, shriek with laughter and start shopping for my dorm room. Make a spreadsheet of my classes for the next four years. But I couldn’t do any of those things. Verity was gone. The path we’d laid out was closed to me now. Thinking about it would eat me alive. I could feel it already, the same slithering hunger that reared up every time I thought about going after Anton. Dwelling on what I’d lost would only give it strength, until it took me over completely.

“I told you, it doesn’t matter. I can’t go.”

“But you got in. You can celebrate a little, right? This is what you and Verity always wanted. And maybe you’ll find a way.”

“Maybe,” I said, with an unsteady laugh. “God, it would have pissed Jill off, wouldn’t it? Being stuck with me for another four years.”

Lena watched me silently. I closed my eyes, shook my head once, and opened them again. “Anyway. Better get to work, right?”

I logged out and turned to face the room. Around us, people were writing stories, popping out to do interviews, arguing cheerfully about the layout. Lena took a breath and looked at the list of articles still to be turned in. “You finished that editorial?”

I didn’t need to rummage through my bag to know the answer. “No. I meant to, but ...”

“Things got crazy.”

“I’m sorry. I’ll crank it out right now.”

She waved a hand. “I’ll make one of the juniors do it. Good practice for them.”

I watched her approach one of the girls standing near the printer, who nodded eagerly at the chance for a front-page story.

Nick Petros was used to writing front-page stories, I thought—the juicier the better. And now he was telling Jenny we couldn’t help with the case against Billy. Something didn’t make sense.

“Can I make a call in your office?” I asked Ms. Corelli, the newspaper advisor. “It’s a little loud out here for an interview.”

“Don’t touch my chocolate stash,” she warned, but waved me into the tiny room. Nick’s card was still pinned to the bulletin board, a souvenir from his visit to our class last fall. I dialed, hands shaking, and was surprised when he picked up on the second ring.

“Petros.” There was the sound of hunt-and-peck typing in the background.

“It’s Mo Fitzgerald,” I said, and waited.

“Mo.” The typing stopped. “What’s wrong?”

“You told Jenny we weren’t part of the investigation anymore.”

“You’re minors,” he said. “You’re too young to be involved.”

“It didn’t bother you before,” I pointed out. “What changed?”

He sucked in air with a whistling sound. “We’re at a sensitive juncture. There’s a lot happening, and it’s better if you two stay out of it. You did good work, but you need to leave it alone now.”

“I can still help! There’s a list, Nick. People my uncle’s bought off. People who work for him. You said you needed proof, and I can get it for you. I just need a little time.”

“No. Look, Mo. I didn’t get into this with Jenny, but I’ll tell you, because I think you’re smart enough to see the bigger picture. The people in charge of the investigation are very clear. You are not to be involved. Period.”

“But the list ...”

“We know about the list, and we’ll get it. But you’re out, Mo. I’m sorry.”

I thought about Jenny’s choked, tearful voice in the message. The frustration she must have felt. “Yeah. That’s what you told Jenny, right? Do you really think that helps her? She lost her dad, Nick. She needs to see this through.”

His voice was kind, in a gruff sort of way, but absolutely firm. “Jenny needs to let this go, and so do you. I’m sorry, Mo. It’s done.”

He hung up the phone, and I sat for a moment, stunned. The bigger picture? Taking down Billy and the Forellis was the bigger picture, and that list was the key. I was their best chance at getting it.

And I wasn’t giving up.

Colin was waiting for me after school, the red truck sitting amid midwinter slush like a Christmas ornament that had yet to be packed away. I squared my shoulders and climbed in.

“Where to?” he asked.

A few degrees warmer than icy politeness, but a long way from normal. Colin kept his hands at ten and two, his eyes on the road, and his guard up.

“Morgan’s.”

“Another delivery.” It wasn’t a question, so I didn’t bother to answer. “I wish you wouldn’t do this.”

“My life,” I said, staring out the window. I wondered what the weather was like in New York. Wondered if, someday, I’d see it. “My decision.”

“I guess it is. Doesn’t mean I don’t worry. Or want to help.”

“You don’t want to help me,” I said softly. “You want to do it for me.”

“You make it sound like I want to hurt you.”

“I know you wouldn’t. But keeping me safe ... it’s not enough. It’s not how I want to spend my life, sheltered and on the sidelines. Not anymore. I don’t want other people deciding how I should live, or what I can do.”

“You signed all of those choices over to Billy,” he pointed out.

“I’m going to bring Billy down,” I said. “And then I’ll leave. You won’t have to worry anymore. You’ll be free of all of it.”

“I will always worry about you,” he said, jabbing at the buttons on the dash.

“I know.” And I knew what was coming—the speech where he let me down gently. Where we promised to stay friends. I hated it. I wanted to cover my ears. To stop time. To jump out of the truck while it was still moving. Anything to stave off the inevitable. “It’s okay. You don’t need to ...”

He cut me off. “I’m so angry with you I can’t see straight.”

“You have a right.” I bowed my head. It hurt to speak, but I forced the words out. “I’m sorry.”

He pulled over. “I don’t ... I can’t get past the mad.”

I nodded.

“But I will. I love you, Mo.”

I felt the tears welling up, escaping down my cheeks. “I know. That’s not the problem.”

“Don’t say that.” He brushed away my tears but more followed. “We can fix it.”

“You can’t fix me. I’m not broken, just ... changed. I have this magic, and I can do something with it. Something amazing. I
want
to, Colin, even if it’s dangerous. But you hate it. All of it. The magic, and the Arcs, and everything I’ve been working to save.”

He didn’t deny it.

“It’s never going to stop, you know. I’m tied to the magic for the rest of my life. It’s part of me, and you hate it. And if we were together ...”

“I wouldn’t hate you.”

“No. But you’d be miserable because of me. And I’d start to regret what I’d done, and who I’d become, even though it’s this incredible thing, because it made you unhappy. I can’t do that. I can’t afford to regret my whole life. And I don’t want to resent you for making me feel that way.”

“I wouldn’t.” He kissed me, and I tried to memorize the feeling of his mouth, the taste of him, the circle of his arms keeping the rest of the world at bay for just a moment longer. “It’s a job. At the end of the day, you put it aside, and we’re together. We can make it work.”

“The magic is part of me. I can’t put it aside.” Wouldn’t, even if I could.

“So it’s the magic that’s to blame.”

“No. It’s me.”

“And Luc.”

I shook my head, covered his hands with mine. “That would be easier, wouldn’t it? But it’s not Luc.”

“What, then?”

“We’d end up damaging each other. You can’t build a life with someone who’s constantly running off into danger, because it’ll make you insane. And I can’t build a life with someone who wants me to give up a huge part of myself, and thinks it’s for my own good. It will ruin us. I don’t want us to be ruined, Colin. I’d rather be done now, while you don’t hate me, than wait for the day that you do. That’s not a life, it’s waiting for the ax to fall.”

“Mo ...”

“Tell me I’m wrong.” I was crying openly, breath coming in raggedy hitches. “You can’t, can you?”

He drew back, slumping against his door. “So I’m supposed to shut off how I feel about you?”

“I don’t know. I don’t know what comes next.”

“And you think I do?”

I flinched at the harshness in his voice, swiped at my tears, and said nothing.

He started the truck again, and we finished the trip to Morgan’s in miserable silence.

After he parked, he said, “Do you want another bodyguard? It would probably make Billy’s day.”

“I don’t need a bodyguard.” My head throbbed from all the crying, and I rubbed my temples.

“You’ve got two crime families interested in you. I might not be able to protect you from the magic, but I can still keep an eye out for Forelli and Ekomov.”

“You’d stay?” I didn’t believe it. Didn’t deserve it. Didn’t know if I could handle it.

“You think I could leave? I told you before. The most important thing is making sure you’re safe.”

“And once Billy’s done? Then what?”

“Then ... I don’t know. It’s not for you to worry about.” The reproach was clear in his voice, and I could feel the lines of our relationship being redrawn, the rules rewritten to take in this new reality.

I ducked my head. “Are you coming with me for the delivery?”

“Didn’t I just answer that?”

I nodded and went inside.

“What the hell’s wrong with you?” my uncle said the minute I stepped into the back room. “You look terrible.”

“Do you have something for me or not?”

“Here.” He handed me a thumb drive, small enough to tuck into my pocket.

I turned it over in my hands. It was navy blue with white lettering, a tiny St. Brigid’s crest embossed on the side. The same kind you could buy at the school store. “I take it this is supposed to be mine?”

“Verisimilitude,” he said, looking way too pleased with himself. “You copied files off the computer here while I was out dealing with the police.”

“The police were here?” There’d been no sign of them when I came in. Then again, I wasn’t really looking.

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