What Lies Beneath (As Above, So Below) Vol. 1

Chapter Two

CHAPTER TWO

Going, Going...

Much like my favorite cat, I hate Mondays. I woke up in my fluffy bed on my stomach and clutching a pillow. I could hear my brother shuffling around and packing up. It was time to go.

We didn't actually have a home. We used to, of course. Back when he'd first gotten me, we'd settled when we could. Mom and Dad had left us a lot of money and a plan that Jax had followed perfectly. Never too long in one place. You lingered, you got found out. When the threat of me being taken loomed over him, he was very cautious. But I was eighteen now, so we were safe in that one regard.

I groaned and sat up, blinking when Jax ripped open the curtains, blinding me. "Blah!"

"Hush," he said before he turned around. "Get up if you want an Egg McMuffin."

I covered my head with my blanket. "Boo, I say! I think it would be best if you let me sleep. Mean Mila isn't a person you want with you in a van for — Wait, where the hell are we going?"

He sighed and ripped the blanket off my head. "Dunno. I thought we could pick on the road. How does Kansas sound?"

I gagged. "Wheat and antichrists. No thank you."

He rolled his eyes at me. "If I have to hear about those damn books again..." He stood with his hands at his sides, looking around blankly as if the walls would give him something clever to say. "...then I will be very bummed out. Now get up, or I'll sing."

I stuck my tongue out at him.

"Diiiiiamonds are foreeeeeeveeeer!" he belted out without shame or decency.

I shook my fist at him. "Why must you rob me of my sleep? I was dreaming about that chicken again. I almost had him this time."

"FOOOR WHEN LOVE'S GONE—"

"I GET IT! Stop, or I'll break out that Futurama song."

He frowned. "Please don't..."

Ha. Always got him. I was actually a pretty good singer, so I always made him get misty-eyed when I sang it. "If it takes forever..." I started.

He covered his ears and started singing "la-la-la-la-la-la-la" until I stopped. "The dog just waited there, La!"

I nodded and stood up. "I know," I said and patted his shoulder.

I showered and changed into something that would be comfortable for a long drive. It was May, but that meant something different for every place in this country. I decided to just go with a shirt and shorts. I could pull off my cowgirl boots with anything, so I put them on and left the bathroom.

While I was tying my hair up in a ponytail, I walked over to my bag and started packing up. I was annoyed to find that the wallet I'd lifted from Lefty wasn't actually a wallet. It was some kind of address book or something. There were a lot of contacts and some meetings jotted down, but it was of no use to me. It was somewhere in my bag to be thrown away later.

I slipped my knife into my pocket like I always did. We were safe in the car, of course, but at this point it was more like a security blanket. Jax had gotten it for me when I was fourteen. He'd said to never leave home without it, so I hadn't.

Home then had been a little town in Ventura County, California. We would stay in one place for a whole semester before we would find a new place. He knew how to make the papers they needed to let me enroll. A skill he'd learned from Dad, he said.