Velocity: The Gravity Series #2

by A. B. Bloom

  “Nothing.” Denial was always worth a shot.

  “Stop the pity parade, Brother. It’s not becoming.” Celeste placed her hands on her hips and looked truly intimidating. Nick knew she could show him his arse in one single move. She was more powerful than anything he’d ever known. Well nearly everything . . .He blocked the half-recalled memory before it could take shape.

  Celeste snorted. “You can’t fight destiny, Nick. You’ve got to let it be what it will be. She will work it out. Are you going to be the one to stop her because you’re scared of what will happen when she does?”

  He shrugged. He didn’t have enough words that could adequately convey all the many thoughts he had on the matter. “I’m just trying to protect her.” He bit out at last.

  “From herself?” Celeste offered a dry laugh.

  “If that’s the case, then yes.”

  Celeste shook her head. “I don’t think she will like Neanderthal Nick.”

  He laughed a little before sobering up. “It hurts being away from her.” Even as he spoke, the chain pulled and twisted, causing him to wince.

  Celeste’s face smoothed of annoyance and she took as step forward, placing a hand on his arm. “Why don’t we pause for the night? You could go see her.”

  “I can’t. I have a duty.”

  Celeste gripped his arm. “You’re no good to us if you are weak and in pain.”

  He knew she was right. He was no good to anyone like this. Not even Bronte.

  His mind was made up before he knew he was contemplating it. A slow smile lit his face, lifting his soul. “I’ll be back.”

  Celeste smiled a devilish grin. “Make it worth it.”

  He pulled his energy into a fiery bolt, visualising Bronte. He bent the air around him, creating a window to step through. A window that will lead him straight to her. His soul.

  I stared at the ceiling.

  Again.

  There is a limit to how much time it is healthy for one to stare at a ceiling, and I believed I’d crossed it. Two days ago.

  Connor was lurking around the house, silently, refusing to do anything and refusing to talk.

  Yesterday I’d asked if we could go out. He said no.

  In frustration, I threw back the duvet, the isolation was driving me crazy. I missed everything, my life, even the life when I fell down a lot and had to deal with Eleanor being a bitch daily. I missed my friend. I missed my mum. And I missed Nick. He hadn’t text since he left four days before and it ached and hurt.

  Heading to my cupboard I found some tracksuit bottoms and a hoodie. Deep in the recess of the wardrobe were a pair of unused trainers that had never seen the light of day, let alone any physical activity.

  I needed to burn off energy. For the first time in my life I would go for a run. I was being kept prisoner here on the cliff in Cornwall by a surly prison guard. But I had been the one to lock the windows and doors, using my new found violet hued snappy energy. I was sure I could unlock them and sneak out. I needed to breathe. I needed to breathe the purple salt tasting sky and feel it fill my lungs.

  I kept my tread quiet on the way down the stairs and placed my hand against the solid wood of the front door until the pulse of light emitted from my palm. It was amazing really. I could feel the wood sigh against me as if it was agreeing to my request and would allow me to pass. I might never need a Yale lock again.

  Using my new-found agility I stole into the dim dawn. I didn’t bother with a warm up; I went straight for it, keeping my breathing even as I made my way down the path to the cliff.

  I’d been running for a good ten minutes with no resuscitation when I felt someone next to me. “Where are you going?”

  I huffed. Not because I needed to. “I’m exercising.”

  Connor laughed and pressed his pace a little faster. I matched it. “I see that. Nice tracksuit.”

  “Thanks.” I ignored him in the hope he would fall in a ditch, but when he was consistently on my heels and showed no signs of going away, I turned my head and asked, “What are you doing?”

  “Well, Bronte, just because we don’t like being together doesn’t mean I’m going to put my head on the line and ignore my duty.

  His words stung.

  I literally had no one. Nobody at all, and the person who was being forced to babysit me didn’t even like me much.

  It was a sobering thought and my feet slowed to a halt. I didn’t think I was out of breath but I leaned down onto my thighs and dropped my face to the ground so he couldn’t see me.

  I refused to allow his hatred to beat me. I straightened my spine, marvelling at the back of my mind that there was no physical discomfort, either from the run, nor bending over. “Listen, Connor. I’m sorry, alright. I’m sorry that I was supposed to be fated to you and it all went wrong. I’m sorry that there is another Half Born somewhere but we’ve accidentally lost her. I’m sorry for whatever happened to that girl before.” His eyes narrowed. “But I don’t see how I can change anything. I don’t even know if I should.”

  Connor’s face was as smooth as glass as he watched me. His blue eyes calculating. His vivid azure energy spiking around him. “Emma,” he said eventually. “Her name was Emma.”

  Having a name of the girl before me made it all seem frighteningly real.

  A low stone wall bordered a leaf riddled garden. I sat on the wall with a thud like my legs weren’t going to hold me anymore. “What happened?” I kept my focus on the ominous purple sky, unwilling to meet his eyes.

  “She died,” he snapped.

  “I know that, you bloody idiot. But how? Ash said on the moor that he’d made a mess. . .” I thought of him making a mess with an innocent girl’s blood, and bile rose up my throat.

  Connor grimaced. “I know what he said.”

  I thought back to the night on the moor. The night that had erased every foundation of my life. “You know, I thought you’d died when you were fighting the other side.”

  Connor sniggered. “As if.”

  “No, really, I did. There were blue sparks falling everywhere and they reminded me . . .” He turned slightly and I felt my words tangle on the way out. Clearing my throat with a cough, I continued. “They reminded me of your soul.”

  A flicker of a smile ghosted across his face. “It would take more than that to finish me off.”

  Part of me dreaded to think what could finish him off. What would it take? How would it look?

  “So what happened to Emma?” I prompted.

  He sighed and rolled his neck. “She was a bit like you in a way; We found her early and watched her to make sure she was safe.”

  My heart banged at the thought of Nick watching me from the shadows. Connor tutted, tuning into my Nick distraction. ‘Sorry,” I said, although I wasn’t sure what I was apologising for exactly . . . apart from the huge problem of me loving someone else.

  “So, if she was safe, what happened?”

  “Ash. He’s a clever bastard.” He spat the word like muck.

  “How do you mean?” Although I knew he was clever—he’d tricked me for sixteen years and kept himself hidden from the Star’s passing through my life.

  “He waited for our numbers to be down and then came for her.”

  This made little sense. If they were protecting her and knew the risk was imminent, why weren’t they all there? “Why were your numbers down?”

  Connor scowled at the pavement for a long pause before allowing his bright blues to flash at me. “You.”

  “What? What did I do?” I held my hands up. “I wasn’t even born, was I?”

  He shook his head slowly his face torn. “No. You’d just died.”

  “What?” My words died on my lips.

  “Nick.” Connors mouth turned down in distaste. “When you die, he loses it. Sulks like a child.” Connor’s hands gripped his knees. “I begged him to come and help but he wouldn’t.”

  This explained so much of the animosity between the two. "I thought he got splintered in
to fragments in the sky? That's what you told me."

  Connor nodded. "Sure, there's that. Then the sulking comes afterwards when he realises he's got to lose you all over again."

  I wanted to say something, anything, but my tongue was useless. My heart ached. My fingers lifted his off his knee and I held them in my own. The nails were chewed down to the quick and something about the sight of them softened my heart a degree.

  Connor evaluated me through slitted eyes. “You know, Sweetheart, I hate to tell you this but Nick’s not all perfect. You should ask him all about it one day.”

  My back straightened. “Yeah? And what am I supposed to ask him?”

  Connor smiled. “Ask him why everything's the way it is. I’d love to hear his answer.”

  I sighed. This wasn’t getting us anywhere. “Connor, don’t fight me, we’re kinda stuck together right now.”

  His smile grew wider. “True. I just want you to know that Nick isn’t all innocent. Not like he makes out.”

  I took a deep breath and decided to rise against his pessimism. “What did Ash do? To Emma?” I squeezed Connor's fingers and he squeezed them back. “Did he steal her energy?”

  Connor shook his head, his eyes pooling a little along the lashes. “No. He spilt her blood.”

  I gagged on the bile that rushed into my mouth. I could say sorry, but it wouldn’t cover it.

  I was sorry that Nick wouldn’t help him because of me. It made me cross to think he’d allowed an innocent girl to die. Connor pulled my hand.

  I didn’t get it. “How does he always feel the same about me? Don’t I change each time he meets me?”

  “I don’t know.” Connors blue eyes held my own steady. “Do you?” He nibbled his lip. “He’d die for you though, he proved that on the moor. I don’t think you can doubt that.”

  A cough pulled my attention away from Connor. Nick was stood down the road, his face torn, his hands stuffed deep in his pockets.

  “Nick!” I screeched and jumped off the wall. In a single fluid moment I was in his arms, my hands around his neck, my fingers in his hair. The chain pulled and jangled, rejoicing at his return. “What are you doing here?”

  He smiled, although the fields of violet in his eyes were laden under a hard frost. “I couldn’t stay away.”

  “We were just chatting,” I turned to wave at Connor but he was already gone. “Oh.”

  Nick leant back. “Oh, indeed.”

  “What are you doing here?’ I asked again when I eventually pulled away from kissing him. I’d felt him thaw underneath me, his body melting into mine, his lips softening as he relaxed against me. I could breathe with him there. I might not have understood what we had, but I felt it, it sang inside me like a long forgotten memory.

  “I . . .” He glanced over my head, his eyes narrowing slightly. “When we aren’t together it hurts. I was worried it was making you sick again.” His words sounded like a half truth and I wondered what he was holding back, but in all honesty, I was so pleased to see him I didn’t care.

  “I’ve been so bored. Connor is so moody, you wouldn’t believe.”

  Nick laughed and his hand pulled me into his side, our fingers knotting together tightly. “Oh, I believe you,” he said. “Still, you looked like you were getting on just fine.” His lips crimped into the straight line I could read so well. I pulled on his hand and nudged our shoulders together.

  “He was telling me about Emma.”

  “Oh.” Nick’s cheeks flared with the faintest tinge of pink. “Not my finest hour.”

  Was he for real? Not his finest hour? A girl had died! “It’s not a joke, Nick.”

  “I never said it was.” His feet faltered to a halt and he stopped along the path. “Listen, I didn’t come all this way to fight.” A heavy sigh escaped his lips.

  “No? What did you come all this way for?” I so wanted this to be easy between us, but then I also wanted us to be accountable for who we were and why.

  “I can be accountable, Bronte,” he answered my thoughts. “But really I’d just like to kiss you first.” The violets flashed with warm summer sunshine. “If you don’t mind?”

  A slow smile crept across my face. “I don’t think I mind.”

  He gathered me into his arms and I relaxed against him. There would be questions later, but right in the moment I needed to just connect with my soul and my Star.

  “How long are you here?” I snuggled closer, skimming my nose along the length of his throat. He still smelt of heather and all things fresh and wild. I wondered where he had been. But as usual, whenever he was around, my questions became nothing more than random thoughts I couldn’t articulate. My capacity for speech had been somewhat inhibited by the laying on the bed—together—situation we were currently participating in. This was all new for me. Although I knew it might not be new for him. And I wanted to know everything.

  “So, Rose?” I pulled myself out of the unexpected but comforting hold of his embrace and crossed my knees.

  His lips curved into a smile and he linked his hands under his head. My gaze skittered over him. It was strange seeing him without a cap, I had to keep reminding myself that I could see him now. That there was nothing standing in our way. “Yes, Bronte? Have some questions, do you?”

  Did I have questions? Was the earth round?

  “What was she like?” I studied the violet and white bedspread, my eyes averted.

  “She was like you, but had slightly less questions.” He flashed me a grin that made my heart stall.

  “Seriously, Nick. I want to know more.”

  He sighed and rolled onto his side so he could see me. His hands came down and one slid along my leg. I tried to not focus on its progress, although it was hard as it felt like a scorching trail of fire blasted with ice. It rested mid-thigh, burning through my jeans; a combination of hot coals and icicles. “She was like you, determined and feisty,” he grinned at a memory I didn’t have access to. “I’d go so far as to say strong willed.”

  “But you loved her?” I needed to understand what this was between us.

  Nick’s face flickered with a barely covered frown. “Yes.”

  I leant forward, reading his eyes. “Why?”

  He shook his head, just fraction. “What sort of question is that? I just did. She was special.”

  A sharp pang of jealousy pierced through me, I didn’t want it to but I couldn’t block it quick enough. It skimmed through the surface of my consciousness like a bread knife through butter.

  “Am I special?” I challenged, but he laughed loudly which wasn’t the response I wanted.

  “Believe me, you are definitely special.”

  “That’s not even funny.”

  One hand caught mine. “I’m sorry. It’s just hard to explain.”

  “Try. Please. For me.” For my sanity. I wanted to add.

  Using our connected hands, he tugged me in towards him and the violet of his soul flared and reached for me. I wondered if mine was doing the same thing. His voice pitched ten notches deeper and it echoed along my bones turning them to jelly. “When we kiss, our first kiss, it’s always different.” His lips glided over mine, one hand reaching and running through the fine strands of my hair. When he pulled away his eyes were burning. “Different, but the same. You always taste the same.” His lips curved into a slow smile and my skin warmed at an alarming rate. I would be on fire soon, I was sure.

  “Do I recognise you even though I don’t remember you in each life?”

  I trawled back through my memories to when he arrived. The chain in my stomach that connected us had told me straight away he was something. Something special to me, even if I didn’t know what.

  His eyes gazed to the side while he contemplated this. “I’d like to think so.”

  I nodded slowly. This was good. We were talking, I was learning something, even if it wasn’t the reason why. Why we were what we were, endlessly.

  “Although.” He grinned and sat up alongside me. “You do
a good job of taking an instant dislike to me every time we meet.”

  I giggled. “I can’t see that happening?”

  Raising one eyebrow, the violets flashed. “Oh, believe me, it does. Ask Celeste, she’s kept a tally. I think it’s currently at sixty, forty.”

  “You must be very annoying then.”

  His fingers grab mine and squeeze. “Must be.”

  “How many times?” The question slipped out and his gaze rose to meet mine.

  “How many times what?” His voice had that tone again.

  “How many times have you fallen for me?”

  “I lost count.”

  I nodded slowly and my heart ached for all the times we’ve been together and he’d lost me again. “I wish I could remember.” My throat tightened.

  His fingers reached and tucked a strand of hair behind my hair. “Hey, we’re talking about it now, that’s something we’ve never had before.”

  “Why?”

  “Because it’s against the rules.”

  “Whose rules?”

  I watched as the shutter came down and he clammed up. I scrambled off the bed, darting out of the way of his outstretched hand. “Why won’t you tell me why this is happening?”

  He shook his head. “It’s not that easy.”

  “Why?”

  “Because I can’t. Listen, Bronte, please don’t make us fight. I don’t have long.” He beseeched me through long dark eyelashes.

  “You’re the one making us fight by keeping secrets that involve me.”

  He exploded off the bed. “Yes, to keep you safe, not because I want to.” He ran a hand through his hair, making it stand up on end. “You’ve got no idea...” He cut off his own words.

  “No idea about what?” Silence echoed so I answered for him. “Anything?” I glared at his back as he turned away, his elbows above his head as his fingers grabbed his hair. “Forget it, Nick.” And with my words, I slammed out of the door.

  I was in the kitchen sitting at the island when he came to find me. His secrets were crawling under my skin. I didn’t know how to get over it. So, I was taking it out on a muesli bar, which I was pulverising between my fingers.