Page 7 of The Curse

When I reached the little girl, I did something that felt instinctive. I threw my body over her tiny frame and braced for the impact that I feared I might not survive. While the car wasn’t traveling fast, it was still a fucking heavy piece of machinery. I felt the steel as it crashed into my body, the pain and impact knocking the air from my lungs and a scream from my throat. I also felt another random wave of energy wrap around me, cocooning me and the small girl in some sort of protective shell. Oh, the pain was still there, and I could hear people screaming,finallyacknowledging that something tragic was happening. The little girl beneath me whimpered.

And then I felt and heard nothing at all.

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“Are you okay?” A voice was asking and then screaming, “Somebody call an ambulance! He needs an ambulance!”

I tried to move, moaned, and then, without opening my eyes, did a mental evaluation of all the aches and pains that were rudely reminding my body I was still alive. Since everything hurt, I assumed everything was still in working condition, or at least my back or neck hadn’t been broken on impact. Slowly, I opened my eyes to find an older lady leaning over me, a concerned expression making her wrinkles even more prominent. The witch hat sitting askew on the top of her head didn’t help her overall appearance of nurse extraordinaire, either.

“Don’t move, Sweetheart. They’ve called for an ambulance. Everything’s going to be fine,” she assured me as her hands busied themselves by touching every inch of my body in search of injuries.

Suddenly, I remembered everything that had happened and I sat up quickly, looking all around me for the little girl that I’d tried to rescue. “Where’s the little girl? Is she all right? Please tell me she’s okay,” I asked. The panic in my voice increased with each word because I couldn’t find the tiny tot that had caused me to throw my body in front of a moving car.

The old lady moved back several inches and frowned. “What little girl, honey? There wasn’t a little girl. Just you and the car. Did you hit your head?” She looked around at the crowd surrounding us. “I think he’s hit his head. Someone called an ambulance, right? He needs an ambulance.”

There wasn’t a little girl? What. The. Fuck? There was a little girl. I saw her. She was the reason I’d found the strength to throw off whatever had hit me on the sidewalk and make my body move. If it hadn’t been for her, I would still be bent over in debilitating pain.

My eyes cut through the crowd and focused on the windows of the museum. This time, both Bella and Morgan were looking out the window of the third floor. Morgan was standing slightly behind Bella with her hand wrapped around the back of her employee’s neck. As I watched, Morgan tugged her away, and the curtains fell into place, blocking my view of what was happening inside Morgan’s personal living quarters…which were off limits to everyone except Morgan.

Oh, and apparently, Bella.

Feeling confused and exceptionally stupid as I lay in the middle of the road with no less than fifty lookie-loos surrounding me, I was unsure of what needed to happen next. My body was telling me that I was okay, that the car must not have hit me that hard. My mind was telling me not one damned thing that made any sense whatsoever. The strange energy that had been with me since I’d entered Salem that morning was telling me I wasn’t safe…at least not yet.

I looked at my rescuer again and asked, “Are you certain there wasn’t a little girl? I could have sworn she was in the road.”

She laughed nervously and looked around, like she was silently begging someone in the crowd to rescue her from my craziness. The thing was, I hadn’t hit my head. Or at least I didn’t feel like I’d hit my head. Nothing was hurting any more—not even a twinge of discomfort. If I sounded crazy to the crowd of onlookers, it had everything to do with me hallucinating and nothing to do with getting hit by a car.

I needed to make a hasty exit.

“No, there wasn’t a little girl, dear. Don’t you worry now, because the ambulance will be here any minute now. Everything’s going to be fine.”

Everything was far, far, and away from fine.

I stood up quickly and said, “I’m fine.” I took a couple of slow steps, just to assure myself that I hadn’t broken myself in any important spots, and then started moving more quickly. “No need for an ambulance. All’s good. I’m not even sure the car actually hit me.”

I kept edging away from the crowd and toward the spot where I’d asked the taxi to pick me up. I glanced around, looking for the little girl one last time, but saw the mangled car instead of the child. Again—what the fuck had just happened? The entire front end was caved in…and I wasn’t feeling any pain at all.

I fought the urge to start running, putting as much distance between Salem and myself as possible. I felt like a freak.

I felt like I was in danger.

“Hey! I bet the accident was staged!” One of the onlookers yelled.

“Yeah! That’s it! It’s part of a show!” Another person added.

My rescuer didn’t look convinced, so I gave a small bow and a wave to the crowd. Their oohs and ahhs followed me down the sidewalk and a few people started clapping and whistling their appreciation. They’d been given an unforgettable magical show in downtown Salem. The only problem was that it hadn’t been a show. There had been a child in the middle of the road, andthat damned car had run over both of us. I didn’t know what the fuck was going on, but I wasn’t sticking around to find out. I had a feeling that if I didn’t get out of Salem fast, I might not get out at all.

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