When Cameron screeched to a halt on a narrow pull-off, I flew forward and hit the cab. Pain exploded in my head. For the second time I almost lost consciousness, but I fought it with every ounce of determination I had.
I glanced back at Jared. He hadn’t moved. He was still standing there, eyeing me, his powerful stance testifying to his strength, to the might he held in his grasp.
Cameron jumped out of the cab and retrieved the rifle from the bed. He turned and pointed it.
Jared stood his ground.
But again I lunged and knocked Cameron off balance. The shot fired harmlessly into the air.
Jared bared his teeth.
As Cameron chambered another round, Jared turned and sprinted toward the caves in the red canyon wall, disappearing behind a hill.
With a curse, Cameron threw the rifle onto the ground. “Why did you do that?” he yelled, engulfed by anger and frustration. “Don’t you see what you’ve done?”
I shook my head in disgust. “You’re crazy. You’re both crazy.”
He stepped toward me and I tensed. He must have seen me flinch, because he stopped himself. Tension dug furrows into his forehead as he glared at me. “Better crazy than dead,” he said at last. He turned and latched the abused tailgate. “Get in the cabin.”
“I’m not going anywhere with you. You’re absolutely nuts. Here you’ve been stalking me for days, and now —”
“Him!” he said harshly. “It! I’ve been stalking that thing for the last three days.”
His confession stunned me. I stared at him with mouth agape. Why would he have been stalking Jared?
Growing impatient, Cameron tried to take hold of me again, to drag me back into his pickup. I fought him with a wicked kick to his shin.
Success at last. Finally something got his attention. He let go with a string of curses any rapper would be proud of and fell back against the tailgate, rubbing his shin vigorously. After a moment, he slid to the bumper and cast a malevolent look at me, breathing hard, his patience clearly dissipating.
“Whose blood do you think you’re covered in?” he asked, raw emotion ragging his voice.
I glanced down at myself for the first time and gasped. He was right. I was practically drenched in blood. My apricot shirt had become dark crimson. My capris had huge ugly spots and hung in ragged tatters over my knees. I swiped at the blood, tried to get it off as a latent state of shock consumed me.
“That thing’s?” he continued. “Mine? It’s yours, Lorelei.” He leaned forward. “You don’t know what it is, why it was sent here.”
“Sent here?” I asked as I peeled my shirt away from my skin. Nothing. Not a single scratch, and yet at some point I’d been drenched in blood.
“For you. It was sent here for you,” he said with fury.
“Of course,” I said as realization dawned. How else could I have survived without a scratch? “To save me.”
Cameron scoffed aloud and shoved away from the truck. “Man, I wish I lived in your world.” He picked up the rifle and threw it in the bed. “I’ll tell you what, shortstop, when you’re ready to return to Earth, you let me know. Until then, get your ass in the cab. I’m not leaving you out here.”
“He saved my life, Cameron.”
In an instant he turned on me, whirled around and stabbed me with a glare that made the blue in his eyes ignite with anger. “It doesn’t do that!” he yelled, waving a hand toward the spot where Jared had been standing. “It doesn’t save lives, Lorelei. That’s not what it does.”
“Then what?” I asked, growing more irritated by the second. “What are you talking about?”
“That’s it.” He raised his face toward the heavens as though asking God for patience. After sucking in a deep breath, he acknowledged me again. “I’m not doing this here. We have to go. Now, you will either get into this truck voluntarily, or you will get in by force. I’m up for either. But let me assure you, one way or another, you will get into this truck.”
He was serious. Arguing with him had come to an end. With a sigh of resignation, I lifted my chin and strolled to the passenger’s side, pretending it had been my idea all along. I needed to sit down anyway, before I collapsed.
Cameron climbed in and slammed his door shut to emphasize his sour mood. The sound sent a shock wave jolting through me. It sounded like the rifle as it fired into Jared’s chest. I flinched and molded myself into the corner like the Cowardly Lion.
When Cameron started the truck, a wave of nausea washed over me. Everything that had happened that day hit me in one massive assault. From waking to find Cameron crouched by the tree outside my window—still there from the night before—to crashing into Jared in the hall; from being shoved into the street by skateboarders to being given a second chance at life by an angel; from witnessing the most savage acts of violence I had ever imagined possible to enduring the raw hatred and anger in Jared’s eyes; from all of that to this. To not knowing why any of it was happening, to not knowing who Jared was, or how he did what he did.
“Wait,” I said in a whisper as I felt my stomach lurch. “Wait, pull over.”
“No way.”
“No, I’m going to be sick. Pull over.”
When I covered my mouth with both hands, Cameron reluctantly pulled over. Bile burned the back of my throat before I could open the door. Stumbling out of the pickup, I heaved onto the side of the road. I threw up the cappuccino I’d had at the coffee shop and a few other contents I dared not identify.
Cameron came around to stand beside me and tried to sympathize, but I held up a hand. “Don’t,” I said as I started to cry. “Just don’t.”
For reasons unknown even to myself, a sadness welled up inside me. I couldn’t hold it back. Tears glided past my lashes and trailed down my blistered cheeks. I fell raggedly to my knees and cried on the side of the road like a two-year-old.
I shook with trauma, with shock, with fear and doubt. And I longed for my parents, mourned their deaths. There were so many questions left unanswered. In the years since their disappearance, I hadn’t forgotten what it felt like to be in their arms. It was like being embraced by love, enveloped by warmth and safety. I wanted them back so much, now more than ever.
I could feel Cameron at my side, but he didn’t try to touch me again. Instead, he handed me an oily rag, probably one he used to work on his engine. But it was better than nothing. I wiped my face and mouth and after several embarrassing moments, I pulled cool air into my lungs and forced myself to calm.
A thought had emerged. A thought that, however disturbing, would explain a lot.
I looked up at Cameron, swallowed back the lump in my throat, and asked with more curiosity than fear, “Am I dead?”
He crouched beside me with a grim smile and, in the most understanding voice, said, “Not even close.”
THE GIRL IN THE MIRROR
As Cameron cut through the dirt parking lot of Wild ’n Wonderful, my grandparents’ health food store, I hunkered down in the passenger’s seat.
“It’s your grandmother,” he said, letting me know who was in front running the store. It should have been me. I was scheduled to work at four. Guilt washed over me, adding to the turmoil churning in my already upset stomach.
“Was Grandpa with her?”
“I didn’t see him.”
“Darn. He may be in the house.” My mind raced as Cameron pulled around to the back of the store where I’d lived since I was six. The store had an attached apartment. After my parents’ disappearance, I moved in with my grandparents. I’d practically lived there anyway. My mom ran the store most of the time while I was being spoiled rotten by Grandma and Grandpa. Mom always said it should have been criminal to be so pampered. My
