Heroes of Falledge Book One: Black Hellebore (27 page)

Not that he would ever trust her.

He permitted the Black Hellebore to dart behind and grab him, even allowed himself to be knocked to his knees. The girl pried his jaw open, and she forced a light ball into his mouth. Yes. Although cadmium was ordorless and tasteless, he was certain it was in the dust portion of the light. If he expelled it back into her face, she would suffer severe cadmium poisoning and die within a short period of time. He retained the ball in his mouth, wrestled Nicholas off his back, and raced over to the burning tree. The heat it gave off was immense, yet when he touched his bony hand to the tree, it did not burn. He exorcised the cadmium, and the flames destroyed the metal poison.

He swept the fire into a ball and waited.

The Black Hellebore did not disappoint. He waited until he felt the swift arrival of the hero and threw the ball in his direction. The Black Hellebore jumped out of the way, and the fireball exploded, sending sparks and soot everywhere, dusting the grass with its ashes.

He was toying with them. It was proper to do so. Allowing them to think he could be bested was foolish.

He stalked toward the Black Hellebore. He was every bit as fast as the hero, if not faster. The distance between them narrowed to millimeters as they kicked and punched, their limbs flying by in blurs of clothing and bones. Each blow the Black Hellebore landed gave him no pain, although his blows did not seem to affect the Hellebore either. How easy it was to crush humans, and yet this one seemed superhuman. Maybe chemicals had affected him as well.

He could hear the girl approaching through the air. Or perhaps magic.

He allowed the Hellebore to punch his ribs, and reached up to pluck the girl out of the sky. Before he could kill her, or talk, or even think, she disappeared.

He sniffed. The tree had been completely burned to char, but the fire had not spread beyond it. No hint or trace of magic remained in the air. She had truly left the battlefield.

Facing only the Black Hellebore no longer pleased him, and he, too, left. It was time to check on Killa. The next stage in his plan to bring down Big Don was almost ready.

Chapter Forty-One

Early the next morning, Nicholas dropped by Julianna's before he left for work. She was in a foul mood, he could tell, from the dour expression on her face to the half-hearted peck she'd given him when she'd opened the door.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

She shook her head and sat down at the table. He sat across from her. "I thought you two had the perfect relationship back then."

Something in her voice made him think she was lying, but he didn't call her on it. Maybe Julianna knew more than she let on.

"We did," he said. "Other than her... accident."

She rolled her eyes and looked away. "Is that what you call it?"

He furrowed his brows. Death, dying, and the like were too ugly to use in conjunction with Justina. "What are you getting at?" he asked, trying not to show his annoyance with her mind games. If she had something to say, she should say it.

A long, bitter silence filled the room. All Nicholas could hear was his heartbeat. Slow and steady. Strong. Vibrant.

For the first time in a long while, he wished he had died in her stead.

"Call it for what it was." Julianna's voice was scarcely above a whisper, yet each word stabbed into him. Her words were poison.

"Don't tell me..." Could the tox reports have shown the drugs had been laced with something?

But Julianna hadn't known about the drugs...

She clasped her hands together and placed them on the table. Tears swam in her eyes. "You... you didn't know?"

"Know what?" Didn't the woman realize the suspense was killing him?

"She... she left a note."

At first, he still didn't get it. Then realization hit him like a sucker punch. She had left him voluntarily? He had always thought she'd accidentally OD'd. "A suicide note?"

"I thought you knew."

"Do you still have it? What did it say?" His mind raced, as did his heart. His chest ached. He rubbed the tender spot.

"I do. It's upstairs. It said, 'I'm sorry I failed you. I failed you all.'" She hung her head. "For the longest time, I didn't know what she meant. But she must have been referring to the drugs."

"If anyone failed anyone, it was me. I should have been there for her. I should have told your parents--"

"She would have hated you for that."

"I should have never left her side. I should never have pushed her away. I should have made sure she never touched drugs in the first place!" Nicholas slammed his fist into the table. The wood split beneath him, the crack echoing throughout the room.

He had also jostled coffee out of her cup, and it stained her tablecloth. She stood and walked into the kitchen. Instead of returning with a cloth, she handed him a small book.

"Go on, read the part I marked," she encouraged. The bleak look in her eyes told him the passage he was about to read would not make his mood any brighter.

I'm weak. I can't help myself. The feeling I get -- it's so wild and crazy and just more than anything else I've ever experienced. When I come crashing back down, it sucks. I just want to get high again. Nick used to be all I cared about. Not anymore.

He wanted to throw the book against the wall, to scream, to beat the crap out of something. Her familiar, rushed scrawl begged to be read, and he gave in:

I never should have tried it in the first place. Nick was right -- the stuff is dangerous. But when Bobby dared me, I couldn't say no. I never turn down a dare. I had to prove I wasn't a coward.

But I am a coward. I'm a coward each time I light up. I'm afraid of never finding my purpose in life. Because I don't think my life has purpose. I've failed Nick. He deserves someone better than me.

He flipped through the rest of the book, but this was the last entry.

"Dad found it this morning. He was planting in the garden and came across our time capsule. We made it when we were eight. She must have dug it back up."

Numb. He felt numb inside. Cold. Frozen. As if a breath would shatter him into pieces.

"We both failed her, Nick. I had no idea about the drugs. How could I have not known? I was her twin. Sure, we spent less time together because you two were always running off, but still..." She covered her face with her hands and wept.

He should move. Comfort her. Wrap his arms around. But he didn't move.

He could feel
her
presence. Knew
she
was behind him.

He was at a crossroads. He could continue to hold onto her ghost.

Or he could move on and not look back.

She
took a step closer, and he heard a floor board creak beneath her foot. Julianna, still crying, hadn't heard it.

He stiffened.
Her
icy cold breath tingled against his neck. All he had to do was turn around, and Justina would claim his heart again. He would never be free of the ties that bound their hearts together.

With nerves of steel, he deliberately stood and walked around the table, each footstep even and precise. When he reached Julianna, he broke down, pulling her into his arms, letting her tears stain his shirt, his own tears falling into her hair. For a long moment, they clung to each other as if they were the only people alive in the world.

Julianna pulled away first, wiping her face, then his. "I feel better now," she whispered, as if confessing a sin. "No more secrets."

He wished he did, too, but he still had one secret left. He couldn't look at her, his empty arms dangling by his side, throat dry, stomach clenched.

Her expression twisted from peace to unease. Must've read his face, remembered he was holding back still. She took a step away from him.

He grabbed her hand. "He wasn't a good guy."

Julianna's eyes turned hard, her jaw rigid, and he knew she understood his reference. She refused to face him. "Just because he was a bad guy doesn't give you the right to kill him."

"You would have killed him, too."

"Nicholas, you're going too far."

"I did it for her. Because of her."

She furrowed her brow as she eased back into a chair. "What does Justina have to do with--"

"He was her drug supplier."

"Oh... Nick..."

He sat down and closed his eyes. He could remember the stench of it on her, the fights they had... He shuddered. "I pushed her away," he croaked, his voice thick with remorse. "I tried talking to her, explaining, yelling, arguing, begging, bribing... nothing got through to her. And then
he
dared to show up at her funeral. I just snapped."

*****

Nick couldn't believe it. Bobby Gilbert. That son of a bitch had the nerve to show his face.

Bobby was walking down the hill toward her grave when he caught Nick's gaze. He shoved his hands into his pockets, turned around, and walked away.

Nick gave Mrs. Paige a swift hug, patted Mr. Paige on the back, squeezed Julianna's hand, and hurried after Bobby. The sun was beginning to set, and darkness was creeping over the town. It matched Nick's mood. He had felt anger before, but this rage festering inside of him -- it was like a monster inside of him with an insatiable appetite that needed to be fed, and soon.

Bobby didn't seem to realize he was being followed until he headed down an alley and Nick accidentally kicked a rock into a metal trashcan.

The drug dealer whirled around. "Who's there?"

Nick stepped forward, his fists shaking. "You did this to her. You killed her! She never would have overdosed if you hadn't--"

"I never meant for any of this to happen," Bobby said, his normal bravado gone. Without it, he seemed like a little boy. He cowered as Nick lessened the distance between them.

"You killed her!" Nick screamed.

Bobby held up his hands. "I never--"

Nick jumped on top of him, ready to beat the crap out of him, but Bobby pulled out a gun and pointed it at Nick's chest.

"Get off of me," Bobby demanded, a hint of his old superior tone sneaking back into his voice.

Nick backed away. Fleetingly, he thought about forcing Bobby to shoot him, to die and join Justina, but he couldn't. He was too weak. He did want to die, and yet he didn't.

Staring down the barrel of a gun didn't frighten Nick. It added more fire to his rage. How dare Bobby try to intimidate him. Bobby couldn't be allowed to hurt someone else as he had Justina.

Nick kicked a pebble into another trashcan. Bobby turned his head, and Nick wrestled the gun away from Bobby. Their hands grappled for the gun, it alternated pointing at Bobby, then Nick, and the trigger squeezed.

It hadn't been self-defense. Nick had had control of the gun. His finger had pulled the trigger.

He was a murderer.

He dropped the gun onto Bobby and ran. He kept going until his legs weighed five hundred pounds, and all the while his footsteps echoed in his mind, singing, "Murderer. Murderer."

*****

"You're right. I probably would have killed him."

Nervous energy filled him, and Nicholas jumped up and paced around the table.

"I was pretty messed up then. If I had known the truth about everything, I probably would have killed him," she added.

Nicholas had lost his life. But Julianna had lost her twin and her best friend.

His leaving had been so selfish on so many levels.

"How did you... after..."

"Don't want to talk about it."

"Hey, is that fair? I've told you about my past."

"Not all of it. Just bits and pieces. You're still holding out on me."

"Fine, you want to know everything? Every year, I came back. Placed a black hellebore on her grave. Counted down the days until I would come back. Hated being here, but could never move too far away. I'm tied to this backwater town, and I hate it. There's so much hatred inside of me, for everyone who lives here."

"Including me?"

"Especially you."

"Including you?"

"Especially me."

He lowered his gaze to her ruined tablecloth before glancing at her. Could she possibly understand him? He was still messed up. The events of his past had altered him forever. He might finally be ready to move on and leave it behind him. But could she?

She hung her head and shook it. "You're lying to yourself. If you hated everyone in Falledge, you never would have become our personal superhero. You stayed because you wanted to."

"No..."

"And you don't hate me. You don't hate yourself either." Julianna stood and wrapped her arms around him. She dipped his head down so their foreheads touched, and she looked up to see his eyes. "I love you. And you love me. It's just the two of us."

"You love me. And I love you." He did. He loved her so much it hurt, but the pain was a good feeling. He still lived and breathed and loved.

They held each other, rubbing each other's backs, caressing, supporting each other. They had each other. They had love. That was all that mattered.

Chapter Forty-Two

Though time felt nonexistent as they talked and shared, it marched on. Nicholas would now be late for work, even if he used his speed. After a tender goodbye, he moved out onto Julianna's front porch to do just that, but Gavina appeared.

"I'm sorry," she said without bothering to greet him first. "For just leaving you like that. I was afraid he'd kill you."

"Then you shouldn't have left." His lips quirked into a small grin. "I'm fine. You shouldn't have worried. He left right after you did."

"My plan didn't work!" she wailed.

Julianna popped her head outside. "I thought you were leaving for work, but I heard voices. Gavina, hi again."

"Hi, Julianna," she said glumly.