Read Death's Dilemma (DHAD #2) Online
Authors: Candice Burnett
“Dad, this is Trevor,” I said as I pulled away from the wall and stood at Trevor’s side. “And, Trevor, this is my Dad.”
“A Guardian?” he questioned.
“Yes.”
“You and your mother with your forbidden fruit. At least she picked a Reaper,” he said, confirming my suspicions.
“So she was a Guardian then.”
“Guardian? No, she was much more than that.”
Chapter Forty-Three
Deep
“Cendall, before we get to your mother, I’m going to need you to tell me what the hell all of this is about and why you have a bounty out on your head?” he asked, and I told him everything that had happened since the day I met Lacie. Well, except the parts about me being with Trevor. I didn’t see how that pertained to the story really. Several times throughout the story, he looked like he wanted to throw up. Each time I spoke about how I almost died, he would keel over. I even saw a tear leave his eye, but it all just kept spilling out of me. It felt good to be honest, and by the end, I was balling. “Cendall, I had no idea. I’m so sorry. I wish you would have said something. You should have never had that high of a soul on your first list, and from what you’re telling me, her name might have not belonged there at all. I can’t believe you were able to put her soul into another being. I always knew you’d be great but that’s power way beyond my scope of imagination.”
“Where have you been?” Drake asked him. “You left, but he said no one had a clue and hadn’t seen you since the trial.”
“I’ve been here and there. I knew after the trial they’d want to question me on who exactly your mother was, Cendall, and that is not information I am willing to share. Then I tried to contact Dave’s dad and he told me about what happened,” his eyes went to the floor and back up to me. “And also told me he saw you stealing an extractor so I thought it was time to come to you. I’m sorry it wasn’t sooner. So tell me again, what did the Demon say to you when you were leaving?”
“Something about a Jake. He said he knew he couldn’t have pulled this off and then said it was really me he was after.”
“But that doesn’t make sense. Jake was Herald’s son, and he died a long time ago. About eighteen years ago to be exact.” He looked away and then back at us.
“Who is that?” Dad asked as he got up from the table and walked over to the mantel. “Who is this?”He picked up the picture I’d put there of Lacie, so she’d remember what she looked like. He gripped the frame so tightly that it began to crack in the corners.
“That’s me. Well, what I used to look like,” Lacie said to him. He dropped the frame and walked toward Lacie. “You lie.”
“No, dad, that’s really her. I stalked and then protected her for the last year. I think I would know,” I laughed, trying to make light of the situation. He was losing his mind in front of me. This wasn’t how I wanted to introduce my new family to dad.
“This woman in Lacie’s kidnapping story that was imprisoned, she also had blonde hair?” he asked Lacie.
“Yes, and a ruby ring on her left hand.” With that, he let out a deep bellow that had the room shaking.
“Dad, stop! What is wrong with you?” I asked.
“I just wish fate would have let me known.”
“Let you know what exactly?” I asked.
“Cendall, all these years I’ve wanted to tell you so much about your mother. To tell you about her loving nature, fierce spirit, and breathtaking smile. I just never thought. Cendall, that Angel they have trapped is your mother.”
“Wait... what?” I asked, none of this was making sense.
“Dad, please. You’re sounding insane here.”
“I guess for it all to make sense, I should start at the beginning. Cendall, your mother, as I’m sure you’ve figured out by your gifts, is an Angel. We fell in love hard, and of course, it was forbidden. This made our lives complicated, but damn, she was worth the fight. We’d even thought we’d figured it all out until Herald’s son, Jake, got in the way. He got mad because she’d protected a soul he was supposed to take. He thought that, because of her protecting it, he would have to kill her to get it. He was too obsessed with finishing his list. He came to me, asking me for advice, and I told him to let it go. One, because that’s what you’re supposed to do when you lose, you fucking let it go until another opportunity arises. And two, I was absolutely in love with your mother, and I wouldn’t let anything touch her. I’d fought so hard just for her to give me a chance. I didn’t ever want to let her go. When your mother got pregnant, we were so happy, but so worried. We had no idea how we were going to keep you a secret from both of our realms, but we didn’t care anymore. Even if it meant living on earth forever, we were both ready for that sacrifice.” He choked up on the last word and wiped a tear from his cheek.
“Your mother was about to have you when we finally figured it out that, apparently, Jake didn’t get the picture or take my advice, and he had been stalking us for quite some time. He rushed into the room, knowing it would be his best shot. Your mother couldn’t fight during child birth. He came into the room and tried to take me down at the hospital. I had to kill him as he was about to stab your mother. I stabbed him with my scythe, and before he died, he muttered what I thought was just gibberish. He said, ‘That baby will belong to my master and will help bring down her entire realm. How dare you fraternize with this creature! Being from both worlds will help this child destroy theirs. You have no idea what you’ve just accomplished, but all the credit will go to me.’ And he died with an eerie smile on his face. At the time, I thought he was insane. But as soon as you came out, Cendall, we didn’t want to take any chances. Cate called out to her Guardians and other Angels for help, and I ported you out before they got there. As soon as I had you at a safe location, I ported back, and that’s when I lost her. Demons, Angels, and Guardians were battling everywhere, but she was nowhere in sight. There was so much blood.” His face went pale. “When the fight finally died out, I overhead them say she was killed. They talked about how no one had known she was pregnant, and it was sad because the baby had been taken. I thought they meant you, Cendall. I thought they meant you were taken away, but I made sure you were safe. I had no idea by ‘taken’ they meant there had been another baby. We had no idea there were two. She must have given birth to Lacie while I was porting Cendall away.”
“I’m so sorry to both of you. We didn’t let anyone know of her pregnancy, and we hid out for eight months in fear that someone would find out about us. Surely no one from either of our realms wanted a mixed Angel and Reaper baby. So, that’s why I lied too. When I finally showed you to the rest of the realm, Cendall, I lied and said you had a human mother that had died during childbirth. That happened sometimes, when humans weren’t convinced to come live in hell. We got lucky that you didn’t show any of your other gifts until after you were out of training.”
“Wait, so what are you saying is...”
“I’m saying your mother is that trapped, Angel.”
“That’s impossible,” cut in Abram who appeared out of thin air and startled everyone. “Lacie is my sister’s child.”
“And Cendall’s sister,” my dad countered.
“No, there was only one. I was there. My sister called me. I got there before anyone else. She was screaming in pain and thought she was going into shock. I looked under the sheet and saw Lacie coming. “You’re having a baby,” I said to her. ‘Having or had?’ she asked, and I thought it was odd. I told her, ‘Having. I can see it crowning.’ ‘Holy shit’, she screamed. Then she had Lacie.
Immediately after, she said she could feel Demons were approaching and that I had to get Lacie out fast before the other Angels got there. She said I had to protect Lacie. That she’d stay there and take care of whatever was coming. I tried to argue with her, saying she’d just given birth. I still had so many more questions. I begged her to come with me, but she refused—said she had to wait. She made me promise if she didn’t make it that I’d protect Lacie. She told me I couldn’t tell anyone about her either, as she didn’t want to bring our family any shame. I understood none of it at the time, but I granted her wish. Once I got the baby out of there and to a safe spot, I came back, and she was gone. They said Demons had come and rushed her, and that she’d been killed and her body taken. She was so close to death when she handed me the
one
child, not two.”
“That’s because I’d already taken Cendall,” my dad said to Abram.
“NO! My sister would never be with a Reaper.”
“Why else do you think she’d hide her pregnancy,” my dad rebutted.
“NO, she…” I could almost see him connecting the dots in his head. “She did say protect ‘them’. I thought she was delusional, but I took the child away as our healers began to work on her. I had no time for questions.”
“But how does that make Lacie my sister?” I asked, breaking the conversation between the two of them.
“There’s no other explanation. You’re both eighteen, and she looks identical to your mother. You have your mother’s cheekbones and eyes, but she looks like a mini Cate.” My dad sobbed at her name.
“I thought you said I looked like my mother besides my hair.”
“You do, Cendall. You have her facial structure, eyes, and wild spirit. But your hair is your own—a mix of heaven and hell.”
“But Lacie’s birthday is not the same. It’s in August.”
“I changed it when I gave her to her first set of adoptive parents. I told no one that she was my sister’s child, as that was what she wished. But I did tell them that I’d found a child who was gifted that we had to put extra protection on. I’m sorry Cendall if I knew I was your Uncle I would have never,” Abram began but I cut him off.
“But we look nothing alike” I said as I pointed to Lacie and back to me.
“Fraternal twins,” Lacie said with a smile as she grabbed my hand. “It feels right, doesn’t it?” I nodded. It was insane, but I’d always felt that instant connection with Lacie. I’d blamed it on becoming soft when, really, it was instinct.
“It also explains why she’s been such a death magnet. Even though she didn’t display any signs of being a Reaper, she is drawn to death.” I said and all the heads in the room besides dad’s nodded.
“And I just thought I was unlucky,” Lacie sobbed.
“So wait, though. Does that mean Herald knows since Jake was his son? And if so, why didn’t Herald just kill me?” I asked dad.
“I think he knows some things, as it can’t be a coincidence that she was on your first list. But what all he knows, I’m not sure. I just thought he was always hard on you because he blamed me for his son’s death. When Jake died I, had to be the one to come and tell him about what happened. I told him there was a fight and that I couldn’t save him.”
“I knew that mother fucker was extra hard on me all those years. He hates kids, and especially me because he blamed you for his son’s death. I’d bet a hundred that he put her on my list dad.”
“That would mean he’s working with...”
“Exactly.”
“He can’t know everything. If he did, why wouldn’t he just tell the Mobrolantis about me in the first place?”
“He probably doesn’t know you are sisters. If I knew Jake like I think I did, he probably started working with the Demon to try and kill your mother. If you were a Reaper trying to get into Demon status, what better way than go to the Demon with the ultimate plan. I’d put a million souls on the fact that he told that Demon it was his kid and his master plan to get the Demon into heaven. Mobrolantis is under assumption that because Lacie is half and half that she’ll have powers that no other being possess. That she would be able to port to both realms. That had to be what he meant when he said those words to me. Nothing else makes sense. But in reality his plan failed because she doesn’t have any powers and couldn’t port that Demon to heaven even if she wanted to. No human or reaper that he’d be able to possess can port to heaven.”
“But I can.” I said exposing my secret. “I can port anywhere dad, heaven hell it doesn’t matter. It’s me he wants, and now I finally know why. He thought it was Lacie who could take him up to Heaven for an invasion but it’s really me. If he were to possess me, he’d be able to go anywhere. This is what he meant when it said it was me all along…he knows,” I said with a shudder as chills ran up my arms.
“You can port to heaven?” Everyone but Trevor asked in shock.
“This is way too much to process,” I said as I grabbed Trevor’s hand and he squeezed it tightly.
“I know, if I would have been honest with you from the beginning so much of this wouldn’t have happened. Have you told anyone else about your ability to port to Heaven Cendall?” Dad asked.
“No.”
“Okay that’s good, I don’t think they’d like that. But considering Abram and I have both found you guys so easily we should get moving now.”
“To where?” I asked not wanting to leave this place before I had time to process all of this. I’d gone from losing everything I ever knew, to now finding out I had a sister and an uncle I’d never known about. What if I had gone against my instincts and really killed her, only to find this information out at a later date. I wouldn’t have been able to live with myself…thank you instincts. All this time I knew something wasn’t right about this. Finally fate had given me a clue suggesting my assumption was correct.
I looked around the room. For once it held everyone I cared about at the same time. My old and new found family surrounded me, giving me temporary relief. I’d worry about a demon wanting to possess me tomorrow. We joined hands and dad ported us to our next location.
The end…for now.
More
Book three of the Death Has A Daughter Series is coming in March of 2015
Other novels by Candice Burnett
Caylee’s Confessions Series
Caylee’s Confessions
Revamped
Death Has a Daughter Series
Death Has A Daughter
Death’s Dilemma
DHAD 3 (title TBA in 2015)