Chapter Sixteen
When I was little, I hated being away from my dad. I assume now it was because he had taken me from Mom. Maria had done everything she could for me to cheer me up. We played games, baked, and did so many things. The one thing that always stood out in my mind was how anytime I or one of the boys got upset, a penny would appear.
She would tell us the angels didn’t like it when we were sad so they would send us pennies from heaven to make us smile. I was smart for a little kid and knew she was the one doing it but I never said a word to the boys. So what I saw that day made me think twice.
“Funny thing. After I killed him, I noticed something. Lying beside him on the floor, were two bright, shiny, pennies.” I put my hand down in my bra and pulled them out. I had kept them. I handed one of the pennies over to Gabe and he just stared at it.
I watched as Lorik came across the room. I handed him the penny. He looked down at it and then pulled me into his arms. I felt his hand rub the skin on my back. I pulled back from him.
“I’ve always thought of you all as my guys. I don’t mind to wear your names.”
He broke down in tears and fell to his knees. He wrapped his arms around my waist and cried like I had never seen him. I run my fingers through his hair trying to soothe him as I closed my eyes.
“When Braydon came out of the office I saw how pale he looked. He had blood covering one side of his shirt. I knew he wouldn’t make it much longer. He was staggering; his eyes didn’t seem to be focusing. I couldn’t let him die,” I broke down in sobs. The thought of not seeing them again hurt. “I knew I was taking a chance on killing myself by saving him. I knew I had lost a lot of blood with the things they had done.
“What was I supposed to do? I grabbed the med kit from the office and started talking to him. I filled the blood bag and set it up so he would get the flow quickly. I told him stories of all of you. I wanted you all to know that if I didn’t make it, you were the ones I was thinking about at the end.”
This time it was me that fell to my knees. Lorik had moved away as I had been talking to sit on the edge of his Dad’s desk to listen. He had tried to catch me but my body felt like it just crumbled. I was sobbing into the floor. I knew my back was showing and I didn’t care.
Within seconds I was surrounded by the guys. One was holding me, one was wiping my face with his shirt, one was kissing my forehead, one was holding my hand and the other was moving my hair out of my face. But they were all telling me how much they loved me.
“Marissa, do you mind if I see those scars?” Archer asked. I looked over at Dean. He nodded.
I got up and stumbled my way to him. The meds must have finally started wearing off. I raised the back of my shirt and waited. I felt his hand touch one scar and then felt him pull the back of my shirt down. When I turned around he was looking at Dean.
“I don’t understand how that child made it.”
Dean rubbed his face in his hands then shook his head. “She shouldn’t have. She had so many broken bones that she shouldn’t have been able to even move.”
“How?” Archer asked me.
“I wasn’t going to let anyone hurt the people I love. I used the pain I was feeling to keep me going. It wasn’t until I saw Dad and Dean that I gave in and passed out. The moment I felt safe, I was gone.”
I know not many people would understand that. Most would say it was impossible but when you love someone that much, you’ll do amazing things to save them.
“And you’re still adamant that you are not the black rose?” Archer asked.
“Yes. I got this tattoo because I found out about some women being killed. There was nothing I could do to help them. It didn’t matter to me that they were older than me. It still bothered me. They were someone’s sister, someone’s daughter, and girlfriend or wife. They didn’t deserve what happened to them.”
The alarm sounded throughout the building and I turned to the television on the wall. The screen lit up. Standing in the hall were three guys, all in black, and all with weapons drawn.
I grabbed my phone, calling Braxton and had him check all floors and other sensors as I put my suit back on. When the all clear came through I looked around at the boys. No one was armed but me and Dean.
“Take Dean’s gun and sit in the corner facing the door. No one comes in, no one goes out.”
I grabbed the big steel frame that held the dry erase board Dean used for planning and put it in front of the door as a shield.
Lorik grabbed my arm. “Marissa you are not going out there.”
“I have to. Listen, none of you are armed or suited. I have no choice. They are after me anyway.”
“You cannot keep risking your life for ours. Let us protect you like you protect us. Please. Rissa don’t you understand any of us would die for you,” Gabe said as he stood before me.
“I know. That’s why I love you guys. But you are going to have to let me stop them. None of you can fit in my suit anyway.” I smiled and winked at him.
“You’re going to have to kill them Marissa,” Dean stated. I just stared at him. These guys weren’t bad just misinformed. “They’re murders Marissa. Someone has broken inmates out of prisons from Mexico, Cuba, and other places. They have gotten the worst of the worst to come after you. Kill them and don’t think twice.”
I hadn’t heard anything about it. It’s not like I’d been watching the news lately but when something like that happens you usually hear people talking. Yeah. That is if you actually listen to what they say. I nodded to him.
Zavier grabbed me before I could move and shocked me. He pulled me to him, held me tight in his arms and kissed me. And I couldn’t stop myself from kissing back.
When he let go, I run across the room where Archer was sitting and watched him jump up quickly as I jumped putting my foot on the wall to boost myself. I had to sling my blade at the same time to lodge it in the concrete past the tile to be able to finish pulling myself up at the angle I wanted.
I knew if I did it right, I could come out behind the guys and they would never be the wiser. I crawled through the tiles, past Dean’s door, and activated the special contacts I had that would allow me to see body heat.
I was two foot behind them when I dropped down. I didn’t even give them a chance to say anything before I stabbed two of them in the heart while wrapping my legs around the other and twisting my body, breaking his neck. I landed on my hands and flipped over letting his body fall to the floor.
I heard the alarm sound again and had the boys standing in front of me before I knew what was going on. When I turned around I had expected someone else. But standing there staring at me was my mother.
I released the blades so they shot back down in the cylinders and put them in the holsters they were in.
“Mom, what are you doing here?”
Her eyes widened and her mouth opened. When I turned to look at Shayden I knew why they had come out of the office, they were keeping her from seeing the dead bodies. Shayden gave me this look like; I cannot believe you just said that. Then I figured out my mistake. She didn’t know we knew.
“Oh uh.” I looked back at Shay again for help. “We sort of found out last night. We, uh, found the birth certificates.”
I watched Mom for a minute. Her shoulder length brown hair was put up in a ponytail. That was when I realized, we looked nothing alike. We were the same height but that was where it stopped. Her eyes were a dark brown and set apart more, her nose wider, and lips thinner. Her frame was just a little wider than mine. I guess I got my looks from my dad somehow.
She seemed to think about this for a minute before nodding her head. She leaned over looking past me, “What are you boys hiding?”
Okay so being smooth was not always my best forte.
“There are dead bodies behind them. We didn’t want you to see them.”
The color drained from her face right before she dropped to the floor. Smooth. Shayden gave me a hard look and I grimaced. I tol
d them to put her in Dean’s apartment for time being, making sure to leave the light on for her so she would know where she was. Then I watched Braydon and Zavier start carrying the bodies downstairs. I tried following but Gabe held me back.
I stood by the window looking out as Dean and Archer talked about the moves I had done and the suit I had built. When the boys came back in and sit down, everything seemed to pick up right where it left off.
“Did you wake up anytime on the way to the hospital?” Gabe asked.
I nodded but never said a word. Everything got quiet. I really didn’t want to have this conversation. The meds wore off and the tension in my body was horrendous.
“I woke up to somebody forcing something down my throat. They were telling me to drink it. I remember vomiting blood all over the window of the car as we were pulling into the emergency room.”
Dean’s chair flew back and hit the wall behind his desk. Zavier started screaming he was going to kill him, while Sage grabbed a hold of me forcing me to look him in the eyes. He was searching for the truth. I guess what he saw there was enough because he reared back and punch the brick wall behind me, breaking his hand in the process.
I run to Dean’s apartment, grabbing ice out of the freezer, putting it in a bag and wrapping a towel around it. I tried to put it on his hand but he kept refusing it saying he didn’t deserve it.
“It wasn’t your fault.”
He didn’t care. He wouldn’t listen. Everyone in the room was going into a fit except me and Shayden. We had no idea what was going on. Gabe and Braydon were doing everything they could to hold Zavier back and keep him from running out the door. Dean was on the phone screaming at someone to do something.
“STOP!” I screamed.
Braydon let go of Zavier as I walked over to him. I forced him into a chair and sit down in his lap. I wrapped my arms around him and held him. At first he was stiff and wouldn’t respond but after a few minutes he wrapped his arms around me and held so tight I thought my insides would rupture.
“I’m going to kill him. I’m going to kill him for what he did to you,” he kept repeating it.
“Shh. It’s alright. Okay. I’m fine.”
He stared at me for a second before speaking, “You don’t know who it was do you?”
I shook my head. I didn’t remember. Every time I tried remembering the face it was a blur.
“It was my dad.” The statement hit me like a ton of bricks. One minute I was looking from Zavier to Sage, the next I was waking up on the couch in Dean’s office.
I laid there listening to the conversation between Dean and the boys. They had been able to tell from my reaction that I knew nothing about who it was. They also couldn’t figure out why he had done it. If I had known it was their dad, I wouldn’t have said anything in front of them. I did not want to live everyday knowing that I had caused their pain. That I would be the reason they went after their own father.
“Could he have figured out that she and Shayden were twins?” Mom asked.
“We did everything to make sure no one knew,” Dean answered.
“I don’t understand, what did it matter if they found out we were twins or not?” Shayden asked. That had bugged me too. Why did they have to separate us, the prophecy never said anything about twins. The director of New Zealand did.
“Because it was said that it would be her twin to start the allegiance,” Archer spoke.
I had figured he would have left. I couldn’t understand why he was still here. He told us what he needed to. Unless being retired he was enjoying the action.
I sat up and looked around the room. Everyone remained quiet as I looked at each of them. It seemed there was no way for me to stop this. Except maybe one.
“I quit,” I stated.
Everyone in the room just stared at me. No one spoke.
“You can’t quit. Even if you did, we would still have to fight to protect you. So you have a choice. You can retire and allow us to do what needs to be done without your help, or you can continue the way things are and be there to make sure your men make it back alive,” Dean stated as he stood up.
He knew he had me. He knew there would be no way on God’s green earth that I would allow my guys to go out after them alone.
“Fine, have it your way. I won’t quit. But I’m hungry and I’m going to fix dinner. You are all more than welcome to join me,” I said as I walked to the door.
“We need to figure out why he did that to you,” Shayden commented.
“We won’t find answers staring at each other or these walls. Sam and whoever else he is working with are the only ones that know the real reason. So I refuse to sit here starving and worry about what stunt he will try next.”
I knew they had all followed as I was walking down the hallway to our apartment. I could hear silent conversations between Dean and Archer, Sage and Zavier, and Mom and Shay. Theirs bothered me more than anyone’s.
Mom was asking Shay if we hated her. She wanted to know if we blamed her for the way things had went. She asked him if he thought I would speak to her or if I would pull away. He answered her saying he didn’t know. How could he not know? How could either of them think I could turn against her? I heard Dean, plain as day, say Mom had refused to give us up.
It hurt knowing I was raised thinking my mother was gone but I understood the logic behind it. Knowing Dad he did it this way because he knew that if I were with him, he would see me daily. He would have also figured out that Shayden would end up joining the academy, which meant he would see him as well.
It was actually pretty smart thinking. And if it weren’t for the fact that we looked so much alike, it may have worked. I wished it had of. This would have never happened.
I had Mom come and talk to me while I made dinner. We talked about me and Shay, about her and Dad, and school. She asked me how I was doing with everything and I really didn’t know how to answer that question.
What was I supposed to say? Well Mom, I hate it all. I don’t want to be the black rose and have people constantly trying to kill me because they think I’m going to turn this all into a freak show. No I couldn’t. There was really no one I could voice how I felt to. I was alone in this. If Dad were here I could have spoken to him about it. He would have understood.
After dinner was over and I watched Mom, Archer, and Dean walk back to his office, I gathered my things together for a shower. I needed one, bad. I let the boys do whatever it was they were planning on doing. Knowing them, plan a way to kill these guys.
I undressed, set everything needed in the shower, got in, turned the water on, and was blasted with a fragrance I knew too well.
Chocolate.
I was severely allergic to cocoa and I just ended up with a mouthful. It was as toxic to me as poison.
I tried spitting it out but I knew the moment it hit my throat and slid down to my stomach. It burn the entire way. I had less than a minute to wrap a towel around me before the pain caused me to double over and begin vomiting blood. After three minutes my airway would begin closing off and I would lay here in this bathroom and die.
Lucky for me I had two things going for me. My twin could feel my pain and my tracker would set off the alarm. And both happened.
As I was double over the toilet, with blood spewing from my mouth, I could hear the running. They were all coming. I underestimated my time.
I could feel my throat closing up as the blood tried to make its way up my throat. I would drown on my own blood. They had to use something stronger this time.
“Epi,” was all I managed to get out before I couldn’t speak at all.