The Descendants

by K. K. Allen

  I desperately want to hear him speak—to give me any explanation for his time away, for not calling. He owes me so much. But what if he doesn’t feel the way I do? He hasn’t been the one waiting around like a fool. And here I am, closer than he deserves me to be. It’s as if we’re back to the same place we left off. Same intensity. Same unspoken questions. Same attraction. It’s buzzing in the air, screaming through the silence.

  My heart quickens as he reaches up to touch my cheek. “Kat,” his voice cracks.

  No. Don’t touch me. My anger wins out. I tear my eyes away, forcing the tears to stay back. “Don’t.” It’s less than a whisper and clearly filled with emotion, but he hears me and retreats slowly. There’s so much uncertainty between us, and it angers me. We had something special, and it was growing every moment we spent together. He can’t just show up here after all this time and do these things to my heart.

  We stand together, pain evident on his face, the same pain I feel in my core. And through my frustration, I’m thankful for these hidden moments I get with him, but it doesn’t make me feel any less guilty for them.

  The sound of the door opening startles us. We take a step away from each other. “Thanks for covering, you two. I’ll be back in a couple hours.” Roy grins and slips back out the door.

  Johnny and I exchange a look, knowing Roy’s true intentions. Of course. We were set up.

  It’s a long and tortuous night, and Roy doesn’t come back at all. Johnny and I work different ends of the restaurant, and it’s so busy that there are few instances of us bumping into each other. Not that any sort of contact would go over well with Alec, whose eyes stay glued to us the entire night.

  The restaurant traffic thins out, and all other servers go home, but I offer to stay until close. If Johnny and I are forced to close together then maybe we can finally talk.

  It soon becomes clear that’s not going to happen. Alec insists on taking me home, and I can’t exactly tell him to leave without me; that would be too obvious.

  As soon as the last customer leaves, Johnny starts counting down the registers. “Just go. I’ve got this,” Johnny waves us off quickly, avoiding my eyes. His expression doesn’t give me much away except maybe a tinge of anger. Is he jealous? By now he knows I’m with Alec.

  “Okay then. If you’re sure.” I spot Alec, who is already heading to the door.

  With one final look back at Johnny, who’s too occupied flipping through cash to watch me leave, I turn and exit the Island Grille.

  Our walk feels longer than normal … and it’s silent. Alec and I are never silent. I sneak a glance at him beneath my eyelashes and frown. He’s deep in thought, brows turned down. I haven’t seen Alec so unhappy since I avoided that ride from his basketball game.

  “Are you okay?” I dare ask because I care about him. The last thing I want is for Alec to be sad.

  He looks at me surprised, anger melting away, and he shrugs. “I’m okay. Just a lot on my mind.”

  I swallow my tension, hoping it will dissolve, but it just intensifies. “It’s been a rough week. Brent will get better. He has to.”

  Alec nods. “I really hope so.”

  We arrive at my doorstep just as we have so many times in the past. Alec leans in to kiss me, just as he always has. I’m not prepared for what I’m feeling. Instinctively I turn my head. If I was thinking clearly, I probably would have let him kiss me out of habit, but things have changed. And we both know it.

  “I-I’m sorry, Alec. I’m just—”

  His eyes tell me no explanation is necessary. He bows his head and turns away. “So this is it, huh?” He shoves his hands in his pockets, jaw clenched.

  Oh no. I’m not ready to call it quits. I know my feelings aren’t fair to him, but I need time to sort them out. He can’t be ready to give up on us, just like that, like our relationship means nothing at all.

  “Just give me some time, Alec. Our world has been rocked in a big way. You want normal, and I just want to stop feeling like our lives are constantly threatened. I don’t want to go to Island Grille and socialize like there isn’t someone out there killing our friends and sucking the life from every body he steals.”

  Alec shakes his head. “Don’t do that, Kat. Please don’t stand here and start blaming what’s going on right now on Erebus. Tonight has everything to do with Johnny coming back, and you know it. Don’t avoid what’s really going on. That’s not fair to me.”

  He’s right.

  I watch Alec run a hand through his hair in deliberation. “The fact that he’s been gone for a year and a half while I’ve been here … this entire time …” Alec’s voice cracks, and I feel the emotions welling up behind my eyes. “It’s not enough for you. Nothing I do is enough for you, is it?” He’s angry, and although it was a question, I understand it’s a rhetorical one. “A year and a half, wasted on loving someone who can never love me back.”

  I’ve never been punched in the gut, but I’m certain this is what it would feel like. The blow sends tears flowing down my cheeks. “You think you’re incapable of breaking my heart too? Just because you stayed, and he left? Is that really how you feel?”

  Alec’s face hardens and he takes the first step to leave. “I’m not the bad guy here.”

  “You’re no victim either,” I accuse.

  His face immediately softens, but he makes no move to apologize. With one last look of defeat, he practically runs down the steps, leaving me to my misery.

  My shower helps me physically, but not emotionally. I dry my hair and dress in shorts and a tank top before escaping to the comfort of my bedroom. Except when I enter my bedroom, Alec is leaning with his elbows on my balcony rails, facing the bay. He’s left the French doors open so I can see him.

  I toss on a long robe to cover myself and join him on the balcony as he continues to stare deep into the moonlit horizon.

  “I didn’t mean what I said.” His voice is soft, apologetic … sad.

  I sigh. “I know.”

  “I don’t know what’s wrong with me. Ever since Johnny reappeared, I’ve felt as if our relationship has this expiration date I’ve been too blind to see before now. Or maybe I just didn’t want to see it.” He shakes his head before burying it into his forearms. “I don’t want to lose you again.” His last words are muffled, but I hear them clearly.

  “You won’t lose me,” I plead. I rub his back reassuringly. “You’ll never lose me, Alec.”

  When he doesn’t look up, I force his eyes to mine by tugging at his chin. He regards me intensely, deep wrinkles set in his forehead, as if trying to find something he’s lost. He’s not convinced, or maybe my words aren’t the ones he wants to hear.

  “All I’ve ever wanted was to love you, Kat. Since the moment I met you. I don’t even know how it’s possible, but when I saw you on the beach, I knew I would fall in love with you.”

  This conversation is painful. There was a time I felt the same exact way. It’s impossible to keep the heartbreak from my voice. “When you met me, I was so broken. It doesn’t surprise me that you wanted to love me. I had just lost my mom; I had never met my father; I’d never even had a real friend until you came along. You were my first real crush, my first kiss. I might have even started loving you back then too. But this life we belong to, it forces us to grow up and change so quickly. Quicker than we’re ready for, I think. So much has changed since I moved here …”

  He nods. “I realized that tonight. We never even had a chance,” he says sadly.

  He’s right. Our time was stolen by the Equinox. We never got to follow through on our feelings, and we’ll never know where things could have gone if Ava and Iris hadn’t gotten to him, and if Johnny hadn’t come along.

  “I didn’t plan for any of this.” My voice feels weak against the wind. “I know we’re meant to be in each other’s lives, I’m just not sure in what way.”

  He turns to me and surprises me by taking my face in his hands. “And that’s where you lose me. He left you.
I’ve been here the entire time. I stood by you while I thought your heart was mending. I never pushed you. When you came to me that night—I thought that was the moment you’d finally let him go. I even asked myself what would happen if he did come back. What actually happened was far different than what I prepared for. I was just fooling myself. For that, I blame myself.”

  I drop my eyes guiltily. “You’re right. But I promise you, I thought I was moving on too. I was tired of crying, tired of feeling things and hoping for things I couldn’t control …” I groan. “That night I came to you was the night I promised myself I would try. I wanted to be with you. I thought if I just had you and moved on, my heart would follow.”

  Alec closes his eyes. “I know you so well. You’d torture yourself and stay with me just to avoid hurting me. But there’s no way I can be in this relationship anymore. Not knowing what I know. No matter what happens with you two.”

  “I just need some time—”

  “Take all the time in the world,” he says, “but I can’t wait anymore. I’m sorry.”

  Even the force of my lids pressed together doesn’t dam the tears from escaping.

  With a final, heart wrenching kiss, Alec is gone—and I’m alone.

  Chapter Eight

  It’s unfortunate how crying yourself to sleep can make you feel as though you’ve had no sleep at all. When I wake up in the morning, my eyes are dry and my entire body feels like it’s weighed down by bricks. Magic may fix my physical ailments, but it doesn’t fix the way I feel about breaking up with Alec.

  “Kat!” The banging on my door gets louder. “Wake up. It’s Christmas! And it’s almost ten o’clock.” Charlotte bursts in and pulls the covers from me, then places her hands on her hip while she examines me from above.

  “Hey!” I protest.

  “We’ve been waiting on you for hours. Are you okay?” she asks with obvious concern.

  I shake my head and reach for my covers, pulling them back over me. “Alec broke up with me last night.”

  “Oh, Kat. I’m sorry.” She sits at the edge of my bed. “Because of Johnny?”

  I nod. “He doesn’t even want to give me time to figure it out.”

  “Figure what out?” She asks carefully. “You aren’t exactly hiding your feelings for that Poseidon god.” And even in my gloom, the way she says Poseidon god makes me want to burst into laughter. “I’m sure that would make a guy like Alec feel pretty insecure about your relationship.”

  Groaning, I press my eyelids together. “I can’t help anything I do or feel around Johnny. He renders me completely senseless.”

  Charlotte chuckles lightly. “Sounds like you’ve been reading too many romance novels. But if it makes you feel any better, I think you do the same thing to him.”

  I frown as I sit up, tossing my hair into a bun. “I’ve never read a romance novel. Besides, we worked together last night. It was like nothing and everything had changed. The feelings are there, but he hasn’t even apologized, Charlotte.”

  She nods and brushes a loose lock of hair across my forehead. “He was looking for you the other day after he met with Rose and your father. I didn’t know how to tell him you took off with Alec. He was quite disappointed when you weren’t waiting for him.”

  My chest expands, finally hearing words to lift my spirits, but they’re subdued quickly with my next thought. “That was the day I found out Brett was still at the hospital. He’s not waking up, Charlotte.”

  She nods and shuffles her feet. “He’s not doing well. Rose and I have been to see him and ran into his parents. His parents have no clue what to do. They’re devastated.”

  I gasp, wondering why the question didn’t pop into my head sooner. “Have his parents seen the Equinox marking?”

  Charlotte shakes her head. “Normals can’t see energy the way we do. Our energy is like air to them. Solstice Followers, on the other hand, are able to spot it.”

  “There’s got to be something we can do for him.” I frown. “You saw the marking?”

  She nods.

  “Why does Erebus want to hurt innocent people? Brent has nothing to do with any of this.” It’s the same thing I asked Dr. Floros, but it just doesn’t make sense.

  “We’ll figure something out, Kat. We’ve got Enchanters at the lab working on it.”

  “The lab?” I’ve never heard a reference to a lab before. “What kind of lab?”

  Charlotte hesitates. “The Solstice lab. It’s located in the energy plant, but don’t bring it up to Rose. She’d kill me if she knew I even mentioned it to you.”

  “There’s a Solstice lab at the energy plant? What goes on there?”

  She sighs, realizing she’s said too much. “They study things to do with our magic.” She waves her hands, signaling she’s done answering questions on the subject. “C’mon, get out of bed. Your dad is taking you somewhere today to help take your mind off things. I came up here to get you and to tell you to pack an overnight bag.”

  “He’s taking me somewhere?” My eyes light up. “And you aren’t going to tell me where he’s taking me, I’m sure.” I smile at her, and she laughs.

  Charlotte pats my leg playfully. “Not for me to tell. Get up. Now.”

  I do as Charlotte says, happy to have a distraction today.

  “Hey, baby girl,” my father says before wrapping his arms around me in an embrace. I love when he calls me that. It’s like he’s making up for lost time. “Merry Christmas.”

  I sink into his arms, ready to cry from the volcano of emotions inside me bubbling close to its peak. There’s healing in a father’s embrace. It’s as if he’s the only man that matters in this moment. It’s good to have him here. “Merry Christmas, Dad.”

  “What do you say we head out of town for a day? I want to take you somewhere.” His voice is soft and speckled with doubt. What is he afraid of?

  I look at the brightly lit tree in the corner of the room near and frown. “Sorry I ruined Christmas.”

  “Nonsense,” Rose chimes in. “We’ll open presents when you get back.” She smiles and grabs hold of Charlotte’s arm. Rose may be stubborn, controlling, and cold at times, but she’s also genuinely ecstatic that Paul and I have a relationship now.

  Without pause, I muster up a smile. “I’d say it’s the perfect time for a getaway then. Where are we going?”

  He grabs my bag from my shoulders and walks toward the door. “I’ll tell you in an hour.”

  An hour crawls by before I make any attempt to ask where we’re going. The truth is, my dad offered me the perfect getaway for my problems. No Erebus, no boy drama, and best of all, I get to spend time alone with my father.

  “Okay,” I give him my best eager look, but a smile peeks through. “Tell me where we’re going.”

  He glances over at me, and the tranquil atmosphere shifts to something layered with confusion and bundled with curiosity. “I will, but promise me you won’t be mad.”

  I fold my arms and narrow my eyes. “I will not promise that, but I take it you aren’t surprising me with a Disney cruise,” I say.

  His expression grows distant. “I could do that. Would you like that?”

  With a shake of my head, I let out a laugh. “I was just kidding. You don’t need to take me on a cruise to spend time with me. But please spill; you’re reminding me of Rose with your secrets.”

  He makes a face. “Okay, okay. I’m just worried … I got a letter from your mom’s attorney the other day, letting me know your storage facility requires a lease extension. So, I either need to renew it or get rid of it. I thought you might want to help me make that decision.”

  Oh. A bundle of emotions ignites at the mention of my mom’s storage locker. I’ve never even seen it. After her death, I allowed the moving company to box up everything we owned and take it there. They mailed me a key that I keep in my dresser drawers, but I wasn’t planning to go back there anytime soon.

  “Why did they contact you?”

  Paul taps the w
heel rhythmically. “Because she was my wife.”

  A coldness seeps in around my ribs as I stare at his face—uncertain and afraid. “She was—but you two divorced. Were you in her will or something?”

  He shakes his head. “No. Kat, there’s something I haven’t told you because it never really mattered—or I never thought it mattered. But maybe it does. I don’t know.” He shakes his head.

  I gasp. “You two were still married? The entire time you were apart?”

  He nods, then breathes out a whoosh of relief. “Wow, that was a lot easier than I thought.”

  Rolling my eyes, I face front and curl my legs up in a ball beneath me. Leaning against the window, I think of what this means. Maybe he’s right and it doesn’t really mean anything—or maybe it means everything. Paul must have still loved her if he remained married to her for all those years.

  “We meant to—” he clears his throat, “divorce, that is. But it was difficult to communicate with Grace once you both moved. I didn’t push it.”

  “But why?” I ask sadly. “Didn’t you want to move on with your life?”

  He shakes his head. “No, Kat. That’s exactly it. I never wanted anything more than I wanted my family. I don’t want to tell you this, and I’ve avoided it because I don’t hold any grudges against your mother, and I don’t want you to either. But if you have to know the truth, I think we could have lived with our divide. I would have tried. I would have succeeded. Your mother … it was harder for her.”

  This week has been such an emotional one that I’m not surprised when his words bring tears to my eyes and swelling to my throat. “For sixteen years I was certain you didn’t care, that you chose another life. I even accepted it.”

  “Katrina,” he says gently, “I’m sorry it took me so long to tell you this.”

  “You didn’t have to.” I look at him. His eyes are focused on the road, but he’s listening. “Since the moment you showed up in my life again, I knew. We can’t make up for lost time, but we can enjoy the time we have together now. And I have been. I love having you around.”