I’d made more of an effort tonight after court to participate in conversation with my dad and Draper, but we all knew it was a bad act. I begged off the second I counted thirty sentences of normal interaction I’d offered up to convince them that I was fine.
The tray of food the servant brought me at my dad’s insistence that I was getting too thin sat on the table in my bedroom. It was probably delicious, and I knew my stomach was hungry after the whole day of manual labor, but my heart wasn’t in anything these days. I ate like it was my job and punched out as soon as my stomach was filled enough that it wouldn’t be annoying to me.
I collapsed on the bed, which felt like a desert of too much space with just me in the king-sized monstrosity. I didn’t even have Abraham Lincoln with me anymore to cozy up with and make me believe that I was a good mother. I don’t know why, after over two decades of taking in animals who would eventually split, it still hurt enough to make me feel the constant pang of loneliness. I was usually better at feeling the sadness and moving on.
I’d let my bear baby get stabbed. I’d watched with horror while Madigan ran him through. Possessed as my Lucky Charms fiancé was, I hadn’t been able to save my baby from a bloody and public death. My brave Hamish’s head had been crushed under Mad’s boot, and I’d been impotent to save them. Tears welled in my eyes, and I pretended they were all and only for Abraham Lincoln and Hamish, though admittedly, a few were for Link, Madigan, Lane, Demi and even Roland.
I pulled on a pair of clean jeans when it dawned on me that I hadn’t double-checked that Dad had shut all the windows on the first and second floors. I padded down the steps and moved like a zombie through the rooms and down winding hallways, closing the occasional opened window.
As much as I hated to admit it, I missed Lane with a childish panic. I needed my mom, and might never stop. She’d been my best girlfriend my whole life, and now that I barely recognized my life, I wanted her there to be my touchstone while Avalon rocked me around without mercy.
I made it halfway through the second floor of the house before the ground started to tip. I stumbled through the hall and tumbled into the next room to check the windows there, my body protesting how long I would be allowed to exhaust it. The small room with green and silver furniture and draperies had plenty of places to lounge around, but I couldn’t make it to any of them. I collapsed on the enormous oval-shaped emerald rug, deciding that would be as good a place as any to make a bed. My head was too heavy to hold up anymore, so I laid it on the rough fabric, my eyelids shutting without my full consent.
“What do you think you’re doing?” Kerdik asked from behind me.
I’m not sure how long I’d slept, but when my head rose and swam in protest, I knew it wasn’t long enough. I glanced around the room, unsure where I was at first. I blinked into focus one of the house’s many adorned studies. It looked like a decorator from the Victorian era had been given a blank check. This one had an emerald chaise in the corner next to a bookshelf that wouldn’t dare collect dust. I so wanted to know what each book said. The silver frames on the walls held portraits of scenery so pretty, I wanted to roll around in the green of it all, but was too depressed to commit to the effort. “Just making sure the house is secure. Someone could sneak in through a window,” I said, rubbing my eyes.
“And you just decided to sleep on the floor?” He called down the hallway. “I found her!”
Kerdik eyed my bedraggled and confused state with a pensive look on his face. He pursed his lips before going over my head and rescuing me from myself. “That’s enough worry and work out of you for one night. You simply must learn how to enjoy life with a house full of servants. They can tend to the windows. To bed with you, darling.” He moved forward and scooped me up in his arms, ignoring my weak protest as he carried me up the stairs like a damsel.
“But it’s dangerous! I have to make sure the windows are latched. My dad! Is he alright? I need to check on him.”
“Urien’s absolutely fine, though we’ve all gone a bit insane searching for you. It’s only due to my blood in your tattoo that I was able to find you in this massive place. You’ve got to stop worrying about every little thing. This isn’t like you.”
When I heard my dad’s voice boom out my name as he trotted up the steps to meet us, I burst into embarrassing tears. “I thought you were dead!”
Urien stopped short, his hand on his heart. “Why would you think that? You saw me whole and well when we held court this evening, and our chat afterwards. Do I not look well? I can call Jean-Luc back to the palace if you’re worried. He can give me a look.” He glanced down at his white dress shirt and gray trousers, curious as to what had led me to this conclusion. Remy was off with Lane, and Jean-Luc had been setting up an office in the province with several other healers to provide healthcare to everyone. I hadn’t seen him since the cloaked fish-breath dude sliced a line across the back of my hip, and he’d stitched me up.
“Lane’s gone! Everyone keeps leaving, but you stayed. I know someone’s going to take you away from me!” I sniveled, knowing I was irrational and a little unhinged. “I told you to close the windows! Someone could sneak in and kill you. I told you how dangerous the windows are!”
Urien, to his credit, handled my crazy with grace and kindness to rival any saint. His voice was deep, and seemed to coo around my heart, wrapping me with his warmth that never seemed to run out. “Darling, you worry about so many things now. You can’t go wandering about like this. You need sleep. I assure you, everyone is quite safe.”
I wanted to argue that Demi had died in a palace easily enough, but I wasn’t exactly coherent. I sobbed into Kerdik’s crisp white shirt instead while he cradled me in his arms. You know, like a respectable adult. I barely recognized myself. Beneath my unrest and panic, I was ashamed of my behavior.
“I’ll watch her for the night. I’m back for another day at least now. You go back to your studies. There’s much to read up on, old friend.” Kerdik didn’t wait for a response, but moved up the steps with me in his arms, He had the fixed, graceful movements any ice skater would envy.
He used his elemental magic to make my wood door swing open, and then carefully set me down on the large bed. He kissed my cheek, taking in my swaying state with a frown. “You’re alright to dress for bed by yourself?”
“I should go check on Draper.” Dread dawned on me afresh as I stumbled toward the door. “Oh my goodness! I didn’t make sure the window down the hall from his bedroom was bolted! Draper!” My heart started pounding, fearing something terrible had happened to my brother.
Kerdik captured me in his embrace before I reached the door. His arms around me were strong, and his voice was slow and steady. “Love, your brother’s absolutely fine. Stay in your room and get ready for bed.” He walked me over to the bed and sat me down again. Then he leaned me forward, resting my forehead to his navel. “I’m worried about you.”
“I’m worried about my family. Can you go check on them for me?”
He looked down on me with a clouded gaze and a frown tugging down the corners of his mouth. “Of course, if that’s what you wish.”
I was grateful for the privacy when he let himself out, promising to be back in a while with some hot tea. I clumsily kicked off my jeans and crawled under the rose-colored comforter, hoping a deep sleep would claim me.
7
Rosie, the Irrational Lunatic
I tossed in the giant bed, crying into the sleeve that was far too big for my arm. The owner of the flannel shirt wasn’t there to hold me. Even though I’d lived most of my life without him, the lack of his added protection felt like being left naked and exposed to life’s cruelties, with no backup.
I missed Judah, who had slept by my side for so many years. I despised the months we had to be apart, pretending like it was totally normal to live without the functioning wheels on our bicycle built for two. There was a Judah-shaped hole in my heart to match the others left by the friends and family I’d made
in Avalon who hadn’t been able to stick around.
I fell into a short, fitful sleep, and then woke in the night to a bolt of anxiety. I hadn’t heard anything about Draper or Urien, and worried a burglar had broken into the house. I got out of the bed, telling myself I was just going to check on them, as I had for so many nights in a row now. My feet dragged on the way to the door after I lit the lantern, but I jumped in surprise when Kerdik’s form filled my hazy vision in the hallway. He moved toward me and leaned against the frame when I opened the door halfway. My face drained of color. “Is everyone alright?” Grief shot through me, unbidden. “He’s dead, isn’t he!”
Kerdik’s eyes widened. “Who’s dead?”
“My dad! I closed my eyes for two seconds, and someone snuck in through the window and killed him!” I covered my mouth as the scene played out in my fractured imagination. “It’s all my fault! I didn’t check the window on the first floor four doors down from Draper’s bedroom!”
Kerdik was holding an empty teacup and saucer in his hand. He studied my face far too closely before responding. “Urien’s perfectly fine. I just spoke with him down in his study before I came up here to watch you toss and turn. You’ve nothing to worry about.”
“Draper?” I asked, scared all over again.
“He’s fine, as well.” He shook his head at me. “You look like you haven’t slept in ages. I know you’re long overdue. You used to be you. Where did you go?”
I wiped my tears on my damp flannel sleeve, trying to compose myself and recall my personality. “Oh, you with the compliments.”
“You know what I mean. Your insides used to be so bright that they shone through and lifted everything around you. And forgive me, but tears and irrational fear add nothing to a woman’s beauty.”
I looked down at the oversized flannel shirt that wasn’t even mine, taking in just how pathetic I’d become. I didn’t know who I was anymore. I’d lost some vital part of me that made me act like a loon who lost her mind over an imagined break-in. I sniffed and swiped at my eyes with my baggy sleeve. “I know what you’re thinking: it doesn’t get much sexier than this.” I motioned to the old shirt and my hair that had dried in funky waves hours ago.
“That’s exactly what I was thinking, actually.” Kerdik pushed the door open the rest of the way and then locked it behind him after moving into the bedroom. He let out a weighted sigh when I fastened the other three locks, just in case. “I can’t look at you in that shirt anymore. It’s depressing, and it’s starting to smell.”
“I like sleeping in his shirt,” I admitted the obvious, owning up to the pitiful nature of the beast.
Kerdik shook his head at me, taking the lantern from my hand and hanging it on the hook near the door. “Young love. I remember now why I don’t bother with it anymore. Go on behind your partition and take that thing off. I’m serious. I can’t look at you in his clothes another second.”
I hugged myself, that nagging anxiety making me antsy as I shifted from foot to foot. “It makes me feel safe.”
“Darling, you are safe. I’m here.” A tender expression crossed his features, and he slowly began to unbutton his charcoal vest. “You can wear mine instead.”
My gaze climbed up to his face, perplexed. “But you like your shirts unwrinkled.”
“I like you unwrinkled, and if you don’t sleep, there won’t be any undoing that. Run and change, now. We haven’t got all night.”
I didn’t know what to do when Kerdik put his shirt in my hand. He was rarely without long sleeves, and I could tell by the way he kept running his hands down his bare arms that he didn’t like how on display his green skin was. He wore his undershirt, but the lack of long sleeves I could tell was a big step for him. The dim light of the lantern flickered, making his muscular arms seem to glow with a Wicked Witch of the West kind of aura. Only he wasn’t a wicked witch – at least not to me. He was my friend, and no matter how many times I pushed him away with my crazy lately, he kept coming back to see if I’d returned myself to us. “You’re being sweet to me,” I noted, gazing up at him in confusion. “I’m being an irrational lunatic, and you’re being nice. When did we switch roles?”
“Yes, you are a lunatic. Though I’ve been quite unbalanced toward you on a far worse scale in the past, so hopefully this tips us more toward even footing. Would you like me to send a servant to fetch Jean-Luc? It’s been a while since he’s given you a look.”
“No, I’m fine. And you don’t have to think about the time you froze me in the tub. I know you’re working on controlling your temper these days. I can see it. You let me rub scrambled eggs on your face last week, and the house only shook a little. Progress.”
“That was a month ago, not last week.” He rolled his eyes at me. “Just take the shirt.”
I moved behind the partition and changed out of the dirty rag I’d been using as basically a wearable blankie. Totally pathetic. I splashed a little water on my face from the basin on the stand and buttoned Kerdik’s white shirt up over my underwear. The crisp material was far more breathable against my skin, and made me feel like I was gloriously naked, though the shirt fell to the middle of my thigh. Bastien was just plain bulkier than Kerdik, and it showed in the fit of each man’s clothing on my curvy form.
I came out from behind the partition, the lantern’s light dancing on my bare legs. “Thanks, K. I think maybe I needed someone to take his shirt away. Now he can really be gone.” I pushed the sleeves up my arms. “After tonight, I’ll sleep in regular nightgowns. Thanks for getting me over the hump. You’re a good friend. I know I’m being a loser about everything lately. I can’t seem to shake myself out of it.”
Kerdik swallowed thickly, his gaze lingering on my form. “No trouble at all. I rather like the look of you in my clothes.” He stepped toward me and unbuttoned the cuffs, then took his time folding them over and over, so that they hung to my elbows at an even length on both arms. “Much better.” He eyed the top button that he always kept fastened, but I had left undone.
“Thank you. The super long sleeves do get annoying in the night.”
“Let me be good to you.” He tucked a lock of my unruly hair behind my ear so I couldn’t hide from him. “It worries me to see you so troubled. I don’t do worry.”
I wrapped my arms around my middle, feeling low enough to admit aloud what I needed. I couldn’t look at him; what I wanted was too embarrassing. “Will you stay with me? Just until I fall asleep?”
Something shifted between us, though I couldn’t put my finger on just what. He tipped my face up to his, so he could take in the full scope of just how much that request had cost my pride. “You know I’ll stay with you forever. You only had to ask.”
He took my hand and led me to the bed, backing into it until he was sitting on the mattress. He pulled me to stand between his long legs, his hands still holding mine, like he was wary to let that small contact go. He glanced down at his bare arms with a self-conscious frown. I let go of his hands and traced my way up his forearms, rubbing the muscles, regardless of whether or not he was capable of getting sore. “I never get to see your skin much. Why is that?”
A wind belted through the room out of nowhere, knocking the window open with a bang. I jumped and stumbled over to latch it shut. I leaned out slightly to grab hold of the window, but the edge was just out of reach. I felt Kerdik’s hand on the back of my hip, knowing exactly how to touch me. He moved me aside and leaned out to shut it for me with his much longer arms. “No, no,” he breathed when he turned around. “That shirt is completely transparent on you. I don’t want anyone seeing your body out there.”
I glanced down in the dim lantern’s light. “Oh, yikes. Thanks. Was the comment about your skin an off-limits topic or something? I didn’t mean to make you upset by it. I like your skin, but you act like it’s something to hide.”
“It is something to hide. It’s bright green, or haven’t you noticed?”
I eyed his sour expression and reached out to
make what was probably the wrong move. With slow and clumsy fingers, I untucked his undershirt, maintaining eye contact as my hands trilled across his bare abdomen. He stopped breathing, but lifted his arms when I tugged his shirt over his head, revealing a leonine and sculpted purely green torso. His arms made to cover his chest and stomach, but I brushed away his effort. “Beautiful,” I whispered, astonished at how amazing a man could look when dowsed in a pure color that held no apologies. I didn’t hesitate to reach out and stroke the ripples in his abdomen. My finger circled his navel, as if I had the right to do what I wanted with his body. “I wonder why the hair’s darker here,” I mused, running my nails through the thin tuft that trailed from his belly button downward and disappeared beneath the waistline of his chocolate-colored trousers. “I thought it’d be blue.”
Kerdik moistened his lips as his breathing picked up, his light green eyes climbing up my body to meet my gaze. “You are trouble. Nothing but trouble when you’ve got no filter like this.”
When my fingers stroked down his naked side, goosebumps broke out on his flesh, and I appreciated his glorious skin anew. I didn’t know who I was anymore, but the green had a conviction about it that fascinated me. The green knew exactly what color it was, and didn’t permit any amount of confusion. I longed for such certainty. I’d been the ugly girl, the lost girl, the rich girl, the stupid girl, and now? Now I just felt broken. “Do you think I could…” I wanted to be closer to something so magnificent and sure. My fingernails trilled over his chest, alighting on sensitive parts that made him shiver.
Kerdik bit down on his lips before his gaze tightened. “Okay, you’re going to sleep right now.”
“Maybe I already am asleep.” The line between sleep and waking was so blurred in my mind now, that sometimes in the night I couldn’t tell the difference. “Maybe you’re a dream.”
Broken Girl: A Fantasy Adventure Based in French Folklore (Faite Falling Book 5) Page 4