by Jamie Magee
“They let you kill those people? Then helped you get out?” I regretted asking as soon as I did. I saw the hell in his eyes, every bloody life he had taken.
“It was the only way. The law wants their catch, one way or another.”
Mystified and broken I stared up at him. “But they killed him. Channing said Malcolm was dead.”
Slayton swayed his head. “Malcolm was only a stepping stone to where they’re going.”
I was on my feet and pacing seconds later. All that crap Dawn had said to me over the last four months; all her therapy bullshit was starting to chisel away at my mind and emotions.
“You got over me,” I finally said. Before I turned to him, he was already on his feet glaring down at me like I had just crossed the last fucking line that should be crossed. “You got out clean. I thought you were dead. They did too.” He glared at me and I went on. “Months, Slayton. Not weeks. Months.” I swayed my head in defeat. “Why now? Why did you shelve me and right when I found a way to agree with the pain you do this? Show up.”
“Over you?” he roared. “Every day, every fucking day you are the only thing I think about!”
I kept shaking my head, doubting him. He lunged and gripped my shoulders. “Do you know how fucked I am, Ember?” He leaned closer to my face. “I was twisted before you ever came ‘round. I stayed unhinged and cold. Never knew who to believe or why I cared.” His grip on my shoulders tightened but then loosened the second he figured out he might be hurting me. “Those last few months in the cage all but stole my humanity,” he stepped back. “I didn’t trust myself with you. I still don’t. Not even after thousands of hours of therapy.” He glared me down, the demons he could see in my eyes. “You needed time to heal, too.”
I trembled “Why now?” my voice was a whisper that was all but lost on the wind.
Slayton’s gunmetal stare rushed over my face as his expression soften. “Channing came to check on me two weeks ago. He told me I had to stop fucking ‘round with my pussy ass anger—he said you need me.” His eyes welled. “He said we couldn’t heal without each other.”
I only vaguely nodded in agreement.
“Next thing I knew he turned into a fucking genie, landed me here with a chaste kiss on the cheek,” he dropped his head, but before he did, I saw the sorrow in his eyes.
“He kissed me too,” I said with wide eyes, not to invoke jealousy, but to figure out what the hell that meant.
Slayton looked to the side then in a raspy voice said, “He freed us from the life of the underworld, a kiss of death. That’s what we are to him now.”
I hesitantly took a step forward but halted when I saw him tense.
“You love him,” I whispered.
Slayton met my stare dead on then. “He’s my brother...”
It was all I could do to stay balanced just then. I was searching Slayton’s features that I had memorized and doing my best to pair them with Channing’s. Where Slayton was dark, Channing was fairer, but the eyes were close. I’d always assumed that it was the life they lived, the emotion behind the gray stare that made them seem that way.
“Odin’s princes, different Mom’s,” Slayton said like a curse. “I didn’t know my story, but Channing did. He remembers Dad—a man I never met.”
When I moved closer to him, he held his hand out to stop me. “I always wanted to know my story until I knew it. I didn’t want to know that the parts of me I hated the most were a reflection of a man that was a legend to most, and a deadbeat bastard to me—only one of his sons.” His breath hitched. “My mother was a pretty face that he sucked into his hell, and in the end, she was hunted, and I was tossed in with the throw away kids.”
Slayton balled his fists as his stare raked over me. “Don’t you get it? I fought so hard not to be him. To not elegantly and proudly rise in his world.” He bit his lip. “What did it get me? I was tossed into the pits with the trash of the underworld, treated the same, and they still took you. Still sucked you in. We became a tortured version of the two people I hated the most in my life. My parents.”
I swayed my head in my denial. I may be fucked up in the head right about now, but I knew we were not them. His story had put words behind the emotion I had always read in his eyes and explained why he held back from me, even though being with me was the only thing he wanted. But we were not anyone but Slayton and Ember. Our fate may have been set, but we chose how to endure it. And we chose poorly.
I was staring at everything I had ever wanted, so it was hard for me to argue the path his fears had thrust us down. To curse him for guarding his heart from me all because he knew if he gave into the pull we had that he might understand the man Odin was. That he might let himself believe that there was a chance his parent’s love affair mattered to them.
“I can’t explain it any better,” he said like a curse not liking that I might disagree with him. “It wasn’t fair to you. I couldn’t tell you everything, and I couldn’t lie. I refused to hurt you.”
“But you did,” I rebutted so quickly that it jarred him. “I grieved for you from the second I laid eyes on you. I knew we didn’t have a chance. And when you didn’t come for me, not even to say goodbye, I grieved. I was determined to come back to you as soon as my dad was right.” My voice hitched as I grazed against the reality that I had not yet really grieved for my own father. “And for the last months of my life, I grieved so hard for you that I was sure I was dying.” I glared. “You need to learn to fucking communicate with words, Slayton Winslow.” I lifted my chin. “Don’t you ever fucking shelve me again.”
He went to argue. I saw it in his expression, how tense his muscles were, how fierce his eyes were but I held my hand up. “Where is here?”
He furrowed his brow. “You said Channing brought you here—me here, where is here?”
Slayton’s gaze softened. “Alaska.”
TWENY-FOUR
Alaska.
One word, one I said to him in passing just before one of the most beautiful moments we had shared commenced. Staring at Slayton now, standing in the middle of this snow covered terrain, I could still feel the thick air of the attic, the ice slowly gliding over my sweltering body, the look in his eye.
A night that never had an end, our moment was stolen from us, and we quickly realized that what we thought was hell was nothing compared to what was waiting on us.
The corner of his lip drew upward, even though he fought it. He was reading my thoughts. We were both standing in a memory together. Hesitantly, I stepped closer to him. Daring to grin or not, he was still tense, and as always ready to explode.
He fiercely stared down at me as I placed my hands on his chest, and like the scared girl I was when I first laid eyes on him, I lifted my gaze and met his. I sighed when his trembling hands landed on each of my cheeks, and his eyes searched mine so deeply that it was downright unnerving.
I couldn’t handle the suspense any longer, I rose to my tiptoes and kissed him. When a growl left his chest, and he finally opened for me, the zing, the rush this boy always gave me washed down me like a perfect high. Eager as ever, I pulled him down to me knowing I wouldn’t know if it was snow or hot coals at my back.
He refused to give in to me. Instead, he lifted me around him and charged toward the cabin. At the door, he stopped and pressed me against it, even when it swung open he didn’t move us from it, and I’d be damned if I wanted him to. I could feel his rock hard erection pinned against the seam of my jeans. With his hips holding my weight as my thighs clung to him, his hand made quick work of ditching my jacket. I don’t even remember my shirt leaving, just that in my drunken haze of lust I looked down and saw his hands chasing snowflakes across my pointed, begging, nipples.
His hot mouth landing on my flesh had me crawling up the door with my back, fighting to feel more of his lips, of his touch. With a snarl he gripped me around him and carried us inside, slamming the door with his foot as he did.
I wasn’t positive, but I thought he set me
on the back of a couch. Finding my balance, I went to war with his clothes. He had far more layers on than I did on, but shirt by shirt left him and I found his chest. I giggled celebrating my victory of feeling his flesh against mine. My playful mirth faded when his hands gripped my ass and pulled me to stand so he could push away my jeans he’d unbuttoned. Hungry and fearful something would stop us, more than likely him, I had his jeans unbuttoned, and his throbbing cock in my hand before my clothes hit the floor.
I moaned a complaint when he lifted me again, but gave up my protest when I felt him lay me down. He stopped kissing me and I felt his lips leave mine, and when I didn’t feel them land anywhere on my body, I slowly opened my eyes. We were in front of a fire, the glow on his skin had to be the most beautiful thing I’d ever seen. His hands slowly eased over my chest, down in a sensual circle around my belly, then as he held my stare his strong fingers slipped into the soaking heat of my core.
The slow glide over my clit, the unexpected plunges of his fingers had my hips lifting and meeting him as I rushed my hands over his shoulders and his chest. When my hand settled over his heart, when I felt it thundering under my touch, I’d never been so grateful in my life. I’d never felt more blessed or less deserving. This was all I ever wanted.
For months, I’d relived every moment we had together searching for a way where I would find an end like this—feeling the pulsing rhythm of life under my hand. I wanted a thousand tomorrows with him. To know what it felt like to not brace for an end.
My pause didn’t go unnoticed by him, his lips slowly fell to my chest, right above my heart. A warm rush exploded through my soul. I struggled to gain some control, to pull him in closer and finally I had him in the cradle of my legs, I felt his engorged head grazing my entrance as his fingers kept to their enticing glide over my clit.
I reached for his back, and as delicately as I could I traced my hand down his spine as I pulled him closer to me. I wanted him. I needed him inside. When I saw him reach down to guide himself in, when his eyes met mine, the first quake of a tremor rushed through my core. I made myself push the sensation back, to wait for him.
I hissed as soon as I felt the head of his cock slide in, it didn’t matter that he wasn’t my first or even my second, he sure as hell felt like it. The groan he let out as he pushed his entire length inside took any sensation of stretching for him away. His satisfaction, how he stilled and quivered for precious seconds was breathtaking. It made the wait worth it, the hell worth it. For the first time, I understood this right here didn’t mean shit, that it didn’t feel as right as it was supposed to unless there was emotion present. If there was anything the pair of us had in abundance, it was emotion.
I moved my hips spurring him into action, every thrust had me crying out his name as I felt it all building deep within. I fought it because I wasn’t ready to become boneless yet, I wasn’t ready to let the first wave of this end. Clutching him as tightly as I could with my thighs I pushed him to his back.
His surrender wasn’t easy to claim; even when I managed to get him to his back and I kept our chests flesh to flesh as I kissed down his neck. The feel of his long, powerful arms encircling me made me feel safe, safer than I had ever felt.
Loving the hisses of breath coming from him, and wanting to drive him wild, I slid further down, taking every inch of his shaft as deeply as I could when I rose from his chest. Holding my stare, he arched his hips up, and I yelled out as my nails gripped his chest.
“Close?” he grunted like he was in pure agony.
I could only nod as I met him thrust for thrust. “Now, now,” I panted as an unexplainable rush burned through my body, instantly taking all the vigor out of me as I became boneless. He gripped my hips as he rose, plunging himself deeper. I loved the feel of his hands cupping my breast, his hot lips on my neck, how his hips only barely paused from moving.
My core gripped him tighter as the height of my climax made itself known in both of our ruthless moans. The explosion of power I always felt pulsing under his flesh erupted. In the next beat of my heart, I was on my back as his hands rushed up my sides, then over my chest before gliding up my arm and pinning it above my head.
I only wanted to feel the downhill ride of my climax, the utter satisfaction that had been withheld from me my entire life, but he was relentless. He pushed harder, and deeper. The pressure only milked the convulsions my body was enduring, soaking us both.
My free hand dashed over his chest as I lifted my hips and moved them in half circles as I purposely flexed around him. Every growl, how hot he became, the intensity of his body only pushed me to keep at it. We had all but crossed a savage line laced with a mix of tender and primal touches when I felt another orgasm reach out and inhale me.
I was floating on a high when I felt him shake; begin to still the power behind his thrusts. I reached my arms around him with all the strength I had left in my body. The feel of his hot breath across my neck as he relaxed above me was most assuredly an undefined bliss.
Neither one of us wanted to divide and were slow to do so. Even when he was at my side, the idea of moving felt like the weight of a mountain was on me. I didn’t want to leave the bubble we were in.
His still calloused hands rushed over my raw flesh. “I loved you that dawn...”
Lazily I lolled my head toward him—he wasn’t really looking at me. His gaze had the same glaze mine had, but he focused and drew his brow together. “I think I prayed for you,” he rasped. “I mean, I didn’t come out and say it, but I always figured I didn’t have to...that I couldn’t ask for something I’d never felt, or believed in, but needed.”
Numb and full of contentment, I reached to trace the features of his face as he spoke. “I hated Him for giving you to me, though,” he admitted searching my eyes. “Before I was ready, before He made it right.” His hand glided over my heart. “How could He put an angel in my world?” he asked anyone but me.
I still felt inclined to answer. “Angels are divine warriors...they’re created to protect what He deems most precious.” I bit my lip hoping it would hold back my tears, but it didn’t. “I loved you then, too, Slayton.”
He playfully glared, his way of calling me out on my lie. In his mind, he had terrified and insulted me seconds after we met, which he did. But still. “You awoke me,” I whispered. “Only love could do that.”
The smile he gave me changed his entire visage, it washed years away, and somehow I saw a glimmer of a boy that never had a chance alongside a man who was grasping endless unwritten tomorrows.
TWENTY-FIVE
I want to say that was our happy ending. That some greater power decided that the pair of us had lived through enough hell in our short lives, and now we only had to live in bliss. Make love all day long, watch the snowfall, and shut the world away.
The truth is, there are no happy endings, only happy moments. How many you have and how often they come may feel out of your control, but they’re not. You decide what you can handle and what you can’t. You decide if you’re brave enough to see what’s on the other side of the storm or if you’re content to stay where you are.
My grandmother always told me ‘the only thing unchanging was death, and until such time each day we become a new person. Every day we change, and every day we grow, as do those around us. We can clutch all that we care around us. Love endlessly and unconditionally, but we cannot command the will of others, the heart of others. No matter how hard we try.’
The first year was the hardest for Slayton and me. It was impossible for either of us to truly feel safe. I’d blurted out the word Alaska forever ago with the reasoning that you could always see your enemies coming, what I didn’t anticipate were the enemies lurking inside us both.
Yes, I had grief to deal with. I managed to make peace with my grandmothers passing rather quickly. I don’t think there was much room for the pain any longer and peace was my only choice. My father’s death was harder than I expected it to be. And I don’t think it was
because I arrived seconds too late, or that I saw his murdered body.
I’m more than positive it was because I was grieving for what he took from us—all the stolen days when he was happier with his demons than me. All the promises he made that he’d change, the on£s he stopped bothering to utter just before I came to live with him. I ached because I wasn’t reason enough for him to clean his shit up and live a good life. Because no matter what I said or did, he still died.
One day, I finally grew out of room to hate him, to hurt for him and set his memory aside so I could pick up the broken pieces that I’d become.
It stings my mind to think, much less, say such a thing, but I was blessed when it came to the sexual assault that happened to me. I don’t say so because of how it ended, but because I mean it. Seconds before my father was murdered, I was almost raped. How many girls can say ‘almost’ before raped? In my darkest moments, I let myself realize what would have happened if the door opened a minute later. It is never pretty.
Yes, I was touched and abused when I was taken, violated and arguably, stripped of my humanity. But I wasn’t raped. A pretty face, a gleam of good health...those things might’ve saved me. I could count them as a win. But who would? Did it really matter that other girls had it worse than me? One second I didn’t think so, the next I was sure it did.
The night with Channing was just as haunting. At times, I wish I never knew he and Slayton were brothers. Every once in a while, the resemblance comes through a bit too clearly. It didn’t matter that Channing had treated me with more dignity than any other girl in the room. It still happened.
What could have happened in the box, what Slayton had no choice to do to me, the fear I lived with—it was impossible to find the blessing one day, and easy to find it the next. I had to look back to see the angels my grandmother always told me about had stepped in when I needed them most. I had to look back to understand I was never alone.