Cherry Red Summer (Emely and Elyas Book 1)

by Bartsch, Carina

  I looked at Eva, wishing I could telepathically cause her excruciating pain. But she just kept staring into Elyas’s eyes.

  I tossed my books onto the bed beside her. “Why would it matter to me what you two were talking about?”

  “It wasn’t anything bad,” Eva said. “I was just telling him about how you recently tripped in the student union and practically landed in the dean’s arms.” Eva blinked at Elyas, and they both began to giggle.

  Why did I need enemies when I had friends?

  “Thanks so much, Eva. And FYI, in case you were thinking of having Nicolas overnight again, you thought wrong.”

  “Oh, don’t be angry, dearest,” Elyas said. “We think your clumsiness is nothing but cute.”

  I crossed my arms, irritated. “What are you even doing here?”

  “I missed you!” he said with a grin. “Eva was nice enough to let me in, even though she was just on her way out the door.”

  Eva glanced at the clock. “Oh, my lecture. I’d better get going.”

  “Sorry to have kept you,” Elyas said.

  “No problem,” she replied, standing. As she slipped on her shoes, I caught her eye and desperately tried to communicate not to leave me alone with this jerk. She just shrugged, said, “Ciao,” and left.

  Well, great! Note to self: Find new and better friends.

  “Sorry,” Elyas said in a low murmur as he stood and approached me. “But two weeks without seeing you is way too long. I had to stop by.” He tried to do that thing with his eyes again. What was the word? Hypnotize. He was trying to hypnotize me. This time I braced my entire body and would not be lulled into anything.

  “Don’t you have other women in your list of contacts who are just itching to bask in your sunlight?”

  A corner of his mouth pulled into a half smile. “I’m seeing one of them right now.”

  Smug as always. I snorted. What was he up to? And why was I getting upset about it?

  “I’m annoying you right now, aren’t I?” He grinned.

  “No. I gave up being annoyed by you a long time ago.”

  “You’re so cute when you try to lie.”

  I moaned.

  “So, what should we do now?” he asked.

  “Whatever you’ve got planned, have fun. I have to study.”

  “What is this ‘studying’ I hear people talking about?” he said.

  “I’ve got to read this book.” I pointed at one of the books on my bed.

  He frowned. “You call reading a book ‘studying’?”

  “I have to write a paper critiquing that novel by Monday, so it makes sense to read it first, don’t you think?”

  “I get it . . . ,” he mumbled. He thought for a moment and said, “OK.”

  “‘OK’ meaning you’re leaving?” I asked.

  “No.” He laughed. “‘OK’ meaning I’ll keep you company while you ‘study.’”

  Why me? “Elyas, I don’t think that’s a good idea.”

  “Oh, come on. Hand me a book, and I’ll keep my mouth shut.”

  “A likely story,” I grumbled, glaring at him.

  “Come on, give me a chance. If I don’t keep my word, you can throw me out.”

  “You’re just saying that because you know perfectly well you’re ten times stronger than me. I couldn’t physically throw you out, even if I wanted to.”

  “That may be true,” he said. “Although I find the image of you trying extremely titillating.”

  My next inhalation was very, very deep.

  “Come on, dearest!” he said, batting his long eyelashes. “I promise I’ll bail the second I start bugging you.”

  “Good. You’re bugging me right now. It’s been great. See you next time.” I strode toward the door and held it open for him, but he sat down on my bed, grinning.

  I stared at him. There were cures for most ailments or infestations nowadays. Why nothing for him?

  He lay down on his back, crossed his legs, and picked up a book. “What are you still standing there for?” he asked, batting his eyes. “I thought we were going to study.”

  Grrr.

  Not even the world’s largest horsefly could be as persistent as Elyas. Resistance was futile. I surrendered to my fate and sat cross-legged next to him on the bed. I put my hair up so it wouldn’t bug me while I read, and I focused stubbornly on the book in my hands. I ignored comments such as “Damn, I love it when you go all librarian on me” and somehow managed to make him keep his mouth shut.

  But I didn’t make much progress. I was trying, but I couldn’t concentrate with Elyas lying beside me. Plus, all my recent studying had started to take its toll on my neck. I’d had my nose stuck in books more hours than not over the past few days. It had been only a question of time before my neck rebelled against my unhealthy posture.

  As unpleasant as the soreness in my neck was, it couldn’t hold a candle to the primary nuisance in the room—aka Elyas Schwarz—who merely pretended to read one of my books, for all of ten minutes. After ten minutes he set the book down and resumed his apparent true objective of driving me crazy. Every time I felt his stare burning my skin, I glanced up from my book and found myself staring directly into his eyes. As if that weren’t enough, I kept smiling at him. I was about to start pulling out my hair.

  “Say,” he started. “Aren’t you supposed to be turning pages?”

  I checked my page number, which hadn’t increased in some time now. My cheeks got hot, and that only made Elyas’s grin wider.

  “I would, in fact, be able to turn a page,” I hissed, “if you’d stop driving me crazy!”

  “Does it annoy you when I look at you?” he asked.

  “No. It drives me crazy! That is the mental state right before someone goes on a murder spree.”

  He grinned. But then the smile disappeared. He watched me for a long time, and the twinkle in his eyes grew duller and duller. He lay back and patted the pillow next to him. “Would you like to lie next to me?” he asked.

  Goose bumps ran down my back.

  The mere idea triggered nervous tingling in my stomach. How would it feel to lie in Elyas’s arms? How would it feel to have his fingers gliding up and down my back?

  Dammit, what was I thinking? I frowned. “Elyas, why don’t you just go into the bathroom and pull one out?”

  He stared at me and sighed.

  Had I hurt his feelings?

  God, what was wrong with me today? Imagine me, hurting Elyas’s feelings. Ridiculous. I took a deep breath and returned to my book. But the words registered as little as they had before, though I was remembering to turn the pages now.

  “I haven’t been able to stop thinking about you for two weeks,” he said after a while. I looked up from my book to find his eyes directed at the ceiling.

  “I mean, suddenly finding out after seven years that everything was a stupid misunderstanding,” he said. “It leaves a bitter aftertaste in my mouth that I can’t get rid of.”

  I didn’t say anything.

  He eventually looked at me. “You know what I’m saying?”

  Did I know what he was saying? Well, yes. One might say that very topic had played the lead role in my thoughts for two weeks as well.

  “More or less,” I mumbled.

  “It sounds stupid,” he continued, looking back at the ceiling. “But I keep asking myself what we could have had together if I hadn’t been so dumb as to take Sören at his word.”

  That, in turn, would have kept my first time from being with Sören Nordmann. But I kept that to myself.

  I slowly traced the smooth spine of the book with my finger. “It wouldn’t have lasted more than six months in any case,” I said.

  “Why do you say that?”

  “That’s when you went to England.”

  “Emely,” he
said wistfully. “You were the main reason I went abroad.”

  I stared at him.

  “I’m not kidding,” he said. “I couldn’t stand running into you every day, with that ridiculous Simon in tow.”

  I considered correcting his “Simon” to “Sören,” but thought better of it. What Elyas said had completely caught me off guard.

  “You’re exaggerating,” I finally said.

  “It’s true. Why should I lie?”

  Because it’s easier to have your way with women by saying things like that? I kept my commentary to myself and shrugged.

  “Emely, you broke my heart. Why don’t you believe that?” Elyas looked at me as though he could find no explanation for it. Fundamentally, I lacked the power of imagination to suppose he had loved me that much.

  “Elyas, are you seriously telling me I was the reason you went to England?” More and more wrinkles covered my forehead. Without batting an eye, he confirmed with a nod.

  “You were my first great love,” he said.

  My throat turned dry and seemed to close in on itself. Elyas seemed so sincere, so honest. Still, I couldn’t allow myself to forget he would probably say anything to talk me into something. Thinking back to our reunion four months ago, everything pointed to his trying to pull one over on me.

  “It can’t have been much of a love,” I snorted.

  “Why?”

  “Because you didn’t even recognize me when I helped Alex move.”

  He grinned. His smile implied the same underhandedness I had detected four months ago in Alex’s room. “That bugged you, huh?” he asked.

  Yes, dammit. It way-more-than-bugged me!

  “I might have been annoyed for two or three seconds,” I replied, turning up my nose.

  Elyas laughed softly. “You should have seen your face.”

  Fine, maybe I had looked stupid at first, but that was because of the shock. Seeing him again after so long, only to have him not even recognize me—anyone would have had a dumb look on her face!

  “Emely,” Elyas said gently. “You don’t seriously think I didn’t recognize you?”

  I stared at him.

  “Angel,” Elyas said with a smile. “I knew who you were the first second I saw you again. You’ve obviously changed some, but I recognized your face instantly.” He shrugged. “How could I have forgotten you?”

  “Maybe you were trying to make a fool of me!” I said.

  His amused smirk was confirmation enough.

  I couldn’t believe him. And not knowing what else to do, I slammed my book onto his stomach, in pure desperation.

  “Ow!” He grabbed the spot where I’d hit but couldn’t stop laughing. I had a tremendous urge to kill him. Today.

  “Wh-wh-why? Why are you always trying to pull stuff over on me?” I finally managed to get out.

  “No idea,” he said, shrugging. “Reflex.”

  “You must have had a reason.”

  Elyas looked at me and then got serious. “Not everything in life has a reason.”

  He was lying. There was a reason. I could tell by looking at him. But I could also see he wasn’t going to tell me just now. Did it have something to do with our past? Could it be that, hiding behind all his fuss, there was a desire to take his revenge on me? No. I didn’t think Elyas was that underhanded. He had never hidden his intentions.

  “Guillotine, stoning, hanging, or the rack?”

  “Huh?” I asked.

  “You obviously intend to kill me, given how angrily you’re looking at me. I’m just wondering how I’m going to die.”

  “Currently I’d most like to toss a hand grenade your way. That would be fastest.”

  He grinned. “How about you find a way to turn your aggression into something more intimate?”

  “How about you find a way to turn your pushiness into resignation?” I raised an eyebrow.

  “Now that I’ve gotten you this far?” he asked. “That would be pretty stupid.”

  “Forget the hand grenade,” I snarled. “Make it a nuclear bomb!” I glared at him darkly, but he laughed softly. “Can I go back to studying?” I asked, annoyed.

  He shrugged as if to say I obviously could and that my lack of progress had nothing to do with him. I shook my head and made a third attempt to make some headway.

  With meager results. I counted thirty-five pages, which I would have to reread later anyway because I’d immediately forgotten everything. I suggested Elyas go home, but he didn’t think the idea was nearly as terrific as I did, and remained recumbent on the bed.

  It was frustrating how Elyas managed to fluster me with his mere presence. All he had to do was cast several masterful, charming glances in my direction, and I saw a soup of letters before my eyes.

  Whatever feelings he was unleashing inside me—all I knew was they were wrong. I shouldn’t let him wrap me around his finger like this, and under no circumstances should I lose control. If I did, I would pay bitterly for it, one day.

  I needed distance. The more, the better. But that was easier said than done. It was a pointless venture so long as our lives crossed paths.

  God, if he didn’t look like the devil!

  Was his hair really as soft as it looked?

  Oh God! I was gawking at him again. Read. Book. Now! I turned from Elyas so my eyes wouldn’t keep landing on him. But no matter where I sat, the letters on the pages churned like indecipherable hieroglyphs. I stretched my neck and rubbed my hand over the spot that hurt.

  “Is your neck hurting?”

  “It’s all right.”

  “Should I massage it?”

  “Thanks, Elyas, but I can imagine how that would go.”

  He rolled his eyes. “Why do you always think I’m up to no good?” He sat up. “Just let me try.” He had hardly finished speaking before he started kneading my back.

  “I . . . No, Elyas . . . ,” I protested, trying to scoot away, but he held me close with his upper arms.

  So much for distance!

  He tried to pull my hoodie up over my shoulders.

  “What are you doing?” I asked.

  “How am I supposed to massage you through a sweatshirt? You’ve got a T-shirt on underneath.”

  “You’re not supposed to be massaging me at all,” I said, trying to scoot away again. He held me a second time, and I whined softly.

  “Oh, be quiet,” he ordered. I could hear his grin in his voice. Slowly, much too slowly, he pulled the hoodie over my head, and goose bumps covered my whole body. Why did I feel naked underneath?

  “Stop tensing up. Relax,” he said.

  I winced when he laid his hands on my shoulders and started massaging me. It was so unusual, so scary, letting him touch me. His thumbs pressed softly in slow, circling motions to the left, then right, moving down from the top of my neck along my spine. Even though I still had my clothes on, my skin responded with enormous sensitivity.

  What he was doing felt so good, and it didn’t take long for the pain to ease. I involuntarily dropped my head forward, and Elyas didn’t stop the extremely pleasant things he was doing with his hands.

  When he pressed the spot that hurt the most, I moaned. I was putty in his hands; the tension dissipated beneath his fingers. I closed my eyes and surrendered to the massage.

  “Is that good?” he whispered.

  Good? That was the understatement of the century. Unbelievable, breathtaking, magnificent—it was the best massage I’d ever had.

  “It’s all right,” I said in a high voice, and he chuckled softly.

  Conceited ass. He knew exactly what he was doing. Worse yet, he noticed how I was responding. Fortunately, he had no clue that my heart wasn’t necessarily the most relaxed muscle in my body.

  As the tips of his fingers roamed my neck, my eyes practically rolled back i
n my head. His fingers sent shivers over all of my skin. He worked his way back up my neck and then massaged my scalp, running his fingers through my hair. Oh, how good that feels, I silently moaned.

  Dammit, this wasn’t a massage anymore—it was foreplay!

  I bit my lip, imagining what else Elyas could do with his fingers.

  No! I will not let myself imagine that!

  Thousands of tiny sparks shot through my muscles, as though Elyas were carrying electricity. It would be only a matter of seconds before I completely forgot everything around me, aside from Elyas’s warm breath on the nape of my neck.

  In the blink of an eye, my internal alarms switched on, and the shrill sirens brutally ripped me out of my trancelike state. Whatever Elyas was doing, it was high time to put an end to it!

  I cleared my throat. “So, uh, thanks. That was very nice . . . but now I really need to do some more studying.” I slipped out of his hands and frantically crawled to the other side of the bed.

  What in the hell was that? And how could I have allowed it to happen?

  For alibi purposes, I started flipping pages in my book, nervously peeking over the top. Elyas was still kneeling on the same spot, looking at me with an inscrutable expression.

  “What am I going to do with you?” he finally asked, his shoulders drooping. He sounded like the baffled but good-natured owner of a hopeless dog who had been pooping on his carpet for three years.

  But, dammit, I hadn’t gone on his carpet even once!

  “You don’t need to do anything with me!” I replied vigorously. I had been trying to make him understand that for months now.

  His standard grin gradually reappeared on his lips. “I know you’re shy—but this shy?” He sighed. “Would it help if we started by holding hands and I took things much more slowly?”

  That. Did. It.

  “Out!”

  “No, no,” he laughed, waving his hands. “I was just joking, sweetums. Please don’t throw me out.”

  “Too late. You promised to behave, and what did you do? You’ve kept me from studying. Exactly as I predicted.”

  “Please, I’ll pull it together, OK?” He looked at me with pleading eyes. “I’ve been missing you for two weeks. Now you want to kick me out after just an hour and a half?”