Promise (7 page)

The anger built inside me as I watched with
horror.

"Daddy, stop it!" The little girl tried to
grab her dad's muscular arm.

"Don't hurt her, Phil," the woman begged from
the ground. "Please don't hurt her."

Phil raised his hand again. I don't know who
he meant it for, but his intentions didn't matter. As he swung, his
daughter threw herself at him, taking the smack in the shoulder.
She crumpled to the ground next to her mother.

The anger within me surged to rage. Without
thinking it through, I stomped toward them, intent on giving this
human debris a dose of his own medicine. I was mad enough. Madder
than I'd even been with James. I knew I could do it—I knew I could
knock the crap right out of him. And I wasn't scared. If he hurt
me, I'd heal anyway.
Unless he broke a bone
. I wasn't so
sure about that. But I didn't care at the moment.

A few yards away, I stopped, about to warn
him to back off. But I suddenly couldn't bring myself to do it. I
just stared at him wide-eyed as he turned his dark eyes on me.
Bad, bad, BAD!
My sixth sense screamed.

"What are you staring at?" he snarled,
turning toward me. "You don't wanna get involved, missy!"

Oh, crap! Crap, crap, crap!
Now that
his anger was directed at me, the fear washed away my own rage. I
stood still, my hands balled into fists.
What the hell am I
thinking?!
My heart pounded. I wondered if, with the fear
rising, I still had enough anger to hurt him. The power was already
dissipating as I stared into his angry black eyes. He took a step
toward me.

"You need a little lesson, young lady," he
threatened.

The mother and daughter both whimpered. I
took a clumsy step backward as he advanced on me, tripped over my
own feet and fell. He stood over me in an instant. I squeezed my
eyes shut and instinctively raised my hands. They trembled over my
face.

I heard a thud, but felt nothing. I peaked
between my fingers. Phil was gone. He lay flat on his back on the
ground ten yards away, staring up at…
Tristan
. A whoosh of
air expelled from my lungs.

"I suggest you get out of here
now
,"
Owen, now next to Tristan, said to the wife-beater. His words were
polite, but his tone was menacing. I never expected Owen to be so
threatening.

"You need to mind your own damn business!"
the man barked.

"
GO!
" Tristan roared, his fist in the
air, his arms bulging with obvious power. Phil flinched and his
face paled under his dark tan. Then he scrambled to his feet and
bolted for the parking lot.

Tristan followed, his fists clenched. I sat
there, shaking uncontrollably, wondering what he would do. I didn't
want to watch, but I couldn't make myself turn away yet. The mom
and daughter watched Tristan, too, their tear-filled eyes wide with
fear.

"Tristan, let him go!" Owen called after him.
Tristan took a couple more steps, then stopped. Phil jumped into an
orange, older model Camaro and peeled out. Owen rushed to me first.
"You okay?"

"I'm fine." I nodded at Tristan. "Is he?"

"I don't know." Owen walked toward Tristan as
he headed back to us and they both stopped within a few feet of
each other.

"Did he hurt her?" Tristan demanded.

"Alexis is fine. Are you?"

Tristan nodded. "What about the other
two?"

They started back toward us. I crawled over
to the little girl.

"Are you okay?" I asked.

She sobbed as she held her shoulder. The
mother shook her head, dark strands sticking in the tears flowing
down her bruising cheek.

"We need to go home," she whispered.

"You can't go home!" I gasped. "Won't he be
there?"

"Not yet. He'll come later. But the longer
we're gone, the worse it'll be," she explained.

"Then don't go!"

"You don't understand…."

She was right. I had no clue why she would
want to go home to him.

"Is there anywhere else you can go? We can
take you somewhere."

The woman didn't answer me, but stood up and
brushed herself off. She pulled a pair of cut-off shorts and a
t-shirt out of her beach bag and put them on. She held out a
sundress to her daughter, who slowly rose to her feet, wincing as
she put weight on her left foot. The mother then pulled keys out of
her bag and shook them.

"We'll go to my sister's," she said. She
tried a smile. It looked forced. "I drove us here. I can get us to
her house."

"Isn't there something we can do for you?"
Tristan asked.

She bit her lip and blinked rapidly, holding
back more tears. She answered quietly, "I think you've done
enough."

She turned and headed toward her car. Her
daughter tried to follow, limping and still holding her shoulder.
Tristan gently scooped her up and Owen and I followed. Tristan set
her down in the passenger seat of a blue Ford coupe. The three of
us watched as they left, Tristan taking a few steps forward, as if
he wanted to follow them.

"Will she really go back to him?" I
asked.

"Probably," Owen said. "But we've done all we
can."

"No, we haven't," Tristan grumbled, that
steely undertone in his voice.

"Tristan…leave it alone," Owen warned, eyeing
him carefully. "Maybe you should go. I'll take Alexis home."

Tristan spun around. "No, I'll take her."

Owen shook his head. "That's not a good idea.
Sophia…"

"Sophia can deal with it!" Tristan barked,
apparently not completely over his anger. I flinched and his eyes
flew to me.

It was very fast and I could have imagined
it. But for half a second I thought I saw what Carlie might have
been talking about. The sparkles of gold in his eyes looked
different, more like sparks of fire. His eyes
looked…
frightening
. Maybe everyone else had been right. I
waited for the nudge to return. Or even for the alarms. But nothing
happened.

He must have seen something in my own eyes,
though. His face immediately softened and his body relaxed. What
anger he might have had just a second earlier—whether at the
wife-beater or at my mom, I wasn't sure—didn't show in his eyes as
he studied my face.

"Are you sure you're okay?" he asked, his
voice smooth and silky again.

I forced a small smile. "Yeah, I'm fine. Are
you sure
you
are?"

The gold flecks sparkled now as he smiled
slowly. He nodded. "If you are, I am."

I gave him a bigger smile, then turned to
Owen.

"Thanks for the offer, Owen, but Tristan can
take me home. I'll take care of Sophia."

Owen narrowed his eyes as they bounced
between Tristan and me.

"I'm gonna lose my job," he said with a
sigh.

"No, you won't," I promised. "It's not
exactly in your job description to be worried about how I get
home."

He muttered something under his breath.
Tristan smiled slightly, as if he'd heard.

"You're sure?" Owen asked me as he turned for
his car.

"I'm positive. Sophia will get over it.
Besides…it's not like she's my
mother
." So, that wasn't
exactly true, but they didn't know.

Owen snorted, jogged to his car and left.

I looked up at Tristan. "You really don't
mind, do you?"

The corners of his mouth twitched. "A little
late to be asking, don't you think?"

"So…you do mind? You need to be somewhere
else? I can walk…."

After all that happened, I really didn't want
to walk all the way home by myself now. But I would if I had
to.

He chuckled. "I said I'd take you home."

He put his thumb under my chin and tilted my
face up toward his. That strange current pulsed through my jaw and
up to my temples. He gazed into my eyes, making my bones
soften.

"There's nowhere I'd rather be," he murmured.
My heart skipped. He smiled before letting go. "Ever been on a bike
before?"

I followed him to the motorcycle, pleased it
wasn't the crotch-rocket he usually rode to campus. The Harley came
to life with its distinctive rumble. I climbed on and looked around
for something to hold onto and found chrome handholds on each side
of the seat. He looked over his shoulder at me and glanced down at
my hands. He probably expected me to hold onto him. Part of me
wanted to, but that was a closeness I wasn't quite ready for.

"Ready?" he asked.

I nodded.

It would have been a lot less tense if I
had
held onto him. It couldn't have been more unnerving with
that small space between us. As the bike rumbled under us through
the streets of the Cape, I felt arcs of electricity jumping between
us. I was woozy by the time we pulled in front of the cottage and
it wasn't from the vibration of the motorcycle.

"That was…different," he muttered after
shutting off the engine.
He felt it, too!

It must have been after six since Mom's car
was already there. I hoped she would stay inside and mind her own
business.

"Thank you," I said as Tristan and I stood in
the driveway. "For everything, I mean."

He smiled, but it didn't reach his eyes. "Did
I scare you?"

"Um, no," I lied.

"I'm sorry. I was a little pissed off."

"Hmm…yeah, a little." I smiled to show him it
was okay.

"What were you thinking anyway? You looked
like you wanted to
hit
him or something."

Ha! If he only knew.
Now that it was
all over, I realized how incredibly stupid I'd been. If I had
punched the wife-beater like I wanted to…well, it could have been a
catastrophe. Tristan and Owen would have seen what a freak I was
and Mom and I would have to move already. But worst of all, I
probably made things a lot worse for the woman and her
daughter.

"I don't know. It made me so mad to see him
hurt them," I said. "I'm just glad you got there when you did."

"Me, too." He looked into my eyes and I saw
something unreadable in his.
Concern?
It was still there
when he changed the subject. "So, what was with you today? I tried
to catch up with you when the team was done, but you took off like
you were escaping. You seemed lost in thought all afternoon."

Of course, he'd noticed. He usually walked me
to my car and I hadn't even thought about it. "Yeah, I guess I
was…lost in thought. Sorry if I was rude."

When I looked up at him, he seemed to search
my eyes for an explanation. I didn't give one. I couldn't tell him
about Mom or Carlie and what they both had to say.

He held my eyes as he lifted his hand to my
face and stroked a current across my cheek. A shudder tried to work
its way down my spine, but I fought it back.

"You'll make it up to me," Tristan said with
a smile.

"I can do that," I promised with my own
smile.

And with perfect timing, the cottage's front
door opened. Mom didn't say anything, but I felt her glare.

"I better go," I muttered.

"See you later,
ma lykita
," he said
quietly.

I raised an eyebrow. He smiled and shook his
head. Mom cleared her throat from the door. I sighed with
frustration.

I gave Tristan an apologetic smile and then
marched into the house. Neither Mom nor I said a word as I brushed
past her into my room and slammed the door shut.

Chapter 5

The sun on my face woke me in the morning. I
opened the window, breathed in the fresh air and let the morning's
coolness clear the nightmares out of my groggy head. In my dreams,
I fought with Phil all night long. My body now felt like I actually
had. I didn't have time to dally, though, or I'd be late to class.
When I stepped out of my room to go shower, I nearly tripped over a
small suitcase in the hallway and I immediately panicked.
We're
leaving? Already?! But I like it here!

"Mom?" I asked shakily. She came into the
hallway, pulling her door closed. "What's the suitcase for? Are we
leaving already?"

"I'm just going out of town for a couple
days," she said. She sounded more relaxed than she had in days or
weeks.

Whew
. But then I realized what that
meant.

"You're
leaving
me? Alone?" She'd
never left me alone overnight.

"I'm…going to a booksellers' convention. My
first holiday season's coming. I need to make sure I know
everything I should be doing." She spoke quickly and wouldn't look
directly at me. She lied, but I didn't know why. "Owen said he can
work today and come in at one tomorrow and close up, if you can
open the store and stay until then. Of course, we're closed Sunday
and I'll be back Sunday night."

"No problem," I mumbled, following her into
the kitchen. I wasn't worried about having to work. It was being
alone that scared me.
What if
they
find me and I'm all
alone?
I fought a shudder.

"Thanks, hon." She picked up her travel mug
and planted a kiss on my forehead, before turning back toward the
hallway. "Call Owen if you need anything—his number's on the
fridge."

She stopped and turned back into the
kitchen.

"Do me a favor, please? Keep your distance
from Tristan at least until I get back? We can talk about it then,
okay?"

I plopped into a chair and shrugged. I hadn't
planned on seeing him anyway. Except for that one time at the
coffee shop, I never saw him on weekends.

"Please? Promise?" She nodded her head
slowly, part of her persuasion technique. Next, she would reach out
to touch my hand or arm.

I glowered at her, refusing to let her get to
me. "No, Mom, I won't promise. It probably won't matter, but I
won't make a promise I don't
want
to keep."

She didn't even try her next move.

"Fine," she snapped. "I'll see you Sunday
night."