The Mark of Cain (35 page)

Still dazed by how beautiful it was, she could only
say, “
Totally
.”

The water rushed down approximately thirty feet into
a pool, but it didn’t seem to go anywhere from there—there wasn’t a stream or
river leaving the large pool.

“Where does all the water go?”

“Into an underground river. In fact, you can’t see
it because of all the foliage, but the waterfall comes from underground, too.
This is the only place it hits air. You should drink some. It’s the best water
on Earth.”

She knelt down and scooped a handful of the cool
liquid into her mouth. It was definitely the most refreshing water she’d ever
tasted…but that could just be because of how rough the hike had been.

Inac set down his humongous pack and asked, “Good,
isn’t it?”

She could only nod as she continued to take in the
beauty of the surroundings. There were overly fragrant flowers of every kind
surrounding the pool. Pink ones, purple ones, white ones, blue ones…. If she
could imagine Heaven, this would be it.

Inac was behind her, rustling through his pack, but
she ignored that, instead walking around and exploring the clearing. The air
was humid and crisp from the waterfall, feeling delicious against her skin.
Eventually she came upon a patch of white flowers, one of which had a blue and
black butterfly perched on it.

She put out her finger, not really expecting
anything, but the butterfly took to the air and landed on it.

She giggled and looked over at Inac, who was smiling
at her with delight on his face.

“Look,” she cried.

“Most life forms can sense your nature,” he called
back. “It must know you’re an angel.”

She smiled and looked back down at the butterfly as
it slowly fluttered its wings.

“Oh…” she said after it took flight.

She looked back at Inac, whose mouth was now open in
awe as he stared at her.

“What?” she asked.

“Um….” His brain didn’t appear to be working.

“Inac…” she whined in a cutesy voice. “Stop looking
at me like that. You’re making me embarrassed.”

“Sorry. You’re just…god, Hara, do you realize how
beautiful you are?”

“Thank you,” she said as she walked up to him. “But,
for the last time, don’t swear,” she gently chastened.

“I will do whatever you say. Sorry, my mind just….”
He still seemed out of sorts. He probably didn’t even know what swear word he’d
said.

Like he liked to do, he put a hand through her hair.
But this time, he didn’t look her in the eyes and kiss her. Instead, he stared
at her hair in wonder as he ran his fingers through it. He seemed mesmerized by
her thick waves.

She knew it was odd that she hadn’t put her hair up
for the long hike—and it probably had twigs and bits of leaves in it now, as
well as the nape of her neck was slick with sweat—but it was all worth it for
this moment. This was exactly why she’d left it down. Inac loved to play with it,
and she loved him doing so.

She put her hands on his elbows and closed her eyes
so that she could pay more attention to the sensations of his touch. As she
tuned into her senses, she felt the hot sun against her face, warming the
outside of her as much as he was warming the inside.

“Hara?” he said, his voice cracking slightly.

She opened her eyes when he didn’t go on. His eyes
were the warmest gray she’d ever seen.

“Yes?”

He let out a deep breath as he brought his other
hand up to her cheek, lightly grazing it with the back of two fingers.

“I just….”

A part of her wanted to scream, “Say it!” But she
was worried that doing so would never get him to open up about his feelings.
Maybe if she told him how
she
felt, he’d be able to say the words that
his eyes were telling her he felt. She wasn’t even sure why she hadn’t said it
to him yet because she told everyone else how much she loved and cared about
them. She just didn’t know how Inac would react to the depth of emotion she
felt for him.

“Hara…I….”

She stood on her tippy-toes and gave him a small,
yet sensual, kiss. When she was done, she pulled away enough to whisper, “You
what
,
love?” Maybe saying the word would help him to repeat it.

She kissed him again, this time feeling a smile
under her lips. When he pulled away, his smile disappeared and he was looking
at her seriously, his brow furrowed. As he obviously fought to come up with the
words she so longed to hear, he began a soft caress along her cheek.

“I love you, Hara,” he finally said, his voice a
verbal caress softer than any physical one he could ever give her.

She smiled, her spirit soaring through the clouds at
his words. “I love you, too, Inac.”

He got a small grin on one half of his face, but his
brow was still furrowed.

“Is there something wrong with that?” she asked.

She felt like he was about to tell her everything he
hid from her…as well as that she probably wouldn’t like it. Instead, at the
very moment she was sure his walls had broken, a large smile took over his face
and he said, “You must be starving. Come on. I brought us dinner.”

True to Inac’s character, he had switched his
emotions so quickly that she was now lost while trying to figure out what
exactly was going on. She stood there, wishing for a road map of his mind so
she could figure out what turn he’d just taken, while he took items out of his
backpack. Before she had him figured out, he had a blanket set up, Tupperwares
full of things set around him.

“Sorry it’s not as glamorous as the last one we had
together,” he said as he dished up some kind of fancy salad for her.

“Well, we are in the middle of nowhere,” she said as
she moved to take off her hiking boots and socks. Once they were tossed aside,
she sat there letting the late afternoon golden sun soak into her skin. She was
wearing shorts and a racer-back tank so the light was getting a lot of her. Too
bad she didn’t tan. She didn’t
anything
. Her skin seriously didn’t mark
at all. She didn’t even have freckles. It was pretty weird. Then again, Inac’s
skin was flawless as well. But his skin was much darker than hers so it wasn’t
so much a surprise that he didn’t have any marks on him at all. Not even one
scar marred his perfection…other than the one on his right shoulder where he
was shot only a few months ago. But that seemed to be fading fast….

“While I make our sandwiches,” he said, “why don’t
you go take some pictures?” He then threw her a pair of sandals; the kind you
wore wading in water that had the black foamy bottoms and the two Velcro
straps. Tevas, or something like that.

“These aren’t mine.”

“They are now. I bought them for you to wear up
here.”

“Oh. Thanks.”

He smiled in response before beginning to make them
turkey sandwiches. Ignoring that, she put on the sandals and got out her
camera. She had taken so many pictures this trip already that she would fill up
at least three more scrapbooks when they got back. Still, she took picture after
picture of the scenery and the animals—especially a chipmunk that scampered
nearby collecting seeds—until Inac called her over for dinner.

They ate, mostly talking about school as they did
so. Once they were finished and he’d put everything back in his bag—only after
rinsing them off in a pot he filled with water—he asked, “Do you want to see
something amazing?”

He seemed so excited that there was no way she could
say no. However, when it ended up that in order to see something “amazing” she
had to wade across the pool, which was shallower than it looked—her short
shorts barely got wet—and hike up the side of the waterfall, she wasn’t as
excited as she had been. When they got to the top, though, it was worth the few
scrapes and bruises she’d received despite Inac’s help in getting up.

“Oh my…. Inac, it’s gorgeous!” she exclaimed. She
found herself on the top of a peak with a 360 degree view. A view made even
better since it was also perfect timing for the sunset. The hues of oranges,
pinks, and purples looked like swirls of paint in the vast sky.

His answering smile was so large that she couldn’t
help but kiss it.

“I thought you’d like it,” he said once she pulled
away.

“
Like
it? I have to take a few pictures.”

She took tons more before leaning back into Inac.
They were still standing so he put his arms around her waist as she laid the
back of her head against his chest. She then put her arms around his. It was so
beautiful; so effortlessly romantic. She wanted to live in this moment for the
rest of her life.

It was when the show was almost over that Inac
turned her in his arms. He then bent over for just a moment and picked a
beautifully vivid purple wildflower.

“Thanks for bringing me here. It really was
beautiful,” she said, taking a fragrant whiff of it as he placed it under her
nose.

“Not near as beautiful as you,” he said, pulling it
away and tucking it behind her right ear.

She looked down, suddenly shy for some reason. Maybe
because of the cadence of his words. She felt like he was going somewhere with
that.

“Hara,” he said, lifting her chin until she was
looking him in the eyes. “I know that I’m not the best boyfriend; that it’s
frustrating that I don’t open up. And I’m sorry that I don’t. But my life has
hardened me. From the time when I was a boy, I had to take care of things for
my family and wasn’t really allowed to feel things emotionally. And then, the
Mokolios have been such a large part of my life. They’ve been the only thing
I’ve put myself into, which makes it difficult for me to put myself into
anything else. It’s all I’ve known for a very long time. And, as a Mokolio,
I’ve done some things that I’m not proud of. Things that were necessary, but
not necessarily good. I wish that certain deaths didn’t have to happen, but
they do—they
did
. And that’s all a part of me, too. But, despite all
that, it’s like I said earlier, I really do love you.”

“I love you, too.” She couldn’t think of anything
else to say after his emotional confession.

His lips turned up in a small smile before he
continued. “I’ve been thinking a lot about things the past few months. About
places I’ve been and places I’m going. I’m not proud of a lot of the things
I’ve done in my life, and I can’t change them or make them better…what’s done
is done. I can only move forward and not make the same mistakes.”

“Okay…?” She didn’t understand what he was talking
about. He seemed to be opening up, though, and she wanted to encourage him to
do so.

“I guess what I’m getting at is how much you’ve done
for me. I know we’ve only been together a couple of months, but I like seeing
you every day. Especially this past couple of weeks. I like waking up with you
in my arms.”

“And I like waking up in them.”

“It almost feels perfect, doesn’t it?”

She giggled. “What do you mean, almost? It feels
perfect to me.”

“So you can’t think of anything that could make it
better?” he asked with a glint in his eyes. He seemed to be enjoying her
confusion.

“No…. Not that I can think of. Can you?”

“I can think of a couple things,” he said with a
roguish grin that made him appear years younger. “But one in particular.”

She squinted slightly, looking at him in suspicion.
“If you’re talking about being intimate, then forget it, buddy.”

He laughed. “Relax. I’m not talking about sex. At
least not in how that could be the
main
way things could get better,” he
said with that rakish grin of his that told her that he wouldn’t be upset if he
could show her
all
the reasons, including the S-E-X one….

“Okay. Then what?”

“I think that, in order to have things perfect, we
would need to be married.”

She would have fallen off the mountain if Inac
wasn’t holding on to her. When he didn’t go on, instead just looking at her
expectantly, she realized that he was waiting for her to say something.

“Oh…um…yeah…that would make it…um….” When she couldn’t
think of what to say, she instead asked, “Are you trying to get at something?”

He laughed. “No. Just making an observation is all.”

“Oh.” She couldn’t help but be disappointed. She had
begun to think that he’d brought her up here to propose, which was a
ridiculous
sentiment. They couldn’t get
married
. They hardly even knew each other.
She definitely wouldn’t have said yes….

He shuffled his feet while putting one hand in his
jeans pocket. She was about to ask what he was doing when he knelt one leg on
the ground while holding her hand with one of his.

She took in a deep breath and held it.

“Hara, I know we have every reason
not
to get
married. We’ve only known each other a few months and have only dated a couple
of those. We still have a lot to learn about one another. You’re religious; I’m
not. You’re innocent, and I’m of the world. I could go on and on. But none of
those things really matter because we love each other. I know that I told you
that my next marriage would only be because of love. And that’s why I’m asking
you…Hara,” he said, letting go of her hand to open a black velvet ring box.
“Will you do me the honor of becoming my wife? Will you marry me?”