Wayward Secrets: The Raven Brothers of Fallen Mountain

by KT Strange

  Another hand grabs me, and I’d cry out if I could, but I just descend into another fit of coughing. A man beside me yells, and punches somebody else. That person goes tumbling down with a grunt and a groan.

  “FIGHHHHHT!” The cry splits the air. In answer, there’s a yell from everyone around me. It builds into something that takes over, vacuuming up every bit of silence around us. There’s no empty spots between spoken words, it’s just a wall of sound enveloping us. It’s the roar of dozens of people crying out, shouting and stamping over the sand as they crowd in to the fight. I gasp as someone nearly steps on me. The ground seems to vibrate.

  Slim fingers drag me out from the melee, and I stumble, free, into the shadows and cool air. My knees hit the sand as noise expands outward from behind me. My fingers fist in the soft, cold sand, as I try to catch my breath. It’s hard, too hard, and painful. Each gasp of air comes in as shuddery and shaky, squeaking into my traumatized lungs. A warm palm strokes over my back.

  “C’mon,” a rough, female voice says, low and whispered. I glance up as she, the woman, offers me her hands. “Come with me.”

  Her hair is dirty, descending in snaky, oily curls from her scalp, and there’s a bruise under one eye-

  Her face.

  My mouth drops open.

  Her face has been haunting my dreams for days, staring out at me from the window every time I ride into town.

  “Lacey?” I breathe, my skin prickling as icy lines descend down my back.

  Her eyes widen and she backs up, her lips parting. We’re near the edge of the forest, and I swallow, trying to get to my feet, get the moisture back in my mouth, to scream for Kyron.

  She’s here. Alive. Right in front of me.

  “Lace-” Coughing interrupts me as she reaches the woods, spit bubbling up on my lips. I wipe my mouth with the back of my hand and inhale a huge gasp of air. She lifts her finger to her mouth, begging me for silence, and shakes her head.

  Her name dies in the back of my throat.

  And like that, she vanishes into the woods.

  “Cordelia?” Kyron’s voice is edged with worry as he appears at my side seconds later, but she’s already gone. He goes rigid as he reaches me, and I glare up at him.

  “Where the fuck were you?” My voice sounds like I’ve swallowed a cup full of gravel, and chased it with another cup of hot sauce. My gaze falls to his body.

  His clothing is rumpled, the neck of his shirt pulled down, and he’s missing a button. And his jeans-

  The button is popped.

  Because of course it is. Was he getting a blowy from someone? Irritation rises up inside of me before I tamp it down. I don’t… own him.

  “Hey,” he says, reaching for me.

  “You were right, this isn’t my scene,” I say, trying to keep the ice out of my voice. “And you’re about two seconds too late,” I bite out. “Lacey was here.”

  His nostrils flare, and he squints into the darkness, like… something is bothering him, like he knew it but didn’t realize it, and now it’s all adding up.

  “Right,” he mutters, “of course she is.” His jaw tenses and he glances back at me. “Let’s get you home.”

  “But Lacey,” I say, pointing at the woods. He gazes past me, back to the bonfire.

  “Fight’s bad. I’ll come back for her,” he says. Behind me, the sounds of aggression are getting louder, and before I can turn, Kyron wraps his arm around my waist, hauling me up against his side and over his shoulder. We’re at the truck in a heartbeat, as a bottle goes sailing past us to smash against the side of his truck-bed. He shoves me inside without so much as a how-do-you-do, and jumps, skidding over the hood of the truck like it’s a sedan.

  I breathe again and he’s next to me, the truck engine rumbling to life.

  “What the-” A bottle smashes against our windshield and I shriek. He throws himself in front of me, hitting the gas at the same time, and the truck lurches. My head bangs against the window, and the world turns sideways and melts into black.

  14

  Cordelia

  There’s more blackness when I wake up, the world muffled and soft. The scent is all wrong, not my cabin, and not my bed. Instead it’s more of what I buried my nose in on the ride out to the bonfire. Something shifts beside me, and I freeze as the mattress moves. My eyes open in the dark.

  I can hear him breathing.

  In… out…

  I inch my fingers across the sheets, brushing the edge of his heat radiation, where he starts and I end.

  Ooookay. Be calm.

  I close my eyes, as he coughs in his sleep, and shifts around, making the mattress shake. I inhale and hold it.

  “You need something?” Kyron asks in the shadows. So, not sleeping then. I exhale noisily.

  “What do you think you’re doing?”

  “Trying to sleep,” he says and sits up. “Lemme get you a water. How’s your throat?”

  “I think I just want some explanations before water,” I say, although I do sound a bit froggy. “Did you go back for her?” The memory of her face rushes up on me.

  “Getting you out of there alive was more important,” he says, but he sounds bitter, like he didn’t want to make that choice and he hates himself for it.

  Or maybe I’m projecting.

  Just a little.

  “Please tell me once you got me home, you went back.” I roll over. His back is to me as he sits on the edge of the bed. Everything is too intense for me to be freaking out about the fact I’m in his bed (something new, novel, and like a fresh tooth breaking through the flesh. I want to be able to revel in this feeling, but it’s not mine. This isn’t my place. I’m not his. He’s not mine.), but Lacey comes first.

  “Of course I did,” he sounds offended. He sighs and runs a hand through his hair, shifting his weight. The bed creaks. “The woods were empty. I looked… everywhere.” He’s frustrated, that much I can see from the tense outline of his shoulders in the dim light. There’s something glowing from beyond the crack of his doorway, maybe in the main living area of the cabin.

  “Are you sure you saw her?” He asks, the words folded down and small, like he almost wants me to say no. If that would make it less that hard on him, to lie, for a second I’m tempted to do it.

  He just sounds so sad. So unlike-Kyron.

  “I saw her,” I let out in a whisper, because he has to know. He curses under his breath.

  “Those two fuckers had to go off now of all times,” he mutters and then shifts, like he wants to get up.

  “Why’d you bring me to your room?” I ask. “You could’ve…” Put me anywhere. In my own bed. In one of the guys’ beds. On the couch.

  “Needed to keep an eye on you.” He says, and stands up, stretching. “You need something to drink? Pill for your head?”

  “No,” I say, reaching up. There is a dull ache in my temple, and I hiss as my fingers find the bump. “When will the guys be back?”

  “Tomorrow, maybe,” he says, walking to the door. “You sure you don’t want any water?”

  “Are you mother-henning me?” I ask, slipping out of bed. I’m fully clothed. Well, that’s nice. A relief. He’s ten steps ahead of me, flicking on the lights, and I’m not even sure what time it is.

  “You woke up,” he says, “but you were pretty groggy. Stayed awake the whole drive home, but you… needed to sleep.” His back is to me, and he’s shirtless. Those muscles under his skin tense, the light playing off them. He looks like his spine is going to crack right out of his body, from how poker-stiff he is. “So you slept.” He turns, yawning, bending down and fishing out a frying pan. I squint at the clock on the wall. Quarter past five. Well, it makes sense. I got about eight hours of sleep, but I really don’t feel amazing. My waking time is more around ten than five.

  “I don’t remember it,” I say, as I sit on one of the barstools.

  He’s cracking four eggs into the frying pan, and pulling out a hunk of bacon rashers, splitting them with hi
s fingers and laying them out. The sound of crackling, cooking food fills the air, the scent floating over to me and filling me up with warmth as I inhale.

  I try not to think of being in his bed.

  How that felt.

  How right it felt. It didn’t mean anything to him. He was just watching over me. He said as much, and I believe him. It’s me, my fault, all my problem, that my cheeks are hot, and there’s a swelling, floaty feeling in my gut that’s all emotion and stupidity.

  He’s scraping a wooden spatula over the eggs, scrambling them, and he doesn’t seem to notice that the bacon grease must be hitting him on the chest and stomach. He doesn’t even flinch.

  He sighs and half-turns to me, not looking at me but focusing in on me all the same.

  “Now you know why I go and start fights at the motel,” he says. I snort, before I can help it, and then murmur a soft apology, before saying,

  “Not… really. I’ll be honest, that was a brawl, yeah, but I don’t get it-”

  “Those people aren’t Fallen Mountain,” he says, “Sure they live here, but they’re not the lifeblood, and they don’t have good intentions. You could smell it in the air as soon as we got there. Anyone offer you anything to drink?”

  “No, wait, yeah,” I reply, thinking back. I just remember Kat being really drunk, and kind of annoying. And a lot of people staring at me. And then… That feeling that descended on everything. Like the air was electric and sick.

  “They load up a bucket with hard booze, as hard as they can get, then they layer in the syrup, and berries, and those fruits just suck up the alcohol. It hits you like a truck when you drink it. And they do that for the women, to make them-” His knuckles are white around the wooden spatula’s handle, and I jerk when it cracks in his grip. He stares down at it, apparently unsurprised. He crosses the room and the wooden spatula flies, hitting the garbage rim and tumbling down inside. “There’s good people here, and none of them were there last night,” he says as he turns to me.

  “If you think so little of them, why did you take me?” I ask, and he licks his lower lip, just a flicker, the silence swelling between us. My gaze is steady on his.

  There’s something there. In his eyes, some emotion that I’m reading that is so counter to everything I know about him. Kyron, always with the booze.

  Except last night. He hadn’t touched a drop. That I saw, anyway.

  “Because you would have gone. I saw it in your face. Kat convinced you to go, for whatever reason you’re attached to her,” he looks angry, and even though he’s a bit right, I’m not mad at him for saying it. He’s not angry at me. He hates her. It’s radiating off of him in waves. And I have no idea why.

  A thought tickles at the back of my mind.

  “We should go look for Lacey, now that I’m awake,” I say, “two pairs of eyes are better than one.” He sighs, shoulders sinking down and he turns back to the frying pan, before fetching two plates. He scrapes our breakfast out, and I wonder if I can tell him that I’m not hungry at all.

  In fact, I’m feeling kind of nauseous.

  He’s right, I would have gone out last night, by myself. And I’d gotten caught in the middle of a fight. The only reason I didn’t get trampled in it was Lacey. Lacey, who’d appeared out of nowhere, back from being missing, looking like she’d been dragged under a bus for a few hundred feet.

  “She’s not in the woods,” he says. “Wherever she is, she doesn’t want to be found. That much I’ve figured out.” He sets the plate in front of me. “Would you please eat?” He asks.

  I swallow down the knot in my throat and reach for the fork he passes me.

  “I’m not hungry.”

  “Please,” he says, eyes soft. He’s watching me like a mama bear eyes up her cub.

  “Okay,” I agree, and tentatively poke at the eggs. They wiggle at me suspiciously. They don’t look entirely cooked through, but Kryon’s probably thirty seconds away from feeding me by hand if I don’t start.

  “You’re not what I thought you were,” I say after enough bites are swallowed down that he’s relaxing a bit. He raises an eyebrow, but says nothing, his own mouth stuffed full. “I don’t get how you one-eighty from acting like this just… complete douche, to… this.”

  “What’s this?” He asks, scraping his fork on his plate. The eggs are gone, the whole heaping fluffy pile of them, and his bacon is missing too. He packed it all away when I was staring at my plate, wondering how I’d get down enough food to satisfy his weird brooding urges he’s getting. Next thing I know, he’s going to drag me back into his bedroom and sit on me, or something.

  And not in a sexy way. Like he’s a hen and I’m his egg he’s trying to hatch.

  My cheeks heat up across the bridge of my nose, and I’m pretty sure they’re glowing.

  “Well,” I’m struggling to find the right words. “I get the impression that I’m just sort of annoying, a speed bump to your existence, and then you’ve been really nice to me-”

  His hand slaps on the counter-top and I shut up, staring at him.

  “Don’t mistake me not wanting you to get dead, or at least, hurt last night, with me being nice.” His eyes are dark, and he looks angry again. And frankly, I’m sick of it.

  “Okay, well, thanks for breakfast, or whatever,” I say, pushing away from the counter, my chest feeling like it’s being compressed from the inside. I don’t even know why I care what he thinks, or if he’s nice to me, or anything. It just felt like, in the darkness, there was something, between us? Maybe? I don’t know. I’m stupid. I’m looking for emotions when I should just be out in the woods, each day, hiking and appreciating the natural beauty of everything.

  I came here to get away from people.

  And I keep trying to run to him, and Grady, and even maybe Beau a little bit, to make friends with them, to feel something, because… I’m so lonely that my heart has cracked like an egg in my chest.

  I just hurt. I realize it as I walk to the door. I’m hurting, right down to my soul.

  I am dying. And before I die, I want to feel loved again. I want to feel a warm embrace. I want to sink down into someone’s soul, and not feel so lonely. Because I’m about to take the first steps into the stars, evaporate into the universe, and cease to exist, and I can’t do that with anyone’s company but my own. Dying is a lonely art. I want to feel people around me before I go.

  The ache is steady in my chest, and it makes it hard to breathe. I get to the door, and my face is wet. Stupid tears.

  “Are you crying?” He sounds dumb, stupid even. I turn and glare at him. He’s a few feet from me, having followed me.

  “What do you think?” I point at my face. “Do these look like tears of joy?”

  His face is a mask of surprise, and his throat tightens, bobbing, before he speaks again.

  “Hey, hey, don’t-” He reaches for me, and I’m being folded against his chest. It bubbles up from inside me. The grief for what I’m losing. For a life half-lived. For never having done anything except breathe, and wake, and go to work, and see to my Auntie’s needs, and just float through things until I’ve ended up here.

  Where it all ends. With people who don’t even like me, or want me around.

  His hand cradles the back of my head and I sob myself out into his shoulder, the sound of my own cries somehow compounding the interest on my pain.

  I’m here. I’m alive. I’m living, for now, and soon, it’ll all be gone. I’ll be nothing but a faded memory. Please don’t let me go.

  “I don’t want to be forgotten,” I choke out. Because there’s nobody back home. Just these three guys here, in Fallen Mountain, and the few, meager, weak friendships I’ve managed to eke out in the last weeks.

  “What’re you, what, I mean-” he stumbles over his words, “forgotten? What kind of shit is that?” He tries to inject a laugh into his voice, but I can hear it in him, he’s scared. My tears are scaring him. My reaction is over the top. This isn’t about him, or last night, or the
eggs and bacon I couldn’t finish.

  “Sorry,” I say wetly, “I’m just being stupid.” I pull away, out of his warm grip, and I want to stay close to him. “Last night was crazy.”

  “Ya-huh,” he agrees, running his fingers through his hair, setting it all at odds. I bite my lip, and lean up, my hand hesitant and I smooth down the messy strands. He doesn’t move, frozen, and then his eyes flutter shut and he leans into my touch. “I like that,” he urges me, voice throaty. It’s… dirty. The way he says it. And I’m just brushing his hair down, my nails not even reaching his scalp, until they do and I make contact. He groans in response, pressing harder into my hand, ducking his head so I can reach more of him. His reaction chases away the bad feelings, spreads warmth inside me, until I want nothing but this.

  “You okay?” I ask him, because my body is on fire, like I’m blushing all over. My breath stutters to a stop in my throat when he pulls away, his eyes glassy and half-open.

  “That was,” he says, clearing his throat, probably because it’s thick as if he’s drunk, “very nice.” He blinks at me and then looks away, his jaw tight. “Thanks.”

  I’m not really sure what just happened. I liked it. He… loved it.

  “You’re welcome,” I offer.

  “Are you done crying?” He asks, but his tone is gentle, and he’s giving me a side-eye like he isn’t sure if he should hug me again, or get me a tissue, or bolt because Women Tears are scary or something.

  “I think so,” I murmurs then straighten my shoulders. “Yeah, I’m good.”

  “I’m sorry,” he adds, and when I give him an odd look he smiles, rueful and sheepish. “I wasn’t being nice last night, taking you, I guess. I-” He pauses and then shoves his hands in his jeans. He’s fully dressed in the same clothes, so he must have crashed out wearing them. “I guess I don’t see looking after you as being nice. It’s not a… choice. This town doesn’t look like much, but it eats people and spits the bones out when it’s done. Protecting you is…”

  “Like Lacey,” I say, “what do you think happened to her?”