Dangerous Lovers (200 page)

“Elijah.” Another warning. Stone pulled the wraith out of the room. Two others were out there as well.

I was left alone again. It should have been a relief, but all I felt was the sudden pain of loneliness. This was what they were planning all along. To tease me with their voices, their touch, and then abandon me again. I had known it would come. Yes I’d known. Still, I silently begged for their unfamiliar presence. I took in shaky, uneven breaths. Tears fell. Cruelty was their specialty.

Chapter Eight

Stone

Audrey kept glancing over at Elijah. She looked comfortable in her fear.

“What’s a wraith?”

When she regarded me, I could tell that she couldn’t believe she actually spoke. I stared at Elijah and realized he wasn’t savoring her fear; he was speaking to her as if he knew her or knew something about her. For some reason that pissed me off to no end. I could barely control myself. My skin itched, and my muscles expanded.

“Elijah.” I wanted his attention off of her so badly that I didn’t even notice my voice came out as more of a growl. Marcus and Dallas were still fixing the lock when I forced Elijah out of the room by his shoulder.

Pushing past them, I called out, “Marcus, Dallas. One of you should go in there and keep an eye on her.” Dallas moved past us, but I kept my eyes on the wraith in front of me. He wasn’t looking toward the door, only at me.

“You don’t know, do you?” Elijah rarely smiled, but when he did, it honestly scared the hell out of me.

I was used to Elijah’s cryptic words, but his game was starting to piss me off. He might have caught on something from her mind, but why not tell us? My fist had tightened over my knuckles. My teeth bared as another growl rumbled from my chest. Marcus noticed and stood up. A fierce fey, brimming with power…for once appearing his actual age.

“What’s going on?” His usually musical voice held no warmth.

I was losing control. The growl still lingered in my voice. The muscles I tried so hard to control were shifting, my bones were expanding. I needed to get a grip. Confronting Elijah would do no good. There was still so much about wraiths none of us knew. “She doesn’t know what a wraith is.”

“Well, I would call 'er lucky.” Marcus’ attempt at lighthearted, fell short.

Elijah finally looked away from me.

“No, Marcus. She doesn’t know anything.” His words felt like a snake coiling around us. Marcus became utterly still.

“Is she human?” Marcus asked.

“Jacobs and Dallas would have been able to tell if she was human when we found her.” Not only that but Jacobs hadn’t sounded surprised when I had called my find in. He had to know something more. We were silent for a moment then Dallas came out.

“What the hell doesn’t she know?” Dallas asked as he shut the door behind him.

“Anything. This is why I ordered you not to talk to her.” Jacobs strode down the hall in one of his many suits. All of us came to attention except Elijah, he turned his focus to the door. The small smile slipped from his face.

“She is curious.” Elijah concentrated on the door as if he could see through it, and maybe he could.

“The best of the best, my ass. Get out of here, all of you, before you ruin everything.” Jacobs appeared restless again. “Elijah, stay.”

I almost stopped in fear. The higher-ups wouldn’t command Jacobs to use a wraith on her, would they? I stayed with the others, hoping I’d be able to find other friends of mine who would know.

Chapter Nine

Audrey

After Dallas, the old one and the one with pitiless eyes came in, I had tipped the bed on its side and pushed it toward the door to use it as a sort of barrier. Behind its protection, I curled against the wall. Why wouldn’t they leave me alone? None of them had tried to hurt me yet and the waiting, the expecting…it was a new type of torture.

Jacobs looked at me with sad brown eyes that were the same odd amber color that Dallas had. There was too much to see in those eyes. They were older than the body they lived in.

“Will you say your name?” The old one, Jacobs, asked. I shook my head once. “Audrey, right?”

My head shot up. Stone had told them. I shouldn’t have trusted him. He told them. No one else knew it, no one else had muttered in years. Four years, three days, and about 6 hours. I had been referred to as “the little monster”, “creature”, or “it” when I first arrived. Those bodiless voices. A sad smile spread across his face.

“Yes, that is what we thought.”

I wanted to ask who “we” were. I wanted to ask if they knew. Did they know I was a monster? But something else came out instead.

“When am I going to die?”

The older one gasped. Jacobs’ watched me as he spoke.

“You are a rarity, my dear. We are not going to kill you.”

I feared that the most. My body started to quake. Tremors shook me to my very core.

“Audrey, we won’t hurt you. You have nothing to fear from us. Unfortunately, you do have a lot to learn.”

I wouldn’t meet his eyes. He was a liar. All of them were.

“What was the one pleasure they gave you?” the black eyed one, Elijah, asked, his voice still utterly flat. How could he know that? How could anyone know that? And yet, I found myself willing to answer.

“I got to shower.” Once a month, they came and took me, blindfolded, to a shower. They washed me, dried me, and combed the tangles from my hair. My skin would be pink and clean, my legs smooth. I would touch them forever. These people took me before my next day.

Elijah stepped closer to me. He sat on the bed only three feet away. He didn’t seem to be looking at me.

“How?” I couldn’t understand how he knew that they had given me one kindness.

He turned to me and smiled, revealing dangerously sharp teeth.

“Magic.” It was the first time I heard a semblance of emotion in his voice. I almost forgot about the older one, who paced the room.

“You’re the loud one’s father,” I stated, watching him. He stopped pacing and looked at me.

“Yes, Dallas is my son. My name is Jacobs.” There was a hint of a lie in his eyes. I was comfortable with lies. “If we allowed you to shower, would you try to hurt yourself?”

“No. I’d probably try to kill myself.” Another smile lifed Elijah’s lips. “A razor’s too slow. Your gun would be faster, but I don’t suppose I would shower with that. No more cutting.”

The idea of being clean, the idea I could do it without foreign hands, gave me something I hadn’t had in years. Hope. I did not like this.

Jacobs seemed stunned by my explanation, but he continued to pace.

“Would you mind? I need to read your intentions; the best way is physical contact.” Elijah held his hand out, this time facing me. His offered hand was a great temptation. If it was being offered, how could I possibly refuse? I was already hoping to be clean, why not hope for contact? I gave him my hand. He closed his eyes. His hand was cold and held no tenderness, but it was real. It made me feel alive. For once I wasn’t scared of someone’s touch. Suddenly images flashed in my mind. I gasped.

I was looking at myself from Elijah’s point of view. Then, I was in the hallway with Stone, whose eyes kept changing. Then, I was in darkness, Elijah was in there, and he knew we weren’t alone. Words were coming at him, but I didn’t understand them. These weren’t my thoughts, they weren’t my memories. Elijah pulled his hand from mine, and I realized I was crying. I started to feel his pain.

“How did you do that?” Anger clipped his words short and his face twisted into a scowl.

“I don’t know.” That had never happened when I touched another person before. I recalled slight touches from Dallas and Stone. Nothing had happened with them. I could feel his black eyes on me as I stared at the ground. I waited for his next question, the one when he would ask me what kind of
thing
I was. I was a monster.

“Jacobs, she won’t hurt herself if you allow her to shower.” With that, Elijah stood and left.

“I’m sorry I had him invade your thoughts, but I needed to be certain you wouldn’t harm yourself. I’ll send down one of the girls. She’ll help you.” Jacobs left as well.

I could tell he felt uncomfortable, but my mind was stuck on the invasion of my memories. Maybe I’d done the same to Elijah, but then different information attacked my mind. Jacobs was sending someone new. I cringed, folding closer to myself and closed my eyes, trying to find a moment’s peace.

• • •

I don’t know how long I slept in my corner, but I felt eyes on me. I jerked my eyes open and scooted to the wall. Dallas leaned casually on the door, looking bored, but his eyes weren’t on me. An unnaturally beautiful girl with deep seaweed-green hair sat on the bed. Her eyes were a shade of coral and her skin had a hint of green in its otherwise pale complexion. I swallowed at her closeness. She was only two feet from me, but her long legs almost touched me. There was something odd about her legs when I looked at them - like the air around them wavered. It looked like a ripple of water in the air. She clapped her hands when she saw me awake.

“Hello!” Her voice sounded more like liquid. It was hauntingly exquisite. “I love, LOVE meeting new people. I am Nixie. What’s your name?” Nixie practically squirmed in her seat, which made me feel very uncomfortable.

“Nixie, she doesn’t talk much. We’ve been calling her Scars.” Dallas motioned to me when saying the name Scars. I reached my hand to my scars and turned away slightly. They were…

“Dallas you are such a … a …a blowfish!” Nixie turned her strange eyes to him.

“Call me an ass, Nixie It’s what you wanted to call me.” A note of playfulness carried in his voice, but before I could read more into it, I turned my left eye away.

“Leave, Dallas.” Nixie’s voice turned shrill like she was really hurt by his words. She turned away from him.

“I’ll be back later.” He slipped through the door. Silence followed the light click of the door closing.

“Now, what’s your name?”

I felt uncomfortable with the weight of her stare and the falsetto of her tone. She tried to sound upbeat and calming, but I could hear the slight wavering, the undeniable fear.

“Audrey.” It felt so strange coming from my lips. The green haired girl shrieked excitedly but it just made me want to run and hide. Instead, I cringed away from her slightly.

She barely even noticed. “Your voice is so pretty. I wouldn’t be shocked if you are a cousin of mine. Now come on. Shower time! I love the water.” All fear that undercoated her words had disappeared completely.

I was still reeling from her exuberance and didn’t realize that she grabbed for me. She was incredibly strong…or I was weaker than I realized. I tried to reclaim the hand she had taken, but she held tight, either ignoring my pulling or not noticing it. Though I fought it, I relished her soft, silky hold on me but only for a moment before the fear overrode any other feelings. They wanted something, something I didn’t have. Once they realized that, they would lock me away, alone forever. Again.

She pulled me down a narrow hallway lined with doors. I didn’t want to know what was hiding behind them. Were there more scarred, lonely people? Were there more beautiful people like Nixie? Memories I thought forgotten tried to surface, but I focused on my feet. They slapped against the wood floor,
wood that wasn’t spattered by blood.
I whimpered and closed my eyes, hoping the dream wouldn’t manifest. She continued to pull me along.

We stopped. The floor hitched and jerked then we were moving without moving. I opened my eyes and saw Nixie watching me closely. Her eyes kept going back to my scars and to my seemingly dead eye. I watched her eyes closely. There were a million shades of coral, making it seem as if I was underwater, looking at a reef. She didn’t know I was studying the colors shifting in her eyes; there was no curiosity in her gaze. The colors closer to the surface were darker and shiny. Lament and sympathy ran deep, to the point that I had to look away. She wanted to cry for me but kept up the bubbly appearance. The small box we were in stopped and dinged. I remembered the name now, but it had been more than four years since I had been in one, an elevator.

“Come on.” She pulled me through more hallways with fewer doors. She stopped and pulled out a key. “Sorry, my room is a complete mess. When I heard there was fellow girl in need of a shower, I practically jumped up and down volunteering.” She opened the door to reveal a much smaller version of the first room I’d been in. Two rooms split from the one. This was lived in. It was a home.

The couch and floor were littered with clothes. The couch looked maybe as old and beat up as I felt. Pictures and paintings cascaded down the walls. I looked at it all, feeling overwhelmed. Every color enhanced and held more to it. A memory, a thought, an emotion. I turned my gaze downward.

“I’ll show you to the bathroom, then see if I can find some clothes for you to wear. That whole old, dingy, hobo look isn’t going to work.” Nixie focused on the outfit that I had lived in for the past five years. Dragging me toward the bathroom, she paused at the door. “One second.” She ran in and I was left alone. I started to panic, my hands were twisting together, my weight kept shifting. The door suddenly opened wide. Nixie appeared with another bright smile.