Broken Wings (A Romantic Suspense) (69 page)

Sitting on my bed wrapped up in towels, I call her.

"Hey," she yawns. "Di? What's up?"

"Are you working today?"

"Nah. My uncle gave me a couple days to sleep it off. You really saved my ass."

"Can you come over? Wait, I'll come to you."

It takes me an hour to get dressed, and a glass of orange juice and a frozen sausage biscuit to get my strength up to drive. Charity is waiting for me on her porch. We go around the back of the house and sit in faded, warped adirondack chairs around a big clay chimney pot.

"You want some weed?" she says, looking wistfully into the distance. "You have an 'I need weed' air about you today."

"No."

"My uncle made brownies."

"I could go for brownies. Wait. Do they have weed in them?"

"No, he does this thing that makes a kind of butter out of it-"

"Nevermind. I need a drink. Something that won't intoxicate me."

She comes back with plain old lemonade in a glass and I down half of it at once. It's actually pretty good.

"Tell me what happened."

I take a deep breath, and I tell her. She nods and listens, and when I'm done she slaps her fist into her other hand.

"That sucks. Where is he? I'll rip his balls off. That'll show him."

"Yeah, please don't. I just want to forget about this."

"Uh, isn't his dad banging your mom?"

I look over at her and wrinkle my nose.

"I mean, are they not in a… uh… relationship?"

"It's not like Mom has never dated before." I shake the lemonade at her. "She'll dump him when he pisses her off. This needs vodka."

"Uh," Charity says, eyeing me. "You… maybe start off with a beer?"

"Just give me some fucking booze."

"Fine, fine. I'll be right back."

Truth is, I'm not much of a drinker, but the now hardened lemonade goes down easy and after a big gulp I already start to feel a buzz. Over the next ten minutes or so, I drain it and Charity gets another one, and one for herself. I can tell by the color that hers is mostly booze. She can usually handle her liquor. She must have had a
lot
at that party. By the time she's half done a tall tumblr of mostly vodka, she's a little giggly but that's it.

"Am I fucking cursed?" I blurt out, and take another drink.

"You got some big brass balls on you, bitching the way you do," Charity snaps.

"What?"

"Listen to yourself. You have trouble with one boyfriend and it's the end of the fucking world, and the other shit. 'Oh, my mommy won't pay for my underwear when I got to college on a full ride!' You know where I'm going? Community college. To study plumbing. I'm going to be a girl plumber. People are going to make jokes about me for the rest of my life. At least your mom gives a flying fuck about you. Mine doesn't even know I exist.
She
lets me do whatever I want. Oh, it's just great! Fucking great! Oh no, the hottest guy in town ate my pussy like a pro for a week straight, I had too many orgasms, whatever shall I do!"

I just stare at her.

She stares back. "I love you, Diana. Besides my uncle you're the closest thing I have to real family. But it can be tough to be your friend, sometimes. If you want my life and I'll take yours, I'm game. I don't get the guys that are considerate enough not to actually fuck me before they get bored and move on. My last boyfriend only stayed with me until I took it in the butt. He dumped me the next day. With a
text.
Hey, hope your butt isn't too sore, see ya later! Except he didn't spell out you. It was just, like, a U."

"You… he… in your butt?"

"He had a needle dick anyway," she takes a long swig. "If prince charming isn't interested anymore, give him my number. I'd trade a little rumpy-pumpy for these amazing oral skills you keep talking about. I could do a week of infatuation before I get dumped. At least I'd get to feel like somebody sees me as more than cheap labor or some moist holes for a few days."

"Jesus, Charity," I blurt out. "I'm sorry, I didn't-"

"Now you're leaving too," she blurts out, then sucks in a breath that turns into a sob. "In a couple of months you'll start school and I'll be all alone here, if I don't get thrown out of the house by the end of the summer."

Stunned, I sit there and listen to her sobbing quietly. What do I do? Is she angry with me?

"Charity?"

"I'm sorry," she chokes out. "I didn't mean it like that. You know I love you, but… Diana, you're beautiful. You and those eyes and your huge rack and everything. When you go to college there will be boys all over you. Real human boys, not towering fuckbots like Lucas. Lucas will probably get a football scholarship, roid rage and choke out a hooker in his third year, and go to prison. You can do whatever you want. I wish I was you sometimes, that's all."

I grab her hand, and I finish my vodka.

Then my phone rings.

I shouldn't have chugged the second half of the glass. I feel a little, ah, funny.

"Hello?" I slur.

"Diana?"

It's my mother.

Oh.

Uh oh.

"Hi!" I shout, trying to sound calm and normal.

"Where are you? You left all the lights out at the house."

"Oh. Sorry." I seem to have forgotten it was getting dark. "I'm at Charity's house."

"Are you drinking? You sound like you're drinking."

"Who, me? No, I'm just tired and uh, cramping. I have cramps."

"Get back here. We need to talk."

"Uh," I say, glancing at Charity, who is no better shape
 
to drive than I am. "I don't think that's a good idea. I'm really tired. I probably shouldn't drive."

"How much have you had?"

I swallow, hard. "Uh, two lemonades?"

"How much
alochol?"

"Uh, two lemonades?" I repeat.

"For Christ's sake, Diana. I'm sending Bob to pick you up. Stay there and try not to walk into a tree."

I hang up on her. Jamming my finger on a button isn't as satisfying as hanging up a real phone, but it will have to do. I shove it in my pocket and Charity grabs me to keep me from tipping right out of the chair.

"Easy there," she says, steadying me. "I think I gave you too much."

"Yeah," I manage.

A few minutes later the horn is honking and Bob Anderson's black Crown Victoria is parked out front. I lean on Charity until we get to the car and dump myself in the front seat and stare at nothing as he drives.

"You've been drinking," he says, in a neutral tone.

"Yes."

"You're not old enough."

"Nope."

"That's a shame. If you were my daughter we'd have words. You're not, though, so we won't."

"Thanks."

He just drives, and soon deposits me at the house. Literally. He keeps me from falling on my ass until I'm in the sitting room on the couch. Mom walks in and sits down in the chair on the other side of the coffee table. She looks tired from travel.

"Diana," she says. "I got home and you weren't here. I call you and you didn't answer your phone. I was worried something happened to you."

My lip trembles. My jaw shakes. Then I burst out sobbing, weeping violently into my hands. I see her feet as she gets up and sits next to me, and puts her arms around my shoulders.

"What happened?"

I can't tell her. I can't.

"Is it something to do with Apollo?"

I nod.

"You know I didn't approve of my daughter dating my… boyfriend's son," she catches on the words. "That doesn't mean I want you to get hurt. Did you two… while we were gone?"

"We didn't…"

She sighs. "Diana, you're old enough and I know how the plumbing works. He didn't make it to home plate, you're trying to tell me?"

"Yeah. I wanted to. I would have, but then he started bullshitting me about stupid shit about not wanting to hurt me or something."

"Hurt you?" she says. "What did you mean?"

"I w-wanted him to be my boyfriend. I've never had a boyfriend. I wanted to… with him. I tried to make him and…"

"If he wasn't willing to work through it with you, that's for the best. He's not the one."

I snort. "The one. What do you know about the one? I've never seen you go out with a guy more than twice."

She shrugs. "I get bored quickly. That was the problem with your father. I was bored and never knew it. There was no heat, no passion." A wistful smile passes over her face before she looks away, distant. "It was like that at first with him, your dad. Then it wasn't. I've been hoping ever since that I'd find it, but." A deep sigh.

"You don't seem like the most passionate person."

"I don't? My whole life is passion. I put myself into what I do one hundred and ten percent, and I expect that from everyone else. Diana, I wanted to talk with you about this. I think I'm changing my mind about your choice of schools and career paths."

I look up. "What?"

"I've been a bitch," she sighs. She notices my flinch and smiles. "No need to gild the lily, right? I should have listened to what you were telling me. We're a lot alike, Diana. I fell hard for the first boy to show a real interest in me. Unlike you, I married him before it was too late."

"It felt like it was real."

"Not every spark has to catch flame. Love at first sight isn't real, Diana. That's just infatuation. Real love takes work, and both parties have to be involved, deeply committed. You can't make someone love you. If you scared Apollo off with your intensity, that's a
good
thing. You want somebody that clicks with it. Meshes with it. Meshes with you."

This is getting weird. We've never, ever talked like this before. Not any kind of heart to heart or anything like that.

"Does his dad mesh with you?"

She takes a deep breath.

"Yes. I feel more compatible with him than anyone else. It's a good thing that it didn't work out between you and Apollo, sweetie. Believe me, it's for the best."

I sit up.

"Where are you going with this?"

She looks at me almost sheepishly. I think the fucking world is ending.

"Well," she says, a hint of uncharacteristic hesitation slipping a quaver into her voice, "The thing is… we eloped."

"Excuse me?"

"We got married."

"I know what eloped means… what did you say?"

"We went to a wedding chapel in Las Vegas. I'm Mrs. Temple now. I'm keeping my name, but-"

I shoot to my feet, wobble, and fall right on my butt, all staring at her.

"You…"

"I know this is sudden. We're going to have a second, formal ceremony here at the house, invite some friends…"

"You
married him? After a week?"

"I know what I'm doing. You should be happy. We're prepared to support your academic efforts. He helped me see the light-"

"I don't fucking care about that, Mom. I care about
you.
You've known this guy for a week and you
got married?"

She looks at me and shrugs.

"It's my life. It may not last, but I hope it does. He makes me happy. As I said, we're going to have a ceremony… Let me get you some cranberry juice. You're going to need it."

Chapter 11: Apollo

"You did
what?"

Dad stares at me, his expression still as cold waters. "It was necessary. If I didn't she would have pulled back. She's a strange woman."

I can't believe this is happening. The last thing I was expecting was for Diana to be my
stepsister
.

"This changes everything. What are you going to do?"

He's sitting on the sofa in the living room, looking at me calmly as I pace in front of him, scrubbing my fingers through my hair. I feel like I've been stabbed in the gut a thousand times. I'm tearing myself apart from the inside out, and here he comes sauntering in, dropping his bags on the floor, and telling me he got married in Las Vegas to the mother of the girl that I…

Say it, Apollo. Just say it to yourself.

The girl I'm in love with.

I couldn't do it. I couldn't do this to her. I couldn't be her first lover, I couldn't defile her and run away like, well, a thief in the night. It's better this way, I'm sure of it. Better she suffers some small bitterness now than deal with really falling for me just before I destroy her life and disappear. I couldn't live with myself. I can't
do
this anymore.

"Do?" he says, interrupting my brooding. "I'm going to finish the job, and we're going to disappear."

"You
can't!"
I below, locking eyes on him.

"Did you do your job? Any progress on the layout of the museum? Any surprises?"

I was supposed to scout. I forgot all about it. I storm away, into the kitchen.

A moment later, he follows, and winces when he spots me pouring some rum into a tumbler. I pour way too much and gulp it halfway down, my eyes watering from the burn. I slam the glass on the counter so hard I swear it will break, but it holds. I look at him and snarl, a vicious edge in my voice.

"You can't
do
this. This is cruel. We could have found another way-"

"Not in time, and not cleanly. We can't botch this. How many times do I have to fucking dance around this? The price of this job is our lives. If we botch this, we're both dead."

"We?" I snap at him. The rum goes down hard, I cough, and the glass shatters in the sink. Already tipsy, I grab the other counter. "What the fuck is
we?
I don't remember signing up for a job for these people. Who the fuck are they that have you so fucking scared?"

His voice never changes. His face is as still as stone. Yet there is something in his voice I've never heard before. What I have taken for composure, isn't. He's so terrified it's frozen him, chilled him inside.

"Their proper name is in ancient Aramaic. It means 'the fangs', as in the fangs of the serpent."

"Oh fuck me," I moan.

I know that name.

Last year they launched some kind of failed terrorist attacks. Took a bunch of hostages at a school, tried to shoot up some malls. The authorities were tipped off and stopped it. There's rumors in the darker corners of the Internet that they were doing something else at the same time, something big that they didn't pull off. Like, atomic bomb big, or something like that. I can't believe what I'm hearing. My father is working for
terrorists
.