“I can’t wait that long,” she says. She’s flustered. Her hair is in disarray around her shoulders. Her cheeks flushed. She’s someplace dark, maybe a closet?
“Are you all right?” I ask.
“I—” She looks down briefly and then straight into my eyes, and even though I know she can’t see them, somehow her gaze finds me and drills into me. “Locke, I’m skipping the meeting tonight and coming to see you instead. I hope that’s all right. I need to see—”
“No, Raine. You can’t—”
Her image disappears. She’s clicked off. Or someone cut her off. I try to call her back but there’s no answer. Did her father intercept her? Hap? I try to call again. Again, no answer.
What happened? My mind races with the possibilities. She doesn’t even know where I live. Did she mean she would see me at the park? There’s no way I can make it there. I barely made it from my bedroom to this chair without collapsing. Maybe if I—
I pull myself up. If I shower. If I get dressed. Maybe I—
I stumble and grab at the back of the chair, feeling woozy. Do this, Locke. Figure it out.
I walk with shuffling steps to my bedroom, concentrating on every move, trying to will my ribs and hip into compliance, and when I finally make it to my room, I decide I will have to skip the shower. Dressing will be challenging enough. I’m pulling my pants on when Jenna walks in. “What do you think you’re doing?”
“I need to go out.”
She laughs. “Look at you. How far do you think you’d get before passing out?”
“I’m feeling better.”
“Oh, please.” She rolls her eyes. “Whatever it is, it can wait until—”
We hear a knock at the door. My heart goes into overdrive. For once I hope it’s Carver and he’s pestering me again. But he wouldn’t knock. He’d just walk right in.
“That must be Xavier,” Jenna says. “I gave him a list of supplies.” She’s already headed toward the door.
I limp after her. “Jenna, stop. It might be—”
But she’s already swinging it open.
Visitors
I watch the sharp intake of Jenna’s breath as she looks at Raine. It tells me everything I already suspected. Raine is the mirror image of Karden. Probably all the way down to the obstinate tilt of her head.
“Hello, I’m Raine Branson,” she says. “I’m here to see Locke. Is he available?”
Maybe even the timbre and cadence of her voice is the same.
Jenna blinks and takes another deep breath, trying to regain her composure. I wish there had been the time to tell her the truth about who Raine is. I watch Jenna’s face, almost seeing the gears of her mind turn as she puts each piece together, and I pray she doesn’t blurt out the name Rebecca. She clears her throat. “I’m not sure if—”
“Yes. I’m here.” I know I should have ducked back into my bedroom before she saw me. I should have sent her away. I should have at least put on a shirt before I called out. But I didn’t. The shakiness of her voice made all the shoulds disappear. I don’t understand what Raine does to me—she makes me become someone else—someone who takes chances that I shouldn’t. Jenna swings the door wider and Raine sees me standing in the bedroom doorway.
Her lips part and she looks like she’s trying to suppress any reaction at all in front of Jenna but then she walks right past her over to me. “My God, Locke, what happened to you?”
> “I—” I glance at Jenna, who shrugs and has no words to help me out. “I took a tumble. Down the stairs.”
“But all the scratches, the cuts, the…”
The gashes. She stares at my bare chest. “There were cats involved. And glass I was carrying. Top of the stairs. It was dark. Late. Three cats I think. Feral.” I keep piling on explanations, hoping one of them will stick.
Jenna begins to close the door, and a large golden arm reaches out to stop her. Hap enters the doorway. “You may not shut the door unless Miss Branson is on this side of it with me.”
“Sorry,” Raine says. “I forgot. May he come in too? I had to bring him.”
I look at Hap. He looks at me. At least we have one thing in common—mutual distrust. “Sure,” I answer.