26
Julia
Nathaniel is out of the Jeep and running before I can put it in park. Time slows down. I’m walking toward them. I take out my phone. Call the police. I feel outside my body. Just acting, not thinking.
I inhale sharply as Nathaniel drops to his brother. “Lincoln?”
“I’m calling 911,” I say listening to my phone ring.
Nathaniel’s face is pale as he nods to me before returning to Lincoln who is bleeding from a cut on his forehead and holding his arms around his stomach.
Nathaniel gently pulls up his brother’s shirt and I gasp back the tears that instantly prick my eyes.
“911, what’s your emergency?”
“We need an ambulance,” I say, distantly aware of Lincoln moaning and shaking his head. Nathaniel helps me get the boy into his house when I hand him the phone for his address.
I kneel next to Lincoln and push back the dark curls that line his face. “It’s going to be okay. You’re safe now.” I say it over and over and hold his hand until the ambulance arrives.
“I’m going to go with them,” Nathaniel says to me. He’s lost, his mind working a million miles an hour.
“It’s fine. I’ll lock up when I leave. Take your phone and keys.” I hand him both things as I pushed him toward the ambulance.
“It’s going to be okay,” I repeat to Nathaniel. “Go with him.”
His eyes come into focus and search my face. “He should have been here with me. This is my fault.” Unshed tears balance on red-rimmed eyes.
“This is nobody’s fault but William’s. Do you understand me?” He nods numbly as I pull him in for a hard hug. “You are with him now. He’s going to be okay.”
He runs a hand over his face. He shakes the tears back and nods. “Okay, I’ll call you later.”
“Yes. Go.”
* * *
I drive home checked out from my body. My mind keeps flashing images of Lincoln’s battered body and the anguish that twisted Nathaniel. I have to keep shooting out sparks of harmless light to keep myself from boiling over. My powers seem stronger the more I use them. Instead of running out of steam, they only seem to grow, like a muscle being worked regularly.
That monster, William—their father … I could kill that man. I want him to hurt. To suffer as his sons have suffered. What sort of twisted monster takes out his own pain on children? In my mind, he’s strapped to a chair and I explore all my abilities on his flesh. I’ve never burned with such hateful revenge but I have never cared so much for two people since my grandparents.
I sit in my car and stare at the front of my house. I’ve only come home to pack a few things and check on Ginger. Then I’ll get some coffee and head to the hospital for the night. The sun is in the process of setting, fat and hot in the sky. Blaring pink light reflects off the windows of the house, causing me to squint.
I’m almost to my front door, keys in hand, when the sound of feet crunching in the gravel behind me makes me pause.
More than one set of feet.
“We meet again,” a deep voice grumbles.
Slowly, I turn, positioning my keys between my knuckles. A trick every girl learns as soon as she gets breasts.
Adrenaline slows time and messes with my head. It takes my panicked brain several seconds to analyze the scene. The large man in front of me is straight out of a slasher film. Dressed in a long leather apron, his face is obscured by a full-sized welding mask. The two men that flank him are wearing similar outfits.
The man in middle smacks a crowbar smugly against his palm. The one to his right, equal in girth but slightly short in stature, wraps a thick chain around his wrist. The third has a crossed piece of metal—a tire iron?
At least they’re not guns.
If their intention is to intimidate me, they’re succeeding.
“Miss me?” The middle man’s voice is muffled under the mask. “I haven’t stopped thinking about you.”
