Book of Secrets

CHAPTER ONE-4

The apartment seemed cavernous without Stacy’s cheerful clutter spread everywhere. Bella shut the door and leaned against it, exhaling slowly. She walked into her room and put her suitcase down, then turned down the hall into the bathroom. She started the tub filling, then undressed and sank into the warm water, trying her best to let her mind go blank.

She had not realized until now how exhausting it had all been. She had traveled back and forth from Phoenix to Virginia a handful of times since that fateful call in June. Then in early December when Rose took a turn for the worst, she had powered through her finals early – thank God for understanding professors – and hopped a plane.

The last month had pretty much been a blur; every waking moment spent at the hospital, then the funeral service, and lastly the plane ride back to Phoenix.

She thought back to when she was eight. When her parents had died, it was sudden and a complete shock. And it completely sucked. This time, it was announced, so to speak. Instead of quick and unexpected, Granma’s decline was slow and brutal to watch. And it completely sucked.

Even if someone had had the stupidity or nerve to ask which was easier to deal with, Bella wouldn’t have been able to answer.

Her stomach growled to get her attention. Food. Now there was a thought. Bella realized she hadn’t eaten all day. She pulled the plug on the tub and stepped out, reaching for a towel. Wrapping it around herself, she tucked the corner in at the top and turned to the mirror absentmindedly.

Wow. I really do look different with this shorter hair, she thought to herself. But I kinda like it. Easier to manage, anyway.

She put on her ‘comfort clothes’ – yoga pants and an oversized sweatshirt -and went to the living room. Reaching for the phone, she dialed Ping’s Palace and ordered her usual chicken fried rice with mushrooms and bean sprouts, and an extra eggroll. She fixed a cup of hot tea and settled in on the sofa to watch TV while she waited for dinner to arrive.

And it occurred to Bella – this was the getting on with living that she and Grandpa talked about. She was managing it. It might not be easy, but she was doing it.

***

* * * *

Mikel came awake with a start.

Where am I? his mind raced.

I’m in my room, of course Where the hell else would I be?

But he knew why he was disoriented. The face he had been picturing in his dreams almost every night for six months was more vivid than usual. His angel.

Bella.

“I must see her again,” he said aloud in the darkness. “I must make her mine.”

He felt the familiar strain of p***s against pajama bottom and fought to clear his mind. He knew he could have anyone he wanted. There were several women right here in the complex he could bed if he wanted to.

But he didn’t want them. He wanted Bella.

Sighing, he rolled out of bed and pulled on his clothes. There was only one other way he knew to soothe the heat that surged through him.

Striding out into the hall, he approached what looked to be a broom closet door. He opened it, placed his palm on the scanner, and was rewarded with a red elevator door opening. He punched in his keycode, then pressed the button for Sub-Level Three. Once the door opened at his destination, he repeated the security protocols and then a retinal scan to access the tunnel entrance.

Mikel traveled through to the decontamination chamber and suited up. He pressed the keypad at the far end, walked through the negatively pressured antechamber, and entered his workrooms.

Stopping at the first station, he picked up the clipboard and murmured, “Good evening.”

***