Lullaby (A Watersong Novel) - By Amanda Hocking Page 0,30

whatever it is you do?” Harper asked.

“Nah.” He shook his head. “Some of the people I’ve gone with before are out. They think there might even be a tornado, but I don’t think it’s likely.”

“So why aren’t you with them?” Harper asked. “I know you love that kinda thing.”

“I do,” he agreed. “It just doesn’t feel right. Not with Gemma still being gone.”

“Oh.” She let out a deep breath. “Have you heard anything new on that?”

“Not really,” he said, then corrected himself. “Nothing useful, anyway.”

“That sucks.”

“I went to the police today,” Alex admitted, sounding sheepish about it.

“Did you really?” Harper asked. “What for?”

“I just wanted to know what they were doing to find Gemma.”

“What are they doing?” Harper asked.

“Not a whole lot,” Alex said. “I mean, I can’t really blame them. They’re still looking into the murders of Luke and those other boys, and Gemma just ran away from home. She’s not exactly their top priority.”

“Yeah.” Harper hadn’t really expected any different, but she’d hoped for more than that. “Do they have any leads on the murders?”

“I don’t think so.” He shook his head. “They asked me a couple more questions about Luke, but I didn’t tell them anything.” He paused for a minute, thinking. “The sirens killed him and the others, right?”

Harper hesitated before answering him, then nodded. “Yes, they did.”

“But I can’t tell the cops that.” Alex sounded exasperated. “They’d think I was crazy, and if they didn’t, they’d think Gemma was involved. And she wasn’t.”

Harper swallowed hard when Alex said that, but she didn’t respond. Not for the first time, she wondered exactly what Gemma’s involvement with the sirens was.

“You should go, then,” Harper said.

“What?” Alex turned to look at her, confused.

“If there’s nothing new on Gemma, you should go,” Harper told him. “I’m home, so I’ll be here if she gets back. There’s nothing more you can do. You can’t sit cooped in your house all the time, waiting for her to come back. You need to do something.”

He hesitated before asking, “Are you sure?”

“Yeah.” She nodded. “Go on. Go track your storm. Have fun. I’ll be here.”

“You’re right.” He gave her a small smile. “I’ll have my cell phone if you need me.”

He hurried back in the house to gather his things, and it was almost as if he’d been waiting for permission. Harper knew he cared about Gemma a lot and didn’t want to do anything to betray her, but he couldn’t stop living just because she was missing.

Thunder boomed in the distance, and Harper watched the approaching storm. She thought back to what Alex had said about the sirens, and she couldn’t shake her new fears.

She didn’t believe that Gemma had hurt anybody. At least not yet. But if the sirens were monsters, how long would it be before her sister acted like a monster, too?

TWELVE

Compulsion

“Today is the first day of the rest of my life,” Gemma told her reflection. It was her attempt at a pep talk, but it wasn’t that effective.

What Penn had said to her the other day had finally gotten through to her. Gemma had made a choice to be with the sirens, and since they were immortal, it was a very long commitment. She couldn’t spend the rest of eternity moping because this wasn’t what she’d wanted. She’d been living with them for nearly a week, and that was enough sulking.

Admittedly, she’d had to leave behind everything she cared about, her friends, family, boyfriend, and the swimming career she’d worked so hard for. Those were plenty of reasons to be heartbroken, but she’d given herself time to grieve. Now it was time to make the best of things.

Since she’d started swimming every day, she felt much better. Not great, but better. She was no longer nauseated, which made the hunger more intense, but she was managing it so far.

Thea had told her that Aggie had been kind, and Thea herself didn’t seem so bad. That meant that while being a siren might not be a choice, being evil was. So Gemma would simply choose not to be evil, and try to make the best of everything else this life had to offer.

She woke up determined to have a new attitude about the whole thing. She got up, showered, got dressed, and went downstairs to see what the sirens were up to for the day.

Gemma found all three of them and Sawyer in the living room watching Splash on the giant flat-screen. Thea was sprawled out on her belly