Deep Betrayal (Lies Beneath #2) (31 page)

“If Pavati promised you,” I said, holding my hands out, moving closer, “you know she’ll make good on that.”

“Then where is she?” His voice cracked, the pain cutting through as a dark head broke the waves. It was only a silhouette. I couldn’t tell who it was, but whoever it was, he or she was listening. I was sure of that.

“She couldn’t come before. You wouldn’t let her come,” said Sophie.

Jack jerked in surprise and let go of Sophie’s wrist. “I’ve begged her to come!” he said as I silently pleaded with Sophie to run, but she stayed by his side.

“You’ve been too angry. She can’t get close to you when you’re like that,” Sophie said, squinting at the ground. “Even now you’re making it hard. Please look. She’s there. She’s trying her best.”

He raised the chain toward Sophie’s neck while I ran toward them.

“Run, Sophie!” I slammed into Jack and shoved Sophie out of the way, but Jack lunged for me. One second later, I was in a choke hold, staring out at the lake.

“Let me go! This isn’t going to help.” Jack yanked me closer to the edge. I struggled and he tightened his grip. “Even if you convince someone the mermaids exist, even if they search the whole lake, what is catching Pavati going to do? You know she’ll end up dead in the end.”

“Good!” he said, spit flying past my face. “If I can’t be
with her, no one can. Besides, we don’t belong with their kind. You don’t know how they mess with our minds. Not yet anyway. I’m doing you a favor. I’m putting you out of your misery.” He dragged me a few feet to the right and grabbed the length of chain from the ground.

“No, Jack. Don’t! Pavati. She’s there.” I was gasping. Tears distorted my vision.

“She wants to be with you,” Sophie said, pulling at Jack’s fingers around my arm. “She came. She just can’t get close to you when you’re like this. Calm down.”

“Shut up! Shut up! You’ve learned to lie too well.” He yanked my body, tossing me off balance. “I suppose he taught you how to do that.” The chain looped around my neck and shoulder. Sophie closed her eyes and pulled at his elbows, but he kicked her aside.

Jack shoved the cinder block into my arms and pushed me closer to the edge of the rock. I planted my feet and refused to move. I tried to sit down, but he was too strong.

“I never meant to kill anyone,” Jack said. “Connor was an accident. I kept him down too long. But then … at least that got people’s attention. For a while. Brady and Chief Eaton—they were easier. People can’t keep thinking it’s an accident
forever
! But no. You wouldn’t even side with me when I grabbed one of your own friends.”

“Your mind is clouded, Jack. Open your eyes. Open your eyes! Pavati’s there. Do you see her?”

“Shut up!” he yelled. “There’s no one down there.” I bent my knees, trying to anchor myself to the ground, but he grabbed me under the arms, lifting me off my feet.

For the first time I focused on the water, so clear I could see the bottom despite its great depth. Pavati stared up at me from the sand, through the rippling water, her eyes red with grief, her mouth open in silent disbelief at Jack’s confession.

“Pavati, do something,” Sophie yelled. “Now! It’s your only chance!”

But Pavati was frozen, an icy pillar beside the underwater cliff face. If Sophie’s invocation registered in Jack’s mind, he didn’t show it. If he saw the object of his desire in the water below, the damage was already done. My feet slipped, and I slid closer to the edge. There was no hope now. Had there ever been?

I squeezed my eyes tight and two large tears rolled down my cheeks. When I opened my eyes, it was just in time to see a blue angel burst from the waves, sailing through the air, arms outstretched. The most amazing sight, equal in both beauty and terror: Pavati arcing against the sky. She threw her arms around Jack as she rose over us, then turned, returning to the water with him, Jack’s face glowing with fervent obsession.

Somehow, in that balletic maneuver, I was knocked off balance. One second I was mesmerized by beauty; the next, the world tilted on its axis. It was just one

Adrenaline raced to my brain, setting it abuzz—the chain still wrapped around my neck, the cinder block heavy in my arms. Stupidly, I clung to it like a life preserver. Above me, Sophie was watching. She was always watching.

I counted the seconds until Calder would save me:
One Mississippi. Two Mississippi. Three Mississippi …

Jack, finally appreciating he was in the arms of his beloved, burst open with an enraptured light even I could see. I heard Pavati’s mental gasp and then, overcome by starvation, she spiraled him to the bottom of the lake, crushing him to her until he was no more.

Eight Mississippi
.

Nine Mississippi
.

Ten …

I cried out, and a torrent of icy water rushed my lungs, drowning out any oxygen I might have been able to preserve. The seconds stretched out between my heartbeats, which slowed, then stuttered.

Twenty Mississippi …

Sophie screamed, her voice piercing the water.

Twenty-three …

Twenty-four …

Twenty-five …

The voices of
all
my family, some merely imagined but
others real and very close, called my name: Mom from the porch steps. Calder and Dad and Maris in the water. Pavati’s sated sigh. Sophie from the rocks.

A high keening burrowed like a dentist’s drill through my brain and out the top of my head. I called for someone—anyone—though no words escaped my lips. Instead, from my open mouth burst a light so brilliant the whole world burned white-hot. A ripple of spasms tore through my body and lifted me into the air, dropping me onto the rocks, gritty and wet and hard against my grasping fingers.

And then everything went black.

I
drifted in and out of consciousness. Men were talking in mix-and-matched sentence fragments and non sequiturs. Some of the combinations made me laugh out loud, but laughing made me sound hysterical, and hysterics only increased the din of their concern.

“Explain this,” said the angriest voice.

“I didn’t do it,” said the saddest. “I didn’t do anything. I would never do this to her.”

“You weren’t trying to be a hero?”

“She didn’t need one. She was still alive.”

“Then what the hell is this supposed to mean?”

“I don’t know. I’ve never understood her.”

I arched my back and opened my eyes to a cloudless sky, patchy and blue through the tree branches. Skin pulled tight across my rib cage. I levitated. No, wait, someone was lifting me from a car. Gravel crunched under their feet as they carried me down a road.

“Careful, Lily. Be still. We’ve got you. You’re home.”

“Dad?” I croaked. “Where did you come from?”

“I’ve always been here. Now don’t talk.”

“Where’s Sophie?” My throat constricted, and the words came out like a rasp.

“I’m not speaking to you,” she said.

“Put me down. You don’t have to carry me.” I struggled in a net of arms, but Dad and Calder tightened their grip.

“Get in the house, Sophie. Tell your mom we’re coming,” Dad said.

My muscles seized, arching and twisting me in their arms. Pinwheels of light spun in my field of vision, and I squeezed my eyes so tight I feared they’d turn inside out. Blood filtered over my tongue as my teeth pierced my bottom lip.

“Let me go!” I cried, trying to break free of Dad’s grip, but I couldn’t feel my legs. For the first time, I was truly afraid.
Did the chain break my neck? Am I paralyzed? Is this why they are carrying me? Me and Mom both in wheelchairs?
It was too much to comprehend. “No!” I cried.

“Easy, baby,” Dad said. “Everything’s okay.”

But I could hear the lie. Tentatively, I reached down, afraid of what I’d feel. Afraid of feeling nothing. My fists
refused to unclench, but slowly I willed my hands to open, letting my fingers stretch to their full length. The first thing I found were the remains of my shorts, hanging in fringed tatters from the waistband. I combed the strips of cotton through my fingers and took a deep breath. If only I could feel my fingers against my legs, I knew I’d be okay. No one would ever hear me complain if it was just a broken leg. I laid my hands flat against my thighs, relieved to feel my palms hot against my skin, but gasping at the sensation, because beneath my fingertips was the familiar texture of smooth scales over compact muscle. In a panic, I replayed my slip off the rock, the sinking, the air burning up in my lungs. I remembered the flash of light.

“You changed me?” My voice was a coarse grating—like the bottom of a boat against the sand.

“He says he didn’t,” said Dad, whom I’d now located at my shoulders.

“I didn’t!” Calder said, from my feet, or fin.… I didn’t want to look, but peeked through my lashes. All I could see was a twitching blur of pink that caught the sun and flashed light in my eyes.

Calder and Dad carried me up the porch steps, and Mom called through the screen door. “Jason! Jason! Oh, thank God you’re home! What are you—? What’s wrong with her? Lily!”

Sophie held the porch door open, and Dad and Calder carried me in. The pain was unbearable now—like waves of broken glass pulsing through my bone marrow. I writhed and twisted as my skin pulled and joints strained in their sockets. Somewhere in my head, Mom was screaming.

“Blankets!” Dad yelled, and Sophie pulled quilts off beds and the afghan off the couch. My tail knocked over a floor lamp as I thrashed and seized uncontrollably.

Mom whimpered nearby while Calder cocooned my body with the blankets and placed couch cushions around my head to stop me from slamming it into the wood floor. Already, a goose egg rose up at the back of my skull.

“Shhh. Shhh,” he said. “Just breathe. Deep breaths.”

I screamed in agony against the ripping. Could they hear me tearing in two? It was so loud in my ears. Tears burned like acid behind my eyelids. “I don’t understand!” I cried.

“You shouldn’t have butted in,” Sophie said.

“Not now, Sophie,” Dad said. “Why is it taking so long for her to change back?”

“I don’t know,” Calder said. “I’ve never seen anything like it.”

“Should I call the doctor?” Mom asked. “Maybe Father Hoole?”

“No!”
sounded four voices in unison.

“No, of course, not,” Mom said. “What was I thinking? I don’t know what to do. Give me something to do.”

“Take me to the lake!” I howled. “Get me back. I can’t stand it!”

“How long has it been?” Calder asked.

“I don’t know,” Dad said. “Ten minutes? Fifteen?”

When I opened my eyes, Calder was my mirror. When I flinched, he did as well. Every movement I made, every grimace played out for me on his face. To both feel and see the pain doubled its intensity, and I gripped his arm with such force, he sucked air through his teeth.

“Please,” I begged, digging my fingernails into his flesh. “Get me back to the lake.”

Dad apologized. He didn’t want to backtrack the process. Perhaps I’d made some progress that they just couldn’t see; perhaps just another minute longer and I’d be back to normal, whatever that was.

I shrieked again as a tremor ran the length of my spine. If I didn’t know better, my vertebrae were trading places. Calder scooped me up and slung me over his shoulder like a bag of laundry. Dad protested, but Calder wasn’t listening. He ran for the lake.

I lifted my head off Calder’s back just enough to see Mom and Dad through the kitchen window, Dad’s arm around her back, supporting her as she stood, watching, her hand covering her mouth. She turned into him and buried her face. Through the window, I could hear her say, “Don’t leave,” and Dad’s shaky voice say, “I never left.” My face fell limply between Calder’s shoulder blades. At least Dad was home. He and Mom would be all right. If I was dying, at least I could die happily, knowing they had each other.

I clenched my teeth to hold in another scream as my body stiffened. Calder adjusted me in his arms and slid me, ever so gently, out of the blanket and into the lake. I slipped in smoothly and all my muscles relaxed, my shoulders dropped. The pain dissolved like sugar into the waves, the water finding no resistance against my body.

Calder knelt at the edge of the dock with his face inches from mine. “If I leave you, you’re not going to go anywhere, are you?”

“What do you mean, ‘if I leave you’?” I asked.

“Just for a second. I’ll bring the blanket back to the house, check in on your parents. I worked too hard with your dad to make this reunion happen. We hadn’t counted on your little … accident. I’ll be right back. Don’t go anywhere.”

His hand brushed across my back, raking his fingers through what was left of my tattered shorts. “I’ve never seen a mermaid in a Hendrix T-shirt before. Or with a tattoo. I wondered if that would stay.”

“You’ve been wondering if this would happen?”

“Worrying is probably closer to the truth. Now stay here.”

I watched him run back to the house, his arms pumping and his muscles flexing, his skin smooth and glistening in the sun. The front door slammed, and I was alone.

It was peaceful. Right now, the trials of the landlocked world were as foreign to me as life on the moon. I ran my fingers over my tail. It was dark raspberry with iridescent pink, possibly the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen, next to Calder’s.

I swam away from the dock. Just a little. While I waited for Calder, I turned in circles, flipping over and around, trying out new muscles, wondering, wondering. I swam out deeper and dove down to skim along the bottom. I held my breath—too afraid to see how imperfect the transformation had been. How embarrassing would it be to try to breathe underwater only to come up choking and sputtering?

Out of the corner of my eye, I sensed a movement. The floodlights were off, and a cloud blocked out the moon. The water was a black, matte canvas. Still, there was something there. In the distance. A dark shape. At first I thought it was a submerged log, but it was moving fast. And then I
knew. My thoughts must have been too loud for Maris not to notice me.