Children of the Earth (10 page)

“Do you want to look into your wife’s eyes again, to touch her hair?” The sheriff leaned into Luna’s words. “Do you want to hear her laughter and hold her close all night, every night, forever?”

The sheriff opened his mouth, and Heather felt her breath stop. The Children of the Earth were frozen around her, their entire future—their reason for being together, their reason for being—hanging on the sheriff’s answer.

“My son . . .” The sheriff spoke in a cracked husk of a voice. “Charlie.”

Luna nodded. She took his hands in hers. “I’ll take care of him,” she promised. “Charlie will be safe. All you have to do is let go.”

Tears glistened in the sheriff’s eyes. His lips trembled, and his skin seemed translucent in the greenish moonlight. He looked lost and tiny next to the towering pine trees.

“Are you ready to let go?” Luna whispered.

He nodded.

“Yes.”

Luna cupped his cheeks, raising his face to the moonlight. For a moment, the sheriff’s eyes blazed with the full force of a million lives, with every precious moment from birth through childhood, from adolescence to first true love to fatherhood to middle age. A smile stretched his lips, and his face filled with happiness so pure it stuck like an ice pick in Heather’s heart.

Then his eyes closed, and his body went limp. Luna caught him beneath the shoulders and laid him gently to rest as the drumbeats pattered into silence. She tilted her ear to his mouth and listened for breath. Then she drew the dagger from her thigh holster and raised it to the moon, an icicle cutting the sky.

She knelt at the sheriff’s side and slid the dagger across his fingertip, releasing a trickle of blood. In one fluid movement she dipped her finger in the scarlet pool and used it to paint a teardrop on his forehead.

The Children of the Earth joined hands as she rose to her feet and looked out over the lake. Heather felt sick and shaken by what she’d just seen, the power that had bloomed like fire in her chest now a small, lost ship rocking nauseatingly in her stomach.

“Gods of Water.” Luna addressed the lake, the moon, the pale and trembling circle of her siblings. “Your sacrifice is complete. We have taken from your oceans and rivers, and now we humbly offer you blood in return. Do with it what you will. All we ask is that you consider our plea: Grant us an early winter so that our brother returns home to us.”

Ashy clouds began to gather over the lake, plump with moisture and sinking low in the sky, as a chill wind ripped through the pines. The Children of the Earth shivered in their light jackets. The sweat from their ritual dance cooled to a clammy glaze, and Heather watched goose bumps rise on her arms.

“It’s cold.” She pulled on the sleeves of her sweater, stretching them over her suddenly freezing palms. “Like,
really
cold.”

“Do you know what that means?” Kimo turned to her, his skeletal grin stretched wide.

The frigid air rushed to her head, making her feel dizzy and sick. A man lay dead just a few feet away, a man who had passed away at Luna’s command, a man whose death she’d helped orchestrate.

“It means it
worked
!” A great cheer dashed through the circle as he threw his scrawny arms around her, squeezing and lifting and spinning until her feet were off the ground and the lake and trees were a blur. The rest of her brothers and sisters pressed in, hugging and squealing and yelping until the lakeside was a blur of limbs, grappling and tackling, a cacophony of excited chatter even as the temperature dipped lower and the clouds hung dark and pregnant over the lake.

Their energy infected her, pushing away the doubt until it was just a tiny nagging voice in the back of her head, and she finally let her mouth fall into a smile, joining her husky laugh with theirs and hugging her family the way they deserved to be hugged, with all the love she had to give.

The cop wouldn’t have gone if he hadn’t wanted to go, just like Luna said. All they’d done was give him what he truly desired.

13

JANIE COUL
D FEEL THE MUSIC
from the Vein even before she stepped inside. It pulsed through the rough dirt of the parking lot and pounded up through her high heels, thrumming in her legs and vibrating the denim of her curve-hugging jeans. She weaved between sloppily parked cars, shivering in the sudden, unseasonable cold and ignoring the hungry looks from a knot of men smoking by the front entrance.

“Hey, lady,” one of them grunted as she passed. “Want to show me a good time?”

She didn’t answer. She might have had a clever remark for them long ago, but the Janie with the snappy comebacks was gone.

“What’s a nice girl like you doing in a place like this?” the prospector persisted, blocking her way. His voice grated against her, and his eyes were bloodshot over a foul leer.

“Meeting my husband for a drink,” she said through gritted teeth.

“Gal like you’s too young to be married.” His gaze rested on her low-cut fuchsia top, a throwback from when she dressed to show off her body. From when she cared.

Silently, she flashed her ring in front of his face. He looked like he wanted to put up a fight, but just then the door opened, releasing a blast of thick, heavy bass into the night air.

“He bothering you, miss?” The bouncer looked from Janie to the prospector. His massive shoulders blocked out a panorama of pulsing lights and fog, bodies gyrating to the beat.

“I was just wishing her a good evening.” The prospector shrank back against the wall.

“That better be all you were doing.” The bouncer shot him a look that made the prospector wilt, before stepping aside and ushering Janie through the door. “You let me know if he gives you any more trouble,” he whispered as she passed.

“Thanks.” She was barely inside when the music assaulted her, an army of sound. Lights flashed between tightly packed bodies, casting shadows in the swirling fog. The club-goers didn’t dance so much as ride the beat like surfers dipping and cresting on an endless wave. Liquid sloshed from their drinks and trickled in tiny waterfalls to the floor, where they left a sticky film that sucked at the bottoms of her shoes.

She squinted, trying to pick out Doug’s big, square head. She hadn’t exactly been lying when she told the prospector she was meeting her husband for a drink. She’d just left out the part where Doug didn’t know about it.

She still didn’t understand what she was doing at the Vein, not really. She’d been silent as Doug pulled on his sneakers and stomped down the stairs earlier that evening, his truck making a mean squealing noise as he careened down the long, twisting driveway. Yet something had been different that night, not in Doug’s behavior but inside of her. Before, she’d been able to tolerate the silence and loneliness, even to welcome it. But that night it tore at her, a screaming pain in her chest. She couldn’t bear to spend another night alone with Bella and the Teen Moms, waiting for the vodka to warm away the pain.

And so, without taking too much time to think, she’d dug through the plastic trash bags of clothes still unpacked from her former life, looking for something as bright and fun as the old Janie had been. She’d combed her hair and applied thick, heavy mascara, rimming her eyes with liner until they sat like smoldering jewels in her face. She’d fortified herself with a few slugs of cherry vodka, “borrowed” the keys to Vince Varley’s Buick, and navigated the cold, dark roads to the Vein, knowing she was drunk driving and that was bad, but who would really care if she didn’t make it? Not her, that was for sure. It would just be an easier way to end things.

Now, with lights flashing purple and red in her eyes and throngs of prospectors leering at her chest, she wondered what she’d been thinking. This was a man’s world—Doug’s world—and she was trespassing. She wanted to know what he got up to every night while she drank alone in the west wing of the Varley mansion, but she also kind of didn’t. Yet as her eyes adjusted to the dimness and her ears started to pick out bits of conversation from between the thundering beats, she heard his braying guffaw over by the go-go platforms and realized that, whether or not she still wanted to, she was about to get a glimpse into Doug’s secret life.

Her husband lounged in a cluster of greasy-looking men, a Coors tallboy sweating in his hand. His teeth gleamed as he threw back his head and howled at something one of them said. But he wasn’t looking at the men—his gaze was fixed above them, at a woman oscillating atop a go-go platform like something out of an old James Bond movie.

Janie tensed as a spotlight flashed across the platform, illuminating the glitter on Luna’s face and the charms in her hair. Luna’s eyes were closed, and a catlike smile played across her lips as she spun a lit-up hula hoop in figure eights around her body, the leaves on her tree tattoo shivering as she moved. Even from across the room, Janie could read the desire in Doug’s eyes. It was a look she remembered from the old days, a look he’d given her across the cafeteria junior year, a look that had followed them through early groping in the backseat of his dad’s car and into the first time they made love after junior prom, on a sleeping bag spread out in the bed of his truck under a chilly sprinkle of stars. A streak of possessiveness flared somewhere beneath the vodka fog, pushing her past the gaping prospectors and bellying her up to the bar. She hadn’t seen that look from Doug in a long time, and she didn’t like where it was directed.

A barstool materialized, and she perched on it, ducking under the curtain of her blond hair. Doug hadn’t seen her yet, and she was thankful for that. She needed to formulate a plan, a way to make him realize what he was missing, how important it was for them to recapture what they’d lost. He wouldn’t find what he was looking for with Luna, she knew that. No amount of longing on Doug’s part would make her love him the way that Janie could. The way that she wanted to, if only they could find a way to turn back time and go back to the way things were.

She needed a drink, and she needed it that instant. She reached into her purse and waved a wad of bills at the two bartenders taunting a throng of prospectors down at the other end of the bar. At last, one of them acknowledged her with piercing emerald eyes.

“Cherry vodka!” She had to lean all the way across the bar and shout to be heard.

The bartender arched an eyebrow. “And?”

Janie felt herself flush. “And nothing. Just cherry vodka. In a glass. With ice, I guess.”

She could feel the bartender’s judgment in the feline arch of her back as she turned to fix Janie’s drink, but once the glass was in her hand and the sweet liquid was on its way to her belly it didn’t matter. She felt her uneasiness lift and her body relax into the relentless noise as she gulped it down, and with a satisfied sigh she settled the empty glass onto the bar and signaled for another.

“Rough night?”

The velvet voice came from the barstool to her left. The vodka made the whole room lurch as she turned, but then it was still again, and she realized she was looking at an angel.

Okay, not a
li
teral
angel. She may have been tipsy, but she wasn’t
wasted
. Still, the boy on the barstool next to hers was so beautiful he was barely human, so perfect she wouldn’t have been totally surprised to find wings sprouting from his back.

His skin was golden, his eyes the green of spring’s first pass through the mountains. His cheekbones sat high on his face, delicate as robin’s wings, and honey-colored hair cascaded to his chin in a curtain so lush and shiny she had to fight the urge to run her fingers through it. His smile cast a spotlight on her face.

“I’m sorry?” she croaked, realizing she still couldn’t answer his question—couldn’t even remember what he’d asked.

“You don’t seem thrilled to be here.” The words were a harsh dose of reality, but his tone was an invitation embossed on silken paper and awaiting a reply.

Still, she couldn’t seem to speak. It felt like eons since anyone had noticed anything about her—unhappiness tended to blind those around you, to make them want to talk about anything but the big, sad elephant in the room.

Her silence didn’t faze him. “I can tell you came here looking for something,” he continued. “But it’s something you already knew you wouldn’t find.”

“Maybe I did find it,” she found herself saying. The green of his eyes made anything seem possible. “Maybe it wasn’t what I thought I wanted after all.”

His smile widened, refracting the bar’s dim lights like a stained-glass window.

“So you’re open to new possibilities.”

“I guess.” A million questions drifted through her mind, none staying long enough to let her form a complete thought.

“I’m Ciaran.” He extended a hand, and she took it, noticing the way his palm sent spirals of warmth up her arm.

“Janie.”

“Nice to meet you, Janie.” Her heart beat a dozen more times before he released her hand.

“Same,” she said, feeling dizzy and happy and way too warm.

“You lost someone recently.” Ciaran rested an arm on the bar and leaned in close, so close she could smell pine needles and peat moss wafting from his skin. “Someone important.”

Her mouth gaped. “Are you psychic or something?”

“Not exactly.” His laugh was honey-tinged. “But sometimes I pick up on things other people don’t. Especially when it’s someone I find interesting.”

The warmth seeped through her skin and into her bones. For the first time since her wedding, she felt special and singled out. She felt like she was glowing.

“You think I’m interesting?”

Once upon a time, she wouldn’t have had to ask why a good-looking guy was interested in her. She would have known it was because she was cute, and fun, and knew how to crack a joke and a smile. But that was before her spark had gone out, before she traded a life in color for one etched out in shades of gray. That was before her baby died.

“Why?” She could barely choke out the word.

“Because I can tell how much you’re suffering. It makes you more interesting, somehow. More alive.”

She looked up at him in wonder, searching his face for signs that he was joking. But the way he leaned into her, so far forward that his barstool was in danger of tipping over, told her he meant it.

“That’s funny.” She allowed herself a small, ironic laugh. “It keeps everyone else away.”

He shrugged. “Most people can’t handle suffering. It freaks them out. They don’t realize it’s an essential part of life, no better or worse than joy.”

The bartender set Janie’s drink down in front of her, but for once she didn’t want it. She didn’t want anything to dull this moment, the fierce and sudden way this stranger, Ciaran, made her feel special and important.

He leaned closer, wrapping her in his forest-y scent. “So what was his name?” he asked quietly.

She drew back. “Whose name?”

“You know.”

She felt her shoulders slump, dragged down by the leaden familiarity of her sadness. There it was again, big as before and twice as heavy. She should have known better than to try to ignore it.

“Jeremiah,” she said stiffly.

“Janie.” He clasped both of her hands in his. “It wasn’t your fault. Jeremiah is in a better place now. It’s time to let go.”

A sob bloomed deep within her. She tried to stifle it, but it was too late. Tears flooded from her eyes, stinging a trail down her cheeks. She hadn’t cried much since Jeremiah’s death: It was like her tear ducts had turned to stone, and all she could do was retreat behind a thick pane of loss and watch the rest of the world go by while she stood still, waiting for something that never came.

Now all the tears she had never let herself cry, all the pain she had never let herself feel, poured from her. Ciaran held her hands through it all, an island in the ocean of her grief.

“It’s okay,” he crooned in her ear, a lullaby of forgiveness that she’d been waiting and longing to hear. His hands stayed steady on hers, cloaking the two of them in a bubble far away from the spilled drinks and laughter in the bar, in a secret space no longer part of the harsh world she’d known.

“I’m sorry,” she blubbered. She could feel the tears loosening her mascara and knew she was getting raccoon eyes in front of the one person in the world who had actually made her feel pretty again. “I just met you—I shouldn’t—”

“You should,” Ciaran said firmly. “You need this. But it doesn’t have to be here. Let’s go.”

The words brought her back to reality, to the sordid bar where she’d come to reclaim her husband. She glanced around, locating Doug in the mess of shadows, a string of saliva glistening between his teeth as he stared up at Luna grinding away on her go-go platform.

Ciaran stood and wrapped an arm around her, protecting her from the drunken, caterwauling crowd. She knew that as long as she could feel his touch, Doug would never hurt her again.

“Let’s go,” he said again, gently steering her toward the exit.

She went.