by Amira Rain
I didn’t know what to say, wanting to wait until he had actually parked to drop the news on him.
Eventually, after a long moment or two of silence had ticked by between us, I finally said that I just wanted to talk about “us.”
Jake glanced over at me again. “Well, that can’t be good. You don’t look too happy about the idea of talking about ‘us.’”
Horribly uncomfortable, I sighed. “Jake, please. Let’s just wait to talk until we get to the dirt road.”
“Okay. That’s fine.”
He clenched his strong jaw, clearly getting some clue about what I wanted to talk to him about. Dreading what was to come when I finally said the words to him, I turned my face to look out my window, hardly even seeing the tall grass and lush green trees that bordered the side of the country highway.
Several moments later, I jumped just about a mile, gasping, when Jake suddenly banged a fist on the dashboard. I only knew that he’d banged his fist, instead of a massive rock having hit the car or something, because there was a fist-sized dent in the dashboard at least five or six inches deep. This illustrated very clearly just how strong most vampires were, because I was pretty sure that no human man would have been able to do what Jake had just done, no matter how hard that human man banged his fist on the dashboard.
Shaking and a bit alarmed, to say the last, I asked Jake why he’d just done what he had.
To my surprise, he just shrugged, gazing straight ahead at the road with his expression perfectly neutral. “Oh, I think you know why.”
Having expected him to express hurt, although not necessarily anger powerful enough to make him bang a fist on the dash, I now bizarrely wished for more anger. I wanted him to yell; I wanted him to call Paul an asshole; I even wanted him to shout at me, asking how I could choose Paul over him. I wanted Jake to act any other way than how he was currently, which was perfectly calmly, even after having put a fist-sized dent in the dash. This was because there was something about this calmness-after-extreme-anger that was beginning to absolutely terrify me.
After a few moments, I made a decision and asked Jake to please turn the car around. “I just want to go home. We can talk more there if you want.”
With his mouth actually curving in a smile, he glanced over at me. “Why? So that you can have Paul come to your rescue if I scare you by banging my fist again?”
Becoming increasingly terrified, I shook my head. “I just want to go home, Jake.”
Still smiling, he suddenly banged his fist on the dash again, and with such force that the front of the car swerved to the side for a second. “Uh-oh. Where’s Paul, Chrissy?”
Beginning to cry, I pulled my phone from my pocket with trembling fingers and began typing in my passcode to unlock the screen, intending to call my dad. However, Jake grabbed my phone and silently chucked it out his open window before I could even get the screen unlocked.
Now openly weeping, I asked him to please just turn the car around. “I just want to go home.”
Silence was his only response, that and gunning the engine, taking the car up to eighty or ninety probably. More scared than I’d ever been in my life, I just cried into my hands, not knowing what I should do.
However, to my astonishment, after maybe half a minute, Jake suddenly decelerated slightly and whipped the car around in a U-turn. “Oh, forget it. You haven’t been my primary goal anyway. You were just something I wanted as a bonus.”
Incredibly relieved to now be heading west, I didn’t respond, not wanting to anger him again. He continued talking, although changing the subject radically.
“Do you know what Machiavelli’s The Prince is about, Chrissy?”
Tentatively, I shook my head. I hadn’t researched the book, and Jake and I hadn’t discussed it since the first day we’d met.
“Well, it’s about conquest, glory, and power. Can you relate, on any level, to wanting glory and power?”
Again, I shook my head tentatively, terrified of making him mad again.
Jake turned his gaze from me to the empty road ahead. “Well, I can. I’ve wanted glory and power for about as long as I can remember. At first, I thought that I should attempt to get these things by moral means, but then I read Machiavelli, and the experience opened up my eyes. See, sometimes the ends justify the means, and how we get glory and power doesn’t even matter, as long as we get it. Do you understand what I mean?”
All I understood was that Jake was raving like a madman. The Jake I’d fallen in love with was gone.
Thinking that maybe my rejection of him had caused him to have some kind of a sudden, psychotic break, I began crying again.
Jake abruptly heaved a sigh, raking a hand through his hair. “Jesus. Look. Don’t cry anymore. Okay? There’s really no need to. I’m taking you back home, and we can both just go our separate ways. No hard feelings about you choosing Paul. And I’ll buy you a new phone. Okay? No need to keep crying, Chrissy.”
This was the Jake I’d fallen in love with. This was the Jake who spoke to me in a comforting voice when I was upset. He was back. And for some reason, this just made me cry even harder.
He didn’t ask me to stop crying again, and instead, just kept driving, glancing over at me with a sigh every so often.
When we got back to the house, he put the car in park right out front, then looked at me with a pleading sort of expression.
“Look, Chrissy. Look. I didn’t mean to just loose it how I just did. I’m sorry. That was all totally uncalled for, and I didn’t mean to scare you. Sometimes I just get these…I don’t even know what they are. Just brief flashes of anger that I have a hard time controlling. Someone told me a long time ago that they’re probably just the result of me being abused when I was young. It’s possible, right? At any rate, I really didn’t mean to show my ‘angry side’ to you, and I never will again. You don’t even ever have to speak to me again. Just promise me that you’ll forget that all this ever happened, and just promise me that you won’t tell your dad. Okay? If you ever really cared about me, just please promise that you’ll forget all about this. After all, think about how angry you’d feel if you got dumped after being strung along like I’ve been for over a month.”
I couldn’t give much thought to that, because I was too busy thinking about something else, which was what Jake had said earlier, about me not having been his “primary goal” and instead just a “bonus.” I was thinking about this in terms of it possibly being evidence that he’d come to the farm with a completely different purpose than just joining the Watchers, falling in love along the way.
I also thought about what Jake had said about his favorite book, and how that might indicate that he’d come to the farm for a purpose other than simply wanting to join the Watchers. At the time, Jake’s ramblings had just sounded to me like complete nonsense, but everything was starting to make sense. He was teasing me, I thought. Maybe he was even enjoying the thrill of seeing how close he could come to spilling the truth without actually having me catch on.
Jake’s very abrupt change in demeanor also made sense now, too, as did his shift back to “normal Jake.” After all, if what I was thinking was correct, it only seemed logical that he’d become a master at acting by now.
Taking all these things into consideration, I was pretty sure that I was currently sitting in a car with the Warren spy. The Warren spy who’d somehow marched right onto the farm, telling everyone his real last name, somehow convincing everyone that it was just an unfortunate coincidence. How he’d gotten past my dad’s vetting process, I had no idea, but that didn’t even matter at present. All that did matter was that I safely get myself out of the car before Jake showed his true colors again, maybe even punching me this time instead of the dash.
So, not wanting to make him angry again, I forced myself to nod in response to what he’d said. “Yes…we can just forget about all this. And I won’t tell my dad. Just promise that you’ll leave me in peace to be with Paul, all right? I just don’t want any t
rouble.”
Seeming satisfied by what I’d said, Jake said I wouldn’t get any from him. “And that’s a promise that I’ll keep, as long as you keep yours about not telling your dad.” He then hit the auto-lock button on his side, unlocking all the car doors. “See you later, Chrissy.”
Mumbling a goodbye in return, I got out of the car and shut the door behind me. He immediately sped away, heading down the long dirt driveway to the highway, where he’d drive briefly before turning onto the dirt road that led to his house on the western edge of the property. Pretending to walk across the driveway to my own house, I watched his car out of the corner of my eye. As soon as it disappeared from view, I took off at a sprint and veered left, heading in the direction of the woods, intending to find my dad, or Paul, or both.
CHAPTER 19
Reasonably sure that I knew what part of the woodland my dad’s patrol would be coming through around this time, and also reasonably sure that Paul would be with the patrol, about to leave to come meet me at the house for our five-thirty “date,” I charged up a path through the eastern edge of the woodland. However, suddenly wondering if I should just meet Paul at the house, I suddenly slowed my pace, then stopped running altogether. Since my phone was now on the side of the highway, I couldn’t check the time, but I knew it had to be about five-fifteen, give or take a few minutes on either side. Although my ordeal with Jake in his car had felt so long as to be torturous, we actually hadn’t been away from the farm for very long.
Debating my options, I just stood in the quiet of the forest for a little while, eventually deciding that I could probably meet up with Paul quicker, probably bumping right into him, if I just kept on running, instead of backtracking to meet him at the house. Besides, I wanted to talk to my dad immediately, too, anyway.
I’d just lifted one of my feet to begin running again when a sudden noise made me freeze with my foot in mid-air. As keyed up as I was, with my heart racing and my mind jumbled, it took me a second to recognize the noise, but then I got it. It was quacking, coming from somewhere not too far away. Realizing that one of Jen’s ducks must have wandered away from the pond, I sighed, feeling duty-bound to catch it and try to turn it around and make it head for home. If it didn’t want to waddle back up the path, I figured I’d just tuck it under my arm and take it with me to find my dad and Paul.
Cupping my hands around my mouth, I did a particular duck call that I’d heard Jen do sometimes. “Quack, quack! Quack, quack! Do any white-feathered little angels want some organic croutons?”
Although this obviously wasn’t even close to any kind of a traditional duck call like a hunter might use, it seemed to work for Jen, at least most of the time. And, after I’d repeated the call twice, a plump little duck with yellowish spots on his bill came waddling through a gap in some nearby shrubbery.
Johnathan was an “exploratory little fellow,” as Jen sometimes said, and he often wandered into the woodland. However, he usually didn’t wander quite so far back, and when I picked him up, I told him he was a naughty little thing.
“I will still give you your croutons, though…but just when we get back to the house. Right now, we’ve got to find my dad and Paul.”
Actually nuzzling my shoulder with the top of his head, as if he were a cat or something, Johnathan seemed agreeable to make the trip; so, with him tucked under one of my arms somewhat like a football, I once again began jogging up the path.
I’d been jogging for maybe five minutes, wondering if I’d made a mistake in judging where my dad’s patrol would be, and also wondering if I just should have remained at the house to meet Paul, when suddenly, I almost ran right into Paul, who’d been running through the forest parallel to the trail. Simultaneously, we both came to a stop, with Paul asking where I was going.
A little out of breath from my jogging, I drew in a few lungfuls of air before replying to him. “Listen. Listen, I have to tell you about the spy. I know who it is, or at least, I think I have a pretty good idea, and I’ll explain why. But, even before that, I have to tell you something else that’s important, too. I have to tell you that I’ve made a decision about who I want to start a real relationship with, and I want you to know that I decided this even before I found out who the spy is. I actually decided when I was in the bathroom with Jen last night, watching her write on the bathtub wall with soap, but…all that isn’t even important right now. All you need to know is that I made my decision last night, long before I found out who the spy is.”
For a long moment, Paul just looked at me with what struck me as a curiously neutral expression, given the circumstances. “And what’s your decision?”
Drawing in a few more lungfuls of air while Johnathan quacked quietly under my arm, I hesitated for a long moment or two, suddenly beginning to feel overcome with emotion. “I choose you, Paul. I want to start a real relationship with you. All of a sudden last night, it just hit me, and I just got it. You and I have a once-in-a-lifetime connection.” Realizing that that was kind of a bold, certain-sounding statement for a person who was pretty inexperienced with dating to make, and also realizing that Paul might not exactly feel the same way, I suddenly felt embarrassed and tried to backtrack. “Or...well, I meant to say that we have a very special connection. That’s what I meant. I didn’t really mean to say, ‘once-in-a-lifetime connection’ so soon in our relationship.”
With his gorgeous gray eyes twinkling in sun that was filtering into the forest through the treetops, Paul gently took Johnathan from me, set him on the forest floor, and then took my face in his hands. “Well, I’m sorry to hear you backtrack on that ‘once-in-a-lifetime connection’ statement, because I actually think it’s true. I actually do think we have a ‘once-in-a-lifetime connection.’”
With my heart filling with joy, I allowed myself a little smile. “You do?”
Still cradling my face, Paul smiled in return. “I do. I’ve actually been thinking this for a couple of weeks…but I’ve just been trying to be patient, just waiting for you to realize it, too.”
After just looking into each other’s eyes for a few moments, both of us grinning, Paul brought his mouth to mine and began kissing me, pulling me close while he did so, with his hands at the small of my back. And suddenly, I was in heaven, with all thoughts of Jake, and the earlier events that had happened with him, floating right out of my head.
At first, Paul kissed me gently, with his lips firm but not demanding. However, when I began slowly running my hands across his chest and shoulders, his mouth became a little hungrier, and more insistent; and it wasn’t long before our kissing became more passionate than it had ever become before.
A short while later, while tangling my fingers in Paul’s thick dark hair, I began to feel emotions and physical sensations that I’d never felt before, and I suddenly got the idea that I wanted to take Paul’s black t-shirt shirt off so that I could run my hands over his bare muscular chest. I also wanted to feat on it with my eyes a little, too, having never even seen a guy I was attracted to with his shirt off.
So, after eventually deciding that my idea was a good one, and that Paul probably wouldn’t mind if I took his shirt off, I broke our kiss, and then immediately began peeling his shirt upward. However, I didn’t get it peeled very far, at least not up to his shoulders, before he stopped me, yanking his shirt back down.
“Don’t, Chrissy. Don’t do that.”
I didn’t even need to ask him why he didn’t want me to take his shirt off, because I was pretty sure I already knew. I was pretty sure that the reason had to do something with a large tattoo I’d seen, just for the briefest of split-seconds, on one side of his chest. Done in black ink, the tattoo was of a letter. A W, to be exact. And coming from both sides of the W were wings, making this tattoo identical to tattoos worn by many Warrens. Many of them liked to see themselves as some sort of dark angels.
Suddenly feeling cold all over, when just a short while earlier, I’d felt hot, I looked up into Paul’s eyes and spoke in a voice
that held a hint of a tremor. “Was that a W tattoo on your chest? With wings?”
Part of me just couldn’t believe that I’d seen it correctly.
Turning away from me, frowning hard, Paul raked a hand through his hair, not seeming like he was going to answer me.
So, with my voice beginning to waver even a bit more, I tried again. “Paul, are you a Warren?”
No answer. He just frowned down at the forest floor.
“Paul, are you the spy?”
Not even needing an answer anymore, I began crying, burying my face in my hands.
THE FINAL CHAPTER
After a few moments, I felt Paul gently trying to pull my hands from my face. “Chrissy, please…just listen. Just look at me. Please.”
Still crying, I refused to let my hands be pulled, and Paul sighed, taking his hands off of mine.
“All right, then. If you won’t look at me, then at least please just listen. I never, ever meant for you to find out about me this way. Please believe me when I say that I never wanted to betray you or hurt you. Or both.”
I was glad that he’d said both, because I’d been thinking it.
“I never meant to hide my true self from you, but I had to. It wasn’t like I could just walk into the farm and announce, ‘Hey, everyone! I’m a Warren, sent here to spy on you all!’”
There was a brief pause, and I heard Paul sigh before he spoke again.
“I come from a large coven of Warrens in Indiana. From an early age, I never felt like I fit in. I didn’t like the way that my father and the other men acted. I didn’t like what they did to people in various cities and towns in the area. The Watchers, though…the nearby group of Watchers that always tried to stop them…they were my childhood heroes. I always wanted to be just like them, protecting people.”
Not sure at all that I could trust a word that Paul was saying, I said nothing, and he continued.