“Let’s just say that Aidan and I had a falling out about sixteen years ago.”
I reach out and grab Nolan’s arm before he can step even an inch farther from me. “Get in the car.” I nod in the direction of my pale blue rented subcompact. “You’re driving me to Mexico.”
He tries to shake off my grip, but I hold tight. I laugh at the surprise on his face. “I’m a lot stronger than I look.”
“So am I,” he answers. “And I’m not taking you anywhere.”
“Don’t you want to save your beloved luiseach?” I spit. “What I told you about Aidan was true,” I add, before he can object. “He really did keep Sunshine from touching you.”
“How about what you said about protectors and luiseach? Is it true that they can fall in love and be together?”
“It’s rare,” I admit. “But don’t pretend you didn’t know that. You know that the only way to create a luiseach child is with two luiseach parents. If luiseach were constantly falling in love with their protectors, we’d have gone extinct long ago.”
“But you are going extinct,” Nolan says. “That’s what Aidan thinks.”
“And he’s right,” I answer huskily, dragging the boy away toward the parking lot. “At least, he’s right as long as the girl lives. But once she’s gone . . .” I trail off, setting my jaw. Of course I know our numbers were dwindling before the girl’s birth—we were limited by the fact that it takes two luiseach to make one—but at least we were still able to reproduce somewhat!
And some luiseach are better than none.
Without closing my eyes, I search for the strongest nearby spirit: what’s left of a high school athletics star. Its strength pushes Nolan along behind me. “I see it’s going to take a little bit of persuasion to get you to do what I need you to do.”
It doesn’t matter why he wants me at his side when he steps foot onto Llevar la Luz. I’ll be able to go with him even if the only reason he wants me there is to stop the pain.
It’s time to show him just how strong I am.
CHAPTER THIRTY-FIVE
Focus
With all this nervous energy coursing through my body, the last thing I expect is to fall asleep while I’m waiting for Nolan. But I do. And I dream.
I see Nolan and that girl again. The normal girl, with her frizz-free curls and her nonhauntedness. I see them from the back—she’s leading him across a parking lot, but wait . . . her fingers are digging into his arm so deeply that she’s clawing holes in his jacket.
That’s not normal. There’s nothing normal about that.
Now she’s pulling him down a pinecone-littered street that looks more like a path out of a fairy tale than an actual street in an actual neighborhood. She turns onto a long driveway, dragging him behind her all the time. I’m so far away—floating above them like a disembodied pair of eyes again—that it takes a second for her face to come into focus, like looking through the viewfinder of my old Nikon and adjusting the lens.
If my disembodied pair of eyes had a mouth, this is when it would gasp. If I had legs, this is when they would run to Nolan. If I had hands, they would wrap their way around her fingers and pry her away from him.
I’ve seen her face before.
It’s the face from my nightmares, the dreams that began the first night I slept in this house. This is the woman who stood over me as a helpless infant. The woman who tried to kill me.
When I wake up, I can smell her: lavender and spices.
I thought I’d never want to talk to Aidan again, but instead I’m banging on his door at eleven at night in the pitch-dark hallway. The wood splinters beneath my fist. When Aidan finally opens the door, I see that he’s still fully dressed, but his white shirt is wrinkled, and it looks like he hasn’t slept for days, maybe weeks. His eyes are bloodshot, and the dark circles beneath them are so dark, they look like bruises. How have I never noticed this before? Does he usually hide it somehow? I don’t wait for him to step out into the hallway before I ask, “Did Helena try to kill me?”
Aidan blinks. “What?”
“You said that you insisted that you be the one to eliminate me, remember? But before that—did she try to do it herself?”
“Why are you asking?”
“It’s important!” I try not to shout. I hear Lucio moving around in his bedroom nearby. “Please!” I beg, even louder now, more desperation in my voice.
Slowly, like his head weighs about a thousand pounds, Aidan nods.
“When you started to cry, Helena insisted that Victoria bring you downstairs. She held you close and you stopped crying—you must have smelled her milk. But instead of feeding you, she held you tighter. And tighter still. As though she thought she could squeeze you right out of existence.”