The Centerpoint Trilogy (11 page)

She took a deep breath in and stared him down. The psychopath looked anxious and maybe a little bit ashamed of his actions. He flinched at her glare and then apology filled his eyes. They widened and he looked like a kicked puppy dog.  "I just want to help," he said. "I didn't mean to act overenthusiastic."

Her eyes widened. She had not expected him to apologize like that. "Why the hell are you so excited anyway? Eth, did your brother tell you who he was?"

Ethan shook his head. "Just a detective who would be able to help us," he said softly.

Alicia knew Ethan’s brother, at least casually, and she did trust him. She trusted him because she trusted Ethan. Still, there was something shady about this man. He was a detective, or so he said, but he knew about the supernatural and was very interested in this whole thing with their kids. She was not happy about that, not at all.

"I'm sorry for acting so excited," the man repeated. "I've just been working to bring them down for my whole life and I'm finally getting close."

"These are our kids!" Alicia argued.

"I know," the man said, his voice gentle. He was trying to placate her. "I know and I'm going to help you."

"I don't trust you," Alicia whispered.

"I don't blame you," the man responded immediately. He looked straight at Alicia and then over at Ethan and Anna, who were trying their very best to find what was going on. They were looking all over the house, even as they spoke, because there had to be something that they missed. She was distracted from Ethan and Anna when the man spoke up again.   "I suggest that we talk to the police and then I'll take one of you with me, to the place where you guys were held five years ago."

"Why?" Ethan asked. It was obvious that Anna's husband did not trust the man either. Despite his brother being one of his closest friends and his greatest confidant, aside from his wife, Ethan did not trust. He was staying a comfortable distance from the detective. His brown eyes were intensely narrowed.

"The kind of magic that they do sort of leaves a stain," he said. "The powers they bestowed on you are bright too. I think that place might show us something. It's instinct and good guessing, but it's all we've got to go in on."

So, despite the fact that none of the three parents trusted Wayne, they used his word to talk to the police and then prepared to go back to that place. "We shouldn't all go," Wayne said softly. He looked at the three with him, as though he knew that they would not trust him with that.  “We need to talk to the cops and then two or three of us should go. At least one should stay.”

"I'm going," Alicia said.

Anna took a deep breath. "Ethan, go with them too. I'll stay back here and meet your brother.”

"Okay."

And that was that. On the word of a man that they didn't trust.

The police came.

Chapter Five

Ethan was surprised. The building that replaced the one he, Anna and Alicia had been held in five years earlier hardly looked different from the one that Rhiannon's amazing power with fire had absolutely gutted. It was a small, suburban apartment building with five stories. It was painted a light shade of blue that was supposed to be warm and inviting. The only major difference that Ethan noticed between the building and the one that replaced it was that this building was populated and had not been rented out by psychopaths. Cars were in the parking garage and he could see people walking nearby, windows open, everything that showed signs of life.

They had talked to the police, who assured them and promised to find their daughters. They were questioned extensively, and Ethan felt incredibly number as he answered. They were all lucky that the situation was one that would be traumatic to any parent, because all three of them acted frozen, paralyzed. The police just didn’t get to know the many reasons they had for being paralyzed with fear. It was definitely not your normal abduction.

As they entered the apartment building, he tried his best not to do anything that aroused suspicion in the people living there. He stayed close to Alicia and the mysterious Detective Wayne (who was evidently his brother's friend, although this was the first Ethan was ever hearing of him). He walked with them around the perimeter of the building. He was trying to pick up on any vibe that would tell him what the hell was going on. He could come to no such conclusion. It wasn't like the building was just going to shoot off magical, evil vibes.

Ethan and his ragtag band of misfits eventually found their way inside the building. Alicia, next to him, was looking around in just the same manner as he was. Her head was whipping back and forth and he saw her eyes open wide as she tried to absorb every little detail. She was desperately sucking it all in.  She was trying to find clues in a place where that seemed utterly hopeless. She was wondering exactly what he was - why had they come there? Was that going to do anything to lead them to their children? Yes, the whackjobs of the Celestial Centerpoint had held them there five years ago, but the building had been rebuilt and now normal people lived their lives within. It was no longer related to the story, was it?  Well, then again, the place made him so emotional. Maybe it did still have a power over them.

They headed up to the fifth floor without even coming to a consensus that they had to do so. They had been held on the upper floor of the former apartment, so it only seemed right that they would find what they were truly looking for in this location. Alicia stayed very close to Ethan the whole time and he noticed the woman kept looking at Detective Wayne with suspicion. Ethan could not say he blamed her. His interest and enthusiasm was enough to make a man suspicious and very, very nervous.  He just wasn’t sure what to take of him and now was not a time to test his trust.

Although the building was not the same, Ethan could not help have a very intense reaction to being in that same place. It was five years ago, but it felt fresh in his memory. He remembered the flames and the screaming, the watching as Anna was almost killed by the pain of their ritual. He saw a young man named James, because the terrifying leader of the Celestial Centerpoint had deemed him unworthy. He took a deep breath and closed his eyes, trying his best to steady his mind as it totally raged.

It was obvious that next to him, Alicia was affected by the building in the same way. He quickly reached over and grabbed her hand. From the moment they had endured hell in this very building's predecessor, Alicia had become one of Ethan's dearest friends. He and Anna quickly built their relationship together - from two people who were casually dating, to two people who were madly in love and had a child on the way. All this time, however, they kept Alicia very close. Alicia was the best friend that they could ever ask for and he cared about her immensely. She was one of the best friends he’d ever have. She squeezed his hand back, to let him know that yes, she was freaked out, but she was okay too.

Wayne, of course, did not have the emotional connection to the building that they had. He was walking around the hallway with a large step. He walked along and they could both see the way that his eyes took everything in, analytically. He had his hands out, as if he was scanning for something. He kept touching the walls, the plants, at sporadic moments. Finally, he walked over to where the wall was slightly bulky. It was obvious that there was some sort of safe-like compartment in the wall. Ethan realized that this was, position wise, probably right about where the ritual was done on he and his wife.

"What is that?" Ethan asked.

Wayne shrugged lightly at him and flicked it. It opened up immediately. It seemed as though it had always been there, but Ethan doubted that as much as he doubted anything. The chances of the little flap being there before someone from the Celestial Psychopaths intervening really did not seem at all possible to him. He opened it up and pulled out a folded piece of paper. The paper was a parchment of some kind and looked very old. It reminded Ethan of a pirate's treasure map.

When Wayne opened it, it was actually a map. It was folded into fourths and contained what looked very much like the small city that they lived in. A large circle was drawn near the center of the map. It looked as though it had been hand-drawn and Ethan once again thought about a pirate's map for treasure. That was truly what it seemed like, although he knew that the treasure in question was their children. The idea made him nauseous.

Ethan hadn't even realized that he was panicked, until his mind started calling out. Usually, Ethan was very much in control of his powers, but evidently the strain of losing his daughter was too much for him to handle. It came out like a stream that he could not stop. It started like a slow trickle and then came pouring out of his head like a gushing river.

Whoever you are, give them back. They're our children! Please! They don't want anything to do with this! They're just little girls!

Ethan could barely contain himself and held a hand over his forehead to try and stop it, but the stream had already been released and he was staring in awe of what he had just done. Was he an idiot? Oh god, his idiotic actions had totally put their children in danger. He swallowed as a bout of nausea overtook him.

Ethan was still cursing himself for what he had done when he heard a reply. The voice was sultry and crystal clear within his mind. "Come and get me," it said, with a lot more power than any of the mental projections that he had heard in the past. It sounded like a real voice. It sounded as though it were coming from someone standing in front of him. He looked around, almost as if expecting someone else to be standing with them.  "Come and get me, pretty boy."

Ethan shook his head. He looked over at Alicia and Detective Wayne. He shook his head again and again, but he could not erase the thing that he had done. "I am so sorry," he said softly. He could not believe himself in that moment. "I'm sorry."

"What are you talking about Ethan?" Alicia asked.

"I got freaked out and all of a sudden my head called out," he tried to explain. "It wasn't even like I was controlling it. I just called out mentally, louder than I ever have before. I let it go and there was no way that I could get it back. It was really bad. I am so so sorry."

"That was the most idiotic thing possible!" Wayne yelled. His eyes were so wide that they practically bugged out of his head.

"Shut up!" Alicia yelled at Wayne, but even though Alicia told the detective off, Ethan could see the anger flash in her eyes when she looked at him. He did not blame her in the slightest. He had put her little girl at risk. God, he was the stupidest man ever. .

"Look," Alicia said, once she had gathered herself up and was speaking much more calmly, "what we need to do is go to the location that's circled on the map. We need to find out what they want from us and we need to get our daughters back."

Wayne shook his head. "Alicia, love, it's not that simple," the man said steadily. He was trying his best to stay calm and talk to her reasonably, but Ethan could tell he struggled with that. "Your daughters are a powerful tool and they don't want to give up the kids. They want to taunt you, because the Celestial Centerpoint has always been about show."

They didn't find anything else in the apartment building and quickly made their way, new map in hand, to Anna and Ethan's house. Anna had texted Ethan to let him know that she was leaving Alicia's and heading back there. The moment that he arrived, his wife jumped into his arms and held him so tightly he was pretty sure that she was going to crush him where he stood.

"Honey!" she yelled desperately.

"I'm here," he comforted, rubbing Anna's back. Anna was the strongest woman he knew, but he also knew that this was killing her.

Anna explained quickly that she'd spoken to his brother and he was going to try and do some investigation of the local areas. He was also keeping everything in their lives under control for them while they dealt with this crisis. He was taking care of their families, getting in contact with them and discussing matters with their workplaces.  "In essence," Anna said with a pained laugh, "your brother is being a total saint Ethan."

It wasn't long until the strength that Anna was showing vanished.

Anna held herself as strong as she could manage, but eventually it all crumbled. While Alicia and Wayne discussed strategies and how to get their daughters back from those who would keep them at all costs, Anna sagged into his arms and started to cry silently. Her sobs were so silent that nobody else would notice them, but Ethan knew the way that his wife's back shook. Her entire body just trembled like a leaf in the wind, then started to shake almost violently.  Ethan knew the pain she was in. It hurt like nothing else to know Genesis was gone, and Anna had the added bonus of having known something was going to happen.

She eventually fell asleep in his arms. While she slept, Ethan thought about Anna and their beautiful daughter. Anna and Gen had changed his life. They had given him something to live for and he needed them more than ever. He stroked his wife's hair and vowed that he would go to hell and back in order to put Genesis back in her arms. Those two were the most important parts of his life. He could not survive without them.

Ethan closed his eyes for just a moment, leaning against Anna. He did not sleep, because his mind was not equipped to do so. He just pressed a kiss to the top of her head and closed his eyes. He let the darkness overtake him for a moment and let his body relax, even as his mind raged hysterically.