The Damned by LA Banks

Author:LA Banks [Banks, LA]
Format: epub, mobi
Published: 2010-05-21T16:33:47.891000+00:00

Stopping abruptly as he made his way to stand twenty-five yards away from the house, Carlos lowered his head in shame, bent his knees, and dropped, not caring that small rocks and sand stones cut into his flesh.

"Please forgive me," he said, clasping his hands. "Don't let this thing take hold in me. Preserve my spirit. Get it out of me. I'm clinging to the thin thread of silver lining. I disobeyed, I know, but we're all infected… Don't leave me. Don't let me hurt her or the family."

She woke up with what felt like a horrible hangover. Damali sat up slowly and glanced down at the blanket that covered her. Vaguely, she remembered that Carlos had been there last night. In slow increments the accident and burning his clothes came back to her, but as she gathered the blanket closer to her, guilt stabbed at her. He'd wrapped Jose's blanket around her?

When she attempted to stand, she was forced to hold her head with both hands. She looked at the small coffee table and the remnants of dirty wineglasses and groaned. "No more, never again," she said with a wince. "How much of this crap did I drink?" She allowed the rhetorical question to follow her to the bathroom, and then into the bedroom. Catching her profile in a mirror, she looked like pure hell in the disheveled clothes that she'd obviously slept in.

Blurred memories of insane, terror-filled dreams flitted through her brain like snatches of dark confetti, but she couldn't string together anything that made sense. All that remained was the sensation of pure horror and a throbbing headache that culminated at the base of her skull. Did Carlos leave already?

Then she remembered his potential relapse and began walking through the house with urgency. Her gaze tore through every room, half afraid of what she might see. God forbid that anything might have happened to him. If a pile of ash greeted her somewhere, she'd die on the spot of a heart attack.

But when she ran out onto the deck, bright sunlight made her shield her eyes. Relief dropped her shoulders and slowed her frantic pace.

She stood in awe, slowly lowering her hand from her eyes. He was on his knees with a lemon yellow towel wrapped around his waist, consumed in silent prayer near the cactus that had transformed into her long blade in the earlier vision. The way the new day's light played across his bare shoulders and sent a prism of color between him and the desert plant, made her squint. Immobilized by the spectacle of watching him send his inner thoughts skyward, she added her own fervent message in silent refrain: Please let him be all right. Watch over him.

As though sensing her presence, Carlos lifted his head, stood, and turned to face her. When he stepped before the cactus, Damali stopped breathing. He was in the same position as he was in her vision, his brown eyes begging her with a question that she didn't understand.

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