Total pages in book: 103
Estimated words: 98697 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 493(@200wpm)___ 395(@250wpm)___ 329(@300wpm)
Estimated words: 98697 (not accurate)
Estimated Reading Time in minutes: 493(@200wpm)___ 395(@250wpm)___ 329(@300wpm)
“How are ya, Gran?”
“I’ve been better. How are ye, Deja?” She cups the side of my face and turns her head to kiss my forehead.
“I’m grand. No need to worry about me.”
“Och, but I do. I worry about ye a lot. Especially when yer name comes up from auld friends,” she says as she looks at me.
I lift my head and sit up a little. She’s looking back at me searchingly. I have no idea who she’s talking about.
“Auld friends?” I lift a questioning brow.
“Aye, there’s an auld gypsy named Phoebe Romaine. She lives in America now. Years ago, she told me some things I had a hard time believing.
“I wish I would have listened back then. Your da’ would still be here and ye would have had the life ye wanted instead of being stuck here with an auld dying woman.” Her words are cut off by another coughing fit.
“I’m not stuck here. I love it here with ya.”
“That’s a load o’ mince. Blaeflummery ye speak. Yer a young lass, ye don’t date, ye work in that crumby auld pub when ye are smarter than most the people in this village and ye never bring friends around.
“What type of life is this? Ye should be off with a young lad of ye own. I feel like I’m robbing ye of yer life.”
“Now that’s rubbish. I could date if I wanted to. I just don’t want to. Friends are overrated. I love being here to look after ya and soak in yer wisdom,” I say with a smile.
“Wisdom,” she snorts. “Wisdom would have been holding Archie’s head under water until he stopped breathing or telling Lennox to take him out back to put a bullet in his head before the blood of the innocent rained down on our heads.”
“Huh?”
“Those were Phoebe’s words: ‘The blood of the innocent will rain down on your heads’. Archie was a bad egg. She warned me, but what mother wants to be responsible for taking her own son’s life?
“Instead, I’m responsible for the deaths of my two grandsons and the love of my life. I will take that pain to the grave, but I’ll tell ye what guilt I can’t bear.
“I will not hold ye here with me until my death. Ye will leave me soon and I want ye to know yer supposed to. It will be fine.”
“Gran, I’m confused. What are ya talking about?”
“Phoebe has sent a letter. In it, she has told me ye don’t belong here anymore. Ah dinnae ken everything she has said, but the one thing that’s clear is that ye will be leaving and greater things await ye.”
My mind is racing as I try to follow what she’s saying. This day is only getting stranger by the second. I think everyone has lost their noodles.
I lick my lips as I think to ask my gran what in the world my uncles were talking about. I have no idea what this old woman could gain from lying to me. I’ve been good to her.
“Gran, I have a question. Why did my mum send me here? What am I hiding from?”
She smiles and her eyes mist up. “Aye, Phoebe said this would be the beginning. Once ye asked after ye mum, it would all fall into place. The lad who loves ye is already here, isn’t he?”
I jerk my head back. My mouth is flapping open and closed. I feel like I’ve stepped out of my body as an observer at this point.
“I’m not sure I know what yer talking about.”
“Aye, ye do. Ye will see. Phoebe says ye have to unlearn a thing or two, but ye will. Ye will have friends and comfort and family.
“Just not here with me. Deja yer journey is coming. Ye have the gift the old man wanted ye to have, now it’s time ye use it. ‘A mother will be scorned, but the child of the lions will rise to roar.’”
“What are ya talking about, Gran?”
“Those were her words. Yer mum and da …” She begins to cough again.
I’m on the edge of my seat to hear what she is about to say. However, after a few moments pass and her coughing spell doesn’t, I snap out of it and get her a glass of water. Gran finishes the water and waves me off as she closes her eyes.
I sit beside her once again, staring into space as I replay her words. When her snores begin to fill the room, I sigh. I don’t know how to feel about any of this, and I still don’t have any answers.
CHAPTER 18
Take His Place
Brooklyn
“Now that I know where Logan is, I’m doing everything I can to get him home. However, that’s not being made easy, and I have to be careful,” Sam says as we sit in a private room at Club Desire.