Embrace (The Gryphon Series) (5 page)

“Gabe
Allen Garrett!” Grams snipped, her lips pressed together in a disapproving line.  “I told you two before that I don’t want you doing that kind of stuff under my roof.  This is my home.  You
will
respect my rules, boy.”

My jaw h
ung slack.  Pure glee filled my brother’s face.  Slowly, I turned my head in the direction of my
usually
much-adored grandmother.  “You
knew
about this?” I croaked.

“Of course
, dear.”  Grams lifted one bony shoulder.  “Grams doesn’t miss much.”

“And you’re
okay
with it?”

She looked stunned that I would suggest otherwise.  “Well, yeah.  Gabe’s a good boy, Alaina
’s a good girl, and they’re in love.”

“
They’re in…” My head swiveled back to the couple.  Alaina’s slender arm was around Gabe’s waist.  Her other hand rested casually on his broad chest.  Both of his overly-muscular arms were wrapped protectively around her.  “But she’s a…!  And he’s a…!  And it’s…
ucky
!”  My ability to articulate had apparently short circuited.  “
How long has this been going on
?”

“S
ince shortly after you killed Barnabus.” Alaina replied softly.

“
That’s like two months!  And all this time you kept it from Kendall and me?”

“Um…I knew too
, Cee.” Kendall interjected from our bedroom doorway. 

Oh, sure—s
he wouldn’t go into the mountains with me, but
this
she gets off the bed for.
“Sometimes Keith and I double date with them.”

I pinched the bridge of my nose a
s my head began to pound.  “All this time.  All the fighting and bickering.  I thought you two hated each other, but turns out it was just love play.”  My hands fell to my sides limp. With a slight lift of my shoulders I asked, “Why? Why all the secrets and lies?  Why didn’t you just tell me?” 

All four of them seemed uncomfortable by that question. 
Feet shifted, hands fidgeted, looks went anywhere but at me.  Alaina finally answered.  Even her usually soothing, made for radio voice faltered as she tried to explain.  “Well, it seems that as of late you have been…struggling.  We didn’t want to upset you further.”

Heat rose to my cheeks.  “
What does that mean?”

“You haven’t been the same since things with Alec went south, Cee.”  Gabe
stated, his face somber.  I instantly bristled at the mention of Alec’s name. “I know you don’t want to talk about it, but you need to.” 

“
There’s nothing to talk about.”  I tried to keep my face and posture detached, like this particular topic didn’t eat at me.  But for all my squirming I couldn’t conjure up anything that came across as neutral.  “Sometimes these things just don’t work out.  It’s no big deal.  I’ll get over it.”  At least the visible signs of my discomfort supported my fictional break-up story.  If they knew the truth…

No.  That wasn’t an option.

Gabe separated himself from Alaina and stepped toward me.  “If it was just the Alec thing, yeah you absolutely would.  But Grams told us about what happened with your professor today.  And that you wanna quit school. It’s a monumentally bad idea.  Whether you realize it or not you’re turning your back on your human life.” 

“
I haven’t quit my job.”  Even I knew how weak my argument sounded.

“Only because of lack of f
undage, I’m sure.”  Keni leaned against our bedroom door frame, her hands hidden behind her Tinkerbell jammy pants. 

Anxiety ma
de it difficult for me to stand still, so I yanked my ponytail holder out and combed  my fingers through my snarled hair.  “So just to clarify, you didn’t tell me about your relationship because my life is such an abysmal failure that you didn’t want to rub in it?  Is that what you’re saying?” 

Gabe shoved his hands into the pockets of his jeans.  There was no hostility or resentment on his face, just blatant honesty. 
“Basically, yeah. We feel bad because we’ve figured out how to balance our lives and our callings, and for some reason you can’t seem to.”

Her face reflected her sympathy for me as
Kendall nodded her agreement.

Grams leaned her bat up against the wall and
wrapped a comforting arm around me.  “We just want you to remember, honey, that it’s not all about the fighting.  There’s more to life…”

“
Just stop!” I snapped and ducked away from her touch.  “None of you really get it!  You think you do, that you have my whole situation all figured out, but you have no idea!  For me, it
is
all about the fighting.  Because
I’m
the Conduit. 
I’m
the one the Dark Army is looking for. 
I’m
the one that hordes of demons want to kill.   Every moment of every day someone, somewhere is plotting my death.  Not yours.  Or yours.  Or yours. Or yours.”  I jabbed a finger at each of them, then stabbed a thumb at my own chest.  “
Mine.
The sacrifices and tough decisions are mine to make, because it’s my calling.  There’s no question that you two can balance your double lives better than I can.  Because you can slip into your “super suits “whenever the mood strikes you, and forget about it the rest of the time.  But I don’t have that luxury.  Because
I’m
the chosen one.  You’re the
sidekicks
.  You have no idea what I’m dealing with.”  With that I skirted around Grams, and marched down the stairs.

“Celeste
!”  Grams called after me.  “Where are you going?”  

“Out!”

“Let her go.”  Gabe grumbled loud enough for me to hear, which I’m sure was on purpose.  “Maybe she’ll run into some big bad demon that’ll knock her off her ‘chosen one’ pedestal.”

I stomped out of the house,
crossed the dew moistened yard, and climbed back into my truck.  My earlier agenda for the evening all but forgotten.  I crammed the key into the ignition and fired the engine to life.  Snatching up my cell phone, I punched in the number.  Then cradled the phone between my shoulder and ear so I could throw the gear shift into reverse.  Gravel flung as I peeled out of the driveway.

S
he answered on the second ring.  Music blared in the background.  “Helloo?”

“Sophia, it’s Celeste.  Are you still at th
at club?”

“Sure am, babe!
”  She bubbled.  “It’s called Smokey Joe’s and it’s off the hook!”

“I’ll be there in thirty minutes.”

CHAPTER 6

The thirty minute drive back to Nashville went by in a red haze of me stewing in my own anger.  My entire family had been deliberately keeping things from me, and somehow managed to rationalize it away by turning the blame back on me.  They believed I was “giving up on life”? More like life already gave up on me.  This definitely wasn’t how I envisioned my future playing out.  Just a few short months ago I’d been so looking forward to dorm life.  I planned to discover who I was and who I wanted to be through trial and error.  Every conceivable experience and adventure would be mine to embrace.  Now that could never be.  Because the more people I was around, the more lives I put at risk.  But fine.  They want me to go out and live?  That’s exactly what I would do.  And if someone ended up dead—or unexplainably evil, like Alec—that was on their heads.  Not mine. 

A
ctually finding Smokey Joe’s in Nashville turned in to an endeavor in itself.  And one I really didn’t have the patience for.  All the tall buildings, claustrophobia-inducing side-streets, and loads of people milling all about made me long for the Podunkness of Gainesboro. I puttered down 3
rd
Avenue, peering around for the address.  Other drivers honked and threw me the bird because of my snail’s pace, but I couldn’t have cared less.  With my mood I could’ve redefined “road rage” for them if they wanted to start something.   

A thumping musical beat seeped through my cracked window.  I slowed the truck to
an idle and squinted down the narrow alleyway toward the sound.  A jovial group of kids—teens, maybe early twenties—spilled out from the side of an old high-rise.

“You’ve gotta be kidding me.”  I grumbled to myself.

The blue piano shaped sign confirmed my fear.  Smokey Joe’s sat back in the tight alleyway, nestled into the basement of the aged brick building.  Cement stairs led down to the entrance.  Fantastic.  And I was supposed to park my truck…where? 

In a huff
, I drove off to find a place to park.  After circling the block four times, uttering every cuss word I knew, and inventing a few new ones, I found a spot three blocks down and a street over.  The walk back involved cutting through the kind of dark, foreboding alleys that girls are always warned never to venture in alone.  Long, narrow, limited visibility—and not the least bit disconcerting if you happen to be a supernaturally strong freak.  Since taking down a three-story dragon, muggers had become significantly less worrisome.  

I ducked
around the corner of a four story office building and strolled toward Smokey Joe’s.  Almost instantly the street noise was silenced by the concrete and brick walls around me.  Trash cans were lined up outside service doors, graffiti covered sections of wall, but there were no signs of life. Perhaps the ominous nature of my isolated surroundings were to blame, but a familiar prickling sensation sprang up on the back of my neck.  I glanced behind me.  Nothing there but a few random leaves blowing around in the nippy autumn breeze.  I zipped my coat up a little further, then kept walking.  The feeling intensified.  No doubt about it, someone was following me.  I couldn’t hear whoever it was, but I knew they were there.  Despite the quickening of my pulse I kept my head down and stride steady. 

With my empathe ability
, I reached out for the link to my stalker’s emotions.  No living being was anywhere around.  Yet my Conduit instincts told me I wasn’t wrong.  I prepared for the inevitable by dropping my purse next to the wall, shoving my coat sleeves as far up my arms as they would go, and striking a defensive stance.  The corners of my mouth tugged back in a grin.  A little violence to blow off steam was
exactly
what I needed.  And here it came.  They entered this realm in five black puffs of smoke. 

Poof. 

Poof. 

Poof.

Poof. 

Poof.  

The gangs all here.

I
righted my posture and dropped my arms to my sides.  “You have
got
to be kidding me.”  

These were, without a doubt, the worst collection of demons I
’d ever seen.  On the far right stood a broad-faced, pasty-skinned guy who looked an awful lot like Eddie Munster with a Mohawk, signature widow’s peak and all.  Next to him were a pair of Siamese twin demons connected at the shoulder with bowl haircuts, and glasses held together with Scotch tape.  I even had a couple inches on them height-wise. The third dude was tall and gangly, with reddish-orange hair that stuck up every which way.  He had a fish hook nose and Dumbo ears that trumped Professor Nosehair’s.  The last guy suffered from some sort of demonic acne.  His skin was an angry mess of boils, blotches and puss.  After my initial glance, I opted to avoid looking directly at him at all costs.

They were demonic geeks
, and seemed absolutely terrified to be here.  I confirmed my suspicion by doing a false-start jerk in their direction.  They squealed and huddled together.  The twins even squeezed their eyes shut.  Unless these guys had some hellacious powers, I found it deeply offensive that this sniveling band of goobers had been sent after me. 

“The Dark Army sent
you
?” I scoffed as I yanked my coat sleeves back down my chilled arms.  “To do what exactly?”

“We’re supposed to kill you.” One of the twins squeaked and
tried to hide behind his brother, which of course was physically impossible. 
Idiots.

My hand paused on my sleeve.  I raised one eyebrow at him and
did my best imitation of Gabe’s cocky smirk.  “Is that a threat?”

I
couldn’t tell which, but one of them whimpered.

“No
!  Our powers aren’t completely developed yet.” Admitted visibly trembling Red.  “We don’t even know why we were sent!”

With an exasperated sigh, I straightened up
—again.  This proved without a shadow of a doubt that Rowan lied.  Why would anyone in their right mind voluntarily abduct and demonize these weenies? 

But a demon
’s a demon, and I was still itching for a fight.  “What
can
you do?”

“Well, I can do this.”
Red held up his index finger.  He grimaced and strained until the digit began to glow red hot.