Then I heard a sound behind me and turned to see Julian standing in the doorway.

17

“Julian, wait!” I called as he turned and stormed away.

I looked back over at Michael but had already fallen asleep again. I got up and started to chase Julian through the apartment. Adam was still asleep on the couch. All of the bodies were gone, so Julian must have finished burying them and then come inside to check on how I was doing. It was the worst possible moment for him to be standing in the doorway and to have heard what Michael just said.

“Julian, stop!” I said as he put his hand on the doorknob to leave. “Please, just let me explain.”

He took his hand off the door and turned around to look at me with a look of anguish on his face.

“What is there for you to explain?” he said. “I have loved you for my entire life. I’ve been there with you every single day without fail. I almost made love to you that night in your dorm, but we waited because it was supposed to be special. And instead, I find out that not only have you slept with someone else but that you chose to sleep with the man who murdered your mother?”

“It’s not what you think,” I said through my sniffles.

“Did you have sex with Michael?” he shouted at me point-blank. “Answer me: yes or no.”

I swallowed hard. “Yes.”

He leaned in and hissed at me, as if he were possessed. “Then, it is exactly what I think.”

“What’s going on?” Adam said groggily as he sat up against the couch.

I glared at him. “Julian, don’t.”

He ignored me, though. “Oh, you know, I just dragged away and buried a bunch of dead dudes that we killed, and Lisette had sex with Michael. That ought to catch you up on what you missed while you were sleeping.”

Julian reached for the door again and walked out, letting it slam shut behind him. And as Adam stared at me in confusion, I felt my heart drop to my toes.

“Tell me which part of that was just a dream,” he said.

“Unfortunately, none of it,” I said as I went to sit down beside him on the couch. And when Adam simply stared at me, I drew in a deep breath.

“I’m sorry,” I said. “I didn’t know how to tell you.”

Adam leaned closer to me, and gingerly lifted his injured arm to wrap around me as he pulled me next to his chest. He laid his head against mine.

“You’re not mad at me?” I asked.

“No,” he said. “A little hurt, but shit happens. Do you love him?”

I blinked. “Who?”

“Michael.”

“My feelings right now are so messed up,” I said as I leaned my head back against him. “But I know that I have feelings for all three of you. I’m sorry if that isn’t right, but I just haven’t had time to sort through how I feel. Everything has been happening all at once, and I feel like I can’t breathe.”

“It’s okay,” he said. “I understand. You know how I feel about you, and I’m not going anywhere. I can wait.”

“Thanks,” I said as relief rushed through my veins. “I just wish Julian wasn’t so upset with me.”

“Give him some time, I bet he’ll come around. You two have been friends your whole lives. If nothing else, that won’t change. He’s just hurt right now; he’ll get over it.”

“How did you get to be so wise?” I teased.

“I’ll tell you all the stories about it someday,” Adam laughed.

“I look forward to that,” I said.

And I truly meant it.

I cared so much for Adam, and for Julian, and for Michael. And because of that, I knew I couldn’t keep putting any of them in more danger because of me. Eventually, Lineage would be back, and there would be more fighting. Maybe next time it would be worse. Once the guys were healed up, and hopefully, once I mended my relationship with Julian, I had to make sure they didn’t follow me into another fight. I wouldn’t be able to live with myself if anything happened to any of them.

“I should go out and look for him,” I said as I got up from the couch. “There could be more guys creeping around out there.”

“I doubt it,” Adam said. “Lineage won’t risk sending another group of men so soon. It’s too high-profile to be trying to assassinate someone right on the campus. I’m guessing we have at least have a couple more days before they try again.”

I looked toward the door, wondering what Julian was doing out there and hoping he wouldn’t do something stupid just because he was upset.

“I’ll go see what he’s up to,” Adam offered.

I rubbed his back. “You’re hurt, you should stay here and rest.”

“I’m okay. Besides, I don’t think you’re the first person he wants to see right now.”

I’m sure that was true.

I helped Adam up from the couch, and after he went out to talk with Julian, I walked back to the bedroom to check on Michael. He was still asleep, and I was exhausted from not having slept last night and from all the emotional trauma of today.

So, I climbed carefully into the bed next to him and fell asleep.

It was good to dream about my mother again. I hadn’t had a dream with her in it for a while. When I went too long without dreaming about her, I started to get worried that I wouldn’t remember her face. That was always my biggest fear that I would forget the things about her that mattered; the look of her face, the sound of her voice, the way her fingers felt when she ran them through my hair.

Michael was in my dream this time too. Thankfully, he wasn’t ripping Adam apart this time. He was sitting with my mother, and it was strange how normal it felt in my dream to see the two of them sitting together. My mother was talking to him, and he was writing down what she was saying. As I walked closer to them, I could hear her words. I remembered those words because they had haunted me every day. She was telling him what to write on her suicide note.

She turned to look at me and smiled, but her eyes were sad and moist with tears. Michael turned to look at me too, and a single tear was streaming down his cheek and over his jaw until it dripped down onto his shirt.

I got down on my knees in front of both of them and cried.

“What does it mean, Mom?” I asked her through my tears. “What message were you trying to give me in your letter? I read it, and I don’t understand what the message is supposed to be.”

But she didn’t answer me. She just sat there and smiled her sad smile. And when I woke up from my dream, I was nowhere closer to knowing what I needed to know.

Her letter was with the rest of my things, which were still back in Adam’s bedroom in the Lineage apartment. I kept it tucked inside my favorite book that she used to read to me as a child. I’m sure by now, some Lineage thugs had already gone through all my stuff and taken it. I remembered what it said, but I wanted to see the note again because I still felt like I was missing something.