Love Beyond Sight (10 page)

Because I can never let you see me as I really look. It's too horrific. I can't stand the sight, and my own parents, who had adored me since I first came to them, can barely look at me. I won't have my one true love seeing me in that fashion
.

The smooth, textured feel of his voice in her head cooled off her anger immediately. That was always how they'd communicated. There was familiarity to that sensation. A feeling that she knew him, that he wasn't a potentially threatening stranger.

Where the anger dissipated, however, sadness took its place. Tears threatened to spill from her eyes again and she dug her fingernails into her palm to stop them. It was a trick she'd learned growing up with her family. They hadn't approved of her tears. Only people not going to hell got to express genuine feelings in her household. As she'd been bound for the pit since birth, her emotional needs hadn't counted for much.

When she was sure she was in control, she spoke. "You've been in my head, a lot, right?"

"Nearly every day since we were ten."

She gasped before she could stop herself. "That long? And you never contacted me before that day in the mental hospital?"

"I always wanted us to meet in person, even when it seemed impossible, and then you vanished. I couldn't find you at all." He turned from her to stalk to the window. "I thought you were dead, Eden. Then all of a sudden I could feel you again."

She nodded. "Probably because Charma and Marina arrived. Their presence helped free me from the drugs."

"Makes sense." He still didn't look at her, which made her narrow her eyes. He was upset? He got to act angry? She was the one who had been wronged here.

"So, you've been in my head nearly every day for twenty years—unbeknownst to me." She let her voice raise an octave to relay her annoyance at that last part. "And you think that I wouldn't like you if I could really see your face? You think I'm that shallow. Wow, I never knew I was such a bad person."

If there was one thing Eden had always believed about herself, it was that all the time she'd spent traveling around and 'preaching' had given her a sense of what really mattered in life. She'd thought kindness and compassion were traits she held above all others. Maybe she'd been wrong.

Do you think I want kindness and compassion from my soul mate? Do you think those are the feelings I wish to illicit from you? Like I'm some kind of wounded animal?

He hadn't turned around as his words, laced with anger in their intonation, filled her mind.

"Reading my mind? I'm going to have to figure out how to stop you from getting in there so easily."

Not going to happen
. His back was stiff as he answered her telepathically.

"Turn around and speak to me if you want to say something. At least look me in the eye if you're going to invade my mind."

He whirled around, his blue gaze meeting hers. "You've never minded the so-called invasion before. You like it. You look for me in your head. I love being in there. You don't get to tell me I can't do it anymore when it's the one time of the day that I actually feel like life matters."

She threw her hands in the air. This was an impossible situation. "Wonderful."

The cleaning idea seemed better and better. Clearly, she was stuck in his apartment with him until the storm passed. Leonardo and Marina were hurt—possibly fatally—and there was nothing she could do for them.

Samuel gritted his teeth. "I don't want kindness and compassion from you."

"What
do
you want, Samuel?" She felt very small asking that question. This was the first time they'd met in person and yet he had the ability to wound her as no other could. Fate had given him that right and Eden suspected that no matter how long she fought it, she would always need him.

"I never thought to have anything between us." He took two steps toward her
. But now that I am with you, even as my face itches and burns, I want everything. I crave your desire, your love, your friendship, your passion. I don't want you to treat me like someone else you have to care for while you take no time to be kind to yourself. I want you to be hot for me. That's why you'll never see me as I really look. In your presence, I'll always look handsome, or at least normal looking.

"That's all good and fine." Eden stepped toward him. If they both just moved a few more inches, they could touch again. But she wouldn't be making that leap. "I'm not exactly in love with how I look either. I wish I weighed ten pounds less, or more."

"That's crazy. You're beautiful." His voice was like a caress over her body and she shivered from the effect.

"Thank you." No one had ever said that to her before. She wished she had time to roll around in the feeling for a few moments. Her point, however, had to be made. "What I mean is that I understand how it is to be self-conscious. Only I can't hide myself from you and it seems a little unfair that you can from me."

"It's a little unfair I nearly died in a fire, don't you think?" He turned from her again, this time storming from the room.

Okay, so he made a good point. Chasing after him, all she wanted to do was to take back the last thing she'd said. "Samuel…"

He interrupted. "I'm not angry, beautiful. Just frustrated."

"Look, the thing is that you might think I will be attracted to you like this or however else you appear. But I'm not."

He stopped and turned around. Whatever else he might be, Samuel was tall. At almost six-feet tall she stood above nearly everyone else. But he had inches on her. She had to glance up to see him and it definitely worked for him in the intimidation department.

"You're not?" He looked out the window. "Tomorrow, I'll go find someone who you do find attractive and I'll look like him. We'll pick me out together every day. You point, I take."

She shook her head. He couldn't have any idea how much desperation radiated off him at that moment or she knew beyond a shadow of a doubt that he would have done a better job of hiding it. Her heart bled for him.

"I've never been attracted to anyone, Samuel." She sighed and walked to the chair that she hadn't broken, still placed next to his small table. "Have you? Have you ever wanted someone other than me?"

Finally, when the passage of time had pressed out before them like a chasm she wondered if she'd be able to travel over, he answered, "No."

She wished she could sleep for a year. "We were born for each other. That's the way it's been explained to me. Neither of us is going to be truly turned on by anyone else."

"Shit." He sat down on the floor. Right where he had stood, he folded his legs and dropped to the floor. "This fucking sucks."

She laughed at his remark. "When I hear your voice, it sends tingles all over me. It's like hearing what is mine but then seeing you feels wrong, somehow. It feels false."

"I can't do it, gorgeous. I can't let you see me. I couldn't take it. The pity, the glances away. Gods forbid, you were repulsed." He stared at her, the light in the room rapidly decreasing as the sun set outside. The snow on the ground would keep it light out well after the time the sun had gone to bed for the night.

Eden stood up and crossed to him. "We could try doing it with my eyes closed."

"You'd need something to picture. My voice alone probably wouldn't be enough."

The fact that they discussed this like it was even possible seemed utterly ridiculous. "Do you have any pictures of yourself, of what you really look like?"

"Not since I was twelve, no."

That made sense and would obviously not be an option. "Then I guess we're not going to have an intimate relationship. Not like that anyway."

She could hear how dejected she sounded. Samuel pulled her into his embrace, laying her head against his shoulder. She closed her eyes. He smelled right. The scent of ivory soap, laundry detergent, and toothpaste wafted to her nose. Beneath them all was a scent that seemed pure Samuel. Being this close to him made her feel like she could finally take a deep breath after a lifetime of not being able to.

"Now that I've got you, I can't let you go. Even if I have to change my face every day. I need you."

Eden could feel how that confession tore out of him and she wondered if she was starting to be able to visit his mind too. That would be fair. If he could do it, she should be able to.

"I could pretend." She knew she could too. For the feel and love of the guy sitting next to her on the floor, she would manage anything. "And I'm sure it would be great."

"Don't be ridiculous. I'd be in your head, knowing you weren't really feeling what I wanted you to feel. That would be worse."

She squeezed his hand in hers. "Even if we're never… together like that, we can be best friends, can't we? We can be together, always."

He kissed her cheek. "Forever, if you want."

Chapter Eight

To Samuel, Eden smelled like heaven. His cock jumped to attention even as he knew she didn't feel the same way. He should have known that she would have needed his physical appearance for that. For most people, this soul mate thing would be some kind of gift. In their case it turned out to be more of a curse.

Eden would never
want
him the way he
craved
her. Something would always be missing and she could never find relief from anyone else because she'd been programmed to desire him—an appearance she could never witness since he'd been destroyed. As for him, he'd always want her and always know she didn't feel the same toward him.

"What was I doing when you were going to approach me?"

He twirled a piece of her strawberry-blonde hair in his hand. This would be so normal, so peaceful if he wasn't going to die from the pain of his erection pushed up against his pants. "You were giving out pamphlets with your family in Boise."

She shut her eyes like they hurt. "Oh god, the braids. You saw the braids."

Yes, he had. Two long braids that fell down her sides past her rear end. She'd looked adorable and twelve-years old even though she'd been twenty at the time. Her dress had done nothing to show her figure. It had been brown, squared off at the shoulders, buttoned all the way from the floor to the top of her neck, and probably three sizes too big on her. The same look her mother, sisters, and the entire crowd had sported that day.

He'd thought she was the most breathtaking sight he'd ever seen.

"Did you hate it?" Samuel asked.

"The preaching or the outfit?"

He kissed the top of her head. "Both."

"I hated the outfit. I didn't much care for the preaching either. I've always had this feeling that religion should be a personal thing. But I liked meeting people, seeing how others lived."

That sounded like Eden. She didn't like the process but found joy in the task.

"I wasn't sure what I was going to say to you. Oh, by the way, you're really not human, come with me."

Eden's laugh acted like a fire to his blood. He hadn't thought it possible but he got even hotter.

"I would have been so grateful to get away that I'd have jumped at the chance. Oh, I'm not really human? Sure I'll come with you right now as long as you never make me wear these clothes ever again."

He rubbed her leg. This would—somehow—have to be enough. Tonight, he got to touch her. The girl who he could never have sat pressed up against him. He needed to be grateful for that moment instead of the burning sense of irrational irritation that he'd never have more.

"How did you get away?"

"Well," she blinked rapidly, her long eyelashes fluttering. Samuel couldn't help but notice the dark smudges under them, telling him that she hadn't slept enough lately. "I don't really know. I went to bed one night and I awoke the next morning in a mental institution in New Jersey. Or maybe it wasn't the next morning. I have no idea how the passage of time worked once I got there."

"You have no idea what happened to get you there?"

It just didn't make sense to him. That place had been a major operation. She didn't simply land there by accident. And if the demon had caught her while she'd been so helpless, well, he couldn't let his mind go in that direction. It made him want to hurl something across the room.

"None. And from what Jason has told me, the place is not cheap. I can't figure out who paid for it. My parents don't have that kind of money. Sometimes we went hungry."

"Oh, I suspect your family had some money." They'd run a hell of an operation. Big vans, lots of people. Sometimes light shows. The brief time he'd observed them had made it clear to him that Eden's family made quite a living at their religion. That his version didn't match with Eden's version of her childhood didn't surprise him. She probably thought they were poor.

"In any case, that's what happened to me."

"I couldn't find you. They kept you so drugged, I couldn't get into your mind." Those had been the worst months. Thinking she was dead or, at least, gone from him. Even if he could never be with her, knowing she lived in the world was enough to sustain him. When he'd thought her gone…

She touched the side of his face. "Where did your thoughts go?"

"Nowhere good." He pressed his mouth to hers before he could think better of it. Her lips were soft, like rose petals against his own. And she tasted, no surprise, like strawberries. He forced himself to pull back, keeping it to only a small moment. No good could come out of knowing what he couldn't have.

She gasped and pulled back, her hands going to her lips. He didn't see desire in her blue-green eyes and it made him go cold inside. Stupidly, he'd still held out hope. Now it was obvious, Eden didn't want him. She really never would.

He opened his mouth, knowing he had to say something but having zero idea of what that should be. Just then Eden's phone rang. Saved by the ring, he sat back letting his head bang against the wall.

"Hello?" Eden spoke into the phone and he watched transfixed by the way her red lips moved next to the small speaker.