Heartless (The Heartless Series) (8 page)

"I eat your face."

Why does he sound like a freakin' pouting kitten? Because he's Hart, that's why. Evil, evil Hart Blackwell.

I hit the back of my head against the table, and the sound echoes through the room. "Just get it over with. Please. I have things to do."

He picks up the knife and twirls it around his finger a few times, the gleam of the blade catches his eyes, and when it does, they shift from red to brown. "It isn't fun to eat someone who doesn't resist being eaten. All sexual connotations aside, that's sad. Have we really gotten to this point, sweatheart? Are you really tired of me?"

"Oh, good glory. Don't tell me you're hurt."

"Not hurt. I don't do hurt. Disappointed maybe. But, to be fair to me, this is all on you."

That made no sense to me. "How is it on me?"

"That's the wrong question." He places the tip of the knife right above my belly button. Apparently, he
hadn't
gotten tired or bored of slicing me. "The right question is why am I here?"

"You are here to torture me." Simple question. Simple answer.

"But why are
you
here? What is it about you that wants to be in here with me?"

"I don't…" I sound defeated even to my own ears.

"Don't lie. Don't. We are past that now. Home stretch, baby. Almost show time."

I have no idea what he's talking about, and I have no idea what to say.

"Okay, how's this? When you went to sleep, you took the wrong medicine. You said you were taking the nightmare medicine."

"You can hear me when I'm not asleep?"

He smirks. "But you took the one that makes your brain more active."

"I don't have one that does that." I pull on my straps. I can't lie there anymore. I need up. I need to be awake. I need away from him.

From the way his dimples shine, my struggle seems to make him happy. "Yes you do. You know you do. You are doing this to yourself, sweetheart. And you blame me for it." He slides the knife over my stomach, light enough to leave a scratch, but not deep enough to bleed. No pain. It actually sort of tickles in a strange sort of way. "You are more sick in the head that you know, do you realize that?"

If I could get up, I'd smack his jaws. "Why were you in my class today?" I want to talk about him now. Not me. Anything but me. I need answers. He's all I have. I have no idea how long I'll be asleep, and I need to have some answers before I wake up. Why else would I be here?

"Why else indeed?"

He never used to read my mind. NEVER. I hate this new Hart. Not that I liked old Hart much either, but at least with him, I knew what I was getting.

"Why were you there today?" I yell, my eyes trained on the black spot that still seems to be getting a little bigger.

"Me? The figment demon of your imagination. In your class at school? Are you crazy?" He laughs because he's him. "I suppose you are."

"Don't play dumb with me. Please. I need to know. What's going on?"

"What makes you think I know?"

I glare at him in time to feel the pain erupting through my midsection. "Because you're the one doing this to me!"

"Sweetheart." He twists the knife and dark red blood erupts from my throat, splattering my face. "You need to wake up now."

"No." I gurgle. "No. I want answers, Hart. I want to know who the girl was you brought the last time I was here. Danika."

He raises a blood-splattered eyebrow. "Danika?"

"She's dead. What did you do to her?"

He twists the knife in the opposite direction, and another bubble of blood comes out of my throat. "What makes you think I did something to her?"

"Because she's dead. She was here. I dreamed about her, and now she's dead." Everything is becoming blurry. This doesn't normally happen. Normally I stay awake through all this. Blood loss has never been a problem for me because it's just a dream.

So why is my head so light feeling, and why is the room starting to spin?

"When you start asking the right questions, let me know. Think about it. Of the two of us, who is really in the real world? Who could have possibly killed that girl?"

From the corner of my eye, I see a new girl. She has long, curly red hair down to her mid-back. She's pale. Very pale. She has on a green shirt and a peace sign necklace. Without a word, she stares at me. Blood runs down her mouth, too. Her chest, right over her heart, is covered in red.

Hart leans down and kisses my cheek. He runs his tongue over it and lifts the blood to his lips. He's never done this before, either. When he looks down at me, his countenance is almost compassionate.

"Gracen Sullivan. You really have no idea, do you?"

Chapter Nine

"
G
RACEN, WHAT THE HELL?"
S
AM'S VOICE
booms through my head, through my room, and I jump like I've been shot or stabbed by some red-eyed demon in my sleep. Whichever.

The sun hurts my eyes as it cruelly filters through the curtains of my room. Didn't I close them before I went to bed? Seriously, why can't I keep anything straight anymore? It would be nice to just wake up and go on about my day without having to think about what was real and what wasn't. Or about Hart and that stupid room.

It takes a few seconds for my brain to transition from creepy, horror torture room to creepy, too bright bedroom with Sam staring at me like I have two faces or twenty ears. Or just like I was annoying him.

"What are you doing home?" Probably not the best thing to ask, since I know the obvious thing he's going to ask me next.

"Me? What about you? It's noon, Gracen. You are supposed to be in class." He sounds all gruff. There was a time—way back in never-never land times—when I loved his gruff voice. It sort of turned me on back then. Now, I'm too tired and irritated to be turned on. I just want to sleep, and I want him to let me. Him and Hart. Is that too much to ask? Apparently it is.

"I had a break." I shrug and roll back over on my side. Not that I want to go back to sleep, because I know exactly where I'll be. I'll be back in the room with Hart and the red-haired girl.

Why do these random people just pop up in my nightmares? It's bad enough to have Hart there, but extras? And, not to be outdone, but Hart is now in my living awake times. None of this makes sense, and part of me doesn't even want to question why. Why can't I just go with it? Just ignore it and go on like nothing is wrong. No one will notice unless I tell them anyway. It's in my head and my brain and my nightmares, and no one will ever have to know about it, but—say it with me—me.

"Right."

If Sam was the type of dude that crossed his arms and huffed, he'd so have his arms crossed and be huffing right now. But he isn't. He puts his hands in his pockets and sort of does a mix between a shrug and a slump. Then again, Sam is a behemoth of a man and, when he slouches, is still taller than most people. His eyes have red rings around them. Not red like Hart's. Red like he either has allergies or has hit the liquor store early. He's been drinking more lately. I don't like it, but who am I to judge? Didn't I just take some brain pills with red wine?

"Look," his voice doesn't even have an edge to it. "I'm worried about you."

"There's nothing to worry about. I didn't sleep well last night and thought I'd come home and take a nap after history. No big." I hope he buys it… I hope he buys it… I hope he buys it. Truth be told, it is the truth. I didn't sleep well, and I did need a nap after history. Of course, one of the reasons I have to take a nap is because my nightmare sat next to me the entire friggin' time. Good times…

Sam's eyes get the puppy dog look that I haven't seen in, well, forever. He moves my laptop to the side and sits down on the edge of the bed. He pushes his hair behind his ears and leans his elbows on his knees. All that is fine and dandy, but when he starts fidgeting with his fingers, I get nervous.

"What's wrong? I'm fine, Sam. I promise. I'm fine…"

He clears his throat.

Oh God, this can't be good. Why am I so nervous? Could be because I keep hearing Hart in my ears? He keeps whispering about a girl… the girl. Who is the girl? And why can I still hear him? I need my mommy, or a supportive version thereof.

"This is… more difficult than I thought it would be."

Oh no… no… no… no.

Hart shuts up.

"Gracen, look, I know you've had some problems in the past, and I've never asked you about it. It's none of my business. I've always loved you anyway, right? Despite any mood swings, or whatever."

Well, I'm wide awake now. I sit up, cross my legs, and stare straight into his eyes. "What in the world are you talking about?"

"The cops were here earlier today."

Can't say I expected that. "The cops. Here? Why?"

"I was going to text you and tell you, but it seemed like something that should be talked about in person, you know, without wire traces or physical evidence or whatever. I went to your class and you weren't there, so I kept looking. Didn't think you'd be here. It's bad, Gracen. It's really bad."

"Sam." I grab his hand and hold it firmly in mine. Part of it is to get him to focus. The main part was to get myself in the right frame of mind. If I ever really knew what that was. "Spit it out. Please. What did the cops want?"

"To talk to you. I told them that you'd already gone. I figured they'd catch you there."

I shake my head. "They didn't… I didn't even see them. What did they want to talk about?"

The girl… the girl…
Hart's words echoed through my head. I don't think it's really him. And yeah, I realize how weird that sounds. I feel like these words rattling through my noggin are an echo of what he'd told me before. The girl… focus on the girl.

Danika?

"Danika." Sam pauses and seems to be sizing me up. Is he trying to figure out if I'm going to talk or crack? Oh God, he's gauging my reaction to see if whatever the police told him about me was true!

Stay calm. Play it cool. I can't act guilty because I can't be guilty of anything. "What about her?"

Sam's eyebrows shot up. "You know her?"

Not exactly. "I think she's in my history class. The one with Professor Mitchell."

"Seth Mitchell?"

Wasn't expecting that detour. "Yeah. I think that's his name."

Sam nods. "Seth and my dad were friends. He came to my house like once. Stayed for dinner. Nothing big. Sort of weird."

Sounds about right, but I don't think it's the right time to go down memory lane with a side person who doesn't even really fit part of the story. We need to stick to the main characters, and the secondary characters if we must. Not the D-listers. We have enough to worry about as it is.

"Is that what the police wanted to know? About Professor's, er Seth's, connection to Danika?"

Sam shakes his head and flicks under his already clean nails. "They wanted to know about yours."

"My what?"

"Your connection to Danika, Gracen." Now he's starting to get irritated with me, which I can't figure out because I have done nothing wrong. Nothing.

"I don't have a connection with her. I just saw her in a dream, and I saw her in class." Once I said it, I wanted to push those words back in. Stupid, Gracen. Stupid, Stupid. I blame my big mouth on my mother. I inherited it from her, and I hate it every day. Sam sits up straighter. Why does he have to look at me like that? Like I'm fixing to snap. I'm not snapping. I'm perfectly rational.

I am.

"You dreamed about her?"

I hate myself now. I dug my own friggin' hole. I could've played cool. Told Sam that Danika was just a girl in my class. No big. Nothing major. People know other people without there being a big back story to it. But my stupid tongue got in the way. My tongue. Hart's favorite part.

Ugh.

Sometimes I wish my tongue lied a little better than he said it did.

"Yeah, I guess. I mean it wasn't anything important. I just dreamed about Professor Mitchell's class, and she just happened to be sitting next to me."

Sure, I'd never seen her before the dream or rather had never noticed her before then. I know in my heart of hearts that she had to have been in that class the previous few days. So, maybe my subconscious saw her and I didn't. Maybe that's why I dreamed about her? No, I don't believe that either, but I didn't have to. I just have to make Sam believe it.

He bites on the inside of his cheek. He seriously isn't going to have anything left to bite if he keeps this up. I can imagine the damage he's doing to his mouth. Honestly, I've never seen Sam this nervous. He's really spooked, and that scares the hell out of me. "Sam, what's going on? Please, tell me."

He clears his throat and looks anywhere but at me. "Like I said, the police came to talk to you. I said you'd already gone, so they decided to talk to me. They told me about that girl, Danika, dying. And that they wanted to talk to you. They found her without a heart, Gracen."

I have to stay calm. "Why did they come here? I don't even know her. Not really."

Sam looks down. When his eyes meet mine, they are cold, hard, dark. "Because of the freak out you had in class yesterday and screaming at her… and they found a piece of paper with your name on it in her pocket. Your name. Your address."

"That's just not possible." Blackness starts to fill my vision, and I know I'm going to pass out if I don't get water quick. The colder the better. It always snaps me out of things like this. "I didn't know her. Not really. And besides, anybody could write a note and say it was from me."

"Gracen, your fingerprints were on the note."

I can't process this. I can't. My fingerprints couldn't have been on the note, because I didn't hold the note. I didn't see the note. I don't even know what note they're talking about. I don't suppose the police care about that, though. They'll see it as an open and shut case. Especially since I can't explain how my fingerprints got there.

I didn't hurt her. I know I didn't. Last night, I was at the exact same location. Curled up in my bed, reading fan fiction on my computer just like any other red-blooded person. I wasn't out killing people. I start to tell Sam all of that when my phone dings in his hand.