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  The Temple

  Heather Marie Adkins

  Copyright 2011 by Heather Marie Adkins

  Smashwords Edition

  Smashwords Edition, License Notes

  This book is protected under the copyright laws of the United States of America. Any reproduction or other unauthorized use of the material or artwork herein is prohibited.

  This ebook is licensed for your personal enjoyment only. This ebook may not be re-sold or given away to other people. If you would like to share this book with another person, please purchase an additional copy for each recipient. If you’re reading this book and did not purchase it, or it was not purchased for your use only, then please return to Smashwords.com and purchase your own copy. Thank you for respecting the hard work of this author.

  Disclaimer: The persons, places, things, and otherwise animate or inanimate objects mentioned in this novel are figments of the author's imagination. Any resemblance to anything or anyone living (or dead) is unintentional. The author humbly begs your pardon. This is fiction, people.

  This one is for my daddy;

  he is always right.

  Chapter 1

  My nails were still drying, shining like fresh blood in the ambient evening light that came through the windows of my bedroom as I spread lotion on my legs. Cool air seeped through the ancient panes, raising goose bumps on my skin. The chill, dry English wind was wreaking havoc on my pores. I’d gone through almost an entire bottle of tea tree lotion since the minute I came off the plane, and a lack of Bath and Body Works meant I wouldn’t be replacing the bottle anytime soon.

  Downstairs in the kitchen, my clock radio played bad 90s rock in between bouts of rambling British nonsense. It was taking some getting used to, living in a foreign country; unfamiliar slang and people with accents so thick you could stab a knife through them. Anybody who has said the English speak the same language as Americans was dreaming, or drunk. I swiped the last of the lotion onto my neck, shivering.

  Adipiphine jumped on my bed with a little mewling purr, and curled into the spot I had vacated a short time before, the indentation from my body probably still warm. Her fluffy black form was a perfect oval on my cream colored sheets as she licked contentedly at the fur sticking out from between the pads of one paw. I dropped a pat to her heart-shaped head, comforted by her presence.

  I felt refreshed, having slept through the brightest hours of the day before capping it off with a long, hot shower. My landlord said the building was older than his parents (and he was no spring chicken himself), but the tub was brand new, just installed last year. It was a claw foot, high backed affair surrounded by a red plaid shower curtain that would at some point be replaced by something more my style. The shower head had a flow that rivaled the best waterfall, resulting in issues actually getting out of the shower.

  It had taken almost a week to finally get over the jet lag. I’d barely left but for groceries; a far cry from the girl who used every excuse in the book to get out of the house as a teen. But now, I felt energized, standing in my very own apartment, with my very own furniture, ready to embark on my new employment venture; sketchy, though it seemed.

  With no hands and just a thought, I sent the bottle of lotion I was using sailing across the room and into the red wicker basket on my dresser. It clicked into place between a metal can of hair spray and a bottle of cheap, green hair gel. Squinting into the dim room, another thought had my hairbrush flying through the air and into my hand with a slapping sound that hurt as much as it sounded. “Oww,” I groaned, switching hands and shaking out my injured palm.

  I guess I forgot to mention I’m not exactly what one would consider normal.

  At three, I lifted my adoptive mother, Theresa, a foot in the air by wrapping my two stubby arms around one of her legs. According to her recount of the story, I didn’t wobble once while mumbling unintelligibly at her in delight. She just politely asked me to put her down and picked up the phone to call her husband, Dane, to share the revelation that their daughter was exhibiting signs of super-strength.

  The two of them have been steadfast enthusiasts since my powers began to surface. I know I’m lucky to have them; lucky because for every strange thing I did, they didn’t run screaming the other direction, ripping out handfuls of hair and cursing the gods. Nothing short of fate could have brought me to them.

  Interrupted from my musings by a yowl from Addie, I bent down and cupped her ebony head, scratching my thumbs behind her ears. She shut her eyes, her purr a freight train. If my cat had her way, I'd be giving her ears constant attention.

  Leaving Addie to her ecstasy, I pulled my brush through my hair. It was black and thick as the bowels of earth and hung past my shoulder blades with a full fringe of bangs constantly in my dark brown eyes. I used my free hand to push back the curtain at my window, gazing out into the night. It was densely forested behind my building, and the River Lee flowed just beyond the first line of trees, an incessant gurgling that could be heard when the sash was up. In the evenings, the sun dipping into the horizon would set the river on fire—the days we actually saw the sun.

  “I’m nervous,” I told Addie, fingering the rough linen curtain. A slight breeze rocked the trees out back as if they were trying to bow to the earth in penance.

  Her bright green eyes peered up at me, framed by pointy eyelashes. Why? the tilt of her head inquired.

  “Because I know nothing about this place or this job.”

  You’re the idiot who accepted it without asking questions. She used her scornful voice in my imagination. I sighed, knowing I was talking to myself and that usually precluded being locked up in the bin of crazies.

  I padded downstairs in my bare feet, the wood floors cold. Addie slithered along behind me, the two of us passing through my living area with its well-worn couch and loveseat, the dark TV and the maroon recliner losing its stuffing. I’d purchased them all on the internet from various occupants of the English countryside, so none of them matched, but they were comfy.

  My kitchen was tucked in the back, only a single counter with three mismatched bar stools separating it from the living room. I plucked the long, white envelope off the gray marble, and pulled out a sheet of paper I’d already read and re-read too many times. I shoved a spoon into the roll of cookie dough in my refrigerator and stuck it in my mouth before shutting off the radio announcer in mid-sentence and unfolding the letter.

  I found it cryptic, my call to arms, so to speak. A job offer…meet at a specific GPS location in plain clothes by nine p.m. Today. I’d received the letter the day I arrived, as if they’d been watching me—whoever They should be. Dodgy, yes, but not all that out of the ordinary to a girl who could bend steel and shatter fine china with her mind. According to Dane, I was being offered the job strictly because of my powers.

  The cookie dough was sweet and salty on my tongue. I crossed an arm under my breasts, leaning my hip on the sink beneath the kitchen window and taking my time eating it, with Addie’s petite body rubbing my ankles adoringly. The moon shone like a lantern through the small window over the sink, an arc of white soaring just above the tree line. Closing my eyes, I reveled in the silence of my new home—my own home. Nobody here to keep me from pattering around in my lacy bits, to warn me off of eating raw cookie dough, or to flip on the lights when all I wanted was darkness.

  The phone rang and I dropped my spoon, licked clean, into the sink before answering, “Yeah?”

  “Vale? It’s Theresa. How you getting on, sweetie?”

  As usual, her chirpy, maternal voice brought a smile to my face. The woman always knew just when to call. “Good. Homesick, but settling in. It’s really pretty here, if a little overboard on the freezing rain.” Bending down, I cradled my cat’s body in my arms
and the phone between my shoulder and ear, before I headed back upstairs to get dressed.

  “How’s the apartment? Did Dane do you good? He sent you an email last night with some names and numbers of friends he has there. In case you need anything.” She paused, then added, “Like a home cooked meal.”

  She just had to go there. I dropped Addie on the soft down comforter crumpled on the bed before answering.

  “He has friends everywhere, and I’m perfectly capable of feeding myself.” My father, Dane, had told me he’d never been here before, but it was his friend who got me the place. I glanced around my townhouse, all windows and vibrant colors. I stood in the loft-style bedroom, the balcony overlooking the dark living room to my left.

  “Cookie dough and tuna sandwiches do not cover the bases of the food pyramid,” she chastised gently.

  “I start work tonight,” I told her, attempting to aim the conversation away from my controversial eating habits and into successful territory. I rifled through my dresser for a tank top.

  Theresa drew in a breath. “It makes me nervous you know, you out there alone. You don’t know anything about this job!”

  ”You should know better by now,” I laughed, choosing a lacy camisole and sniffing it for foul odors. “I’m cut out for security.”

  She was silent for a moment. In the background I could hear the clink of dishes accompanied by splashing water. “You could have at least gone for a real law enforcement position. Your grandfather was a police officer, you know.”

  “How’s Macy? Is she doing okay with classes?” I asked, smoothly changing subjects, once again. It’s an art form with my mother. Macy, Theresa and Dane’s biological daughter, was born four years after I came to live with them, and she’s the light to my dark. Short and elfish with golden blond hair and piercing green eyes, she was a miniature Theresa with her daddy’s smile and the kind of curvy body that went out of style years ago. I took to the role of big sister with reckless abandon and have come out with a lifelong partner in crime. My oddities were already a daily occurrence before Macy, so when I could set the table at age nine without lifting a finger it was just less work for her.

  “Good, I think. She loves her Feminist Literature teacher, but I don’t think she cares for her Biology teacher. He’s very chauvinistic, and you know how your sister is. Oh!” Theresa lowered her voice. I could picture her cupping her mouth and the receiver like a teenager telling secrets. I bet she probably soaked the phone in dishwater. “She brought a girl home for dinner last night.”

  “That’s great! What was she like?” I’d only met one girlfriend before. It’d taken Macy a long time to finally come out, which is funny considering Dane and Theresa’s love-all, be-all hippie open-mindedness.

  “A lovely, lovely girl named Amy,” Theresa answered with a sigh. I could picture her standing over the sink, hand-washing the dishes she was going to put into the dishwasher. She’d be wearing the frilly pink apron Dane bought her for their fifteenth anniversary, over a billowy, ankle length skirt and sheer peasant blouse. The apron reads Don’t anger the cook, she has access to household poisons. It's my favorite. “She had pretty brown hair chopped right about her chin, and a heart shaped face with just the biggest, darkest eyes, a little like yours, dear. And she wore a dress! A pretty flowered thing, like what your sister likes to wear.”

  “Keep me posted on the Amy front, but I’ve gotta get ready for work, Mom.” I told her I loved her and hung up, tossing the cordless on the bed where it would lose it’s charge before I remembered to put it back on the base. Addie glared at me when it bounced twice and came to rest against her. She shuffled sideways, dripping disdain.

  I settled on a pair of stone washed jeans and a black tank top with gray Nikes. Thudding back to the kitchen, I tossed together a turkey sandwich, bypassing the cupboard full of tuna on principle, and opened a can of fish innards for Addie. She mewed girlishly, rubbing my ankles before digging in. We ate in silence side by side.

  The forecast had been for a cold one, so I threw on a black zip-up hoodie and slipped into a black and gold University of Southern Mississippi toboggan. Locking the door to my bumble ahode in the cool night air, I took a deep breath and smelled peace.

  It was an inky night. The sky glittered with the frost of a thousand stars, the moon hiding out behind a gargantuan cloud. So far out in the country, Quicksilver didn’t have many street lights, and what few they did have lined the main street through what was considered “downtown.” My apartment complex was a two story, six side-by-side units brick building about a fifteen minute drive from town proper. The only other civilization nearby was a set of apartments across the street, and the occasional farmhouse set off the road between home and Main.

  I’d purchased a tiny black Mini Cooper, the kind that looked stylish but would mean certain death in a battle with an SUV. Lucky the Brits were unlike Americans, who thirst for “bigger is better.” No Ford Heavy-Duty or Hummer in my neighborhood. I loved how I towered over the short car and could look down into the sunroof, yet once inside it was spacey and chic. Not that I cared about chic, of course.

  Don’t tell anybody.

  I clicked the button on my key chain to unlock the doors, and slid inside.

  It still smelled like new car. The engine barely made a sound when I turned it over, backed out of the lot and took a right on to the street. I shifted easily for someone who’d only just recently learned how to handle a manual transmission, traveling an empty stretch of highway to pass through town.

  Quicksilver was sleeping. The single stretch of Main Street was devoid of any sign of life; no lights on in the stores, no people walking, and no cars parked on the sides of the street. I passed the bakery and deli, my favorite little grocery with the bright purple awning, and a couple antique and clothing stores, all with locked doors and closed signs. The road itself was a study in disaster, rutted with holes that shook my car as I passed over them.

  My headlights illuminated street after empty street as I avidly followed each turn barked out by Lucy, the trusty GPS with a saucy Australian accent, on the way out of town. A sharp left had me turning into a wall of trees, where the road became narrow and only roughly paved. Within a minute, I was creeping down a dirt road, the arc of my headlights hitting nothing but deep darkness.

  “You have reached your destination,” Lucy said in her phone sex voice. I turned her off as I came to a stop in a small clearing, the screen going black and plunging the car into darkness. A tan SUV—color me corrected—of indecipherable make waited for me, parking lights on. A white haired man was leaning against the back bumper, and as I exited my vehicle, he came to shake my hand, long tan coat swishing. His smile was genuine, the hair at his temples light gray in deep contrast to his chestnut hair.

  “Miss Avari, so nice to meet you,” he said kindly in an impeccable English accent. “I have spoken at length with your father of you. I’m Edward Nice.” He pronounced his last name like the Paris vacation hot spot, not the adjective.

  I nodded and glanced around, gesturing to the dark forest. “I’m not about to be kidnapped and sent to a military lab for testing, am I? I don’t do well in small spaces.”

  His laugh was hearty as he clapped a hand to my shoulder. The smile that accompanied the sound made him intensely handsome, for a man who was old enough to have borne and raised my parents. “Heavens no, my dear! Here, your unusual talents could well come in handy and will most surely be commended. If you would follow me?”

  We crunched across a bed of fallen leaves and into the trees, surrounded by the symphony of the night. The insects droned in a ceaseless wave of noise, broken only by our footsteps on the ground. I caught the eye of a fox, sliding silently through the underbrush about ten feet to the right, and his tongue flicked out at me as he licked his lips. I’ve got damn near perfect night vision, a plus when I played nighttime Capture the Flag back home. It gets boring in small town America. Population 996 on a good day, my hometown was 75 miles from the
nearest city and nothing but woods and river. You learn to amuse yourself early in a setting like that.

  “So, from what I understand, you’ve got more powers than you know what to do with. An all-purpose kind of girl, eh?” His smile was infectious, but his gaze too intense, too seeing.

  I shoved my hands into the pockets of my hoodie and averted my eyes. “You could say that.”

  “Levitation, including of yourself, if I understand correctly.”

  I nodded, blowing out a breath that was visible in the air. “I can use a vessel of some kind to levitate myself, like a broom or a carpet, but I can’t fly.”

  “Ah, a modern day witch!” We both chuckled; not the first time I’d heard that little joke. It tickled my parents to death. “So, night vision, super strength, telekinesis, some psychic abilities, am I right?”

  “I can speak to spirits if they come to me, but I can’t summon them. I’ve never had the training. And I can hold objects and,” I searched for the word I wanted, “just, know things about them.” I certainly didn’t want to talk about the most embarrassing power I have; thankfully, he didn’t bring it up. Score one to my dad for keeping some things to himself.

  It came out when I hit puberty. I remember it was cloudy and cold outside, or as cold as it gets in southern Mississippi. Our school had been about forty years old, with a heating system to match. I’d worn old, wool gloves to school and had been chilled enough to sit through three class periods with them on. At lunch, I was surrounded by bodies and warmth. I took off my gloves to pick at the vile chicken-based product that passed as protein and crunchy mac and cheese on my plate, only half listening to my friends.

  We were talking about kissing, oddly enough. At that age, everything’s interesting if you haven’t done it. Aaron Stockholm, one of my best friends, was turned around and gesticulating wildly with a classmate across the room, when I reached over and grabbed his forearm to get his attention. I watched in shock as the touch of my hand gave my thirteen year-old classmate his first orgasm.