Beautiful Beast (Enchanted Fairytales) (7 page)

He started up the stairs that he knew as well as the back of his hand. She followed behind. At step ten, she stumbled and Alex cursed under his breath. He’d forgotten to warn her about the warped tenth step. Habit had caused him to step over the upturned lip. He reached back to help her, finding her arm. He slid his hand down to hers, wrapping his fingers around her palm. She immediately gripped his hand back. He tried to ignore the sensation of having her hand bound so tightly to his own. It meant nothing, right?

“Thought you said
kind of
dark,” she said, a little nerve quivering in her voice now. “I personally would call this pitch.”

Alex chuckled. “Sorry. I’ve been going up these stairs for a long time. I forget how dark it is. I could find my way with my eyes closed.”

“Of course you could. It’s the same with your eyes closed or open.”

Alex smiled into the darkness. Calli was pretty funny, he was finding. At the top of the steps, he stopped and she bumped into him.

He didn’t answer, assuming it to be a redundant question. He found the door handle and pushed it open. Muted light flooded the stairwell. To Alex’s surprise, she didn’t let go of his hand. He led the way out of the darkness into a long, narrow hallway to opposite direction from which they’d come.

“What is this?” she breathed.

“There’s . . . nothing . . . in these rooms,” he said, hoping she didn’t catch his hesitation over the lie. “It’s what’s at the other end of the hallway that I wanted to show you.”

“Lead the way,” she said.

He did just that, retaining his grip on her hand. The doors to all the rooms were closed, the light coming in from high, small rectangular windows near the ceiling. At the end, he reached up and took a key from above the doorframe. He had to release her hand to unlock the door as it was a bit sticky. He got it open, and stood back for her to step through.

She stepped out and gasped, turning back to him with a look of amazement on her face. Alex was relieved. He’d been afraid she would think it stupid.

* * * * *

Calli couldn’t believe the view.
She could see the entire town from here. She’d never seen it from above like this. To her, Orchid had always been small, dingy, and something like hell on earth. But from here, it was full of color. The trees were changing in the fall weather, painting the town shades of red, yellow, green, and orange. The streets laid out in a nice, square pattern. Town hall, the bank, and a couple of the churches stood tall and proud above the tree line. What she had always thought of as a definite line between her side of town and the rich side of town was blurred from here.

“Alex! This is amazing.”

He stood behind where she leaned against the railing. The entire viewing area was small. Five or six people would crowd it and be shoulder to shoulder. The roof came out on both sides of the deck, the only open area opposite the door where she now stood. It was more of a cove than a deck.

“I can see why you come up here,” she said. She looked back at him. He slid down to the ground, stretching his legs out in front of him.

“Yeah, it’s a good place for me.”

Something in his tone caught her attention and she moved to sit next to him. She noticed he sat against the right wall so she could only sit on his left side.

“What do you mean by that?” she asked.

He looked down at his hands, tapping his thumbs softly together as if debating. Finally, so quietly she almost didn’t hear him, he said, “No one can see me here, but I can see everything.”

Calli bit her lip. “You mean you can hide here.”

His eyes flicked up to hers for a brief second. He nodded.

“That other thing, at sunset . . .” She hesitated. Would he tell her? She supposed he wouldn’t if she didn’t ask. “Why do you do that?”

He didn’t say anything. He reached over and took her hand, pulling it into his on his lap. He cocked one eyebrow as he looked sideways at her, as if asking if it was okay. Suddenly it occurred to her that he probably hadn’t ever held anyone’s hand, and her heart constricted. She smiled and bumped her shoulder against his before leaning her head on his shoulder, looking out over her town.

“Sunset is the worst time of day for me,” he said slowly. “It’s the time of day that the accident happened.”

Calli forced herself to stay in place when she really wanted to gasp, stare at him and demand more information. What was he talking about? Instead, she twisted her hand in his, tangling their fingers together, and placed her free hand over top, sandwiching his hand between hers.

“My mom, my sister . . .” He shuddered. “The fire was too intense. I couldn’t get to them. It should have been me. Not them.”

His voice was filled with sorrow and self-recrimination. Calli tried to reason his words. Then, as if someone had flipped the light bulb on in her brain, she began to get a picture. Just him and his father living here, his face that appeared melted, the sadness that always seemed to shadow him. She’d seen scars like his before, on other burn victims. Not in Orchid, of course, but on TV and in photos. In her mind she saw a picture of a blazing fire and Alex trying to get into whatever was burning to rescue his mom and sister, and failing.

“They were . . . burned?” she asked.

“I couldn’t get to them,” he repeated. “I tried, Calli, I swear I did. If I hadn’t screwed around with my friends after school. If I had just gone straight home I might have been able to get them out before it started. If I had . . .”

His hand tightened in hers. She wanted to glance up at him, but didn’t want him to see the tears of grief and pity that filled her eyes. She did the math in her head. It had to happen before they’d moved here or everyone would know about it. They’d been here eight years, he was seventeen, and certainly some time had to have passed between that and their moving to Orchid.

“Alex, you were, what, like seven, eight years old? An eight year old can’t be responsible for something like that.”

When he remained silent she looked up at him. His jaw clenched, lips pulled tight, a mixture of grief and guilt coloring his expression.

She turned around so she faced him, and placed her hands on both sides of his face. He flinched as she touched the damaged side, whether from pain or something else she didn’t know. But she felt strongly that if she removed her hand, there would be no going back.

“Alex, look at me.” He brought anguished eyes to hers. “You were a little boy. What could you possibly have done if you’d been there?”

He opened his mouth, then clamped it shut again. “Alex,” she said, pleading. Suddenly he sat forward and wrapped his arms around her. He leaned into her, laying his forehead against her shoulder. She put her arms around his broad shoulders and he turned his head, burying his face in her neck. She tightened her hold on him and he reciprocated. Her heart cracked at the burden Alex carried. She couldn’t imagine why he carried the guilt. On top of that he carried the physical evidence of his failure, the evidence that kept him from living a normal life, that made him something to be stared at and mocked. To be called monster. And she had been part of that. She thought that at this moment her self-recrimination might just match Alex’s.

They sat that way for a long time. Calli thought she could sit there forever and hold him if it would help ease his pain at all.

Finally he released her. “We should go back in,” he said, not meeting her eyes. She nodded. He stood and held out a hand to help her up. He locked the door behind them, and led the way back down the hall. She stepped into the stairwell and waited while he closed the door behind them. He pushed past her, taking her hand and leading her silently back down the stairs and into the closet. He immediately dropped her hand once he opened the closet and they were back in the light.

They returned to Mr. Palmer, Alex still not saying anything. Calli felt he was probably feeling vulnerable. Just before Mr. Palmer left, Alex slipped from the room, still without a word. Not surprisingly, he didn’t join them for dinner.

* * * * *

Saturday morning, Alex watched from his private cove as Calli climbed into the cab
that his father had called for her. She glanced backward once, as if searching. She looked up toward the cove. Alex knew she couldn’t see him. Her shoulders slumped and she climbed into the yellow car.

Alex was angry with himself for telling her what he had, for allowing her to see that side of him that he hid even from his father. He’d been reserved with her the rest of the week in spite of her attempts to tease him out of his mood.

He’d never admit it, but he dreaded the next two days without her.

* * * * *

Calli knew she should be relieved to be home
. After all, hadn’t she negotiated for this? But as she stepped into her small, dingy house her spirits fell. Her father snored in his room. She knew that snore. He’d gone drinking last night.

She walked into her room and looked around. This had been her room her whole life. So why did she suddenly feel like a visitor, that her room was up on the hill? The room she’d only been in for five days.

The house was spotless. Mr. Stratford might not have gotten her dad into rehab, but he had apparently gotten a maid. She walked around with nothing to do. She finally decided to bake some cookies—if they had the ingredients, anyway.

A visit to the food cabinet showed that they more than had the ingredients. It was better stocked than it had ever been. She opened the fridge and saw that it was the same. She got everything out she’d need for the cookies and mixed them up. While the first batch baked, she got the checkbook out of the drawer. Opening it, she saw that the power and gas bills had both been paid on time. Even Calli couldn’t get them paid on time most of the time. They didn’t usually have the money.

The timer on the oven buzzed. She took the cookies out of the oven, removing them from the tray and reloading it with fresh dough before replacing it in the oven.

“Fresh cookies first thing in the morning?”

Calli glanced up at her father’s grumbling voice. He grinned at her. She took in his messed hair, the stubble on his chin, his slight stagger.

“I promise, Dad,” she laughed. “Alex and I get along really well.”
Most of the time
, she thought. “My room is really nice, and Mr. Palmer, our tutor, is really good.”

“Okay,” he said, releasing her. “Can I have one of those cookies?”

“You can have two,” she said.

* * * * *

Alex stayed in the cove all day.
He watched the town closely. He knew he couldn’t possibly see her from here.

Still, he stayed.

* * * * *

“
C’mon, Calli, we want the deets.”

Eli had been relentless since they’d first come by to pick Calli up on their way to Punky’s. All she’d given them was that Alex was nice. She refused to tell them what he looked like other than generals (blonde, dark eyes, tall). And she certainly wasn’t about to tell them anything he’d shared with her.

Calli was stunned by Brittany’s defense of her. She genuinely thought Brittany would side with Eli and try to force information from her.

“Yeah, Eli,” Brandon chimed in, ever in support of Brittany. “Leave her alone.”

Eli’s mouth tightened. Calli, aware of his temper, stepped in.

“Tell me what I’ve missed,” she said. Brittany and Jennae quickly began telling her the latest gossip. After a few minutes, Eli quit pouting and joined in the discussion. After two hours with them, Calli was exhausted and just wanted to go home and go to bed.

Only, the home and bed she wanted to go to weren’t the ones she was going to be sleeping in tonight, but rather the ones in Monster House which overlooked where she sat. She turned her gaze to the house, squinting as if she could see it from here. In particular see the cove, to see if Alex sat there looking for her as well.

* * * * *

Alex pushed the barbell above his chest.
He’d added extra weight, needed to expend nervous energy. His right arm burned with pain. Welcoming it, he lowered the weight and then pushed it up again.

“Impressive.”

He nearly dropped the weights onto his chest at the sound of her voice. His head turned to the side. She stood leaning against the frame, one ankle crossed over the other, her arms folded, grinning at him. He carefully placed the bar into the rack and sat up, smiling back at her. He didn’t think he’d ever seen anything as beautiful as Calli Clayson standing in the doorway of his exercise room.