Forgiven (Book 3, The Watchers Trilogy; Young Adult Paranormal Romance) (30 page)

Tara
rolled her eyes at me.  “We are not cut from the same cloth, girl.  I knew if you had sex before marriage you would regret it for the rest of your life.  That’s just who you are.  Now, me on the other hand
?
”
Tara
said pointing to herself
.
“I’ve already been around that block.  There wasn’t anything to save because I’d already given it away to the wrong person.  Now I know what it feels like to be with a man I love and there ain’t no power on this earth who’s going to take that away from me.”

“Maybe I should warn Lucifer,” I said.  “I know how you are when you want something and it ain’t pretty.” Mentally, I was reliving the after-Thanksgiving
mayhem caused by
Tara
’s unstoppable desire to get what she wanted
for Malik
.

“You think that might stop him?”
Tara
said with a smile.

“I know it would stop me,” I
replied in all seriousness
, before falling into a fit of laughter.

The next person I went to see was Will.

We hadn’t talked much since Utha Mae’s death
,
and I felt a bit guilty for not checking up on him sooner.  When I knocked on his apartment door, I saw the curtain of the front window move and knew he had seen me standing outside.  I waited what seemed an eternity until he finally answered the door.

“Hey, Lilly,” he said, looking a complete mess.  His hair hadn’t been brushed in at least a couple of days.  His facial hair was a good inch long and he smelled like he hadn’t bathed in a week.

“Are you ok?” I asked, immediately concerned.  “Are you sick?”

Will shook his head.  “No.”

We stood there silently looking at one another.  Finally I asked, “Can I come in?”

I wasn’t sure Will was going to let me in but finally he opened the door wider and allowed me entry.

When I stepped into the apartment, I could smell the
overflowing
trash can and what remained of
left over take
-
out coming from the kitchen area.  I immediately found my phone in my pant
’
s pocket and called
Tara
.

“Get over to Will’s,” I told her.  “I need your help.”

“What’s wrong?”

“Just come over.  We need to clean.”

When I got off the phone with
Tara
, Will had already returned to his bedroom and pulled the cover over his head, apparently attempting to hide from the world.

I didn’t bother him.  It was going to take a while to get his apartment back to normal and the less he was in the way the faster I could accomplish it.

When
Tara
arrived, she looked like she was ready for battle.  In one hand she carried a mop and in the other hand she carried a bucket filled with cleaning supplies. As she stepped over the threshold,
she
gagged a little but stood fast against the mess and helped me clean our best friend
’
s home.  Once we reached the bedroom,
Tara
used the wooden handle on the mop to poke at Will still underneath the cover.

Will peeked out with bleary eyes obviously not appreciating the disturbance.

“Stop it
Tara
,” he said, annoyed at her poking and prodding.  “Can’t you guys tell I want to be alone?”

“Considering the way you smell?”
Tara
said.  “You’re lucky th
ey
haven’t called the police to come and see if there’s a dead body in your apartment.”

Will pulled the cover over his head and mumbled, “Go away.  I don’t want you guys here.”

In one swift motion and with more strength than I thought she
possessed
,
Tara
poked the mop handle under the comforter and slung it onto the floor.  I snatched it up before Will could pull it back onto the bed and took it straight to the washing machine in the kitchen.

“Now don’t make me do to you what I just did to that comforter,”
Tara
warned.  “You stink like the gates of
Hell
opened wide
, Will Allan Kilpatrick.  Get your butt out of that bed before you make me come in and snatch that pretty blonde hair of yours right off your head.”

“Leave me alone!” Will yelled, burying his
face
into his pillow.

When I walked back into the room,
Tara
was
just about to pounce on Will making good on her threat when I stopped her.

“Give us a minute,
Tara
,” I said to her.  “I have a feeling I know what might be going on.”

“Well, if you can’t get results, let me know,” she said.  “I’m sure I can go to Lowe’s and buy a garden hose.  ‘Cause he’s getting a bath one way or the other before I leave this place.”

After
Tara
left the room, I put a hand on Will’s shoulder only to have him flinch away from me.

“Will,” I begged, “turn around and face me.”

I wasn’t sure he would but he finally rolled over onto his side
, refusing
t
o
meet my eyes.

“You haven’t been the same since you had you
r
talk with Utha Mae.  What did she say to you?”

Will blinked like he was finally coming back from wherever his mind
had gone to hide
and reluctantly answered me.

“She said she loved me and that she forgave me for taking her Will’s life.  She said she knew,” he looked at me, “that you all knew Will was different after that night at the lake, you just couldn’t quite put your finger on what had happened.”

Will fell silent.

“What else did she say?” I gently prodded.

“She told me it was my responsibility to make sure Will hadn’t given up his life for nothing and that I should protect you no matter what because that was what I had been sent for.”

“I don’t understand
.
W
h
y
does that upset you?”

“Because she said it wasn’t Lucifer who sent me,” he looked back at me.  “She said God sent me to you.”

“You already figured that part out,” I reminded him.  “I still don’t understand why you’re so upset.”

“It was the way she said it,” Will said.  “It was like she knew it for a fact.  It was something I suspected but didn’t really know.
  Why would
H
e still care about me, Lilly?  I betrayed
H
im in the worst way.  I chose to take Lucifer’s side against
H
im.  I hated humans just as much as
Lucifer
did and couldn’t wait to find the time when we could finally destroy all of you.”

“But you don’t feel that way anymore,” I said.  “Utha Mae was right.  All three of us knew you were different
,
but we didn’t talk about it with one another.  You were still our Will and changed or not we loved you. 
We still love you.  You’re like the annoying big brother our parents never had.”

Will laughed harshly, but it was still a laugh.

“Now come on and stop feeling sorry for yourself.  Take the gift you’ve been given and prove that you earned it.  God didn’t send you to us to just wallow around in self
-
pity.  You’re too good a person for that.  Plus, you have to go somewhere with me and Tara.”

“Where?” Will said, rubbing his eyes with one hand, finally coming out of his self-imposed stupor.

“Brand and I are taking the whole family to Disney World to wait out Lucifer’s plan.”

Will looked at me like I’d lost my mind.  “You know how crazy that sounds
,
right?”

I shrugged.  “Listen, if the world is going to end at least we’ll be at the happiest place on Earth.  I figure if there’s one place Lucifer’s power isn’t going to work it has to be there.”

“Why would Brand want me there?”

“Because whether you like it or not, he considers you part of the family too.  Yes, the black sheep of the family but still family.”

“You’re all crazy
,
you know,” Will said, sitting up in his bed, almost causing me to gag on his body odor.

“Apparently not as crazy as you,” I said, waving a hand in front of my face to dissipate the stench.  “Now go shower a few times while I wash these sheets.  And don’t come out of there without that hairy thing living on your face taken off.  You
’re starting to look like Cousin It
.”

A twinkle of mischief entered Will’s eyes and I knew what he was about to do but felt helpless to stop it.  He pushed me down onto the mattress and started to rub his scraggly beard along my cheeks
. 
I tried my best to push him away
but just ended up
laughing hysterically.  The bristles were too soft to hurt, only tickle.

When he finally let me go, we both had smiles on our faces like we did when we were children trying our best to annoy one another.  I stood from his bed and kissed what I hoped was a clean spot on his forehead.

“Now go clean up, Will Allen.
W
e’ve got
Space
Mountain
to conquer.”

Brand said he would go talk with Abby, Sebastian, and Malik about going with us and the last person on my list was my mother.

After Utha Mae’s funeral, Brand and I had a long talk with my mother and told her everything.  She had already seen my power when I used it on Utha Mae and needed to know who it was she had married.  I was surprised at how well she took everything and was proud of her when she moved back into her trailer.  She said she would file for a divorce as soon as she could figure out where Lucas/Lucifer was.

After Tara and I got Will straightened out, I phased over to my
m
om’s.  She answered the door quickly and gave me a big hug of welcome.

“Come on in, sweetie,” she said.  “I was just making me something to eat.  You want to eat some supper with me?”

We ate my mom’s specialty, Hamburger Helper.  A gourmet cook my
m
om wasn’t
,
but she was pretty good at H and H.
  It was then I realized my culinary skills must have been inherited from her.

“I’m glad you came by,” she told me as we sat down to eat.  “I thought I owed you an explanation about why I never wanted to talk about your grandparents.”

I immediately felt a ton of guilt land on my shoulders.  That had been the one point of the explanation Brand and I gave her that we completely glossed over.  I wasn’t sure how to tell my mother that her father
still
didn’t want anything to do with her after all these years.

“Mom, I already know who they are.”

She looked surprised as she had every right to.

“I actually went to see
my grandparents
not too long ago.”

My mother put her fork down on her plate and sat back in her chair.

“How
a
re they?” She asked.

“They seemed fine, though I only talked to grandma.  Grandpa refused to speak with me, but I did see him right before I left.”

My mother sighed.  “That sounds about right.  He was the one who decided I should be shunned away from the others.  Your grandmother just wasn’t strong enough to talk him out of it.”

“Why didn’t you ever tell me you were Amish growing up?”

My mother smiled.  “Would you have believed me or thought I was telling you a lie?”

Thinking on my mother’s past, I knew the answer immediately, “Lying,” I said.

“That’s part of the reason why I never told you.  Plus, I didn’t want you to think badly of your father for leaving us.  At least now we know he was only sent here to give me you.”

“I’m sorry you got used like that because of me.  Your life would have
been so much easier if you hadn’t had me.”

My mother looked at me like I’d lost my mind.  “Lilly, you’re the only thing that I did right.  Having you was like having a little piece of your father with me.  If I couldn’t have him, at least I had you.”

“But,” I felt myself begin to cry, “you never seemed to want to be around me.”

My mother sighed.  “I’m only human, Lilly.  I had a hard time being around you because you
did
remind me of your father so much.  It broke my heart to be around you sometimes because I missed him so. 
I know that sounds selfish and awful, but don’t you dare think for one minute I never loved you.  You’re the only thing in this world I love.”