Entanglement (YA Dystopian Romance) (28 page)

“But . . . but
it was just empty,” he said.

The
vial’s crimson reflection swam in Emma’s tear-filled eyes. “Can I hold it?” she
said.

He
held it out to her, and she lifted it off his palm. Her eyes tracked the red fluid
as it scurried from one end to the other, trying to get to her.

Then
she handed it back to him, and tears dripped into her lap. “Will you hold it,
Aaron?
Please
.”

“What . . .
why?
”
he said.

“Because
you’re warm.”

Aaron
stared at her as the words sank in. Suddenly, he understood. The significance
of what he was seeing, what she meant. The vial held clairvoyance drained from
her own half. She was holding what was left of it, still pulsing, in the palm
of her hand. The part of her that belonged inside her half—trapped forever
inside a cold glass vial.

***

Dr.
Selavio had done this to her.

He
had cut the other end of her clairvoyant channel out of her half. Now all she
could feel inside her was the hole. The vial had been underwater for a month,
and as long as it remained sealed, she was trapped, unable to die. This was Dr.
Selavio’s “cure” for half death.

Emma
watched him, transfixed by the clairvoyance in his hand. Aaron didn’t wait a
second longer. He stumbled from his car and flung the vial to the road. It
popped and bounced to the curb, leaving a red streak. He followed it, crunched
the glass under his foot, and ground it into powder. The glowing fluid pooled
and evaporated.

 In
the silence afterwards, Aaron heard blood jolting through his ears. He climbed
back into his Mazda next to Emma, who looked like she was about to throw up.

“Why’d
you break it?” she said.

“I
set you free,” he said. “Now go find your half.”

Aaron
drove her back to her parents’ house, let himself in, and carried her up to her
bed. She was already asleep. By sunrise, she would be gone.

On
the drive home, Aaron pieced together the facts, his mind a storm. Clearly, the
vial alone hadn’t kept her alive. The headache, the bleeding from her head, the
coma . . . Until yesterday, her symptoms exactly matched those of half death.
Yesterday, though, she woke up.

Yesterday.
The very same day Aaron recovered the vial. It wasn’t a coincidence. He
recalled when he first handled the vial out at the buoy, how it brightened and
appeared to fill up in his hands.

Aaron
jammed the stick into third, and his Mazda screamed onto the deserted freeway.
Emma’s half died that night, yet she didn’t keel over in class until weeks
later. He also remembered the words of her father when Buff and Aaron visited
her. How when she first felt her half
go missing, something kept her
going.

That
something was Aaron, when he touched the vial right before it sank. Yesterday,
he touched the vial again—and once again prolonged her death. Both times,
he
kept her alive

And
he thought he knew why.

In
the case of normal half death, her clairvoyance should have leaked through her
half’s dead body into oblivion via their channel. But Emma’s channel was
severed. She no longer had a half. Neither did Aaron. He and Emma were two
loose ends, pulling at each other like magnets. Thus her channel had been
rerouted to Aaron’s, temporarily plugging the leak and waking her from a coma.
If not for the scar tissue blocking Aaron’s channel, they would have snapped
together and become each other’s halves.

Even
if it didn’t make them true halves, it probably would have been enough to
convince the world—

A
chill pierced Aaron’s spine, and his knuckles whitened on the steering wheel.
Of course. It
had
convinced the world. Eighteen years ago, Dr. Selavio
did exactly that to Amber and Clive. He used the machine on both of them,
severed them both from their original halves and made them snap together. They
were fakes, just like Amber said. Clive’s first half must have died. In
response, the Juvengamy Brotherhood chose a pureblood replacement that would
make him heir: Amber Lilian.

But
Amber’s true half was Aaron.

So
why didn’t he die? Once severed from Amber, Aaron should have lost clairvoyance
fast, like Emma—a vegetable just days after she was severed. Maybe his severed
channel had scarred over, sealing the leak, while Emma’s had not. At least that
would explain the scar tissue at the back of his brain . . .

***

Aaron
skidded to a stop in front of his house and ran inside. The Monday morning sun
burned streaks along his wall. He yanked out drawers and tore through his
clothes, searching. Searching for
what?

What
the hell could he even do?

His
eyes darted to his cell phone, still plugged in. Now fully charged. And still
off. His cell phone had been off since his birthday, and he hadn’t even checked
his messages.

Aaron
pounced on it, flipped open the screen, and waited for the messages to flash.

Two
new voicemails.

He
held the phone to his ear and listened to the first message from Buff.
Apparently, Buff saw how it was and he didn’t want to be best friends anymore
either. Aaron closed his eyes and waited for the second message.

His
heart pulsed against the plastic. When he swallowed, his clammy cheek smeared
against the phone’s screen. Aaron’s heart had almost scuttled up his throat and
into his mouth by the time the message finally played.

It
was Amber, breathless, on the verge of tears. Terrified. “Aaron, it wasn’t
supposed to happen like this, I’m so sorry . . .
you have to run away
—” She
was cut off.

Aaron
shoved the phone against his ear, and the plastic dug into his skin. He wanted
to hear everything—the brush of her cheek against the speaker, her heartbeat, the
flutter of her eyelashes.

 But
it was Clive’s voice that stabbed his eardrum.

“Aaron
Harper,” his voice drawled. “I do hope you get this message, for Amber’s sake.
She agreed to do some things for me she isn’t proud of, just so she could call
you—and you didn’t even pick up.”

The
line clicked. Then silence—
silence
, leaking into his ears like the
frozen, endless vacuum of outer space.

End
of new messages.

Aaron
closed the phone slowly. Every fiber in his muscles had gone limp.

***

Aaron
called her phone.

It
rang once, beeped, and then a recorded voice said, “We're sorry, you have
reached a number that has been disconnected or is no longer in service . . . ”

Aaron’s
hand trembled as he ended the call.

He
dialed Clive’s number, but Clive didn’t pick up. He called from his dad’s
phone, from his house phone. But he knew it was pointless. Aaron jammed his
cell phone into his pocket and paced his room. Each time his volleyball got in
the way, he kicked it as hard as he could.

Then
he yanked his phone right back out and jabbed the buttons with his thumb. His
heart clanged as he scrolled down his list of contacts.

He
paused at Dominic Brees, not sure why he even had the guy’s number. Maybe
Dominic knew where they were.

Aaron
took a deep breath and dialed the rugby player. He lifted the phone to his ear.
Two rings
—
three rings
—It felt heavy now, unwieldy—
four rings
—
five
rings
—

“Who
the hell is this?” said Dominic.

“Put
Clive on the phone,” said Aaron. “I want to talk to him.”

A
pause. “You’re too late, number eleven. They’re not here anymore.”

His
heart sank. “Where are they? Is . . . is Amber okay?”

“You
know, there’s a rumor going around, number eleven . . . people saying they can’t find
your half or something—Dr. Selavio won’t shut up about it. He keeps saying he
can help you.”

 “He
can start by making me and Amber halves again.”

Aaron
heard a girl’s whiny voice in the background, then Dominic snapping at her.
“Hang on,” he said to Aaron, “Tina wants to talk to you.”

“
Who?
”

“Tina
Marcello, fuckface.”

There
was a long pause. Aaron clamped his cell phone even tighter and pain shot down
his ear. A moment later, Tina spoke.

“Aaron,
they left for their honeymoon,” she said.

His
lips went numb. “Where?”

“We
don’t know. They’re
gone
.”

Gone.
The word was indigestible. “
Where?
”
he repeated.

 “After
her birthday, it was like she gave up. She stopped trying.”

Aaron
squeezed his eyelids shut. “Does Clive answer when you call?” he said.

“Only
for Dominic,” she said, “but he won’t tell him anything.”

“Then
you can get a message to her,” said Aaron.

“How?”
she said. “Her phone’s disconnected.”

“Yell
the message into Clive’s phone so she can hear it,” he said. “Yell it
loud
.
Blow out Clive’s eardrums.”

She
was silent for a moment. “Yell
what?
”

Aaron
lowered his cell phone to his chest and scanned his bedroom. His lungs stung
with each shallow breath.
Yell
what?

Amber
had already given up.

No—that
had to be a lie. Amber
never
gave up. He pressed the phone back to his
ear.

“Tell
her I love her,” he said.

Plus 1
Day, 20 hours, 42 minutes

“Are you nervous?” said Amber.

Clive dropped the cord
from his hoodie, which he had been fidgeting with, and fixed his gaze on her.
“I’m proud,” he said.

“Of who?
Yourself?
”
The limo drove over a pothole, and she felt a spasm of pain in her back.

“Of you,” he said. “The
potentate will be delighted to see how much you’ve matured since the last time
we visited the palace. You’re a beautiful girl, Amber.”

“Can you please stop
talking like them?” she said. “Like who?” said Clive.

“Like our parents.”

Clive smirked, ignoring
her comment. “Then again, I still have to teach you some manners . . . ” he leaned
forward, “and that’s what the ten hour flight’s for, Mrs. Selavio.”

 Amber felt her lip
curl. She pressed her forehead to the window, but she could still feel his
gaze. She loosened her hair, and a blonde curtain fanned out between them.

Clive’s cell phone
rang.

Amber listened to the
ring tone, and her pulse quickened. She glanced up at him. “Aren’t you going to
get that?” she said.

“It’s
them
.”

 The ringing stopped.
The limo bumped the curb as they pulled onto the runway, and she winced again.
She sat forward carefully, trying not to put too much pressure on her tender back.
She resisted the urge to scratch the scabs. The less she scratched, the milder
the scarring.

She felt the whine of
jet engines through the soundproof, tinted windows, but heard nothing. The limo
glided past small propeller planes and commercial jets, and beyond the private
airport’s control tower she could just make out the mountains through the
rippling haze—the mountains where she and Aaron had stargazed two nights before
her birthday.

The memory stung her,
and she felt a sudden, throbbing pressure behind her sinuses. She had tried to
call him, but of course he was with his half. Now there was no way to reach
him. Since she blocked Clive’s calls, she wasn’t allowed a phone anymore.

Amber closed her eyes
and held her breath, but Aaron refused to leave her mind. Of course not, he had
to ruin everything in there first and turn her into an emotional mess. The limo
parked next to the potentate’s private jet.

“That’s a Gulfstream
gee-six-fifty,” said Clive, nodding to the sleek, black aircraft. “Here to Italy
without refueling.”

“Does it look like I
care?” said Amber.

Clive’s cell phone rang
again, just as the driver opened the door for her, and the scream of jet
engines blasted her ears. Amber hesitated. What if it was an emergency?

 “Could you give us a second?”
she said to the driver.

He nodded, tipped his
hat, and shut the door. Silence again. Clive’s cell phone was still ringing.

Amber faced him.
“Didn’t Dominic just let you stay with him for an entire month?”

“He’s the one who owes
me
,”
said Clive.

“For
what?
”

“For Father’s
services.”

The phone went silent,
then rang again.

Amber glared at him.
“So you’re just going to ignore them?”

Clive sighed and jerked
the phone open. “What do you want?” he said.