Verum (9 page)

“First, we call them coppers here,” Dare explains with a snicker. “And second, you don’t seem to understand the power of your name yet. Savages can do anything they like around here.”

“But you don’t consider yourself a Savage,” I remind him as I tread water. Something akin to warmth floods his eyes, and his mouth tilts up in the crooked grin that I am beginning to love. When he’s not smiling, I wait for it to appear, like an addict waiting for a fix.

“I fall under the same umbrella, though,” he tells me. “At least, for outsiders looking in.”

“Did you know that you speak in riddles?” I ask him in annoyance. He dives under water without answering, and within two seconds, he’s grabbed my ankle, pulling me under with him.

I struggle and twist, but he pulls me down, down, down, and then I’m against his wet hard body and suddenly, I don’t want to struggle anymore. I don’t want to push him away.

Not by a long shot.

His body is both strong and lean, cold and warm. It’s very hard, and I’m held against it, reveling in it, soaking it in. He’s angles and muscle, strength and grace.

He’s moving against me, his hips, his hands.

His fingers glide fluidly against my skin, creating friction even beneath the water.

I’m on fire.

The warmth spreads from my arms to my legs to my belly.

It’s a wild-fire, and suddenly I’m quite sure that he’s the only thing that can put me out.

Together, we float to the surface, still intertwined. We break through the top and I suck in a breath and Dare is staring into my eyes.

There’s tension here, but not the bad kind. It’s the kind that ignites you, the kind that intoxicates you, the kind that once you taste it, you’ll crave for the rest of your life.

I’ve forgotten that I was going to be careful, that I was going to reject him on every level.

All I can remember, all I can focus on, is how very
alive
Dare DuBray is making me feel in this moment, how alive he
always
makes me feel.

For a girl who has been surrounded by death her entire life, this is a very big deal.

“I’m a little afraid of you,” I blurt honestly, and Dare still has his arms around me. Our treading water motions keep our legs rubbing together, the friction still there.

Hot,

Hot,

Hotter.

Dare smiles, but there is no humor in it.

“Good.”

“Why?”

My honesty makes me seem innocent, but I don’t know how to play games. I have no experience with the opposite sex at all.

“Because that makes you feel something.”

But he’s hesitant now and he looks away. There’s something he wants to say, it’s balanced on the tip of his tongue, but he swallows it.

“What is it?” I ask softly. “Just tell me.”

He wants to, I can tell. His secrets are killing him. He just wants to be normal, he’s just acting out a role.

I don’t know why I feel like I know this. It’s just there, suddenly resting on my heart.

“You don’t have to be someone you’re not,” I murmur quietly. His dark eyes snap up to mine and he pulls his hands away. There’s something in his eyes now, something guarded, and our easy afternoon has come to an end.

“What makes you think I am?” he snaps. “Pretending to be something I’m not, I mean.”

I’ve somehow annoyed him, and I don’t answer because I don’t know what to say.

“I’m not being someone I’m not, Calla,” he says coolly as he strides from the water. “I’m being who you need me to be. We’ve both experienced loss. You just can’t handle yours.”

I’m stunned because he’s normally so patient, and I’m dripping wet.

“We don’t have towels,” is all he says when I follow him. My clothing soaks up the water and it is a very cold ride back home.

Dare doesn’t say another word and I leave him in the garage.

I don’t see him at dinner, and I don’t see him the rest of the night.

But as I lay in bed around midnight, I see his car leave the garage.

I don’t see him come home, and I’m awake for half the night waiting.

I have no idea where he goes when he slips away.

Somehow, I think he wants it that way.

There’s a fork in the road and even though I see it, I can’t avoid it.

One road goes left, one goes right, and neither of them ends well.

I feel it in my bones,

In my bones,

In my bones.

I sing a song of nonsense, and it sings back. The notes echo and twist in the air, and I swallow them whole.

“Come out,” I call behind me, because I know they’re there.

I can’t see them, but they’re always watching.

Eyes appear, blood red, and they blink once, twice, three times.

“I can see you,” I announce and there’s a growl and then I’m crushed beneath the dark, beneath the weight, beneath the oppression.

“You don’t scare me,” I lie.

There’s savagery here, there’s grace.

But above all, there’s oblivion and no matter what I do, I will be sucked into it.

I know it.

I feel it.

I’m crazy.

And it doesn’t matter.

I’m the rabbitrabbitrabbit and I’ll never be free.

F
or some reason
that I can’t explain, I’m holding my breath, waiting to see if Dare comes to dinner.

He does.

Dressed in black slacks, shiny black loafers and an oatmeal-colored soft shirt. He wordlessly moves across the room, sits in his seat, and places his napkin in his lap.

I look at my plate, remembering the way his hands touched me yesterday, the way I’d wanted it, the way I can’t forget how he makes me feel.

My cheeks flush and I take a bite. They’re both staring at me, or at least it seems that way.

“The fish is delicious,” I finally offer, without looking up.

I think I hear Dare smile. My discomfort probably amuses him.

“Adair.”

Eleanor’s tone makes it sound like she just ate a persimmon.

“Yes?”

I look at Dare and it’s easy to see that he can’t hide his disdain.

“Play for us.”

She commands him like a monkey, like he’s expected to jump when she beckons, which of course he is. We all are.

Wordlessly leonine, he walks to the piano in the corner. Sitting at the bench, he gracefully does as he’s told.

The song he plays is something sad and dark, which is perfect, because that’s the mood I’m in. The notes brush my cheeks, play with my hair, and then fall limply onto the floor when he’s done with them, after he strokes each of them from the keys.

I watch his hands and I can’t help but remember yesterday, the way those same strong hands skimmed my wet body, tracing my curves. I can’t help but remember how I’d let him touch me, how I’d folded into him.

I know I wouldn’t have resisted if he wanted more.

But then he didn’t.

I feel like I’m a lamb, and he’s a wolf. But at the same time, I feel like he doesn’t want to be. He’s caged, when he should be wild, and I don’t think he knows what to do about it.

The room is silent as we listen to his song, and I’m more emotionally charged by the minute. My past wells up in me, my present, my future. None of it looks good and then the music stops and my emotions pause.

Dare pushes the bench back, and he walks straight for me. My heart pounds as he bends, his lips close enough to graze my neck.

I remember those lips. The way they feel soft, yet firm. The way he tastes of spearmint.

“You smell like apples.” His whisper is low. I close my eyes for a scant second, because an apple is what destroyed Eden.

I open my eyes.

“I’m sorry I was rude earlier. This is just so goddamned hard for me.”

I know.

God, I know.

“Meet me in the garden tonight and I’ll make it up to you. Midnight.”

I glance up at him and I’m brave, but my bravery will get me eaten. Whether he wants to be or not, he’s a wolf.

And I’m a lamb.

Dare walks away, because it doesn’t matter to him what anyone thinks.

Dare does what he wants.

He lives free.

M
idnight comes quickly
.

I swing the gate open and tread inside among the night lilies, evening primrose and moonflowers. This garden is filled with things that are vibrant during the day and opulent at night. It is a small piece of paradise in the middle of a frightening place, and my mother had loved it. And so do I.

“Hey.”

He’s here already, and he lingers in the shadows, so at home in the night.

It reminds me of something my brother scribbled in his journal.

Nocte liber sum.
By night I am free.

Am I free here with Dare?

“Hey,” I answer, internally commending myself on my eloquence. “You’re early.”

“I wanted to be ready.”

His voice is velvet, and it wraps around me like a blanket.

“What do you want with me, Dare?” I ask him honestly, because at the moment, I don’t know. He’s hot and cold, a distinct puzzle and I can’t put him together.

“I can’t do this anymore, Calla. It’s too hard to watch you, to stay away from you….” his voice trails off. “We’ve been through so much already. Don’t do this to us now.”

“So again, I ask you, what do you want from me?” my words are simple, and I don’t know what I’m doing.

Like always.

“That’s a loaded question,” he tells me as I approach and he watches my body as I move. I swallow hard because his expression is heavy and dark, and it’s meant for me.

He’s staring at me like he wants to eat me, and I am once again reminded that he’s a wolf.

“So give me a loaded answer,” I suggest, and my words surprise me
and
Dare.

What am I doing?

What am I doing?

His eyes widen, then narrow.

Dare practically growls as he yanks me to him, and he’s hard against my body. I sigh into his mouth and he groans.

Sensations blur and conscious thought ceases.

Consequences be damned.

Sweet Lord.

Dare’s tongue plunders my own and I’ve never felt so sexily invaded in my life. God, I’ve missed this. I’ve missed him.

So much,

So much,

So much.

It’s like every nerve ending in my entire body has exploded, like I’m standing on fire, like I’m fire itself. I’m ore, I’m magma, I’m lava. I’m melted, I’m the sun.

He’s ignited me.

His hands clutch me, big and strong and splayed against my back, and I somehow feel like I’m balanced in his hands, like he’s holding me steady.

Maybe he is.

Maybe he always has.

My head falls back and he slides his lips along my neck, grazing the soft skin, inhaling my scent.

“You smell like apples,” he tells me again, his voice husky in my ear. I feel urgent and rushed and desperate, yet his voice is even, controlled. I don’t know how he’s managing.

I pull back to ask, my hand on his rock hard chest, and suddenly the world spins.

Fragments, scents, sounds… so many things swirl together in my head and I’m not living in the present anymore.

I’m in the past,

And the past is a prison.

My eyes flutter closed because I can’t take the overwhelming sensations, and even though I hear Dare’s voice, asking me if I’m ok, I can’t respond.

Because I see him.

Not in front of me in the moonlight, but in my head.

He’s real, and he’s familiar, and he’s mine.

His face is twisted in pain, and he’s trying to tell me something, but I don’t want to listen. He’s bloody, he’s dark, he’s broken.

He wasn’t supposed to be there.

My memories are wrong.

But I can’t find the right ones.

“Calla, are you ok?”
he asks with bloody lips and his teeth are red.

I can’t move,

I can’t think.

He grabs me to him and screams,

And the scream builds into a roar,

And the roar is the ocean.

“Help!”
Dare shouts, but I think it might’ve been me.

I close my heart, and he opens his lips, and words fall out, and I shake my head.

Because Finn is on the beach and he’s dead.

And Dare has done something, something, something.

The fear grows and builds and takes me over, covering me up in shadows.

That boy will be your ruin,
Sabine whispers. He’ll breakyoubreakyoubreakyou.

In my head, blood spatters and someone screams and I yank away from Dare now, gasping for breath.

He’s here,

and he’s fine.

He’s fine.

He stares at me, nervous, hesitant to approach.

“Are you all right, Calla?” his British words are clipped, and his eyes are concerned. He holds his hand out like he’s soothing a disturbed filly, and I’m disturbed. That’s the only thing to describe me.

Because none of that happened.

None of that is real.

Except for the fact that my brother is dead.

The nausea hits suddenly, in a frightening wave.

I whirl around so he can’t see, and I retch into the bushes.

Humiliation swells in me, but not so much as the sickness.

Over and over, my stomach rebels, and I feel him behind me, trying to soothe me.

“Go,” I tell him over my shoulder, utterly embarrassed.

“No,” he answers firmly. “Maybe you have food poisoning. We should go see Sabine.”

His answer for everything.

But somehow, I feel like she’s causing this. I never felt this way until I met her. These things never happened to me before.

“No, not Sabine,” I rasp, wiping my mouth and backing away. “I’m fine. I promise.”

I’m lying. I’m not fine.

But he can’t know that.

I spin around and flee, running for the house, running away from Dare. He lets me go, surprisingly. I glance over my shoulder when I’m bounding out the garden gates and he’s standing limply, watching me with a strange expression.

I don’t slow down until I reach the house.

I creep into my room and when I do, I imagine Finn waiting for me in the chair by the window, sitting in the dark.

Because that’s what he would do if he were here.

He turns on the lamp.

If he were real.

“Where have you been?” he asks me quietly, judgment in his pale blue eyes.

“Out,” I tell him. “I don’t feel well.”

“Did something happen?” he asks, cocking his head. “Did he do something to you?”

Annoyance fills me up. “Why would you assume he did something?” I demand, yanking my nightgown out of a dresser drawer. “You’re imagining things. I just don’t feel well.”

He stares at me doubtfully.
“I’m
imagining things? Cal, this is getting dangerous. I don’t know what you’re up to, but it’s not good.”

I exhale a shaky breath, hating the way my lungs feel sick.

“I don’t want you here tonight,” I answer. And he’s instantly gone, the chair vacant and dark, and I’m alone.

I turn my back, heading straight to the bathroom to change.

I don’t know what’s wrong with me.

All I know is, something is going on with me, something I don’t understand. Something I don’t want.

I run the water for a long time, splashing my face, cooling me down.

It doesn’t help, and my dreams don’t either.

I toss and turn in my bed, unable to wake even though I want to. My breathing quickens and I feel like I’m right on the cusp of…something.

Dare whispers. “Keep going. You’re almost there. You can do this.”

I don’t know if I can.

I’m floating in an ocean of insanity. It’s just ahead of me, so close I can touch it. But even though it shines and glimmers, it has glistening fangs and I know it will shred me.

“I’m scared,” I whisper, gripping Dare’s hands.

“You should be,” he answers and his words impale me. “But it’s ok. I’m here. You’re not alone, Cal.”

But I feel like it.

I’m alone.

I’m bobbing in a dark ocean and the lies surround me.

“Help!” I scream out, but no one is there, not even Dare.

“Finn!” I shout. “Please!”

No one answers.

No one comes.

I’ve been cast away, and I’ll never be found.