Rouge (36 page)

Alex was helping Josiah – the
Sunday chef – plate up. As Hunter stuck her order on the rotator, she noticed
that both of them were watching her too.

Already sick of it, Hunter
slapped her notepad down on the steel counter and glared.

“What? Why the hell are you
looking at me like that?”

Josiah barely spoke any
English, so he simply looked away and went over to the frying vegetables. Alex
dropped her gaze as well, but not before Hunter had seen the look in her eyes.

“You think it’s me, don’t
you?”

Alex put two plates on the
counter and hit the bell. “Order up.”

“Come on Alex!” She waved at
her friend, ignoring the hot plates.

Alex sighed. “You do look a
lot like her Hunter.”

“Why, because I have red
hair? It’s New York, for Christ’s sake. You said to me yourself that there are
loads of weird characters out there.”

“Yeah, but not everyone can
walk through fire.”

“Exactly,” Hunter shoved a
plate between her thumb and pinkie and rested the other on her wrist. “It’s not
me.”

She whirled, almost slopping
a side of noodles onto the carpet, and grabbed a jug of water from the shelf.
For the next fifteen minutes, Hunter went about her usual waiting duties;
filling up jugs, clearing plates and placing orders. But instead of finding an
escape in her work, Hunter felt trapped. Just like at Raoul’s, the heat built
up inside her and soon she began to feel suffocated. She tripped on a chair leg
as it jutted out on her way to the kitchen, and the tray of crackers she’d been
holding went soaring through the air where it hit the counter and crashed to the
floor.

I can’t take this,
she heaved. Alex caught her eye and
before Kin could start yelling at her, she nodded and Hunter went running to
the bathroom.

Sweat poured down her face
and neck as she burst through the door and yanked the tap on. Someone was in
the second cubicle, so she hurriedly splashed her face to cool herself down and
took deep breaths.
This is too much. Eli was right, I can’t be around people
when all they do is stare at me. How could I ever have thought this would be
easy?

I should have listened to
Joshua.

Hunter couldn’t believe what
she was thinking. Suddenly, she missed him. She missed training – as God-awful
as it was – or even hanging out with him in the lab and talking about her
parents. It felt like a stab in the chest every time she thought of just how
much Joshua cared for her, and what he went through to protect her, but he was
turning into someone she just couldn’t be around. After what she’d seen on the
tape, she could honestly say she was afraid of him.

The sound of a flush drew
her out of her thoughts and she looked in the mirror and saw a woman come out
of the cubicle. She nodded at Hunter and casually began washing her hands, but
the wonder in her eyes was undeniable. There were words on her lips that were
simply dying to come out.

Hunter sighed. “I’m not
her.”

The woman froze, shot a
nervous smile at her, and hurried out of the bathroom with her hands still wet.

“Hunter you really shouldn’t be wearing
that,” said Eli, his face stony.

Hunter glanced down at Eli’s
flannelette shirt that she’d slipped on. It had become her after-sex shirt.

“What do you mean?” she
picked up the hem and stretched it out. “It covers everything.”

Eli sighed, shaking his
head, smirking in that sexy way she loved so much. “That’s the problem,” he
murmured, snaking a hand around her waist and placing the other delicately on
her thigh. “You need to take it off.”

Hunter chuckled. “What if
your Dad comes home early?”

“Who cares?!” he shouted.
Drunk with happiness and the endorphins of their recent heated activity, Eli
stepped up to the window and threw it open.

“Eli, what are you-”

“I just want everyone to
know!” he yelled down at the street. Hunter ran up to him and yanked on his arm,
pleading him to stop, slapping him across the back. “I just had SEX! With my
GIRLFRIEND! That’s right!” Eli ducked back under the frame and lifted Hunter
up, wrapping her legs around his waist. Hunter shrieked.
What has gotten
into him?
“And I want to do it again,” he whispered into her chest.

“Slow down there tiger-” Eli
threw her down on the bed and jumped on top of her. “Eli!”

“You don’t want to?” He
pinned her arms down, kneeling over her. Her shoulder throbbed in pain, but she
was learning to ignore it.

Hunter raised her head and
planted a kiss on his lips. “Of course I do. I want this to be the rest of my
life. I want to make love to you until I’m ninety five and I can hardly spread
my legs.”

Eli frowned. “That’s an
attractive thought.”

“Shut up. Let’s just sit
here, okay? Let’s put on some music, enjoy the moment and try to come down from
this magical high you’re on. And I’m pretty sure we’re out of condoms.”

“Well that’s a sentence I’d
love my friends to hear.” Eli pecked her and jumped off the bed. “What are you
in the mood for?”

“Surprise me.”

With Eli’s back to her,
Hunter had the pleasure of watching him lean over his laptop. In the glow of
his golden lamp, his skin looked like a perfect blank canvas, rippled by the deep
muscles of his broad shoulders. An old seventies folk song played softly and
Eli turned back to her. He was glowing. Hunter hadn’t ever seen a more
beautiful and happy person in her life.

Eli slowly climbed into the
bed beside her. He propped himself up on one arm and stared into her eyes.

“Why did your mom leave?”
she asked.

A small portion of the light
left Eli’s eyes. “Why do you want to know?”

“I just want to know more
about you. You know absolutely everything there is to know about my past, and
it’s pretty shocking.”

He nodded, his eyes full of
memories that dragged him back to a bad place. “Um… my Dad was going through a
hard time at work, and so he was a very hard person to be around. Mom never
really… she wasn’t into the whole ‘being rich’ scenario. She always wanted to
live normally, away from the big city. But Dad always put his needs before
hers. She just got sick of it.”

“Didn’t she want to take you
with her?”

Eli gave a short, humorless
laugh. “Let’s just say she learned a thing or two from my dad about
selfishness. She just left. Couldn’t handle it anymore. No note or anything.”

“Didn’t you try to find
her?”

Eli sat up. “Can we talk
about something else?” he asked, slipping out of the covers.

“Wait.” Hunter’s hand shot
out and she snatched his arm. Squeezing gently, she pulled him back beside her.
“I’m sorry. We don’t have to talk about that now. When will you hear from
Yale?”

Looking relieved, Eli lay
his head on the pillow. “Not for a while. I’d really like to get in, but I sort
of feel… you know, pressured. Like I get all these good grades, and it’s almost
expected for me to go to college and study something difficult like medicine or
advanced engineering. But a part of me just wants to get out and… you know, see
the world. Travel.”

Hunter had been staring at
the line of freckles down Eli’s neck when his head rolled on the pillow to
stare at her.

“What do you want to do,
besides go to Hamilton?”

“It doesn’t matter,” she
said. “Whatever I want to do will be ruined by my stupid power.”

Eli shifted on the bed so he
faced her. “You don’t have to change your entire life just because you have a
power.”

“Yes I do Eli. My shift
tonight proved that. No matter what I do, no matter what college I go to or
what job I get, I’ll always be judged. And if I’m not out there saving the
world, people will judge me anyway. I have no future ahead of me.”

“Hunter.” He leaned over and
ran his fingers gently down her jaw. “Don’t let this stop you from what you
want to be. It’s your life, now you live it how you want, understand me?”

She smiled. “Yes sir.”

Eli kissed her again, and
Hunter wondered when the feel of his mouth on hers had become so familiar. It
was as if she knew his body like her own. They’d spent all week together at his
house, avoiding Mr. Akerman and praying he didn’t hear them rock the bed so
many times in a day. Eli studied hard, and Hunter tried to focus on her work,
but there was so much for her to think about. Joshua hadn’t made any attempt at
contacting her. Not even a message on her phone.

But even though it had been
the craziest week of her life, it had also been the best, because she spent
every moment of it with Eli. And they had Prom to look forward to.

Mr. Akerman and Eli had
argued long into the night when he and Melissa returned home on Tuesday
evening. Hunter stood back - even though she wished she could throw a flaming
ball of fire at Eli’s father just to shut him up. But Eli held his own for the
very first time, and in the end Mr. Akerman accepted the terms that it was only
temporary. She was grateful for even that, but it was still hard to ignore the
hard glares from Mr. Akerman and the taunting and prickly gaze Melissa ran over
her like a sharp knife.

The only peace she felt was
when they closed Eli’s bedroom door and were alone with each other.

But her life still wasn’t
perfect. What worried her the most was the fact that Jack hadn’t been in
contact. According to Eli, this wasn’t normal at all, and he grew anxious also.
She’d suggested maybe they go to his house to check on him, but Eli dismissed
the idea.

“What’s wrong with his
home?”

Eli had that uncomfortable
look on his face that he had when he tried to hide something by painting over
the truth. “Jack’s family is... complicated.”

Hunter waited impatiently
for him to explain, and finally Eli gave up.

“His parents were killed a
few years ago. He was only thirteen, and his sister was twelve. No one
volunteered to take them in, so they were put into foster care until the two of
them ran away. Jack looks after Clare, living off the meager inheritance his
parents left them. Poor guy hardly gets any time for himself, except soccer
once a week. He studies like a madman. He wants to go to college way more than
I do.”

Hunter wished Eli hadn’t
said anything.
No wonder he was so pushy that night at the library. He just
wanted someone to talk to.
Fear stabbed at Hunter’s heart. What had
happened to him?

She’d considered calling
Joshua. A terrible feeling had been brewing inside her soul that Joshua had
something to do with Jack’s disappearance. After all, Miss Smart had been
killed only a few days after she’d told Joshua that her teacher knew of her
powers. Joshua could have seen her talking to Jack the other night. Was it
really possible that Joshua was behind all her heartache? That he would stoop
to such a level to keep her protected?

“What’s the matter?” asked
Eli, and Hunter snapped back to the present where Eli was leaning over her on
the mattress. He held in his hands a small silver digital camera. The flash
went off and Hunter was blinded.

“Eli!” she shouted and tried
to swat it away from him. “What are you doing?”

“I want to remember this
night.” He raised the camera. Hunter threw her hands in front of her face just
in time for the flash.

“Stop it!”

“Come on Hunter, please?
Here,” he sat against the headboard beside her and raised the camera in front
of the both of them. “Smile.”

Sighing, Hunter made a face
for the camera just to humor him. After a few more minutes, Eli had a
collection of silly photos on his camera that he couldn’t wait to print.

“You’re so cute, aren’t
you?”

Eli rested a fist under his
chin and batted his eyelashes. “Don’t you know it?” Hunter laughed again as Eli
placed the camera back on his desk. “But things are about to get a little more
R-rated.”

Hunter threw out her arms.
“Bring it on.”

And Eli’s grin grew wide as
he dove on the bed.

The night of Prom, Hunter felt as if her
dreams were becoming reality. After a perfect week, it would all be over in one
perfect night, a night every teenage girl dreams about. Sure, Hunter had a lot
more on her mind than any other girl her age, and she was never really one for
partying, but getting dressed up for Eli and celebrating the end of high school
was well worth getting excited over.

The dress she wore was full
length, flowing with chiffon material and a slit down the side. Silver
diamantes spiraled around the hip where the back curved, revealing and very
sexy. It was exactly her kind of dress. And, it was white, which went
beautifully with the messy up-style of her rich red hair. She borrowed
Melissa’s black high-heeled pumps and some of her less provocative silver
jewelry. It was lonely doing her own hair, and Hunter kept wishing her mother
stood behind her holding the curling iron and telling her how beautiful she
looked.