Then Bad was there, Reyes, his anger even more distinct than those around me. But he wasn’t angry at me. If I had let him, he would have sliced my stepmother in two. I knew this like I knew the sun would continue to rise. I begged him underneath my breath not to hurt her. I tried to make him understand that what was happening was my fault. That I deserved the wrath of the people around me. Denise had warned me not to talk about the others. But I hadn’t listened. He hesitated. Then, with an earth-shattering roar, he disappeared, leaving in his wake his essence, his earthy smell and rich, exotic taste.
My dad stepped forward then and took Denise by the shoulders. She shook with sobs as he led her away to his squad car. The cops questioned me for what seemed like hours, but I refused to speak about it any longer. Not really understanding what I’d done wrong, I closed my mouth and said no more. And I never called Denise Mom again.
It was a hard lesson, but one I’d never forgotten.
Two weeks later, I’d sneaked off to the park alone. I sat on the bench, watching Bianca play. She motioned for me to join her, but I was still too sad.
“Please, tell me,” Mrs. Johnson said from behind me, “is Bianca still there?”
She’d scared me, and I jumped off the bench, watching her with wary concern. She looked over to where Bianca was playing in her homemade sandbox near the tree line.
“No, Mrs. Johnson,” I said, edging back. “I didn’t see anything.”
“Please,” she begged. “Please tell me.” Tears streamed down her face.
“I can’t.” My voice was nothing more than a frightened whisper. “I’ll get in trouble.”
“Charlotte, sweetheart, I just want to know if she’s happy.” She stepped forward and knelt beside me, her breath catching in her throat.
I whirled and ran away, hiding behind a trash bin as Mrs. Johnson crawled onto the park bench and cried. Bianca appeared beside her and ran a tiny hand over her hair.
I knew better. I knew not to say anything, knew the consequences, but I did it anyway. I sneaked up and hid in the bushes behind the bench. “She’s happy, Mrs. Johnson.”
The woman turned to me, bobbed and weaved her head, trying to see me through the leaves. “Charley?”
“Um, no. My name is Captain Kirk.” I wasn’t the most imaginative being on the worldly plane. “Bianca asked me to tell you not to forget to feed Rodney and that she is sorry for breaking your grandmother’s china cup. She had assumed Rodney would have had better table manners.”
Mrs. Johnson’s hands flew to her mouth. She stood and circled the bench, but I was not about to be slapped again. I tore out of there and headed for home, swearing never again to talk about the departed. But she chased me! She ran me down and jerked me off the ground like an eagle snatching his dinner from a lake.
I’d thought about screaming, but Mrs. Johnson hugged me to her. For, like, a really long time. Uncontrollable sobs racked her body as we sank to the ground. Bianca stood beside us, smiling and petting her mother’s hair again before she drifted into me. I figured she’d told her mom what she needed her to know—apparently it had been a really important cup—and she felt she could leave. She smelled like grape Kool-Aid and corn chips as she passed.
Mrs. Johnson continued to rock me for some time before my father came in his patrol car. She stopped and looked at me. “Where is she, darling? Did she tell you?”
I lowered my head. I didn’t want to say, but she seemed to need to know. “She’s by the windmill past the trees. The search party was looking in the wrong place.”
She cried some more, then discussed what’d happened with my dad as I watched Bad in the distance, his black robe undulating like a sail in the wind, spanning the width of three massive trees. He was magnificent, and he was the only thing I’d ever truly been afraid of my whole life. He dissipated before my eyes when Mrs. Johnson came to give me another hug, and Bianca’s body was found that afternoon. The next day, I received a huge bouquet of balloons and a new bike, which Denise wouldn’t let me keep. But every year on Bianca’s birthday, I got a bright bouquet of balloons with a card that simply read, Thank you.
I learned two things from that experience: that most people would never believe in my abilities, even those closest to me. And that most people would never understand the devastating need of those left behind, the need to know the truth.
Regardless of how things had turned out, I’d caused a lot of pain that day. And a lot since. I should have made sure Rosie Herschel boarded that plane. I should have escorted her to the security checkpoint and then slipped one of the personnel a twenty to make sure she stayed put. Zeke couldn’t have found her before the plane boarded. He was with me. Had she changed her mind? Surely not. She was like a kid in a candy shop, ridiculously excited about the new life awaiting her. The enormous burden of living under the constant threat of violence had already been lifted from her shoulders. No, she hadn’t changed her mind. And instead of protecting my client, I was playing dodge-the-right-hook with her scum-of-the-underworld husband.
But therein lay the rub: She’d trusted me. With her life. And once again, I had let someone down in the most severe way possible.
I felt Angel standing across the room and glanced up through my lashes. His head was down, his eyes darting occasionally to my right, where Reyes sat. In the dark, I realized he was there as well, sitting patiently beside me. Not touching or demanding. Heat drifted off him like sand off a dune.