Siren's Song by Heather McCollum

Author:Heather McCollum
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Siren’s Song
ISBN: 9781939392862
Publisher: Spencer Hill Press
Published: 2014-09-11T04:00:00+00:00

13

“The best answer to anger is silence.”

~Author Unknown

I suck in a breath and squeeze my eyes shut. I hear the knife clatter against the hardwood floor and someone grab for it. Someone squeezes my leg and tilts it. “Okay, that hurts,” I say and blink my eyes open. Taylin’s fingers pinch along the red line that swells with my blood.

“Careful,” Luke says and pushes Taylin’s hands away. “I’d better be the one to do it, anyway.” Luke looks straight at me. “Sorry.”

I smile tightly like someone being brave. Inside, my stomach twists. He bends over and squeezes, more gentle than Taylin. Blood flows freely now, and several drops dot the oak floor. Everyone holds their breath. When a pool about the size of a quarter lies in a miniature, thick, red pond, he stops. Taylin and Matt look at Luke.

“Any difference?” Matt asks.

Taylin squints at Luke. “You look the same. Hell.” She sighs. “Nothing happened.”

Luke puts pressure on the slice. Carly hands him a wad of gauze doused with peroxide. “I’m sorry,” I whisper.

He kisses my knee. “No, I’m sorry, Jule.”

“Would you be willing to let him pierce your eye?” Taylin asks with what I hope is mock sincerity.

“Uh, I think I’d rather die first,” I say.

“O-okay,” Carly draws out. “I’ll just continue with plan B, then. Let’s find out what happened to Morgan.”

“And let’s think about getting a larger quantity of my blood,” I say. “At my dad’s lab.”

“How?” Taylin asks.

“Well,” I list our assets in my mind, “I’ll need someone who can open locks to go with me.”

“Not Luke,” Matt says, looking at his brother. “Just in case, you should stay away from her as much as possible.”

“Luke can teach me how to open complex locks,” Taylin says. Luke frowns, but doesn’t object.

“I thought you opened Jule’s locker?” Carly asks.

“That’s simple,” Taylin says. “Luke’s got a thing for opening any kind of lock, and I’m imagining that your dad has some heavy-duty techno locks at his lab.”

“I’ll ask my dad to take us on a tour for a science paper,” I say.

“I’ll go, too,” Carly chimes in. “Matt should stay with Luke.”

Luke catches my hand as he stands up. I let my skirt fall back over my bandaged thigh.

“I’ll talk to Dad tonight about it.”

Luke nods. “So this meeting is over.” He pulls me gently along behind him as he walks out of the kitchen back to the living room and out onto the front wrap-around porch. The late afternoon sun is slipping down the sky toward twilight. He stops by the lilac tree, its blooms beginning to fade. He turns to me, wrapping me in toward his chest. I step up to him and he buries his nose into my hair and inhales. “That’s better.”

I look up into his face. “Better?”

“The smell of your blood in there.” He shakes his head. “It just brings back nightmares I’d rather not remember.”

“Premonitions.”

“No,” he says quickly. “Just nightmares that I will never let happen.”

I watch his hands grip into fists. I grasp one and work the tight fingers open.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.