Dark Hope

by Monica McGurk

  Suit yourself, he sniffed, and I heard no more from him.

  I plopped down on the bed and drummed my fingers against the nightstand. Maria and Jimena looked at me expectantly.

  “He’ll be here soon,” I promised, and they beamed. “We just have to wait a few more minutes.”

  I looked back over at the phone. A wave of longing for my mother swept over me. Michael had been so vigilant at first, and after that I’d resisted the temptation to contact her, afraid of what might happen or what she might do if she knew where I was. But now, knowing Michael was nowhere near, I felt guilty. I was sure by now she knew I was missing.

  I looked over at Jimena and Maria and thought of their father; wondered if he even knew that they had ended up in so much danger.

  Mom must be frantic, I thought. But I didn’t trust myself to talk to her—not now, not with so much unfinished business. But there was someone else I could call, I thought, smiling to myself. Someone who would have no problem butting her nose in.

  I picked up the phone and let my fingers dial the number I knew by heart.

  It was the middle of the afternoon. Her phone was probably off while she sat in classes, so I wasn’t surprised when it rolled to voice mail.

  “Tabby, hi, it’s me, Hope,” I began, my voice a little shaky as I rushed through the words. “Sorry I haven’t called you. But hey, I was wondering, could you do me a favor? Can you call my mom and tell her I’m okay? I think she’s worried about me and, you know, she likes you so much, it would really mean a lot coming from you. Okay? I—I gotta go now. Bye.”

  I hurriedly put the receiver back in the cradle and stared at it. A loud knock at the door made me jump. My heart pumping, I moved away from the phone as fast as I could.

  “Who is it?” I asked nervously.

  “It’s me, Michael.”

  I let out a long breath and walked to the door, throwing it open. He rushed through, his brow knitted with concern, and without thinking I threw myself into his arms, burying my face in his shoulder. His warmth seeped through me, soothing every aching muscle and joint in me. I almost didn’t feel the painful catch of my skin as he pulled me close.

  Too soon, he pushed me away, holding me out from him for inspection.

  “You really are healing,” he noted with wonder. He lifted a tentative hand, as if he would trace the blistered skin along the curve of my cheekbone, but then he checked himself, bringing his hand to rest in my hair instead. “You probably can’t even tell how much better you look. I didn’t know this was even possible.” He tilted my chin, gently, to get a better look.

  Behind me, Maria cleared her voice. I stepped away from Michael, confusion and embarrassment flooding through me.

  “Michael, this is Maria and her sister Jimena.” I gestured to them where they sat at the foot of their bed. Michael came through the doorway and closed the door behind him.

  “I’m so glad you are safe,” he said seriously. They stared up at him, wide-eyed. “You must be eager to get home.”

  Maria looked at me warily. “I am not sure if that is a good idea.”

  I reminded Michael of her fears of her uncle. His face darkened. “I can take care of that,” he said menacingly. I saw the blood drain from Jimena’s face. She leaned over and whispered something to her sister.

  “I don’t care what he has to do,” Maria spat, disdainful of her sister’s fears. “He deserves whatever he gets. Who am I to judge the actions of an angel of God?”

  Michael arched a brow and cocked his head, looking at me pointedly. “An angel of God?”

  I shrugged. “They saw you when you attacked the car. At this point, I couldn’t see the harm.”

  He grimaced slightly. “Oh, well. I suppose you are right. At least it makes our next move a little easier.” He turned to the girls.

  “Neither of you is too seriously injured, I hope?” When they shook their heads, he continued. “Then I’m taking you back to Mexico. Tonight. Get whatever things you have together. We’ll leave as soon as it is fully dark.”

  The girls began scurrying about the room, looking for whatever meager belongings they had taken with them.

  Then Michael turned to me, speaking under his breath. “You stay here and wait. When I get back we’ll regroup. It will be time to turn our full attention to the Prophecy.” He seemed to struggle with what to say next. “I’m not really sure where to go from here, but we’ll figure it out.” He reached out and took my hand in his. “Together.”

  I felt myself flushing as he looked at me. Questions came unbidden to my mind. Why was he being so tender with me? Why did he keep saving me? Could I really trust him? My heart told me yes, but I knew that nothing had changed. We still faced the horrible choices dictated by the Prophecy.

  Don’t forget—every action he takes is driven by his need to find the Key. That is all.

  I pointedly ignored Henri.

  “Can’t I go with you?” I asked.

  He shook his head sadly. “Flying with humans is always tricky business. Three of you will be a bit much. And with your injuries, I can’t risk it. Not while you’re still recovering. Especially since there’s likely to be some trouble once I’m there.”

  “The uncle?” I asked, quickly surmising what he meant.

  “Yes.” He grinned, giving my hand a little squeeze. “Though I’m hoping the old ‘lightning and thunderbolts from Heaven’ routine will scare him straight without me having to do any permanent damage.”

  I smiled, happy to be holding his hand, happy to be in his confidences once again.

  Oh, give it a rest.

  I held back a laugh. You just can’t resist, can you? I jabbed at Henri.

  “What’s so funny?” Michael asked sharply.

  “Nothing,” I said, dropping his hand and trying, I think unsuccessfully, to wipe the smile off my face. I looked over my shoulder for a distraction. “I think the girls are ready.”

  He nodded brusquely and began directing them. Maria translated his commands with ease. “Go down the hall to the fire escape. Climb up to the roof. You can manage that? Good. I’ll be right behind you. You might as well make your goodbyes now.”

  He stood off to the side, making room for the girls. Jimena smiled shyly up to me. “Thank you,” she said. Suddenly, she threw her arms around me, squeezing me tightly in her bony little arms. I winced, just a little, before hugging her back, hard. With a sob, she rushed past me and into the hallway.

  Maria’s gaze followed her sister until the door swung closed behind her. Then she turned back to me.

  “I will never forget you,” she said, almost whispering.

  “Nor I you,” I answered in response, my voice choking. “Take care of yourself, Maria.”

  She took my hand and gave it a squeeze.

  “Please call me Ana. That is my real name, what my family calls me.”

  I felt the lump in my throat growing bigger.

  “Ana,” I whispered, squeezing her hand back. “God speed, Ana.”

  “And you, Hope. Wherever it is that you are going.” She shot a furtive glance at Michael. “God has given you a special mission, I can tell. You will not fail.”

  Before I could ask her what she meant, she slipped out of my grasp and through the door, leaving me to gape after her.

  Behind me, Michael cleared his throat. “Are you okay here by yourself?”

  What he really wants to know is that you’re not going to run off and try to escape, Henri sniped. My back stiffened. I turned back to Michael and eyed him warily.

  “I won’t run away, if that’s what you mean,” I answered.

  Michael looked at me, incredulous, the vein in his forehead throbbing to life. “That’s not at all what I meant,” he snapped as he stepped toward me, clenching and unclenching his fists. “After all that happened last night, I would expect you to know that.”

  I crossed my arms, refusing to back down. “I don’t know any such thing. But you can rest easy. I’ll stay put. For now.”


  His eyebrows knotted together in fury, his eyes flashing as he came face to face with me. “You child,” he spat at me as he gripped my shoulders with a ferocity I’d not yet seen from him. “You have no idea what you are saying. No idea at all the danger in which you keep putting yourself.”

  I shrank back against the wall, shaking. Heat surged from my shoulders, spreading like tendrils down my back. I gasped and tried to pull myself away, sure that I was about to erupt in flames.

  Michael’s eyes widened, and as if he was waking from a dream, he looked at me, looked at his own hands where they shook me, and let go, stepping away.

  “I’m sorry,” he said simply. I did not respond. Instead, I watched the vein in his forehead as it throbbed. I wondered if it was because of me, or if the pain of his disobedience was worsening.

  He stared at the floor and continued talking. “There is something you should know about last night.”

  When I didn’t respond, he continued.

  “The men in the car that chased you weren’t men. They were Fallen Ones.”

  My jaw fell open in disbelief. “But I saw the car explode! I saw the fire!”

  “Yes, the car exploded, but mixed in with the shrapnel was the black flock the Fallen Ones turned to as they made their escape. I’m afraid for you, Hope.” He paused, as if hesitating to tell me anything further. “I didn’t defeat them so much as they seemed to give up.”

  My heart sank as I remembered hearing the fluttering of wings before I’d discovered the girls in the corridor, the way the shrapnel had seemed almost choreographed as it flew in a single direction out of the night sky.

  “Your escape seems too easy to me. It was almost as if they sacrificed themselves for some reason. I don’t pretend to understand it, but I believe they have been using Ana and her sister as bait all along. To what end, I do not know. But I fear you are still in danger.”

  Michael looked up, a bitter smile on his lips. His blue eyes shone as he drank in my face. “Which is worse, do you think, Hope? The harm you’ve had at my hands, or the harm you could have had at theirs?”

  I answered him impulsively. “You never hurt me deliberately.”

  He pressed his lips together in a stern line. “Maybe not. But the damage was done nonetheless. And now—”

  He broke off, leaving his thought unspoken as he held my gaze.

  “I’d better go,” he whispered. He edged past me in the narrow hallway and swung the door open.

  “Be careful,” he warned over his shoulder. “I’ll be back as soon as I can.”

  nineteen

  Mona jumped, startled awake in the chair where she’d collapsed.

  That noise, what was it?

  She looked around, trying to find the source. It was barely a scratch, it seemed. Maybe it was her imagination?

  No. There it was again.

  It was early morning, and she could barely make out the dim light of the rising sun through the slats in the shutters.

  Something was behind them. Outside. Trying to get in.

  She drew in a breath and rose up, clearing the space between herself and the window in a few strides.

  There was a candelabra next to the window, an antique the decorator had somehow foisted upon her. She picked it up as she heard the scratching again. The candlestick was heavy, substantial. She was sure it could knock someone out if push came to shove.

  Bracing herself, she raised the candlestick above her shoulder and pulled open the shutters.

  “Don!” she exclaimed. “What on earth—?”

  He was hiding in the shrubbery, bracing himself as if he expected her to leap through the glass and clobber him. In a second her mind took in his worn camouflage jacket and hiking boots, the obvious bulges where gear had been stuffed into countless pockets.

  “Mona, please!” he half-whispered, half-shouted through the glass, his hands lifted in the air to show he meant no harm. “I need to talk to you. Let me in, please?”

  She lowered the candelabra and set it down on the side table, taking the moment to look away and appraise the situation. Don would certainly have come alone. He had no friends to speak of. But that lack of friends meant that he’d have to leave Hope behind alone, and he wouldn’t do that. Maybe she was here with him, too. Her adrenaline surged at the idea that her daughter could be nearby. Maybe this was her chance.

  She scanned the room, trying to remember where she’d left her cell phone. She should really call that FBI agent and have him come over and arrest her husband.

  It’s too damn early for this, she thought to herself as she rubbed the narrow bridge of her nose.

  “Please,” Don said plainly. He wasn’t wheedling; he wasn’t whining. She turned back and sighed. He looked up at her with shining eyes, working his cap over and over in his hands, and she felt herself caving in, just as she always had.

  “Come around to the garage,” she grunted.

  He beamed at her, the smile of a man who knew his purpose and had no doubts, and he stood up to his full height. Even though the house was slightly elevated above ground level, he could look at her eye to eye when he drew himself up. That was one of the things she’d always liked about him. She could wear heels and not be embarrassed to tower over him.

  Irritated with herself for thinking that way, she closed the shutter on his smiling face and twitchy hands and made her way to the front hall. She looked into the mirror that hung there. Her hair was a disheveled heap on her head, one of Hope’s borrowed headbands barely managing to stay in place. She licked her teeth and felt the coating of last night’s wine. Grimacing, she rubbed her finger over her teeth and tried to smooth her hair into place.

  “Futile,” she muttered to herself, before straightening her robe. It would have to do.

  She marched over to the kitchen door, opening it to reach into the garage. The big button glowed in the dark as if daring her to push it.

  Be cool, Mona. She might be close by. This could be your chance. She repeated the words over and over to herself until she had regained her composure. Then her finger reached out and once, deliberately, pushed in the button. The garage door groaned to life, slowly inching up.

  Don didn’t wait, but darted under the half-raised door as soon as he could.

  “I brought you doughnuts,” he said, pushing a crumpled bag toward her as he came rushing in.

  She caught it up in her hands. She could feel the heat of the doughnuts, just out of the oven, through the waxy paper. “I don’t eat doughnuts anymore,” she said, unsure what to do.

  He brushed by her, darting a glance over his shoulder as he passed. “Sure you do. Everyone eats doughnuts. It’s not like you forget how. Look. I even brought you an apple fritter, your favorite.”

  She peered into the bag and let the sugary sweetness waft toward her. Her mouth watered as she closed the door.

  “You can’t ply me with sweets, Don,” she admonished, even as she started the coffee brewing.

  He laughed. “You know they make them with non-saturated fat now, or whatever it is that is supposed to be healthy. I say who cares—a doughnut is a doughnut. I don’t need the government telling me how to eat.”

  He flopped into a chair at the kitchen table, looking for all the world like nothing unusual was going on; as if it were his home.

  Which, once upon a time, it had been.

  “Mona, we have to talk.” He’d dropped the fake cheeriness and the pliant guise he’d worn to talk his way in. His jaw was set with a determination she remembered from long ago.

  She turned her back and started the coffee grinder, trying to ignore the heat that coursed through her body. How could he be here? Here, in her kitchen, with her making him coffee? She should be screaming bloody murder at him. She pulled the fuzzy robe closer about her body, wishing she could just disappear into the ground.

  Instead, she poured the water from the carafe into the coffee machine, occupying her mind by watching the water level rise. Eight cups. She pushed th
e start button. The light flickered to red. Finally, she turned to face him, squaring her shoulders.

  “Did you bring Hope, Don?”

  “You know I don’t have her, Mona. That’s why I came to talk to you.” He leaned in conspiratorially. “People are watching me, Mona. I saw them. Yesterday.” He drew a heavy arm across his face, as if he was trying to wipe away the memory.

  She groaned, not even bothering to try to hide her reaction.

  “What are you talking about this time?”

  “I was at work. You know, at the Taco Bell? And I saw the cars. They stood out, you know? Not the typical teenager type of car. Lincoln Town Cars,” he said, pausing dramatically between each word to underscore the significance of this detail. “The only people who have those are limo drivers and government types. And these didn’t have any hack licenses.” He lifted his eyebrows, expecting her to realize the gravity of the situation.

  “Go on,” she said, crossing her arms and sending him her best frown to show she was not amused.

  With a sense of urgency, he continued, his hands gesturing wildly. “They were in with my manager,” he whispered. “I waited until they came out. I saw the whole thing.”

  Her mind zoomed out for a moment. She imagined Agent Hale sending a team out to collect the time-clock records and videotape. She imagined they would question whoever was in charge. She groaned.

  “What did you do then?” she asked, afraid of what Don might answer.

  “I did what I had to do,” he said, pounding his fist firmly on the worn kitchen table. “I took off. Too many coincidences. Not good. Not safe. Especially while Hope is missing. I need to be mobile if we are going to find her. I had to get out of there.”

  Mona began to pace, absentmindedly gnawing on a knuckle.

  Don, an apparent fugitive, was sitting at her kitchen table. She darted a glance over at him and found him happily chewing away on a cruller.

  “Hey, is that coffee ready yet?” he called out. Apparently even a paranoid needed his morning caffeine.

  She went to the cupboard and silently pulled out a cup. “Mother of the Year,” the cup proclaimed. How ironic, she thought. She filled the cup almost to the top and then dashed in a tiny bit of cream to cut the bitterness.