“No,” Rowan agreed. He stood for a moment, watching Juliet.
She knew he was trying to decide if she believed him now or not, but he didn’t ask. Good thing, too. Because Juliet didn’t know what she believed anymore.
He went back to the kitchen and sat down in front of the computer, gesturing for Juliet to sit next to him. “Now tell me more about this Internets,” he said. “Can you really get any information you want from it, simply by asking?”
“Pretty much,” Juliet said, shaking herself and sitting next to him. He was a quick learner, but he knew nothing about computers yet and Juliet was tired of ordering rare herbs and random minerals for him online. Rowan was frighteningly intelligent, though, and something told Juliet that in a few days he’d be teaching her things about computers she’d never even dreamed.
“Sounds like magic,” he replied, looking back at the screen.
CHAPTER
2
Rowan sat at the desk in Lily’s room, reading something on her computer. He was wearing the same dark wool sweater he’d worn before and a pair of warm sweatpants. His black hair was pushed up all around his head in a dozen directions, only making him more beautiful. Lily couldn’t decide if she wanted to stare at him a bit longer, or if she was so hungry for the sound of his voice that she wanted to burst the quiet bubble of concentration that surrounded him.
She thought about reaching out to him in mindspeak, but stopped herself. He couldn’t know that she was in contact with Lillian, and she knew she wasn’t strong enough yet to keep all thought of Lillian out of her head while she and Rowan were in rapport.
It wasn’t the first time Lily had avoided mindspeak with Rowan in order to hide what she was thinking, but it was the first time she felt guilty about it. The thought stuck with her, stale and lingering like a rotten mouthful.
“What are you doing?” Lily asked in a voice that crackled with disuse.
Rowan turned in his chair to face Lily. “This is amazing,” he said excitedly. “It’s like your people were trying to make up for everything you lacked without willstones and magic.” He laughed boyishly. “You don’t need
to remember things—your computer does it for you. And if you don’t know something, all you have to do is look it up on the Internets. Genius.”
“Internet. Not nets,” Lily corrected gently. “Come here. It’s too weird to see you in front of a computer.”
“It’s Juliet’s fault,” he said, grinning. “She taught me how to use it. Now I’m hooked.” Rowan came over, sat on the edge of her bed, and immediately began checking her injuries. He lifted up the edge of one of her bandages. “This is much better,” he mumbled, pleased with what he saw.
“How long have we been back?”
“Nine days.”
“How is Juliet? How have you been getting along with her and my mom while I’ve been out?”
“It’s odd,” he said slowly. “Neither of them knows me, but I’ve known them most of my life. At least Samantha doesn’t look at me like a complete stranger. She’s used to seeing me in other worlds, I guess.”
Rowan’s face fell. Lily knew what he was thinking. The version of Samantha in his world had died not too long ago.
“It’s disorienting,” Lily said, recalling how strange it had been for her to meet the other Juliet, and the other Tristan. “Has Tristan come by? Does he know I’m back?” she asked as soon as the thought of him entered her mind.
“He came by once,” Rowan said, frowning. “Drink this.” He placed a straw between her lips and Lily sipped at the bittersweet brew.
“What happened?” she asked.
Rowan let out a frustrated sigh. “Well—you’d been gone for three months. Everyone here thought you’d been kidnapped, and when you finally did come back you were like this,” he said, gesturing to Lily’s extensive burns. “We’re telling everyone that you were at a private clinic to get radical treatment for your allergies. That’s how we’re explaining away the burns. We’re calling them swelling and redness from subcutaneous exposure therapy.”
Lily nodded. “They tried that on me as a kid. I looked like a leaky tomato. But how are you explaining the fact that my mom didn’t know where I was?”
“She did, though,” Rowan said, stretching out next to her on the bed. Lily tried to snuggle against him but Rowan stopped her. “Be really careful when you move. No friction,” he cautioned. “While you were gone, Samantha told everyone that she could see you, but she couldn’t get to you. Everyone’s chalking it up to your mother’s condition. They believe that she sent you to get treatment, but got confused and panicked when you were gone.”
Lily grimaced. “And everyone’s buying that?”
“Almost everyone. Juliet is backing her up to all the neighbors and the police.” Rowan shook his head. “Strange word. Police,” he mused. “Anyway, the police and another group, the FBI, were involved from the beginning. It was big news that you disappeared the way you did.”
“Yeah, I can imagine. A teenaged girl with life-threatening allergies disappears into thin air with none of her medication. Right after having a seizure at a party,” Lily said, grimacing as she tried to picture it.
“There’s one FBI agent who’s been particularly tenacious. Special Agent Simms. She’s the reason we had to tell everyone you were back. She was giving your father and Tristan a really hard time and we had to let her know you were alive so she’d leave them alone.”