NOCTE (Nocte Trilogy #1) (16 page)

The electricity feels like it’s going to
snap in the air, and electrocute me with the intensity, but it doesn’t.
 
It just creates a current that runs from
me to Dare and back again, lighting me up, making me tingle in places I’ve
never felt before.
 

I swallow hard.

“Kiss me,” I whisper, looking hungrily
into his eyes.
 
He blinks,
then
stares, his mouth tightening.
 

“I shouldn’t,” he answers, low and husky.

“Do it anyway,” I reply, hoping, praying,
holding
my breath.
 

Then he does.

He lowers his beautiful face and his lips
come down on mine, soft, firm, real.
 
I sigh into his mouth, into the spearmint breath that absorbs my own,
into the thing I’ve been wanting for weeks.
 

He feels so comfortable, so exciting,
so
natural to me.
 
Kissing him is like taking a breath. It gives me life.
 

He pulls away abruptly, though, leaving
my heart pounding and my breath broken, and then he stands up.
 

“I shouldn’t have done that,” he mutters,
taking the towel into the kitchen.
 
I leap to my feet and chase him.

“Why not?” I demand.
 
“I’m eighteen and I know exactly what I
want.”

I
want you.
 

But he’s already shaking his head.
 
“You don’t know what you want,” he tells
me regretfully.
 
“Because you’re upset,
and you’ve got more to deal with than most people ever will. It’s not a good
time for this. It’s not fair of me to take advantage of you right now.”

“You’re not—“ I start to say, but
he puts a long finger against my lips.
 

“I am,” he says firmly.
 
“I can’t do that.
 
Not today.”

But he
doesn’t say
never
.
 

I stand still, my breathing harsh and
ragged. Then I turn and walk away, humiliated with the rejection, but buoyed by
it, too.

Because
he didn’t say never.

He
didn’t say never because he draws me at night and so I know he thinks about me
too.
 

I walk out the door into the rain,
ignoring the way he calls after me.
 
I walk straight to my house, straight to my room, and
after dropping my clothes and Finn’s journal onto the floor
,
I step into the shower
.
 

The hot water floods my senses, blocking
out the memory of his smell.

I envision his hands holding my own, and
I squeeze my eyes shut.
 

He thinks that’s he’s not what I need,
but he’s
exactly
what I need.

He distracts me from my pain.
 
From my worry.
 
From my fear.
 

But even as I have the thought, the truth
of what he said slams into me.
 

It’s
not a good time right now.
 

It’s not a good time because he doesn’t
want to be a d
istraction.
 

He deserves to be a
focus.

And in my current state, I can’t focus on
anything, except for maybe saving my brother from insanity.
 
Dare deserves more than that.

But my selfish side wants him
anyway.
 

I slide to the floor and close my eyes,
letting the water wash my tears away.

***

I
don’t know how long I stayed in the shower, or how long I’ve been curled up in
the window seat of my room since.
 
All I know is that my father and Finn came home, and Finn disappeared into
his room.
 
I heard him rustling
around in there.

I heard him clamoring down the stairs,
yelling for me, yelling for Dad.

And now he’s coming back up, stomping
angrily, bursting through my door.

“Where’s my journal?” he demands, his
pale blue eyes like icicles, his thin hands clenched into fists at his sides.
 

For the first time in my life, I lie to
my brother.
 

To his face.
 

“I don’t know,” I say simply, staring at
him, not blinking.
 
I don’t look
away, because I don’t want to accidentally glance at the bottom drawer of my
desk, where I have stashed his little book.

“You do, too,” he says angrily.
 
“It was in my room, and now it’s not.”

“I don’t have it, Finn,” I tell him
again.
 
“Why are you so upset?
 
It’ll turn up.”

After
I have a chance to read it.

Finn’s face is taut and anxious and I do
feel guilty for inflicting distress on him.
 
I know what happens when he gets upset,
but it’s a chance I have to take.
 
I
can’t help him unless I know what is truly bothering him. And this is the only
way to find out.
 

“If you find it,” he says limply, turning
to leave.
 
“Don’t read it, Calla.”

I don’t answer, so he stops in his
tracks, glancing back at me, his desperate gaze meeting mine.
 
“You can’t read it, Cal.”

I can’t help but stare into his eyes,
fascinated by the utter desolation I find there.
 
The level of his despair over a simple
book is staggering.

“Why do you feel so strongly about this,
Finn?”

My question is simple.

But his answer is not. He turns back to
me, and his face crumples and he cries.
 

“Because things have to happen in order,
Calla. They have to. In. Order. Can’t you see? Can’t you?”
 
His skinny shoulders shake and I pull
him into my arms and my hands stroke his back as he breathes harshly against
me, his chest rising and falling against my own.

“I see,” I tell him, which is another lie
because I don’t.

It’s minutes and minutes before he steps
away, before he’s gathered control of himself enough to step out of my
bedroom.
 
But the look on his face
is haunting when he does, as he closes the door and the last thing I see is the
despair.
 

God,
this hurts.
 

But I’m his protector.
 
If I don’t do it, no one will.

And sometimes, we have to do things we
aren’t proud of to protect those we love.

So I lock my door and pull out his book,
curling up once again in my window seat so I can invade his privacy.

Below me, I see Finn go outside, and pull
out an ax.
 
He takes his aggression
out on the wood, chopping piece after piece, even though this is summer and we
won’t need it for months. In fact, we won’t even be here when it turns cold.
But my father will.
 

So Finn chops wood for our father, while
I turn my attention to his journal.
 

The craziness it contains spirals and
leaps on the page, and I find myself holding my breath as I read.
 

I’m drowning. Drowning. Drowning.
 
Immersum immersum immersum

Calla will save me.
 
Or I will die.
 
Or I will die.
 
Or I will die.

Serva me,
servabo
te
.
 
Save me and I will save you.

Save me.

Save me.

Save me.

Calla calla
calla calla calla calla calla calla

I will save
you calla.
Calla calla calla.

I tear my eyes away from the painful
words, wrenching them away, because once again, just like always, Finn calls
out for me when he’s afraid.

Even in written words on the pages of his
journal.
 

He thinks I’m the only one who can save
him and I have to agree.
 

But he also thinks he needs to save
me,
which is slightly ridiculous.
 

I’m the only one who understands.
 
I’m the only one who knows. And I can’t
tell anyone, because if I do, my father will have no choice but to send Finn to
a mental institution, and I know enough to know that he’d never get out.
 
They’d keep him.
 

So I have to save him without telling
anyone.
 

And the only way to do
that,
is to read his innermost thoughts.
 
All of them.

I shift my gaze out the window, into the
rain, and I’m startled to find Finn gone, but Dare is in his place.
 
Jogging along the trail, up from the
beach, he strides confidently and unaffected by the downpour.

In fact, when he’s on the edge of the
lawns, out in front of my window, he stops abruptly.
 

Then his gorgeous face tilts upward and
his eyes meet mine.

I stop breathing.
 

I stop thinking.
 

I just lift my hand to the glass,
pressing it there, as though Dare’s hand is resting against my own. The rain
runs in rivulets down the pane, around my fingers like tears, and Dare’s eyes
soften.
 
Without a word, he lifts
his hand.
 

He holds it there, as though he’s
touching me.
 
As though he’s
comforting me from things he has no knowledge of.
 

But what
I
know,
is that he
is
comforting me.
 

His
presence
comforts me.

He knows it.
 
That’s why he stands in the rain for
several minutes more, for
so long,
until
he’s absolutely drenched, until finally, finally, he drops his hand and continues
on his way, through the rain and onto the trails.
    

He disappears into the canopy of trees,
and then he’s gone.

Gone
from me.
 

I realize something as I linger with
Finn’s crazy thoughts in my lap.

I’ve never felt quite so alone
before.
 

VIGINTI
ET VNUM

I
somehow pull myself together by morning, after losing hours of sleep, tossing
and turning and panicking. By morning, I’m calm.
 

I have to be.
 

I can’t fall to pieces because I have to
put Finn back together.
 
  

At breakfast though, he seems utterly normal
and grins at me over his cereal.
 

“I’m sorry I fell apart last night,” he
tells me casually, putting his spoon down and taking a bite of his bagel.
 
He has an appetite.
 
This is good.

I smile hesitantly.
 
“It’s ok.
 
I’ll keep an eye out for your journal,
Finn.
 
It’ll turn up, I promise.”

He smiles angelically. “I know.”

His calm demeanor almost alarms me, as
though he knows I have his journal.
 
But that can’t be true. If he knew, he’d freak out, and tear my room
apart
hunting for it.

“Do you want to do something today?” I
ask him as I pour my orange juice.
 

“Can’t,” he mumbles around his
bagel.
 
“I’m going to sort through
my stuff, and lean it down.”

“Do you want help?” I feel my eyebrows
knit together.
 
He’s acting so
aloof.

He shakes his head.
 
“Nah. I’m still not feeling that
great.
 
You should go do something
with Dare.”

This snaps my head up.
 
He wants me to do something with
Dare?
 
What the hell?

He shrugs,
then
chuckles because my astonishment is apparent.
 
“What?
 
You’re leaving at the end of the
summer.
 
You should have a summer
fling.
 
It’s on every girl’s bucket
list, right?”

I roll my eyes at that, although my
insides are leaping.
 
He isn’t going
to make me feel guilty for spending time with Dare?
 
It’s like the Heavens are opening up and
God is smiling upon me.
 

“I don’t know,” I answer.
 
“I’m too young to worry about a bucket
list.”

“Just go,” he tells me, pushing away from
the table.
 
“Dare was asking Dad how
to get to Warrenton last night.
 
You
should take him yourself.”

The fact that I’ve been there a million
times before doesn’t matter, because I’ve never been there with Dare.
 

“I’ll be back in time to eat dinner with
you!” I call to him.
 
He waves over
his shoulder without looking.
 

I’ve been dismissed.
 

Suddenly I feel like I’ve broken out of
jail, like I’m free and I have to hurry and make my getaway.
 
I all but run for the Carriage House,
and I’m still breathless as I knock on the door.
 

I’m even more breathless when Dare
answers it.
 

Because he’s shirtless.
 

In fact, he looks like he just stepped
from the shower because his hair is wet.
 
And his chest is bare.
 
I
can’t help but stare at the bare skin, the muscled abdomen, the lithe torso,
and the perfect, chiseled V that disappears into the top of his jeans.
 
A silver belt buckle shaped like a skull
is positioned perfectly-centered a few inches beneath his belly button.

I swallow hard,
then
swallow again.
 

The corner of Dare’s mouth twitches.

“Yes?” he asks, his lip curling at the
corner.
 
He has to know the effect
he has on me.
 
He probably has it on
everyone.
 

I swear to God my intention is to ask him
to go to Warrenton Beach.
 
But my
tongue has a mind of its own.
 

“Draw me,” I breathe, surprising me and
surprising him.
 
His eyes widen, and
he stares at me.
 

“Draw you,” he repeats slowly,
hesitantly, his eyes never leaving mine.
 

I nod.
 
“You’ve drawn me from your imagination,
but wouldn’t a real model be better?”

Without waiting for a reply and before I
can think the better of it, I nudge past him and enter his little house.
 
He stares at me, his eyes like black
molten lava, and I can tell he’s trying to figure out how to handle me.
 
So before he can say anything, I turn,
forcing a confident grin.
 

 
“Where do you want me?”

Don’t
reject me.
 
That’s all I can think as I stare at his
gorgeous face, and I must be crazy because there’s no way he’s going to do this.
 

“Calla,” he says huskily, his tongue
darting out to lick his full bottom lip.
 

“Don’t,” I interrupt him before he can
turn me away.
 
“Draw me, Dare. I
want you to.”

He stands as still as a statue, studying
me, his body so long and
lean
.
 

“Please,” I add finally, my whisper
husky.
 
“Where do you want me?”

I count the beats as he stares at me, as
he ponders me.
 

One.

Two.

Three.

Four.
 

Fi--

“Just a minute,” he finally answers,
interrupting my internal counting, his eyes black as night.
 

He crosses the room and pulls a chaise
lounge to the middle of the living room.
 

“You can sit there.”

He sounds so professional.
 
I do as he asks, and I perch on the edge
of the seat, my nerves dancing along my skin, disbelief pulsing through
me.
 

He’s
going to do it.
 
He’s going to do
it.
 
  

“Close the blinds,” I tell him softly, as
I unbutton my shirt.
 

I
can’t believe I’m doing this.

I
can’t believe he’s letting me.
 

I watch him swallow hard, his Adam’s
apple moving in his throat, while he does as I instruct.
 
When the room has been darkened, he
pulls a seat up in front of me, his sketchbook in his hand.

“Are you ready?” he asks, his voice
level.
 
He keeps his eyes on my
face.
 

I shake my head.

“Not yet.”

And then I take off my bra.
 

Dare clears his throat and opens his
sketchbook, the picture of a professional, and I swear I feel ten thousand
flames lapping at my body as every inch of me flushes.
 

I stand up and shove my shorts to the
floor.
 

Dare doesn’t move.
 
It doesn’t even look like he’s
breathing.
 

His eyes are frozen on me, appreciation
flaring to life in them, and then he stares into my eyes, his gaze deep and
dark.
 

“Calla,” he begins again, and he starts
to move, to get up.
 

“Don’t,” I tell him sharply.
 
“Please. I need this.
 
I want to be…distracted.”

His eyes seem guarded now as he studies
me, but he still stands up.
 
He
walks to his closet and comes back with one of his dress shirts.
 
A white button-up.
 
He hands it to me.
 

“Put this on,” he tells me.
 
“Leave it unbuttoned.”

My heart
pounds as I do
what he asks
.
 

He waits,
then
adjusts the opening of the shirt to fall just right against my skin, so that only
the top curves of my breasts show.
 
He buttons one button there, and then pulls the shirt open so that my
belly button and hip are exposed.

He settles back into his chair.
 

“So I’m a distraction, then?” he asks
simply, bringing his pencil to the page and drawing a flowing line.
 
The beginning of my
hip.

I flush.
 
“You’re far more than a
distraction.
 
But today… I need
distracted.”
  
I swallow and
his eyes meet mine, then he looks away.
 

“Lay back,” he tells me brusquely.
 
He gets up and comes to me, bending and
moving my hair over my shoulder.
 
His hand brushes my skin and a fire erupts, a heat, a raging lava-like liquid,
churning in my belly, and I ache for him to lay down with me, to feel him next
to me.

But he doesn’t. He stares down at me,
studying me.

“Arch your back a bit,” he tells me.
 
So I do.
 
He slides a small pillow behind it.
 

“Bite your lip,” he tells me.
 
“Not hard.
 
Just enough to look like you’re thinking
about something. Fantasizing, maybe.”

Oh
God. I can totally do that.
 

He smiles, just a little, and returns to
his seat.

His hands move across the page, quickly,
then slowly.
 
He looks up at me, his
eyes so so dark,
then
he returns his attention to the
page.
 

The electricity in this room is
charged.
 
It’s real.
 
It’s smothering.
 
It’s exhilarating.
 
I can’t breathe.

Dare meets my gaze.

“Are you okay?”

I nod.
 
“I am now.”

Now that I’m here.
 
Now that you aren’t rejecting me.
Now that you see me.
 

The edge of his lip curves up, and he
swoops his hand,
then
bends his head in
concentration.
 

“So what brought on this scene from
Titanic?” Dare asks me tritely, eyeing me above the top of his paper. I feel a
blush spread from my forehead to my chest and I look away.
 

“I’m not…it’s not,” I practically
stammer.
 
The cool air drifts over
my body, forming
goose-bumps
everywhere.
 

Dare pauses.
 
“No?”

I shake my head.
 
“No.
 
I just wanted… to feel something else.”

“Something other than?” Dare waits.
 

“What I’ve been feeling,” I clarify.
“Craziness.
 
Sadness.
 
I just want to be someone else just for
a minute.”

Dare examines his picture,
then
sits back in his seat a minute.
 

“Why would you want to be anyone else?”
he asks softly. “Calla Price is amazing.”

He stands up and comes to me, staring
down.
 
His expression is guarded and
intense and he lingers above me.
 
His dark eyes trace the outline of my naked hip, the curve of my thigh,
and then suddenly, he follows his gaze with his finger.
 
He runs it lightly from my knee to my
hip, his fingertip scaldingly hot.
 

“You want me, don’t you?” I whisper, the
words hesitant and afraid, hopeful and anxious.
 

His eyes are ablaze as he answers.
 
“I’ve always wanted you.”

Any answer I can possibly give him his
frozen in my throat, jammed against my tongue and so all I can do is move. I
turn to give him better access, so that he can touch me, so that he can move
his fingers and grip me tight and shove his tongue down my throat and…then he
takes his finger away and offers me his hand.
 

I stare at his extended hand in
confusion, but then let him pull me to my feet.
 

I stand toe to toe with him, my bare
breasts almost pressed against his body.
 
If I just rocked forward a little bit, his hips would be pressed to mine
and….