Jivaja (Soul Cavern Series Book 1) Read online

  Only the rough rumble of the van’s motor sounded as they entered the Barrons’ subdivision. The familiarity of it brought tears to her eyes. How could things have gone so wrong? How could these streets no longer be as peaceful as they’d always seemed?

  Her dad parked around the corner from the house, and the engine rattled down to silence. He looked over at her. She read resignation in his eyes.

  “You’re going to insist on coming to the house, aren’t you?”

  “Yes.”

  A sigh slipped from his lips. “All right. We’re going to go around the back and have a look first. They may not be gone.”

  She nodded, butterflies twittering around in her belly.

  “Don’t do anything without letting me know first, okay?”

  “Okay.”

  “Let’s go.”

  The hike through the wooded area behind the house reminded Mecca of her escape from Emilia. It took everything in her not to break into a panicked run toward where she knew the house sat. She let the early evening air fill her lungs as twigs crunched under her sneakers. Little stabs of pain shot up from the soles of her feet. She welcomed them. They kept her focused.

  The house loomed up, dark except for a dim light from the office. The pool looked like a murky pit without the soft, colored lights usually left on. A stifling sense of disaster gripped her.

  Her dad turned back and put a finger to his lips and then moved like a ghost across the patio. She followed close behind. All her nerves perked up. She strained her ears, trying to pick up any strange sounds, but only the breeze spoke as it slipped through the leaves behind them.

  When he reached the big picture window that she knew opened into the office, he held up a hand for her to stop as he peered inside. Heat prickled under her skin and she ignored his gesture. Instead, she stepped up beside him and focused on what she could see on the other side of the window.

  The once-elegant office now had streaks of red sprayed across the walls. Dark blood pooled on the corner of the big oak desk and dripped, like a faucet, onto the hardwood floor. She could almost hear it.

  Three feet from the desk, Jim Barron lay with his throat ripped open. His chest rose and fell, but the long pauses in between scared her. With each breath, a little spray of red droplets erupted from the chasm in his neck, falling in a fine pattern on his chin.

  Mecca’s gut wrenched. She doubled over and heaved, spraying the bottom of the brick wall with regurgitated coffee. She had just enough time to pull in a ragged breath and sink to her knees before the muscles of her stomach knotted and she retched again. Brown spittle hung from her lips.

  Her father’s hand rested on her shoulder. He’d crouched beside her when she went down to the ground.

  “He’s—he’s still alive,” she said. The scene inside was more horrible than even the dried husk of Hayden she'd left behind.

  It was Jenny's dad.

  And the blood. Everywhere.

  She dry-heaved again. Bile burned the back of her throat. Her heart knocked around in her chest like it wanted to escape the confines of her rib cage.

  “Yes. I need to get inside. Will you be okay out here by yourself? I don’t think anyone’s around.”

  She shook her head. “I’m coming in with you. I’m okay. Just let me get up.” She struggled to her feet, with his help. Get it together, girl. Come on.

  “Are you sure? You don’t have to see it again. I don’t want you to.”

  Mecca straightened and pushed his hand away. If she planned on fighting Emilia and her crew, she would have to get used to scenes like this. She drew a deep breath of the night air, letting it fill her lungs completely before she released it. Her pulse slowed and she tried to calm down. “I’m okay. Let’s go.”

  Chapter Eighteen: David

  Shadowy darkness stretched through the house as they hurried through. The felt heavy, pressing in on him from all sides. A slice of muted light edged from the office door, which stood ajar. David shoved it open and rushed into the room.

  He hadn’t thought it could, but it looked worse from the inside. Blood littered every surface, even if only a few drops. Spray on the walls, ruby red drops scattered along book bindings, pooled on the desk. The metallic scent hung heavy in the air. That was the worst of it, as if Jim’s life could simply evaporate like steam.

  David glanced back at Mecca as he made his way to where Jim lay. She had become a statue in the doorway. He wanted her to stay out of the office, but she’d become his shadow once they got inside the house. Now she looked more like a little girl than ever. Her eyes, wide and gleaming, didn't meet his, but rather looked over his shoulder at the room. Her face grew chalky. He wanted to sweep her away, but he couldn’t.

  “Call 911,” he said.

  He didn’t wait to see whether she did it because Jim’s wheezing breath brought David’s attention back. He went to his friend’s side and crouched down. Dread skimmed along his spine.

  Jim wouldn’t make it through this. He couldn’t. Not with this kind of damage.

  His friend’s face sported a jumble of bruises and welts. His left eye, black and swollen, barely opened and the part of his eyeball that should have been white gleamed bright red. A bruise darkened his cheek, blending in with his puffy lips.

  “Jim? It’s Dave. We’re calling an ambulance. Hang on.”

  Jim’s good eye lolled for a moment, then rolled around and focused on him. The wheezing increased and blood droplets sprayed up and out of the hole in Jim’s throat, scattering over the top of David’s hand. Jim tried to lift his head from the floor, his swollen lips moving in time with the wheezing.

  “Shh,” David said. “Don’t try to talk.”

  Jim’s hand grappled and pushed against the side of David’s leg. His fingers waved like the branches of a dead tree in the wind. David leaned in and listened as Jim’s shattered voice box allowed a few words to creep out.

  “Jenny...Caro...Carolyn. Save..”

  “Jenny and Carolyn are fine. They’re in London with Ken.”

  “No!” The exclamation wasn’t above a whisper. “She… she is going… to kill…”

  “Dad?” Mecca’s voice edged along his consciousness. “The paramedics are coming.”

  “You hear that, Jim? They’re going to come and fix you right up. Don’t worry about Jenny and Carolyn. I’ll make sure they’re safe. I promise.”

  Jim’s body went limp, and David’s heart froze, panicked, but the rattling breathing went on. Each intake sounded like it used all the energy Jim’s body could muster. David held his friend’s limp, clammy hand, not caring that blood covered his shoes, his knees and his own hands.

  “Go get some towels,” he said, looking up at his daughter. At least it would get her out of the room. “We can try to stop the bleeding.”

  Mecca looked around the room, saucer-eyed, and swallowed so hard, David heard her gulp. When her gaze swung back to him, he could read the question in those eyes. “How much can there be left?” He said nothing to the unspoken question, she turned and rushed out of the room.

  Jim’s breath rattled, and David looked down to see his friend staring at him with wild eyes. David gripped his hand tighter, reached out with his own life force and felt for Jim’s.

  The bloody room dropped to the background as the Cavern unfolded over the scene. The cave was cool and almost empty. It was like an old grotto that had been an underwater beauty, but was now reduced to a brittle cave with only a sad, trickling stream of water slipping along its smooth floor.

  David couldn’t keep the soft groan from his lips as he realized just how close Jim was to being gone.

  “I’m not going to let you die,” he whispered, as he released some of his own life energy into that hollow cavern. In his mind’s eye, the strong golden wave rolled away from him and splashed against the wall of Jim’s soul center. It trickled down to the ground and began to drain away.

  “No.”

  He released another small burst of energy, wat
ching it illuminate the cave and then slip down the walls to the diminished stream. David let a larger bit of himself go, feeling the subtle weakening of his own energy as he tried to feed his friend’s life force. It didn’t matter. Each time he sent his energy out to Jim, it slipped away within moments. Jim’s life had been shredded; David couldn’t feed it energy faster than Jim lost it.

  “I brought the towels.” Mecca’s whisper brought him away from the Cavern.

  Golden light pumped out of the open wound in Jim's neck just before David shut the mental door to the Cavern, the two visions merging for that one moment. Jim still stared at him, but the fear in his eyes had gone. Did he understand what David had tried to do?

  He took the towels from Mecca, keeping his other hand firmly on Jim’s. Sirens howled in the distance as he laid one towel with care on his friend’s throat. A red blossom bloomed on the ivory material, like a rose.

  Jim’s hand twitched in David’s grasp. He took a long jangling breath and whispered, “Save—”

  Then it was over.

  Jim’s hand fell limp and his eyes stared through David. The rose on the towel bloomed for another minute, then it too stopped.

  Despair slid into David’s heart. How could they fight this woman who had no regard for life?

  One thing became clear in those minutes before the siren stopped at the front door. Mecca was right: Emilia wouldn’t stop hunting either of them. Running wouldn’t help.

  He stood, his belly a mixture of regret and apprehension, with a seed of anger thrown in to take root. Behind him, Mecca loosed a sob. He turned and pulled her to him, holding her tight against his chest. Her body shuddered with her tears, but she didn’t pull from him. Whatever he’d done to make her angry earlier had been washed away in the blood in this room.

  Banging on the door.

  “I need to let them in,” he said to her, his voice low. She disentangled herself from him without looking down and left the room. He followed, fear for her heavy on his heart.

  They spent three hours with paramedics, then police officers, explaining a version of the situation over and over again. Yes, he’d been talking to Mr. Barron while driving with his daughter. There had been a loud sound in the background. Mr. Barron grunted and then went off the line. He could still hear sounds, so he rushed over, but this is what they’d found.

  No, they didn’t know who might have done this. Yes, he’d call if he thought of anything else.

  The entire time, he expected Emilia's goons to show up.

  When the police finally allowed them to leave, the night had blackened, which made the walk back to the van a long one. Luckily, they hadn’t been asked about their vehicle.

  David wondered if one of the detectives would eventually think about the father and daughter who’d gotten there without any transportation. He’d worry about it when the time came, he decided, as they reached the van and climbed in.

  “Do you still want to fight them?” he asked, as the van’s engine rattled to life.

  Mecca didn’t respond. He looked over and she was studying her finger.

  Red flakes of dried blood scaled her fingertips. He didn’t know when she’d touched the blood. He reached and laid his hand on her forearm. She looked at his it, but didn’t raise her gaze to meet his. The hot splash of a tear landed on his knuckle.

  “If you want to fight them, we will. If you want to run, we can.” He wouldn’t run, though. Not after this. He would make sure Mecca had a safe place to stay, and he would track down Emilia Laos and drive a stake through her heart with his bare hands, if that’s what it took.

  “I don’t think we can. Did you see what she did to him? She slaughtered him.”

  David put the van into gear and began the trek out of the subdivision and back to the highway. How could he protect her from this? Even if he killed Emilia Laos, who else had the woman told about Mecca? When would it end?

  “Then let’s not worry about that now,” he said. “How about we go check on Jenny?”

  Mecca lifted her gaze at the mention of her best friend. “We can’t let her get Jenny.” Her voice was small, like it’d been when she was a little girl.

  “We won’t. And after we know she’s safe, we can decide what to do.”

  “Okay.” Her system must have been shot. Too many traumas over too short a time.

  They drove in silence as he pulled onto the interstate, heading south, and the silence hadn’t lifted as David pulled off an exit and turned left down Edgewood, passing hipster bars and eateries.

  Farther on, old shells of buildings with peeling paint and warped doors lined both sides of the street like soldiers, sad old veterans being ravished by time and neglect. No homeless in this neighborhood. The gathering of young thugs on the corners saw to that.

  He took another left onto Euclid, the line of demarcation between the haves and the have-nots. As he entered the Little Five Points area, brightly painted pastel homes popped up on the right and the left, then gave way to rows of New Age shops, mom-and-pop bookstores, the occasional hole in the wall joint with great pizza/fries/beer, depending on what you were looking for. And, of course, the bars.

  A variety of people came out to Little Five at night. Being so close to the ASU campus meant college students could be found here day or night. In the brick plaza, men and women with tattoos, or Rasta braids, or brightly colored hair — sometimes a combination — sat around and begged for money in exchange for music or poetry. One woman had a precariously balanced folding table covered with rough woven blankets. Splayed across the surface was every manner of trinket. David drove past.

  “Where are we going?” she asked.

  “I need to meet with someone. We’re going to have to throw them off the trail. They’re probably watching the airport, at the very least.” Channeling Jim with those words. Hadn’t he said the same thing about David’s house and credit cards when he’d given David the money from the lamp?

  “I left Josie’s car at the cabin.”

  “We’ll get it to her, don’t worry.”

  He looked over and worry tickled at the edges of his mind. Still focused on her fingers, Mecca stared at them with an intensity he’d never seen. Had she lost it or was steeling her resolve? Would he be able to tell the difference between the two?

  A twinge of guilt slapped at him for thinking this way about his daughter. How would he have reacted at twenty if these things had happened to him? Though perhaps he wasn’t the best person to compare to, really.

  David found a parking space down the street from Sara’s house and fed the meter a few coins he found in the van’s ashtray. He decided that parking with Mecca’s side on the curb had been a very good idea when she flung the door open without even looking up. A young girl with spiked hair—purple, tipped in neon green—jerked out of the way.

  “Hey, watch it, bitch!”

  David came around and put himself between the two, but the girl just kept walking. He leaned in toward Mecca’s ear. “Are you going to be okay?”

  She nodded, but didn’t say anything.

  He put a hand on her back and directed her toward Sara’s house. Emilia Laos had hinted that she knew about his past. Had she told Mecca? Was that what had been upsetting her at the cabin?

  He didn't know whether putting the two parts of his life in the same room together was the stupidest idea he’d ever come up with. He thought it might be. But he didn’t have a choice. He needed to get Mecca out of public. Sara’s would be the safest place for her.

  This can work, he thought as he rang the bell.

  Chapter Nineteen: Mecca

  A woman about her own age opened the door. Small and compact, pale, with short, tight curls of black hair, she wasn’t really paying attention as she opened the door. A cell phone, poked into the front pocket of her faded jeans, buzzed. She pulled it out long enough to check the display, then crammed it back into her pocket.

  When she finally noticed them, her vivid green eyes lit up. She broke into a
smile and held the door open. “Hey! Is this Mecca? You found her!”

  Mecca tried to decide how her dad could be friends with someone so young. Someone who probably went to school with Mecca, considering where this chick lived. When and where would he have met her? And why did her smile look familiar?

  And what did she mean by “found”? Had her dad told this stranger about what had happened? Mecca’s heart rate sped up. How much had he told her?

  “Yes and no. She actually got away herself.” Pride swelled his smile. “Mecca, this is Sara.”

  “Hey,” Mecca said.

  Sara grabbed her hand and shook it fiercely with her own thin fingers. “It’s great to finally meet you! And I’m so glad you’re safe. What happened? They didn’t hurt you, did they? Come in!” Sara just about pulled her over the threshold.

  “Thanks.” Mecca looked at her dad. Seriously. How much did this girl know? And when am I going to get my hand back?

  He followed them in and pushed the door closed. “Sara, I need a connection.”

  She finally got an eyeful of him and gaped, dropping Mecca’s hand. “What the hell happened to you?”

  Mecca looked at her dad's clothes. He'd washed his hands and face before they'd left the Barrons' house, but his clothes were a mess. Blood stained the knees of his jeans and the sleeves of his blue jacket. Fine red drops splayed out in a mist pattern along the front of his shirt. The reminders brought acid up from her belly. She turned toward the living room.

  “I'm okay. There was an accident at a friend's house.”

  “The councilman?”

  She wasn't watching, but she guessed he'd nodded. Mecca’s nerves jangled every time Sara spoke. It seemed like every other sentence out of her mouth was something she shouldn’t know. Or Mecca preferred she not know, anyway.