“Oh, I’m sorry. I just thought… wait, she told me she was your girlfriend!” I begin to apologize, then remember her confronting me in the hallway.
“Well that was obviously a load of bullshit. I didn’t tell her Mr. Adams asked me to help you either.” Dante huffs before dropping back onto the sofa. Is he mad at me? He’s not looking in my direction, so I can’t see his face.
Across from me Milo clears his throat. “Oliver and I… we…” He turns to look over at Ollie, his shoulders rise as his eyes widen. “We… um…” Milo continues to stammer, running his hand through his hair.
“We’re really close, in a lot of ways. But we aren’t together in that sense really,” Ollie interjects. He never even bothers to look up; he’s still completely relaxed. Milo nods his head to confirm Ollie’s statement. He looks the opposite of relaxed. His hands are jerky as he brushes imaginary lint from his shirt.
My face heats, I’ve obviously made a rash judgment, and I’ve embarrassed myself and Milo. My tongue sticks to the roof of my mouth as I try to form an apology. Ares drops his palm heavily on my thigh, above my knee. I look over at him, my eyes search his for the right words. He winks at me, the only sign of encouragement I get.
I stand, feeling all kinds of awkward. Tangling my fingers together I approach Milo, “I’m sorry for making an assumption.” Ollie deserves an apology too, but this one is for him. “I’ve never really had very many friends. I’m not trying to use my ignorance as an excuse, I shouldn’t have done that, sorry.” Milo looks up, his lips in a thin line as he attempts a false smile.
Ollie swings his legs over to the floor and leans into Milo’s side, wrapping his arm over his neck. “He’s not mad at you Laura. He’s mad that through all of this, none of us have made our intentions clear.” My brow furrows.
“What intentions?” I question as Milo jabs his elbow into Ollie’s side, causing him to fold back and grunt.
“Easy bro,” Ollie pants through his teeth.
Milo’s eyes go wide. “Shit, man I’m sorry.” He stands, backing away from me and the couch. “I wasn’t trying to exert. Are you okay?”
Ollie unfolds on a slight wince. “I’m good, we all probably need to focus on not using our abilities for a little while, a least until we get a handle on the extra boost.”
“That was my fault. You hurt him because I was standing close to you?” I’m the one backing away now. I don’t think I truly believe I’m somehow enhancing their abilities, but I can’t stand the thought I might be the catalyst for them hurting each other either. First Ollie with the fire, now Milo. “I think you guys need to tell me what’s happening. If I’m the one causing this then I need to figure out how to make it stop.”
Ares sits forward on the sofa, resting his elbows on his knees, his eyes tracking my movement. “That’s the last thing we want to do.” My mouth pops open to argue with him and Ares raises his hand. “I just mean the making it stop part, we will explain what’s going on.” I deflate, the fight leaving me. He pats the spot I was sitting in, inviting me to return. I look at Milo who is standing near the fireplace shaking out his hands.
Slowly, I make my way back. Keeping as much distance between Ollie and myself as possible. I feel like he might catch fire if I get too close, it’s not reasonable because we were sitting together on the floor earlier, but still I do it.
Ares places his hand on my thigh again, his fingers curl slightly above my knee with a gentle squeeze. Like he knows I’m afraid of triggering them. I narrow my eyes at him. “Can you read my thoughts?” It’s not the first time I’ve questioned their uncanny sense of me. Ares doesn’t answer me, but he does have a dark grin curling his lips.
Knowing that’s the only answer I’m going to get, I push on. “So, tell me about the Infinity, what exactly is it? And how am I involved?”
Fifteen
My question is met with silence. I look at all four of them, wondering if they ever plan on telling me anything. Ares sighs. “Can’t expect boys to do a man’s job.” The others ignore the little dig as he continues. “I’ll start with the basics, considering these guys’ track record with you involving information. An Infinity is usually made up of two men, and one woman. There are a very few that have three men and one woman, we however have four to one.”
“How do you know?” I interrupt.
“Know what?” Ares drops his head back on the sofa, he’s already exacerbated and it’s just my first question.
“Know that there is only one girl, woman. I mean there are four of you, so could that mean there is more than one woman?”
Ares tilts his head, studying my face. “No, I’m confident there is only one.”
“How?”
Dante scrubs his hand over his face. I feel a slight pang of exclusion. They already have these answers, they grew up knowing their lives would change irrevocably at some point. I know nothing. Hell, I still don’t know if I believe them. I pinch my lips together and look down.
I feel the couch shift. “I’m confident there is only you, because I feel it. I know you won’t understand it yet, but I think at some point you will.” Ares tilts my face up, so I can see the patience in his eyes. I nod and wait for him to continue. “Where was I?” he mumbles under his breath. “Ah yes, so we,” he makes a circle with his hands encompassing Milo, Dante, and Ollie, “are like the reactants, and you are the catalyst, or Synergist as we call it. We each have an ability as you’ve witnessed a little of. When you were introduced into the equation our abilities are amplified. Hence Ollie sparking up. When you first came into contact with one, or all of us, there was a reaction. Tingling you said, if I remember.” Ares pauses, waiting for my reaction. I nod my head, biting my lip. How much of our earlier conversation did he hear?
“That tingling is like a warning system. It’s a way for us to know we’ve encountered a match.”
“Do you guys feel it too? When you touch?”
A slight pink rises on Milo’s cheeks. “Not like it was when we touched you.”
Hesitantly, I brush my fingers over Ares forearm and down to the top of his hand, trailing past his fingers, eventually folding my hands together in my lap. When I look up, he’s staring at the hand I just grazed. “It’s not there anymore.” My words are spoken softly, I knew it was too good to be true.
Ollie comes over and sits on the arm of the couch, he places his hand over mine. “It’s changing,” he offers. “You may not believe much of this, but your body has already accepted it. That’s the only way you would have been able to feed my power.” I still feel something when he touches me, I felt the same thing when I touched Ares, but it’s not the overwhelming feeling that would invade my senses from before, now that I’m thinking about it. I haven’t felt it since the first day I came here, and they tried to explain what was happening.
“So, when you guys need your powers, like for something big, I’ll have to be around?” I get a small jolt of satisfaction, knowing I might be needed. Ares gets up and heads to the kitchen, the light from the fridge opening creates a long shadow behind him. I narrow my eyes, wondering if the light is playing tricks on me, or if it is moving independently of him, which is the way it looks.
Dante grabs my attention by answering my question, “It’s more than just when we’re using our abilities for big stuff, it’s more like we become a unit.” He glances around to the others, waiting to see if he gave the right answer. When no one protests he continues, “We’re able to function separately, but it’s like losing one of your senses. If you are born without taste, eating is still something you would do. But say you tasted… chocolate once in your life, then you had to go back to not being able to experience the bitter sweetness melting on your tongue. Wouldn’t you crave it? Crave it like you didn’t know how to crave it before, because you had no idea there was something out there that tasted like that?”
“So, that’s why you guys are so close. Wait, if Ares wasn’t living nearby wouldn’t that have been hard?”
The man in question drops into the seat next to me, closer if I had to judge. “We do get a certain connection from being together, but it’s not the same as the one we get from you.”
“That’s part of the reason I might have seemed like a jerk the last day or two,” Milo cuts in before I really have a chance to think about what Ares is implying. “Not all of us agreed that finding out how you don’t know about us, or yourself, was more important than having us all together.” He’s not looking at anyone in particular, he’s more addressing the room as a whole, but Dante accepts it as a challenge.
“You act like I was doing it to keep her away from you. It was a day or two max Milo.”
“Yeah a day or two, but I’ve been waiting for three years.” As soon as the words come out of his mouth he looks at Ares, then casts his eyes down to the floor.
“I’ve been waiting six.” Ares’s voice is low, and it sends a fissure of awareness through me. The sophisticated clothes don’t hide the fierce man beneath. I shift away from him on instinct. Ares’s darkened eyes snap over to me when I do. Ollie places a steadying hand on my shoulder and the blackness bleeds away immediately, leaving behind the beautiful burnished brown. “What Milo was trying to tell you cara, is that each of us will continue to struggle a bit during this adjustment period.” He clasps my hand in his. “Its normal to feel a little out of sorts, on edge,” he finishes.
It’s quiet for only seconds before Ollie interjects, “Are you sure you weren’t adopted?”
“Jesus Oliver,” Dante groans. I gaze up to Ollie’s sweet face, his long hair is tied back with only few stray pieces escaping. His full lips are turned down in a frown and his brow is wrinkled. The thought never crossed my mind. Could I be? I dismiss the idea as soon as it forms. I know I look like my mom, she even has the same abnormality in her eyes as I do. Hers is much subtler, you have to look really hard to see her right eye has a pie shaped piece of green cutting through the brown. Most people just mistakenly think her eyes are hazel.
“No,” I finally respond after giving the question some genuine thought. “I really don’t think so.”
“But…” Ollie looks around. “You said your mom’s sick right?” I nod. “See, that’s the thing, we don’t really get sick, and if she’s your mom and you’re an Infinity like us, then I don’t see how it’s possible.”
“Wait, you don’t get sick, like ever?” I question, wondering how that’s even possible.
“We get sick,” Milo places his phone on the middle cushion, “but only before your united in an Infinity, afterwards our bodies tend to fight off anything that could get us sick.”
I shake my head. “That’s what I’ve been trying to tell you. The only thing abnormal about me is my ability to blend in. I don’t have any powers, neither does my mom.”
It’s quiet for several minutes. Ollie eventually abandons the arm of the couch for the much more comfortable position he was in previously. He crooks his inner elbow over his eyes and sighs. “I feel like I haven’t slept in ages,” he says around a yawn. A yawn over takes me in the next second. I lie my head back with the intention to relax for a moment.
Dante and Ares start up a quiet conversation. “Why didn’t you tell me you had moved above the garage?”
“Because I didn’t want you coming home just because of me, if you were happy where you were I wanted you to stay there.”
Ares snorts. “Happy wasn’t what I would call it, I was surviving.”
“I was doing the same. I hated being in this house all alone, even when Milo and Oliver were with me, it felt wrong.” My eyes fall shut, I feel like I’m invading their privacy but I’m helpless to get up. Their words grow even more faint as I begin to drift off. I know it’s happening and I don’t stop it. I’m tired of being in my tiny RV alone, waking up at every sound. I just need a few moments’ rest and I’ll ask Dante or Milo to drive me back.
“Laura,” a deep voice coos. “Laura, we need to get you home before your mom calls the cops.” I turn, rolling into a ball in the corner.
“She won’t call,” I murmur, falling back to sleep almost immediately.
“I don’t want you to get into trouble.” Dante brushes my hair away from my face, still trying to wake me.
“I won’t. I promise.” The weight of a soft blanket settles over my shoulders, I burrow down even further.
Jolting awake I shoot upright. The room is dark and I can hear the sounds of heavy breathing. I’m momentarily disoriented. I pat what should be the cushion next to me but my hand lands on a denim covered thigh. I pull back and drop my hand back down gently. As my eyes adjust I see the white glow of Ares’s button-up shirt beside me. His arms are out wide on either side of the back of the couch, with his neck pillowed on the cushion. I roll my head around on my shoulders, my back isn’t used to sleeping on something so soft, nor am I used to sitting half up. I turn to the left, wondering where the others went, until I see Dante with his head supported on the arm of the couch. His legs are outstretched, almost reaching Ares, propped up on a pillow on the table. Squinting my eyes, I can make out a shape on the sofa across from me. It could be Milo or Ollie, it’s too dark to tell.
Should I wake them? I feel bad. Did they stay down here because of me? They could have gone to bed. Ares stirs ever so slightly and takes a deeper breath. I lean in close, going toward his ear. “Ares,” I whisper, no response so I lean in a little more. My upper body is almost touching his. “Ares,” I murmur, hoping not to wake the others. It’s my fault they’re sleeping on the couch, but at least the others are lying down. He still doesn’t wake. One last time I lean in close, I feel the scruff of his jaw on the crest of my cheek, my chest brushing up against his. With my lips at his ear I mutter, “Ares.” He stops breathing. Still whispering I add, “You should go lie down.” He hums a noncommittal response.
I feel the weight of his arm settle on my back. “Do you need to be home tonight?” His voice is low, thick with sleep.
“No.”
He grunts at my reply. The weight of his arm leaves my back and I pull away, ducking as his arm passes over my head. Ares stands, reaching both arms over his head in a drowsy stretch. He twists his back left then right until an audible crack sounds and he lets out a low groan. I feel slightly guilty that I’m the cause of his discomfort.
I curl back into the couch, tucking myself against the corner. Ares takes a step in my direction, and I pull my knees in tighter so he can pass without having to climb over Dante’s legs. Instead he stops in front of me and leans down. His arms go under the backs of my knees and under my arms. I stiffen, it doesn’t stop him from lifting me right off the couch and stepping around the table. “What are you doing?” I hiss.
“Going to lie down.”
“Where are you taking me?” A tiny bit of panic invades my voice, for a moment I think to scream for help.
Ares stops, he looks down at me. I can’t make out his features in the darkness, but his voice is soft when he answers, “I…” he stammers. “I just want to be near you for a little while cara.”
“Should we just go back to the couch then?” I bite my lip, I don’t think he would do anything to hurt me, but I barely know any of them really.
“We can, I can put you right back where you were. I’ll stay right there next to you.” He waits for my response.
“You can go lay down. I’m used to sleeping on the couch. it doesn’t bother me.”
“No, you stay, I stay.” He turns around to return to the sofa. That more than anything changes my mind.
“I’ll try,” I mumble. “But I want to walk.”
Ares’s steps falter, he doesn’t say anything as he bends, placing my bare feet on the floor. I move a few steps away, straightening my clothes as I do. Silently I trail behind him as he passes through an archway leading away from the kitchen. It’s darker the further we go, the dim glow afforded by the moonlight beaming through the French doors fades with every step. Ares is just a silhouette in front of me no
w. We’ve only gone a short distance when he reaches back for my hand. Grateful for the guidance, I squeeze his fingers in return.
Ares stops shortly thereafter. The click of a door unlatching is loud in the surrounding quiet. The space beyond is pitch black. I can’t see a silver of light through a curtain. My heart rate edges up a few more notches. I want to run my hands over the wall to find a light switch, but Ares just strolls in, slowly stopping after about ten paces.
“Climb in,” Ares’s voice severs the silence. I lift my free hand and pat the space to my right.
“I can’t see.” Ares drops my hand and I suck in a breath. I hadn’t realized how much comfort the connection was giving me.
Seconds later his hands find my waist. He lifts me a few inches off floor and my hands go to his chest to brace myself. I’m completely disorientated. The back of my calves hit something firm and I bend my knees as he releases me onto a low bed.
My breaths are coming in short pants. I don’t like not knowing what’s around me. “Ares,” I call into the darkness.
“I’m right here.” I feel the mattress shift, so I scoot back with my hands behind me, careful not to fall off the edge.
“Is this your room? It’s so dark.”
“I can actually see you perfectly.” He doesn’t answer my question.
“I can’t see anything.” To prove my point I wave my hand right in front of my face, there’s nothing. Ares snatches my hand out of the air.
“Lay down, I thought you were tired,” he grumbles. I was, when I felt safe cuddled into the couch with all of them around, now I feel more alert than if I was at home alone. Patting the bed, I search for the pillow and I slowly lower my head, facing in his direction. I’m relieved to know he’s right next to me, but I’m also a little frightened for the same reason.
I draw in a deep breath through my mouth and hold it for a second before releasing it down over my bottom lip.
Infinity Chronicles Book One: A Paranormal Reverse Harem Series Page 14