Free Locked (The Heaven's Gate Trilogy) by C.B. Day Page B

sweeping up her books and heading out the door.
    I looked at the books and
papers strewn about our study carrel and sighed.  It seemed I might have to get
used to being the one to clean up after Tabitha’s big ideas – and the mess that
followed.  I began tidying up, separating the books and magazines into piles
for reshelving. 
    I looked at the clock.  I
still had time to kill before I could catch the extra-curricular bus home.  Idly,
I typed my homepage into the browser and scanned the news.  Celebrity gossip,
another big company merger – nothing of interest until at the bottom of the
page, I spied a link labeled “Miracle in Africa.”  I clicked through and read
how some Ethiopian refugees were claiming that some miraculous light from
Heaven had suddenly appeared and rescued them from the middle of a firefight between
two warlords.  The locals said it was the 7 th or 8 th time
they’d seen the light.
    As I was reading, the
slow prickle of someone’s eyes on me worked its way up the back of my neck.  I
turned, half hoping it was Michael coming to see me, and my heart fell.   There
in the stacks stood Lucas, eyeing me speculatively.  I flushed, and he grinned,
one eyebrow arching as if he knew exactly what I had been thinking.  Hurriedly,
I grabbed my things and abandoned the carrel, my fingers drifting up to touch
my Mark and ward off his gaze.
    *****
    After a week of work,
we’d learned it wasn’t going to be as easy as we’d thought to set up the
interviews with the human trafficking victims.  Tabitha was persistent, but
every place she called protested in the name of client privacy.  We sat around
my kitchen table, staring at the big red circle Tabitha had made on our
research plan.
“We’re already behind,” she moaned.  “If we can’t get any one to talk to us, I
don’t know what we’ll do.”
    Mom muted her phone.  She
had an uncanny ability to follow a conference call and keep up with our
conversation.   Without turning from the presentation up on her computer
screen, she interjected, “I have a client on the Board of ‘Street Grace.’  Do
you want me to call her and ask her for help?”
    Tabitha squealed with
delight, clapping her hands like a child.  “Oh, Mrs. Carmichael, could you?
That would be so awesome.”
    “I’d be happy to,
Tabitha.  It sounds like a good cause, at any rate,” she said, carefully eyeing
me.
    Tabitha didn’t notice the
look as she bounded across the kitchen to give me a hug.  “Your Mom is the
best.  I’m going to make you dinner as a thank you, Mrs. C.  Is that okay?”
    Mom looked surprised. 
“Sure, Tabitha, as long as you clear it with your parents.  And don’t forget
about the technology risk; it is the biggest challenge facing this venture.”
    Now it was Tabitha’s turn
to look confused.
    “Conference call,” I
mouthed to her, pointing at the phone as I headed into the pantry.  Tabitha
followed behind me and began rummaging through the shelves.
    “Your mom seems pretty
cool,” she said, turning packages this way and that.  “What about your dad?”
    “He’s not here.  They’ve
been apart for a long time,” I said, paying an inordinate amount of attention
to the nutrition label on a box of spaghetti.
    She plucked some olives
and capers from a corner and blew the dust off the jars.  “This will do.  You
ever cook?” she asked me, pulling the spaghetti out of my hands.
    “I’m more of the take-out
type,” I shrugged.
    She flipped her long
bangs – today, streaked neon green -- back as she turned and left the pantry. 
“My father taught me to cook when I was little.  I do dinner for the whole
family every Friday.  You should come over this Friday.  We can go out after. 
A bunch of us were talking about going to Stone Mountain after dark.  It’ll be
fun.  And you can sleep over.”
    “Isn’t Stone Mountain
closed at night?” The doubt in my voice hung in the air but Tabitha ploughed
right through