Enthrallment: (Enthrallment Series Book 1)

by Meg Evans

  That must the same couple I saw earlier today.

  I turn around, pretending that halfway down the driveway I remembered I left something in my car and now I need to go back to get it. I feel like trying to get a better look, but the dimly-lit walkway leading to their front door is too dark.

  I open the trunk and rummage in it, shifting things from left to right. Out of the corner of my eye I see the couple approach. The woman is wearing high heels that clatter on the sandstone paving slabs as she walks; he, on the other hand, moves almost noiselessly. When they get to about twenty feet away from me, I experience the same strange twinge in my chest that I did a few hours earlier. I massage the spot to soothe the pain.

  “They’ll be here in a month. We have to bump the numbers up. Otherwise, they’ll suspect something—that’s more than certain,” the woman says. Her voice is trembling. “I don’t even want to think about what’s going to happen if…”

  “Shh!” The man hushes her; he’s probably noticed me.

  I don’t raise my head, though it’s sorely tempting to take a peek. They’re only a couple of steps away. I hear the sound of a car door closing, followed by the rumble of the engine. The couple is pulling out of the driveway. Even though my eyes are still locked on the inside of my trunk, I can sense that they’re watching me.

  When the Bentley disappears around the corner, I close the trunk with a bang and head inside. A hot bath is all I’m dreaming about right now.

  It usually only takes me a minute to fall asleep when I’m exhausted, but tonight I can’t pass out. My mind is overflowing, swirling with chaotic thoughts. Through them all, I can’t get rid of one single question: Who are my new neighbors?

  CHAPTER three

  I wake up the next morning with a small headache. I need to grab a cup of coffee with a splash of my favorite soymilk to make myself feel better. On Wednesdays I break my everyday hurried routine because my classes start late in the afternoon; I don’t have to rush anywhere. Unlike Maddie, who as a high schooler needs to set off to school every day at seven-thirty.

  When I come downstairs, my cousin is already bustling around the kitchen, opening all the cabinets, drawers and the refrigerator in her attempt to compose a super nutritious yet low-calorie breakfast. Lately she’s nuts about cutting down on calories because her prom is in exactly one month. She wants to be able to put on a dress one size smaller than her current four.

  “You’re going to vanish,” I say at the sight of her packing Belvita cookies and half a grapefruit into a Tupperware.

  “I’ll be fine.” She places the plastic container in her backpack. “Are you joining us in Portland this weekend?”

  “No. I accepted Charlie’s invitation to Emily Meyer’s birthday party, remember?”

  “Ah yeah. It totally slipped my mind.” Her big eyes flash with disappointment. “Is Rach going to be there too?”

  My best friend and the birthday girl don’t get along, so it would be a miracle if Rach went.

  “No, I don’t think so. She has other plans.”

  “But Matt will be there, right?”

  My heart speeds up simply from hearing his name. “Maybe.”

  “Too bad you’re not coming with us… but have fun.”

  I agreed to be Charlie’s date only because I’ve been secretly counting on Matt showing up at the party. I’ve been infatuated with him since I saw him for the first time at the school cafeteria a year ago. He’d be perfect if not for one major flaw: a chain of girls in his wake who, like me, have a crush on him and strive to find a ploy that will attract Matt’s attention. I’m slowly getting to the bottom of my list of tricks, and I know that if I don’t come up with an innovative idea soon, I’ll end up in the ranks of those who only attempted, not the ones who actually succeeded—not that there have been many of those!

  I’m going to the birthday party to increase my chances of sparking Matt’s interest. I’ll miss shopping fever in Portland with my Maddie and Cynthia, but I don’t regret it. Two days of wandering about a big mall, probably with a stop to watch one of the latest releases at the movies, and maybe dinner at a sushi bar can’t hold a candle to the guy of my wildest dreams.

  Maddie opens the refrigerator to search for her beloved organic orange juice. Her morning wouldn’t be the same without a glass of her favorite drink.

  “Do you want some?” she asks, but more out of politeness than to actually serve me some; she knows the only two things I drink are coffee and water.

  We hear the sound of a car outside. My cousin, to satisfy her inborn curiosity, closes the fridge and scoots to the kitchen window.

  “That’s them!” she whispers, as if they could hear her.

  “Them?” I frown.

  “Our new neighbors, I mean,” she replies, overly excited. “Have you seen him yet?!”

  I haven’t, but I can tell that his appearance ignites fiery passion in my cousin. She glows from the inside out, and I can even see pink in her cheeks.

  “The woman he’s with is a damn lucky one. She isn’t bad-looking either.”

  Maddie’s reaction to them intrigues me, makes me wonder what’s all of the fuss about. I hurry to the window to evaluate the couple myself.

  He’s standing with his back to me—I can only tell that he’s tall and muscular—but I have the perfect view of her. She’s a woman of unconventional beauty; I’m guessing she must have some Armenian roots. I’d give her age as around twenty-six, maybe twenty-seven. She looks very vintage in her black Delores swing dress, highlighting the curves of her hourglass figure. Her dark, wavy hair perfectly complements the look. “Those two are a perfect match for each other, don’t you think?” Maddie says with a barely audible sigh.

  “I haven’t been able to see his face yet,” I reply, and fix my gaze on the man. I carefully follow him with my eyes while he goes up the stairs leading to the porch. Unexpectedly, he stops and remains motionless. As I look at his back, the uncomfortable pain in my chest flares up, but this time it’s even worse than before. I place my palm on my chest and start to breathe faster and heavier, squeezing my eyes shut.

  “Is everything okay?” Maddie lays her warm hand on my shoulder.

  “Yeah, I’m fine, it must’ve just been a nerve pain.” I look back at the man, and realize with a shock that he’s now facing us. For a fraction of a second our gazes lock; my pulse jackknifes. “Oh my God!” I say, and instantly recoil in shock as if the window was on fire. In my haste, I hit the table behind me with my hip and curse it underneath my breath. Now not only does my chest hurt, but my leg too. “He noticed that we’re staring at them.”

  “Great.” Maddie facepalms. “Now he must be thinking that we’re nothing but nosy gossips,” she whines. “And there goes summer barbecuing with them. What a shame.”

  “I’m okay, by the way,” I say sarcastically.

  “What do you think about him, though?” She totally disregards my incident.

  “I don’t know. I looked away the second our eyes met—I didn’t have time to take him in properly,” I snap, rubbing the spot on my chest; the pain is lessening. Something strange is going on with me, and I can’t understand what it is.

  I float through the rest of the day. In the evening, I bring home my best friend, Rach, who I expect to help me create a killer outfit for Saturday night. She’s a fashion virtuoso with a good eye for putting splendid outfits together. I know that if I surrender my looks to her, I’ll have nothing to worry about.

  “Do you think I should wear a dress or pants?” I ask Rach, who’s intensively examining the entire collection of clothes I’ve pulled out from the closet and which, in my opinion, are suitable for the occasion. My bed is now covered with pieces of clothing including three airy summer dresses, two pairs of jeans, a pair of linen pants, and several blouses and tops.

  “Honestly?” She makes a sour face as if instead of a pile of clothes, there’s a dead squirrel lying right in front of her. “No offense, but these clothes are boring.�
� She tosses me a pitying look through her classy Ray-Ban eyeglasses. “What I see right now is some junk for old women. We have to go to the mall.”

  “Say what?” I’m not sure if she’s kidding or dead serious.

  “Zara… A floral midi dress?” She snatches my purchase from about three years ago. “Or that one?” She points at a brown dress right next to her. “No neckline, dull color. It’s perfect for a nun, but not for a girl whose job it is to seduce the biggest heart-throb at university,” she adds in a gum-chewing-girl manner, which aggravates me a bit.

  “What?” I say, a bit resentful. Rach can be very blunt, and I know that about her, yet I still take her words personally.

  “Oh my goodness, you know what I mean.” She flings the flowery dress onto the pile. “None of these things pass my seduction style assessment test. You failed, honey.” She crosses her arms over her chest and leans against the windowsill. “But you still have a chance to take the test again.”

  “Thank you, professor, but my financial situation—”

  “What’s a couple of bucks compared to the satisfaction that comes from being the most desirable object at the event?”

  Which is what Rach is every time she shows up somewhere.

  “I’m not sure…” I wage an inner battle.

  “You are.” She winks at me. “Tomorrow afternoon we’re going to Salem. Even if it means I have to tie you up and drag to the store by force, I swear I’ll do it. So you’d better be a good girl and make it easy on the both of us,” she warns me.

  “Well, I guess I don’t have a choice, as usual.”

  “Exactly,” she reassures me, and gives me the slyest smile, which suddenly vanishes as she’s thunderstruck by something she’s just seen outside. “Zara!” Her reaction is so passionate that it makes me think she must’ve spotted a UFO landing in my yard. “Get over here, right now!”

  “What’s the matter?” I spring to my feet.

  “Quick!” She rushes me with a hand motion.

  “Did you see a unicorn or something?”

  “There’s the most gorgeous guy I’ve ever seen in my whole life standing in front of your house!”.

  “Aw, yeah,” I stop halfway and say with no enthusiasm, “that’s my new neighbor.”

  I feel like peeking out, but after this morning’s incident, I don’t want to risk him catching me watching him again.

  “Seriously, girl?! Damn! To hell with Matt! You have something one-of-a-kind living next door!” She glues her forehead to the window glass. I hope she doesn’t start drooling.

  “A thing? Rach, really?” I’ve never liked her tendency to talk about men like they’re objects.

  “In the sense that… Well… Matt is attractive, no doubt, but the guy outside… Holy shit…”

  I burst her bubble. “He’s taken. And you’d freak out at his girlfriend too. She’s hot.”

  “Oh well…” She pouts. “Maybe one day he’ll dump her.”

  “You wish, huh?” I smile and shake my head.

  “Me? Of course not!” She winks at me and helps me put the clothes away.

  * * *

  Thursday means another hectic morning filled with haste. I don’t know why I never get up right when the alarm goes off. Every single time, I stall the moment of getting out of bed to the max and as a result, when I finally do, I have to rush at breakneck speed to get ready to leave. Guilty as charged.

  I run downstairs to the kitchen. The aroma of freshly-brewed coffee spreads through the entire first floor. When I clear the door, I come across my aunt wearing a blue mask, looking like a Smurfette. She’s settled back at the table, performing her daily routine: catching up with the local news.

  “It’s unbelievable.” She puts down the newspaper and transfers her gaze to me. Her face is taut, yet that blue color all over it makes her look comical. I turn around and grab a bottle of water, stifling a giggle. “Two days ago someone broke into the Reynolds’ house, and three days before that into Mrs. Gonzales’s. Plus, Molly told me the other day at work that when she was stepping out of the house to get rid of some papers for recycling, there was some suspicious-looking man hanging around her property. She called the police, but it was too late; by the time they arrived, the stranger was long gone.” She takes a sip of her delicious-smelling cappuccino, which leaves foam on her upper lip.

  “Apparently we live in a sketchy area,” I reply, mostly out of politeness and to let her know I’m listening to her. Frankly, I don’t really care about the statistics of break-ins at the moment; I’m trying desperately to remember where the hell I put my notebook, which I need to take with me today.

  “It didn’t use to be like that.” She sighs. “Considering that all these recent break-ins have taken place practically right under our noses, I’ve taken very basic precautions, just in case, and I’ve changed the code to the garage door. From now on, instead of your birth date, you should enter May 22nd, which is the date of the end of my first marriage. I think you should jot it down—you never know when you might need it.” She flips to the next page. “It’s no big deal, I know, but I watched a show lately where the hosts were suggesting that robbers usually use the garage to break into the house. It actually made sense to me.”

  It’s ludicrous how suggestible Cynthia is. She always buys into everything they show on TV. All that happens on the other side of the screen is an undeniable truth to her. If, in one her favorite shows, somebody claimed that the most effective way to discourage potential burglars from coming to our house was installing a scarecrow next to the front door, she’d do it.

  “I’ll remember it; piece of cake. Plus, what if I wrote it down and someone found it? I think it’s better if I just store it in my memory.”

  I rarely use the garage door to get into the house anyway—I don’t even park my car inside because there’s only space for one vehicle, and the privileged one isn’t my Golf, but Cynthia’s Mercedes.

  “Changing the subject”—my aunt folds the newspaper and puts it away—“tonight Maddie and I are going to the hair salon. Would you like to join us, sweetheart? I have one extra coupon and still can make an appointment if you feel like it.”

  “Thank you, auntie, but right after school I’m going shopping with Rach. I need, as she put it, to stock up on some clothes that don’t look like they’re from the medieval ages and won’t make me resemble a ‘tigercow’, which is a woman in her forties, frustrated because of her age and very limited sexual popularity, in case you didn’t know.”

  The moment the words come out of my mouth, I already regret uttering them.

  “Do you think that a forty-year-old woman can’t be attractive?” she asks, her tone slightly insulted. Sometimes I forget that Cynthia is in her early forties, and, after three divorces, has already stopped hoping to meet her prince one day.

  “When you look like you’re thirty, of course you can be,” I blurt out.

  I find the notebook on the windowsill, grab it and throw it into my purse, kiss Cynthia goodbye on the cheek, and leave before she can add anything to our awkward conversation.

  This fine morning I take a bus to school. Rach and I decided that it’s nonsense to drive to the mall in two separate cars after class. Even though she only got her driver’s license two weeks ago, I wanted to give her the satisfaction of taking us shopping and agreed to her being the driver.

  As I amble along the fence, I notice that the Bentley is gone. For some reason I’m a little disappointed. Maddie proudly bragged yesterday about being able to see them up close while coming back from school. She even received a friendly smile from the girl, but neither of them initiated a conversation. I must admit I’m a bit jealous that, even though she blew it, she had a chance to actually meet them. But all is not lost that is delayed.

  * * *

  After three long classes, totally drained, I get into Rach’s tiny car. The Golf that I drive isn’t the peak of luxury and comfort, but at least I have enough space to stretch out my legs inside, w
hich is quite challenging in my friend’s “little baby”, as she calls it. Her vehicle makes me feel cramped, as if I were packed into a can like a sardine. But it’s not the tiny interior that freaks me out the most—it’s her driving. I have the impression that although she’s physically sitting behind the wheel and maneuvering between the other cars, her mind is in a totally different world. She brakes fiercely—the same way that she speeds up—and she shows a total lack of respect toward the ‘amber light means slow down and stop’ rule. She even runs a couple of red lights and doesn’t give way to other drivers, royally pissing them off. She also honks at everybody whenever she feels like it. I see more middle fingers shown to us today than I have for the last five years. When Rach finally pulls into the underground parking lot of the mall, taking up one and a half spaces, I breathe a sigh of relief. The nightmare is over and I’m still in one piece, safe and sound. I feel like I need a drink.

  Apparently Rach still has a lot to learn when it comes to driving.

  Two hours later, exhausted from walking from store to store and trying on at least ten outfits in each, I’m forced to face the nightmare of Rach on the streets again—this time in the rain. For a moment I have the compelling urge to demand to take over the wheel, but how would I explain it to Rach? I’m not as blunt as she is, and I’d never tell her she’s a shitty driver.

  Just as I expected: Rach driving a car is a pain, but Rach driving in the rain is terrifying. She drives straight into potholes filled with rain, and changes lanes without signaling because of how tense she is about the raindrops hitting the windshield. At one point, she brakes so suddenly to let a pedestrian cross the street that my purse falls from the back seat onto the floor and all the stuff inside it ends up strewn under my seat.

  “I’m so sorry, but I hate driving in the rain.”

  Tell me about it, I say to myself, but refrain from sharing my thought out loud. I don’t want to stress the poor creature out even more.

  When we finally arrive at my house, Rach knocks over the recycling bin that my aunt left in front of the house in the morning.