2 Empath (17 page)

Or rather, they were watching Zane.

Had he met them already? I felt an uncomfortable twist in my stomach.

“How about we walk down the beach a bit?” he asked, heading in the direction opposite the sunbathers.

“Sure!” I agreed, a little too enthusiastically. I couldn’t feel the girls’ emotions at this distance, and I wanted to keep it that way. I slipped off my sandals and joined Zane. The warm, deep sand sucked down my feet and squished around my toes. The sun shone brightly from the afternoon sky, even as my brain expected a cool, gathering Wyoming dusk.

My head spun a little. It was all too surreal.

“So tell me about the move,” Zane said cheerfully as we started off. “How does it work with the military? Did you fly commercial? How do you like your new house?”

I smiled. Always, he had taken an interest in what was going on with me — even the little things. I answered his questions gladly and slid in some of my own. My feelings of awkwardness disappeared, and with each step along the calm ocean I felt my spirits rise.

Until, suddenly, he went quiet and stopped.

“What is it?” I asked. I had not been paying the least attention to where we were walking, but now I also stopped and looked around. He was staring back into the houses that lined this section of beach. Specifically, he was staring at the rental condo in which my parents and I had stayed over break.

I felt a wave of giddiness. “What are you staring at?” I repeated.

He turned. “I was hoping you could tell me. It’s been messing with my mind for weeks now. Is that where you were staying when we met?”

I tried hard not to smile. “What makes you think so?”

His mouth twitched a little. Clearly, he knew my game. “Because every time I look at it, particularly that back patio, I get a very weird feeling.”

“Tell me,” I begged.

His green eyes held mine. “It’s a jumble of different feelings, really. I’d say excitement is the main one. Optimism. Laughter. But it’s not all positive. Every once and a while I’ll be looking at it, and then suddenly I’ll feel… very sad.”

“Bittersweet,” I said softly. “That about sums it up. Yes, that’s where I was staying. I would talk to you on the patio so my parents couldn’t hear me. It was only sad because of your situation, and then… well, when we knew you were leaving.”
And a few other awkward moments,
I didn’t add. “Does looking at it make you feel anything else?”

His face changed slowly into a grin. “Maybe. But I’m pleading the fifth on that one. For now.”

My cheeks flushed.
Stop that!
I ordered myself. I started walking again, and he followed me.

“Kali,” he said seriously, “I can really use your help. These random feelings I keep getting all over the place… they’re driving me crazy.”

I couldn’t help but chuckle. “Welcome to my world,” I quipped.

“Tell me more about that,” he asked. “Any progress with the blocking thing?”

We were a good deal further down the beach before I finished filling him in on everything that had happened since our last phone conversation at prom. He was as fascinated by my abilities as he had been the first time I’d told him about seeing the shadows; if possible, even more so.

“You can’t tell what I’m feeling though, right?” he asked for the second time.

“I told you I couldn’t,” I said with suspicion. “But you never know, things may change.”

He offered his sexiest smile. The effects were devastating, as usual. “I hope not,” he replied. “Some of them could get me into serious trouble.”

I tried really, really hard not to blush again. “No doubt,” I said. I might have sounded cool, if my voice hadn’t squeaked as I said it.

Now I did blush.

He pretended not to notice. “Kali,” he said with a sudden earnestness. “I hope you were serious about the do-over, because I am.”

My pulse went into overdrive. I wasn’t sure what to say. I wasn’t sure exactly what he meant.

“I want to go back over everything that happened before,” he continued. “Step by step. I want you to take me there, tell me everything you remember. So I can match up all these crazy, random feelings I keep getting with something concrete. I can’t move on with my life until I do.” He stopped and looked at me. “I want to know everything
you
know… about what happened with us. Is that asking too much?”

Somewhere deep inside me, a little chord of fledgling hope twisted… then snapped. Of course he was eager to see me. I was his only link to the supreme mystery that was his out-of-body experience as a wraith. The only one who could give him answers, grant him peace. Once again, just as before, he was dependent on me — and me alone.

He had no choice.

“Of course it’s not asking too much,” I answered, my voice as bright as I could make it while I died inside. “You know I’ll help you however I can.”

So that you can “move on” with your life.

With me… or without me.

“Thanks, Kali,” he said warmly, flashing another killer smile.

I felt another painful twinge in my gut, and looked away.

Chapter 14

Kylee and Tara didn’t often agree in their advice to me. But on this point they were united: I was overanalyzing. And if I didn’t cut it the hell out, chillax, and enjoy myself, they were going to dog paddle across the Pacific and kick my pessimistic butt clear to Japan. So what if Zane felt grateful to me? So what if he needed my help? That didn’t mean he
didn’t
care. That he
wouldn’t
want to be with me regardless. Where did I get off anyway, thinking so little of myself all of a sudden?

They had a point.

I missed them terribly.

I stood in front of the louvered window in our new living room, looking anxiously out into the street. It was nearly noon; Zane could be here any second. Today was the day, he had insisted as I drove away from the beach last night, that I would have my first swimming lesson. No putting it off.

“You make sure he comes in, now,” my dad ordered, watching me as he tried to repair a coffee table beat up by the move.

“I will,” I agreed, trying to unknot my insides. What guy would want to miss out on the world’s most sphincter-tightening “meet the father” experience ever?

My dad was, for all his bluster, really quite a pushover. But no sane human meeting The Colonel in full intimidation mode would believe that. Even Tara and Kylee were still a little afraid of him, and they’d seen the man eating cereal in Darth Vader pajamas.

A small, beat-up hatchback decked out with both roof and bike racks pulled up the street and parked along the curb. My dad stepped up to the window behind me. “Not much of a vehicle, is it?” he commented.

I wasn’t sure if that was a compliment or an insult. As much as my dad worshipped planes and most other giant means of transportation, ordinary-people cars had never held the same fascination for him. Our own were always the utilitarian type — boring but functional. I decided to spin it positively. “He told me that he didn’t want to spend a lot of money on a car,” I explained. “He’s saving up for other things.”

My dad’s eyebrows rose. “Such as?”

“I’m not sure,” I answered, watching as Zane hopped out of the car and headed for the front door. He moved easily, confidently. He looked amazing in a bright blue polo and new board shorts. “College, I guess,” I offered, trying to think of the most parent-friendly answer. I really had no idea what Zane wanted to do with his money — I only knew that he stood to inherit a lot of it when he turned twenty-one.

The doorbell rang. My father grinned and hustled to beat me to it.

Kill me now.

I stood in the center of the room, trying not to collapse, while my father shook Zane’s hand, introduced himself, invited him in. My mother appeared from the kitchen; there were more introductions. My father was being intentionally intimidating, standing practically at attention as he talked, while my mother was making a laughable attempt to pretend that she — as a respectable middle-aged married woman — was
not
completely gaga over the shock of Zane’s unnaturally good looks. (I had told her several times; evidently she thought I was exaggerating.)

Among the four of us, only Zane seemed to be acting normal: relaxed and upbeat. In fact, after his first glimpse of my parents, when he seemed somewhat taken aback by what was probably a flash of recognition, he seemed even more cheerful than usual.

I had to wonder what feelings he associated with them.

I tensed as the first moment of conversational silence fell, and I could see my dad inhale, revving up for his first pitch. In the game of awkward questions, the man was a master. Historical highlights had been such gems as: “So, young man, how do you plan on serving your country after high school?” and the particularly cringe-worthy “What ideas do you have for how you’ll support a wife and family?” (the last being famously delivered not to any date of mine, but to a friend of Tara’s brother who happened to be giving us a ride to homecoming). Fathers who let things go with the classic “what are your intentions with regard to my daughter?” had nothing on Mitch Thompson, who had long-since exhausted that line on the bewildered young hosts of grade-school birthday parties.

But whatever mortifying question my father was preparing in his head, he never got a chance to ask it.

“I wanted to thank you,” Zane said smoothly, making eye contact first with my father, then with my mother. “Both of you, for letting Kali fly back to the mainland and track me down at that hospital in Nebraska. Not many parents would have done that. But the fact is, if you hadn’t trusted her instincts, I don’t think I’d be alive today. The doctors said there was nothing else they could do for me — that I’d given up. But your daughter dragged me back to life again.”

He turned to me, his eyes twinkling.

O.M.G.

I braved a look at my dad. He’d shrunk about two inches and his face had gone pale.

“You’re welcome,” my mother said finally, warmly. “We’re just glad it all worked out okay.” She cast an amused glance at my father, then turned back to Zane. “And we need to thank you for convincing Kali to be honest with us about what she’s been going through all these years. We really had no idea.”

Zane smiled back at her. “I have no memory of doing that, but hey — I’ll take the credit.”

My mother looked at him thoughtfully. “You don’t remember anything from when you were… here before?”

He shook his head. “No events. Some things do seem familiar to me, though.” He cast a glance at my dad, who was currently staring, glassy-eyed, out into space. “I do remember seeing the two of you before,” he admitted.

My dad snapped suddenly back to attention. “Um… what was that?” he asked stiffly, as if he had missed a question.

“I was wondering,” Zane said easily, obliging, “if you were still looking to surf the North Shore. Kali said you were interested before, but the surf was too rough. It’s plenty tame now, though, and I’ve spent a lot of time talking to the locals, learning all the best spots for getting your feet wet without breaking your neck. I’d be happy to point them out to you sometime.”

I watched as my dad’s internal struggle played out on his tortured face. Zane’s bringing up the topic of the supernatural had thrown him into a tailspin — he still couldn’t acknowledge it, wouldn’t discuss it, no matter what physical evidence stood in front of him in all its glory. The fact that Zane had brought the matter up so lightly and matter-of-factly only added insult to injury, particularly when, at this point, my dad had hoped to have the fine young man reduced to a quivering mass of jelly, rather than the reverse.

Then again, he had always wanted to surf. And this
was
Hawaii.

My dad’s normal color returned. “Kali says you’re staying up by Backyards? That right? What you got out there right now? One, two footers?”

And with that, the surfer talk began.

Slowly, I started to breathe again.

It took some time to get Zane herded toward the door and out, particularly after my mother started telling him embarrassing anecdotes about my previous fails at learning to swim — a subject Zane took way too much interest in for my liking. But by the time we left, there were legitimate smiles all around: my dad had a firm date to rip a few on the North Shore, and my mother seemed confident that — at long last — she had finally met someone who might actually be able to keep me from drowning.

I was just happy to be alone with him again. “That went well,” I praised, buckling myself into the passenger seat.

To my surprise, Zane turned to me with an anxious look. “I hope my talking about your gifts didn’t upset your dad too much,” he said regretfully. “I didn’t mean to make our first meeting awkward for him.”

I looked into his earnest face and cracked up laughing.

***

I had texted Lacey to ask where she was lifeguarding; when we arrived at the pool, she was on a break and waiting for us by the gate.

We hugged each other like old friends, which was pretty ironic, since really we were new ones. She looked the same as I remembered her, short and blond with a plumpish figure, pretty face, and sunny smile. I introduced her to Zane and was forced to watch as yet another female went wide-eyed at the sight of him. She recovered quickly enough, though, and within seconds was talking to me as though we had known each other forever.

Zane soon left us alone to catch up, claiming he was anxious to “warm up with a few dives.” The second he was out of earshot, Lacey whistled out loud. “Are you kidding me?!” she joked. “Wow. Poor Matt never had a chance, did he?”

“It’s not like that,” I protested. “I mean, it’s not like there was ever any competition, certainly not based on looks. I adore Matt, but… I met Zane first, and he and I are…” I sighed. “It’s really complicated.”

Lacey let out a sigh herself. “Talk to me about complicated.”

I studied her face and could feel, vaguely, the conflict within her. She was irritated. Frustrated. At the end of her rope. But a broken heart was not in the picture.