by Jody Klaire
“Just leave all your stuff on the table.” My words were met with blank looks. My experience since Serenity told me everybody had a cell phone, especially teenagers, so I didn’t get it.
“No?” Frei said as if covering me as I tried to figure out why I was being looked at so oddly. “Well, go on then. She went and tapped something under the panel and the water gushed out once more. “Samson and I will fix you some dinner.”
My stomach grumbled but only I heard it as a herd of unruly teens hurtled over to watch the pool fill.
“After you get changed.” She cast a look up and down my outfit. “You’re being stared at.”
“Not surprised, I look crazy.”
Frei arched an eyebrow. “It’s more the tight fitting clothes and the bare midriff. Move.”
I rubbed my hand across my stomach. “Mine? You’re the one in fine detail on the card.” I pointed out the red shorts.
“I’m ignoring you.”
I grinned and pointed to the card again. “He’s even got the detail on the stitching.”
“Can’t hear you.”
I chuckled and turned to head up the stairs. Jessie was watching me go. Her eyes flicking over me as if she was trying to figure me out.
Good luck to her. It would take a lot more than genius to find a description for me other than different. I shook my head at my outfit as I climbed the stairs. Different and something else.
FREI WAS CONSPICUOUS in her silence as we prepared dinner. Hot dogs seemed like the perfect thing. The group, including Miroslav were making the best of playing in the pool. Gone was any surly angst-filled coolness. Nope, right now they were a bunch of giggling kids. It was great to watch.
“They don’t own anything,” Frei told me as she handed me some more bread to toast.
“I seen some with cell phones.” At least what I thought were cell phones.
“It’s a GPS tracker and barcode scanner. All of them are chipped and the scanner checks if they’ve removed it.” She focused on the bubbling water. “Monthly. They don’t realize of course.”
Cell phones weren’t a big thing when I’d been sent to Serenity at sixteen but when I was released, they were everywhere. To think that these kids didn’t have them felt strange.
“What do they think it is? Do they know about cell phones?”
Frei shrugged. “I doubt it. They don’t leave unless with staff and they live here all year round.” She smiled. “At least they aren’t tagged like we used to be.”
“Tagged?” I didn’t want to know but morbid fascination took over.
“Like cattle.” She ran her finger over the rim of her right ear. There was a big scar there. “We were told that it was tradition. Everyone had a ring in their ear.”
“Jäger was around then wasn’t he?”
She looked away.
“Nan used to say that unless you walked in somebody’s shoes, you wouldn’t know if you’d get the same blisters.” I smiled and made sure to catch her eye. “I’m glad you are who you are today.”
“He is a violent man.” She blinked at me then stared down at the food. “I have a lot of scars from him.”
“He do anything else?” The fact he’d laid a hand on her made me want to knock his teeth out.
“No.” She averted her eyes.
“Huber would have torn him apart if he’d known, right?” I asked. I could tell that Huber would have seen it as damage to his property.
“Yes. I never told him.” She shrugged. “Jäger likes his women vicious. The more twisted, the better.”
That said an awful lot about me.
“I can’t believe I let that out.” She shook her head. I could see relief in her eyes that she had. Jäger was nothing but a big bully picking on kids who couldn’t fight back.
“You ain’t told Renee?”
“No.” Her eyes widened. “She can never know. She won’t understand. She’d go after him and get hurt.”
Her accent flipped to fill with the true tones she hid so well. Her hands swished about as she talked. Her energy was so different when she dropped the barriers. I couldn’t help but stare at her.
“She’s a good person,” Frei whispered. “She will rush headlong into any danger to protect people and forget she’s not made of Kevlar.”
Frei pushed the hot dogs around. I watched her for a moment, thinking about it. “But the whole thing with Yannick must have shown her she needed to be careful.”
“It made her hide information from you and risk lives because she was protecting you.” Frei sighed. “Her default will always be to keep us safe. That’s the core of her. That’s the real woman you need to see. She loves us both enough to place herself in the line of fire.”
“Yet she left you because you stuck up for someone.”
Frei spooned out the hot dogs and I started putting them in buns, squirting on a line of mustard, and piling them on a tray.
“I broke a criminal out of a police station.”
I concentrated on the hot dogs “Why?”
“I needed to.” Frei arranged the serving platter. “They risked their necks to save someone close to me. . .” She huffed out a breath. “I couldn’t ignore it.”
“But they were guilty?” I wasn’t going to ask what of but I could see why Renee would have been angry and I could see why Frei had to act.
“It’s irrelevant.” She leaned against the counter. “These kids, if they survive will always be a family. They will always look out for each other. Right or wrong.”
I turned and watched the kids for the moment. Jed was dive bombing into the center, making the girls shriek. “You thought CIG would arrest you when you went to them to help Renee?”
“I was certain of it.” Frei clapped her hands, drawing the kids’ attention. Cries of delight rang out as Jed hoisted Miroslav out of the pool and they all trudged water across the floor.
“Guess we should have dried them off first?”
Frei glanced at the patio doors. We had a seating area in a sun room. I used it to meditate and I was sure Frei did too. “Sun will dry them off.”
She picked up the tray and led them through. I was glad it had a fan in the ceiling for Miroslav.
We all piled around the table. I sat next to Frei, unsurprised to see the Worcester Sauce present. She had it on everything. I was kinda relieved to see her smother her fries in it and stick mustard on her hot dog. She had been prepared to risk everything to help Renee. They were more alike than she realized.
I raised my hot dog up in the air. “To heroes.” I looked at Frei. “Especially unsung ones.”
In response Frei chomped her hot dog and mustard fired out, hitting me in the chin. The group laughed as I scraped the mustard off. I knew someone else who would have done the same thing. Someone I missed like crazy.
Renee and Frei were definitely two nuts from the same nutcase.
THE GROUP STAYED until the bell sounded for curfew. All afternoon they’d chatted and bickered and laughed like a family. As they filtered out, I took Jed by the elbow and slowed his exit. His worry lines had grown deeper throughout the afternoon.
“Tell me what’s wrong. You mad ’cause Kevin wasn’t punished?”
He looked at me with a set of muddy brown eyes and sighed. “He’s in observation. Nobody wants to be in observation.” He smiled. “Good enough for the dork.”
He glanced at the others strolling toward the dorms. The rule was that they had to be silent but their whispered chuckles and gossiping floated on the air to us. It felt great to see.
“Miranda.” Jed hitched up his shoulders and let out a long breath.
“You didn’t get her drunk again did you?” Last time she’d played so badly the next day that Renee had covered her with the excuse of a migraine. Half a terrible performance and Jäger and the principal were not happy.
“No.” He said it like it was a bummer. “She’s getting real stressed out. The guys who come in and visit are promising her some top places or stuff.” He shrugged. “I
don’t get a lot of what she talks about.”
“And you’re worried about her?”
He nodded. “Yeah, she’s so caught up in how she needs to make it big that she doesn’t think straight. She is practicing like crazy, too hard.” He sighed. “Not that I’m important enough to listen to.”
“You want me to talk to her?”
He smiled up at me. “If she wasn’t so pig-headed, I’d say yeah . . . but . . .” He shrugged again. “She’s hot but sometimes she’s mean.”
“Yeah, that’s women for you.” I sighed—a big sigh, which made him snigger at me. “Adorable one minute, bee in their butt cheeks the next.”
“Miss Locks doesn’t seem like that.” He gazed at her cleaning the kitchen. “She’s cool.”
That she was.
“I like Professor Worthington too. You seen her?” He smiled. “She’s even hotter when she’s angry.”
I folded my arms, covering up the fact I flinched at her name. I had to think fast. “That’s why she keeps shooting daggers at me. You sneaking in her block to Miranda?”
Jed shrugged. “She’s mad all the time.”
He had her nailed there.
The flash of the Rolex entered my mind again. “If you are there . . . keep an eye on them, will you?”
Jed raised his eyebrows, nonchalant but there was a twinkle in his eyes. “Like spy?”
“Yes. Worthington, Owens, and Miranda.” I met his eyes. “If you’re gonna be a nuisance, at least be useful to me.”
He saluted. “You got it.”
“Leave Miranda to me.” I don’t know why I sounded so confident but if Jed felt better with my tone, I didn’t care. “Now get, before they kick my butt ’cause you’re out past curfew.”
He saluted again and turned to leave. I was proud of how far he’d come since I arrived.
He sighed, turned, and met my eyes. “I hope one day I get to marry someone half as cool as you.”
Didn’t that smack me right between the eyes. There he was dribbling over my two feisty blondes and he wanted to marry someone like me.
“Take a ticket and get in line, kid,” Frei shot from somewhere behind me.
He opened his mouth but Jessie called out to him about Miroslav. He grinned at Frei, winked, and hurried off to join the group.
I chuckled, closed the door, and dragged my feet back to the sofa. I had no idea why entertaining eight students was so tiring. Maybe it was the healing before it. Frei had let out the pool and had started on the dishes. I went to help but got shooed.
“You telling me that a big, clumsy ol’ thing like me is considered cool?”
“That’s how you see yourself, Lorelei.” She washed up. “Don’t think others see you that way.”
“I know what they see, my size, then they think freak.” Okay, so not everyone. The folks in St. Jude’s had been amazing, Renee and Frei too.
A dishcloth hit me smack in the mouth as I yawned.
“You are special. I’m paying you a compliment. Suck it up.”
I peeled the cloth off me and spat out the soap. “Special?”
She put the dishes away, wiped up, and headed to the drinks cabinet. “Yes, Jed was right. We’d all be lucky enough to find someone who is as cool as you.” She dropped the ice into her glass. “You want it on a postcard or what?”
Was that her first whiskey? I dropped the cloth on the kitchen counter. “You been guzzling that all night?”
“Funny.” Her voice was level as usual. “Suck it up.” She slumped into her seat and winced.
I was in front of her before she had chance to peek open an eye.
“It’s nothing. Just the flip-flop.”
“Up.” I pulled her to her feet, and she sighed. She fiddled with the swimsuit underneath her t-shirt then rolled the shirt up and showed me her back.
“What kind of a flip-flop was it?”
“That’s a ridiculous question.” She glared over her shoulder at me. “It was plastic. Like all flip-flops.”
“Funny, ’cause you look like you got run over by a cheese grater.”
She wagged her finger in the air. “That’s why.”
I was glad she had gotten it. I was lost. “Why what?”
She headed to the medkit. “I skidded against the wall.”
Great. Yesterday when she was saving me. “Least I can do is stick some cream on.”
She handed it over and I tried, gently as I could, to smother the stinging wound. Now I was touching it, I could feel how much pain it was giving her. Not so long ago, I could have helped her heal. “I don’t like not being able to help you. I feel inadequate.”
“Welcome to the human race, Lorelei.”
I frowned. “Considering you just thought I was marriage material, that honeymoon sure wore off quick.”
Frei snorted with laughter. “Don’t ever let Renee hear you say that.”
I couldn’t help but chuckle. “Why? She got issues with marriage along with everything else?”
Yowch. Snappier than I’d intended.
“Something like that,” Frei mumbled. She tensed as I hit a raw patch that looked all kinds of green.
“Ah don’t worry about it, she’ll yell, I’ll freak her out, and she’ll sulk.” I nodded, wondering where all the hurt had billowed up from. “She does enjoy sulking.”
“She’s a great person. Don’t think about her like that . . . please.”
I stopped dabbing the cream for a second. “So you keep saying.”
“Because it’s true.” She tensed again as I placed a gauze over the wound and taped it on. “I have a tendency to bring out the worst in people.”
“No,” I said to Frei, signaling to her glass. “That brings out the worst in people. You ain’t unpleasant to spend time with.”
She raised her eyebrow as she stowed the medkit away. “As pleasant as sandpaper on skin.”
“It’s a compliment. Suck it up.”
Her laughter rumbled up and burst from her lips as she picked up her laptop. She took a seat in her chair. I sat on my sofa and found my page in my current read. Inside was a German phrase book I was attempting to figure out.
“Don’t let anyone in CIG hear you. They will think I’ve lost my touch.”
“Nah, although it’s scandalous that you keep showing your ankles.” I waved my book in the air as she stared at me. “Historical. English ladies didn’t go showing ankles to just anyone you know.” What was so romantic about a bunch of bone attaching a shin and a foot?
“Good to know in case I ever attend a ball, Lorelei.” Deadpan, monotone. She flicked her flip-flops off and put them on the coffee table. “I’d rock a gown though.”
It would make some picture. Frei strutting into a period ball with her spiky blonde hair. “Imagine the poor soul who tried making me a dress.”
Frei snapped her eyes to mine and laughed, loud, free and full of life. I liked her that way. I knew Renee would too.
Chapter 32
MUSICIANS CAN BE strange creatures. There’s an intensity that flows through their veins. Is it any wonder when they spend their lives striving to play a perfect piece that anything less than perfection becomes offensive to them? I was lucky that I only ever played to amuse myself. I wasn’t a musician. To me a musician was somebody who devoted their time to stirring others’ souls to joy with their music.
When I spent time with my violin, it was a sanctuary, a way to unblock myself and release all I felt inside. I felt for musicians, like Miranda, who had to rely solely on performing for others. By Jed’s words, it had stopped instilling her with peace and joy a long time ago.
As I snuck into Renee’s building, I followed my gut instinct and headed to the second floor. A young kid, maybe ten or so years old dawdled out of the room in front of me, head to chest, tears dripping off her chin.
I heard somebody call out to them about having a pathetic bow technique and that they would never amount to anything.
“Nice teacher,” I muttered
to myself. The voice had been young, female.
I dropped to my haunches in front of the sobbing kid, hoping I looked like a friendly face. “Do you enjoy playing?” I asked, trying to ignore the pang of hurt and sorrow from her.
She nodded. Tears dropped down onto her shoes.
“Do me a favor. I want you to go back to your room and find your favorite piece. You have one, right?”
She blinked and then smiled, a watery smile.
“And do you know it by heart?”
“Yes, Miss,” came a little reply.
“Then shut your eyes and play it. Forget her and let every bit of love and joy you have into it. Play the piece just for you.” I smiled at her. “Forget the mistakes, forget technique, just play.”
She bit her wobbling lip.
“It’s your friend. Don’t let some mean snob tell you no different. She ain’t no better than you are.” I took the kid by the shoulders and gave them a squeeze. If I hugged her and somebody saw me, they would either think I’d gone soft or think I was planning to abduct her. Space was a good idea.
“But . . . Miranda is the best.”
I shrugged. Miranda’s attitude stank. “She still gotta pee. Ain’t nobody better or worse than you, just different.”
My attempt at philosophy earned me a snigger. “Thanks, Miss Samson.”
I watched her scurry off and turned back to the classroom. Now to bring Miss Smart-ass back down to earth with a violin bow.
Miranda was alone when I entered the state of the art rehearsal room. Angst and anger rumbled around her. If I could have seen her aura, it would have been crackling and rumbling like a storm cloud. She turned to see me and a flash of rage pulsed from her eyes.
“You’re not meant to be in here.”
I took a seat at the edge of the small stage and folded my arms. She couldn’t go and tell anybody because I was between her and the door.
“I think you should leave.” Her tone was too much like Renee’s and my temper soared to the surface.
“Last I checked, you were a skinny excuse for a student and I was the staff member.”
She glared at me. “I’m more important than the likes of you.” She flicked her hair back with arrogance. One thing I’ve learned is that folks who put on that kind of show rarely feel worth anything.