by P. M. Briede
When Wesley and Tristan were out of sight, Paige and I turned around to run smack into Olivier’s chest. “What are you doing here?!” I flung at him, knowing he was the reason Wesley had altered our previously well laid farewell plans.
“I wanted to see how Breaux was with you for myself,” Olivier unashamedly answered.
“Well?” I asked in a perturbed tone as I put my hands on my hips.
Olivier shrugged, turned away from Paige and me, and headed out of the airport. Paige and I shared a confused glance and hurried after him. “We have another problem,” Olivier answered when we caught up to him. “I’ve been informed that there is a change in plans but I’m not allowed to know the details. My part is to try and gain your trust and your affection. I swear I won’t take advantage of you, however there are going to be times where you’ll need to play along like I’m making headway. I’ve got to start currying more favor in order to get the intelligence from my side that we need.”
“What does that mean exactly?” Paige asked before I could.
“Charlotte needs to stage a couple fights with the whelp. Go out on a few public dates with me,” he answered her before glancing over his shoulder at me.
Olivier wanted me to act? He was out of his mind! “Olivier, if the crux of this operation is about to rely on my ability to lie convincingly, then we’re all doomed. I can’t stage a fight with Wesley. Anytime I get angry, he immediately backs down. The only thing we’ve ever fought about is you and after the ball I made him swear it wouldn’t happen anymore. The challenge with your plan is that we’ve known each other for so long and know each other so well, we very quickly see right through the crap.”
“You’ll be able to cover with him,” Olivier countered. “Short of being caught in bed with me, I don’t think Breaux would ever leave you or believe anyone over you. I’m ready to admit he’s the better man and you both deserve each other.”
That confession stunned me. “Why?”
We’d reached ours cars in the parking lot. He leaned back against his, crossed his arms over his chest, and locked his eyes on mine. “Every move I make to protect you is undermined by your moves to protect him and in many ways his to look out for you. I thought I knew you well enough to anticipate what you’d do, but so far I’ve been wrong.”
I caught Paige furrowing her brow the way she does when she’s mulling over something. “What aren’t you telling us?” she asked like the seasoned interrogator she is.
He took a deep breath and turned his exasperated gaze on her. “My exile commander didn’t appreciate hearing me tell her that they don’t have Breaux as tightly under their thumb as they thought. My suggestion to reevaluate their timeline, well, I’m sure you can imagine her response. Charlotte and he are turning into unpredictable wild cards. I’m hoping having these few months of separation will slow the road blocks they both throw up without even realizing it.” He put his hands to his face, his fingers kneading his forehead and temples.
How were we ever going to survive when Olivier, an immortal angel, looked and sounded defeated? Fear gripped me and my heart started hammering so hard in my chest I truly thought it was going to punch a hole through it. To focus on regulating my breathing and not the myriad of chaotic thoughts whirling through my mind I closed my eyes. If something happened to either Olivier or Wesley, I might as well find a way to be sentenced myself. We’d all become so reliant on the others just for survival, to lose one would cripple the others.
Olivier’s voice pulled me out of the depressing abyss I was drowning in. “We just need to find a way to communicate better. Miss a few of his calls. Attend some public school functions with me. It’ll at least give the appearance that I’m making headway and maybe my commander will start clueing me in again.”
“I guess I can do that,” I agreed in resignation. I had to try. Our lives depended on it.
* * *
I shouldn’t have worried about making up excuses to miss Wesley’s calls because a week hadn’t gone by before he began missing them. The ones he did make were worthless. He was always distracted and we always got interrupted, even during the calls in the middle of the night. I tried to tell myself he was stressed and busy. I’d remind myself that he’s running a national campaign. But Wesley never wanted to talk about our future, our wedding, or even when I could come see him.
Two weeks after he left, Paige and Olivier attempted to ambush me in my kitchen with the morning paper. I say attempted because they hadn’t realized it was all over the news. “Shit, Charlotte,” Paige cried when they waltzed in, battle ready, to find me watching the same news segment over and over and over again. She ran at me and made to wrap me in her arms.
I pushed her away, turned to look at them, but saw nothing. I’d gone numb from the shock of what I’d seen on my television screen. “I don’t understand,” I began.
Paige took a step towards me but I flinched out of reach. Olivier was hovering in the doorway to the hall. “I’m so sorry,” Paige sympathetically offered.
I didn’t want her sympathy though! “I don’t understand!” I threw my head back and railed at the ceiling. Tears flowed down my cheeks. The news segment played in my mind like some bad movie. The story had been on some prominent Hollywood types coming out and backing the campaign. They were in Los Angeles, at the home of whomever it was. I’d instantly forgotten their name the second I saw Wesley and Abigail kissing in the background. And not some innocent peck. Nor was it the kind of kiss where the kissee was too shocked by the kisser to immediately push them away. No it was full on, reciprocal, undeniable passion. Olivier shifting uncomfortably from where he was standing yanked me out of my head. “YOU!” I bellowed. He blinked, shocked by my sudden maliciousness. “This is because of you!”
He put his hands out defensively. “Charlotte,” he began, “I had nothing to do with this. I’m just as surprised by it as yo…”
“GET OUT!” I demanded, charging at him as if I could physically remove him from my home.
Paige leapt between us. “Charlotte! This is not Olivier’s fault! This is all Wesley!” she spat the words venomously. “I told you after Houston but you didn’t want to believe me. He looked at Abigail like he looks at you.”
I crumbled at her words, no longer able to deny their truth. My broken heart exploded in my chest and broke the bones in my body. “No,” I whispered, desperate for an explanation. “You saw him with me at the airport. He loves me!”
Her sad eyes gazed on me with pity. The look killed me, it was so similar to those I’d received when Giles died. The poor, pitiful Charlotte, whatever are you going to do now, looks. I couldn’t take it. My knees gave out and I would have fallen if she hadn’t caught me. “He played you, Charlotte. I’m sorry but there’s no other explanation. I didn’t want to believe it when I first learned about Jim.” Jim was her ex-husband and a charter member of the cheating bastards club. “I know what you’re going through. We can kill him if you want.”
Most would consider this a joke to ease the pain of the loss. I knew Paige better than that, though. Her eyes were filled with a fury I don’t think had even been there when her own marriage dissolved. This is probably how Olivier was also aware that she was dead serious. “You can’t do that, Paige,” he spoke up from behind me. I’d honestly forgotten he was there.
“That won’t be necessary, Paige,” I answered in a voice which was stronger than I felt. I looked up at Olivier and steeled myself to be disappointed. “Is it possible that wasn’t Wesley but the mole?” An exile could take on any persona they wanted. Olivier insisted that his ultimate task was to permanently separate me from Wesley. So far he hadn’t been able to do it. Infidelity on Wesley’s part would and the exiles knew it.
Olivier cleared his throat but never got the chance to answer. “No, Charlotte,” Paige confessed. “It’s Wesley. I should have told you last week, but I caught him and Abigail together when I went to Phoenix to see Tristan.”
My head whipped around so fa
st my neck popped. “Why?” was all I could get out.
“I wanted to give him the chance to come clean,” she admitted. “I was hoping I was wrong. But he scoffed at me, Charlotte. Told me I was being ridiculous, that he’d never be with Abigail. He lied to my face. Tristan and I both saw them together.”
Olivier piped up then. “My guy said the same thing after they were in Las Vegas three nights ago, my dear. You know the mole can’t be the press secretary and the campaign manager at the same time.”
I started grasping for straws. “Maybe we’re wrong about Banks and the press secretary. Maybe the mole is someone else. Maybe there’s someone else. I told you it was just a theory.”
“You weren’t wrong, Charlotte,” Olivier countered.
This was too much. “Please leave,” I begged them both. I needed to be alone. I needed time to process. They both refused to do as I asked until I stood up straight and demanded that they leave with tears heavy in my eyes. Once they were gone, I emptied my mind of everything and spent the rest of the day binge cleaning the house.
I went to work the next day in a sleep deprived haze and holed up in my office. April paged me several times saying Olivier needed to see me about the spring musical for the underclassmen but I refused to see anyone. Throughout the night I’d battled myself as my instincts were to try and put a positive spin on the events of the day before. It said something that I’d been able to rein my forgiving nature in. Though I’m sure the dreams helped solidify my resolve. The constant sight of Wesley’s and Abigail’s love-making whenever I closed my eyes curdled my stomach. I decided it was better to convince myself that the last five months of my life had just been a nightmare and reclaim control. Effectively, I quit and I didn’t owe anyone any explanations.
The trouble with deciding to quit was that you didn’t forgot about your friends or the problems you were mired in before. When I’d get lonely, I’d dial Paige’s or Wesley’s number. When my mind would focus on the exile rebellion, I’d head towards my patio, knowing Olivier would jump the fence almost instantly to talk about it. I would never hit send on the phone or open the back door but the phone and knob would always end up in my hands.
Which is how I found myself mindlessly walking to the music room a week after the heartbreaking news story which announced the end of my relationship with Wesley. I was a few steps from the door when a fiery burn shot through my body. What the hell?! This wasn’t the heated tingling I’d experienced during my healing treatments with Olivier. No this was more like when I caught fire at Mardi Gras. Terror gripped me and I choked on the cry for help that was trying to escape my lips. Where was Olivier when I needed him?! He’d know what to do. My eyes had closed as my body had contracted in against itself. Every muscle was taut. Every bone felt as if on the breaking point of snapping. Every organ felt crushed by a two ton weight. I forced my eyes open, expecting to see the green flames of the ignes iudicii engulfing my skin. Instead I was met with the sight of my skin glowing … BLUE?!
I was so shocked that I stumbled and fell backwards, out of the invisible flames. I gasped hungrily for breath. Normalcy was akin to being thrown in a lake frozen over in the dead of winter. That was how stark the contrast was to me. My head throbbed behind my eyes as blue flames swirled through the hallway, filling my vision.
It was then that the voices penetrated my mind. Something has to be done, and now! Olivier’s voice bellowed in my head.
Save your yelling for someone it scares, Olivier. You don’t intimidate me. You know why we must continue with the plan we have set. The color of the flames weren’t the only difference of this fire dream. The disembodied voice responding to Olivier wasn’t female this time. It wasn’t that of Olivier’s commanding officer. No, it was male and remarkably calm. Trust is what’s required. We aren’t ready to make our move just yet.
Olivier responded dejectedly. This is going to kill her. It already is, just slowly.
That may be the price, his companion coolly responded. You know there always is one. Someone has to pay it.
Then let me pay it. Olivier begged in an echoing whisper.
You very well might, his companion conceded. The decision isn’t mine to make and it’s not the time to make it anyway. You know that.
I was used to burning from the furious green fire that was spurred by the shared hatred between Olivier and his commander. Since learning the dreams had been real, had been shadow images of Olivier’s actual conversations, I’d always assumed their intensity was fed with rage. But hearing Olivier and this unknown man calmly, if sadly, discussing their plans, I learned rage didn’t fuel these fires.
I was on the edge of losing consciousness. I couldn’t let that happen. I didn’t need to be found in the hallway, passed out, by my students or staff. It was clear now that Olivier had no idea I was battling the invisible, fiery assailant on the other side of the wall. He was still entrenched in his conversation, though I’d quit paying attention to the words they were saying. The only escape I had was to retreat away from the music room.
I clawed at the walls and used my arms to drag myself across the floor away from the music room. Tears burned my eyes as I fought tooth and nail for every inch I gained on distancing myself from Olivier and whomever he was speaking with. The minute I reached the end of the hallway every awful feeling I’d had inside evaporated. The fiery burn; the crushing weight; the voices, it all disappeared.
I blinked and peered warily down the hall. Do I risk going back down? I stretched out my arm in front of me. I hadn’t even straightened it all the way when my hand became immersed in an internal fire which colored it blue. My eyes grew wide as I drew my arm back and my healthy peachy color slid from my wrist to my fingertips as if I was removing my hand from a blue tinged hot spring. Well, there was my answer. There was no way I was entering the hallway now.
I was about to make my way back to my office when the bell rang dismissing classes. Olivier and his companion exited the music room at the same time as a tidal wave of students spilled from their classrooms. His companion was just a couple inches shorter than Olivier with jet black, straight hair. His frame matched Olivier’s as did his coloring. They could almost be brothers, except for the hair. And the eyes, which I noticed when Olivier curiously glanced over his shoulder and down the hallway in my direction. The man noticed and leaned to the side to follow Olivier’s gaze. What did I see when their gaze landed on me? A pair of flaming blue eyes glowing in the stranger’s face which mirrored Olivier’s green ones.
Olivier took a step towards me but I didn’t wait for him to push through the swarm of students. I spun on my heel and raced to the safety of my office. Once on the other side of my locked door I recommitted myself to quitting. Green eyed exiles? Blue eyed exiles? Fire which tore you from the fabric of existence? Shape-shifting demons from hell? An irresistible fiancé stealing temptress? It was all too much. I just wasn’t cut out for this kind of reality.
Chapter 8
So I became a recluse. I didn’t leave my house for weeks except to go to work. I kept the window dressings closed and avoided my patio at all costs. The only place I was seen was at the school. I didn’t even do my grocery shopping, instead paying a service to do it for me. As the campaign heated up, I quit watching any television in order to not be confronted with Alexander, Wesley, Abigail, or the faceless Banks.
Paige stopped by a few times during that month and a half in an effort to draw me back in. The first time she lamented her initial insinuations about Wesley’s betrayals and how she knew that if he saw me whatever spell Abigail had cast on him would be broken. “He just isn’t acting like himself with anyone,” she’d said. “Only you can figure this out. You’re the only one he’ll listen too.” How did I keep my heart and sanity safe? I pretended to have no idea what she was talking about. She railed at me for being selfish and immature. In return, I calmly invited her to leave.
The second time Paige came it was as proxy for Olivier. He’d called me every day
after school. At school, I only interacted with him in so far as my position as his boss required and stayed coolly professional. Describing how awful he looked, like I hadn’t taken any notice, Paige beseeched me to talk to Olivier. I told her it was too bad her friend was so depressed but that I wasn’t sure what she expected me to do about it as I was just his boss. Exasperated, she left on her own.
The third visit was to bemoan how much she needed me and that she couldn’t do this alone anymore. Olivier and she were floundering without my unique insight. I’d been outwardly living this lie I’d concocted for myself for seven weeks now. But just like lying to everyone else, I wasn’t adept at lying to myself. Breaking my rule, I put down the knife I was using to prepare the vegetables for my supper and faced her. “I’m sorry, Paige, but I can’t go through it anymore. Walk away like I did. No one will think less of you.”
“I’ll think less of myself!” she hissed. “Charlotte, this is world ending stuff! If you don’t want to do it for them, and trust me girl I don’t blame you, then think about what Giles would have done.”
The mention of Giles made me furious and I unleashed months’ worth of pent up hostility. “If it wasn’t for those damn men, I wouldn’t have to wonder what Giles would have done! I could just ask him! We’d still be in Idaho, happily married, living our comparatively quiet lives. I wouldn’t be involved! You wouldn’t be involved! They killed Giles because of Wesley and Olivier let it happen. For all I care at this moment, sitting back and watching the cataclysmic show this world deserves to suffer is fine by me!”