I blinked at the traitorous sun streaming in
through the blinds. With a start I bolted into an upright position.
It was morning.
Julia cast a nervous glance behind her to the
empty doorway. When she returned haunted eyes to me, the hair on the
back of my neck stood straight up on end. Instinctively I pulled my
blanket over my mouth, in anticipation of the Poltergeist moment
I knew must follow. “Rachel,” Julia hissed. “He’s here.”
There was no question as to which
“he” she referred to. Bryan, the oldest son. Somewhere in the house. Waiting for me.
“Don’t make me go,” I begged Julia. Her face blotchy with tears, she hugged me hard. “It’s okay,” she croaked out. “You’re going to be
fine.”
Yeah, right. That reassurance might have
been more credible were I not about to be carted off to a far-away land called
Massachusetts by the right hand of the devil. No one wanted Bryan around. No one wanted me to live with him. Yet Julia had abandoned
all attempts to save me. I had no choice.
Wriggling out from Julia’s embrace, I hit the
floor and started running.
“Rachel!” Julia cried. “Come back!”
I ignored her. She would never catch me—not
with those smoker's lungs of hers. Normally I
was a shy, submissive child, but desperate times called for desperate
measures. If I had to spend the next month hiding out in the
prickly bushes in Julia’s backyard, that was just what I would do. At my last doctor’s appointment I’d heard
the doctor call me small for my age. If anyone could survive on the occasional berry, it
was me.
And if hanging out in the bushes failed, well, maybe
I would get saved by a pack of wolves, or abducted by a crowd of friendly
aliens. It happened in Disney movies all of the time. Why couldn’t
it happen to me? There was at least a chance. There had to
be. Because I would not go anywhere with him, I would not go anywhere
with him, I would not go anywhere with him…my frantic determination
rocketing me forward, I rounded the corner of the hallway.
The tall, dark-haired man appeared before me so suddenly that I never had the chance to avoid him. With a startled gasp I crashed straight into his legs--and then went flying backwards, on a collision course with the decorative table holding one of Julia's beloved antique flower vases.
My head was inches away from catastrophe when a strong pair of hands caught
me. Stunned yet otherwise
unharmed, I curled my fingers around leather jacket sleeves.“Hey, little girl,”
a male voice said from above. “Where are you going in such a hurry?”
I looked up. When my rescuer smiled I blinked hard.
He lowered himself down before me. Dark blue eyes regarded me closely. “Did I hurt you?" he asked. "I'm sorry about that. If I'd known you were coming I would have gotten out of the way. Are you all right?”
I nodded, robbed of the ability to speak. Because I had met this man before. I even knew
his name, and why he had come here. But he seemed much too safe,
and smelled far too good, to be the person we had all been bemoaning for the
past fourteen hours. How could he be the same
person? He couldn’t be. And yet he looked exactly like
him! “Who are you?” I whispered.
“You know who I am,” he answered, and with that
the last vestiges of my fear vanished forever. The immediate love I
felt for Bryan Jennings was as inevitable as it was
baffling.
“Let’s get you dressed, missy,” he said. As he lifted me up into his arms I saw Julia, standing in the hallway behind us. She was looking at Bryan with an
expression that let me know she would hate him forever.
“I told you last night what time I was coming,” Bryan growled at her. “Rachel should have been ready an
hour ago.” His words left tiny icicles in their wake.
But I didn't care. Because my life with Bryan Jennings had
begun.
