Sparked (The Metal Bones Series Book 1) (28 page)

“You are h-he-helping me now,” she whispered, and then sprung into his arms.

He stroked her back and my heart flipped at the tenderness in his movements. “Sometimes I feel like I do more harm than help.”

“That’s not true,” Bonnie said.

“What is this?” Bear cracked his head in the door. “Group hug?”

Kyle followed him inside and they jumped on top of Alec and Bonnie.

Bonnie laughed as they all rolled to the floor together. I smiled, watching them topple to the ground. They had a way with each other that I envied, a way most humans didn’t have with each other.

It was almost as if they were so much more than human
. Alec rolled over to me and pinned me under him. “It’s nice seeing you smile.”

“Hey.” I laughed and twisted under him. Those penetrating green eyes of his focused on me as he dropped more of his weight to stop me from turning.

“You don’t fight fair,” I said, and rubbed my nose against his.

“With you, baby, there is no such thing as fair.”

I laughed, my heart flying up high to the tippy tops of the trees with happiness.

“Come on.” He helped me up. Kyle, Bear, and Bonnie messed around while Alec guided me outside into the cool air. It blew through my hair, scattering stray pieces every which way.

“You have this way with her.” Alec leaned against the railing and tugged me into his arms. “She opens up with you like I’ve never seen before.”

I shrugged. “I think I reminded her of him, of Steve.”

The wind whistled through the trees and his bangs swayed against his forehead. “I think it’s more than that.”

I rested my head on his chest. The breeze caressed my face and I closed my eyes, inhaling pinecones and dewy grass and morning mist. “I almost forgot what the outside smelled like.”

Alec’s muscles tightened around my body and I wished I hadn’t reminded him—or me—of what we were trying to forget. “Tell me about your cousin. Was she what you expected?”

“London,” I said and her name floated off my lips and drifted away in the breeze, like my chances of knowing her and saving her.

I left her there. I let them take Paula. I should have done something.

“She looks just like me.” My voice caught, and something tugged at my heart. “But that’s where it ends. She’s nothing”—her fire-breathing-dragon tattoo glided into my vision—“like me.”

She’s Mom’s dream child.

An arrow zipped through my heart, piercing me, and I rubbed the ache with my palm.

She’s what Mom always wanted.

“How did you meet her?” His voice lowered.

Darkness.

A florescent light stuttered from the ceiling. Blond and black locks of hair. Unveiled pale blue eyes, staring at me, from my own face.

So like me and so unlike me.

“I . . .” I took a deep breath. “S-Sh-Sh-She . . .” My voice trembled. I pressed my lips together and swallowed.

Breathe.

My heart thumped around in my chest and I rubbed my hands on my jeans.

“She . . .” Tears sprang into my eyes.

“Vienna.” Alec enclosed me in warmth, and I dissolved in his arms, my body shaking, my heart shuddering, and my soul aching.

Wh-Wh-what’s . . . w-wr-wrong with me?

I squeezed my eyes shut.

Why . . . Why am I doing this?

Breathe.

I inhaled and exhaled, stuttering and mumbling, inhaling and exhaling, trying to calm the beating of my heart, trying to still the quaking of my shoulders, trying to quiet the quivering of my lips.

Breathe.

His scent mingled into me.

I can do this.

I took in one last shaky breath.

“It-It-It wasn’t . . . It—” My words tripped over each other, and I collapsed. Sobs raked through me. I convulsed in his arms as tears choked me and images blinded me.

Traitor!

If there was a sweet candy-colored-pink side of me, you’d be it.

“Shh . . .” Alec rocked me, diluting the voices. “This is normal. It’s aftershock.”

No.

I choked on another sob, gasping in his arms.

I shook my head.

Th
-
Th
-
This is not normal. Th
-
This . . . This is not me. This . . . is not who I am.

Alec nuzzled me, nipping my ear, tasting my neck, teasing my lips. And desire flared, soft and slow, unfurling within me. I looked up into evergreen-lust filled eyes and kissed him. His hot lips plummeted into mine, absorbing my cries, and I moaned into his mouth. I thrust my hands into his silky raven hair and breathed him in.

God.
I sighed.
So good.

My tears bathed his cheeks, my hands cradled his face, and my lips devoured his.

Mine.

“You’re going to kill me if you keep doing that,” he said, his lips tasting my ear, and his heart pounding with mine.

I leaned my forehead against his. “You started it.”

He smiled, erasing the haggard lines around his mouth, the dark pooling circles beneath his eyes, and the heavy creases between his brows.

Oh, Alec.

My heart sank as I traced the deepened lines on his face.

What have I done to you? What have I done?

He brought my finger to his lips. “I have you back now. That’s all that matters.”

My heart purred in my chest and I felt heat rise into my face.

“There’s something I need to tell you,” he said, and the light left his eyes.

I snorted. “At this point, it doesn’t even matter. I don’t care. If you were an alien—”

“I called your parents.”

My stomach fell, sinking below my feet. I moved to lean over the railing, letting the wind cool my face. “My parents?”

Mom?

Dad.

A lump welled in my throat.

I must be the worst daughter imaginable.

I didn’t even think about them, not one time since I got out.

Alec wrapped his arms around my waist, fitting his body to mine. “They’re glad you’re okay,” he said into my ear.

“I’m such a bad daughter,” I choked out, “I didn’t even think of them. I should have called them. I should have—”

“I’ll never understand why you always do this to yourself. You’re the total perfect daughter.”

I stifled a laugh and leaned back into his warm chest. “If only. If only. If I was the perfect daughter I wouldn’t have been hunted by the government and placed in a . . .” I swallowed, not wanting to say the words aloud.

“I told your parents we could take you back home now,” Alec said. “You can go back home.”

Home?

Was it even home anymore?

“I can’t,” I said.

“But your parents can’t wait to see you.”

I vaulted out of his arms. “What about London? And after everything’s that happened, you’re just . . . going to send me back home?” 

“That was the promise, Vienna.”

“So what? You think I can just go home and pretend this never happened? Pretend everything never happened?” My voice and my arms started to rise in unison. “You think I can do that? Pretend”—I hissed through my teeth—“as if nothing’s happened? When everything’s happened. I’m just supposed to go back to normal life after this? Not knowing what’s become of Paula? Not knowing . . .” My voice shook. “. . . what happened to London? Am I supposed to go on living, like this never happened?”

“And what do you propose to do?” He crossed his arms. “Go storm the place?”

“They have taken something from me.” I pounded my fist on the railing. “Something that I can never get back.”

They have taken my joy. They have taken my happiness. They have taken my blood.

“That is what they do.” His eyes saddened. “They take and take and take until there’s nothing left to take.” His shoulders hunched. “Don’t let them do that to you, baby.” He reached out and his index finger traced my jaw. “Don’t let them win.”

London . . .

My lip trembled.

London?

“But it feels like they already won.”

Alec drew me into his chest and my arms slipped around his waist.

“When they . . .” He swallowed against my hair and his voice lowered. “When they released me, after-after all the testing, it was like they took something from me, too. Like they ripped something apart deep inside of me. I understand. You feel like you’ve become undone.” He rocked us together in an embrace. “You should know your parents are desperate to see you. They almost bought a plane ticket here.”

“But I don’t know what to tell them about . . .”

Say it, Vienna. Say it.

About Bacchart. About the room of doors. About the darkness. About the stuttering light. About the smoke steaming out encircling me.

My lips stilled, my tongue along with it.

“You tell them whatever you want. Whatever you feel comfortable saying,” he said.

But what do you say when you don’t feel comfortable saying anything?

I gingerly brushed my mind over the thin crack of my soundproof wall.

I want to see you, Mom.
I squeezed my eyes shut.

You are my blood. And you are part of me.

My lips quivered, finally working. “When-when do we leave?”

“As soon as you’re ready. The car’s been packed.”

Everything’s ready to go, to go home.

“London?”

“We’re already working on a plan.”

“What?” I shifted. “Why didn’t you tell me? What is it? Can I have a look at it?”

“The less you know about everything, the better.”

I frowned. “I find that odd considering I know more about the place than anyone.” I pursed my lips. “Who else do you know that’s been inside?”

No one’s seen its depths—not like I have.

“Whenever you’re ready, we can talk about it,” he said.

But I was ready. “I—”

“No.” He pressed a finger firmly against my lips, silencing them. “You’re not.”

I swallowed. But I . . . I was.

I was.

I was.

Chapter 43

I reached into the bag at my feet and hustled out one of the books Alec bought me. I propped both feet on the dashboard, stretching them out. The ride with Alec had so far been peaceful and calm, and my aching body was convinced it had been way longer than fourteen hours.

The lines around Alec’s eyes eased immeasurably since he picked me up, those two days ago.

Two days.

London.

Ago.

“Vienna?”

I snapped my eyes to him. His midnight disheveled hair teased the tips of his long eyelashes framing the emerald green of his eyes. He was too good looking for his own good. And for mine.

“You doing all right?” He raised his eyebrows.

No.

“Yes.”

“Everything’s going to be okay.” He brushed a strand of hair behind my ear.

I gave him a smile and looked out my window, watching the snow blow past us.

Snow.

Cold.

Freezing.

And just like that, my thoughts bled into one another like a river, flowing from one to the other until it reached the endless pit of foreverness.

Darkness exploded around me.

A flickering florescent light.

Boots echoing along cement floors.

Latches clicking.

Doors swinging.

“It’s the link.” Her blue eyes. “It’s the one thing everyone in here has in common.”

Her laugh
—

“Vienna?” Alec placed a hand on my leg.

“Yeah?” I swallowed.

He squeezed my knee. “How you holding up?”

“Fine. Just fine,” I whispered.

“When we get home, what are you going to do? Any plans?”

I sighed, trying to send all my frustration out with it. “I don’t even know where to start with coming up with a plan. It’s so weird.” I leaned back in the seat. “I don’t understand. They said I was the first successful completion and they were so happy about it. Everyone was.”

But it wasn’t even that the pieces didn’t fit together.

It was that I had no pieces.

Chapter 44

Instead of a red and dark gray trim, the house through the car window was now a cream-colored caramel trim house with arched windows.

I squinted against the sun setting from behind the house. Maybe it was all a trick of the light. Maybe the glare of the sun was playing with my eyes and messing with the colors and style of the house that was supposed to be mine.

I shielded my eyes, trying to see past it, to where the house I grew up in used to be.

Alec ran his thumb along the pillow lines that formed on my face. “You’re so beautiful when you sleep.” He kissed the corner of my mouth. “But then, you’re always beautiful.”

My stomach flipped and I turned back to look out the window.

“Are you sure that’s the same house?”

“It’s the same address. Isn’t it?” He tugged a strand of hair behind my ear.

I pursed my lips.

It didn’t look like a house Mom would ever live in.

“They didn’t move, Vienna. People change, and sometimes it’s for the better.”

“Humph.” I slumped in my seat. I wondered if the contents—and the people—were as different inside as the outside appeared. I wondered if Alec was right. If people could change.

“Stop it.” Alec lifted my chin. “They love you and they missed you.”

Would they still love me the same if they knew what happened to me? What I did? After Paula? After Dean?

After London?

“Come on.” Alec helped me out of the car, and my body suddenly decided to side with gravity and give out on me. Alec grabbed a loop in my jeans and picked me up into his arms. He rested his head against mine and pinecones permeated my body. “They’re going to be so overjoyed.” He folded his hand in mine. “Don’t make them wait any longer.”

I breathed him in and allowed him to lead me up the trail to the house, to
my
parents’ house. The landscaping was still the same, same old barren trees, same old evergreen bushes, same old . . . door?

I frowned.

The doorknocker had been replaced, and a shiny new doorbell had been installed in the wall against the new cream-colored paint . . . and caramel trim.

“Where’s the rest of the crew? Didn’t they come with us?”

“Nope. Just you and me, babe. Now stop trying to delay, and ring the bell.”

I narrowed my eyes. “They didn’t want to be here for this ‘reunion’?” I air quoted the last word.

Alec leaned against the wall, giving me that lazy smile and letting his black hair sweep over his forehead. “They wanted it to be special.”

I huffed.

I had a feeling this would be anything but special.

I steeled my shoulders, lifted my finger, and rang the bell.

A skittering sound came from the other side as locks slid, chains unhooked, codes were entered and then the door opened and I saw . . .

Mom?

My heart leaped in my chest.

Mom.

Her yellow eyes paled.
“Vienna.” She reached for me and then her eyes rolled back into her head.

“M-M-Mom?”

My heart cantered in my chest as she fell, gracefully careening into my outstretched arms.

“M-Mom?” I shouted her name again, cradling her and falling to the ground with her. The color slowly slipped off her face.

“Mom?” I whispered. Blood froze in my veins and my eyes focused on her lifeless face. “M-Mom?”

Oh god. Was she dying?

I choked and hunched over, unable to breathe looking at her stony face.

Oh god.

Oh god.

Oh
—

“She’s fainted.” Alec lifted his fingers from her neck and brought them to mine, stroking and caressing my cheek. “Easy. Easy. She’s going to be okay and so are you. Here”—he took her from my arms and carried her over to the couch where he laid her and crossed her hands over her body. She looked like Snow White after eating the poison apple.

Oh God.

Then Dad barged into the room. A triumphant cry strangled his lips when his gray eyes locked on mine.

With Dad, it was like I could do no wrong. And more importantly, it was like I never left.

“Dad,” I whimpered, and we collapsed into each other. He embraced me in his soft arms and I tightened my fingers around his button-down shirt.

Dad.

Old Spice engulfed me.

It’s you.

I buried my face in his shoulder.

It’s you.

“Vienna. Vienna,” he said, and squeezed the air out of me. “You’re home, you’re home, you’re home. Finally.”

Mom struggled, waking on the couch. My name pierced her lips and my heart thundered in my chest.

“She hasn’t been the same,” Dad said, and his eyes roved my face. “Since you left.”

I hadn’t really expected my leaving to have this much of an impact on Mom. I hadn’t really expected Mom to—I swallowed—to miss me.

But she did, Vienna. She did miss you.

Dad held me out, looking me over. He was still as tall and reddish-brown-haired as I remembered.

Still Dad. My dad.

I knelt beside Mom, and she raised a hand, touching my face. Tears formed in her eyes. Her fingers, soft and clean, rested against my skin, smelling of Dove Soap.

“I can’t . . .” Mom’s throat worked. “I can’t believe . . .” She threw her arms around me, paralyzing me.

My mind went numb. Was Mom . . . was Mom hugging me?

She missed you, Vienna. She did.

My hands went around her and brushed against the silk of her blouse.

Alec smiled at me over her shoulder as if telling me,
I told you so
.

“I . . .” I pressed my lips together. “I missed you, too. Mom.”

I did.

“Oh, Vienna.” Her arms tightened. “Oh, my darling.”

Darling?

I was Mom’s darling?

“You’re going to bruise her.” Dad gently plucked Mom’s fingers off my arms and I eased back onto my knees in front of her.

Dad’s eyes shone. “You made it. I honestly.” He swallowed. “I didn’t know—”

“If you’d come home,” Mom whispered, her fingers flitting through pieces of my ponytail as if she couldn’t stop touching me.

“I’m here.”

But not all of us are.

“I met her,” I blurted.

Mom’s eyes cleared. “What?”

I clasped my hands over my mouth and looked at Alec.

Crap! I didn’t mean to. Not so soon.

“Vienna?” Dad shook his head. “Who did you meet?”

“London.” The word escaped my lips before I could recall it.

Mom sucked in a breath.

“Who?” Dad asked softly again.

“A girl . . .” I swallowed and looked at Mom, straight into her wide yellow eyes. “Who had a face identical to mine.”

“No.” Mom’s voice trembled and her skin turned to white ash. “It—”

“She’s Aunt Tamera’s daughter.” My heart cracked, falling in broken pieces. Aunt Tamera’s fingers pushed against the fracture of my interior wall.

Let me out. Let me out. You must get my daughter. You have to save my daughter. Save London! Please.

I shook my head, putting a Band-Aid over her words, putting a Band-Aid over the crack, as if that would fix it—as if that would fix everything.

“Not . . .” Mom’s voice died. Her hands shook. “Is . . .?” Mom’s doe eyes burned into me. “Is Tamera . . .?”

I stared down at my hands.
How was I supposed to tell her? How could I?

I looked away from them, finding a spot on the beige carpet.
How could you not know, Mom?
“Lung cancer,” I spit out.

I shouldn’t have to been the one to tell you.

She’s your sister.
I lowered my head.

Your sister.

“Tamera? But Tamera?” Mom shook my shoulders with a strength she couldn’t possibly have had and my head swayed back and forth on my body. “She, Tamera, she can’t be gone?”

My head felt like a balloon caught up in a wind storm, being blown back and forth. Bounce. Spin. Bounce. Spin. Spin.

I can’t.

My breath clogged in my throat.

I can’t.

And then pinecones were everywhere, enshrouding me.

“I should have told you both.” Alec insulated me in his arms.

“It’s all right.” I heard Dad’s hand slide into Mom’s. “Please give us a minute.”

I peeked through Alec’s arms and saw Mom’s wide, shock-filled eyes, her ashen face and shaking hands.

Alec ushered me into the kitchen and on the way, my gaze caught on the picture of the three sisters on the mantel of the fireplace. Three little blondes curtsying in a row. Now only two were left, the one gone with a daughter soon to follow.

“You made it back. In one piece.” Robotatouille leaned against the stove.

I pursed my lips.

My wall is cracked. London is still there. And if you think I still am one whole piece, you should pry me open and look inside.

All my pieces would tumble right out in front of you.

“How’s it been?” Alec squeezed my hand when I remained quiet and set me on the counter. I slid a drawer open from under me.

“Cooking and cleaning.” Robotatouille tapped the pots hanging from the center of the kitchen island. “For the most part. Glad you’re back. Surprised you’re back, actually, but glad.”

I clicked my heels together. I wondered how he’d feel once he knew I was going back for London and, hopefully, all them.

The drawer banged shut beneath me and Robotatouille’s eyes narrowed on mine.

I heard the shuffle of Dad’s feet and saw him enter the kitchen with Mom. “Have you checked your room yet, Vienna?”

My room?
That’s right. I had an actual room. That was mine.

I shook my head, ignoring Robotatouille’s eyes on my back, and followed Dad to my room.

“Take a look.” Dad opened the door, and I wanted to laugh.

The room was perfect.

Exactly the way it had been before.

My fingers traced the fresh coat of paint on the walls, across my brand new closet door—where the robot had gone flying through—my resurrected picture frames, my books all fully restocked and restored.

My room was everything I was supposed to be.

The same.

I rested my palm against the wall.

And I bet under all those coats of paint, the scars were still there, the scars still lurked, hidden deep inside the support beams.

And here I was staring at a room, pretending everything was okay.

When it wasn’t.

A bubble formed in my throat starting to build, wanting out, until I turned and met Dad’s hopeful face. One look at him and I swallowed the pain down into my stomach.

“Thank you,” I whispered instead and Tamera pounded against the fracture in my mind.

I can’t hurt my parents again.

I’m sorry, Tamera.

I removed the Band-Aid and spread caulk over the fissure of my wall, deadening out Tamera’s cries.

I looked up and found everyone staring at me.

I shifted.

“We’ll give you some time,” Dad said. Mom opened her mouth but Dad shook his head, helping her out of the room.

“What happened?” I asked.

“You sure you’re all right?” Alec tilted his head.

“How am I supposed to be all right?” I strode toward the window. “How can they pretend everything is all right?”

“Who says they are?” Alec asked, suddenly behind me and cupped his hands over my shoulders.

“But aren’t they?” I gestured back at the room. “I feel like it’s their way of saying they expect me to be who I was before I left.”

Alec leaned me back into his sturdy chest and rested his chin on my head. “No one is asking you to do anything, Vienna.”

“I just”—my shoulders shook—“can’t help it. I keep thinking about London. And leaving her there. All alone.”

“You’re allowed to.”

“Alec?” My voice sounded lost and forlorn even in my own ears. “How am I supposed to go on from here?”

How am I supposed to pretend to live a normal life?

“We take one hour at a time. One day at a time. That’s how I got through. And that’s how we’ll get through.”

I don’t know how long we stayed like that, holding each other in front of my window, cascading in the sunlight, feeling the steady beating of each other’s hearts until Dad knocked on the door.

I uncurled from Alec’s body and the vein in Dad’s forehead pulsed.

“See you tomorrow,” Alec said, and kissed my forehead.

“But—”

Alec stilled my objections with a finger against my lips. “I’ll be back in the morning. And I’m never leaving you”—he cupped my face and those emerald eyes of his blazed into me—“never.”

He kissed the tip of my nose and I shivered as he walked past Dad in the doorway. Dad watched him walk the whole way out.