Chosen - Kiersten White Page 0,48
One of the worst parts of navigating the last few months is how alone I’ve felt. Is that why Artemis left? Because she got hurt, and no one could understand except Honora? I would have understood. I will understand. I just need her to come back. To talk to me. To give me a chance to be there for her. Like I’ll be there for these Slayers.
Leo groans, ending the conversation as we all shift to look at him. I want to stare at him until he wakes up. I never want to look at him again. I never want to stop looking at him. I want to tear out my hair.
Doug pulls up in our car. “If you all want to come to the castle,” I say, calculating, “Oz will have to drive too. We don’t have room in our car for every extra passenger.”
“But we do have a kitten!” Doug holds up the tiny orange fluff ball. “Meet Trouble.”
“Better than Chewie, but trouble is what we’re going to be in when Cillian finds out you already named her.” I toss the case of money to Oz. “Check that for, I don’t know, booby traps or trackers or something.”
“All money is a trap, if you think about it,” he says.
“What?”
“Don’t think about it,” Maricruz answers, coming out of the house. “Trust me. Don’t ever think about anything he says, or you’ll lose your mind. Ooh, kitty!” She rushes Doug and snatches the kitten away. It crawls on her shoulder, disappearing into her hair. “Taylor, come see the kitten.”
Taylor drifts to Maricruz’s side. She seems to relax a little. “We’re riding in the catmobile,” Maricruz declares, climbing into the back and settling in with Taylor.
“Your friend doesn’t look so hot,” Oz says, pointing to Leo. I don’t look. I don’t want to acknowledge how bad he seems, because it makes it harder to settle on being livid or being devastated or being happy.
Oz closes the money case and shoves it into his van. “He can lie down in here. Is it a long trip?”
“Ireland,” I say. “We’ll have to take a ferry.”
Oz pats the side of his van fondly. “She’ll get us there. Slowly but surely. But more slowly than surely.”
“What happened?” Leo groans. His voice triggers memories of training in the gym. Fighting side by side. And not listening when he was trying to kidnap me to get me away from his mother, whom he had known was a killer and still let live in our castle.
I crouch next to him. His eyes, so dark they look black but with a hint of violet when you get close enough and the light is right—and I have been close enough, and the light has been right—focus on my face.
“I thought you were dead,” I whisper.
“Not quite yet.” He tries to sit up but doesn’t make it. Chao-Ahn leans down and together we help him stand. We take him inside to the nearest sitting room.
“Go get snacks and water and whatever else you can raid from the kitchen?” I ask Chao-Ahn. She nods and disappears.
I’m still shaking inside. I can feel it in electric bursts of white-hot anger, more powerful than the jolts I got at the convention. Leo looks winded from the effort to make it this far. My anger flares even brighter, seeing how vulnerable he is. “You came to him? When we were right there, this whole time?”
“I couldn’t,” he whispers.
“You most certainly could have!”
“The things I did … the things I hid from you all.”
I throw my hands in the air. “Oh, join the club. We would have gotten over it. You didn’t give us the chance to.”
“It wouldn’t have mattered. You can’t help me.”
“I can help anyone,” I say through gritted teeth. A pained moan from Von Alston’s study contradicts me. I flex my hands, then ball them into fists. Today has nearly broken me. First Artemis proved that when she left, it wasn’t so much to discover herself as it was to get away from me. And now Leo—Leo, who I mourned and blamed myself over—has been alive this whole bloody time and he didn’t think I could help him.
I’m going to help him if it kills him. Chao-Ahn reappears with some full bags, and Doug clears his throat from the hallway. “Good to go.”
“We’re taking you with us.” I hold out my hand to help Leo stand.
“Athena, I don’t—” Leo starts.
I cut him off. No one has called me that since he died—since he