“December 30.”

  “Umm, you wouldn’t happen to have some more of that chicken soup you made yesterday, would you?” I ask, my stomach growling with just the mention of Mason’s specialty.

  Mason grins and I can tell he’s pleased I asked. “I’ll go get it and bring it over. Would you like some toasted butter garlic bread with that?”

  “You know the way to my heart,” I tease, only realizing after I say the words they could be construed in two different ways.

  Mason’s grin widens.

  “I certainly hope so,” he replies before phasing back to his villa.

  I hang my head and shake it. What a bone headed thing to say. I decide I really need to start thinking before I say things to Mason.

  While I’m pulling my blouse out of my pants and walking to my bathroom, I hear a familiar creak of a rocking chair come from my front porch. I walk to the bay of windows in my room and look out.

  Lucifer is sitting in one of my rocking chairs staring out at my neighborhood like he’s waiting for something, most likely me.

  I take a deep breath and try to remember the way Lilly and everyone else told me to act around Lucifer to glean the most information out of him. We need to know what his end game is and the only way to figure that out is to speak with him.

  When I walk out onto the porch, Lucifer looks up at me. A genuine smile graces his handsome face. I can’t deny that he picked a handsome body to inhabit. I feel sure it’s a prerequisite for any body he takes.

  He’s dressed simply in a pair of blue jeans, light blue T-shirt and blue jean jacket.

  “Jessica,” he says standing up. “I’ve been wondering where you were. Your sister wouldn’t speak with me about you. I assume you told her not to.”

  “You assume right,” I say, walking to the railing opposite the rocking chair he’s still standing by.

  Lucifer sits back down and continues to rock as he studies me.

  “There’s something different about you today,” he says, looking at me with a cursory glance. “What is it?”

  I shrug. “No idea.”

  “You’re lying,” he says confidently. “Don’t you know that just makes you more interesting to me?”

  Great, the last thing I need to happen. Become more interesting to Lucifer was not on my list of things to do that day.

  “So, where have you been?” He asks.

  “Away.”

  Lucifer grins. “You know I’ll find out eventually.”

  “Perhaps. At least it’ll give you something to do beside tromp around the globe with your brand new besty.”

  Lucifer grins. “I thought you and Mason would be keeping tabs on us. Have you figured out what we are doing or who he is yet?”

  “I have no idea what you guys are doing,” I say, not tipping my hat that I know the man is one of the princes of hell he has been looking for.

  Lucifer’s grin grows wider. “Well don’t expect me to just tell you. What’s the fun in that? You’ll have to earn the answer for yourselves. I’m not going to feed you the information on a shiny silver platter.”

  “I didn’t expect you to. I’ve always worked for what I wanted, and I’ve always gotten it in the end.”

  Lucifer narrows his eyes on me in an appraising way. “You know for a human you’re rather impressive. Most would have broken considering what you’ve had to deal with in your short life. First you were abandoned by your parents and then abused by your adopted mother’s brother.”

  “My parents didn’t abandon me,” I say, “they were taken against their will. There’s a big difference.”

  Lucifer cocks his head at me. “Hasn’t Mason told you how people are chosen to go through the Tear?”

  “It’s random,” I say, everyone on the planet knows that. Why is he making such a big deal out of it?

  Lucifer chuckles like he’s in on an inside joke. “I suppose it would be nice to think so, but no, it’s not random.”

  I’m silent because I don’t like the look on Lucifer’s face. I feel as though he’s about to lower the boom on me and I’m not so sure I’ll be able to survive it.

  “How are they chosen?” I ask, bracing myself for the answer.

  “Only people who, for whatever reason in their lives, want a fresh start somewhere else, go through the Tear. I suppose it was my father’s way of tempering what I did to make it easier on those who went through. The ones who return are the ones who eventually decide they want to come back home.”

  “You’re lying,” I say, but I know he isn’t. Deep down in the inner recesses of my soul I know what he’s saying is true.

  “For whatever reason,” Lucifer says to me, “your parents didn’t want to be a part of your life anymore.” He pauses letting what he just said sink in. “I’ll never lie to you, Jessica. You know I’m telling you the truth. I thought you should know it too. Don’t waste your time grieving over people who don’t deserve it.”

  I push away from the railing. “I think you should leave now.”

  “If that is what you want. But I will be back,” he says with certainty.

  I nod, not trusting my voice to not betray my true emotions in that moment. Lucifer phases away and I walk back into my house. I close the front door behind me and lean my back against it. Before I know it, I’m sitting on the floor, with my legs drawn up, hugging them to me. I begin to rock back and forth trying to sooth the lost girl inside me. What Lucifer has just said confirms what the seven year old me feared the most: that my parents didn’t love me enough to want to stay with me. It’s like having my worst nightmare brought to life. I try to reason with myself that there has to be another explanation. But no amount of cajoling or reasoning seems to be enough to stop the lost girl’s heart from shattering into a million pieces.

  Chapter 15I feel my world crash in around my heart cracking its armor into so many shards it will never be whole again. I suddenly feel paralyzed with grief and the first sting of tears tells me I am no longer in control of the next few minutes of my life. Sorrow and despair completely consume my body taunting the lost girl within me with the information Lucifer has just shared. Locked away in her self-imposed prison, the child me peeks out and is forced to face the unadulterated truth about her parents. They never wanted her. They never loved her. If they had, they would have never left her alone in a world where people like Uncle Dan could easily use her for his own sick fantasies. Acts that forced her to build walls so high and thick she never truly let those who loved her breach it completely.

  An endless stream of sobs rack my body so hard, I end up having trouble taking in a single breath, like an invisible hand is choking me. I try to force the child within to not forget the good times we shared with my parents, but she asks the same question over and over: why did they abandon us?

  I don’t want to believe what Lucifer said is true but deep in my heart I know he didn’t lie to me. He is often called the great deceiver but on this one subject I know he has told me the unvarnished truth. I feel as though I might be the only person Lucifer will never lie to and I know the reason why without having to be told.

  The reason Lucifer is drawn to me is simple. He senses Michael inside me. He may not know it consciously but some part of him recognizes his one time best friend standing in front of him. A part of him will never be able to lie to his best friend even when Michael is hidden inside a human.

  I cry even harder knowing the truth of this. I have to make the lost girl inside me face the fact that our parents did abandon us. What about me was so terrible it would make them both want to leave me? Did they regret having me? Was I a mistake? How was I supposed to recover from this?

  I feel a presence beside me. Through the fog of my tears, I look to my right and see Mason’s concerned face inches away from mine. He is sitting on the floor with his back against the door just as I am. He doesn’t say a word, just sits there with me, waiting.

  I take in a shuddering breath, intent on telling him what Lucifer has revealed to me but the words lodge themselves in my throat to a point where only another sob comes out. I lean into Mason needing to feel like at least one person in the world cares enough about me to stay, to not abandon me. I feel him pull me closer into him, offering his strength as my support if I will accept it.

  “Oh, Jess,” he says, holding me close with one arm and tenderly cradling my head with the other as I let my pain practically double me over its so intense.

  I feel him try to pull away, but I grab his shirt so tightly I feel him wince under me. That, more than anything else, causes me to pull away from him and look into his face.

  “Did I hurt you?” I ask, taking a shuddering breath.

  “Seeing you like this is the only thing hurting me,” he replies, smoothing wet, wayward strands of hair away from my face and tucking them behind my ear. He stands up and pulls me to my feet in one swift motion.

  Before I know it, I find myself cradled in his arms. I lay my head against his shoulder and wrap my arms around his neck. Mason carries me effortlessly to the couch in my living room and sits down, positioning me comfortably in his lap. I breathe a sigh of relief because my heart knows he won’t leave me until I’m past my grief.

  I’m not sure how much time passes by. Eventually, the well which stores my tears dries up and I end up just trying to concentrate on returning my breathing to normal. I’m reluctant to lift my head from Mason’s shoulder because I know he’ll want an explanation for my tearful outburst, but I do because he deserves to know what Lucifer told me.

  When I look at his face, I’m not prepared for what I see in his eyes. I have often wondered how people believe in love at first sight. I’ve always chalked up such nonsense to some sort of involuntary hormonal reaction to the other person’s physical appearance. But I know if I were just meeting Mason for the first time and he looked at me the same way he is looking at me now, I would have no doubt he loved me. It’s not a look I can explain or even attempt to describe. A million people have used flowery words in an attempt to describe love but none of those phrases seem adequate enough to articulate the emotion I see behind Mason’s eyes as he looks at me.

  “Do you want to tell me what happened?” He asks gently, not pushing for an answer just letting me know he’s there for me when I’m ready.

  “I do,” I say, taking a shuddering breath.

  I feel Mason rub my back in a circular path silently waiting for me to continue.

  “Lucifer was here,” I say. As soon as the words leave my mouth, I feel Mason’s body stiffen.

  “Did he hurt you?” Mason asks, his voice low with controlled anger.

  “Not physically,” I tell him with a shake of my head.

  “What did he say to you?”

  “He told me...” I say, fighting back the last reserves of tears from somewhere deep inside me threatening to reveal themselves. “He said that the people who go through the Tear are those who want to leave their lives behind and start new ones somewhere else.” I look up at Mason and see the answer to my next question before I even ask it. “Is that true?”

  “Yes,” he says, not trying to temper his answer.

  “Why would my parents want to abandon me?” I ask, hearing a child’s heartbreak in my voice.

  Mason doesn’t say anything and I feel as though he’s debating on whether or not to tell me something crucial.

  “I don’t want to say this and get your hopes up, but I can’t let you sit here and think they abandoned you either,” he tells me before continuing. “I’m not so sure your parents were taken through the Tear when it opened, Jess.”

  I stare at Mason completely sure I’ve misunderstood him. He continues.

  “When your parents disappeared, did new tearers take their place?”

  I feel my forehead crinkle at the question, suddenly realizing that small fact has completely escaped me all these years.

  “No,” I say. “No one took their place.”

  “In every recorded incident of people going through the Tear, there has always been new tearers who replaced them. Yours is the only time I’ve ever heard of people disappearing without being replaced. It’s simply not the way the universe works. If one person disappears from here, there has to be someone else to occupy their space to keep the balance in check.”

  I sit up straighter. “Are you saying they’re still here? They’re still here on this planet?”

  “Nick’s actually the one who brought it to my attention when he investigated your family history. We came up with the theory that, more than likely, your parents are still here somewhere.”

  “But where are they?”

  “I don’t know. But if you want, we can look for them.”

  I sit there trying to absorb what Mason has just said. If what he thought was true then…

  “Why haven’t they tried to find me? It’s been fifteen years.”

  “I don’t have an answer for that question, but you shouldn’t jump to conclusions,” he’s quick to say. “They could have been taken against their will. There’s no way of knowing until we find them.”

  Filled with a new determination, I ask, “Where do we start?”

  “I’ve already started,” he tells me, looking a little uncomfortable revealing this news to me.

  “Don’t say it like an apology,” I tell him, grabbing his arm. “Thank you.”

  “I’ve had Joshua searching through the databases comparing your genetic profile with pretty much everyone’s in the world. You have to have some family somewhere. You didn’t just appear out of thin air.”

  “Have you found anything yet?”

  “We’ve found some people who seem to be distant, distant relatives but no one who could be immediate family. Joshua’s only twenty-five percent through though. It’s just going to take some time and patience.”

  “I’ve waited for them for fifteen years,” I say filled with new found hope. “A few more weeks or months aren’t going to bother me.”

  I stare at Mason, not sure what else to say.

  “Are you still hungry?” He asks me.

  I nod. “Did you bring the soup?”

  Mason smiles. “Not only did I bring the soup but I brought you a special surprise too. It’s why I was gone for so long. If I had known Lucifer was here, I wouldn’t have made the detour. I had just bought them when I felt you in distress.”

  I stand up releasing Mason from the burden of my body. Mason instantly takes one of my hands in his and leads me to the kitchen. The large silver stock pot with his chicken soup is already warming up on the stove and there is a pink box decorated with a white lace pattern sitting on the dining room table.

  “I intended for them to be your dessert but why don’t you go ahead and have one now. I think it might perk you up a little bit.”

  “What’s in it?” I ask walking to the table, my curiosity piqued.

  Mason walks to the stove and retrieves a bowl from the wall cabinet beside it.

  “Open the box and see for yourself,” he says, a playful grin on his face.

  I flip the lid of the box open and see four perfect croissants sitting inside drizzled with chocolate.

  I gasp. “Are these the chocolate croissants Malcolm keeps getting Tara?”

  “Yes. I thought since you’ve been hearing about them so much lately you might like to try one for yourself.”

  “This could be a mistake you know,” I warn, taking one of the croissants out of the box.

  Mason looks at me curiously. “A mistake how?”

  “If I really like them, I might end up bugging you all the time to go get them for me.”

  “I have no problem doing that for you,” he tells me, his voice soft. “No problem at all, Jess.”

  I smile, feeling uncertain about how to react and decide to turn my attention to the Parisian perfection in my hand waiting to be devoured. As I bite into the croissant, a mixture of flaky buttery goodness, soft chocolate, and creamy hazelnuts perform a symphony of tastes inside my mouth. I moan in ecstasy and stomp my left foot twice.

  “Oh my God,” I say to Mason. “I can see why Tara loves these so much. They’re better than Beau’s cinnamon rolls. But don’t tell him I said that,” I laugh.

  “You’re secret is safe with me,” Mason promises. “I’m glad you like them.”

  Mason brings me over a bowl of soup and I sit down and eat it after finishing my croissant. When I’m ready for my second bowl of soup, he also brings over the butter garlic French bread he just toasted in my oven. Finally, he sits down with me and watches me eat. Unlike before, I have no problem with him watching me. I pretty much figure he’s seen me at my worst on two occasions now: when I was sick and just now in my living room as I cried my heart out. If he isn’t scared away by now, seeing me with a little soup on my chin won’t make a difference.

  “I wish you had told me about my parents,” I tell him, taking a bite out of the bread.

  “I wish I had too, Jess. Then you wouldn’t have taken what Lucifer said so hard. I had planned to tell you if and when we actually found something out about them. I didn’t want to get your hopes up unnecessarily.”

  “I understand. It makes sense.”

  There’s a knock on my door and I make to get up and answer it.

  “You stay,” Mason orders and I almost feel like a dog being commanded by its master, but I let it slide because I can see Mason is just trying to make sure I stay and finish my meal. “I’ll go answer the door.”

  As soon as Mason opens the door I hear the voices of Mama Lynn and Faison. Before I know it, I’m surrounded by them both in a large group hug. Mason stands leaned against the entryway of the kitchen grinning at us.

  “Don’t worry us like that again,” Faison orders, the strength of her hug rivaling that of Mama Lynn’s.

  “I’ll try not to,” I say, but it comes out muffled because Mama Lynn’s poof of hair is blocking my mouth.

  Finally, they both pull away from me allowing me to breath in some much needed fresh air. Mama Lynn walks over to Mason and I see his surprise as she gives him a motherly hug.

  “Thank you for taking care of my baby,” she tells him.

  “It was my honor,” Mason says.

 

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