Marked by Destiny (13 page)

“It might not
be that easy,” Michael said quietly. “She requested that her
information not be given to you when you were legal age. That’s
going to put a quite the bump in the research road.”

I didn’t hear
him. I’d stop listening as I stared at the page in front of me. I
tuned everything out but the words on the page. Slowly I handed it
to him.

He looked at
me, eyebrows raised.

“If you look on
the right side, near the bottom, you’ll see it.”

He glanced
down, lifted the page and tilted his head. He flipped back to the
front and glanced at me.

“Ih-Ihh…” I
cleared my throat and tried again, my voice coming out in a
whisper, “My mother’s signature.”

Michael’s head
dropped down. “Ohhhhh… I see it.”

“Rebekah. Her
name’s Rebekah Gnowee.” I shrugged. “Or however you say it. I’m
guessing there won’t be too many of those in the phone book.” I
tapped my finger against my thigh. The last name sounded so weird.
I planned to google it when I got back to the hotel later.

Michael set the
Jeep into drive and pulled back onto the road. “Let’s head back to
the hotel and see what we can find.” He tossed the file back onto
my lap. “Is there an address on the page when she signed you over
to the state?”

I ripped open
the file folder to double check.

My heart nearly
stopped. “There is… Holy crap! There is!” My hands shook at the
address scrawled below the signature, her name printed and an
apartment number in Niagara Falls.

“Put it in the
GPS. Let’s go there now.”

“Now?” My heart
that had felt like it has stopped a minute ago now felt like it was
racing down a giant hill on a pair of roller skates. Michael was
right. This is what I came here for. I tapped the address into the
GPS. “Nothing like the element of surprise.”

I was awkwardly
trying to close keep pages from falling all over the place and
enter the address into the GPS, when a folded sheet with hand
written notes slipped out of the file. It read:

Utica
Hospital

Baby Doe, aka
Rouge (R), was born premature. Biological mother was in a terrible
state when R was delivered. She left the hospital before being
medically released and never signed the forms to hand her over to
the state. Only left a note to say the infants name was to be
Rouge. Then the woman up and left; disappeared. She came the day we
released R to the state. Dr. Mormar was the attending physician. He
asked this note be written in case baby R is returned to the state
again.

“I wonder where
I got the name Thomas from?” I said out loud.

“Maybe your
biological mother gave you the name so it would be easier for her
to find you.”

I scoffed.
“Thomas isn’t that unique, you know. Gnowee would have definitely
been easier to find.”

“Okay then.
Maybe she gave it to you because she was trying to hide you from
someone.”

“I doubt it.
There’s a note here that she left a note to say my name was Rouge.
No last name. The state probably gave it to me. Jones, Smith,
Thomas… something simple.”

“Did you know
that your name means
pure
?”

I have him an
odd look. Had he looked it up? “Really? My last name?”

He shook his
head. “Your first name.” He made a left turn, following the GPS.
“Maybe there’s a reason why she named you that. Maybe she named you
Rouge, in the hopes of keeping you pure from the past.” He shrugged
his shoulders, “Just trying to be a little philosophical for the
moment.”

I patted his
shoulder and laughed. “You’re doing a great job.” I straightened
and stared out the window, filled with a new sense of purpose and
drive. “Okay. Let’s go find my mom.”

Chapter
12

It didn’t take nearly as long as I had
though it would before we were there. I
had double-checked the address in the folder to
the GPS. "This has to be it." The disbelief in my voice couldn’t be
missed. I wasn’t expecting much, but this?

I bent my neck to get a better view
through the Jeep window at the rundown apartment building. The
neighborhood matched it a little too perfectly. I shivered.
If my mother kept
me, this is where I would have lived
.

Michael sensed my thoughts. “She might
have given you up because she wanted more for you than
this.”
Or
she was hiding here.

My head swiveled in his direction as I
felt his thought. Touching the
Sioghra, I had no idea if it had come from it or if I had
simply made the thought sound as if it had come from Michael. “It’s
starting to feel like a super-long day. Maybe we should just head
back and check a phone book or something.” Michael looked at me
with sympathy, understanding my urge to run away, and it made me
want to be stronger.

I closed my eyes. “Sorry. It’s fine. We
need to do this. I’ll be fine. I need to do this.” I was rambling,
trying to build courage and hide my anxiety.
You’re doing a lousy
job,
I told
myself.

Michael pulled the jeep to the side of the
curb. He didn't say anything
, which only made me more nervous.

"Think we should go and try to find a
phone number first?" I played with a corner of the paper, tearing
little pieces off.

Michael cut the engine and stuffed the
keys in his pocket. "What’re you going to say if you
call?"

I
glanced out the window again to the third floor. Somewhere
behind one of those rickety balconies lived my family - a mother
who didn't want me. "What will I say in person?"

Michael opened his door and came around to
open mine. "How about we go in, knock on the door and see who
answers? Your mother probably doesn’t live here anymore. The
address is at least fifteen years old." He reached for my hand and
squeezed it. "I'll be right here with you." He slipped on his
sunglasses to hide his bright blue eyes and appear less
obvious.

It seemed pointless to me. With my luck,
we were probably walking into a den of Grollics. Glasses or no
glasses, they would know what he was instantly. I knew I needed to
stop assuming the worst. He was probably right after all. In a
place like this, it was unlikely that she still lived
there.

I
forced a smile, trying to absorb his courage and lack of
fear. "Alright. Let's go see what's behind curtain number three." I
was nervous but something else ran alongside the anxiety… hope. I
didn't want to have any, but I did; and I knew I’d be disappointed
if the address led us to a dead end.

We walked, hand-in-hand, to the building's
entrance. A tall, overweight man sat on a concrete bench wearing a
stained undershirt and old, worn pants. He stared blankly at us,
not even bothering to hide the large can he held in his hand. It
was a very generic brand of beer, only marked BEER in green against
a yellow background. From the smell of him, it was obvious that it
wasn’t his first of the day. This man matched the surroundings,
blending in with the decay and filth everywhere. The jeep, our
clothes, and basic cleanliness were something completely out of the
norm here. I moved closer to Michael, not even realizing I'd done
so until I bumped against him and had to catch myself from
stumbling. "Sorry," I mumbled.

A low chuckle escaped his lips. "That
guy's harmless. Big, but not a Grollic. No mark. Just a really bad
aroma."

“
I didn’t even think to check for
it.”
I hit the heel of
my hand against my forehead. "I was too busy trying to figure out
his brand of beer."

He ignored my lame joke, didn’t even crack
a smile.
"If it’s there
for the seeing, you always need to look." Michael opened the dirty
glass door for me. After letting me in first to the small entrance,
he lifted his glasses to check the names on the intercom system. "I
don't see her name. I bet the numbers don't correspond to the
actual apartment numbers. It looks like it had been done
alphabetically at one point a long time ago, but loads of names
have been added. Who knows which one’s even a legit
name?"

As he continued staring at the list, I tried
the door to the lobby. It opened. "Lock's broke."

Michael turned and shrugged. "Yeah, guess we
could have tried that first."

“
If it’s there for the seeing, you always
need to look.”
I laughed
at his silly grin. "Seems we make a good team."

"Never doubted that for a moment."

We headed inside and paused at the out of
order elevators. The sign looked as ancient as the intercom system.
Michael opened the door to the stairs, stepping in first this time.
"Let me go first. I don't trust closed in spaces." He led the way
to the third floor. No one entered the stuffy stairwell.

It took a moment to find the correct
apartment door, the last number was missing
off the door.

I inhaled a deep breath through my nose
and let it out slowly through my mouth. "Here's goes." I knocked
quietly and then rapped hard twice. I felt Michael tense beside me.
He probably heard movement inside before my human ears could. Sure
enough, a moment later a chain lock slid on the other side of the
door, followed by another. I swallowed nervously.

The knob turned. "Marcus, wha—" the voice
stopped short when the door opened fully. A boy about my age, maybe
a year or two older, stood staring at me, mouth open. It was
difficult to tell his exact age, the hard look on his face showed
years of experience that had nothing to do with numbers. He glanced
at Michael and took a step back. "What the hell?" His gaze flitted
back to me.

He was definitely a few years older. He
was as tall as Michael, but dark hair and complexion. I couldn't
stop staring at his eyes. They were nearly the same color as mine.
"Who are you?" I blurted unable to stop myself.

His gaze narrowed as he glanced once more
at Michael quickly and then back to me. He set his hands on his
hips, his biceps bulging. "Who the hell are you?"

Michael stepped in front of me, his foot
halfway through the door. "Where looking for somebody. Is your
mother around?"

The boy scoffed. He was obviously too old
to still be living with his mom. "My mother? She's having a rest.
You can go find her down the road."

My heart rate sped up. He might be my
brother. His eyes sure seemed to say we were related. I might have
a brother? The thought had never occurred to me. I might have a
brother!

"Could you be a little more specific?"
Michael enunciated each syllable crisply.

"At Saint Andrews."

She was at a church? My mind was apparently
frozen with stupid ice.

"Thanks." Michael turned to go steering me by
the elbow so I walked in front of him.

"You aren't going to get much from her." The
boy called down the hall.

I swung around, part of me wanting to see
him one more time so I could burn the image of his face in my mind.
I peered around Michael. "Why's that?"

"She's at Saint Andrew's cemetery. She's
been there the better part of ten years."

My stomach dropped. "You're mother was
Rebekah Gnowee?"
Please say no, please say no
.

He nodded. His eyes sympathetic a moment
before they turned hard and unreadable again. His head tilted to
the side, his brows furrowed together. "Jamie?"

I shook my head. "My name's
Rouge.”

Michael beat me to my next question. “Who
are you?"

"Robert. Why are you looking for my
mother?" He didn't bother hiding the suspicion in his voice. It
came out more as an accusation then a question.

"It doesn't matter anymore." Michael who
had been standing quietly behind me reached for my hand. “We need
to go,” he whispered curtly.

Robert crossed his arms over his muscular
chest. "You shouldn't be here, Jamie – Rouge – whatever your name
is. Especially with HIM." He glared at Michael.

I imagined the hair on the back of
Robert's neck rising. The obvious dawned on me a second too late.
"Crap!" Robert was a Grollic. Michael obviously had realized a lot
sooner. "We're leaving. Sorry to have bothered you." I started
backing away, my eyes trained on his neck imagining his birthmark
just below his collar bone.

The stairwell door swung open with a loud
bang. I jumped and Michael crouched ready to pounce. A burly guy
about the same age as Robert bounded into the hall. Assessing the
situation, his eyes burned from brown to a light color.

Yellow.

He was a bloody Grollic.

“What do we have here?”

“A mistake.” Michael’s voice stayed even and
smooth.

I envied his ability to stay so calm.

“My apologies.” Michael took my hand, pulling
me to his other side so he stood between the stranger and me.

The guy spent way too much time in the gym.
He was huge. If he turned into a Grollic, I had no idea what kind
of chance Michael and I stood between him and Rob. What if I
couldn’t control them? Sweat began to form as small beads on my
forehead.

“Rob?” Big guy glanced down behind us where
Rob now stood only a few feet away. “Do these guys need to be
escorted out the building?”

Rob grinned. It looked more like a snarl of
sarcasm. “Be my guest.”

“We’re fine.” Michael’s always composed
features were beginning to crumble. “We know the way out.”