The Accidental Kiss

by Nicole Simone

  “Daemon?”

  The shadow shifted. I broke into a run, my hair whipping around my face. Arriving at the grave, I saw it was in fact Daemon but he was broken and bloodied. His arm was laid across his face, as if he was fending off phantom punches. My breath caught in my throat.

  I fell to my knees next to him. “Are you ok? What happened to you?”

  Daemon moaned as his arm flopped to his side, revealing two black eyes and a gash above his eyebrow. Dried blood splattered his cheek. “You with the questions,” he croaked.

  With his sight impaired, I couldn’t tell if he recognized me. “Daemon, it’s Sky.”

  His chin dipped in the direction of my voice. “How did you find me?”

  “Instinct.”

  “You have good instincts.”

  “Thanks.” I assessed the amount of his injuries. They weren’t awful but I hadn’t seen underneath his t-shirt yet. “Would you mind if I lifted up your shirt?”

  “Always trying to get in my pants,” he quipped.

  I was glad to see that Daemon still had his personality in tact. I gingerly raised his t-shirt and gasped. His skin was mottled with fresh wounds. They were pink and raised on the edges as if they were healing.

  I laid my hand over them. “How long have you been here?”

  His shoulders shrugged followed by a wince. “A day, an hour.”

  Retreating to a graveyard after getting seriously injured was a weird place to lick one’s wounds. “Why here?”

  “It’s the closest to home I can get.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  Daemon mumbled a string of incoherent words. I didn’t have to wait long to get my answer though. The fog cleared around us and my eyes drifted to the headstone. The grave Daemon was sprawled across was his own.

  I crawled around Daemon’s body to take a closer look. The inscription on the headstone was simple and to the point. My lips mouthed the words. “Here lies a beloved a son, brother, and nephew. May your soul rest in peace.” His full name was listed underneath. “Daemon Joseph Henley.”

  It didn’t make sense. Daemon had told me he moved here from somewhere else and everybody in Castor referred to him as the new kid, so why was he buried in Plymouth Cemetery? I looked at him for an explanation, but he was turned on his back, staring vacantly at the sky. The answer could wait.

  “I need to get you to the hospital,” I said more to myself than him.

  Daemon rolled onto his side, placed his hands on the ground, and weakly lifted his torso up. “I’m fine. Help me to my feet.”

  I looked at him as if he was nuts. “Are you kidding me? You are barely coherent. How can I possibly drag you to wherever you want to go?”

  “I need food, water, and pain killers.” He cradled his head in his hands. “A lot of pain killers.”

  “I thought you were immortal.”

  “I am, but I can still feel pain. A day or two of rest and I’ll be good as new.”

  Daemon looked as if he needed more than two days of rest but based on the wounds on his stomach that were already healing, I decided to believe him.

  “Fine. Place your hand on my shoulder and we’ll do this together.”

  He complied with my orders. We awkwardly stumbled to our feet and I swayed under his weight. “Where to?”

  “I live up the road. It’s not far.”

  We shuffled down the path at a slow, agonizing pace. He wasn’t light by any means so what would have been a five-minute journey turned into a twenty-minute sweat session. Finally, in the distance, I spotted a small one-story shingle roofed house. We stopped to catch our breath.

  “Please tell me that’s your house,” I said.

  When no answer came, my gaze cut over to him. Daemon’s eyes were closed shut, his chin tucked against his chest. I lightly patted his cheek to no avail. I tried again but this time I did it harder.

  His head jerked up widely. “What the fuck?”

  “Sorry,” I said. “You passed out and were about to collapse on top of me.”

  He rubbed his face where a red mark was blooming. “That’s no excuse.”

  “Come on.”

  We continued on our journey until we reached Daemon’s front door, which was painted bright blue. Flower boxes were under the windowsills, blossoming in a rainbow of color. It was a cheery house for one located in a graveyard. My hand closed around the doorknob and it turned easily.

  “You should really lock your doors,” I mumbled.

  “YOU should lock your doors,” Daemon shot back without any fire.

  His comebacks were sorely lacking. I dragged Daemon into the small living room and deposited him on a leather couch. He melted into the cushions with a sigh of contentment. I had a crushing feeling the voodoo priest and his zombies had played a role in Daemon’s beating. It was only a matter of time before they came back for me as well. Burying the panic, I glanced around the space. It screamed man den, but in a classy way with an industrial style kitchen, bare bones living room, and a set of French doors that led to what I presumed was the bedroom. I would have snooped if Daemon didn’t need my help.

  Grabbing a blanket folded over the back of the couch, I draped it over his body. “Do you need anything else?”

  “Pain killers.”

  I snapped my fingers together. “Right. Where would those be located?”

  He winced at the sound of my voice and yanked the blanket over his head. “Off the bedroom.”

  Nerves flittered in my stomach. Entering his personal space seemed like a huge step in our relationship or friendship, whatever you wanted to call it. I stared at the French doors as if they would open themselves. When they didn’t, I put my feet one in front of the other. Taking a deep breath, I pushed on the glass panel and stepped into Daemon’s bedroom. My eyes gravitated toward the bed, which was king size and absurdly large. The sheets were rumpled, the pillows askew. A flash of lust burned between my legs. An image of Daemon stretched above me, his eyes lit with possession as he claimed me as his own made my legs waver.

  Get a hold of yourself, Sky.

  Shaking off the image, a set of picture frames displayed on a wooden dresser caught my attention. While the frames were new, the pictures were old and yellowed at the corners. I smiled as I lifted the one closest to me. It was of Daemon’s family at Christmas, huddled around a tree. Daemon’s eyes were trained on the camera, bright with excitement. There was a paddle with a ball attached by a string clutched in his hand. It was weird to witness Daemon as a young boy in the 1940s. Sometimes it escaped my mind who he actually was. I gently put the frame back where it belonged and padded into the bathroom. Opening the medicine cabinet, I found a bottle of ibuprofen and brought it into the living room. Daemon had succumbed to a deep slumber so I placed it on the coffee table. Halfway into the kitchen, glass exploded around me as gunshots pierced the air. I dropped to the floor and covered my head. The time had come.

  I belly crawled across the floor to Daemon as tiny shards of glass rained from the heavens above. The sound was deafening. Tiny cuts formed on my arms, leaving a bloody trail. Adrenaline pumped through my veins and I hoped to get out of this house alive. Daemon had rolled off the couch onto to the floor, body tensed and ready to fight. The swelling in his black eyes had gone down in the mere minutes since I had last checked on him. He wasn’t kidding when he said he healed fast. His gaze locked onto mine. He silently beckoned me to escape out the back but my shook my head in refusal. I wouldn’t leave him here alone. Like I said earlier, we were in this war together. Daemon stared at me as if I would change my mind.

  When he saw the hard-set line of my mouth, his expression crumbled. “I can’t lose you,” I heard him say over the relentless gunshots.

  My heart flipped over in my chest as I reached out and placed my hand against his cheek. Daemon turned into my touch.

  “You won’t,” I said.

  Among the chaos, sparks flew between us. It was electric, terrifying, and utterly consuming
. Daemon searched my face for permission but he should have known. He didn’t need any. I had wanted to feel his lips against mine since the day I met him.

  His eyes grew dim with desire as he tangled his hands in my hair and brought my face inches from his. “You’re everything to me, Sky.” His mouth possessed my lips and the world around us faded to nothing.

  It was a heady, demanding kiss, as if I was Daemon’s salvation. As if he could kiss away his past sins and this would be the only chance to do so. Tears gathered in the corner of my eyes because I didn’t want this to be the end of us. Daemon pulled back and rested his forehead against mine, breathless.

  I touched my finger to my lips. “I didn’t see anything. No vision, nothing.”

  “I’m dead.” Daemon’s gaze pierced my soul. “The dead don’t have a future. Only an endless landscape of heartbreak.”

  His confession ripped the future I had built for us in two. Daemon was a zombie who would outlive me, just like he had outlived his parents. The gunshots ceased and silence bestowed upon us, directing our attention to the task at hand. Footsteps sounded outside. My eyes widened in panic as Daemon rolled over and grabbed a handgun from underneath the couch. He cocked it, jumped on the cushions and used the couch as a shield as he aimed the muzzle at the front door. Blood rushed to my ears. The hinges creaked as the door opened slowly like molasses. Daemon’s finger twitched on the trigger.

  “You know that won’t do anything boy,” a voice boomed out. “We are immortal, don’t you remember?”

  The body that belonged to the voice was obscured but I would recognize it anywhere. Parker.

  “Not to Rhodium. Don’t you remember?” Daemon mocked.

  “Of course I do. It’s what we used on you.”

  From my vantage point on the floor, I could see Daemon’s shoulder’s tense. My mind reeled over their conversation. Based on the little knowledge I had on the chemical elements, Rhodium was a super rare kind of metal and one of the most precious. It was like a hundred thousand dollars for an ounce or something, but Daemon’s wounds now made sense. The voodoo priest and his zombies tortured him with it but why?

  “Yes, I remember that,” Daemon replied coldly. The footsteps drew closer to the couch and he jerked the gun. “Stay back. I won’t hesitate killing you.”

  “You just couldn’t give her up, could you?”

  My blood curdled. Parker was talking about me. “Does she know what you did? Does she know how you took away…”?

  “Shut up,” Daemon yelled. “Just shut the fuck up.”

  I yearned to reach out and take away his hurt but instead my hand curled around the knife in my pocket. Daemon wasn’t going to shoot this man. As much as he didn’t want to admit it, Parker was his friend and only thing he had left close to a brother. I inched my way across the floor until I could see his boots.

  “Oh, Daemon. You were always a big softie but I never thought it would come to this. Especially over a mere mortal.” Parker sighed. “I am sorry about torturing you. I am, but we need Sky and when you wouldn’t agree to bring her to us, we went to plan B. Let you go and have her come to you. And look…it worked.”

  “How do you know she’s here?” Daemon growled.

  The boots disappeared as he walked over to the corner of the living room. “Oh, Sky come out, come out, wherever you are,” he sing-songed.

  Parker was more deranged than I thought. My hand gripped the knife tighter as a strange tingly feeling cascaded up my spine, down my arms, and continued to my legs, which jerked in response. An overwhelming desire to stand up washed over me. I knew it was irrational but my body suddenly had a mind of its own.

  “That won’t work,” Daemon said.

  What won’t work? Then it suddenly hit me. Parker was using magic to haul me out of my hiding spot. I fought against the inky black witchcraft with all the strength I had in me. I rolled onto my back while my right leg bended at the knee followed by my left. It felt like I was a puppet being controlled by a set of strings. My eyes pleaded with Daemon for help.

  Parker cackled. “If you play nicely, I wont hurt you.”

  A sharp spasm of pain yanked my hands to the ground and my upper torso bent at the waist.

  “Stay strong, Sky. Don’t let him win.” Daemon’s voice weaved itself into my mind.

  I looked over at him in shock. He was still holding the gun steadily, his gaze fixed on Parker, which meant Daemon could communicate telepathically. I wonder if it worked both ways.

  “Easier said than done,” I responded. His voice in my head remained silent. Guess it didn’t.

  Parker’s boots slapped against the hardwood as if he was pacing. “Does she always fight this hard?”

  Daemon’s lips turned up in a proud smirk. “Sky doesn’t give into anything easily.”

  A spark of red light engulfed the living room and the magic wound its way up my throat. It felt like a hand was cutting off my air supply. I clawed frantically at the invisible force as my feet lifted off the ground.

  Parker’s eyes danced with amusement when I came into view. “There you are! How splendid for you to join us.” He flicked his hand and I flew across the room next to him. He wound a piece of my hair around his finger. “I can see why you like her so much, Daemon. She is rather pretty up close.”

  His sickening cologne made me want to hurl. Hadn’t he ever heard of less is more? The grip around my throat tightened and I kicked my feet wildly. A haziness blurred the edges of my vision.

  Daemon’s features morphed into outrage. “Get your hands off of her,” he bit out.

  Parker ignored his warning and leaned into the crook of my neck, inhaling deeply. “And she smells nice, like cinnamon and apples.” His cold dead eyes locked onto mine. “We will have fun together.”

  “I know I should say I’m sorry but I’m not.”

  Parker’s face whipped around to Daemon. A loud bang echoed off the walls. The smell of gunpowder hung in the air and I dropped to my knees.

  I gulped in lungful’s of air while Parker’s eyes widened in shock. “You betrayed us. All of us.” Blackish red oozed from the bullet wound in his chest. He slumped forward. “This isn’t over.”

  “It will never be over until the voodoo priest is dead.” Exhaustion tinted his tone. “But trust me, his time will come too. Sooner than later.” Parker stopped breathing.

  Daemon dropped the gun onto the floor and came over to me. “Are you ok?”

  I was pretty sure there were bruise marks around my throat and there was zombie blood on my clothes. “Do I look ok?”

  Daemon’s blue eyes smiled. “Like always.” He held out his hand. “Come on, princess. We have to get out of here before any more come. That was my last bullet.”

  “You protected me with one bullet? What if you missed?”

  “I never miss.” I shook my head at his cocky attitude and accepted his hand. He pulled me to my feet. “While I am better, I’m not a hundred percent. We’ll have to lean on each other.”

  Daemon hooked his arms around my shoulders while I did the same. It was the blind leading the blind but at least we were alive. The nighttime sky twinkled with stars. A rogue black SUV was parked askew in the gravel.

  “Why aren’t there more?” I asked faintly.

  “Parker is one of their best men. The voodoo priest probably didn’t think more than him was needed.”

  I raised an eyebrow. “They didn’t expect you to have a bullet made of Rhodium.”

  “No they didn’t and they certainly didn’t expect me to use it.”

  “Guess not.”

  Daemon yanked the door to the SUV open and helped me climb into the buttery leather seat. Once I was situated, he went around to the other side. Conveniently, the keys were still in the ignition. Daemon turned on the car with a loud purr.

  I snapped on my seatbelt. “Where are we going?”

  “Somewhere safe.”

  The long black highway stretched out before us. We had been cruising for the pas
t thirty minutes in silence, Daemon white knuckling the steering wheel. I looked out at the unrecognizable landscape and thought about calling my mom. She would be worried when I didn’t come home tomorrow morning. I reached into my purse.

  “What are you doing?” Daemon’s asked.

  “I have to call my mom and let her know about my change of plans.”

  A muscle ticked in his jaw as he turned his attention back to the road. “And tell her what? You got attacked by a zombie and are now on the run?”

  “Is that what’s happening? We’re on the run?”

  “I don’t know, Sky, but you certainly aren’t safe in Castor anymore. That’s the second time they found you.”

  I threw my hands up in the air. “Well, it’s not hard. I’m either at home or at school.”

  “Exactly. We need to keep you safe until we figure out how to stop the voodoo priest.”

  My body sagged against the seat. “How long is that going to take?”

  “No clue.” Daemon looked at me from the corner of his eye. I must have appeared pretty miserable because he reached across the armrest and squeezed my hand. “It’s going to be ok, Sky. I promise.”

  I turned my chin toward the window and watched as my breath fogged up the glass. Since I had started school a measly week ago, everything had turned into a shit storm. The only bright spot of this whole thing was Daemon. Nonetheless, it hadn’t been easy and now he was telling me I might not see my friends or my mom for who knows how long. My chest ached at the thought. I closed my eyelids and rested my head against the warm leather. Exhaustion pulled me into slumber where for at least a few hours; I could pretend I was normal girl with a normal life.

  My eyes peeled open. I looked around and saw we were pulled over on the side of the road. Daemon was asleep in his seat, head lolled to the side. It was hard not to stare at his beauty. I took in his long blonde eyelashes fanned over his cheek, full plump lips, and a jaw line that looked like it was carved out of marble.