Winters (Book Five)

Chapter Nine

Chapter Nine

"Lena! Please, please I need help," her desperate voice rings from the phone. My hand grips tighter around the thin piece of metal as I start to shake.

"Hadley?" I ask, a tremor evident in my voice. How did she even get this number to call me?

"Lena, please! I need your help, I-" her voice cuts off and I panic. Grabbing my mask off the counter. I glance into the empty apartment and pray Avi doesn't come home.

"Where are you, Hadley?" I ask her seriously. My phone buzzes in my hand and I can see that she sent me her location. I hear sobbing on the other end and I try to focus, it takes me a few bounces but I find the building. It's condemned and looks charred to hell.

A shrill scream pierces through the silent air and I look around desperately. I don't see her slender build anywhere as I hear shuffling, I realize it's coming from the roof, and my stomach drops. Yanking the shadows around me, I land on the roof and it feels more stable than it looks.

"Hadley!" I scream shocked, bolting over to her curled-up figure, I smell blood but can't figure out where she is bleeding from.

"Lena," she says softly. Pulling her into a seated position, I try to focus on what she's saying over the roar of the blood rushing in my ears.

"Take off your scarf, I need to figure out where you are bleeding from. What happened? Who attacked you? Where's the redhead you are with?" I ask her a million questions all at once.

I had been over this way once a few months ago, something drew me to this horrible part of town and I just let myself follow my gut. As I stood on the roof of a destroyed and decaying building, I heard her laugh overhead. Looking up, I saw her for the first time in nine years, her face securely wrapped in a black scarf but the happiness in her eyes was obvious. I ducked behind an old heating unit, and I keyed in on the younger girl with her. She had a bush of unruly curly hair that was an unnatural red color.

"No, no, stop. Leave the scarf alone," Hadley stuttered out and her hands wrapped around my wrist.

"I know what I did Hades, you called me to help you. Please don't fight me on this," I said softly. Pain smothering my voice as I choked out the words. Every day I regret it, and every day I regret not being honest with Avi from the beginning, but making sure Hadley is safe first is more important.

"No! Stop," she hisses and I am shoved back.

Stumbling backward, I fall onto my butt and look at the seated woman in front of me and I wait for the crackle of electricity to fill the air. I wait for something that would remind me of my sister, but everything is oddly still. Eyeing the woman in front of me, I freeze.

"You aren't her," I say as I bolt to my feet and back up. Scanning the area concerned, I don't notice anyone or anything else.

"Of course, I am! I'm your sister," she hisses but I hear it, the inflection is off. The New York accent is too hard, Hadley barely ever had any accent, but it's been almost a decade. Did that change?

"My sister wouldn't hesitate to rip the scarf off and show me the damage that was done. That I did," I hiss as I continue to look for a safe place to go, but all the buildings around here look unstable and ready to cave in. The street is so far away and my eyes are shot from the day.

"You are such an idiot Lena, you always have been," the woman hisses. But the more she talks, the more I realize she isn't Hadley. This isn't my sister and I need to get out of here.

Pain sears through my skull and chest and I crumble to my knees trying to breathe. I can't get up; the lack of oxygen is instant and the world starts spinning around me. I try to gasp something out, scream even. But I just heave for air in my mask and as I collapse to the ground, I see a blurred figure standing over me before everything goes dark.