Valkyrie Rising (14 page)

“No.” He shook his head without once taking his eyes off mine. “You’re not.”

His face was closer now, even though I didn’t notice until his head tipped slightly to the side. It was a signal more universal than SOS and just as panic inducing. The devil on my shoulder told me to close my eyes, to let it just happen, so I did. Even with everything that was going on, I couldn’t let this moment pass me by.

Tuck edged closer, so close I could taste the heat from his skin, so close the air I inhaled had also crossed those lips. So close I felt the passage of the few remaining molecules of oxygen he displaced as he leaned forward.

I held my breath.

I waited.

And I sat like that for a full count of ten. When I opened my eyes, Tuck had turned away. He’d pulled his knees up against his chest and wrapped his arms around them. His head disappeared into the hood of his sweatshirt.

The remnants of tension still lingered in the air, like ozone after a thunderclap.

“Graham’s my best friend,” Tuck’s voice was muffled, far away. “Without him, I’d have flunked out of school. I can’t ask for anything else.”

“Maybe you don’t have to ask,” I said. The slow spreading sting of rejection was leaving a trail of red up my neck and across my cheeks. “Maybe some things aren’t Graham’s to decide.”

“You think I don’t know that?” He finally lifted his head and looked at me again. His face was so guarded, he could have been hiding anything. “But Graham’s opinion
does
matter. Even when he’s wrong.”

I thought about that for a minute, but it seemed to me Tuck always got what he wanted—from anyone. He could outmaneuver Graham if he just tried hard enough. The real problem was that I’d misread the situation and forced Tuck into making awkward excuses.

And then I realized that even if there
had
been a moment between us, a spark, and Tuck had felt it too, maybe he wasn’t ready to risk both Graham and me by acting on it. Either way, it added up to the same answer—complete humiliation.

I wished with all my might that the whole conversation would just shrivel up and die and its brittle carcass would blow away on the wind. From the way Tuck let it drop like a stone, I knew he felt the exact same way.

With that, we lapsed back into silence. And this time, not a comfortable one.

It was just one more devastating item to add to the pile of my problems. Even if I couldn’t tell him what was happening, at least I’d had Tuck and this thing between us to make me feel less alone. Helping me bear the burden of all the secrets I was carrying around. All the crazy mayhem in my mind.

In one fell swoop, the feeling of closeness with Tuck was gone. There was no way to pick up the thread of the conversation, to act like an avalanche of awkwardness hadn’t just buried our friendship alive. It would have been better to kiss him and let that make things weird if our friendship was in danger anyway.

So I sat on the roof next to Tucker Halloway, feeling miserable and alone even in the company of the one person I wanted to be with. Wallowing in an unfulfilled longing that so clearly wasn’t reciprocated. I waited long enough that Tuck wouldn’t know how hurt and embarrassed I was.

Then I rose. “Thank you for saving me today.” I forced my tone to stay light.

“Anytime.” He relaxed back onto his elbows. I caught a flash of white when he smiled. “But you’d have been fine without me.”

“We don’t know that, do we?”

“You’re always better off without me.”

I almost rose to that bait, offered up on a silver platter. Making it all too easy for me to take a cheap shot and let things slip back to the way they used to be. Our usual routine. But instead I decided to just let my honest answer come out. “No, I’m not,” I said. “Everything is better when you’re around.”

Before he had a chance to reply and ruin everything, I scooted my way along the sod roof until I could lower my foot over the edge. I wedged my shoe into the drainpipe as I slid down the siding onto the window ledge. Tuck stayed where he was, propped up on his elbows, staring after me. He sighed and leaned back, looking up at the stars. I wondered how long he’d stay like that. After all, I wouldn’t be able to sleep until I heard his window slide shut and his soft footfalls before he climbed into bed.

T
HE NEXT MORNING
, my brain hurt from a night of restless, anxious sleep. I worried that things would be awkward with Tuck. I worried that I’d come home one day to find Graham staring back at me with white-on-white eyes. Or worse, that he’d disappear altogether. I worried that I was crazy for being so preoccupied with something that could be just a figment of my imagination, cultivated and nurtured by small-town gossips and mass hysteria. But as I scarfed down my breakfast, I mostly worried that if I loitered around the house, Grandmother would try to resume her modesty lecture. Or Kjell would call. I wasn’t prepared to face either eventuality.

I grabbed a book and went to the nearby soccer field, where I knew I’d find Graham and Tuck. Fortunately, Kjell wasn’t there—even though I recognized a few of his friends on the opposing team. I settled on the sidelines, watching the pickup game gel together.

During a pause in the play, when everyone else was catching their breath and grabbing some water, a tall boy jogged across the field and over to me.

“Hi,” he said, glancing over his shoulder and shifting his weight from foot to foot like the grass was on fire. “Have you seen Kjell?”

I looked over his shoulder too. A group of boys was watching us. “Not since he dropped me off last night,” I said, putting my bookmark in place.

“He dropped you off last night?”

I nodded.

“Then no one but you has seen him since he left the bar,” the boy said. “Not even his mother.”

“What do you mean?” I pressed my palms together. They slid, suddenly slippery with a thin film of sweat.

“Just that. No one knows where he is.”

“Maybe he’s fishing with his dad—or went on a trip or something?” It sounded pathetic, even to my own ears.

“Or maybe he disappeared.” The boy was looking at me like he expected me to reveal my horns and spit fire any minute. “Just like the people in the other towns. The Valkyries have finally come here too … and so have you.”

“I’m sure Kjell is fine,” I said. “There must be a simple explanation.”

The suspicion on his face was no longer thinly veiled. It was open and out there for the whole world to see. “Yes. I wonder what that explanation might be.”

“You can’t seriously think I have something to do with this?”

“There are some pretty interesting rumors about your family,” the boy said. “And you’re the last person who saw him.”

“No, I wasn’t,” I said, rising to my feet, outraged. “Graham and Tucker were there too.”

“You’d better watch your back. And if he doesn’t turn up soon, you’ll need to watch more than that.”

Then he was gone, retreating to the safety of his herd. The other boys gathered in a circle around him, casting hate-filled stares back at me as he poured his lies and half-formed theories into their ears.

Two other boys joined him when he broke away from the group and walked to the middle of the field. “This game is over,” he said.

“What do you mean?” Graham called back from the sidelines. “You can’t quit while you’re ahead like this. At least give us a chance to catch up.”

“Sorry, Graham, but the rest of us don’t feel safe here anymore.” He fired a hostile look in my direction. “Ask your sister if you want to know why. She’s caused enough trouble in this town.”

Every eye on the field turned toward me. I was torn between wanting to curl up and die and wanting to march right out there and make that boy eat his words. The new, violent presence in my mind told me exactly how to do it.

“If you have a problem with my sister, you can take it up with me,” Graham growled. His tone and posture introduced a side of Graham the world didn’t get see very often. Apparently it was one thing to ask me out but quite another to insult me. If I ever needed confirmation that it was a good thing I’d kept my mouth shut about everything, this was it.

“It doesn’t work like that,” the boy replied, shrinking back as Graham straightened to his full height. “At least,
this
doesn’t. But no hard feelings—at least not with you.” He held out his hand for Graham to shake. It was trembling slightly.

Graham surveyed him through narrowed eyes before knocking the hand away roughly. It didn’t look like he was going to let it stop there. He took a step forward, his hand curled into a wrecking ball. But Tuck grabbed his shoulder. After a second of standing and glaring, Graham let Tuck pull him away.

Graham walked across the field and wrapped me up under one arm like a mother bird protecting her chick.

“What was that about?” he asked as we started walking toward home. When I didn’t answer, he added, “Does this have something to do with Kjell? If he’s been saying things about you—you know you can tell me.”

“No,” I said, not really sure which part I was contradicting. “It’s nothing. Just a misunderstanding. It’s not Kjell’s fault. Or anyone’s, really.”

“All the same, I’ll talk to him.” Graham looked back across the field, watching the other boys picking up their sweatshirts and water bottles. “Aren’t you supposed to go out with him tonight?”

“Um, no,” I stammered. “Kjell had to cancel. Rain check.” I’d never, ever lied to Graham’s face before. I wasn’t sure I could do it, even if it was for his own good. But both boys swallowed my explanation without question—making me feel even worse. And even more alone.

“On the bright side,” Tuck said, casting me a significant look and a wink, “he might never get the chance to cash it.”

“You shouldn’t wish bad things on other people like that.” The angry words were out before I could stop them. Tuck had no idea how morbidly prophetic he might have been. “You’re so mean sometimes.”

“Easy there, tiger.” He said it lightly, like he didn’t notice my over-the-top reaction, but his eyes locked on me and held on tight. “I didn’t mean something had to happen to him. It just seems like a lucky break. You won’t be spending the evening trying to let a two-hundred-pound Norwegian down gently.”

“Right.” I had to start controlling my emotions. The last thing I needed was Tuck trying to sniff out the truth. Kjell disappearing had rattled me to the core, and I couldn’t afford to do or say anything that could put Graham or Tuck in danger of being next.

“Sorry. I guess I’m just on edge about the whole thing,” I added.

Tuck didn’t buy that, not for a second. He looked at me like I was a book written in a language he couldn’t quite comprehend.

“He’s too old for you—I mean, he’s even older than me. And you’re not ready for something this serious.” Graham paused, then added, “Thought I’d have a chance to tell him that at the game today, but he was a no-show.”

The reminder Kjell was missing would have made me feel even worse if the rest of what Graham had said hadn’t set my remaining patience on fire. “Thanks, but I can handle it on my own,” I said. “I don’t always need you butting into my life, you know.”

“I’m not butting into your life, but this is a lot for you to handle on your own.” Graham tried to put his arm around me again, but I shifted away, just out of reach.

I wanted to scream. Graham had no idea what I was capable of handling, how many things I was already juggling all by myself—things far bigger and more important than boys. I was doing it all for him. For Graham. To keep him safe. My temper quieted, soothed by the logic that even if I wanted to strangle Graham sometimes, I didn’t really want something bad to happen to him. If he found out everything that had been happening in Skavøpoll, and that Kjell was missing, there was no way I could keep him from trying to help out. Which could throw him directly in Astrid’s path. I shivered as I remembered how Astrid had watched Graham after the fishing boat accident.

I couldn’t afford to get into a fight with Graham.

“About the date today. I handled it,” I said, smiling. “I told him I wasn’t interested.”

“I’m glad to hear it,” Graham said, giving me a smile. “I’m proud of you for handling Kjell. And that jerk back there on the soccer field. It looked like you were standing up to him, too.”

Silence settled over the three of us, and I looked back at them, relieved they’d finally let the subject drop.

That’s when I realized only Graham was satisfied by my explanation.

Tuck met my gaze, his steel-gray eyes cutting through my lies like a knife.

A
FTER DINNER THAT
night, we ended up sitting at the table, just talking. In my frustration with her, I’d forgotten how cool Grandmother could be—unlike my grandparents on my mother’s side, who lived in Palm Springs in a house that always smelled like overcooked peas. Grandmother had traveled everywhere in her twenties and told stories that had us enthralled for hours, especially Tuck, who’d never heard most of them before.

By the time we cleared the table, it was almost nine, and I assumed we’d watch a movie or just hang out for the rest of the night. I’d been sharpening my cribbage skills for just such an occasion.

But Graham and Tuck were already conferring in low voices as they cleared the table, making plans to go out.