The Banshee and the Linebacker (A Paranormal Romance) (2 page)

When Liam reached us, he grabbed Keagan by the shoulders and spun him away from me. Liam rammed his brother with arms outstretched and Keagan staggered back a step, but didn't go down.

"You'll have to do better than that on the field Friday night, little brother." Keagan sneered.

Liam's face contorted with rage and he swung at Keagan.

"No," I screamed.

Keagan leaped to the right and away with a laugh. Liam's punch failed to land.

"Weak, bro. You are so whipped you're almost cream," Keagan said.

This only enraged Liam further and he came after Keagan, tackling him. The two rolled on the dirt punching at each other. The players on the field stopped their practice and were focused on the fight, with hoots, whistles, and shouted encouragements.

"Beat his ass, Liam," Billy Broaderick called.

"Keagan. Liam," I yelled. "Stop it. Both of you."

Coach Dixon finally arrived and pulled Liam off Keagan, with my boyfriend continuing to strain against the coach's hold so he could get back to pummeling his brother.

"Knock it off or I'll make sure you're suspended," the coach growled.

Liam stopped straining and the coach released him.

He stood puffing and glowering at his brother. "You're lucky the coach saved you, you sorry douchebag."

When I walked to Liam and hooked my arm through his, Keagan took in my position and nodded as if he knew I'd just signaled my allegiance. Guilt gnawed at me and I dropped Liam's arm. Why did I feel guilty? I hadn't hurt Keagan with the gesture had I?

Keagan rose before brushing himself off and turned to the coach. "For your information, you don't have the power to get me suspended or anything else anymore."

"I was sorry to see you leave the Academy, son," the coach said.

An angry fire lit Keagan's face. "I'm not your son and I don't need your pity. Save your
sorry
for Friday. You'll need it when the Hawks beat your cream puffs into the fake ground of this shitty place."

Liam lunged for Keagan.

This time there'd be blood from both brothers.

Grabbing Liam's arm, I fought to hold him back. But then my eyesight faded, the sound of the surrounding voices muffled, and a vision began. Like a nail shooting through my skull from a pneumatic gun, the images moved through my brain in fast-motion and then slowed.

A football stadium loomed all around me, but it was night and crowds packed the bleachers. Over the loudspeaker, the announcer talked about this being the best game in the history of the two teams and said something about the battle of the brothers. I realized a game was in progress. Glancing to the right I saw the scoreboard lit with visitors: 20, home: 14. The clock was stopped with one minute, twenty seconds left to play in the fourth quarter. Liam stood on the field with number 33 on his uniform. Keagan— at the position of linebacker—fidgeted with impatience in the defensive line. The quarterback called a play and handed off to Liam. He didn't get more than a few steps before Keagan hammered him and the two went down.

Pain, breath-stealing in its intensity, jolted through me as if I'd been struck.

Keagan bounced back up, leaping to his feet. Liam stayed down, lying still with his head at an odd angle. Keagan drew off his helmet. A gloating smile quickly fell from his lips and those taunting eyes became anguished. Coach Dixon and others rushed from the sidelines but it was hopeless. I knew what had happened. The excruciating ache in my neck told me that Liam's had been broken.

Dead. Liam. Dead.

"Nooooooooooooo," I screamed, keening. Falling to my knees, with my head buried in my hands, I wept.

Why was everyone staring at me?

"Tara." Keagan fell to his knees beside me and put his arm around my shoulder. "What is it?"

Through bleary eyes I saw his face, brows furrowed, his mouth compressed in a frown of concern.

"Get your hands off her," Liam yelled. He grabbed Keagan's arm and jerked him back, practically tossing his bigger brother to the ground. Then Liam turned to me as Keagan stood.

"Tara—" Liam began only to be interrupted.

"Are you all right?" The coach crouched in front of me. He started to place a hand on my chin, probably with the intention of examining me, but I didn't want to take the chance of another vision...this time of
his
death.

"Don't," I cried, reeling back to evade his touch.

"Okay," he said, leaning away. "But where's the pain? Is it your head?"

Keagan yelled at the field. "Somebody get the school nurse and call an ambulance."

"She doesn't need a nurse or an ambulance," Liam said, shoving his brother hard with a hand to the chest.

"Just because I suggested it?" Keagan shook his head. "You really are pathetic, man."

"He's right. I'm fine." I struggled to rise to my feet without touching anyone. My breath chugged in and out. The air felt like gravel in my lungs. "There was a...a bee. It didn't sting me. I'm sorry I overreacted but I'm really allergic."

"I didn't see a bee." Keagan scowled, eyeing me up and down.

"If she said there was a bee, there was a bee! A'ight?" Liam shouted getting up into his face.

"Now boys," the coach said. "Calm it down or I'm going to have to call campus security."

"Call 'em," Liam said. "They'll be too late to save this jerk."

Keagan didn't back away. He just stared Liam directly in the eyes. When he spoke the words came out as a growl. "You wanna fight bro? Let's go."

"Aghhhhhhhhhhh," I screamed. "This arguing is driving me crazy. I can't take it."

The three of them—Liam, Keagan and the coach—all turned to me in concert. The expressions on their faces couldn't have registered more shock if I'd sprouted horns. Come to think of it, my outburst was sort of like a fluffy bunny turning into a charging bull.

"Just go ahead and kill each other. I can't stop you." My voice broke on the last word with the strain of the volume and the emotion.

As they all continued to gawp at me, I whirled and ran without really knowing in what direction. The only requirement was to get away.

* * * * *

"It was horrible," I said. "Liam lying there with his neck broken and then the two of them fighting...I knew where it would end. With Liam dead."

As I spoke, head resting on our kitchen table, my voice came out sadly muffled. But my grandmother heard. She reached over from her seat opposite me and placed a hand on my shoulder. The combination of patting and massaging didn't have its usual comforting effect.

"Oh honey. I'm sorry."

Sometimes I used to rail to my Gran about why a banshee could never see anything but death. I couldn't foretell babies or marriages or...well anything happy. Just another person's end. But bitching about
my talent
wouldn't change anything.

"Gran, what am I going to do?" I asked, lifting my head.

"I know what you're feeling, Tara. Believe me, I know," Gran said. "But there isn't anything you can do. It's fate."

My head shook so hard the hair fell into my face. "No. I saw Liam's death before. For seven years he's been fated to die of old age. Now, suddenly, he's gonna die on Friday night?"

"Sometimes that happens. There's a fork in the road." Gran smiled sadly. "He's passed over the fork and his destiny's changed."

My phone pinged, signaling a text. Pulling it out of the purse I'd dropped on the floor at my feet, I examined the face and found a message from Liam: Cum2 dinA @ my hous 2nite. I promiS 2b gud.

Like lightning, another text followed. This one was from Keagan: Won't promiS 2bgud but promiS no fyts w/bro or my MFF.

Keagan's text almost made me crack a smile. I knew the MFF was a less than polite reference to his father. For Keagan that pledge was huge.

Keagan and Liam. The two brothers. Each with a tragic future.

Placing the phone on the table, I glanced up at Gran. "If Liam's fate could change, then it can change back. I can do something to change it back."

"What?" Gran asked.

"I don't know," I said. "But I can't be responsible again for someone I care about dying. I just can't."

"What do you mean
again
? Who do you think you're responsible for?" Confusion knit Gran's brow.

Silence blanketed the room for long seconds until I could force out a sound. "My parents," I whispered.

"Oh sweetheart." Gran rose from her chair and then pulled me up and into a tight hug.

Blinking back the tears, I allowed the words to spill out. "I saw what would happen. But I didn't stop them."

"You weren't responsible for your parents. There was nothing you could do about that accident."

"I tried. I told them, but they didn't believe me."

"That was more my fault than yours." Gran patted my back. "I should have told your mother about the family gift. But I thought, since it would skip over her, she didn't have to be troubled about it."

"I coulda tried harder to convince them," I said, leaning into her soft neck. The scent of her lavender soap enveloped me just as her arms did.

"Even if you had convinced them, it wouldn't have changed anything. If they'd believed you, what would they have done? Never drive a car again? Don't you think I've tried to change fate in my seventy-two years? No, honey," she insisted with a little shake. "And what if you did change Liam's future? How would that change other events? Pull on one string and the whole fabric unravels, maybe? Perhaps someone else dies?"

What did I care about that amorphous someone else? I needed to save my boyfriend. "There has to be some way."

"Your parents' fate was not in your hands and neither is Liam's."

Not in my hands? Maybe not right now, but that didn't mean I couldn't try to grab onto Liam's destiny and tug like hell. But if I tried and I failed, his death really would be my fault.

Did I have the courage to take that chance?

* * * * *

Going to the Ellsworth house that night was the first step in my campaign. But I soon found that sitting through the uncomfortable tension between the brothers and their parents was an almost insurmountable challenge. How successful would I be in changing fate when I couldn't even manage to change the heavy mood of dinner conversation?

Keagan sat on one side of the table opposite Liam and me. He scowled down at his plate as he pushed the mashed potatoes around, trying to form a perfect circle with the gloppy substance. With one turn of the fork, black ink peeked out from beneath the cuff of his shirt.

Omigod, he'd gotten a tattoo circling his forearm a few inches above his wrist. I glanced around the table, hoping that none of the others had seen it.

Their father loomed at one end of the table, stuffing his face. In between bites he sipped a scotch. He wasn't drunk, just buzzed. Mrs. Ellsworth hovered about, mostly occupying the space between her seat and the kitchen. And it wasn't only her legs getting a workout. Whenever Mr. Ellsworth would make some nasty comment, Mrs. Ellsworth would treat it like a turd in a cat box. She'd giggle nervously and let loose a barrage of inane chatter as if she were trying to bury his comment so deep beneath her own words that we wouldn't realize how stinky his words were. The only blessing was that so far most of his jabs had been criticisms of politicians and work colleagues. Only a few had been directed at the family.

At the moment we were all sitting in a merciful pocket of silence between the turd laying and the scratching.

As Mr. Ellsworth finished chewing a bite of the meatloaf, he glanced at Keagan and then at his son's plate. He swallowed and his lips twisted into a displeased curl. He opened his mouth and I knew we were in for a smelly one.

"So Keagan. Flunked any tests at the new school yet?"

Keagan flinched, the slight movement so brief I would have missed it if I hadn't been looking at him. His eyes met mine and the corner of his lip curved upward into a wry smile before he turned his head toward Mr. Ellsworth.