You Are Here

by S. M. Lumetta

Nash and Drew began shouting at each other—I heard the word “ambulance.” I gingerly pushed Lucie away to see her face. My fingers curled into a weak fist around her arm as I fought to get a real breath. Every intake was shorter than the last and even more quick and jagged. Lucie’s face twisted with panic.

  When the world began to pinch and blur, all the things I wanted to say, to thank her for, rushed to the tip of my tongue. But I couldn’t breathe.

  And then I stopped.

  Chapter Forty-Seven

  Lucie

  Payback

  No.

  It was the only word I could utter or think. Someone pulled me off Grey’s body. I knew why, though I fought them anyway. Drew dropped next to him and began to work on him again, trying to get him breathing. Someone else wrapped arms around me—I think it was Nash, who started wheezing, then shouting again. Something about where we were meeting the ambulance.

  Without serious thought, I broke away and ran. I didn’t know where I was going, but my body seemed to.

  It wasn’t the voice in my head, it was me. Just me. And I didn’t catch up until the click of a gun behind me became the only sound in the world. When I turned, I saw Reese looking pretty worse for wear. Scars from the fire decorated his neck and his ear looked disgusting, but there was a tremendous amount of blood covering his shirt.

  “So glad you came to find me, little Mila,” he replied, condescendingly. He shuffled forward with a slight limp, and his skin looked almost gray. He must’ve lost a lot of blood. Good. “I hate leaving loose ends, you know.”

  “You’re not going to give me a speech to anesthetize me first, are you? Maybe you could spare me the grandstanding this time.” My voice sounded bored and that seemed to confuse him. Honestly, it threw me, too. I felt like someone else had taken over.

  Reese’s entire arm shook as he raised the gun and aimed at me, his finger stuck on the trigger. He was trying to fire, but the gun must have jammed. Something kicked in and I leapt at him. An elbow to the windpipe and a knee to the groin put him on the ground and knocked the gun free. I wouldn’t have been surprised if shock put him there more than the physical attack, though he did seem weak. Another layer of memory peeled away to reveal a vague recollection of beginning a sort of defense training with Roman and Jude when I was quite young.

  A leather-bound handle stuck out of his belt, so I grabbed it and kneeled into his chest. Holding the blade against a very specific rib, I leaned in close. When the sharp tip tore his shirt, it nicked the skin, and he jumped ever so slightly.

  I almost smiled as I repeated his last words to my guardians. “After all you’ve done, it comes to this?” It took a moment, but his eyes dilated in recollection. I took a deep, cleansing breath. “And still, you lose.”

  The knife drove deep into his chest under my hand, releasing his damned soul to hell and my rage with a primal scream. For all my losses. For having to keep losing over and over again. The marrow in my bones rattled as though I were the one dying. I stepped away from the body, turned away, and fell to my hands and knees.

  Within the hollow bubble of my distress, I registered footsteps running through the gravel. Then arms scooped me up and lifted me. I didn’t actually care who it was at that point.

  “Milishka, I’ve got you.”

  Despite two decades between us, I knew him immediately. I opened my eyes and drank in my father’s face. My confusion waxed and waned as I followed the lines and wrinkles, the curve of his cheekbones, the wide shoots of steel gray in his hair, and combined all of these features with his eyes. My eyes.

  “I’m sorry I am so, so late, my girl,” he said, his voice tight with urgency. “We must go now. Your Grey needs hospital.”

  “He’s alive?”

  He set me down and looked hatefully at Reese’s body behind me. “Go. Quickly. I am right behind you. I promise.”

  ~

  When I got back to Grey, Nash and Vivi were gone and a shirtless Drew was hovered over him, tying makeshift bandages that Charlotte handed him around his shoulder.

  “What happened?”

  Drew’s EMT training seriously came in handy right now. “His lung collapsed. I can’t inflate it here, so I just have to keep air out of the wound, or the pressure will build up and completely block his trachea.”

  The car appeared with Nash driving as if it were an obstacle course, complete with spraying dirt and rocks when he stopped—thankfully, away from us.

  “Get him in here!” Nash yelled. “The ambulance will meet us just outside fort grounds! Three minutes!”

  “I can’t carry him and keep pressure, so Lucie, you need to hold this down,” Drew said. “Hold it down hard—he’s out, he can’t feel it.”

  I focused on my task, but I was conflicted. My father was here. Grey could still die. My father was alive. How my brain didn’t simply physically implode at that moment, I’d never understand.

  Nash had already pushed down the seats so the back was flat. Drew sat with Grey. Vivi tried to remove Nash from the driver’s seat because he still seemed a wreck, but he wouldn’t budge. Charlotte squeezed next to Vivi in the front. I stayed by Grey’s other side, holding his hand and whispering faith and hope in his ear.

  “Almost there, baby. Hang on. I love you so much.” I kissed him then, lingering as I rested my forehead on his and closed my eyes. I could still taste his blood on my lips.

  Curling my body to his side, I laid my cheek on his shoulder. He rested his head against me, and whether involuntary or not, I clung to the tiny comfort it gave me.

  The ambulance pulled up at the edge of the road at the same time we did. Before I could comprehend, Drew practically kicked open the back and ran to help bring back the gurney. The EMTs and Drew swiftly transferred Grey to the back of the truck and closed the doors before I could even try to get in. Drew held me back as I cried. The truck pulled away, kicking up dust as it sped.

  “There’s no room for you in there,” he said. It felt like a slap, but I knew he was right. I would only be in the way. “Come on, we’ll meet them at the hospital.”

  Turning back toward everyone standing dazed around the car, I looked for hope in their faces. I didn’t see much of it. I eyed the open back to see the bloodstains left there. Vivi ran over to me as Drew flipped the gate up to close it. She ushered me into the back and held me to her. The car was silent as we drove.

  I looked to the barren road behind us, hoping I would see my father following. I was worried I hallucinated the whole thing.

  “I will find you, I promise,” he had told me. “I will follow to hospital. Remember, you stopped to ask directions. You did not know Reese.”

  I had smiled at his patchy English and hugged him again, too scattered to question him before running back to Grey. After a hundred yards or so, I glanced back but he was gone. Reese’s body as well. Stopping with a jerk, I blinked several times, unsure whether it had happened at all.

  Though it was merely ten minutes away, the ride to Callum Memorial was torturously long. We pulled up by the emergency doors, where Nash let us out before going to park. Staring down at the blood on my pants and on the car interior, I wondered why I couldn’t move. I watched everyone rush through the doors except me.

  I shook off my doubts and what-ifs and slid out. Nash pulled away like a race car driver after gassing up. I turned slowly around, looking for incoming cars. Did I imagine Papa? Is he really here?

  I must have stood there immobile for too long because before I knew it, Nash’s arm wrapped around me.

  “He’s going to be fine, Red,” he said, but there was a tremor in his voice that told me he wasn’t so sure.

  Then, I thought about it. Unless I’d completely erased the memory of a fraudulent preview, I hadn’t had a mistake yet in my life. There’d been a period as a teen where I had near-constant migraines from blocking them, as well as a lengthy bed rest one summer due to fainting spells and vertigo. All because I fought against my curse, as I’d thought of it then.


  For the first time in my life, I felt my ability might actually be a gift.

  “I know,” I said, turning to look at him. “He will.”

  Nash struggled against his emotions, swallowing hard and inhaling through his nose. He nodded once before asking, “Is he going to meet us here?”

  “Is who going to meet us here?” I gave him a what-are-you-on look.

  “Your father.”

  “My father?”

  “Are you a parrot? Yes, your dad,” he said. “When you ran off, I came looking for you after I called for the ambulance. I wanted to make sure you didn’t … that, uh, you were okay. Anyway, you were crying and your dad ran up from the other side.”

  We both jumped in our spots when we heard Vivi’s voice. “How did you know he wasn’t the guy who shot Grey?”

  “She hugged him and I heard her say ‘Papa,’” Nash said, comically exasperated. “I’m not a fucking moron, Viv.”

  I kissed his cheek before Vivi could slap it, grabbed their arms so that I was in the middle, and directed us all inside. “Come on, let’s get in there.”

  “It’s going to be a while,” Vivi said. “I talked to the intake nurse. Let’s get you cleaned up, chica. You look like a cannibal with that blood on your face and hands.”

  Absentmindedly, I touched my face. “Yeah, good idea.”

  “Maybe we should go to the cafeteria,” Nash suggested. “I’m so hungry, I could eat the ass end of a dead rhino.”

  Vivi gagged. “I’m not even justifying that statement with a response.”

  Nobody quite knew what to do with themselves once we were settled in the waiting room, except to feign distraction through magazines and crossword puzzles. I could feel questions hanging over our heads, but I hadn’t the energy to deal with them. The act of waiting became too much. With an exaggerated blink, my eyes fell shut. The lids rested together and opened again—only the lapse of time in between was much longer than normal.

  When I woke, the doctor had reappeared and declared the surgery successful. He briefly ran down the list of everything they’d done, and said that Grey would be in recovery for a couple hours before we could see him. Even then, he would probably be too drugged up—and hooked up—to be lucid. They had apparently considered keeping him in a medical coma to heal, but his vitals seemed strong enough following surgery. Drew asked if he would be in the ICU, which the doctor confirmed.

  After that news, I couldn’t sit down right away, both anxious and relieved. I turned to walk back to my seat when a rush of air broke over my back.

  Papa?

  I spun and walked right into his chest, his arms and familiar scent wrapping around me. My inner five-year-old confirmed it was the same scent she would sniff while burying her face in his scarf.

  “My girl,” he murmured. “There is policeman here to speak with you all. I already told them what I know. You remember what I tell you? Keep simple.”

  For the most part, it was quick. The officer asked how it happened, and I took the lead and laid it out just as my father had said, adding in some details for authenticity. Drew jumped in to correct me that I hadn’t done anything but try to stem the bleeding when they arrived. Nash said that when they pulled up, I was just trying to wake Grey up after hitting his head. I was so relieved that they were all here with me. Emotionally drained and tired, I smiled at everyone with grateful tears in my eyes. I turned back to the kind-faced officer and nodded, rubbing my eyes to show how exhausted I was. He asked a few questions about the assailant. I described Reese, saying that he’d run off after he shot Grey. The officer thanked us, leaving us with his card.

  Since I still had a couple of hours before I could see Grey, I decided I needed to speak in greater detail with my father. “Papa?”

  He stood, holding his hand to me. “If you are ready, let us talk.”

  I narrowed my eyes at him again, offering a tattered smile and a nod. I got up to join him.

  He remained silent until we got outside and strolled into a quiet, uninhabited courtyard. When he spoke, it was very quietly and in Russian, perhaps just to feel more secure about anyone listening.

  “I have always been looking for you,” he began again. “Your mother refused to tell me where she sent you, for my own safety she said, but it’s clear now she really meant yours. If Magda sent me a message as to where you’d gone, I never received it. Within a week of returning home, she was murdered.” He paused to allow this news to settle, but I nodded and told him I had a feeling. He brightened a little when I spoke, perhaps happy to hear my Russian hadn’t disappeared as well. A shadow passed through his eyes and I realized he wasn’t just leaving space for me to absorb the information, but that he still mourned her as well. I laid my fingers atop his, but he flipped his hand palm up and closed his fingers around mine.

  “She was the love of my life. Our time together was brief, really, but it was everything to me. When she was gone, I was lost. For a long, long time.”

  I smiled, knowing exactly what he meant. He sighed deeply and continued.

  “I was very good at evading Ekaterina—your grandmother—so that’s what I did for a while … and other things I’m not proud of …” His voice trailed off and he shook his head. “There is so much you do not need to know. I left Russia for good about ten years ago. It was more than a decade of favors for people I’d never wish you to meet. In the end, it always came back to that witch somehow. She was always looking for you.

  “When I began working with a Canadian operation who happened to know—and hate—Reese, I discovered more about his work with your mother’s family. Then, we heard about the attack that killed Ursula and Ivan—your guardians, no?”

  I vaguely remembered their real names now that he mentioned them, and nodded. “They used the names Jude and Roman,” I said.

  “Yes. They never liked me,” he said with a laugh. “Especially Ivan. I think he loved Magda, too. Anyway, that’s when I hired Grey to go after Reese.” He looked at me, unsure how much I might know about him.

  “Grey is the love of my life,” I said, the statement vibrating through the entirety of my being. I sighed, stray tears running down my cheeks. “Like you, I think he’s done things he had to do to survive, but I … believe he’s a good man.”

  He smiled somewhat sadly as he wiped my tears. I leaned into him, my head resting on his shoulder as he finished his story.

  “Ekaterina thinks you are dead,” he told me, tipping my chin toward him with his roughened fingertips. “Reese was ashamed of his failure, so he lied damn convincingly. He was always a very good liar. Finishing the job was only for pride. Regardless, he is gone,” he said, squeezing my hand tightly, “and you are safe. The witch is at death’s door, herself. She may only stop looking for me once she is dead, but I have never been afraid of her, so it does not matter.”

  It all sounded like someone else’s life.

  “Why did she want me dead?”

  A low hum told me he was considering how to answer, and I began to tense. He noticed. “No, Milishka, do not be worried. It makes me angry, that is all,” he explained. “She was protecting her money. She had never been a rational or sentimental woman. Power and fortune were the most important things to her. Your mother, well, she was the anomaly in that family. I like to think she belonged to you and me alone, if only for a time.”

  I thought of my early childhood and was transported to Russia, twenty years ago when my grandmother made him leave us. The last time I saw him.

  “Milishka,” he’d said to me, “before you were born, I dreamed of you. I have to go now, my girl, but I promise I will dream of you every night until I see you again.”

  I turned and threw my arms around my father. “Papa,” I whispered, my voice full of emotion. “Ti menya vidyel vo snye?”

  I was a little girl again—vulnerable yet safe in her father’s arms. My memory had begun to fill itself in, gaps of darkness brightening with pockets of young memories I had always treasured. I was s
o young when he left, but the times I could recall gleamed, throwing light through my mind like prisms.

  “Da,” he laughed, holding me tight. “I dreamed of you every night.”

  We smiled at each other and fell into silence. The wind whooshed wildly around us, bending tree branches and scattering leaves under a dark sky. A peal of white fire broke the blackened sky in half. Thunder was—one one thousand, two one thousand, three one thousand—four seconds behind with a massive rolling percussion that echoed off the courtyard walls. The storm had arrived, and I was calmer than I’d been in days. Before the rain could fall, we shuffled inside and went back to the waiting room. I properly introduced my father to everyone and we sat.

  “Any word, Nash?” I asked, nudging him with my shoulder.

  “No!” he shouted as if I had triggered a bomb. “Deb-ruhh, the mean nurse at the desk down the hall threatened to call security if I bugged her one more time!” His voice hit a higher octave at the last three words.

  “What are you? Eight years old?” Drew shot him a look.

  “Blow me.”

  “Oh, sorry—nine.”

  When Debra finally did come to alert us, I stood, expecting the green light.

  “He’s awake. Very groggy, though, so he may be in and out for a little while, but you can go on in. One at a time, please—and please be quiet. ICU rules give you five minutes each. Except you,” she said, pointing a finger at Nash. “You get two minutes.”

  I charged ahead, stopping only when I got to the door. I was taken aback by all the tubes and wires, but given that Grey just had a serious lifesaving surgery, I tried to brush it off. He didn’t look much better than death warmed over, but the monitor’s rhythm was relatively calm, his breathing was even, and his eyes were closed. I trod lightly to his bedside and carefully clasped his hand in both of mine.

  His eyes opened at my touch. I reflexively smiled from ear to ear.

  His voice was scratchy and thin when he spoke, but to me, it was the most beautiful sound. “You must be an angel.”