The Calling (39 page)

He wanted to beat the shit out of himself for not being counted when he had the chance. He’d been sitting on the beach, inches away from the shore, but too selfish to stick his little toe in the water. As he peered over at her, he worried for her safety. What if he and the baby didn’t make it, and she wanted to end her life, the same as his mother had two decades ago?

A frigid cold settled over his heart, freezing him from the inside out. “Hand me my phone.” He held out his hand. Mandy stopped humming and placed her cell phone into his palm. He realized in the silence how much her voice had soothed him. “You know I love you, right?”

“Of course, I do.”

In the dim glow from the dash, Justin could see her eyes were moist with unshed tears. He brushed her cheek with the tips of his fingers. “I just wanted to make sure.” He reluctantly pulled his hand back from the warmth of her skin and dialed. When his dad picked up, he said, “Hi, Pops.”

“Where the hell are you?” Mitch grumbled. “I’ve been worried sick about you all day.”

“We’re in trouble.”

“Who’s we?” his dad asked.

“Mandy’s pregnant. She hasn’t been counted, and we’re seven hours from the ocean.”

“Oh, hell. She’s going to lose the baby.”

“How long until the Calling is over?” Justin asked.

“Probably two, maybe three in the morning.”

Justin glanced at the car clock.
Midnight
. They weren’t going to be anywhere near the sea by two o’clock.

“Is Mandy with you?” Mitch asked.

“We’re together, traveling south from Little Rock.”

“How the hell did you get there?”

“Long story. We’re heading toward New Orleans.”

“You ain’t gonna make it.”

A surge of energy, more powerful than the others, vibrated his body, curling his shoulders forward. Mandy rocked in her seat. She squeezed her eyes shut, and a tear escaped, trailing down her cheek.

Justin lowered his voice. “There’s another problem.”

“You haven’t been counted either?”

“No.”

“Christ!” His dad took a raspy breath, and the line went quiet. After a moment of aching silence, he heard his father breathe again. “Okay, here’s what you’re gonna do. There was a family, the Murrors, who lived in Monroe when I was growin’ up. My dad used to say they didn’t bother goin’ to the ocean during the Calling.”

The determination in his dad’s voice melted away a small piece of Justin’s strain. “Where’d they go?”

“The Mississippi.”

His limbs tingled with a flicker of hope. “You’re serious?”

“Serious as a shark bite.”

It was as if he were nine again, sitting in the dugout with his dad psyching him up for a home run. He’d never failed to deliver when Pops had coached him, but the stakes this time were suffocating.

He was about to speak when his gut clenched with another surge.

Mandy wrung her hands as she groaned and bent over. He wanted to reach out and touch her, calm her, but he was too lost in the grip of energy vibrating his spine. Christ, the situation was getting desperate.

The wave passed, and he caught his breath before speaking. “A river works?”

“Sometimes.”

The flame of hope extinguished like a fire in a monsoon. “What do you mean,
sometimes
?”

“I mean the weather conditions had to be right. If somethin’ was blocking the waves, sonar, whatever Triton’s sending out… well, then they didn’t get counted, and they took a road trip to the bay.”

With only one hope of getting out of this alive, he gazed at Mandy. “You have your phone?”

She nodded.

“Find the closest route to the Mississippi. We need to be as far south as possible, and we have to be there by two.”

Her eyes widened. “A river?”

“Yep.”

A smile touched her face. “Why don’t all descendants just go to a river if the ocean isn’t nearby?”

“Because it doesn’t always work,” he told her.

Her face fell and, with a solemn expression, she pulled out her cell and began searching maps.

“I need to talk to her,” his dad said.

“Why?”

“Just concentrate on drivin’ fast without getting stopped and hand her the phone.”

Justin pushed the cell to her ear, wondering what his dad wanted to say to her. She clutched the phone, at first surprised, but then her brow furrowed with concentration as she listened. She nodded twice, then went still, not even her chest rising with breaths.

A muffled whimper escaped her lips. “I promise,” she whispered into the receiver. A lone tear streaked down her face, then another… and another. She nodded again, while rubbing wider circles on her stomach with her palm. “Okay.”

Her voice sounded utterly miserable. He reached out a hand and squeezed her leg, wishing he had more reassurance to offer.

When she held out the phone for him, he pressed it to his ear, and growled, “What’d you say to her?”

“Nothing you need to worry about.”

“She doesn’t need—”

“I love you, son.” A lump rose in Justin’s throat, and his anger subsided. His dad didn’t think he was going to make it and, for sure, he’d been preparing Mandy. “I’m sorry I wasn’t there for you after Cecelia died,” Mitch continued.

This was what it took to get an apology? Impending death? His anger should have risen again, but it didn’t. As much as he hated that his dad had abandoned him, he didn’t want to leave this world with a rift still between them.

He chewed on the inside of his cheek, trying to force out the words that would mend their relationship for good. “Love you, too, Dad,” he finally said. “If I get out of this mess, we’ll make up for lost time.”

“You bet your ass we will.”

Justin glanced at Mandy. “Take care of her.”

“I’ve got it covered.”

He knew his dad would do everything in his power to bring her home safely. With one last thing to worry about, Justin hung up, refusing to say goodbye.

* * *

Mandy mashed her lips together, not allowing her sobs to steal her last minutes with Justin. But with Mitch’s words bouncing around her brain, the task was nearly impossible.
“If Justin doesn’t make it, call me,”
Mitch had said.
“I have a cousin who lives in Baton Rouge. She’ll come get you.”
His words lay heavy on her chest, making breathing impossible.

Justin rubbed her knee. “Did you find the fastest route?”

She nodded, glancing at her phone. “We’ll exit on Highway 65 heading south. That’ll take us to the Greenville, Mississippi bridge.”

“Perfect.”

There was nothing perfect about their destination. If his plan didn’t work, both her child and Justin were going to die in the frigid waters of the Mississippi.

She glanced at the clock.
One-fifteen
. The minutes passed like seasons and, though it was agonizing, she was thankful for every precious moment with Justin. She gazed at him, the soft glow of the green dashboard casting shadows across his high cheekbones and angular jaw. She followed the curve of his lips, remembering how it felt to kiss him, to feel those lips on her skin.

“One last time,” she whispered.

“What?” he asked.

“You have to kiss me one last time before we get to the bridge.”

The car began to slow, and she gasped as he swerved to the shoulder. The tires shuddered against the grates before stopping.

“You’re wasting precious time,” she said. “We can kiss on the bridge.”

He didn’t reply. With his eyes intent on her face, he unbuckled his seat belt, leaned across the divider, and landed an urgent kiss on her mouth. His touch made her senses come alive. After being numbed by so much worry and despair, the sensation was overwhelming.

She threaded her fingers through his hair and melded her lips to his, unable to get close enough. Their kiss was sweet and gentle, his lips longingly moving against hers. Before she could really feel him, memorize his taste, his touch, he pulled away. With her fingers still in his hair, she urged his lips back to hers, but he shook his head.

“You have to drive,” he said.

“Why?”

He threw her a meaningful look, his eyes full of sorrow, and she understood what he meant. They were close to the end. The strengthening of the pulses was proof, and if Justin were driving at that last moment, no one would be behind the wheel when it was over.

She wanted to break down right there, to weep in his arms until her tears ran dry. A sob escaped her lips, and Justin reached out his hand and cupped her face, rubbing her cheek with his thumb.

“It’s not over yet,” he said. “Don’t give up hope.”

She nodded, knowing if they wanted a chance at survival, they couldn’t waste time on the side of the road. She opened the door. A rush of cold air invaded the car, and she wrapped her arms around herself as she hurried to the front of the SUV.

Justin met her halfway around. He pulled her body close, one hand pressed against her back, the other wrapped around her neck, and he really kissed her then, holding nothing back. The heat between them exploded when his tongue parted her lips, and his knee nudged her legs open, his thigh resting against her heat.

She moaned into his mouth, her hands exploring his muscular arms, his ridged stomach, his hard chest. The chilled air turned hot, muggy, and sensual. As much as she wanted to hold him, kiss him, make love to him, a surge of energy racked her body, bringing their moment to an abrupt end. She broke the kiss with a groan and doubled over, her stomach cramping, her muscles on fire.

He braced his hands on the car hood and breathed through the pulse, his eyes squeezed shut, his jaw set tight.

“Most painful one yet,” she gasped.

Justin hurried to the passenger seat. “Let’s get to the bridge.”

* * *

Justin glanced at the clock.
One-fifty
. They were a good fifteen minutes from the Mississippi River, and time was quickly running out, the intervals between pulses shortening.

As if on cue, a surge of energy twisted his gut. Mandy clenched the steering wheel, her knuckles turning white. He had to do something to get their minds off the inevitable and, as he racked his brain, he realized there was a story he’d always meant to tell her but hadn’t yet.

“Do you remember the first time we met?”

“Of course. It was Ty’s twenty-sixth birthday. You had the party at your house.”

“No, that wasn’t the first time.”

“Then, when?”

“About a month before that… at Moe’s. You were sitting at the bar with Kirsten, nursing a Corona. I sat in a booth a few yards away from you with a couple of buddies, trying to work up the nerve to approach you.”

“That doesn’t count, because we didn’t meet.”

“I’m not done.”

She raised her hand for him to go on. Her gesture was rigid, hinting at the strain in the rest of her body.

“You were wearing a blue sundress that tied up the back like a corset. You had on white sandals, and your toenails were painted pink.”

“You have the memory of an elephant.”

“No, I don’t. You were the most beautiful woman I’d ever seen. I couldn’t forget that night if I tried.”

Even in the dark, he could see a blush rise to her cheeks. For a moment, a sparkle returned to her eyes, and a real smile curved her full lips up as if it were a normal night, one that promised a bright future for them.

He burned the image of her face into his mind, just as it was in that moment. In the last seconds of his life, he was going to close his eyes and remember her, smiling, full of love and life.

“You still haven’t gotten to the part where we met,” she said.

A sudden course of energy clenched his gut so hard he had to swallow back the vomit.

Mandy’s hand flew to her mouth as she moaned. “That can’t be good.”

He watched the speedometer inch higher, the dark outline of trees sailing past them even faster.

With no idea how much longer they had, he brushed a wisp of her hair aside, so he could see all of her features, and started where he’d left off, determined to leave her with something worth remembering. “It took me an hour, one tequila shot, and two beers to finally get the balls to walk up to you. When I reached your side, you stepped down from the stool and looked over your shoulder at me. I said hi.”

“That was it?”

“No. You said hi back, just before Kirsten grabbed your hand and dragged you away. I stood at the bar for five minutes, cursing myself for not getting off my ass one minute earlier.”

“That’s kinda sad.”

“What’s really sad is that I went back to Moe’s every night for a month, hoping you’d be sitting on that stool again. You weren’t. A month later, Ty brought you to his birthday party. Game over.”