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Run to You Part Five: Fifth Touch
Clara Kensie


Part Five in the riveting romantic thriller about a family on the run from a deadly past and a first love that will transcend secrets, lies and danger…Tessa's nightmares feel all too real, and the hope of getting her family back together has never seemed so slim. Although a psychic warns her that leaving town may mean her death, Tessa cannot stay when she uncovers a new lead to her brother and sister. Not even if she must go alone and risk losing Tristan forever.







Part Five in the riveting romantic thriller about a family on the run from a deadly past and a first love that will transcend secrets, lies and danger...

Tessa’s nightmares feel all too real, and the hope of getting her family back together has never seemed so slim.

Although a psychic warns her that leaving town may mean her death, Tessa cannot stay when she uncovers a new lead to her brother and sister. Not even if she must go alone and risk losing Tristan forever.


Run to You Part V: Fifth Touch

Clara Kensie






www.miraink.co.uk (http://www.miraink.co.uk)


Dedication (#ulink_500d7895-1dd9-559a-b9c0-31ec3e98c65a)

To J


Contents

Cover (#ufecf8344-2d38-585f-87e3-cec250952b7a)

Back Cover Text (#ueb3226a7-813d-595b-ad49-0e51f04ade6d)

Title Page (#u5ebcad8a-3737-556a-9951-41c1886c2f1c)

Dedication (#uc3ca8a8c-8c9f-58dd-9c56-06f4083625d4)

Chapter Seventeen (#u89e1c6fd-a687-5233-aed9-3b1b6a89e1a3)

Chapter Eighteen (#u0d2a46be-0096-5071-9a0d-9c018b44b82e)

Chapter Nineteen (#u271d06b2-ed2f-5299-93ac-e9af487be375)

Chapter Twenty (#uc8ce2269-cf2c-50fe-8d89-41b4b7d1a39e)

Chapter Twenty-One (#u07c19f31-63fa-5484-ada1-9b7858fc515c)

Chapter Twenty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Four (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Five (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Six (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Seven (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Eight (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Twenty-Nine (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Thirty (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Thirty-One (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Thirty-Two (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Thirty-Three (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Thirty-Four (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Thirty-Five (#litres_trial_promo)

Chapter Thirty-Six (#litres_trial_promo)

About the Author (#litres_trial_promo)

Excerpt from Run to You Part Six: Sixth Sense (#litres_trial_promo)

Excerpt from Foretold (#litres_trial_promo)

Copyright (#litres_trial_promo)


Chapter Seventeen (#ulink_41b4723c-1dce-569d-b53f-544e40a07714)

I was going to die.

Inside a little house with silver walls, I was going to bleed to death.

Because Deirdre had a dream.

“How will it happen?” An anxious dread settled in my stomach like a rock. From the counter, the knife flashed again.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I just know that it will.”

“What kind of house has silver walls?”

“It doesn’t matter,” Dennis said solemnly, “because you’ll never be in a house like that. Deirdre’s dreams always happen, Tessa. The only way to keep them from happening is to change the course of events. She dreamed that you left Lilybrook because of your brother and sister. So, to change the course of events, you won’t leave. You’ll stay in Lilybrook.”

“Tristan changes the course of events with his warning premonitions all the time,” I said. “So if he has one about me, I’ll listen. I won’t ignore him anymore. I’ll do what he says. Immediately. I promise.”

“That’s not good enough,” Tristan said. He put his hands on either side of my face and caressed my cheeks with his thumbs. “You almost got hit by that ambulance in Tennessee because you had lifted the fog so high that you were lost in the visions. You walked right in front of it, even though I was yelling for you to stop. It wasn’t that you ignored me; you didn’t hear me. Or what if...” He grimaced, guilt shadowing his face. “What if something like Twelve Lakes happens again?”

My shame was my parents; Tristan’s shame was his failure to keep me safe from Kellan in Twelve Lakes.

“But what about Jillian and Logan?” I asked. “I can’t let a dream stop me from finding them.”

“Aaron Jacobs is looking for them,” Dennis said.

“I’m looking for them too,” Tristan said. “I may not be a human computer like Aaron is, but I’m still searching for matches for Brinda’s drawings, and I’m still contacting psychics around the country. I’ll find them for you, like I promised I would. I’ll bring them to you, here, in Lilybrook.”

The tightness in Deirdre’s face turned from worry to anger. “Dennis spent eight years looking for you,” she said. “Tristan moved away his senior year and put off college for you. They risked their lives to bring you to safety. That you would even consider—”

Dennis took her hand. “You can’t be with your brother and sister if you’re dead, Tessa.”

From atop the fridge, Marmalade mewed.

I stared at the Connellys, and they stared back at me. Deirdre: hurt and resentful. Dennis: decisive and stern. Tristan: distressed and determined.

Tristan and Dennis were almost killed because of me. I owed it to them to stay alive.

And despite the shame that crawled around inside me like a disease, despite my tainted blood, despite being Killers’ Spawn...I didn’t want to die. I wanted to live to see my brother and sister again. I wanted to give them happy, stable, peaceful lives.

I couldn’t give Jillian and Logan happy, stable, peaceful lives if I bled to death inside a little house with silver walls. I needed to live.

For the past eight years, I’d fled from town to town to stay alive. And now, to stay alive, I needed to stay put. I could not change my past, but I could change my future.

“Fine,” I mumbled. “I’ll stay in Lilybrook.”

* * *

As I stood at the mirror in the guest bedroom and brushed my hair for school, Tristan came up behind me. He put his hands on my hips and drew me against him. “I have to leave for class, but I want to let you know that you don’t have to worry about a thing,” he said. “Nothing’s changed except you can’t leave Lilybrook. You’ll still get Jillian and Logan back.”

“What do you think it means, though?” I asked. “A silver room?”

“My mom’s dreams can be symbolic. She dreamed that you had wildflower eyes, remember? You do have wildflower eyes, but not literally. The silver room can be anything. I think the silver is your fog. Maybe it means that instead of lifting it too high, you bring it down too low and pass out again, like you did in the Underground.”

“Hmm. That could be. But the red? The blood?” I asked.

“I don’t know. You’ll hit your head on something when you pass out? You’ll get hit by a car?” He shuddered.

“What if it means someone’s going to kill me?”

“Don’t even talk that way. Who would want to kill you?”

I met his gaze in the mirror. “Nathan.”

A muscle pulsed angrily in his jaw. “I told him to leave you alone. Has he threatened you?”

“No. He hasn’t even spoken to me. But he still hates me. He’s in my nightmares. His eyes become part of the Nightmare Eyes.”

Tristan considered it, then shook his head. “I don’t know what’s going on with Nathan, but he wouldn’t hurt you. He’s a safeguard, Tessa. He protects people. I’ll call him on my way to class this morning and talk to him again. Besides, my mom’s dream will only happen if you leave Lilybrook. And you’re not going to do that. You are going to stay here, where it’s safe. I will bring Jillian and Logan to you.”

I studied Tristan’s face in the mirror. He looked tired, but his jaw was set. He’d failed to keep me safe in Twelve Lakes, and he was determined to make up for that in Lilybrook.

His phone dinged and he swiped the screen. “It’s another psychic responding to my email,” he said. “He owns a metaphysical shop in New Mexico. He even has a crystal ball, just like in Brinda’s drawing. He said he’ll keep an eye out for Jillian and Logan and call me right away if they show up.”

He wrapped his arms around me. “See, Clockwise? I’m getting lots of responses like this. Everything will be fine.”

I turned so I faced him and brought him in close, inhaling his scent of soap and strength and masculinity. The tighter he held me, the more my lungs opened up. Even the Nightmare Eyes dimmed a bit. I needed to stay here, in Lilybrook, in Tristan’s arms.

I couldn’t leave Lilybrook to look for my siblings, so Lilybrook would have to be my headquarters. Command Central. The mission: Find Jillian and Logan. Tristan and Aaron were my soldiers. From my post, I would oversee their investigations and help in every way I could.


Chapter Eighteen (#ulink_8e1dac5b-de82-5468-a49f-441a5f30f004)

Miss Bennett, the enthusiastic geometry teacher, jabbered away while scribbling angles and formulas on the whiteboard. The dry-erase markers squeaked, their acerbic scent permeating the room and making me slightly nauseated. The colorful triangles, squares and circles reminded me of Brinda’s crayon drawings. Chin propped in hand, I pretended to be copying the shapes and formulas into my notebook, but actually, I was writing a note.






The Connellys believed I was happily going about my life while imprisoned in Lilybrook because of Deirdre’s dream of a little silver-walled house that filled up with my blood, and had left the responsibility of finding my siblings to Tristan and Aaron. But I wasn’t happily going about my life. For the past three days, I’d been trying to contact my sister. Psionically.

I knew I couldn’t contact her telepathically—I could only do that with Tristan, and only when we were close. But when my family lived in Twelve Lakes, Jillian had been trying to develop remote vision, the same psionic ability our father had. Or at least, the psionic ability our dad used to have, before the APR neutralized him. Jillian had made some progress before her terrible headaches and bloody noses had driven her to quit—headaches and bloody noses that were manufactured by our mother so Jillian wouldn’t discover our parents’ murderous secrets.

Maybe now that our imprisoned, neutralized mother could no longer give her those headaches, Jillian could develop her mobile eye again.

Jillian thought I was dead, so she wouldn’t purposely send out her mobile eye to find me. But maybe if she thought of me, she would see me in Lilybrook. Alive. Safe.

Chances were slim. Almost zero. But I had to try.

As Miss Bennett scrawled formulas on the whiteboard, I continued my letter to Jillian.






I’d filled almost a page, willing Jillian to see it through my eyes, when the sound of my name brought me back to the classroom. I looked up from the notebook to see Miss Bennett, marker in hand, looking at me expectantly.

“Oh. Um... could you repeat the question, please?” I stammered.

“What is the formula for the surface area of a pyramid?” she repeated, not patiently.

I turned to my notebook to find the page with that formula, and saw that I hadn’t written a long letter to Jillian after all. After a few lines I’d stopped writing words, and instead had drawn a pair of circles, filled in solid black.

My Nightmare Eyes.

“You should know that formula by now, Tessa,” Miss Bennett said.

“I...” I sputtered, staring at the Nightmare Eyes on my paper. “I don’t. I’m sorry.”

Miss Bennett shook her head. “Can anyone help her out?”

In the seat in front of mine, Winter shot her hand up and quite cheerfully provided the formula.

“Very good, Winter.” With a disappointed look at me, Miss Bennett continued her lesson.

Cheeks burning, I gave my head a little shake to break the hold the Nightmare Eyes had on me. I flipped to a blank page and obediently copied the information from the whiteboard onto my paper. But once Miss Bennett turned her attention to someone else, I started a new letter to Jillian. This time, I kept it short and simple:






I stared at it, hard, until my eyes dried out and the words turned blurry. Then I blinked, and stared at the words again.

Was Jillian seeing this? What if the fog was blocking her ability to see through me? I’d been writing notes to her for three days; maybe the fog was the reason she wasn’t seeing them.

I could lift it a little....

I stared at the note again.






Something shifted in my peripheral vision—Winter, turning to smirk at me over her shoulder. She was listening to me, telepathically. Her amused snarl burned into me, along with the Nightmare Eyes, reminding me that I was Killers’ Spawn.

Ignoring both Winter and the Nightmare Eyes, I lifted the fog higher, and focused on my note.

I couldn’t tell if Jillian was seeing through me or not. The only thing I could sense was the multitude of students who’d sat in this chair before me. Trenton Abrams, last period. He thought Miss Bennett was hot. Julie Weaver, two years ago, wishing Tristan Connelly would dump Melanie Brunswick and ask her out instead. Beth Whitcomb, ten years ago, doodling hearts and stars in her notebook.

The bell rang, and fog still raised, vaguely aware of Miss Bennett telling me to pay more attention next time, I shoved everything into my book bag and walked out of the classroom. If Jillian had connected to me via mobile eye, she would be seeing everything I was seeing and hearing everything I was hearing right now.

“Jillian,” I murmured, holding a textbook in front of my mouth so no one would think I was talking to myself, “can you hear me? It’s me, Tessa. I’m alive. I’m trying to find you.”

The halls were so crowded. Was there an assembly or something? If Jillian was watching through me right now, she’d see that I was in a high school, not locked away in a gray cell somewhere. As I pushed through the students, I saw a blue flyer taped to the wall:






I let my gaze linger on it. “See that, Jillian? I’m in Lilybrook, Wisconsin,” I murmured behind my textbook. “Come to Lilybrook. It’s safe here.”

It was becoming hard to concentrate. Everyone was on their way to that pep rally, all walking and talking. So loud. The mass grew bigger and denser by the second, everyone chattering. Brian Edes plodded along. Susie Berkowitz and Tamara Yonkers rushed past him. Girls in acid-washed jeans, boys in brown leather jackets. Junie Lyons. Ben Guntherson.

The bell rang but the hall wasn’t emptying. Girls in poodle skirts and saddle shoes passed by, intermingling with scruffy boys in flannel shirts.

Poodle skirts.

That wasn’t right.

The students in the hall weren’t really there. They used to be there, but they weren’t now. Now they were visions.

The pep rally flyer wasn’t there either.

The fog. I’d lifted it too high.

Dizzy, woozy, I stumbled to the row of shiny lockers, leaning against them for support. Big mistake—the wall forced more visions into me.

Rochelle Mellon in bell-bottoms and sporting big, feathered hair.

Darren Szostak wearing a royal blue T-shirt that boasted LILYBROOK HIGH CLASS OF ’88.

Tristan Connelly, in a hockey sweater and walking with a worshipful Melanie Brunswick to his left and a short-haired, laughing Nathan Gallagher to his right, just two years ago.

The visions of Tristan and Melanie continued past, but Nathan’s stopped. Stayed. Stared.

“N-Nathan?” Was he real?

No—just a vision. He disappeared, swallowed up by other visions, more and more visions, crowding the hallways, shoving and clamoring.

I tottered away from the lockers. But the visions were still there, multiplying, growing denser and louder.

I had to bring in the fog. I had to bring it in now, before I lost control and the visions became solid, and I started spiraling into nothingness.

I pulled it in, but it wasn’t enough.

I pulled it in lower. Thicker. Lower and thicker again.

The visions were gone, but I could see nothing but fog. I breathed in fog. My muscles turned into fog.

No sight. No air. No strength.

Why didn’t Tristan call? He didn’t call to warn me—

Then everything disappeared.

* * *

Blackness. Absolute and all-encompassing.

But even in the blackness, there was something. Something gleeful and threatening.

My Nightmare Eyes, darker than even the black fog surrounding me. Watching me. Dark as a starless night and black as a cavern of coal.

I could not move. The eyes kept me paralyzed. Their rage burned through me. They wanted to keep me in the black fog forever.

Something twinkled. Something silver.

~killers’ spawn

I heard the words, booming through my subconscious, low and rumbling, as if they were spoken aloud, or perhaps whispered in my ear. I struggled to escape from the hateful words, from the eyes’ hateful glare.

A knife. Long and sharp and silver. Its blade glittered and glimmered, sparkled and glowed.

I had to get away. I had to get away from the ominous eyes, from the glimmering silver.

I had nowhere else to go except deeper into the fog. With a desperate heave, I pulled the fog in closer, darker, thicker. It came, quick and solid, and it consumed the glimmering, glittering silver, it consumed the Nightmare Eyes, and it consumed me.

* * *

I found out, after I woke up in the APR’s clinic with Tristan holding my hand and begging me to come back to him, that a security guard had found me. Unconscious, alone and crumpled on the floor of the school’s hallway. The school nurse had called Dennis, who’d rushed me to the APR.

I also found out that Tristan never called because he hadn’t gotten a warning premonition about it. He never got a warning premonition of the visions overwhelming me. He never got a warning premonition of the fog overpowering me.

I also found out that it was the next day. While the Nightmare Eyes had me pinned under their hateful gaze, the sun had set, and risen again.

* * *

Dr. Sheldon, the kind, warm physician who had taken care of me in the Underground, placed one hand behind my neck and her other on my forehead as I sat on the curtained-off cot in the clinic. “Don’t move,” she said. Closing her eyes, she bowed her head.

She’d kept me here overnight while I was lost in the fog. Deirdre and Dennis had stayed until about midnight, and Tristan had stayed the entire night with me, holding my hand. Now he hovered close as Dr. Sheldon determined if I was ready to go back to the Connellys’ house.

“So much fog,” she muttered as she looked into my mind. “But there’s something else...something dark. A starless night. A cavern of coal.” She shuddered, then opened her eyes. “Any idea what that means?”

“That’s just my nightmare,” I said.

Tristan took my hand back. “She gets them every night.” His hair was messy and his button-down shirt was wrinkled from sleeping in it overnight, sitting up in a chair next to my cot.

“I can certainly understand why you have nightmares,” Dr. Sheldon said, “but that darkness is terrifying. It felt...hateful.”

Terrifying. Hateful. Shameful. It all burned through my blood. “It’s just a nightmare,” I muttered.

With a sigh, Dr. Sheldon made a note on her chart. “Well, you’re back in control of that fog of yours, and nightmares are no reason to keep you here.”

“So she can go home?” Tristan asked.

“Yes, she can.” Dr. Sheldon slipped her pen into her white doctor’s coat. Before she left, she put a warm hand on my shoulder. “Be careful with the fog, sweetheart. We don’t want that to happen again.”

“I will.” Relieved I could get out of here, I slipped from the cot. Tristan held out a hand for me to hold in case I was shaky, but I wasn’t. I changed from the blue cotton hospital gown and into the clothes Tristan brought for me—my usual jeans and one of his hoodies.

“I don’t understand why I didn’t get a premonition about you fainting,” Tristan said as we left the facility. A thin layer of snow had fallen while I was unconscious, and it crunched under our feet as we walked to Tristan’s car. Though I didn’t need him to, he held my elbow so I wouldn’t stumble. “I could have called you. I could have warned you and stopped it from happening.”

“It’s not your fault, Tristan,” I said. “I raised the fog. I lost control of the visions. I pulled the fog in too low.”

He stopped short. “Why would you do that?”

I confessed my plan, that I’d been trying to contact Jillian psionically in the hopes that she was trying to develop remote vision again. “I thought maybe the fog was blocking her ability to see though me. So I raised it. Then I lost control.” I sighed. “But I know now that was a stupid idea. Jillian could only piggyback on our dad’s mobile eye. She was never able to move beyond that. Besides, I can’t spend twenty-four hours a day staring at a sign that says Lilybrook, Wisconsin.”

Tristan was still staring at me, incredulous. “How could you put yourself in danger that way?”

“I wasn’t in any danger,” I said. “Your mom’s dream will happen if I leave town to look for my brother and sister. There was nothing in that dream that said I can’t look for them from within Lilybrook.”

“That’s not—” With an exasperated sigh, he scrubbed his hand in his hair. “You raised the fog that high, then pulled it in that low, on purpose. You played with the fog and I wasn’t even with you. That’s exactly why my mom’s dream will happen if you leave Lilybrook.”

The shame burning through my blood was replaced by hot anger, and I yanked my arm from his hand. “I was trying to connect with my sister, who is missing, and scared, and heartbroken. You can’t be mad at me for that. And you didn’t have a premonition about me fainting, so you couldn’t have stopped it from happening anyway.”

He exhaled, his whole body deflating. “You’re right. I promised you that I would keep you safe. I failed you in Twelve Lakes, I’m failing you by not finding Jillian and Logan, and I failed you again yesterday.”

It was usually me who shivered, but this time it was Tristan.

I took his hand and gave it a kiss. “You’re not failing me. I don’t blame you for any of that.”

“Well, you should. I blame myself.”

We reached his car, and he opened the door for me and helped me inside.

We drove back to his house in silence.


Chapter Nineteen (#ulink_619d99f3-ba13-5471-a8b0-a21150bc7ce9)

Dennis and Deirdre wanted to keep me home from school the next day, but I convinced them to let me go after I’d promised not to play with the fog anymore. I had to triple-promise Tristan. “Please be careful with the fog,” he said. “Please. What if I don’t get a premonition again? Even if I do, I’ll be too far away to stop it from happening.” He raked his hands through his hair. So worried. So anxious.

I took both his hands in mine. “Tristan. I know you want to keep me safe, but you also need to trust me. I will be careful.” I stood on my tiptoes and kissed his lips. “Please don’t worry about me.”

Not at all comforted by my promise or by my kiss, he cupped my face in his hands and brushed his lips on my forehead, then reluctantly left for school.

Twenty minutes later, bundled up in coats and mittens, Ember and I shuffled through a layer of snow on our way to Lilybrook High. Determined to prove to Tristan that he didn’t need to protect me as much as he thought he did, I concentrated on keeping the fog balanced. But as always, Jillian and Logan were in the forefront of my mind.

A blackbird descended from the trees, and while Ember stopped to feed it, I gave Aaron Jacobs a call. “Any progress?” I asked, keeping my tone chipper and optimistic. One negative word from me would discourage him.

“Their l-last known location was in Braddock, Tennessee,” he mumbled, tripping over his words. “S-so I started there, and I’m moving outward.”

“That’s a good plan, Aaron,” I said. “Tristan said you were super-smart, and wow, you are.”

“But I haven’t found anything.”

“You just have to keep looking,” I said. “Don’t let Kellan intimidate you. You can do it.”

He was quiet for a moment, then said, “D-does your sister...I mean, do you think she’d like...”

“She likes guys like you, Aaron,” I said. Jillian had had lots of boyfriends—silly, pretty, empty-headed boyfriends. But the only boy she’d ever loved was Gavin, and she loved him because he was sensitive, sweet and super-smart. Just like Aaron.

He said nothing for another long moment. Then: “I’ll find them.”

“I know you will. Bye, Aaron.”

Ember finished feeding the bird, and we continued to school. She’d been quiet around me lately, and I thought I knew why. I’d been so preoccupied with finding my siblings that I’d neglected our friendship. And Ember was the only friend I had.

“How’s your song coming along?” I asked. “I’d love to hear it.”

“My song?”

“You said your band had to write an original song for Battle of the Bands.”

“Oh.” She looked off into the trees. “I don’t know if we’re doing Battle of the Bands anymore. The keyboardist and the drummer quit. I can’t find anyone to replace them.”

“Did they quit because of me?” I asked as my blood started to burn. “Because I live in your house?”

“No,” she said, but she wouldn’t meet my eyes.

* * *

The warning bell rang as Ember and I climbed the front steps to the school. She rushed inside, but I stalled before entering the building. I filled my lungs with the cold February air and balanced the fog. The last time I was here, I’d lost control of the visions, then the fog, and passed out. I had to be extra careful to keep the fog balanced from now on. I had to show Tristan that he didn’t need to protect me so much. I took another deep breath, nudging the fog a little higher, then a little lower.

“Are you okay?” a sweet voice said beside me: Melanie, her black hair tumbling from under her black beret.

“Yeah,” I said, a bit surprised that she’d asked. “Thanks.”

“I heard you fainted in the hall the other day,” she said with genuine concern in her voice. “I just wanted to make sure it wasn’t happening again.”

“I’m fine,” I said, now really surprised. “Thanks, Melanie.”

Melanie Brunswick truly was kind. And sweet. I could understand why Tristan had loved her.

She would make a good friend.

I gave her a smile, a real smile.

She started to smile back, but then she cleared her throat and looked down at her Doc Martens. “I feel bad for everything you’re going through, Tessa. I really do,” she said. “But... my dad...and Tristan...” Her gaze flitted to my hand—to my promise ring. “I’ve lost so much. I’m sorry, but I can never be friends with you.”

She rushed into the building without looking back.

* * *

In art class that morning, Mr. Vargas returned everyone’s fruit bowl paintings we’d made last week. Except for mine. All I got was a slip of paper that read, See me after school.

I shoved the note into my pocket. What had I done wrong? I’d liked my painting, how I’d divided the canvas into six squares and painted just a part of each fruit. But maybe he’d wanted us to paint the fruit as he’d presented it. Realistic, not abstract.

After last period I went to the art studio. Mr. Vargas was bent over the counter, cleaning paintbrushes in the sink and wearing a ratty cardigan splattered, as all of his clothes were, with dried paint. “No one realizes how expensive these brushes are,” he mumbled to me. “You have to take care of your brushes.”

That was why he called me in after school? I’d been concentrating so hard on keeping the fog balanced that it was entirely possible that I’d neglected to clean my brushes. “I’m sorry, Mr. Vargas,” I said. “I forgot. I won’t do it again.”

“Oh, it wasn’t you, Tessa.” He wiped his hands on his sweater to dry them, then went to his desk. He picked up my abstract fruit painting and tucked it under his arm. “Come with me,” he said, and sauntered from the room.

I followed him to the cafeteria. He stopped at the back wall and held his arms out wide, facing it, my canvas still in one hand. I had to step out of the way so he wouldn’t hit me with it.

“Tell me what you see,” he said.

Was I supposed to see something? If I didn’t have the fog balanced, I’d see dozens of visions, but Mr. Vargas wasn’t asking about visions. He was neutral. “Um, a wall?” I said.

“I know you can do better than that. Try again. What do you see?”

“Um...” Oh! “A giant canvas?”

“Yes!” he said. “Excellent. Now what do you see on this giant canvas?”

I stared up at the wall for a minute. We were in the cafeteria, so that meant food. He couldn’t mean... “My painting? My bowl of fruit?”

“Yes. Your bowl of fruit.” He held my painting in both hands, arms straight out. “I want you to recreate this same piece, on a much larger scale, on this wall.”

“But everyone will see it,” I said.

“Everyone should see it. It’s brilliant.”

He couldn’t be serious. “It’s just fruit.”

With one eye closed, he tilted his head, then tilted the canvas the opposite way. “I’ve been teaching for twenty-seven years, and every year, I present that same bowl of fruit and tell my students to paint it. Do you know what I get? I get paintings of the same bowl of fruit, from every student, every year. Some are truly awful, most are decent, and a few are excellent. Yours is one of the excellent. You took it in a new direction.”

“I thought you were going to fail me for not following instructions,” I said. This was incredible. I had to raise the fog a little to make sure I was hearing him correctly.

“I didn’t give any instructions to follow,” Mr. Vargas said. “You’ve only been here a few weeks, and you’re unpracticed. Undeveloped. However, you have a raw talent, Tessa. You are a very gifted artist.”

Gifted.

Jillian was a gifted dancer. Logan was a gifted musician. All the talent in the family had gone to them, I’d always assumed.

I’d painted before, sure. As a hobby. I was decent. Maybe good. Never excellent. Never gifted. But I was psionic now, when I’d never been psionic before. Maybe my retrocognition wasn’t the only thing the fog had suppressed all those years.

I could envision my painting, super-sized, on the wall. The bright yellow-green pear, stretching from the floor halfway up the wall. The shiny crimson apple. The plump purple blueberry. Greedily, I eyed the white cinder blocks. The strawberry would go right there, in the upper corner. The wall’s bumpy texture would be perfect for the orange.

I was stuck in Lilybrook because of Deirdre’s dream. But when Tristan brought my brother and sister to me, I would bring them to this school and lead them to the cafeteria. Then I would stand them in front of the mural, spread my arms, and announce I painted this. They would be so proud.

Breathless, I appraised the blank white wall, a wall that wouldn’t be blank or white much longer. “When can I start?”


Chapter Twenty (#ulink_6813ddbe-fd0d-546d-bcca-a2f98b8600a1)

I started on my mural the very next day.

With a pencil in my left hand, I lightly sketched the arc for the meaty part of the pear. To steady myself, I pressed against the wall with my right hand and a few visions appeared through the fog. A girl wearing her hair in two braids with a headband made from daisies. A boy with hair short in the front and long in the back.

I stepped away from the wall and adjusted the fog, bringing it closer until the visions disappeared. It left me a bit dazed, but still aware. The perfect state for painting. I put my pencil to the wall and completed the arc of the pear, then sketched until it was time to go home.

Although Tristan continued to contact psychics and search for matches of Brinda’s drawings, and Aaron worked nonstop on his webcam search, there had been no new leads in their investigations over the next week. So every day after school, I would meet Mr. Vargas in the art room and gather my supplies. He’d help me carry everything down to the cafeteria, bring me a ladder if I was painting up high, then leave me to my work. I’d have to spend a few minutes getting the fog adjusted to just the right level, then I’d dip the brush into the paint, and get started.

The students in the clubs that met in the cafeteria left me alone, but I could feel them watching. On occasion I felt Nathan Gallagher’s eyes on me as well, watching my every move, as if he peeked into the cafeteria to see what I was doing. A few times I’d turn around, but he would disappear before I saw him. Once I felt John Kellan watching me, but that was impossible. I was keeping the fog thick and close to keep the visions away; I must have been lost in memories of the night he had forcibly taken me from Twelve Lakes.

The Nightmare Eyes were always there. They always watched.

When it was time to go home, Mr. Vargas would come to help me clean up, but I would never notice him. He would have to clear his throat or tap me on the shoulder to bring me out of my daze. My muscles would be sore from crouching and bending and reaching and climbing the ladder. My left hand would be stiff from holding the brushes. And though I never remembered crying, my cheeks would always be damp with tears.


Chapter Twenty-One (#ulink_33f3d0ac-1a2b-5542-9575-ac2fbfa67293)

One sunny morning a couple weeks later, as I was hanging up my coat in my locker at school, Tristan texted me. Just got an email from another psychic. She had a vision of J & L with an animal that looked like a horse. It had one eye.

I had a drawing of that one-eyed horse in my book bag this very moment. Heart leaping to my throat, I texted back: Brinda drew that!

Yep. Told you my method would work. Now we just have to find that horse.

Finding a one-eyed horse would be difficult, and of course, that vision could be symbolic, like Deirdre’s dream. But this was the first development we’d had since Tennessee. We were getting closer. We’d find Jillian and Logan any day now. I was sure of it.

The second I sat down in chemistry, the intercom buzzed. “Sorry for the interruption,” the secretary said in a bored voice. “Please send Tessa Carson to the office.”

I jumped up, and without even checking with the teacher, bolted from the classroom. This had to be about Jillian and Logan. Finally. Finally! Was it Tristan waiting for me in the office, or Aaron? Tristan had gotten that lead about the one eyed-horse, but it had to be Aaron waiting for me in the office—Tristan would have come straight to the classroom to get me.

In the front office, I skidded to a stop. Aaron wasn’t there, and neither was Tristan. But Cole Gallagher was there, wearing a regulation black jacket from the APR, his tawny eyes dour, his lips in a straight line. “Dennis needs you at the Lab, Tessa.”

“Why? What happened?” I asked. “You look like it’s bad.”

Cole slid a glance to the secretary, who was watching with sharp green eyes, clearly curious about why the new girl would be needed at the top secret science lab down the road. “You know I can’t discuss that here.”

“Did Aaron find my brother and sister?” I asked.

“Tessa. Please.” He took my arm. “Dennis says it’s urgent.”

Insides prickling with anxiety, I left with Cole. In his Jeep, I asked him again. “Just tell me if they’re okay.” I slid my hands into my sleeves.

“I feel how anxious and scared you are,” he said, “but I don’t know anything about your brother and sister. I’m sure they’re okay. They probably went deeper into hiding after what happened at that motel in Tennessee.”

It took less than five minutes to get to the APR. I shivered as we hustled down the pebbled path into the building—cold because I’d left without grabbing my coat, and also, yes, because I was scared about why I’d been pulled out of school and brought to the APR. Cole put a timid arm around me, to offer warmth or comfort or both.

Dennis waited for me in the lobby, somber and pensive. “Dennis, what’s going on?” I asked. “Did Aaron find Jillian and Logan? Did something happen to them?”

Dennis thanked Cole for fetching me, then guided me through security. But instead of heading down the main hallway, he turned to the right, into the elevator that led to the Underground.

That’s when it hit me: “You’re taking me to see my parents, aren’t you?”

He pressed the Down button, and the doors closed. “I am.”

“But I told you I’m not ready.” I covered my belly with my hands. I would never be ready. They were liars. Thieves. Murderers. They made me Killers’ Spawn.

“You don’t have to see your mother,” Dennis said as the elevator brought us down. “But your father needs you. As you know, he’s been unconscious the whole time he’s been here. But lately he’s been stirring and mumbling. More and more every day.”

“He’s finally waking up. That’s good.” I didn’t want anything to do with my father, but I was relieved he was waking up.

“He’s still incoherent. He keeps reliving the night Kellan abducted you,” Dennis said. “Today, he became frantic. They can’t calm him down. I was here to check on Aaron, but when I heard what was happening with your father, I suggested that you come see him. He’s not aware of his surroundings, but maybe he’ll sense that you’re safe, and calm down on his own. Are you willing to see him, Tessa?”

“Of course. Yes,” I said, a knot of concern forming in my stomach. My father must be in agony, reliving what was probably the worst night of his life. I didn’t want him to suffer like that.

The knot in my stomach tightened when a gun-chomping, muscle-bound man met Dennis and me at the elevator—Mr. Milbourne, the head warden. Winter’s father. Nathan and the rest of the Lab Brats would know all about my Underground visit by the end of the day. I could just picture the gleeful, vengeful gleam in Nathan’s eyes. He would probably be happy my father was in such a tormented state.

Mr. Milbourne grunted a greeting and led us through the prison. Dim and dank, smelling of mildew and hopelessness. Dozens of steel doors, windowless and locked airtight.

He led us past the cell where I’d stayed for three weeks, the cell Kellan had thrown me in after he’d kidnapped me. The cell I’d refused to leave until I could leave with my innocent parents.

The cell where Tristan had proved to me that he truly loved me.

We continued walking, the hall silent except for our footsteps. We rounded a corner, and an echoed howl came from behind the door at the far end.

My father’s cell.

As Mr. Milbourne swiped his badge through the security pad, I held my breath, gaining the courage to see my father for the first time since I’d left the Underground.

* * *

If he’d been lying peacefully in his hospital-type bed, it may not have been so bad. It was his hysteria that set me trembling, that made my legs refuse to move and a small whimper escape my throat.

My father was even thinner than when I’d last seen him. Pale. Cheeks sunken, hair gray. Unshaven and bedraggled. His eyes, however, were open, and alive with panic. They darted, wild, back and forth. He howled, struggling with ferocious effort against the padded cuffs connected to the bed rails.

“We don’t know where he’s finding the strength,” Dennis said. “They had to restrain him so he wouldn’t hurt himself.”

Mr. Milbourne stood in the doorway, stiff-legged, massive arms crossed over his massive chest. Coming up behind him was the woman I’d seen talking to Kellan outside of the boardroom a few weeks ago.

“Tessa, this is Beverly Jacobs, the agency’s executive director,” Dennis said over my dad’s howls. “She’s Aaron’s mother.”

Her gold badge shone brightly, and her face was smooth and hard as ice as she acknowledged me with a quick nod, then turned to Dennis before I could greet her. “I hope this works, Dennis,” she said.

“Me too,” he replied grimly, and nudged me further inside my father’s cell.




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