The Saints of the Cross (32 page)

“All right, boys,” McCreary says to the guys.“Do the rest of you have rides home, or not?”

I peer through the glass doors into the dark, just as the limo pulls up to the front of the precinct. Javier, still holding the blood-soaked handkerchief to his nose, turns back, and warm relief floods me when I see that his expression has gone soft again. I put my hand to the door, and he lifts his free hand in a brief wave, reminding me of that day at the airport when we first parted. He slides into the back of the limo, and William closes the door. I turn away, because seeing him go like that is putting a dagger through my heart. I open my eyes, and Xander is staring at me, hard. When he realizes I’m staring back, he looks away.

“Our ride is almost here,” Jude answers. Jude, Christian, and Xander are whispering among themselves, and I take a seat by the door.

A few minutes later, Laurel comes barreling through the door in her typical dramatic fashion—heels clicking on the tile floor, hips sashaying, hair billowing out behind her— with Camilla hot on her heels. She storms right up to Officer McCreary and, with a face that would send a seasoned assassin running, points a finger right in his face. I realize something; no matter what anyone thinks of her, Laurel has some serious balls, and we all have to respect that.

“My mother is Katherine Danton, and if you don’t let my friends go, she’ll sue you for everything you’ve got and your great-grandkids will still be paying for it when they die. Understood?”

“First of all, girlie, take your finger out of my face,” McCreary says, his cheeks turning crimson. “Secondly, are you telling me your grandfather is J.P. Danton?”

“That’s right.” Laurel indignantly crosses her arms over her chest, face smug.

“Cuff her, Collins. She’s American. She doesn’t have diplomatic immunity,” McCreary says with a glint in his eye, thumbing toward Laurel.

“Wait, Officer, wait,” Camilla pleads, stepping between Laurel and Officer Collins. “She’s just upset, that’s all.” She whispers over her shoulder to Laurel, “Stand down, dammit.”

Will wonders never cease? First, Christian steps in to defend Xander. And now, Camilla is defending Laurel. Could it get any weirder tonight? Officer McCreary’s eyes narrow at Laurel.

“Get her out of here before I throw the whole lot of you in the clink—to hell with your diplomatic immunity,” McCreary growls, his hands on his holster belt. Collins steps back behind the desk and mutters something about spoiled brats. He’s clearly disappointed at not being allowed to throw the book at us tonight.

Xander walks up to me and, without blinking, says, “I’m going to ride home with Christian and Camilla. Jude and Laurel will take you home.”

“What? But—what about the limo?” I stammer, but I know what’s going on. Xander is wounded, just not in the way Javier was. I see it in his eyes. Xander’s fidgeting and uncomfortable, looking to Jude for help. I have to try to fix this. “Xander,” I say, “I’m sorry for—”

“Don’t,” Camilla interrupts, stepping next to Xander. “It’s not the time or the place. We need to get out of here. Like, yesterday.” She throws a nervous glance back to the desk, where the cops are eyeing us.

Camilla’s right; this is not the place to be having this discussion with Xander. We need to be alone. I really don’t want to explain myself, why I acted the way I did, in front of all these people.

“Okay,” I answer. Xander turns and walks out the door behind Camilla and Christian without looking back. I’m left standing here, jaw ajar, staring after them. Jude’s looking at me with a sympathetic face, but Laurel looks like she could strangle me. I don’t blame her; this is all my fault, after all.

Jude checks his cell phone and says, “Come on, Evie. My brother Jake is here to take us home.” I shuffle past Laurel, who’s glaring at me so intensely that I swear my skin is searing off, and I follow Jude out the door.

The entire way back to McLean, as I listen to Laurel scolding Jude and blaming him for ruining her good time, all I can think about is how I’m going to get Xander back. I know in my heart that I’ve lost him, and I don’t want to accept that scenario. I can’t lose my rock. Not now. Not ever.

CHAPTER 26

What I can’t understand is how I can be so completely and utterly stupid. I haven’t heard from Xander in nearly two weeks, and I don’t blame him. When I went to Javier’s hotel, I pretty much threw everything he’s given me since the day I met him—all the warmth, all the dedication, all the love—right back in his face when I decided to go to Javier’s hotel room. Before I went to the hotel, I knew nothing good would come from that visit. And now this: I’m staring down at a package that just arrived for me via Fed-Ex from Spain.

All I want to do is to throw the package into the fireplace and torch it, but I know that will never happen. I know it’s from Javier, even though there’s no return address—just the postmark from where he mailed it. No matter how valiantly I try to forget our history together, it’s there with its razor-sharp claws ripping me up from within and turning me inside out. We had something special once; I can’t deny that. I still care about him, or I wouldn’t have thrown myself down on top of his blood-soaked body to save him from Christian’s blind rage. In the process, I’ve alienated Xander.

I don’t know why I’m sitting in my room, staring at the envelope. I’ve been in here since the Fed-Ex guy dropped it off over an hour ago. If I’d left for the mall as I’d planned, I would’ve missed the delivery, and I wouldn’t have received the package. Grandma Winnie would’ve taken one look at the postmark and thrown it in the trash. It was all I could do to keep Dad and Grandma from storming the Spanish Embassy after what happened at the Youth Ball. They were seriously pissed when they found out that Javier attacked Xander at the Youth Ball. Apparently, they never liked Javier. And that’s putting it mildly.

So I rip open the Fed-Ex envelope and look inside. There are a few papers, and another letter-sized envelope addressed to me. The documents are written in Spanish and appear to be legal in nature, issued by the government. I’ll have to sit down with my Spanish dictionary to translate them, but there are five addresses; two in Spain, and one each in Italy, New York City, and London. I carefully open the envelope with my name scrawled in blue pen on the front. It’s a handwritten letter from Javier.

Dearest Corazón,

I know you said you never want to see me again, that you are done with me, but I can’t help holding out hope that you will realize I never meant to hurt you and that you will change your mind. I have never loved anyone but you. You are my one and only love. You are the reason I will fight to stay alive. I have to believe I’ll have you to come home to from this Godforsaken place when this war is over. It’s all I have, and it’s all I need. I will carry you always in my heart. Please keep the ring.

Yours Always, Javi

P.S. Enclosed is a copy of my will and the deeds to the properties I own. I have put them all in your name. If I should not make it out of this, I want you to have everything that’s mine.

I turn the envelope upside down, and out falls the ring taped onto an index card. Not the ostentatious, four-carat engagement bauble that he gave me in the hotel room, but the heart-shaped treasure that symbolizes his heart and his love for me. With trembling hands, I place it back on my right ring finger and remember the night he gave it to me—how happy I was, how in love we were.

I was different then. In those days, I worried about one thing only—myself. My biggest fear was losing Javier. I am embarrassed to think of how selfish and immature I was. Now I am overcome with real worries, like the probability that I’ll never find my mother, or meet my biological father—that I’ll let Emma and Ethan, and Mamaw Grayce down because I will fail.

The prospect of Javier being killed in battle is absolutely mortifying. That’s paramount. Also, I fear that I have damaged Xander as a person. If we split up, will he ever be so selfless again with anyone else? Perhaps he will no longer be the same trusting and loving person because of me and my idiotic choices.

My cell phone starts ringing, and I glance at the clock on the dresser. I snatch up the phone, and my heart races as I say a silent prayer that it’s Xander calling, but it’s not. It’s Coralea. I swipe at my eyes with the back of my hand and clear my throat of the sob caught there.

“Cora?” I say when I answer the phone.

“Evie!” Cora’s tone is especially high pitched—her
I’ve-got-exciting-news
voice. “I’m moving to DC at the end of the month!”

There’s a few minutes of silence suspended in the two thousand miles between us as I try to collect myself. I need her. I need her here with me more than I can put into words.

“Evie? Are you—”

I don’t know if it’s the relief at hearing that my very best friend in the world will be here with me by the end of the month, or the conflict I feel over my feelings for Javier, or the possibility that I’ve forever lost Xander, my rock, but I completely lose it. It’s the kind of sobbing mess that when you see it in a stranger, you wonder who died.

I manage to pull myself together and launch into the whole sordid tale of what happened at the Inaugural Youth Ball. Coralea is silent the entire time I’m relating the story, which is completely outside the norm for her. I also tell her about the package I received today from Javier. Finally I finish and suck in a deep, replenishing breath. It comes back out as a pathetic little whimper.

“Evie?” Cora hesitates.

“Yes?”

“You know I love you, right? You’re the closest thing I have to a sister, you know?”

I smile to myself. “Yes, I know.”

“Well, I hope you realize that I’m here for you,” she says, and I can tell she’s stifling a sob.

“I know. Thank you.”

We continue talking about her plans to move here in a month. She tells me that she’ll be attending Georgetown in the fall. She says we should room together when I tell her I’ll probably do the same. I must stay here and help find my mother, so Stanford is completely out of the question now. And to be honest, I’m not sad about that at all. The idea of going to college so far away from home is scary in and of itself. I need my family, and they need me.

After about an hour of talking, we say our goodbyes, and I promise to call her soon, especially if I have any news about my mother. As I hang up the phone with Cora, the front doorbell buzzes. I throw a hoodie over my tank top and race down the stairs, hoping it’ll be Xander at the door, but it’s not. It’s Camilla.

“Can I come in?” Her voice is sweet, but her face is stony. “I have something I need to talk to you about.”

“Sure.”

Camilla follows me up to my room and plops down on the beanbag chair in the middle of the floor. I sit on the bed, and wait for her to start talking. We stare at each other for a few minutes until she looks away.

“You’re just as much a neat-freak as ever, huh?” she says, glancing around the room.

“I thought you had something you wanted to talk to me about, Camilla. Not that I don’t enjoy your company, or anything. I mean, it
has
been a whole two weeks since I’ve seen you,” I say, not at all trying to hide the hurt I’m feeling.

“That’s what I want to talk to you about,” she says, moving to the bed. She sits beside me and turns that obnoxiously beautiful face of hers to mine. “I’m actually here for Xander.”

When she says this, it’s a punch to the stomach. Obviously, Xander doesn’t plan to see or talk to me anytime soon.

“Where has he been?” I whisper, trying to hold myself together.

“He withdrew from school.”

I am in complete shock. I wasn’t expecting to hear that he’d left Holy Cross over this.

“He had enough credits to graduate at the end of junior year,” Camilla says. “That shouldn’t surprise you at all. You know what a nerd he is.”

“Why would he leave when we only have a couple of months left? He’s made it this far.” I know why, but I want to hear it from Camilla. If she confirms what I’m thinking, then I’ll know I have no one to blame but myself.

“He needs time to think, that’s all.” She studies my face more intently than I think she ever has before. Maybe she’s trying to figure out if I’m going to have a breakdown. I’m trying to figure that out myself. For some reason, the despair that’s welling up in me is transforming into white-hot rage. I feel it working its way up from my toes, winding around my legs, and burrowing into the pit of my stomach. It spears its razor-sharp tendrils through the pieces of my broken heart. It’s crippling, and devastating, and unrelenting. I have only one choice to survive this; I turn that rage outward.

“How very convenient for you,” I say, and there’s no denying the accusation in my tone.

“What’s that supposed to mean?” she says and scoots away from me on the bed. The look of shock on her face would be comical under any other circumstance, but this situation is far from funny.

“Come on, you know. And I know that you know that I know.” I watch the color in her face drain. “Why didn’t you tell me in the beginning about you and Xander?”

“There was nothing to tell.” She rises from the bed and moves to the window. I’m pretty sure she’s looking for a way to escape. “That was years ago, in the past. It doesn’t mean anything anymore.”

“Please don’t insult my intelligence by trying to feed me that line of crap. I’m not stupid. I don’t believe it, and neither does Christian,” I say, remembering how broken he was when he told me about their love affair. “You still love Xander, and he loves you.”