The Marriage of Sticks Part 23

He walked slowly toward her. A middle-aged man. There was something in his face, something familiar but so distant and remote that her pounding heart couldn't figure it out. Something...

"I didn't know if I'd get here in time."

She said nothing, only stared at him and the noise was brutal and all over but something she knew, something on the tip of her mind said, Look harder, find it. And she did. She recognized him. "Declan?"

Only when he smiled did she know for sure it was Hugh's son, because he wore his father's smile. She would have recognized it if she had lived to be a million years old.

"We have to hurry, Miranda. They're coming and I don't know how much time we have. I've broken every rule in the book-"

"How did you know I was here?"

"You know everything when you're one of us. Being immortal has its advantages." He looked worriedly behind him.

"How can you know already that you're immortal? You've only lived one life! That's why I was writing the diary! So you'd find it and know and then you could avoid-"

"We have to go, Miranda! There's no time. Tell me in the car. We have to get out of here right now. They're coming."

"Why, Declan? Why are you doing this?"

He spat out the words. "Because you gave me my life! Because you sacrificed your own daughter so that I could live. How could I not at least try to help you?"

A pause. Recognition. Amazement.

All she could do and it was done without thinking was hold out the stick his father had given her. Declan would understand what it was.

end.