Dying to Remember (The Station #2) by Trish Marie Dawson

with a shaky hand.
    Isabel looks
around with a confused expression but then follows the direction of Jess's
outstretched fingers until she reaches the wall. She shrugs, unaware that a
dead boy is sprawled out on the ground just on the other side of the wall.
    "Look
o-over the wall," Jess says.
    It's okay,
just take a deep breath. Oxygen rushes to her brain as Jess does just that
and we watch with fearful anticipation as Isabel steps up to the wall placing
her hands on it much like Jess did earlier to survey what was on the other
side. Isabel's hands fly up to her mouth but it doesn't stop the scream that
resonates through the trees as she backs away from the wall in horror. As the
startled birds explode from the trees Jess begins to tilt to the side.
    Jess! Hold
on, it's okay!
    But it's too
late. My view through her eyes blurs around the edges before fading completely.
Poor Jess has fainted and trapped me in the dark. Unable to see anything around
her, I slink onto the virtual floor of her mind and begin sifting through the
rubble, attempting to piece together what memories I can while she's still and
quiet. I have a feeling when she wakes, she'll be teetering quite nicely on the
brink of Hell. I don't want her diving over the side.
    What have
I gotten myself into now?

CHAPTER 8
     
     
    By the time
Jess wakes up, I have more than enough memories pulled from her mind to put
together a decent picture of her past, at least enough to know what I have to
work with. Now, how to respond? Well, that's different entirely.
    She did
indeed recently have an abortion. And it was less out of spite than sheer
terror. Of her parents mostly, but also of her ex-boyfriend, Chris. Who was now
sprawled out on the forest carpet on his back, killed by the fastest acting
form of Karma I've ever seen. Not that I wish death on anyone, but after seeing
their past, it seems Chris was just one good fight away from killing Jess out
of pure rage.
    She might
have been willing to take a slap from him here, a punch to the gut there, but
she wasn't willing to have his baby; a baby that would bound them to each other
forever. It was her final straw, regardless of his cheating. Ironically,
getting Jess pregnant pushed Chris away temporarily. No doubt he was just as
freaked out by the idea of becoming a parent at seventeen years old as she was.
Sifting through the memories of their many teenage fights, I was certain the
last girl he cheated on Jess with was not the first. He was a jerk in every
way.
    When Jess
awakens she is surrounded by two police officers and her mother, suddenly
acting the concerned parent, which I now know to be a fallacy, as well as
Isabel, the family's live-in housekeeper, who genuinely seems distraught. A
tall man dressed in an expensive looking charcoal-colored suit stands near the
wall, talking to another pair of officers. The trees teem with life now as if
every bird in northern Arizona has come to watch the show and gossip freely.
    "Oh,
honey, you're awake. Thank goodness; I was worried." Mom looks at Jess
with her large, cool eyes and irritably swats the air in front of her at a
hovering fly. Her suit doesn't match the outdoors very well. Heck, nothing about the woman fits in with this picture; except maybe the giant mansion with
the cabin facade on the other side of the trees.
    Jess moans
softly before sitting up with help from one of the officers and Isabel.
"What…happened?"
    "You
fainted," her mother answers for her before the officer has a chance to
speak.
    "Chris?"
Jess asks without looking up.
    "Oh
honey," Mom pats her knee before straightening, tugging on her jacket and
smoothing out the fold of her skirt, "Don't say a word."
    And the witch
is back.
     
    ***
     
    A full hour
later and we are finally sitting inside the house in the main living area with
half a dozen officers…some plain-clothed, some in uniform.
    "Tell me
again what happened, Miss?" asks a short man with a portly midsection
while he scribbles furiously on a