Come Alive

by Madelynne Ellis

  A loud creak prompted her to lift her head from her knees. A shaft of light spilled across the wooden floor and the rug at the centre of the square of sofas. Spook came out of his bedroom.

  He turned his head, even leaned over the railings to look down on the room below. Dani held her breath, hoping he wouldn’t notice her. She didn’t want to make explanations, but there was a tickle in her nose that she had to rub at. The whisper of sound obviously travelled, because he immediately turned and pattered forwards, bare feet tapping on the honey-gold wood. He stopped a foot or so away from the daybed and squinted into the gloom.

  ‘Dani? Is that you? Are you OK?’

  ‘Fine.’

  Wrong choice of expression, fine being the universal indicator that a woman was the very opposite of fine, and Spook Mortensen was intuitive enough to know that. Unsurprisingly, he clicked on a lamp and flicked another switch that illuminated the depths of her hiding place. He took one look at her huddled there, and her no doubt hideously pink and swollen nose, and straightened as if he meant business.

  Shit! The last thing she wanted to do was cause a rift between Spook and Xane.

  ‘There’s a duvet in the drawer underneath you.’

  When she didn’t move, he got it out and gathered it around her shoulders.

  ‘Thanks,’ she murmured without looking up, so as to avoid displaying the tear tracks upon her cheeks. ‘Sorry, I didn’t mean to disturb you.’

  He gently cupped a hand against the back of her head before sifting a few strands of her hair. ‘You didn’t. I was reading.’

  ‘Something good?’ She peeped at him from the corners of her eyes.

  ‘It’s a book about Nikola Tesla. Fascinating stuff. I’d loan it you, but it’s in Swedish.’

  ‘He did weird stuff with electricity, didn’t he?’

  ‘And lots of other things.’

  She raised her head a fraction. It wasn’t as if she was revealing anything he hadn’t already figured out.

  ‘Can I get you anything? A drink, maybe, or another blanket?’

  ‘Vodka,’ she croaked, and then laughed.

  It made her sound hysterical.

  ‘If that’s what you want.’

  Vodka, she recalled, was Xane’s poison of choice. She shook her head. ‘Maybe just a glass of water.’

  Rather than descending to the kitchen, Spook went into his room. He returned a moment later carrying two glasses and a bottle of sparkling elderflower juice. ‘Is this all right?’

  ‘Looks lovely.’

  He poured and handed her a glass.

  Accepting meant she had to uncurl from her porcupine pose.

  ‘Am I to assume you and Xane aren’t friends?’

  She opened her mouth to speak, but promptly closed it again. A thick lump embedded itself in her throat. If she started talking, she was going to start crying again, ugly crying, and Spook didn’t need to deal with that.

  ‘On a scale of one to five, how big a bastard was he?’

  She held up her clenched fist, only to then flutter her fingers indecisively.

  Spook caught hold of her hand. ‘Let me guess, it was something to do with Luthor.’

  She nodded.

  ‘Well, that was obvious enough. Now for the specifics. Did he do something he wasn’t supposed to, or—’

  ‘He wants Luthor. He was thinking about Luthor while we were … I flipped out, and told him that if that’s who he wanted then that’s who he ought to bed.’ She covered her face with her hands again. She didn’t know why she was telling Spook this. It wouldn’t fix anything, but somehow he was easy to talk to, and he actually seemed to be listening. More importantly, he wasn’t frowning in any sort of judgemental way. ‘I really wish I hadn’t said that.’ She straightened her back and yelled, ‘I take it back, OK. I take it back.’

  ‘Where is he now?’ Spook asked.

  She shook her head. ‘I don’t know. With him, I guess. It’s my own fault if he is.’

  ‘OK.’ He squeezed her hand. ‘You know there’s more than one reason I made Luthor bunk with Paul. If Xane’s gone over there with the intention of securing a shag, he’s either performing for a scathing audience right now, or he’s decided an icy cold shower is a viable alternative. Paul’s an absolute bastard about anyone getting any action if he’s not party to it, and gay sex really isn’t his thing. He’s probably the straightest out of the lot of us.’

  ‘You’re all—’

  ‘Sexually fluid? Not really, no. We just live a rock ’n’ roll lifestyle. Experimentation and drunken fumbling are inevitable parts of that.’

  ‘Along with drug-taking, groupies and throwing TV sets out of hotel windows.’

  ‘Absolutely. I’ve done all of those things.’

  She didn’t know how he managed to keep his face straight. ‘I’ll bet you have. I bet you’re the naughtiest of them all deep down. Don’t they always say it’s the quiet ones?’

  ‘Who’s calling who quiet?’

  Touché. He had her on that one. ‘Spook,’ she said after a moment of chewing her thumbnail. ‘How do I fix this?’

  ‘You make a choice: walk away or accept what he is and that he isn’t going to change. And that means accepting his attraction to Luthor. I know you think you already did that, but the reality is that you’ve no more accepted it than when you first caught them together. It’s why you’re doing everything you can to keep them apart.’

  ‘I’m not … I guess I am. It hurts though. It hurts so goddamned much. It’s not just knowing they want each other, or thinking it means he might love me slightly less. It’s the fear that I’ll wake up and it’ll all be over. He’s been there for me for so long.’

  ‘Six months.’

  She pursed her lips. ‘Way longer than that. I don’t know how to survive without him.’

  ‘Then don’t. Choose not to. Choose to accept the reality of who he is and find a way to make it work.’

  He rose from where he was perched on the end of the daybed. ‘He loves you, Dani. I wasn’t sure I believed it in the beginning, but I do now. All you need to do is open your heart to him and you’ve got him for life. He’s a sex addict – you’re not going to magically cure him of that. It’s so much a part of him that he can’t actually separate his libido from his emotional state. But he’s ferociously loyal to those he cares about, and you can’t buy that sort of devotion. Let him love you in his own way. I don’t think you’ll regret it.’

  Somehow she couldn’t help but smile, not when he spoke with such sincerity.

  ‘Am I OK to stay here?’ she asked.

  ‘Sleep wherever the hell you like.’

  ‘Is this where you were going to put Elspeth?’

  He glanced back at her over his bare shoulder. It occurred to her that he was only wearing a pair of lounge pants and that she’d never seen him anything less than fully dressed before. His shoulders and his biceps were inked, much like Xane’s, and his hair was every bit as long, just blond. ‘I’m not sure it’s padded enough.’

  He closed the door, leaving her to wonder just what the hell she was supposed to infer from that.

  Chapter 8

  Dani woke the following morning when Spook breezed out of his room and headed downstairs. She did the same a few moments later. Warm light was flooding into the central open-plan living space giving all the bleached wood and white furnishings a honey-gold glow. Dani wasn’t sure if she’d find Xane in the bedroom they were meant to be sharing, but it seemed the obvious place to look first. Spook’s words to her about choices and not attempting to change things that couldn’t be changed had churned in her thoughts for much of the night. She knew he was right and that, if she allowed him to, Xane would love her in his own fashion and most likely make her very happy too. All she needed to do was conquer her own fear and accept that her lover would never be content as part of a typical monogamous couple. He simply wasn’t wired that way.

  As to her opinions on the subject, they were largely form
ed by the damnation speeches of the Sisterhood of St Agatha, and her mother’s venomous lies. Discovering the actual truth of her feelings would take a while.

  Xane was lying in the centre of the bed when she entered. One strong arm was hooked around a pillow, but otherwise very little of his glorious body could be seen. Too bad: she loved to see him first thing in the morning, sunlight dappling his pale skin. She liked to skim her fingers over the lines of his tattoos, and explore the dips and contours of his yummy musculature, sometimes even lick it. She’d never realised she was quite such a goner for a pretty face and hot man-flesh before she’d met Xane. In her defence, he was a hard man to want to keep your hands off.

  Xane’s coal-dark hair lay fanned across the pillows. His nose was pressed into the coverlet. Somehow, the floral design of the duvet cover seemed out of place. His hard-rocking image demanded skulls and spikes and stars, not delicate sprigs of forget-me-nots. She crossed to where one of his feet stuck out from the bottom of the duvet, and wriggled the tip of his big toe.

  ‘Dani!’ Xane thrust aside the pillow and pushed himself up on one elbow. He regarded her and blinked, then scooted backwards on his rear so that he was sitting upright facing her. ‘Dani … I’m sorry.’ Palm held upwards, he reached towards her.

  ‘Did you?’ she asked, cautiously sniffing the air for any hint of the lingering scent of sexual congress. She didn’t mean it to sound like an accusation, but nevertheless that’s how it came out. The purpose in coming here had been to make peace, not start another row.

  ‘No. Hell, no.’ He strained forward, wordlessly begging her to take his hand.

  ‘You didn’t go to him?’ Surely that was a lie. He’d stormed out stating that he intended to go to Luthor. He’d been hard and geared up for sex, his mind and body rigidly focused. ‘Don’t lie.’

  ‘I didn’t go to him.’

  ‘Then where did you go?’

  ‘I tramped around the woods for a bit. The combination of the cold and standing on a few dozen pine needles soon conquered the urge to fuck.’

  ‘Ouch,’ she mouthed, and barely resisted the urge to check his soles for injuries.

  He’d been naked. It would definitely have been cold, especially with the wind blowing in from across the lake.

  ‘Where were you? I looked for you when I got back, but—’

  ‘Upstairs. Spook said it was OK to use the daybed. We chatted a bit.’

  Xane lowered his brows and drew back a little, as if he didn’t care for the sound of that. ‘Tell you I was a bastard, did he?’

  ‘He said twice as many positive things.’ And that was the truth.

  A grin instantly creased his face with a myriad of laughter lines. ‘Then you’d better remind me to send him an awesome gift for his next birthday.’

  ‘Isn’t that months away?’

  ‘That’s why I asked you to remind me.’

  Dani considered this, looking at her toes curled against the shaggy carpet. Is this what couples did when they rowed and made up? They interspersed the deep and meaningful with the mundane and the ridiculous. In her mind, the way she’d pictured this involved some talking – she hadn’t mulled over the details – and then them making glorious passionate love. That’s how it happened in the movies, and Xane was remarkably good at the sex part.

  ‘Are we still going to be a couple by then?’

  ‘What?’ Xane rose onto his knees and leaned over so that he could grab hold of her. He grasped both of her wrists and tugged her onto the bed. ‘What are you talking about? Come here, are you insane? Of course we’ll be together. I’m not letting you escape. You’re stuck with me.’ He enfolded her in his arms, so that she was locked tight against his hot body. His breath whispered against her ear. ‘I love you. You’re not going anywhere. Do I need to tie you to this bed?’ He sobered a little, and urged her to turn her head so that they were looking one another in the eye. ‘You don’t actually want to leave, do you?’

  There was such fear, such a river of emotion running through his eyes, it choked her up.

  Slowly, she shook her head. Of course she didn’t want to, but their future together did seem murky at times, and she much preferred to see the path ahead laid out clearly. It had seemed remarkably clear until Luthor turned up – date for a while, maybe one day get engaged and then married, and have babies. All right, so she was mentally frowning at all those ideas, because it was too soon to consider any of them, but … they were the logical steps of couplehood. How anything worked when there was a third person involved, she didn’t know.

  ‘Good.’ Xane hugged her around the middle. ‘Totally not letting you escape. When you find a good one, you have to keep hold of them, and you’re more than just a good one.’

  ‘I’m a needy mess,’ she admitted.

  ‘Well, that makes two of us. We’re good for one another, Dani. All couples have their disagreements, but we can find our way around any issue. I swear to you we can.’

  ‘I know,’ she said, actually believing him. The deep anger she’d felt last night had faded away now. All that mattered was being held close, feeling his warmth and knowing he loved her.

  His lips strayed close to hers suggesting kisses were on the horizon. Dani made them happen, tilting her chin up and sliding her hand into his long hair. She sucked at his lips, smiled at the odd pressure of his lip ring. Damn, he tasted good – familiar.

  ‘Do you want to fuck and then talk, or talk and then fuck?’ he asked, ruining her sunshine moment.

  ‘Xane!’ She shoved him, so that he collapsed backward against the heap of pillows, but he simply laughed and pulled her down on top. He held her close despite her squirming, and ignored all the irritated jabs she gave him. Only when she stilled and looked straight at him did he loosen his grip a little. Damn, how to totally derail her thoughts. His eyes were wide open, and he was regarding her with so much love and fear written into his expression that she got choked up all over again.

  Xane lifted his head off the pillow and claimed her mouth. The fact that he could really kiss was one of the first things she’d established about him. He wasn’t just moderately good at it. Xane had an absolute talent for kissing in a way that emptied the mind and left you reeling, flying and clinging on tight to him as if he was your only means of securing your next breath. Cling she did, and mew softly too. When he claimed her like this, it was impossible to envisage a world in which he wasn’t right by her side.

  Xane stroked a finger down the side of her throat. His forehead rested gently against hers. ‘It was hideously cold in here last night without you. I’d rather not ever have to repeat the experience.’

  ‘You want to sleep with me for the rest of your days?’

  ‘Do you doubt me?’ He splayed a hand across her lower back, as if steadying her, ready to turn her over, but Dani held his gaze and refused to let this moment of what she prayed was honesty blow away from them. They needed to learn to communicate in a way that didn’t totally depend on sex.

  ‘Talk first,’ she insisted, in answer to his earlier question. If they approached this the other way round, then the words would never flow. That was obviously why none of those movie romances ever lasted. Guaranteed, if there was a sequel, they’d broken up.

  ‘OK.’ He plumped the pillows again, and settled against them, with a space for her right between his legs. Dani rested with her back against him. It was a good position. It felt safe and secure, and because they weren’t facing, she didn’t feel unduly scrutinised.

  ‘What’s on your mind, Dani?’

  She didn’t immediately reply. Instead, she took a moment to breathe and ground herself. She could feel Xane’s heart thumping away against her back, and his kisses still tingled on her lips. Both things gave her such a crazy sense of well-being, she didn’t know why she resisted talking over her fears with him. Whenever she’d been brave in the past, he’d always listened, and, if he didn’t necessarily have a solution, he’d always been supportive of her while they’d soug
ht one.

  ‘I’m scared,’ she admitted. ‘Terrified, actually. I don’t know how to behave around Luthor, and I wonder what will happen to us, if I truly let him in as I more or less promised to do.’

  ‘What do you fear will happen?’

  She huffed a deep sigh out through her nose. ‘That I’ll lose the closeness we have, and that we won’t be a couple any more, even if we are ostensibly together. We’ll be something else, something everyone will take less seriously.’

  ‘Why does it matter what everybody else thinks?’

  ‘I don’t know. It just feels as if it does, and that it should.’

  ‘I don’t give a fig what anybody else thinks. The important thing is that we’re happy. They don’t have to agree or understand, and actually, those closest to us do understand.’ His assertion didn’t surprise her. It wasn’t that he didn’t care so much as he was infinitely better at hiding his hurt than she was. Public scrutiny was new to her. He’d lived with it for years, if not all his life.

  ‘You mean those closest to you.’ He was talking about the band.

  ‘They’re your friends too, Dani. Haven’t you realised that? They like you, and nearly every one of them has warned me not to muck it up with you. If they’re wary of anyone it’s Luthor, because they don’t know what sort of impact he’s going to make.’

  ‘Wary’ summed up her feelings towards Black Halo’s new drummer too. The thought saddened her, because she and Luthor had been such good friends during the weeks the band had spent touring northern Europe. As the newcomers, they’d forged a common bond. He’d been someone she could turn to for help and advice, and simple companionship.

  ‘If we’re airing concerns, you really ought to mention your biggest fear,’ Xane prompted her.