Southern Charmed (Hell's Belles Trilogy Book 2)

by Alison Claire

  “Thank you,” Virginia said. “So what we’re led to believe is that Ezekiel somehow found poor Huata and brought her three centuries into the future to negate your powers, to make you an easy target for Zillah?”

  “It seems so,” Aleta said. “She was scared to death. The reptiles weren’t affected by her power, and Zillah had her stashed with them. Can you imagine?”

  I shuddered at the thought.

  “Now that we’ve solved at least part of that mystery, we have another,” Virginia declared. “Emma, how exactly do you think Zillah found you?”

  Josephine returned carrying a tray with a pitcher of lemonade and glasses on a large silver serving tray.

  “I don’t know. Dr. Ibis told me that as long as I had my rock, I’d be invisible to her.”

  “That’s true. And had you left the house on your own, you’d have at least had that protection. But what about Briar?”

  Up until Martha Lou’s, I was still leaning toward returning to my old life; my own apartment and job and friends. After witnessing miniature Godzillas threatening to eat a friend of mine, and after unquestionably playing a part in killing Zillah, I knew the threats to my life were real.

  “It was all my idea, Virginia,” I offered. “I didn’t realize the danger.”

  Virginia’s bottom lip quivered. “Dr. Ibis, for all intents and purposes, died today. If I understand correctly, Emma brought him back from the brink. He’s one of my oldest and dearest friends. Girls, make no mistake, we are at war. They’ve come for Emma twice now, and with Briar’s arrival things will only get worse. Losing Zillah will damage Ezekiel, but if he’s capable of bringing a weapon here from three hundred years ago, and risking a dead shaman’s wrath in the process, there’s no telling what else he’s capable of.”

  Chapter 19

  The next morning, I woke up incredibly early; so early that I couldn’t definitively say if it was morning or still night time. Either way, I wasn’t going back to sleep. I was surprised I’d slept at all after all that had happened.

  I blinked my eyes a few times, attempting to adjust to what was still a dark room. My sister slept in the bed next to me.

  My sister.

  It was still something I was getting used to. It turned out, I wasn’t alone in the universe. She’d been out there all along. My twin. We’d been born in many lives together and through them all we would be separated and still always found each other, despite the odds and obstacles.

  I just wish I could remember them all.

  There was still so much to say to her— to learn from her, so I could learn about myself. Now that Zillah was gone, maybe it would be easier to finally solve the great mysteries of my life. We’d worked as a team together to defeat the evil that had taken our parents away from us.

  But there was still more evil to defeat.

  Ezekiel was out there, after all.

  I wasn’t the only one who couldn’t sleep.

  I padded downstairs to the kitchen and was greeted by Aleta Indigo.

  She was pouring coffee into a mug, her back to me. Even without looking, she said, “Hello, Briar.”

  “Hey,” I said. “Mind if I have some?”

  Aleta turned to me, her amber eyes shining— they were such kind eyes. She was so beautiful, as beautiful as Calista really. Her long braids were tied behind her slender neck. Even without a lick of makeup on, she glowed.

  “Of course,” she said, handing me the mug she’d just filled. “Cream, no sugar, right?”

  I nodded. Of course she would know.

  Aleta was the Belle I knew the least. But she was also the one Emma seemed to trust the most and I took comfort in knowing she’d saved my sister and protected her from the people who wished us harm.

  We sat there in silence for a bit.

  “Why are you up so early?” I finally asked her, placing my mug down on the marble counter in front of me.

  “I could feel your restlessness,” she said, giving me an empathetic smile. “So, I figured I’d keep you company. Maybe talk to you about it.”

  I was still unsure about Aleta’s abilities and what they meant. Virginia had been able to read my thoughts, but Aleta was clearly gifted in a deeper way.

  “I’m an empath as well as a telepath,” Aleta said, clearly inside my head, listening to my contemplations. “But I don’t intrude unless invited. Your thoughts were calling out to me. You’re restless and unsatisfied. Angry. Resentful. It’s why Ezekiel’s offer was so tempting for you.”

  I was embarrassed that she knew what I had almost done. I had almost joined the army of a monster. I’d been so easy to manipulate.

  “It’s not your fault, Briar,” Aleta said. “Ezekiel is a charmer and a master manipulator. He’s able to see and feel what makes you tick and use that against you. The fact that you were able to resist him at all shows how strong you really are.” Her voice grew serious. “You are the strongest of all of us in many ways.”

  I shrugged. I didn’t know what to say to that.

  “Calista is the one who seems to be the strongest,” I replied.

  “We’d never have defeated Zillah without your strength,” Aleta continued. “But you must be careful with it, Briar. It’s a wild sort of power that you have, and your emotions are what control it. Your mind is the muscle that moves it. Always remember that.”

  “I’ll try,” I whispered. The truth was, my power scared the shit out of me. It only seemed to work when I was in a rage and very angry. And it only seemed helpful when everything was on the line. And although Zillah had deserved what happened to her, it still bothered me to know that I’d killed someone. Even knowing what she’d done to Emma— I did not take pride in ending a life.

  “What keeps you up, Briar?” asked Aleta. “You’ve never been one who sleeps soundly. Even as a baby, you woke constantly.”

  “Yeah?” I asked. “How do you know that?”

  “Well, don’t forget, you were with us until you were two,” Aleta said. “We took turns with you at night. You would wake up screaming and reaching out for your mother. You were resistant to any action we tried to take to clear your memory of her and soothe your anxiety. It took a long time. A daughter does not let go of her mother so easily.”

  A lump formed in my throat.

  “I’m sure it was easier for her to forget me,” I said, knowing I sounded bitter.

  “Not so,” Aleta replied. “Your mother was in a very long and deep depression the first year of Emma’s life. She thought it was post-partum depression, but it was truly her spirit missing you.” Aleta looked at me. “I can clear the mind of memory. But I cannot clear the heart.”

  Tears sprung to my eyes. “I want to believe that’s true.”

  “It is true,” Aleta said, walking around the marble kitchen island to me. “You have to know that. If there’d been any other way to keep you with her… we would have done it. But every timeline I could see where you stayed ended in tragedy. They would have found you much sooner.”

  “What do you mean?” I asked. “Every timeline you could see?”

  Aleta nodded. “I can see every future a person has. There’s more than one, after all. Our free will means everything happens to us, just on a different timeline. Every possible decision and outcome exists on a different plane. I can look at all of them. It’s how we came to move you from your family and bring you back here. It’s how I know it was the only way to protect you.”

  My mind was blown.

  “So you can see a world where I stayed with my mother?” I asked. “And with Emma? Where I didn’t grow up in a group home?”

  Aleta didn’t say anything. Instead she touched my head, very gently.

  “I can. Do you want to see? Will it bring you comfort to know your mother loved you more than she loved even herself?” Aleta asked.

  “You can do that?” My voice was shaking. “I would… I would give anything to see that.”

  Aleta nodded. “I knew this day would come. I don’t normally
do this for anyone because it can sometimes lead to a deep despondency knowing what could have been. But I feel that you need this. And if that’s the case, of course I will give you that peace.”

  She beckoned me to follow her to the living room that was off the kitchen.

  “Lay on this couch,” she said, pointing to a chaise. “Close your eyes, and listen to my voice.”

  I laid down and Aleta knelt next to me.

  “I’m going to put the heel of my hand on your head,” Aleta instructed. “There will be pressure. You will feel as if you’re falling.”

  I nodded. I was beyond terrified, but also desperate for the gift she was giving me.

  “Close your eyes,” she said. “I will be chanting, but eventually you will not hear it anymore. You will be viewing your life like a movie. You will see yourself with her. With your father. With your grandmother. You will see exactly how much you were loved, Briar.”

  “Okay,” I said. “I’m ready.”

  I closed my eyes and felt the coolness of her palm on my head. My heart was pounding. I could hear and feel the blood pumping through me. I was very aware of my body. Then I heard her voice.

  “Father time, take my soul,

  Cross the water to the past—

  Where my spirit has ascended,

  So mote it be, let it last.

  For I need to see what was—

  What is, what might have been,

  Father time, I pray no further

  Let her past let me in.”

  Over and over I heard her say this chant, until she started to sound farther and farther away.

  And just as she’d said— I felt like I was falling. Slowly, and then faster. I wanted to open my eyes, but I was desperate for this to work. Soon I could barely hear Aleta’s voice and a flash of light pierced me, my eyes now flying open.

  But I wasn’t in the living room anymore.

  Chapter 20

  She was beautiful.

  My mother was in front of me, just like Aleta had said she’d be. She was sitting in a glider in what looked like a nursery. There were two cribs beside her. I could hear what sounded like ocean waves, but soon realized that the sound was coming from one of those white noise machines. It was sitting on a side table next to her.

  She was humming to the bundle she held in her arms.

  She whispered to it.

  “My sweet little baby,” she said. “Your sister is asleep and now you’re falling asleep. Thanks for giving mommy a break today. I’m so tired.”

  I moved closer to see who she was talking to. I could see a baby sleeping in one of the cribs. The smell of talcum powder filled the room.

  “Oh my little Briar patch,” she smiled kissing the baby’s forehead.

  It was me. I was watching my mother hold me as a baby.

  “As hard as twins can be, the joy is so much bigger than the sleep deprivation,” she whispered. “I love you more than anything in the world. Forever.”

  Tears rolled down my cheeks.

  “Even more than me?” A voice said. I turned to see who it was.

  My father.

  He was handsome. Tall. He had dark hair and a square jaw. He looked at my mother like she was an angel.

  “I could never love anything as much as I love you,” she softly laughed. “But it’s pretty close. They’re just so sweet. Can you believe we got so lucky?”

  “Someone wants to see their mommy,” he said and he stepped to the side. A little girl toddled into the room.

  Merritt.

  “Hello, my sweetie pie!” my mother half whispered. “Did you have a good nap?”

  The little girl giggled and clapped her hands.

  “To answer your question,” my father said, grinning. “You feel lucky now. But let me know how lucky you feel at 3 AM tonight when both babies are awake and hungry and Merritt has crawled into our bed with us.”

  My mother sighed. “True. But for now, I’m just enjoying the moment. They’re both in milk comas. All is right with the world.”

  My father walked over and kissed little me sweetly on the head.

  “Can I hold Briar?” he asked.

  “Of course,” my mother said. “I need to pee anyway.”

  “You say that a lot,” my father teased.

  “I know. It made sense when I was pregnant. I guess you have kids and your bladder goes to hell,” my mother laughed.

  I watched her leave, Merritt toddling behind her.

  It was quiet in the room now. I watched my father rock infant me gently in the glider.

  “I love you, Briar,” he said. “You and your sisters are going to run this world one day. I can’t wait to see who you become.”

  The light flashed again and I was in a different timeline.

  I knew this because I was staring at my twelve-year-old self.

  “Why can’t I buy both?” I whined. I was in a store with my mom, Emma, and Merritt who was thumbing through a magazine.

  “Because we’re on something called a budget,” my mother said to me. “Besides, why do they have to be a certain brand? Jeans are jeans.”

  “Yeah, but people we go to school with care,” I said.

  Emma chimed in. “She’s right. Whether we like it or not, brands matter.”

  Mom sighed. “Why on earth would you want to be friends with anyone who cares about what brand jeans you wear?”

  I rolled my eyes. I couldn’t believe my 12-year-old self was so shallow. But I had to remind myself, this was a different timeline. This Briar didn’t have the same problems I’d had.

  “Mo-oooom,” my 12-year-old self whined. “It just makes life easier when you do your best to fit in.”

  Merritt looked up, “Oh boy. You’ve done it now. She’s going to give you the speech.”

  Sure enough, my mother was standing before me and my twin, ready to lecture.

  “I’m not raising girls who obsess about such mundane things as clothes,” she started. “I’m raising girls who will become women who change the world around them through their ideas and their passions. One day you will understand why these things, in the long run, don’t matter. However, I do recognize that you’re preteens and you have the introspective ability of a rock. So I will buy you each a pair of said jeans, and you can share them. But try your best not to become vapid people. The world has enough of those. Of both sexes.”

  “Deal,” Emma and I said in unison and all four of us laughed.

  Another flash of light. I was now looking at my teenage self. I was in what looked like a prom dress and I was sitting on the front steps of a house, crying. My mother was rubbing my back.

  “I know heartbreak is the worst kind of pain,” she said, clearly comforting me. “But believe it or not, you’ll see this as a gift later.”

  Teenage me looked at my mother like she was insane. “How can getting stood up for your junior prom be a gift? I feel like a fool. I can never show my face at school again. And of course perfect Emma’s date didn’t stand her up. And of course even more perfect Merritt has a boyfriend who worships her like some sort of pagan goddess. I’m the defective Ayers.”

  I continued to cry and my mother continued to rub my back. I could see her thinking. She wanted to say the right thing.

  Because she really did love me.

  “The worst things that happen to us,” she said. “Are almost always what we look back on later as the best thing that could have happened. The good things in life aren’t the only things that propel us toward our destinies.

  Sometimes we have to go through pain to get to the other side of something. And in this case, you don’t have to waste time on Matt Reedly anymore. He’s shown you he’s a coward and an asshole. He would have eventually broken your heart either way, because that’s what asshole teenage boys tend to do best. So you get to move on sooner and waste less of your precious life on someone who isn’t even close to being worthy enough for you.”

  My teenage-self laughed. “I love when you call people ass
holes.”

  “Sadly, they’re abundant. Especially in California,” my mom replied. “Did I ever tell you about my first date with your father?”

  I shook my head. “I don’t think so.”

  “We were broke grad students,” my mother started. “Neither of us had two nickels to rub together most of the time, but he’d somehow saved enough money to take me to the movies. We were going to see Toy Story. It was a very big deal at the time, believe it or not. He’d let me choose and that’s what I’d asked to see. He picked me up and he was so cute. Your father usually wore basketball shorts and hoodies, but that night he’d worn a pair of Dockers and a button down shirt. I’ll never forget how handsome he looked.

  “Anyway, we were in line to buy tickets. There was a mother in front of us with two little boys. You could tell she was worn out and had probably just gotten off work. She was still wearing her scrubs; I’m assuming she was a nurse. Anyway, when it came time to pay for their tickets, her credit card was declined. She asked the ticket person to run it again, but it was still declined. She had these two little boys tugging at her sleeves and I could tell she was very upset. They were clearly looking forward to the movie and she was going to have to let them down.

  “They stepped out of the way and I felt so bad for them. I wished I could do something. Your father went up to the counter and instead of asking for two tickets, he asked for three. And then he ran after them as they walked through the parking lot back to their car. He said ‘You dropped these back there.’ The mom looked at him so confused, but then when she realized what he was doing, she smiled. ‘Are you sure?’ she asked. Your father said ‘Of course. They’re your tickets.’ We ended up going back to his house and just eating ramen that night since he’d spent the last of his money getting those tickets for those sweet little boys. It was the best date of my life. I knew I would marry him after that. Even after just that one date.

  “One day, you’ll have someone like that come into your life, Briar. And suddenly you’ll be so grateful for the Matt Reedlys who it never worked out with. You’ll be grateful you didn’t end up with someone mediocre. You’ll be so thankful to the past you for not settling. If there is anything you ever get from me as far as advice goes, it’s this: know your worth, my love. Know how very special you are. Always remember that I love you more than anything. You are my destiny. And I’m so glad I didn’t settle, so that I might find you.”