Eternal (30 page)

That got his attention. He glared at me with such anger it turned my blood to ice. “If you do anything like that, we can never be together.”

A sound more animalistic than human gurgled in my chest. “Don’t. You promised me.”

His eyes softened. “I promised to protect you.”

Briar stepped between us so that I all I could see was the backs of her ripped and torn fishnet stockings. “St. John’s?” she asked. “How fitting.”

“Do you agree to leave her here, unharmed?” Jeremiah asked.

Melding with me had rendered him too drained to manifest. His only hope of protecting me lay in allowing Briar to send him to the Light. My heart tightened until it felt like a cold, hard stone in my chest.

Briar glanced down at me. “How do I know you’ll go when we get there?”

“How do I know you won’t hurt Wren?” he responded quickly.

“No honor among thieves,” Briar quipped. “Come on, then.”

Jeremiah crossed his arms over his chest defiantly. “Untie her.”

Briar jerked her chin at him. “No. Once you’ve crossed, I’ll call that football playing loser to come rescue your little damsel in distress.”

My matted and wet hair trailed across my face, stuck to my lips and my stuffy nose. “Jeremiah, please…”

He tensed at the sound of my plea but he refused to look at me. “Let’s go,” he told Briar.

I writhed like a fish out of water. “No!” I screamed and screamed until my throat burned.

And then, without even looking back, he left with Briar and her two friends.

“Jeremiah!” I called uselessly.

My insides twisted as their footsteps plodded down the stairs until only the sound of my own sobbing and sniffling remained. The house seemed empty. Vacant.

I went completely limp, too hopeless to even cry and yet the tears spilled out of my swollen eyes and pooled in my hair on the rug. Jeremiah was gone and I hadn’t even gotten to say good-bye.

I should have known. I should have listened to my intuition.

This night was supposed to have been so perfect. By now, we would have been in each other’s arms, snuggled in my bed, talking about our future together.

My thumbnail raked against the back of the ring he’d given me—the ring that signified our commitment.

Jeremiah had left with Briar to protect me, to save me,-and now, without him, my body felt like a hollow shell.

Drawing my knees up to my chest, I squeezed my eyes shut against the tears and the pain. Conquered by devastating grief, I couldn’t move. I didn’t want to think, but my mind refused to allow me that luxury. Jeremiah had resolved to leave me and I was powerless to prevent it.

I tried to focus on the hope he’d soon be with his brothers and the people who loved him who’d long since died. But in my mind’s eye, I could see his face the day I sent that woman to the Light. He’d been surprised to see them. He’d been torn.

But he hadn’t wanted to go to them.

He’d wanted to stay here.

With me.

A sob racked my chest and I curled tighter, wishing Briar had killed me. Death would be better than this heart-wrenching anguish.

Visions from the nightmare I’d had crashed over me and I rolled on the floor trying to drive the images out of my head. It was no use.

Once again…

I was in a cemetery.

My gaze swept the moon-bathed tombstones. This time, I knew where I was.

St. John’s. The haunted church on the highway.

I ran toward the building, the spire as my guide. Terror gripped me and I wondered if I was too late.

I rushed up a set of stairs and seized the big handles on the back door of the church. The door wouldn’t budge. “Let me in!” I screamed, pounding on the unyielding wood until my fists ached.

This time, I knew Jeremiah was inside.

I stumbled down the stairs, falling, ripping the knee of my jeans on a rock. Pain shot through my kneecap but I ignored it as I clambered to my feet and hobbled around the side of the church.

I had to get inside. I had to stop it.

And this time, I knew what I had to stop just like I knew I had to save Jeremiah.

My eyes snapped open. Hard realization gripped me.

There was still time. She hadn’t sent him yet. I could stop this if I could get there in time. By asking to go the church, Jeremiah had been doing more than protecting me. He’d been buying time.

I clambered onto my knees and then clumsily worked my hands underneath me, kicking and struggling, ignoring the burning pain in my shoulders as I managed to get my hands in front of me. I stood, shaking so badly I feared I’d fall but sheer determination drove me. I had to get downstairs to find a knife, some scissors. Something to cut these bonds.

“Please don’t let Ella have moved Mom’s scissors,” I prayed out loud as I stumbled down the attic steps. Ella was bad about snitching them for one of her projects and then not putting them back.

Mom had grounded Ella time and time again for it but Ella was hard headed and the scissors continued to turn up missing. And then another dismal thought struck me. Mom had stashed them in a cabinet so high, Ella couldn’t reach them. With my hands tied, that meant I wouldn’t be able to reach them either.

“I’ll just use a knife,” I said to myself as I started down the main staircase.

Navigating stairs with my hands tied, while wearing a long dress was harder than I imagined it would be and, in my haste, I tripped over the hem and tumbled down the last three steps, twisting and landing with a hard thud on my side.

Pain seared my ankle, shooting up my leg in hot, throbbing bursts, but there was no time to give in to it. I crawled to my feet again, crying out as I took the first step.

I’d sprained it. Each step confirmed the gravity of my injury.

Gritting my teeth against the pain, I worked fistfuls of my skirt into my tied hands and hobbled as quickly as I could to the kitchen. Every punishing step proved more agonizing than the one before it but I refused to consider that I might have broken my ankle instead.

Scaling the three steps down into the kitchen tortured me. Tears poured down my face but I made it.

The key to my Jag lay on the counter just where Mom had left it. I stared at it for several seconds, suddenly remembering that driving terrified me.

I squeezed my eyes shut against the rising images of Kira, the sirens, the police and ambulance lights, the first time I looked in the mirror at my scar…

“No!” I screamed, trying to shut out the doubtful voice in my head. Jeremiah needed me. I would not give in to the terror.

Somehow, I forced my feet to carry me to the drawer where we kept the cooking knives. I found one with a serrated edge. Cutting the bungee cord Briar had wound around my wrists was going to be difficult, if not impossible.

I slid down the cabinets, my bottom thudding against the cold, tile floor and clumsily set to work, dropping the knife in my lap several times before I managed to get a grip on it.

Though I knew it was only minutes, it seemed like an hour passed before I’d sawed through the first cord. When it finally snapped, the whole bundle loosened enough for me to free my hands.

Every muscle in my body ached as I grabbed the knob on one of the drawers and dragged myself to my feet. I snatched my keys and limped toward the kitchen door.

One thought stopped me in my tracks.

Provided I got there in time, how could I stop Briar? No amount of determination would matter with three against one injured girl.

“Waylon,” I said as the thought popped into my head. My gaze swiveled to the cordless phone on the counter.

I hadn’t memorized Waylon’s number.

My heart soared when I recalled he’d stored it in my cell phone, but then came crashing down around me when I remembered my cell phone was in my backpack on the landing of the stairs.

Gritting my teeth, I bore the pain of every step as I hobbled up the kitchen steps, through the cavernous house and then climbed the never-ending staircase. I dropped with exhaustion on the landing and rummaged through my backpack unsuccessfully. Exasperated, I turned the whole thing upside down and dumped it. Notebooks, pens, pencils, my calculator, books, all scattered across the carpeted floor.

I scanned the pile and finally caught sight of my phone. Grabbing it, I unlocked the screen and with trembling fingers, managed to scroll down to Waylon’s number.

It rang four endless times before he finally answered. “Wren?”

“Waylon,” I said breathlessly. “I need your help. Briar…” My voice broke and all of a sudden I was sobbing uncontrollably.

“Wren, calm down,” I heard Waylon say.

“Briar took…Briar’s got…Jeremiah.”

“I can’t understand you. Calm down,” he said. “Did you say Briar’s got Jeremiah?”

“Yes. St. John’s. She took him to St. John’s to send him…to…the Light,” I said, fraught with renewed grief as I gripped the banister and struggled to pull myself up again.

“Wren, are you hurt?”

“Not bad,” I lied. “Waylon…I don’t know what I’ll do if she takes him away from me.”

Clinging to the railing with one hand and the phone with the other, I worked my way down the stairs as I explained to Waylon what had happened. “I’m on my way there, now.”

He didn’t ask questions. Instead, he said, “I’ll meet you there.”

“Hurry,” I said, even though I knew he’d already hung up.

Every step proved more brutal than the last as I lumbered toward the front door. Miraculously, I got there and then managed to get across the porch, down the steps and to my car.

A bluish glow from the setting sun stretched across the trees, the house, the vast lawn. My car. It’d be dark before I could get to the church.

After unlocking the door, I fell into the seat, grateful to be off my aching foot and ankle. As I’d done so many times before the accident without giving it any thought, I shoved the key into the ignition.

My gaze fixed on the steering wheel and I realized what I was doing.

Driving.

“I can’t do this,” I said out loud. My breaths quickened. My heart pounded. Bile rose in my throat. The last year flashed through my thoughts and I shook my head to dispel the horrific images.

Instead, I focused on Jeremiah and willed myself to breathe. With trembling hands, I gripped the steering wheel and twisted the key in the ignition.

The Jag’s powerful engine roared to life. I took a few breaths, steeling myself, and then, determined, I yanked on my seatbelt, shifted into gear and hit the gas.

It had been months since I’d driven and the sensation was so foreign, so awkward, I feared I wouldn’t remember how. I didn’t have time to be afraid, though. I had to get to that church. I had to keep Briar from sending Jeremiah to the Light.

I punched the gas. Gravel sprayed as the Jag lurched forward and down the long driveway.

Only a few cars moved along the highway in the shadowy twilight but to me, I might as well have been on a Los Angeles freeway. “Traffic,” I muttered dismally.

I looked down the highway, hesitating, but then the need to save Jeremiah overrode my fear and I wheeled onto the highway. In less than thirty seconds, I came up on the tailgate of a slow moving truck. I weaved, seeing a car in the oncoming lane in the distance. The Jag had the power to pass the truck in plenty of time. But did I have the resolve?

Clutching the steering wheel, I leaned forward in my seat. It was now or never. Holding my breath, I veered into the other lane and gunned the gas. When it kicked into gear, the Jag jolted and then roared as it accelerated around the truck.

Triumph soared. “I did it!” I yelled, glancing in the rearview as the truck faded behind me.

But as I drove, my nerves tangled with dread.

The church seemed much farther than it did when I was on the bus but finally, the first tombstones appeared and then the crenellated bell tower of the church. The hedges grew so high and thick, I couldn’t tell if Briar’s car was parked out front or not. I couldn’t roll right up to the church in the Jag because they’d hear the engine so I turned into the adjoining cemetery, switched off the lights and drove as far as I thought I could.

I recognized Briar’s old blue sedan parked around the back corner of the church. I slowed to a stop before putting the car in park. My fingers shook as I switched off the engine.

Waylon’s truck was nowhere in sight. What was taking him so long?

The gravestones behind the church rose like obelisks, catching the last rays of sunlight. Sick horror shook me to the core. It was the same sight I’d seen in my dream.

I got out of the car, wincing when pain fired up my leg from my swelling ankle. I had to be smart about this. In the dream, the back door of the church had been locked. I’d gained entry through the front door.

Doubt surged when I remembered that also in the dream, I’d seen Jeremiah already surrounded by the White Light. Searing pain shot through my ankle but I quickened my pace and hurried toward the church, refusing to remember the worst part of the nightmare. Jeremiah had been swept up right before my eyes. Gone.

I gulped.

Yellow light beamed through a crack in the door. Briar and the others were already inside.

My heavy legs threatened to give way as I sneaked up the steps. I had nothing to gain in trying to surprise them. With Waylon already on the way, I could at least try to distract them until he arrived.

I threw my body against the heavy wooden door and tripped over the threshold. I sprawled into the foyer. My palms scraped the wood floor hard. Throbbing fire coursed through my arms and shoulders but I ignored it. When I recovered enough to look up, I didn’t take in the rows of old wooden pews, the ages old pulpit or delicately carved altar. I didn’t look at Briar or her two friends who stood waving smoldering sage smudge sticks in the air. My gaze fell on Jeremiah who stood bathed in a sparkling ray of Light that beamed down from the arched ceiling.

With his gaze cast upward, he appeared so beautiful, so ethereal, his features so reverent, my heart broke to look at him. He tore his gaze from the Light and turned to look at me. His eyes widened in surprise and then in horror as Briar snatched a heavy candle holder and stalked toward me.