The voices that surrounded me echoed inside my skull, along with other sounds, like hearts beating–two of them beating faster than normal–and things scurrying in the woods. I could feel two strong arms around my body, rocking me, and soft lips covering the side of my face in kisses.
“I am going to take care of the bodies,” Anwar said. “You stay here and wait for Paige to awake. Right now, she is discovering her keen sense of hearing.”
“Okay,” Nathan said, his voice filled with happiness. “If you don’t concentrate on those sounds, you can block them out,” he whispered in my ear. “I love you.” He kissed the soft spot next to my ear, and I sighed in contentment. He felt it and squeezed me tighter against him.
“Paige!” Carrie’s screaming voice rushed at me.
“It’s okay, Carrie.” Tree’s voice was behind her. “She’s alive, just not awake yet.”
Carrie’s sobs reverberated as her cold hands grabbed at me.
“Back off, Carrie,” Nathan warned, his voice growling from deep within his chest.
“But … But … How?” she stammered. “I’m … I’m … So sorry.” She continued to sob. “I… I would never hurt, Paige. I love her. You got to believe me. I don’t know what happened. I felt pressure on my chest and blacked out.”
“Come here, Carrie,” Tree’s gentle voice said.
“You got to believe me,” Carrie’s pleading voice cried.
“Carrie, I know you’d never intentionally hurt Paige,” Nathan said, but then his voice acquired a disgusted edge. “But why would you invite a spirit inside you?”
“You invited a spirit inside you?” Tree asked, his voice raised in shock.
“I… I,” she said between tears. “I don’t know,” she whined. “When Matt and I were hanging out one night at his house, he took out his Ouija board.” She paused to cough. “He told me if I gave my permission to the spirits to work through me, we’d be able to talk to them. That’s all I know.”
“How come you never told us?” Tree asked, still shocked.
“Because I didn’t want you to know,” she simply stated.
“It’s an innocent mistake,” Nathan told them, understanding the situation now. I stirred in his arms and felt his hand move softly down the length of my arm.
“Nathan,” my sluggish voice said.
“I’m here, baby.” He kissed my cheek.
“Paige,” Carrie said, crying again.
My eyes fluttered open to her moving toward me. Carrie’s image magnified to bizarre proportions and jumped at me. I flinched and flipped my hand over my eyes, taking a couple deep breaths to calm my racing heart. That was freaky.
“Carrie, I need you to stay back,” Nathan said, lifting his hand off of me.
“Why?”
“Yeah, why?” Tree’s voice was filled with interest, and I could tell he knew something was up.
“Because Paige is seeing the world through different eyes now, and her mind needs to adjust to it,” Nathan answered.
“You’re not making sense,” Carrie said, annoyed.
“I think I know,” Tree replied. “But I want Nathan to tell us.”
“I will once we’re inside the house, and Paige can be a part of it.”
“This is bullshit,” Carrie said, suddenly angry. “You guys are holding out on me. Just because I made a stupid mistake doesn’t mean you have to be a–”
“Carrie,” I said, feeling my body getting stronger and stronger by the minute, but my hand remained over my eyes. “Please listen to Nathan. As for Tree, he has a hunch because one, he has a gift for reading people, and two, he saw what happened.”
“Thank you, Paige,” Tree said cheerfully. “And welcome back.”
“I’m so sorry, Paige.” Carrie’s voice was shaking. “I honestly don’t know what happened. And you and Nathan are covered in blood, so it had to be bad. I don’t even know where all that blood came from.” She started crying again.
“It wasn’t you doing it, so please stop crying.” I peeked through my fingers, amazed at the clarity of my vision. I could see every tear on her face, and the bags forming under her eyes. It was incredible. I also smelled the blood on Nathan and me, which made my stomach churn.
“But what if it happens again?”
“Tree, lift Carrie’s hair on the left side of her neck,” Nathan told him. I decided to be brave and dropped my hand. They both had a weird look on their faces. “Go ahead,” Nathan urged and lifted my hand to his lips, kissing it.
Tree did what Nathan said and sucked in a sharp breath. “What is that?” His wide eyes fell on us.
Carrie jerked her head back and slapped a hand over her neck. “What’s on my neck?” she screeched.
“It looked like a three-dimensional spiral,” Tree said. He looked at Carrie. “And it’s the size of a dime.” She screwed her face up and rubbed her fingers on it.
“Correct,” Nathan said. “Humans who invite spirits in receive that mark after one of us casts the spirit out, so a spirit can never enter them again. It’s a self-protection mark. So Carrie, you won’t have to worry about it now.”
“Does Matt have the mark too?” she asked, baffled.
Nathan shook his head and confusion crossed her face. “It doesn’t work on people who are soulless.”
“He doesn’t have a soul?” she shrieked, horrified.
“That explains why he’s such a dick,” Tree muttered.
“There are people in this world who are soulless, Carrie,” Nathan said while laughing, amused at Tree’s comment. “And spirits can enter those vessels at will.”
“Carrie, let me see the mark on your neck,” I said. She scrambled to her feet. “Stay where you’re at. I can see it from here.” She gave me a funny look, but did what I said. She lifted her hair and tilted her head to show me.
“Cool. It looks like a birthmark.” Tree was right. It was a three-dimensional spiral, conch-shell form.
“You need to tell us what’s going on,” Tree demanded.
I’d seen that stubborn look on his face many times, and knew we had to tell them.
“Yeah,” Carrie said, sounding like a bratty kid. “And we want to know now.”
“It is okay, Nathaniel. They can come in the house.” I heard Anwar say from inside and knew Carrie and Tree couldn’t hear him. I was really liking this bionic hearing and was able to control it and block the sounds I didn’t want to hear. It was easy.
I looked at Nathan, and he smiled. “I’m okay with it.” But then I looked at my arms and realized what Carrie was talking about earlier. They were covered in dried blood, and Nathan’s white T-shirt was drenched in it too. We looked like we’d committed a murder. “But we need to clean up first,” I added.
“Don’t get up too quickly,” he whispered in my ear. “And keep in a stride with them while walking.”
I nodded, and then his warm lips joined mine, soft and sweet. I shifted in his lap and looped my arms around his neck, kissing him harder, deeper. He responded with an eagerness that sent my pulse racing.
I had felt like this before with him, but never imagined it to be greater than what it was, however, the change in me enhanced everything, and for a second I forgot about Carrie and Tree, until Tree cleared his throat.
Nathan broke our kiss, his bright eyes on mine. “I love you,” he whispered.
“I love you too,” I whispered back, moving my thumb across his lips, then rising to my feet. “I’m sorry,” I said to Carrie and Tree, slipping my hand into Nathan’s, noticing my body wanting to move faster. I pretended I was walking in thick mud. “I didn’t mean to get carried away.” I paused. They were totally gawking at us. “What? Why are you two staring at us?”
“Because your eyes are really bright,” Tree said.
Carrie stuck her face in front of mine. “Why are they like that?”
“Well, to put it bluntly,” I said. “It’s because we’re horny for each other.”
“That’s just wrong.” Tree scrunched up his fac
e. “You’re like my sister, Paige, and I don’t want to think about you getting horny and doing you know what.”
“Come on, Tree. You know Nathan and I have had–”
“Stop! I don’t want to hear it,” he cut me off and stuck his fingers in his ears and said, “La, la, la.”
“Erotic,” Carrie murmured, and we laughed.
She seemed to be in a lot better mood now, probably because we were going to tell her our secret. And I knew once her and Tree found out, they would carry it to their graves like Nathan’s father had.
When we walked across the deck, glass crunched beneath our feet. Two gaping holes where the windows once were, now had thick black plastic covering them. And then something occurred to me when we reached the front door, and I started laughing and crying at the same time. They stopped and stared at me, not understanding my bizarre outburst. I encircled my arms around Carrie in a bear hug.
“Owe, Paige. You’re holding me too tight,” she said, while I continued to laugh and cry on her shoulder.
“Sorry.” I released her and saw tears in her eyes. Then I pulled Tree into my arms and hugged him too.
“Damn, Paige. You’re going to crack my hip if you keep squeezing me like this.” Tree laughed, not realizing I actually could if I were to use my full strength.
Dropping my arms, I smiled between tears. “I’m just so happy I don’t have to say goodbye to you two.” I glanced at Nathan, and he was beaming. He knew how much Carrie and Tree meant to me and how happy I was I could keep them in our life.
“Why would you say goodbye to us?” Carrie asked, sounding upset.
“Because,” I said, walking inside the house, “of what we’re going to tell you in a few minutes.”
“Okay, I’m really nervous about this now.” Carrie paused to look around. “I love your place,” she gushed to Nathan. “It’s totally awesome!”
“Thanks,” Nathan said, looking about. “I like it.”
Anwar stepped into the room, and with an inviting smile, he gestured for them to sit. They sat on the couch, looking up at him as if he were a mythical god.
“Anwar, these are my friends, Carrie and Jack, but we call him Tree,” I told him.
He bowed his head. “I have heard many great things about you two,” he said, his warm eyes on them.
“Tree and Carrie, this is Anwar.” I turned to him and smiled.
“Please to meet you,” Carrie and Tree said in unison, awestruck.
Anwar pointed at them. “Your energies go well together,” he said. “And I see much love there.”
Carrie blushed, but Tree was staring at Anwar like a little kid meeting his idol for the first time. I’d never seen Tree fascinated by someone like this before, and I couldn’t help but smile, enjoying his reaction.
“Nathaniel, I will play host to these two while you and Paige get cleaned up,” Anwar said, looking at Nathan. “And then I must go for a few weeks to attend business.”
My face crumbled. “But I don’t want you to go. You need to start teaching me stuff.” I didn’t want to sound like a whiny child, but I could hear it in my voice.
He turned to me, his expression filled with affection, clearly touched by my words. “I will be back before you know it, little one. But in the meantime, your body needs to acclimate to the changes before we can proceed with your teachings. However, Nathaniel can teach you a few things in my absence. And from what I understand, you still have weeks of school left dat you must finish.”
“True.” I chewed on my lip. “But I already know I’m going to graduate. All I have to do is take the written finals.” I was hoping he’d suggest for me to take some more time off, to get use to these changes.
He chuckled, reading right through me. “Your father would haunt me if I were to support your desire in dismissing your education, which I will not do. You need to finish the year out with your dear friends. Dis summer I will teach you what you need to know.”
I let out a complacent sigh. “Fine.”
Tree rolled his eyes. “Jeez, Paige, it’s not the end of the world. I’m sure Nathan will take you to school and eat lunch with us like he did before.”
Nathan placed his arm around my waist. “Absolutely,” he said.
Carrie glared at me. “Yeah, you need to be at school with us.”
“Okay, I’ll go back to school tomorrow,” I said, annoyed they were taking Anwar’s side, even though I knew they were right. “Anyway,” I continued, “Nathan and I will be right back. I can smell the blood on us, and it’s making me sick.”
“C’mon, Paige.” Nathan took my hand and led me to his room. “I have a shirt you can wear until we get back to your house.”
“Hurry back,” Carrie called. “I’m dying to know what’s going on.”
Beyond the Eyes: YA Paranormal Romance Page 57