Forbidden (25 page)

Could it be an engagement ring, engraved with a message to her mom? She slipped it on. The ring was so small, it only fit her little finger.
Strange
, she thought. Her mother’s hands were the same size as her own.

Then she felt it. A vision was coming. Claire blinked, and then—

She was sitting at a wrought-iron table set with a bone china tea service, on the back porch of a large brick mansion, overlooking a green expanse of garden
.

The amethyst ring sparkled on the slender ring finger of her right hand as she sipped from a cup. The tea was warm and fragrant, and it relaxed her
.

The sound of a little girl’s laughter caught her attention. A golden-haired child, perhaps four years of age, sat at her own miniature table across the lawn, serving tea from a tiny teapot to a group of dolls and stuffed animals
.

“Lynn!” The womanly voice that issued from Claire’s mouth was concerned but not angry. “Be careful not to spill any tea on your dress.”

“Okay, Mommy,” the little girl replied
.

With a rush of sound and light, the images disappeared.

Claire caught her breath. The child—Lynn—must have been
her mom
. And the body she’d inhabited must have been her mom’s
mother
—the grandmother Claire had never met. Tears sprang into Claire’s eyes as she carefully replaced the ring and returned the shoe box to its hiding place. She’d just seen where her mother grew up! She’d felt what it was like, for a fleeting instant, to be her own grandmother!

For the first time, she had an inkling of what Alec had meant when he said she had a potent gift that might make others wary. This power she had, it was truly amazing … incredible.

With no boxes left to go through, Claire sifted quickly through her mother’s clothes. She made sure to deliberately touch each garment, but nothing happened. She was about to slide the closet door shut, when her eyes fell on a garment bag hanging at the far end of the rod. It occurred to her that—even though she’d touched the bag—she hadn’t looked inside. In fact, although Claire had seen this old garment bag every time they’d moved, she’d never seen her mother open it. With a sudden, eerie sense of premonition, she took the plastic bag out of the closet, lay it on the bed, and unzipped it.

A brown corduroy sport coat that looked older than she was—and was obviously meant for a man—was inside. Claire’s heart raced.
What was her mom doing with a man’s blazer?
She extended her hand toward the jacket, her fingers trembling. It seemed as if the room was filled with an electric charge. Slowly, gently, she placed her hand on the rough corduroy lapel and waited. And waited.

Nothing.

Nothing?!

Claire frowned, annoyed, refusing to admit defeat.

She wrapped her fingers tightly around both lapels. “Breathe,” she said aloud, trying to reproduce the trance Erica had put her in. “Focus.” She stared at the jacket lying on the bed and mentally begged it to speak to her.

“Whose jacket are you?” Claire implored quietly.
“Who do you belong to?”

A wave of dizziness consumed her, along with a mild twinge in her stomach. Claire felt a sudden, strange sensation of loss and distance, as if this coat had been separated from its master for a long time, dimming whatever memories it contained. She had to fight to stay upright and to hold on to the jacket.

“Tell me!” she insisted.

All at once—

Claire’s ears were assaulted by the sounds of traffic. A city in motion came into focus around her. She was walking down a crowded sidewalk. On one side, she was flanked by tall buildings that reached to the sky. Across the street was a huge green park dotted with trees bursting with autumn color. In the street, a line of yellow taxicabs honked and inched slowly forward
.

It looked like the New York City she’d seen depicted in every TV show, movie, and picture postcard
.

Someone was holding her hand. It was a woman, blond, and shorter than she was. It was a younger version of her mother! She looked about seventeen years old and radiantly beautiful in a bright blue turtleneck and scarf
.

Looking at her mom, the person that Claire was inhabiting felt a surge of warmth and happiness, a feeling so intense that it nearly took her breath away. Claire glanced down to discover that she—or whoever she was—was wearing the brown blazer. She heard herself speak. But it was a man’s deep voice that issued from her throat
.

“Lynn, you look cold.”

In one smooth motion, the man shrugged out of the jacket and wrapped it lovingly around her mother’s shoulders. It was at that moment Claire noticed the gentle swell of her teenage mother’s belly. She was pregnant
.

“Don’t be an idiot, Tom. You’ll freeze,” her mom replied with a gently reproving look
.

Tom
, Claire thought. Was that her dad’s name? My God, this was incredible! She was experiencing a precious moment from her mom’s past—a moment her mother had never shared with her. Claire desperately wished her mom was wearing reflective sunglasses, so she could see the man’s face.

A new sound entered Claire’s consciousness, louder than even the New York traffic: the thump and vibration of the front door closing. She blinked and came back to the present with such force that she almost fell backward. The sounds of her mom dropping her bag and keys on the table downstairs filtered upward.

“Claire?” came her mom’s voice. “Are you here?”

Claire quickly zipped up the garment bag and stuffed it back in the closet. She shut the closet doors and double-checked that the room was in the exact same state in which she’d found it.

“Claire?” Her mom was starting up the stairs now.

Claire tiptoed down the hall into her own room, where she dove onto the bed, jammed earbuds in her ears, and snatched up a textbook from the floor. Her mom appeared in the doorway. Claire kept her eyes on the text, pretending to read.

“Why are you reading in the dark?” her mom said, flicking on the light switch.

Claire gave her mom her most innocent, surprised look, as she tugged loose one earbud. “What?”

“Hello to you, too. Why didn’t you turn a light on?”

“It was, like, totally sunny five minutes ago.”

“Well, now the sun is setting. Thanks for putting the lasagna in the oven—it’ll be ready in ten minutes. I’ll make the salad. Come down and set the table.”

“’kay. Just let me finish this paragraph.”

Her mom nodded and headed briefly into her own room. Claire held her breath, listening, waiting. A few seconds later, she heard her mom return downstairs, apparently not having noticed anything out of the ordinary.

Dodged that bullet
, Claire thought, heaving a sigh of relief.

Throughout dinner her mom was uncharacteristically quiet. Which was just as well, since Claire’s thoughts were preoccupied by the strange couple of days she’d had and all the questions that were burning in her mind. Like: What had her mom’s childhood been like? Where was that palatial house? Not to mention the whole angel thing. Tom
had
to be her father. Her mom was pregnant at the time. Why else would her mom have kept that jacket all those years, unless she loved him very much—and missed him? Still, did her mom really know who and what Tom was, and that Claire was a Halfblood?

And oh yeah: Am I destined to be vaporized by a Council of celestial beings?

This wasn’t the right time to bring any of this up. She’d stick to her plan and say nothing. For now.

Thankfully, however, Claire
could
talk to Brian and Erica. She spent several hours on video chat that night, telling them about her dad’s jacket vision, and detailing everything she’d learned from Alec.

“Fascinating,” Brian said, in a dead-on impression of Mr. Spock, when she’d gone over all that she remembered. “And frightening.” He insisted he’d been paying full attention, even though his eyes were glued to the video game he was playing—and winning—simultaneously.

“I sure hope Alec knows what he’s doing,” Erica added, “and can get you off the hook.”

“You’re not the only one,” Claire agreed.

“What I want to know is, what’s Alec
doing
here?” Brian said.

“What do you mean?” Claire asked.

“He said the Grigori watch over the Awakened and police the Fallen—but that he wasn’t assigned to you. So what
is
his assignment?”

“Huh. That’s a good question,” Claire said. “We’ll have to ask him tomorrow.”

Mr. Patterson faced the class, swinging his right hand up forcefully against his left fist, an action that propelled a tiny wad of paper up with a resounding
pop
. “Okay! Pop quiz, everyone.”

The class groaned. Claire stifled a yawn. After the late-night chat with the gang, she’d been up until two in the morning doing homework. That, compounded by her lack of sleep on Saturday night, made her so groggy that she’d barely been able to drag herself out of bed that morning.

“Clean sheet of paper, name at the top,” Patterson commanded. “Question one: Name three things that Benjamin Franklin invented.”

Claire leaned toward Alec, who sat beside her. “How about, name the true source of Franklin’s genius,” she whispered with a covert smile.

Something whizzed past her head and hit the wall behind them—a small, pink rubber eraser. Claire started up guiltily to find Mr. Patterson glaring at her.

“I’m sorry, Miss Brennan, I seem to have dropped something back there,” Patterson intoned flatly. “Would you mind bringing it back to me? Or would that interrupt your conversation?”

Claire flushed and was struggling for a reply when Alec scooped up the tiny eraser and stood. “It was my fault, sir. I wasn’t sure I heard your question properly, and Claire was just repeating it for me.”

“Next time, Mr. MacKenzie, raise your hand and ask
me
to repeat it.”

“Yes, sir.” Alec walked to the front and calmly set the eraser on Patterson’s desk.

Claire hid a grateful smile. Mr. Patterson continued with the oral quiz. After class, she waited for Alec outside.

“Thanks for taking the blame,” Claire said as he emerged.

“I told you I’d protect you.”

She returned his grin as they headed off together toward their next class. She was bursting with questions for him, but first she was eager to share her news. “I have something to tell you.”

“What?”

“I found my father’s jacket last night.”

Alec’s green eyes widened as Claire told him the whole story, from the thing with her mother’s shoe, to her grandmother’s ring, to the vision about her mother and Tom.

“For a few minutes, I
was
my own father—at least, I’m pretty sure it was him. I didn’t feel sick or hot during any of those visions, either. Why is that?”

“Your body is getting used to your mind being displaced to another time and location,” Alec explained. “But there could be more to it. They were pretty gentle visions, weren’t they?”

“They were all lovely.”

“And the sickest you ever felt was when you watched me…?”

Claire nodded.

“It’s possible that the more violent a vision is, the greater the toll it takes on your body.”

“Fun,” Claire muttered sarcastically.

“This is really significant, Claire. You should be proud. You made all those objects talk to you. That level of control doesn’t always happen this quickly.” Alec reached out hesitantly, as if to take her hand.

Claire flinched away just inches from contact as their eyes met. She swallowed hard. “We probably shouldn’t …”

“Right,” he said, lowering his hand and shoving it in his pocket. “Better not to take any chances.”

“This is so frustrating,” she groaned, “being so afraid to touch anyone.”

Alec gave her an encouraging smile. “It won’t always be this way.”

“It won’t? How do you know?”

“I don’t—not for sure. But look how much progress you’ve made already. Something tells me you’ll learn how to control your abilities, Claire Brennan, and it will happen sooner than you think.”