Scream in the Wind (Paranormal Peacekeepers: Book Two)

Chapter Nine

CHAPTER NINE

Grace

12:04

I glared at the numbers on the clock. I shouldn't have been in bed. I should have been knee deep in an investigation. But I was alone. The lights were off, the curtains were drawn, and Miles was gone.

Groggy, and with a splitting headache, I pushed myself off the bed and immediately fell to the floor in a painful heap when my limbs gave out on me.

"Holy shit," I groaned, grabbing my head as stars danced in my vision.

I pushed up until I could brace my back against the bed and my head lolled back, sending uncomfortable waves through my already stiff neck. As I massaged my spine and tried to shake the sleep from my eyes, a bottle on the bedside table caught my attention.

Orange juice.

I didn't remember Miles ever returning with the drink, and I definitely didn't remember draining it. But propped against the bottle sat a Paranormal Peacekeeper calling card.

Carefully, as to not agitate my already throbbing head, I inched toward the bedside table and grabbed the small white square. Turning it over in my hands, I read the words printed there, and let my mouth fall slack.

My first instinct was to cry. To pick up the phone, dial his number, and demand to know why. Why would he do this? After everything we'd been through, after everything we talked about, what on earth made him think that this was the right course of action?

The blank side of the card held five words. Five simple words that should have soothed me, but instead stoked the flames of anger I'd been trying so hard to contain.

I love you. I'm sorry.

After flinging the card across the room, I shrugged off the last of whatever drug was making me drowsy and made my way to my feet. And just as quickly, I crumbled back to the ground.

"Dammit!"

The heat of my anger mixed with the icy pulse of sadness swirled together in my chest, twisting until my heart was enveloped in a painful tornado of emotion.

"Why?"

As soon as the word died in the open air, I knew why. I knew and it killed me that I was at fault. As much as I wanted to blame someone else -namely, Miles- I couldn't. Because he didn't make the decision alone. He wouldn't.

But a unanimous vote would. If the Peacekeepers wanted to exclude me from an investigation, they could. Easily.

And I couldn't blame them.

I was broken. Every day another piece of my control fell away. They were blocking me out. Maybe just for one night, maybe for a month. Or a year. Or until whatever this was that was raging to life inside me was banished.

Either way, I was being excluded.

There were many things I could tolerate, but being left alone while people turned their backs on me definitely wasn't one of them.

That old voice, the one that told me I wasn't good enough, returned with a vengeance. And this time, I didn't try to quiet her. No. This time, I wasn't scared. I couldn't control much when it came to my life, but there was one thing I could control.

The darkness.

I wrapped my hand around the bar of black tourmaline resting at my neck... and tugged.

The silver chain broke and pooled into a pile in my hand. Shuddering through a million different emotions, I dropped it to the ground before reaching into my left pocket and extracting the small onyx stone that always rested there. It joined the tourmaline pendant on the floor. As did the obsidian in my right pocket.