Cursed

Chapter 8

“Desolation” wasn’t even an adequate word. “Fury” didn’t describe what I was feeling. Blindly, I turned around. Rage and sorrow swelled, wanting to swallow me whole.

“I knew this was going to be a mistake,” Kurt said. “I told Jonathan we shouldn’t have brought her here. The little one—whatever, but I knew this one was going to be a problem. Just look at her, she’s getting ready to blow.”

“Kurt, can you just shut up?” Hayden started toward me.

“You can’t tell me you aren’t worried about her being here. She’s unstable right now. She’s capable of anything. Are you seriously comfortable with her running around in your house?”

“She’s not dangerous,” Hayden said in a low voice.

“That’s right. I forgot. You’re blinded by your obsession with her.” Kurt took a step forward.

“Everyone knows. All those times you went back there. There was no reason.”

“Are you finished?” Hayden asked calmly.

“No,” he said. “She should’ve been wiped—” I acted at the basest of instincts, the cruelest of desires. I dove at him, aiming for any part of exposed flesh. All I could see was him touching Adam, removing all traces of me. So that was his gift. For some reason, I felt like that should have been a more powerful realization.

But all I could think was that I kind of wanted Kurt to die.

Kurt’s hand caught me in the side before I could even touch him. An explosive string of curses sounded, and then he pushed hard. Unable to catch myself, I fell backward and landed in the gravel at an awkward, hip-first angle. Pain flared, unexpected and intense.

Since I was on the ground, I didn’t see how Hayden got to Kurt so fast. All I knew was that he did, and I could feel his rage in the form of a blast of red-hot energy. There was a smell in the air—almost like rubber burning. A snapping sound jerked my head up. A huge tree branch swayed and then broke free from the tree, landing between the two. Ignoring the pain in my hip, I scooted back.

“Don’t ever touch her again,” Hayden growled.

Kurt looked up, eyes wide. “Are you threatening me—over her? I’m like your brother, Hayden!”

“Not anymore.”

Kurt blinked, a stunned look crept across his face. “She was going to touch me. I defended myself.”

“I don’t care. Stay away from her.”

For a tense moment, they locked eyes—Hayden’s the color of the darkest hour of night. The air thickened and snapped. I glanced up at the trees, half-afraid the whole forest would come down on us.

Neither of them moved for what seemed like an eternity. Finally, Kurt spun on his heel and stalked toward the house.

“Are you okay?”

I stared at the branch. It was thick enough to crack a skull if it’d hit someone. “Yeah,” I whispered.

Hayden unexpectedly reached out, grabbing my hand and hauling me to my feet. Stunned by the contact, I didn’t pull away. He held on for seconds, but it equaled a lifetime to me. Without thinking, my fingers curled around his, reveling in the smoothness of his hand, the way his fingers seemed to bend around mine almost eagerly.

But then he dropped my hand as if it burned him. From what I’d learned from him before, a few seconds couldn’t have done anything to him. Silence stretched out between us. I tried focusing on anything other than Adam, but Hayden just had to go there.

“Why did you lie to me yesterday?” he asked. “You told me you didn’t tell him where you were. If you hadn’t lied to me, I could’ve stopped this from happening.”

“I didn’t know he was going to come here. Adam didn’t know anything. He never knew.” I stopped, sucking air unsteadily. “Why am I even telling you this? It doesn’t matter now. So I lied to you. You all have won, okay? I’m not going anywhere, because I don’t have anywhere left to go. Olivia loves it here, and isn’t that what you all wanted? To make sure she loved it here?”

“Ember, no one—”

“And now I have nothing.” My voice broke. “So you’ve won. Aren’t you happy?”

He reached for me again. This time his hand caught my arm. “This doesn’t make me happy.”

I looked down at his hand. His fingers, long and elegant, circled my covered arm completely. I glanced up; our eyes locked for one, two, three counts. Something intense flowed across his face, and he took a step forward—so close I had to crane my neck back.

“You hurting would never make me happy,” Hayden said.

“You don’t get it. He was all I had. Adam was it. That was it. And you all took it away.”

He flinched and dropped my arm. “That’s not true. I’m here for you.”

Shaking my head, I backed up. “I don’t know you, so that means nothing to me.”

“Emmie? You sleeping?”

I opened my eyes, staring at the vaulted ceiling. “No.”

Olivia was quiet. Seconds later, I felt her hoist herself over the edge of the bed. She crawled across and sat so her face was directly above mine. I closed and opened my eyes, but her face was still planted in front of mine.

“Why didn’t you eat dinner?”

“I wasn’t hungry.”

She reached out and grabbed a handful of my hair. I braced myself, but she managed to not leave me bald this time. “Ms. Liz said you had a bad day.”

That was the understatement of the millennium.

Humming softly, she separated the curls in her hands. I stayed impossibly still so her little fingers didn’t brush my scalp.

“You mad at me?”

“I’m not mad at you.”

“You sad?” She tugged a thick curl across her fingers.

I had no idea how she jumped from me being mad at her to me being sad. It hurt my head to even try to figure it out. “I’m just tired.”

Straightening out several curls, she pulled my hair in front of my face. Her fingers smelled like Play-

Doh. I loved that smell. The sudden rush of tears was unexpected. I squeezed my eyes shut.

She let go of my hair, giggling as the curl sprang back. “Emmie?”

“Yeah?” Even with my eyes closed, I felt her face in mine again.

“I love you lots.”

Something was wrong with my eyelids. They weren’t blocking the tears. I slid my hands between us and smacked them over my face. I bit down on my lip to keep the horrible sound from escaping.

Olivia tugged on my sleeves. “Emmie?”

“I love you too,” I said thickly.

Eventually, she gave up on the tug of war. The bed dipped as Olivia shifted down and wrapped her arms around my waist. I didn’t dare move until I heard Olivia’s soft snore. I lowered my hands carefully to chest level.

Vaguely, I wondered when I’d turned into such a wuss. I had cried after the accident, Dad’s death, and my own dying stuff, but I thought I’d used up a lifetime’s worth of tears. But losing Adam was just as painful—ripping open old wounds, creating new ones. I eventually caved to exhaustion.

My eyelids drifted shut and when I opened them again, Olivia was gone.

Crying always left my head feeling like a drummer had taken up residence inside my skull. I pushed off the covers and swung my feet off the bed.

Soft light from the bedside lamp cut away at the darkness. I found my way to the bathroom and washed away what remained of my tear-fest. Then I pulled off my hoodie and tossed it back into the bedroom. I refused to look in the mirror after that. With my current drama-induced freak-out, I would probably throw myself on the floor after one glimpse of my scars.

Unable to fall back to sleep, I sat down at the desk and booted up the computer. Hope sparked alive when I checked my email. There were old messages from Adam, proving that he had known me once upon a time, and the one Dad had forwarded to me before the accident, but nothing new.

I don’t even know what I was thinking.

Out of boredom and a sort of desperate need to think about anything else, I Googled: “Gifted.” Results were so not what I was looking for. Then I searched “special powers.” Wikipedia brought the giggles, but since I didn’t think I was dealing with the X-Men, I hit the backspace button.

Finally, I came across a website dedicated to real accounts of superpowers. Taking a deep breath, I clicked on the link and started reading. Things like clairvoyance, precognition, the ability to look into the past, rapid learning, super-speed, telekinesis, telepathy, pyrokinetics, memory removal, dream manipulation, and on and on. There was nothing on bringing back the dead or a “toxic touch” syndrome.

All these years I’d never really considered the idea of Olivia having “superpowers,” but there was no doubt she was gifted, and so were the other people in the house.

Me? I was cursed.

Yawning, I scanned the rest of the page. Curiosity got the best of me and I typed in “The Facility.”

After several pages of nonsense, I gave up. I don’t know why I’d thought some crazy research-slash-kid-

stealing institute would have a website.

Weary, I turned the computer off and picked up my sketchpad. Several attempts at drawing ended in failure. Everything came across wrong, uneven. I ripped the pages off one by one and tossed them to the floor. All the while my brain kept spitting out questions that had no answers. Tossing the pad on the desk, I stood and glanced around the room. The drapes covering the balcony doors stirred as the air kicked on.

The flimsy material billowed out further. I reached out and caught the drapes. Outside, thick clouds rolled through the night sky. Only a fine sliver of moonlight hit the balcony, casting shadows of the nearby trees. But something looked strange about the shadows near the balcony door. Frowning, I leaned closer and peered through the glass.

One of the shadows appeared way too thick, too solid—and way too tall.

My fingers slid away from the curtain. Then the shadow moved.

I jerked back from the door, tripping over the chair I’d been sitting in. I caught myself on the edge of the bed, eyes glued to the door.

By the time I found the courage to look again, there was nothing on the other side of the door or anyone on the balcony. I double-checked that the door was locked—a pointless precaution, but it made me feel better. I climbed into bed and lay down on my side, clutching the blankets to my chin. My eyes stayed on the balcony doors.

It was a long time before my heart would calm down enough so I could fall back asleep.