“Okay. Okay! We need to make it quick. Take my hand and just trust me, okay?”
Gingerly, she clasped his hand and their fingers linked as if on auto-pilot. Kate hissed a noise out at the sparks that were flying between them. She could feel the pull through his vibrating fingers and it rivaled her own.
“Hurry, Jake.”
“Close your eyes.”
‘What? Why?” She let out a snicker. “It’s not as if these eyes are real, Jake.”
“Just do it!” The frustration in his voice was evident. “You still have your human form and I can still see your eyes, so just humor me, Kate.”
“All right, already! Jeez, keep your shirt on!” Kate looked at Jake to see his serious face, eyebrows slashed, mouth pressed tight before closing her eyes and letting him take her to her father.
In the blink of an eye they were standing near a short wall, facing away from the tower.
Jake leaned in to Kate so that he was almost touching her and whispered in her ear, “Are you okay, baby?”
Kate fought the urge to lean her face into his soft mouth. She couldn’t manage anything more than, “Mmm.”
Trying to stifle the excited buzz soaring through her, partly from Jake standing too close and partly because she was about to see her father for the first time in three years, she slowly focused on her surroundings.
Kate’s eyes were wide like saucers. They were standing near the edge of a very high point near the ocean. Only a second ago they had been on the other side of town.
“Jake! What the hell just happened? How were you able to zap us over here?” She was the only one that could teleport and it was because she didn’t inhabit her body.
“I’ll explain everything soon, I promise. There’s so much I need to discuss with you but you insisted on seeing your father.” Jake spun Kate around to face Robert. That was the end of the discussion for now.
A delighted cry escaped her as she spotted her dad straight away. She shone the most dazzling smile at Jake and then dashed over to her father, calling out to him over and over, lost to his presence.
“Dad! Dad! It’s me, Kate. Oh my God! I can’t believe you’re here!”
She sprinted at full pelt’ not stopping in time, coursing right through him, almost losing her balance on the other side as her father’s energy jerked her body as it passed through.
Robert appeared to have felt something too as he spun around, touching his body, looking at the Gladiator’ stunned. “What the fuck was that?”
“What, sir?”
“That power surge. Didn’t you feel it just then?”
“No, sir.”
Robert stared vacantly at The Gladiator while Kate regained her composure and glared at her father, remembering why he was ignoring her.
“Daddy?”
Jake was beside her instantly. “He can’t see you, remember?”
The horror of the situation was finally starting to sink in as she whispered quietly as if she hadn’t heard Jake speak. “He can’t see me! I forgot—”
“Kate.” Jake’s arm came around her shoulder as she gave in to her grief and shuddered mercilessly, unable to cry but feeling deep sorrow.
“I’m so sorry. For everything. I know you and your dad are close.” His mouth was pressed to the top of her head as he kissed it and then pressed his cheek into her hair. “He’s looking for you. He won’t stop until he finds you.”
Kate looked up into Jake’s eyes as he brushed her cheek with his thumb.
Robert walked right past Jake and Kate without glancing sideways, causing Kate to tremble further at her father’s snub.
“Oh my God! My own father can’t see me. I’m invisible.” She shook Jake off and raced over to her father, patting him on the shoulder to try and get his attention.
“Hey! Dad! I’m here. It’s Kate. Please! I know you can feel me.”
Her hand seemed to disappear into Robert’s body again and again as the patting started to become pounding. “Dad! Dad! Look at me!”
For a second, Robert stopped and Kate hoped that finally she had got through to him but when he motioned for The Gladiator to keep walking straight ahead while he eyed a map in his hand, she knew that it had all been wishful thinking.
She howled out towards the moon like some animal in pain, devastated. “Aaarrrrrgh! I hate this! I hate this! He can’t see me! I’m nothing! I’m going to be stuck like this forever!” Her high pitched screaming caused Jake to grimace. He rushed forward.
His warm hands gently pulled at her waist so that she stood flush against him with her back against his rock hard chest.
“Shh. Hush now. It’s okay, Kate. We’re going to fix this. I’m here to help you. You’re not in this alone.”
“Fix this? Just how do you plan on fixing this, Mister Brainiac? You think you’ve got all the answers? Hah! Tell me, Jake! How is this ludicrous situation ever going to be fixed?” She was almost hysterical as she fought against him, lashing bucket-loads of anger towards him.
She was flailing her arms around, trying to free herself from Jake’s strong hold but it was like trying to pry free from steel shackles.
“The first thing we need to do is find your body and get you help. Can we just do that first, please, and then we’ll figure the rest out? Let’s just take one step at a time.” His arms were vise-like around her, keeping her in place so she didn’t run again.
It took a moment of struggling against Jake before she realized it was useless to fight against him. He wasn’t letting her go. Maybe it was a good thing. Maybe she needed him more than she thought. After all, there was no one else that could see her. It was all just so crazy. She let her body settle into Jake before something dawned on her. “He didn’t acknowledge you either, Jake. Why?” Kate’s question took Jake off guard as he momentarily eased his hold on her and then tensed again. Kate could feel his energy change. She knew he was struggling to answer her. He was keeping something from her.
“We need to talk but first you need to show me where your body is. We’ve taken too long as it is.” Jake released Kate from his stronghold, letting her move forward.
Something suddenly hit Kate. She stopped and turned to Jake, blanching. “That man!”
“Your dad?”
“No, the other man. Who is he?”
“He works for the military. He’s helping look for you.”
“But he was following me.”
“What? When?” Jake looked alarmed.
“The night before festival day I was having dinner and he was watching me.” Kate frowned.
“Maybe your dad had him watching out for you.”
“Why? It doesn’t make any sense.”
“I’m not sure but he’s one of the good guys, Kate. He wasn’t going to hurt you.”
Kate pushed some hair out of her face and pursed her lips. She had known that, but still. “Whatever. It’s just another account of my fucked up life.”
Resignedly, Kate started walking away without another word, hoping Jake would follow. The sooner she showed him where her body lay, the sooner all this insanity would be over.
Jake pulled on her arm. “Hey! We can get there a lot quicker, you know.”
Kate turned and eyed him angrily, not sure if anything was real any more, even his searing touch on her arm.
It was all just madness, that’s what it was. So Jake could time travel, or teleport, too. No big deal, right? Why not just play along with the wacky dream and see what would happen next?
“Whatever, Jake. Just do what you have to and get it over with.” She pulled her arm away from him to make it easier to be angry.
“In order for this to work, you’re going to have to do it. I don’t know where your body is. It’s easy, I promise. All you do is concentrate on the place you want to go and voila!”
“You want me to teleport us both out of here?” she asked, poking herself in the chest with her thumb.
“Yes. My holding onto you is no different than you being o
n your own. Just remember where your body is and concentrate on taking us both there.”
“How are you able to teleport when you’re not like me? Magic doesn’t exist.”
“I can’t explain it now. We don’t have much time. Just trust me, okay?”
Kate knew that Jake was keeping her in the dark about a lot of things but she also knew the urgency of showing Jake where her body was. As much as she didn’t want to, she reached out and grabbed Jake’s hand in hers. He entwined their fingers and gripped her tightly so that there was no way she could pull away again.
Closing her eyes, she pictured the ledge where her broken form lay and in an instant she knew they had moved. The sound of the waves crashing onto the rocks below caused her to open her eyes. Jake was already gasping as he broke contact with her and was kneeling over her body.
Kate could feel his emotions, even at a distance.
Jake looked up to the top of the cliff, becoming harshly aware of just how far Kate had fallen. Looking across to where Kate’s ethereal form stood with her hands across her chest, he asked the million dollar question.
“How did you fall? What were you doing standing so close to the edge? You did fall, didn’t you, or were you pushed?”
“No! I wasn’t pushed. I was running…”
Jake stood up and took a step closer to where Kate hovered.
“Baby…”
Kate stopped him. “Don’t come any closer. Just stay there.”
“How did you fall?”
“I was standing looking out to the ocean, trying to gather my thoughts. Trying to piece together the strange things that had been happening to me. I thought I heard you behind me and I took a step—”
Jake appeared mortified. “Fuck!” His hand swept through his hair, causing it to stand on end as his whole face screwed up. He looked ready to punch something. She could see the anger building in him as he walked over to the face of the cliff and pounded his fist into the dirt and rock over and over again, causing pieces to break off and crumble onto the ledge. He looked like he was in such turmoil at what she’d just told him. He was blaming himself because she’d not only been running from him, she’d fallen because of him.
She watched on in horror as Jake started to pound his head into the wall. It seemed like he was punishing himself on her behalf. One of his fists started up again in between his head-butts. If he didn’t stop there was going to be a landslide. She couldn’t let him keep torturing himself like that. It was hurting her too much.
“Jake, stop!” She walked over to him and put a gentle hand on his back. He tensed underneath her touch but his head and fist stopped. “Don’t do this to yourself. It’s not your fault. I slipped. It was an accident!”
“Accident?” He hadn’t turned yet, as if he was too ashamed. His voice was littered with disgust. “Kate, you were running because of me. I saw the recognition in your eyes at the festival. You sensed me. You came here to get away from me. You fell because you thought I had followed you. Don’t tell me it was an accident!” His fingers were digging into the dirt.
Kate could see the weight of Jake’s guilt on his shoulders and knew deep within her soul that even though she’d reacted to his arrival in Vernazza, he couldn’t be held responsible for the accident. “It’s not your fault that we have a connection so strong that I can feel you without seeing you. You didn’t push me to my near death. I over-reacted. I let my anger and hurt control me. I acted hastily. It was a stupid accident, nothing more. I shouldn’t have been standing so close to the edge.” She was surprised at her own words and how quickly she was forgiving Jake. The more she thought about it, the more she realized it was all true.
He shrugged her off and moved over to her battered body where he sat back down and moved her bloodied head to face him, as he gently stroked her cheek.
Kate watched how tender he was being. He cared about her. That was evident. At her apartment, before she’d vanished, she’d agreed to hear him out before she said goodbye to him for good. She owed him that.
His fingers found the faint pulse in her neck. His hands were shaking.
Kate stared at his hands, still not able to see his face. Something wasn’t right.
“Jake?” Unease crept forth. Her sixth sense was fighting through all the haze and drama. A knowing was bubbling to the surface. How had she not seen it before?
He didn’t answer her.
“Jake?” Her voice was louder and higher now.
As he slowly looked up to her with a destroyed look on his face, Kate put a hand over her mouth. “Jake! Your head! Your hands! They aren’t bleeding or cut! I watched you pound both of them into the rock wall. How…? What’s going on?” As if she didn’t already know. She’d just been too blind to really see.
His expression didn’t change and he didn’t give her the answer she needed to hear. “We need to talk. Not here.”
Kate didn’t know now if she wanted answers. To get answers would confirm her growing feelings of dread that had started hanging around Jake. His skin looked better than it ever had. Glowing almost. How could that be? There were so many questions plummeting through her, obviously due to whatever it was Jake wasn’t telling her. Since first seeing him, everything had manifested into a giant mess. What the hell was he even doing here? She had to ask. To try and make some sense of it all.
“Why are you here, Jake?” He looked at her with such sadness, she almost lost her composure and went to him.
“We need to find a way to get help. Get you to the hospital. You’re barely hanging in there, Kate.”
“No. I mean here in Vernazza. Why did you come after all this time?” He’d never really come out and said it. She was curious as to what had led him back into her life after so long. She had always sensed he was here because of her, but why?
“I’m not one hundred percent sure. I do know that I need your help, though. I think that was the reason for coming here.” Confusion swept across his features.
“Why? Why do you need my help?” It was more of a whisper as she took a few steps closer, being careful to keep some distance. Something was so wrong with Jake. Why were his knuckles and head still intact after his meltdown minutes ago? Why couldn’t he remember exactly what had led him to Vernazza? That didn’t make sense coming from someone whose memory was normally so sharp he could recall what he’d been wearing to his first birthday. Well, maybe not quite that far back, but it was better than anyone’s she’d ever known.
“Something has happened to me. The same way it has happened to you. I’m out of my body, too.” He looked away from Kate and back down to her physical body, where he pulled some of the bloodied, matted hair away from her cheek.
And there she had it. The confirmation she’d been dreading. “Are you…” Dare she ask? “Dead?” Now it was her turn to stare wide-eyed at Jake waiting for an answer she didn’t want to hear.
“Not yet. It’s a long story. Can we please just get you help first and then we need to go somewhere safe so I can explain everything? I promise I’ll tell you everything. Why I had to leave you in the first place. Where I’ve been for the last five years, and how your father is involved.”
A whimper escaped Kate as her hand came up to clutch at her throat in shock. “My father?”
“It’s complicated, baby.”
“My father is involved in you being out of your body?”
“No. Yes. Not directly. Look, how are we going to get help to you? That’s my main concern. We’re both walking ghosts. No one can see us.”
“You! How can you see me? How can we see each other?”
“Well, you have your ‘special talent’ and can obviously feel and hear me no matter what but I’m guessing we can see each other now because we’re not physical anymore. Our other senses are heightened.”
“How was I not able to know my father was in Vernazza until I stumbled upon his bag in my apartment? How am I not able to know everything you’ve been keeping from me, Jake? Why does my gift only show i
tself when it wants to?”
“I’m not sure. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that you’ve never really developed it more. You’ve never really wanted to have it. You accepted the fact that you were different but never really embraced it.”
Kate tried to process everything that was happening. Her fall. Jake. Her father. How was he involved in all this? Is that why he was in Italy? She’d known it wasn’t a social visit but could he be here to try and save Jake?
“Kate. Something happened to your father when you ran through him down near the Doria Castle. It was almost like you zapped him with your energy. Do you think you could do it again? We need to somehow get his attention. Make him think that it’s you trying to connect with him. I can’t think of any other way.”
“Can’t I just try calling him? Oh wait. I don’t have my cell.”
Jake stood again and sheepishly pulled Kate’s cell out of his back pocket.
He stood with his hand outstretched, watching her mood turn from disbelief to annoyance.
“It was you? I threw my cell on the floor because I couldn’t get in contact with any one and when I returned to my apartment it was gone. I saw my father’s bags there and assumed he must have picked it up. What are you doing with my cell, Jake?” Kate’s tone had changed, sarcasm dripping from her words.
“I meant to give it to you earlier. I picked it up when I was in your apartment and then with everything that has happened this evening, I kind of forgot.”
Kate snatched it out of Jake’s hands and switched it on, screaming as she looked at the screen, furiously stepping closer to Jake and punching him in the shoulder, causing him to flinch and take a staggering step back.
“Ten missed calls from my father? What the hell were you thinking, Jake? Why was my cell switched off? My father has been calling trying to get a hold of me.”
As she said this she also noticed five missed calls from Carlos. She swore and put her head in her hands, shaking it furiously.
“What the hell right do you have to even take my phone, let alone turn it off when the people I care about are trying to reach me?” She could barely get the words out.
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