Runaway Love by Jodi Flanagan (ebook reader library .txt) 📖

Prologue
The tires were squealing with protest, as the car went sideways. The last thing I heard was Mom’s voice yelling over the sound, telling Abbey and I to hold on.
The windows broke, spraying glass over everyone. My head became a ping pong ball, bouncing off of the seats and the car window, shattering it. I watched my sister’s head go through her car window and hit the tree trunk, and her body go limp, that was when I blacked out, tears of pain, and sorrow in my eyes.
A while later, I regained consciousness, I did a self assessment. My ribs must have been broken, because it hurt to breathe, I was bleeding somewhere because I was covered in blood. I could feel the hot sensation of where the seatbelt cut into me. I looked to my left, and my heart shattered. My little sister was covered in blood, and was barely breathing. I unbuckled, and slid over to her, not paying attention to the shards of glass that was now stabbing me everywhere, and pulled her to me, and wept. She was only nine years old, hasn’t even lived her life yet. It wasn’t right for her to die, especially this way. I was startled when her hand closed around mine. She asked what happened, and if mom, dad and I were ok.
I started to answer her, but I noticed the rather big hole in her skull, and she was bleeding profusely. She was going to die, right there in my arms. I told her a story of when we were both younger, happy memories. I was on my third story when she completely stopped breathing, my little sister was dead. I was the only one left alive, my mother, my father, my little sister, was all dead, yet I survived.
Chapter 1
~Seven years later~
Anna, my social worker, was driving her nice new sedan to my new ‘home’. Another family that will try to replace my real family, but that was just it, no other family could be as good, and natural as mine. This would be my fourth foster home since the death of my family. Each foster family I had was the same; a family that would go out of their way to make me feel welcome, and would end up dead within a year or so after getting me. The cops would find their deaths accidental, with each ‘accident’ occurring in the winter time. I knew better, It couldn’t have been just a coincidence that each family I was with ended up dead on the same Ivory road as my parents.
Anna, pulled into my new home, and I wiped the tears away. I looked up at Anna, my social worker, “Are you ready?” I looked in her deep brown eyes, “No, not really. I don’t want to be here, but I really don’t get a choice in this do I?” I laughed at her sad expression, “it’s alright. I am sure that this one will be different. So, are you going to come visit me?” I have known Anna since my family’s death seven years ago, and I will happily admit that I had gotten close to her over the years of death and sorrow. I was just glad that I had her to lean on after each accident. My ‘family’ started filing out of the house, so I got out of the car and grabbed my three giant mobile bags. As I watched the family come out of the house, I almost laughed. They were Christians; I had no doubt about that. The mother and father were wearing bright colors and all, and then I saw the son. He looked like a teenager; he looked to be about seventeen or so. I smiled, we would get along great. We were both wearing dark clothes from head to toe. I had an Alice and Wonderland hat, blue and red fake highlights clipped into my hair, which were blowing in my face because of the wind. I was also wearing a nice fishnet shirt, with a black tank top underneath, and skinny jeans that had some chains hanging off of them. He was wearing a black tank top, which showed off his muscles, and blue and black chained pants. He smiled at me, after he checked me out, and I smiled right back. That was when I saw her. She was a little girl; probably around ten years old. She had short curly brown hair, and bright green eyes. Her frilly white dress that went down to her knees and had thin straps swirled around her as she caught up to her parents who were walking towards me. Tears sprang to my eyes; she looked just like Abbey, except Abbey would never wear that dress. Abbey loved the darkness; she loved everything that children her age should be afraid of.
“Are you Ok, Taya?” Anna asked as she grabbed my shoulder, and I tore my eyes away from the girls face. “She…she looks just like Abbey. I will be fine, don’t worry about me.” Just then the three strangers approached. “We are so happy to have you here, Taya. My name is Kim. This is my husband Jim, our son Damien and our daughter Katie.” I nodded to each of them, “Well you already know my name, its Taya Siros. Thank you for taking me in, I know it mustn’t have been an easy decision.” Damien nodded at me, and went into the house. The father, Jim, immediately apologized for Damien’s hasty exit. I smiled and held up my hand to silence him. “Please, I been through four foster homes, I am used to reactions like that. So may I see my room?” Katie ran up to me, and grabbed one of my lightest bags, and she took me up to my room.
When Katie opened the door, I almost cried. This room would make a princess room look like a closet. It was a huge room; the bed looked really comfortable, despite all of the pink. Katie showed me where the plug-ins was, and told me that there were other blankets in the closet that I could choose from. Katie set down the bag that she grabbed down on the pink bed just as I jumped on it. The bag went flying and landed across the room, Katie and I laughed. “So Katie, how old are you?” She looked at me, “I am ten, going on eleven in a few months. How old are you?” I laughed, “Much older than you. I am nineteen.” Katie’s face made me laugh, “What’s that look for?” She looked away, “You are a year older than Damien. No wonder he doesn’t like you.” A moment of silence passed, so she continued. “He wants to grow up faster. He hates being young and having to obey others. Oh, by the way, my mom wants you to come down after you get settled in, she wants to bore you with the rules.” I nodded, and she left after throwing a pillow at my head. She giggled when I retaliated, but missed entirely. I needed to work on my aim.
I went through my bags, and started to unpack a little bit at a time, spreading my things around the room. I stopped when I picked up the only family portrait that I could save from the house before I was swept away to my first foster home. I was so occupied in my thoughts that I didn’t even hear the door open and close. “Who is that?” His voice, Damien’s, scared me so much that I actually dropped my picture. Without even thinking I brought my leg up and caught it like a hack sack. It was perfectly balanced on my foot, I laughed and It fell on the floor, but not hard enough to break. I picked it up, and looked at him. “I’m sorry I didn’t hear you come in. What did you ask?” He smiled and took the picture from my hands, and pointed at the picture. “Who are they?” I smiled, “Don’t you recognize me?” He shook his head, “It’s ok, I was only eleven when this was taken. It’s a picture of my family, before the accident. I am sitting closest to my mother, and my little sister is near my father.” He looked from my eyes to the picture.”This is your sister?” I nodded, “She looks just like Katie.” I nodded again. “They are quite alike, their eyes …its hard to look at her.” Damien nodded, “So why are you in foster care?” I took the picture frame back and put it on my dresser, and sat on my bed. “Right to the point, I like that. I am in foster care because my family was killed, but I survived. None of my relatives wanted me, thinking I was a bad omen or something like that, so I was put into foster care at age eleven.”
To pass the time, I made Damien help me put up all of my posters; even had him help me set up my knickknacks, and other photos. After that was done, Damien and I just sat on my bed and talked about music, hobbies, and other things as well. He was surprisingly like me. We were both into the same type of music, and clothing stores; Hot Topic and Spencers. A few minutes passed, and I noticed that we were getting closer to each other. I swore silently when I realized that he was going to lean in a kiss. I got hurt plenty of times in my life to know that getting involved with Damien would be a train wreck. I argued with myself a few seconds on rather or not to let him kiss me. Before I could even chose to lean in, or back away, his lips were on mine. His kisses started off gentle and then became more demanding, I felt him gently push me down onto the bed.
My mind was racing. He shouldn’t be doing this, we shouldn’t be doing this. I am his foster sister; we shouldn’t be touching each other this way. I broke the kiss the instant I felt his hand start to pull my shirt up. I pushed him off of me with some force. When I looked at him, I saw that his eyes were glazed over and I knew that it wasn’t his fault. “You should go. I have to meet your mother.” Damien nodded with a hurt expression and got up. My eyes never left him as he walked out the door. Once he was gone I groaned, dang, he was a great kisser! I definitely had to be on my guard when I was alone with Damien that was for sure. I straightened my clothes, brushed my hair, and then went down the stairs to Kim.

Chapter 2
I found Kim at the dining table, reading a book. She has probably been reading the book while waiting for me to come down the stairs. A blush climbed to my face when I thought of what was keeping me. When she saw me she smiled and put down her book. “Hello Taya, do you like your room?” I nodded and sat down, “It’s definitely bigger than my other rooms”. The next like half an hour was boring; Kim just droning on and on about the rules in the household, and such. When she was done, and I was excused I remember my cigarettes upstairs. “Kim, would it offend you, or Jim, if I smoked while on your property? It will