Lonely Souls (22 page)

“Triss, are you going to be okay here? Should we go somewhere that you aren’t constantly bombarded with memories?” Logan asked, as he saw me scanning everything.

“I don’t know what the best thing is, but I’d rather be where I can feel connected to her on some level while we try to figure everything out,” I sighed.

My body fell on the couch, and Logan sat down in the chair, not making it out to grab more things. I think we were both trying to unwind from the long drive, and this was going to be home for a while for us both. It still hadn’t completely sunk in.

“Remember when we were on our way to the park, and I asked you if you knew something else, and you answered ‘nothing concrete’?”

His eyes darkened a shade.

“I think I’m at the stage in my grief process or healing process or whatever we want to call it to start hearing your not-so-concrete observations,” I told him.

He stretched his legs out in front of him, leaning back in the chair with his hands gathered behind his head. His distressed jeans were falling a little too low for me not to be distracted briefly. He let out a sigh and closed his eyes. I took my eyes away from the trail on his stomach and forced myself to stay focused. The breeze was picking up and circulating through the house ushering out the stale air, but it was still lacking something.

Since he hadn’t started speaking yet, I got up from the couch and went out to the car grabbing a couple more of the bags I had placed the bouquets and herbs from our pantry in. Coming back inside, Logan was still stretched out, but his eyes were now open, and he was watching me make my way through the kitchen. I placed the bags on the counter and began searching for the rose and lavender mixture to place on the table in the family room. If I added a little thyme oil to it, I might be able to calm our energy and get him to talk. I knew he was getting close to telling me something. We just weren’t quite there yet.

Walking over to the cabinet, I grabbed a glass bowl to place my mixture in. I could feel his eyes on me, following my every move, and I did my best not to disappoint as I reached up onto the high shelf. Turning back around to begin my trade, I used the tiny dropper, squeezing a few drops of the thyme oil over the lavender and rose petals, letting the fragrance release into the air.

“That ought to work for us,” I said, feeling quite domestic, bringing the bowl to the table in the great room.

I looked up at Logan, his eyes still holding steady on me. He was contemplating what he wanted to tell me, and I hoped I could persuade him to divulge as much as possible.

“You’ve been so strong, Triss. I know you’ve been holding a lot in, and I don’t want to make things worse for you, especially if there’s no significance. I feel like the more I tell you, the less you’ll want to be near me,” he replied. “And even if you don’t want to be with me in the way I hope, I need to be allowed to protect you. I just don’t want my past to overshadow my future with you.”

“Doubtful. I’ve grown quite fond of you,” I mumbled, looking up at him surprised by my own admission.

Logan let out a long groan and placed his head in his hands. He stayed there for a few minutes and then looked back up at me. His dark hair was completely disheveled, and his blue eyes were filled with worry.

“I’ve been in contact with your father,” he whispered, his eyes turning icy blue. “Not recently. It was when I was studying the dark arts.”

My insides churned, and I fell back on the couch for support. This wasn’t what I was expecting to hear. I looked away from him and began staring at the glass bowl I had just set down on the table, wishing it would do more for me. I don’t think enough herbs or spells existed to calm me after hearing something like that.

“Are you going to say anything?” he asked. There was no mistaking the misery in his voice.

“I don’t know what to say,” I said, refusing to look at him. I needed to feel the emotions naturally. I couldn’t let myself get caught up in his soulful stare to distract me from making the right move.

“This was my worst fear,” he whispered. “Right here and right now, exactly what’s happening. That I’d lose you before I got you.”

I could see out of the corner of my eye that he was holding his head again. The turmoil the statement I begged him to say was crushing us both. I felt as responsible for this situation as did he. Everything was going so well and then this.

“Are you going to speak to me again? It probably won’t help, but you can ask me anything, and I’ll answer.” His words melted my heart. Logan was trying so hard to right his past, and here I was digging it up at every chance I could get and throwing it right back at him, only this time it involved a part of me creating a mess I didn’t know that I could fix.

“I feel like my emotions are under siege, partly by my own doing,” I replied after a few more minutes.

“I’m sure you do,” he said, his voice tender.

“Why did you keep this from me?” I asked, looking briefly over at him.

He raised his eyebrows at me. “Because I didn’t want
this
to happen. I knew eventually I would need to tell you. I just wasn’t sure when that time would come.”

“Was it like a one-time deal or what? Did he know you knew me?” I asked suspiciously, as if every answer from this moment forward might lead me down another path I didn’t want to trespass on.

“It was several times that I was in contact with him. He’s known as an expert in many aspects of black sorcery, and naturally, I wanted to learn from the best. He mostly instructed me through email and phone contact, but he did fly out to Illinois twice for some hands-on training, but that was it for in person contact.” He was in pain with every word he spoke. “And no, I never told him about our connection, but my guess is that he knew. I’m sure that before he took me on, he investigated me a little bit. I…,” he stopped himself.

“What?” I asked.

“It probably doesn’t make a difference, but I didn’t know he was your father until it was too late.” He looked up at me waiting for my reaction.

“What made you stop interacting with him?” I asked, keeping my distance, staring straight ahead rather than at him.

“You,” he replied. “The entire time I was learning about the dark arts, I kept thinking of you, and if you’d ever give me a chance if that was the path I followed. If I lost you before I’d even gotten the honor to have you, my world wouldn’t be worth living, and that’s what I told myself every day when I was contemplating staying with black magic. I told your father the conflict I was feeling. He thought I was young and foolish, and he told me that he had to make a choice once, and the dark side won.” He stopped to take a deep breath. “That’s when I started to make the connection. I didn’t know it was your father until I was ready to quit. Unfortunately, I was already practicing and under his tutelage before I figured it out.” His eyes were blazing with anger.

“Wow,” I sighed. “Things just keep getting worse.”

“Does your mom know?” I whispered.

“Hardly. I’m sure there are some things that have happened recently that have made her wonder about things, but as far as your father teaching me? No.” He shook his head.

I sat in silence trying to figure out how to spin this into a positive. Maybe this could work in our favor, or maybe I was being naïve. I started shivering from the breeze that began whipping its way into the house. Logan jumped up and started toward the front door.

“I’ll get a fire started. We’ll need it for the evening anyhow,” he mumbled, completely at a loss, and left closing the door behind him.

“Thanks,” I replied, still staring into oblivion and completely in a daze that I wasn’t sure I could shake this time. Thinking back to the night before, I was thankful I hadn’t uttered any words to him that I couldn’t have taken back.

Chapter 21

The fire that Logan built earlier was roaring, and it was doing a great job of heating up our tiny cottage, but the heat wasn’t connecting with my bones. Since the moment he spoke those words, I’d been stuck in a frigid ice storm of my own making. I was still in a fog full of confusion and hurt, but somehow managed to cook chicken and rice for our dinner.

I wasn’t sure how sitting across from Logan at dinner was going to work. I managed to avoid almost all eye contact with him, and nothing came to my mind to say to him, so Logan took the hint and seemed to be hiding out in his room.

I felt awful. It wasn’t that I was furious with him for contacting my father. He had no way of knowing who he was, and I couldn’t even tell if I was angry with him for hiding it from me. I almost wished I didn’t know, so how could I be mad at him for forcing something out of him that he didn’t want to tell me anyway, and then turn it around and be miffed because he didn’t tell me right away? Why would telling me something like that within forty-eight hours versus a month make a difference? It shouldn’t. It’s not like he could tell me something like that on day two or was I just making excuses because I was beginning to like him so much?

Since Logan arrived back in my life, I felt sane, protected, and even a small amount of happiness had been allowed to trickle back into my world. I didn’t want to lose that feeling. I didn’t want to lose Logan period, and I felt like I was on the edge. I think what was bothering me more than anything was what my father said to him about choosing between love and black magic. It wasn’t even so much about me and my mom that hurt me or worried me, because my father had obviously made his decision long ago, it was that Logan asked the question. What scared me was if I allowed myself to fall in love with Logan, only to have him realize the same thing as my father did, that the pull to black magic was too strong, and he decided to choose black magic. I know I wouldn’t be able to follow him to that world, and the thought of losing him was crushing. It was better not to have him in the first place.

The rice cooker clicked signaling that dinner was ready; I only hoped I was. I placed the silverware on the table and walked toward Logan’s room. I gently tapped on the door, waiting for a reply.

“Come in,” he replied softly.

I opened the door to see Logan sitting in a chair by the window reading. He didn’t look up, and I didn’t blame him.

“Dinner’s ready,” I said lightly.

“Thanks, Triss. I’ll be right out,” he replied, glancing quickly at me. Something had changed slightly with him. His eyes looked a little red, and he seemed dismissive, even more so than I would have predicted under the circumstances.

“Okay,” my voice overly sweet as I backed out of the room.

I felt a lump beginning to form in my throat, and I was relieved my voice didn’t catch when I responded to him. My feelings for him had already taken over, and it was going to be a lot harder to lie to him or myself about it, but I was going to try if for nothing more than survival’s sake. Thinking back to what that stranger-turned-predator said in my house about some people not making it, I wanted to be sure that I’d proven him wrong, even if that meant shutting off potential problems before they even started. Unfortunately, for him, he dabbled where he shouldn’t have, and now he wasn’t a worry for me any longer. But his words still haunted me. I pushed the feelings away that were trying to roll into my mind about last night’s events—one thing at a time.

I sat down at the table and watched Logan come out of his room, shoving his dark hair back from his face, staring at the floor while he walked into the kitchen to join me for dinner. He had put on a sweatshirt even though it was plenty warm in the house, unless he was suffering from the same problems as I.

“It’s nothing fancy. I wasn’t really that into cooking by the time I got around to it,” I muttered, pushing the chicken toward him.

“Looks great to me,” his voice polite, treating me almost like a stranger.

The knot in my stomach began twisting tighter as the minutes of silence passed by while we filled our plates. He was sitting directly across from me, and I had nothing to say. I didn’t know where to begin, and I was beginning to get the feeling neither did he.

The fire was crackling and popping, and a few hours ago, it would have seemed romantic. How things can change in a blink of an eye. I should have learned that by now.

Logan was pushing around the rice on his plate. I reached for my glass of water when Logan looked up and caught my glance.

“The daisies are beautiful, Triss,” he said to break the silence, nodding at the arrangement I’d made for the table.

“Thank you,” I replied, not sure what else to say.

His reference to the daisies pulled at me a little. I wondered if he was trying to send me a hidden message like he did earlier. On the other hand, the flowers on the table were daisies. My chicken and rice looked less appetizing by the second. My mind started rewinding to all the times he had held me or innocently kissed me, or not so innocently kissed me, and all the excitement that would build by merely being near him. I wondered now if those moments were the only ones I’d ever get to experience with him.

“Is there anything I can do to make things better?” he asked. His voice was full of tension and it shocked me out of my slump.

His eyes were cutting through me. I wanted to run over and throw my arms around him and tell him I was fine and that nothing mattered, but I didn’t know if that was true.

“I don’t know,” I replied sullenly, looking him directly in his eyes, feeling the charge of emotions running through me. I pushed my plate away and put my elbows on the table, resting my chin on my hands staring at him for as long as it took. Now was not the time for me to hold anything in.

“I never expected you to drop that kind of bomb,” I whispered, forcing myself to keep my gaze steady. He didn’t seem to be experiencing the same problem as I was. He was looking directly at me, his stare crushing.

“I’m sorry. The more you pressed and the more time that went by made me realize it was only going to get worse. I guess I wanted to deal with the repercussions before things had a chance to get too serious, not that they would,” his voice strained. “I never meant to hurt you. If I had known he was your father, I never would have contacted him.” He was almost pleading with me, and my heart was on the verge of shattering. But if I didn’t ever let him in then it couldn’t shatter. I had to keep the walls up.