by M. Leighton
“What’s up?”
“Who was that?” I asked without preamble, my brain as scrambled as always in Jackson’s presence.
“Nobody. What’s up? I thought you had a coffee date,” he said acerbically. He really didn’t like the Kender brothers for some reason.
“I didn’t go. Who was that?” I repeated.
Jackson made a noise that sounded like a sigh, a sigh of equal parts irritation and frustration.
“It was Nadia Cobretti,” he answered abruptly. “What did you need?”
“Nadia? What did she want?”
Jackson made the noise again.
“She needed to talk about something. It’s none of your business.”
I felt Jackson’s words like a slap in the face. They hurt, much more than I cared to admit. It only hurt for an instant, however, because my one, ever-present defense mechanism came rushing to the surface to overwhelm it. It was my temper. And I saw red.
“No, it’s none of my business who you sleep with. I just wonder how the High Council would feel about it? I doubt they’d think as much of you if they knew you were screwing half the descendants. Maybe if they found out, they’d move you. Get you out of my hair,” I spat, spinning on my heel and stomping angrily back into my room. It only added insult to injury when I felt the sting of tears at the backs of my eyes.
I was reaching for my keys when steely fingers wrapped around my upper arm and spun me around.
“There’s nothing you can do to get rid of me, Princess. There’s nothing going on with me and Nadia, and no one will believe otherwise, so save your breath.”
“Oh, they’ll believe me alright,” I said, tilting my chin up and glaring defiantly into Jackson’s face. “I’ll get rid of you one way or the other.”
Jackson wrapped the fingers of his other hand around my other arm and jerked me toward him, pulling me up on my tiptoes. I got the feeling he wanted to shake the stuffing out of me.
He looked irate, but I didn’t care. I was hurt and angry, and that was a dangerous combination for a female of any species.
“Why do you want rid of me so badly? Am I interfering with your plans for Aidan? Oh, wait. Aidan’s infatuated with someone else now. Maybe this has something to do with the Kender kid then. What, did he turn you down, too? Feeling a little wounded, Princess?”
“This has nothing to do with either of them. I could care less who Aidan’s interested in. And I just met Berlin. Why would I give a crap about him?”
Jackson bent his head, his nose nearly touching mine, and he spoke. His voice was deadly calm, making the hair at my nape prickle.
“Then what’s your problem?”
I stared at Jackson’s handsome face. His manly smell teased my nose and the heat of his body warmed me through my clothes. I wanted to cry and scream at the same time. I wanted to tell him that all I cared about was him—his safety, his nearness, his kiss. But his indifference, his rejection stung my pride, overriding everything else.
“I just want you out of my life. I can’t stand having you near me. It’s driving me crazy. I…I…I hate you,” I shouted at him, my traitorous chin belying my words with a faint tremble.
For a moment, I saw hurt flicker in the depths of Jackson’s fathomless blue eyes, but then it was gone, leaving in its wake an indecipherable expression.
His voice was so quiet when he spoke that I had to strain to make out what he was saying.
“I didn’t feel hate on your lips when I kissed you in the woods.”
His reminder caught me off guard. Immediately, my mind was flooded with memories. I recalled every subtle nuance of that kiss, from the feel of his lips to the fire in my belly. And that’s all it took. That small lapse in the tidal wave of my anger was just big enough for my body to forget my pique and turn in a totally different direction. I went from impotent rage to burning hot passion in the space of a few seconds.
“I…I…”
“You what?”
I was caught in an invisible web of feeling. I was lost in the sudden change in the conversation, the sudden change in Jackson.
His eyes were softer, steamier as they watched me. His touch was gentler now, his fingers tenderly massaging the flesh of my arms. His voice was dark and velvety, like a caress.
“We were pretending,” I somehow managed to squeeze past my dry lips.
“Were we?”
My stomach leapt with excitement, with desire, with the whole-hearted hope that he was insinuating that we hadn’t been just pretending, that he hadn’t been just pretending. I wanted it to be real. Oh, how I wanted it to be real.
“Yes,” I whispered, the last remnants of my pride digging in its heels.
Though Jackson’s face drew closer to mine and his head tilted slightly to one side, his eyes never left mine. I felt them like burning holes in my soul, felt them like a nest of unruly butterflies in my stomach. My entire world—all of my senses, every nerve in my body, every cell of my blood—was tightly focused on him.
“Liar,” he whispered, his breath fanning my lips, making them throb with want.
He didn’t move, not one tiny bit, just stared at me. We were so close that when I took a deep, shaky breath, my breasts grazed his chest. I could feel his thighs brushing mine as I inadvertently swayed toward him.
All I could think about was getting closer—pressing my lips to his, feeling his body against mine, having full contact. Everywhere.
I heard Jackson suck in a tiny breath and my control broke, pride a thing of the past. I didn’t care about anything but touching my lips to his.
I leaned in, just enough to close that last inch of space between our mouths. And then there were fireworks.
The instant our flesh made contact, sparks flew. I felt a tiny bolt of electricity shoot straight to my core and explode into a shower of light and heat. Intuitively, I knew then that I’d never be able to get enough of Jackson. Just as I’d known other things that day, things that I’d somehow divined, I had no doubt that there was something magical and eternal between us.
I knew that Jackson couldn’t deny it anymore either. I felt it in the way he released my arms and splayed his hands across my back, pressing my chest into his. I felt it in the way he sank into the kiss, teasing my lips open with the tip of his tongue. I felt it in the way he tasted the inside of my mouth, like a dying man tasting life.
Stretching up as far as I could, I melted into Jackson, touching him with every surface of my body. I wound my arms around his neck, threading my fingers into his short hair, feeling the silky prickle of it against my palms.
And then his lips were gone.
I could’ve cried when I felt Jackson pull back. He looked down into my eyes for one heart-stopping second and then he stepped away. Dejectedly, my arms fell back to my sides. Inside, I felt emptier, more bereft, than I could ever remember feeling.
He stood in front of me, a foot of steamy air separating us. His chest was heaving. Mine was, too.
But, again, it was his eyes that told the story. They didn’t leave mine, and in them, I saw the battle. I had no idea why he was resisting, but he was. I could almost feel it, a heavy tension that he wore like a cloak.
I saw a frown play quickly across his forehead. I waited—breathless, helpless—while he struggled.
I wanted to go to him again, pride be damned, and make the decision for him. But I didn’t. I wanted—no, I needed— him to make the decision. I wanted him to want me, but I also wanted him to admit it. I wanted him to choose me over whatever he was fighting, over everything else. I wanted him to choose me.
It was in the barely perceptible shake of his head that I knew he’d made his decision. My breath hitched in my chest when he started to step away.
But then he didn’t.
Suddenly, Jackson reached across the space between us and grabbed my face in his hands. He brought his mouth to mine and dove into a kiss that set my world on fire.
He devoured me with his lips, with his tongue, with
his hands. He threaded his fingers through my hair and held my face tight to his, where I couldn’t escape him. He needn’t have done that, though. I had no desire to be anywhere but in his arms, surrounded by Jackson.
I wound my arms around his narrow waist and slid them under his shirt, dragging my fingers up the smooth skin of his muscular back. I felt one of his hands fist lightly in my hair.
I lost my breath again when his lips left mine and he tugged my head back, arching my neck as he blazed a burning hot trail of kisses across my cheek and down my throat where he licked the pulse that beat wildly there.
He continued on his path until he reached my collar bone, where he stopped to nip at the skin with his teeth. A shower of delicious chills rained down my chest and stomach, my nipples furling into tight, tingling buds.
I couldn’t help the moan that escaped my lips. At that moment, I was lost to all else but Jackson. There was no right or wrong, no should or shouldn’t, no do or don’t—only feeling. Strong, all-consuming feeling that I had neither the strength nor the desire to resist.
Jackson must’ve sensed my reckless abandon because his ardor cooled somewhat and he tilted my head back up and leaned his forehead against mine.
I was confused.
“What’s wrong?”
“We can’t do this,” he answered, his voice hoarse and low.
“Why?”
“We just can’t.”
“But why? No one has to know.”
Jackson leaned back and looked into my eyes.
“I would never hide you from anyone,” he said earnestly.
I wanted to smile, but not as much as I wanted Jackson’s lips on mine again.
“Then why?”
One side of Jackson’s perfect mouth tipped up in a small, sad smile.
“Because you’re not mine.”
I was afraid to say all the things that I felt, things like I was his, whether he knew it or not, whether it was right or not. But I didn’t. Something held my tongue.
“I’m not anybody’s,” I said quietly.
“Not yet,” he said, stepping away from me.
I had nothing to say to that. I felt nauseous to think of spending a lifetime with anybody other than Jackson, but I couldn’t say that either. I would eventually have to marry Aidan, despite our ties to other people. It was the Mer way. I could never be with Jackson, not for long anyway. Ours was a forbidden union and we both knew it.
Smiling more fully, Jackson held out his hand.
“Come on,” he said, tipping his head toward the door. “Let’s get out of here.”
Nodding, I took his hand and let him lead me from my room.
CHAPTER EIGHT
I didn’t know where we were going and I didn’t care. I was just happy to be in Jackson’s company, my fingers wrapped securely in his.
It was when we walked out the dormitory doors and I saw Building A across the street that I remembered why I’d come to Jackson in the first place.
I pulled up short and Jackson stopped a couple paces in front of me.
“What’s wrong?”
“We need to go to the woods. Come on,” I said, tugging him in a slightly different direction. “I’ll explain on the way.”
And I did. I told him how the Seer had come to me in the shower and how he’d somehow taken me out to the forest through the rain. I told him what I’d seen there. I explained everything from the tree spirits to the wolf-like creature that I’d seen and how I thought it was probably Wolfhardt.
“But you said it was dark, right? And rainy?”
“Right.”
Jackson and I both looked out across the horizon to the last vestiges of a setting sun.
“Maybe if we go back into the trees, they’ll show me who Wolfhardt is. Surely the tree spirits have seen something.”
“I guess it’s worth a try. We need to hurry, though. It’ll be dark soon.”
“We have time. It won’t happen tonight.”
“How do you know?”
“I saw a full moon through the trees. And we both know the moon won’t be full until tomorrow night.”
And we did. Being tied so inexorably to the sea, Mer knew without ever having to look into the sky where we were in the lunar cycle. We felt the sway of the moon just as surely as the ocean did.
We walked in silence for a ways before either of us spoke.
“I know this has been hard on you,” Jackson said quietly. “And, for what it’s worth, I think you’ve been incredibly brave.”
I felt the rush of blood to my cheeks. I shrugged, feeling embarrassed by and unworthy of his praise.
“I don’t know why. I haven’t done anything.”
“Sure you have. You’ve stepped up and taken the initiative to find out who Wolfhardt and the Straus Maiden are. You were almost killed trying to get to your parents. You were almost abducted by Seers, although now, I imagine they were probably trying to help,” he said, grinning sheepishly.
“Speaking of, I never got a chance to thank you for that.”
“Thank me for what?”
“For saving me.”
It was Jackson’s turn to shrug.
“It’s my—”
“Don’t say that it’s just your job,” I interrupted sharply.
Jackson chuckled. It was a throaty sound that I felt rasp pleasantly along my nerves, making me want to purr. My abdominals clenched in response.
“I was going to say that it’s my pleasure to guard you.”
Jackson looked down at me and grinned. I couldn’t stop the huge smile that I beamed at him in return.
When his grin faded, he was still looking at me.
“I know what you risked, though. I know what could’ve happened to you if they’d wanted to hurt you.”
Slowly, Jackson raised my hand to his mouth and pressed his lips to the backs of my fingers.
“It doesn’t matter. I could never let someone hurt you.”
His words, his tenderness, the look in his eyes made my heart soar.
“Madly?”
At the sound of my name, I jumped guiltily, jerking my hand out of Jackson’s and springing back away from him. I noticed his frown right before I turned to see CoCo Crane coming out of a paint supply store.
“Hey, CoCo,” I said, my cheeks stinging even more now.
“I thought that was you,” she said.
CoCo sauntered over to stand beside me, swinging her bag of goodies as she eyed Jackson.
“You ever do any modeling?” she asked him bluntly.
Jackson scowled. That was like asking a Sentinel if he wrote poetry or got pedicures. Sentinels were supposed to be hard and brutal and ruthless. I happened to know, however, that while Jackson probably could be all of those things when the occasion called for it, he had a soft, chewy center that made my heart swell. Of course, he still didn’t take kindly to her insinuation.
“No,” he snapped.
“Oh,” she said knowingly. “The brooding type, huh? Even better.”
Jackson looked at me, scowled more deeply and then looked back to CoCo.
“What are you up to, CoCo?” I asked, hoping to break the tension that everyone but CoCo seemed to feel.
Reluctantly, she tore her eyes from Jackson to answer me.
“Getting some new oil colors. I want to try my hand at painting people. Nudes to be precise,” she explained, her eyes darting quickly to Jackson and then back to me again, as if she couldn’t keep them away from him. “I needed some different colors.”
I nodded, quelling the urge to claw her eyes out.
“Well, have fun,” I said, reaching out to take Jackson’s hand again in a childish show of possession. “See you at school.”
With that, I turned and tugged Jackson forward. Obligingly, he moved. If he hadn’t, there would’ve been little I could do about it. He probably weighed a small ton.
When we’d left CoCo far behind, I turned to Jackson.
“Can you believe her? I mean,
seriously, could she have been a little more obvious?”
He said nothing, just frowned down at me.
“What?” I asked, puzzled by the odd look on his face.
Jackson glanced down at our hands briefly, his fingers working their way free of mine. Hesitantly, I let them go.
“You let go of my hand awfully quickly. Who did you think it was?”
It was my turn to frown. “I don’t know. She just startled me. Why?”
Jackson said nothing for several long seconds. He simply stared at me as if he was trying to read my mind.
“No reason. Come on. We’d better get going. It’ll be dark soon,” he said again, as if it suddenly mattered.
“Is there any water around here? In the forest, I mean. A pond, a stream, anything? I’ll need more water than what’s in my bracelet for this.”
Jackson nodded sharply.
“There’s a small stream that runs across the northwest corner.”
“That will work,” I said, striking off in a northwesterly direction. That’s another thing all Mer had in common—an unerring sense of direction.
By the time I could hear the fine babble of the creek, Jackson’s mood had grown dark and there was an uneasy tension between us. I knew asking him what was wrong would be a waste of time. Jackson wasn’t the type to share things like that, things like his feelings.
I stood on the sloped bank of the stream, looking at the gurgling water with longing. I squatted down and dipped my fingers in, feeling the invigorating power of the element as if it flowed in my veins.
Kicking off my boots and tearing off my socks, I rolled up my jeans and waded in a couple of steps, just until I could feel the current wash past my ankles.
Closing my eyes, I raised my arms, feeling the warmth of the bracelet make its way up into my shoulder and then explode through my chest and belly.
“Let me see you, dark spirits of the trees. Show me your secrets,” I whispered, focusing all my energy on my task.
The water began to churn around my feet, slapping at my ankles in agitation. I opened my eyes and looked around. The trees were empty of the creatures, that or they were not allowing me to see them.