“I don’t feel like I’m being forced,” Micah murmurs. “I would choose this even without a predestined connection.”
“You don’t know that. You don’t even know me.”
“Yes, I do.” Micah closes the distance between us quickly. “More than you know.”
He surprises me, then. Big time, when he leans forward, grips my chin, and brings his lips down on mine. I hesitate, only because I am stunned stupid, before shoving him away.
He presses his face close to mine. “A part of your soul wants this, Kris…”
“No!” I shove him again, harder this time, and the sand, the water, the gentle breeze fades from around me.
CHAPTER 15
I was on my feet before the lingering smell of saltwater faded from my dream-sense. Only one thing was on my mind as I stomped across the room and flung the door open. Micah’s room was just down the hall from mine and, within a matter of seconds, I was barging inside.
With a quick glance across the room to Gabby’s sleeping form, I crossed to Micah’s bed. He was stirring, coming out of the dream. When his eyes opened and landed on me, on my furious face, he started to sit. I saw the excuses and reasoning for his actions form behind his clouded eyes, but I didn’t give him a chance to voice them.
My fist slammed into his chest, driving him down onto the bed. Keeping my voice barely above a whisper, I snarled, “Don’t you ever, ever, do that again, do you hear me?”
For the first time ever, I saw fear in Micah’s eyes as he looked up at me. He didn’t immediately answer, and I didn’t give him the chance to form an excuse-ridden reply. I turned and walked out of his room. My temper was boiling over, and I knew I’d better get far away from him.
Before I did something stupid.
Just outside my bedroom door, he caught up to me, unaware of the danger he placed himself in. Grabbing me by the elbow, he spun me around. “Are you really this upset because I kissed you? Or because you kissed me back?”
“I did—” I hesitated. Just like I had done when he’d kissed me. I hadn’t really kissed him back, but I hadn’t stopped him either. Not right away. “It was a dream, Micah,” I hissed between my teeth. “I’m not really me in my dreams. I’m a different girl. The real me would never kiss you, and you know it.”
“Not yet, maybe. But it’s coming. That version of you that will want to kiss me? She’s coming. I can feel it, and I know you can, too. That’s why you’re panicking, sticking your nose in those books all day long, hoping to find a way to prevent it.”
“No.” I was a heartbeat away from punching him in the face, and even though he had to know that, he didn’t back up.
He stepped closer, pushing me unwillingly against the door. “We’ll see. How you feel about me in the dreams will become a reality, Kris. It’s a part of the connection. You won’t be able to avoid feeling that way about me.”
I scoffed. “If I don’t kill you first.” For the first time, I was serious. I didn’t care that the kid was some almighty savior. I couldn’t stand him, and would prefer to have him out of my life.
The thought of wringing his neck was starting to give me enjoyment.
“We’ll find a way to stop you from turning Skotadi,” Micah responded confidently. “You won’t kill me.”
“I won’t have to be a Skotadi,” I threatened viciously, pushing him away from me.
Before he formed a reply, the door opened behind me and Callie stepped into the hallway. It only took her a quick glance between Micah and me to see what was going on.
“Come with me,” Callie said, grabbing my arm and tugging me after her, away from Micah.
Even as the bathroom door shut behind us and Micah was forced out of my sight, I still shook in anger. When everything started to go blurry, I knew I was in trouble.
Or Callie. Perhaps she was the one I should have been worried about, being locked in a bathroom with me—the girl who was quickly, after one standoff with Micah, losing the battle over the evil raging inside of her.
I suddenly knew exactly what had happened to me that day I’d punched Nathan in the nose. I knew because it was happening again. Anger, so much anger, blurred my vision.
I wanted to hurt someone. Anyone would do.
“Kris?” Callie turned with a washcloth extended to me. When I didn’t immediately take it, the frown on her face deepened. “Kris? You okay? Your eyes…”
I looked down at the floor to shield them from her. My hands hung clenched at my sides.
“Here, Kris,” she said, sticking the cloth under my nose. “It might make you feel better.”
I swatted it out of her hand, something that sounded similar to a snarl rising in my throat. She bent to pick it off the floor, and I thought about how easy it would be to snuff out her life right then and there.
Quick. Easy. Fulfilling.
My hands shook as I tried to keep them down, at my sides, but it was as if someone else were moving them for me, toward an unsuspecting Callie. As she stood up, I lifted my gaze to meet hers, and saw her eyes widen in fear.
I briefly wondered if it was the excitement of seeing her fear of me, or the sudden intense need to do something to give her a reason to really fear me, that drove me to black out.
When I came to, I was floating. I heard voices—two familiar voices—around me. One, the deeper one, above me and close. The other one softer, and farther back, but getting closer.
I was moving, I thought. Something big and sturdy had a hold of me and I was moving. I squirmed, trying to move on my own, but the grip on me tightened.
“Easy, Kris,” the deep voice—I now recognized as Nathan’s—said. “You’re fine. Just getting you into bed, okay?”
A moment later, I was set down on something soft, and I opened my eyes. As they came into focus, they fixated on Callie. Then on Micah standing at the foot of the bed.
With one look at him, my desire to ensure a violent end to him was rekindled. I don’t know what the others saw in my face in that moment, but their reactions were brisk and severe. Callie gasped, and she and Micah both took a step back, while Nathan pressed my shoulders into the mattress.
“Kris!” He shifted to block my view of Micah, lowering his face to mine so I had nowhere else to look than at him. “Focus on me, Kris. Not him. Focus! Micah,” he called over his shoulder, “get the hell out of here. Now!”
In my periphery, I saw Micah move to the door and as much as I wanted to jump up and run after him, I wanted him to leave even more. I would be glad to see him gone.
The door opened before he reached it, and Gabby and Richie rushed inside. Their initial reactions when they first saw me mirrored those of Callie and Micah. Then their expressions changed and, instead of fear, I saw hatred and vengeance.
They didn’t hesitate to charge. Nathan sprung from my side, placing himself between me and them. Micah managed to grab ahold of Gabby from behind and wrestled her toward the door. That left Nathan to take on Richie one-on-one. Callie took Nathan’s place, between me and the struggle, as my final defender.
While Richie was a trained Kala, he was not a natural fighter like Nathan. They traded a few blows, and I winced as one of Richie’s fists found Nathan’s face. Despite that, it was a brief scuffle, with Nathan gaining the upper hand and forcing Richie out the door with Gabby.
“Lock it. Keep them out,” Nathan ordered Micah before returning to my side.
With just the four of us in the room now, Nathan turned his undivided attention to me. From the wary look on his face, I knew he wasn’t sure what was happening to me. Not like I did. I knew exactly what was happening.
I was dangerously close to slipping over the edge, to the side I had been fighting against so hard, for so long. The impulses that Alec had spoken of were happening to me, right now, and I couldn’t push them down. Couldn’t control them.
Surely the others, especially Nathan, had to have the same suspicion.
If they didn’t realize this, they were idiots.
Stop!
I shook my head to push out the malicious thoughts before they took hold of me. Even so, they were right there, brewing, pushing to break through. I couldn’t—I wouldn’t—let them.
“What happened?” Nathan asked me softly. When I didn’t immediately respond—I couldn’t for fear of losing control again in a moment of weakness—he turned to Callie and repeated the question.
“I don’t know,” she replied. “I heard her and Micah out in the hallway, arguing. She sounded like she was ready to kill him. I took her to the bathroom to calm down. She was shaking…”
Nathan’s eyes lifted to Micah, where he stood against the door with his arms crossed. He didn’t need to ask Micah. The question was visible in the rigidness of his jaw.
Micah shuffled his feet before answering. “She got mad at me. It was like a lit fuse, escalated into something else entirely.”
“Why was she mad at you?” Nathan asked harshly.
Micah shrugged and glanced between Nathan and me like he was afraid he would soon have two people in the room wanting to rip his head off. He had a right to be nervous.
“I—uh, I kind of kissed her,” he stammered, then added hastily, “In a dream.”
Nathan glared. His mouth opened, and what he had been about to say in response, I’ll never know, because Micah’s mention of the kiss brought the surge of anger back. I shot up, intending to launch myself across the room at him. Nathan caught me mid-leap, pushed me to the mattress, and held me there. My body shook with the need to break free and finish what I’d started, but Nathan’s hold on me wouldn’t allow that.
“Kris!” Nathan yelled, lowering his face so that he was all I could see. “Pull it together! You can fight this! You need to fight this!”
He shifted his weight, kept me pressed down with his forearm across my chest, and used his free hand to brush away the hair that had fallen in my face. Looking up at him, I saw the raw fear in his eyes, and knew that it matched mine.
I was scared. Terrified. I didn’t want this.
I had to fight it. I wasn’t exactly sure how to do that, but Nathan’s encouragement gave me the strength to try. The simple act of his hand gliding softly down my cheek was giving me the willpower I had previously lacked.
I could do it. I would do it, with his help.
My breathing slowed, steadied. I saw him nod his head.
“Good, Kris,” he murmured. “You’re doing great.”
Breathe. Just breathe. One at a time.
Nathan’s blue eyes broke through to me—the real me—and I started to believe that I could do it. I was doing it. The demons were quieting.
But not gone yet.
My eyes were locked on Nathan’s, but that didn’t prevent me from catching a glimpse of Micah in my periphery as he stepped closer to the bed, apparently having thought that the danger had passed. As my eyes shifted to him, the anger surged once again, and my body went rigid as the battle for control of it raged inside of me.
A high-pitched ringing sounded in my head as nothing but thoughts of violence and blood and Micah’s painful death took over. In the distance, I heard Nathan’s voice as he shouted at Micah, but I couldn’t make out what he was saying as everything—Micah, Callie, Nathan, the room—faded from around me.
Micah waits for me, the quickly dissolving black abyss all that separates us. As I grow closer to him, I try to shout to him, to tell him to run, to get as far away from me as he can. Not because I hate him, but because I know of the danger I am to him.
And because I care for him. He is my soul mate, but we cannot be together. It is for the best, but I know he refuses to see that, to believe that. His love for me is all that matters.
His smile widens as I near, and I know that he cannot hear my warning. Nor would he likely listen to it.
Tears are streaming down my face by the time I reach him, and only then does his smile fade. Not because he realizes the danger I pose, but out of concern for me. He is blinded by his concern, by his love, for me.
It blinds him to the knife as it pierces his chest. As his white shirt turns red with blood, his eyes remain on mine, pained and mournful as he realizes too late what I am.
Together, our eyes drop to the knife, and my hand on the handle. I should be surprised to see that it is my hand, but I’m not. I had known my role in Micah’s demise. It was he who was taken off guard.
Only then do I hear my own screams.
The scream didn’t follow me, and I awoke quietly, surrounded by darkness. For a moment, I thought I was still stuck in the dream, or in some in-between world, until the room came into focus around me. It was only dark because it was still night.
Or night again? My muscles were stiff, as if I had been asleep for days. Callie slept peacefully beside me, and I watched her for a moment as I stretched my achy muscles and collected my thoughts.
It was me who had turned Micah’s shirt red. I was the one who killed Micah in the dream. I knew that I had been created as his one true nemesis, for that very purpose. But to see it…
I would not let his devotion and blind love—or what he thought was love—for me get him killed. I had to find a way to stop it. Not only my fate, but everyone’s, relied on Micah surviving me.
The bed shifted as someone sat beside me. I rolled my head to see a shadowy outline hovering over me. Nathan’s face came into focus as he leaned closer.
“You okay?” he whispered.
Of course, he had never left. I smiled despite the lingering heaviness of the dream, and the reality of what it meant. “I think so.” I kept my voice low so as not to disturb Callie. From years of sleep overs, I knew that she was a deep sleeper, and this was no exception.
Nathan’s hand lifted slowly, to tuck a chunk of stray hair behind my ear. I loved it when he touched me, even something as simple as that. His tender side was something I would never grow tired of. Probably because I didn’t get to experience it often.
“Do you remember anything?” he asked.
Aside from the horrible dream, which was crystal clear in my memory, most of the events from the last several hours were mostly a blur, with spots of clarity here and there. And those spots, I wished I could erase.
“Some of it.” I shifted, only to be reminded of my stiff joints. “How long have I been asleep?”
“A day.”
What I recalled had happened twenty-four hours ago? I sighed warily. No amount of time would take away the flashes of memory in my head.
“Start from the beginning. What do you remember?”
“I remember being mad at Micah. I wanted to hurt him. Callie took me to the bathroom to calm me down…” What I remembered then was something I immediately wanted to forget. I sprang up in a panic. “Oh, my God, Nathan,” I said a little too loudly. I cast a look over my shoulder at Callie. She hadn’t moved. Looking back at Nathan, I couldn’t keep the panic out of my voice. “I nearly hurt Callie. I wanted to hurt Callie!”
Nathan gripped my shoulders, pressed his face close enough to mine that I could see the tiny silver specks in the blue of his eyes. “But you didn’t,” he said firmly. “You fought it. That’s when you blacked out, wasn’t it?”
I nodded numbly. “I think so.”
“The same thing happened when you fought the urge to hurt Micah.” He wasn’t asking; he was stating a fact. “You fought it, Kris. You can fight it. You need to keep doing it.”
“Nathan, I—”
“No, you listen,” he interrupted gruffly. “We’ve gotten this far, we’re this close, and you can’t give up now. I’m not going to lose you now.”
I’m not going to lose you now. Despite the tone with which he said it, his words wrapped my heart in silky sentiment. It was the best kind of combination of tough-Nathan with tender-Nathan. Not the distant, dismissive one that boiled my blood, but the one I had fallen for.
If I’d had any lingering doubts, the look of utter determination in his stormy bl
ues crushed them. I loved those eyes and…yes, I was in love with him.
“Say it,” he demanded. My heart nearly stopped beating as I wondered when Nathan had developed the ability to read minds. “I want to hear you say you’re not going to give up,” he clarified, saving me from burying my head in the pillow in mortification.
“I won’t,” I said softly.
“Won’t what?”
Geez, he really meant business. I sighed and tried again. “I won’t give up.”
Only then did he loosen up enough to give me one of his almost-smiles. It was perfect—the moment, the setting, the soft shadows around us. If it weren’t for Callie sleeping beside me, it would have been the ideal moment to tell him how I now knew I felt about him and that I would do everything in my power to keep my promise to him because of that.
As it was, Callie’s soft snore sort of ruined the moment. And, well, Mother Nature had something else in store for me anyway.
Nathan must have seen the grimace on my face. “What’s wrong?” he asked.
“Nothing,” I said quickly, then amended, “I just, well, I really have to go to the bathroom.”
At least I’d found a way to turn the almost-smile into a full-on grin. With an amused nod, he stood, giving me room to slide out of the bed.
I was slightly mortified to see just how little I was wearing. I really hoped it had been Callie that had taken off my clothes and slipped nothing but an oversized t-shirt over me. As much as I would welcome a little skin exposing encounter with Nathan, I’d prefer it to be when I was conscious. Fortunately, my expanded bladder made it possible to overlook my lack of attire.
“I’m going with you,” Nathan said as he followed me out of the room. When I shot him a curious look over my shoulder, he added drily, “Not in the bathroom. I just don’t want to leave you alone yet. I don’t trust Gabby and Richie.”
Nor did he probably want to risk me having another run-in with Micah. As I took care of business in the bathroom, I wondered how much of that had to do with Micah’s safety and how much had to do with Nathan’s reaction to hearing why I’d been so angry with Micah in the first place. Did knowing Micah had kissed me, even if it was only in a dream, bother him the way it bothered me? I’d felt wrong when it happened, like I had betrayed Nathan by letting it happen. Technically, I had no reason to feel that way. Nathan and I weren’t together, even if I wanted that to be the case.
Sacrificed (The Ignited Series) Page 15