How I Found You

by Gabriella Lepore

  It would have been cruel to take normality from her. How could I have done it? My altruistic side could see how much freedom was in her grasp, and what a great life she could have—and should have. I’d have envied her if I hadn’t been so magnanimously in love with her.

  So, I left. In the middle of the night. No warning. No goodbye. Hardly surprising, really. Goodbyes were too difficult for a coward like me. Instead, while she was sleeping, I snuck into her room and placed my half of the silver heart on her pillow, then I kissed her head and walked. And I didn’t stop.

  Once we were out of Millwood, Caicus charmed us a car. It wasn’t a Lamborghini Gallardo, but it was okay. We didn’t speak on the journey home. He drove, and I stared out the window.

  When we returned to the coven, we told them everything: about Marco, Rose, Lathiaus… We didn’t get the heroes’ welcome we’d hoped for. They kind of nodded and reluctantly congratulated us. A few of them were peeved about Marco—not because they cared for him, but because he was a damn good combatant. I could vouch for that.

  As the weeks passed by, I thought only of Rose. Sometimes I considered going to her, but I never did. And I knew that she wouldn’t find me. That was another thing about being a witch—you didn’t get found.

  The seasons changed and the leaves turned orange and fell from the trees. I watched their lives deteriorate until the trunks were all but bare. Their gradual demise happened alongside mine, so I took solace in them. We faded together.

  And then the snow came, thick and heavy and not going anywhere anytime soon. People said that nothing would grow beneath the winter snow. That was me. Beneath snow. Standstill. I didn’t grow. I didn’t live. I was frozen.

  Purgatory.

  Caicus bashed on my door again.

  “Go away!” I shouted.

  From the balcony, I heard my bedroom door open and he stomped in.

  I kept my gaze transfixed on the white mountains and the opaque silver sky.

  “Go away,” I sighed.

  He halted at the gap in the drapes and lobbed something at the back of my head. It was small and sharp and sent a bolt of electricity down my spine.

  I looked to the floor where the bullet lay.

  What the…?

  I spun around.

  “You can have your stupid heart back,” she said.

  My jaw dropped. I didn’t know if I smiled, or laughed, or wept…

  “Rose,” I whispered.

  She paused. Her expression gave away the fact that she’d probably had a whole angry speech rehearsed, but was too thrown to remember any of it.

  “I don’t want it anymore,” she blurted out. I guessed that was around line seven of her speech.

  Actually, I wasn’t having much luck, either. I’d had four months to think of all the things I would say to her if ever I saw her again, and yet there I was, my moment to shine, and all I could come up with was, “Hi.”

  Line, please?

  “Hi,” she said back. “I’m very angry at you.”

  I nodded my head. But it was hard to look understanding while beaming with joy.

  “I’m very angry at me too,” I offered.

  “How could you leave like that?” she demanded.

  I stood up now, face to face with her where she hovered, veiled behind the thin drapes.

  “I wanted you to have a better life,” I told her honestly.

  She didn’t seem to like that.

  “You ruined my life,” she screamed at me. “You took away the thing I love most.”

  “Caicus?” I tried to joke.

  Uh, oh. That didn’t go down well. Eh, maybe she’ll laugh later.

  “Look,” I said, sincerely, “I know what I put you through last summer, and I care about you too much to involve you in this world. It’s dark and it’s scary—”

  “So what?” she snapped. “The world is always dark and scary. But it got a little brighter with you in it, and it got a little less scary, too.”

  “Less scary?” I raised my voice. “Don’t you remember what you had to see? Death, violence, carnage beyond what you ever imagined possible—”

  “Yes, I remember. I lived it. Because it was my life too. And you had no right to take it away from me.”

  “I had every right. It’s my responsibility to protect you.”

  “Since when!” she spluttered. “Who asked you to?”

  “Since forever. Since I let you die the first time.”

  “The first time?” she frowned.

  “Not this lifetime,” I elaborated as best I could. “I mean, when I lost you before. I could have saved you.”

  Rose stared at me. “No, you couldn’t have.”

  I kicked my balcony chair in frustration. “Yes, I could have.”

  “Did you go back? Did you do the Retracing spell, too?”

  “I don’t need to,” I told her. “I carry the memory with me in every life.”

  She staggered backwards. “You remember it?”

  “Not exactly. I don’t know what happened back then, but somewhere in my subconscious, I know that I was to blame for your death. I’ve always known. How could I forget? How could I ever forgive myself for that?”

  She touched the drapes as though she were reaching out to me. The anger began to fade from her eyes.

  “Forgive yourself,” she said softly. “It was my decision. And I’m going to keep making decisions, with or without you.”

  I snorted.

  She carried on, “You saved my life.”

  “No, I risked it.”

  She smiled at me benevolently. “You stopped me from drinking the poison. You gave me the chance to fulfil my prophecy. Sorry, our prophecy,” she corrected herself. “It was destined for us. If it hadn’t been for you, I’d be dead by now, and the line of witches would be too. Why can’t we celebrate that?”

  I hung my head. “I don’t want you in this world,” I repeated adamantly.

  “You don’t want me in your world?” she asked.

  I laughed bitterly. “My world doesn’t exist without you.” I bent down to pick up the two pieces of silver heart. And as I did, she stepped through the drapes, out onto the balcony.

  I could see her clearly for the first time, and it was impossible not to stare. Not that I made any attempt to resist.

  “That’s our heart.” The half-hearts were nestled in the palm of my hand. Rose pushed them together. “It’s complete.”

  I swallowed.

  She grazed her fingers against my chest, where my real heart pounded in exhilaration.

  “I still want your half,” she said.

  I was crumbling inside. “You can always have my half.”

  My remark seemed to quieten both of us. For some minutes we stayed in our own thoughts, separate, but also very much together.

  Rose smiled sadly at me. “I had to find you, Oscar,” she said at last. “There were things I needed to say.”

  “And now that you’ve said them?”

  “I’ll leave.”

  “No,” I murmured. “Don’t go.”

  “I have to. You said it yourself, I don’t belong in this world.”

  “You belong with me,” I blurted out.

  I didn’t wait for her response. I dropped the fractured heart onto the floor and pulled her into me, kissing her with every ounce of my being. A shower of feathery snowflakes sprinkled over us like beads of confetti. Perhaps I took that to be a sign, or perhaps I was merely tired of insisting I knew best, but from that moment on, everything changed.

  “Let me come with you,” I said. “Let me stay with you.”

  She blinked through her brimming tears. “Okay.”

  I grinned. “I’m running away with you,” I declared.

  Romantic gesture number fifty-two.

  “Where?” she asked.

  “Anywhere.”

  “Millwood?”

  “Millwood,” I agreed, still grinning. Quite frankly, I couldn’t have wished for anywhere else.


  She smiled up at me. “Then we should take Caicus with us.”

  I returned the smile.

  “Rose?” I ventured, brushing a snowflake from her cheek. “How did you find me?”

  She winked teasingly. “I have my ways.”

  “How?” I persisted.

  She took my hands and held them to her. “You, Oscar Valero, are in my heart. You always have been, and you always will be. And that is how I found you.”

  BOOKS BY THE SAME AUTHOR:

  How I Found You

  Secrets in Phoenix

  The Witches of the Glass Castle

  The Witches of Glass Castle:Uprising

  For more information visit: www.gabriellalepore.com

  Or follow on Twitter @GabriellaBooks #SecretsinPhoenix

  Thanks for reading!

  Huge thanks to Sasha, Greg and Megan, who got out there in sub-zero temperatures to create the perfect Oscar and Rose cover photo. Troopers!

  Thanks to the fantastic readers who share and swap! You are amazing and I’m so grateful for your support.

  Thanks, as always, to my amazing family and friends: Lepores, Nelsons, Carters, Wynne-Jones/Oystens and the Fabulous Saunders of Whaley Bridge!

  Love and thanks to my parents, who’ve followed every step; To my best squirrel Lorna (you don’t), who always shares her food and deviously tricks me into watching way too many episodes of American Horror Story; To Louis, who still holds the record for longest phone call ever.

  Special thanks to James, for everything. For fixing kettles and computers, and for thinking things through… because sometimes I don’t

  Last but definitely not least, thanks to my amazing friend Ben, who believes that together we are unstoppable. I believe it too.

  Love,

  Gabriella xxx