by Tricia Barr
Maybe that was it. A dark protector for a dark soul. Since I was someone who only brought death, maybe he was my guardian demon. Maybe I was from Hell, after all. The thought strummed a chord of terror in my core. I didn’t want to be a bad person. Was I doomed either way?
He must have seen the distress on my face, for he lifted his hand and ever so softly caressed my cheek. I closed my eyes and nuzzled into his thumb. Ah, this is wonderful. This feels right. When I opened my eyes, I saw that he was leaning in closer.
He was about to kiss me.
And I wasn’t going to resist. I couldn’t.
I could feel his breath on my face, feel the warmth radiating off his skin. Just a few millimeters closer…
“Lorelei?” a voice called from the backdoor.
His upper lip had just barely grazed mine before the call interrupted us. We lingered in position, just like that, unwilling to pull apart.
“Lorelei? Is Lorelei out here?” the girl kept calling my name as she came closer.
I sighed and pulled back, turning my head to address the girl who was looking for me. She was some blond sorority girl. I recognized her as Carly, she was the girl who had invited Trixie to this party.
“Yes?” I asked, my voice raspy.
Carly spotted me and came closer. “It’s Trixie,” she said. “She drank a little too much. She’s not looking too good. I think you’d better take her home.”
At the thought of Trixie being sick, she instantly became my top priority.
I followed Carly into the house, and Killian followed me. We found Trixie passed out on sofa, the stench of vomit confirming her over-indulged state.
“She played a round of beer pong with me, which we lost, and then she took a shot,” Carly explained. “She threw up twice, then asked me to find you.”
“Oh, Trixie,” I said with a pitying frown, kneeling beside her and brushing her hair out of her face. I shouldn’t have left her. I should have known that an ex-Catholic school girl would go overboard at her first college party.
“Here, let me help you get her to your car,” Killian said. He bent down and scooped her into his nicely muscled arms. The ease with which he carried her through the crowd was sexily impressive, and the care with which he cradled her was incredibly endearing.
We exited the frat house and walked side by side down the road to where my car was parked. There was a whole new kind of tension between us as we walked only inches from each other. We had almost kissed, and both of us were yearning for completion.
Not only that, but there was so much unsaid, so much that still needed explanation. As much as I wanted to finish what we started on the makeshift dance floor, I was now more governed by my rational side, and it demanded answers before relinquishing the fruits of its vessel.
I unlocked my car, and Killian gently set Trixie down in the passenger seat.
“Thanks for that,” I said as I closed the passenger door. “I don’t know how I would have gotten her to the car if you weren’t here. I shouldn’t have even let her get this way.”
“Don’t blame yourself,” he said. “If there’s one thing I’ve learned in my life, it’s that you can’t control other people’s actions. Choice is the most powerful thing in the universe.”
I snorted a laugh. Some of us don’t get a choice. Some of us are born screwed up.
“Hey, um, about…earlier, can I see you again tomorrow?” he asked, his vulnerable side peeking through once again.
“You will see me tomorrow, in Biology,” I said with a teasing smile.
He gave a small laugh. “No, I mean, can I take you out? Can we see each other non-academically, and on purpose?”
He looked so earnest, so sweet as he awaited my response. But my guard was back up. I needed it to be.
“That depends,” I said. “Are you going to give me some answers?”
He looked away, and I could tell there was something he was hiding from me. “Look, can’t we…just hang out? Enjoy each other’s company?”
I imagined what “enjoying each other’s company” meant in my vocabulary. I wanted to enjoy his company absolutely everywhere—on my couch, in my bed, in the back seat of my car with Trixie passed out beside us. I wanted to enjoy his company until dawn, and then some. But now that my brain had regained control, it put my body on lockdown, and it could not be unlocked until I knew I could trust him, until he gave me a reason to trust him.
“Please,” he pursued, voice smooth as butter. “Have dinner with me tomorrow. If you still don’t trust me by the end of it, then you never have to see me again.”
The prospect of never seeing him again nearly broke my heart. It made me want to grab him and never let go, even if it meant my destruction.
“Okay, fine,” I said. “Dinner tomorrow night. But I won’t be satisfied unless you give me something.”
His narrowed eyes sparked green with innuendo, and he said, “I would hate to leave you unsatisfied.” He leaned in and planted a feather-soft kiss on my forehead, and my insides turned to mush as his words sent two hundred volts through my heart. “Until tomorrow.”
He walked away down the sidewalk, leaving me standing next to my car, staring after him like a love-sick, droopy-eyed puppy.
Biology class the next day was more distracting than ever.
Killian sat beside me just like any other day, but the smile he wore was full of flirtation, and practically dripping with charm. I had spent all night thinking about the kiss that didn’t happen. Now that the lips I’d been obsessing about were right next to me, smiling at me like that, it was especially hard to concentrate on anything else.
We spent the lecture hour sneaking glances at each other, and then blushing and giggling—that was mostly me—and winking—that was Killian—every time we caught each other’s eye.
I could hardly wait to see him tonight. I rushed home after school, eager to get my homework out of the way so I could free up the whole night for Killian. But by the time I finished my assignments, I was completely drained. After not sleeping last night, I really needed to recharge. I didn’t want to be groggy in front of Killian; I didn’t want to miss anything good.
So, I decided to take a nap for an hour. As soon as my head hit the pillow, I was out.
I was so heavily asleep, I was numb to the world around me. I didn’t even dream. I wasn’t aware of when it happened, but when a sharp whisper of my name in my ear cut through my thick slumber, I woke to find that I was floating several feet in the air!
The ceiling was a foot away from my face. I reached beneath me and felt nothing but empty space. I was cautious to move, afraid that any motion would make me fall. But I gingerly turned my head to have a look around the room.
How is this happening? What’s holding me up here?
As I stared wide-eyed around my room, some of my possessions broke free of gravity’s hold as well and ascended into the air. This wasn’t me. I didn’t have the power to do this. Whatever was haunting me was doing this. And once again, its presence was very well hidden. Only when I pushed hard with my preternatural senses could I feel the underlying essence of menace, of evil.
As if the world around me was becoming overcast, darkness descended around me. Inky tendrils slithered from the shadows under furniture and around corners, climbing up the walls.
A silent chorus hissed my name, almost inaudible at first, then growing louder and louder, until it shook my eardrums, forcing me to clamp my hands over my ears.
One thick black smoky swirl coiled out toward me. In panicked reflex, I willed my spiritual power outward, desperate to push that blackness away. The spiritual pulse I sent out was almost visible, as the smoky tentacles shirked away from its power. My response made whatever it was angry, I could feel that.
Suddenly, an invisible force slung my body hard into the wall behind me. The impact knocked the wind out of me, and I was too jarred by the pain to catch myself as I fell to the floor.
That same eerie laughter rumbled o
ut of somewhere unknown and echoed around me.
“What do you want!” I yelled, on the verge of tears.
The inky smoke thickened, filling in the empty space around me in every direction. I was trapped! I curled up into a ball and hugged my legs tight against my chest, my terror at its peak.
“Lorelei, are you alright in there?” Carmella’s voice called from the hallway.
No, Carmella, don’t come in here! I pleaded internally. This thing could do whatever it wanted to me, but I didn’t want Carmella to get caught up in this too.
But at the sound of her voice, the black smoke rescinded, evaporating until the air of my room was crystal clear. The objects that had levitated fell roughly back into place, the can of pencils landing awkwardly and spilling its contents across the floor in front of my desk.
Carmella opened the door and peaked inside, her eyes widening in surprise and concern when they found me in the fetal position on the floor.
“Mijita, what’s wrong?” she asked, rushing to kneel beside me.
“Nothing,” I sniffled unconvincingly, then formed a lie on the spot. “I just had a bad dream. That’s all. I think I fell off the bed, and that scared me even more. But I’m okay.”
Carmella patted my head. “Are you sure?”
I nodded, shakily filling my lungs with much needed air.
She frowned. “Alright. I just hope that school isn’t putting too much pressure on you. If you’re sleeping in the middle of the afternoon and you’re having nightmares, maybe the stress is too much. Maybe you started college too early—”
“No, Carmella, everything’s fine,” I assured her. “I’m not stressed out. Really. School is fine. I guess I just…haven’t escaped my old demons yet.”
“Oh,” she said, understanding crossing her Latina goddess face.
She and I had never talked about my powers, but she knew something of what I did for Luca. He must have told her all about me. So even though we had never discussed those dark topics, she knew that I had a haunted past, even before I came to her and Luca.
“Do you want to talk about your dream?” she offered. “You know, you can talk to me about anything.”
“No, it’s okay,” I said. “Actually, I’m running late for a date.”
Her expression went from concerned to excited. “A date? With a boy? Ooo, I want details.”
“We can talk about him later,” I said. “Tonight, when I get back, I’ll tell you all about him. But right now, I have to go meet him.”
She helped me stand up and I quickly got ready.
The plan was that Killian was supposed to come pick me up at seven, but this couldn’t wait two more hours. Whatever was going on, it was all going way too far. The things that had been happening before were just innocent little parlor tricks. Scary, yes, but for the most part harmless. Now this presence had actually hurt me, and I knew that it could do much worse. Killian knew what was happening, and I was going to be damned if he didn’t tell me what he knew right now.
I got in my car and opened the Catch A Cheater app on my phone. It could GPS locate any phone by its phone number, and I had used it quite a few times to track down people for Luca. Who knew I’d ever have a use for it again.
I put in Killian’s number, and in a few seconds, a little red balloon pinpointed his location on a map. He wasn’t anywhere near me, and that fact was quite relieving; part of me suspected that he might have been the one behind this most recent attack somehow. But just because he wasn’t close now didn’t mean he wasn’t still responsible. I didn’t know what he was or what powers he had. The only thing I knew was that he knew something, and I was going to make him tell me.
As I looked down at my phone’s screen, his little balloon changed position. He was moving, in a vehicle from the looks of it. I backed out of my driveway and hit the road, heading for his balloon’s general vicinity.
The balloon kept moving, and it appeared he was heading toward campus. Did he have a class right now? I looked at my dashboard clock. It was 5:13. This was pretty late, although I guess it was possible he could have a night class. If that were the case, I needed to catch him before his class started.
I shifted into a higher gear and raced toward campus. His balloon went into the parking garage closest to the administration building, and two minutes later, my car followed it inside. I parked in an abandoned section of the ground level, wondering where to start looking for him. This app only told where someone was on a two-dimensional plane; it didn’t account for ranges of height off the ground.
I zoomed into the map on my phone, hoping to get a more accurate idea of his location. His balloon was right on top of me. I looked all around in the twilight dimness of the garage. He wasn’t here. I’d feel him if he was. So, he must be on a higher level.
I searched my surroundings for the nearest staircase. There was an elevator right across the driveway from where I stood, but there was no way I was going in there after what happened earlier. Scary Movie Rule #1: Never go into an elevator, because that’s where the monster/ghost/demon/whatever bad thing kills you. And my life certainly felt like a scary movie right now. Stairs were much safer.
The sound of footsteps echoing down the garage drew my attention away from my search for stairs. I turned in their direction and saw a male figure walking this way. I didn’t sense anything, so I almost shrugged the figure off as insignificant. But at the last moment, recognition triggered in my chest as he passed under a spot light that illuminated his face.
Latte colored skin, musical swagger to his step, that was Smooth! For a brief instant, I smiled at the surprise appearance of my old friend and took a step toward him.
But then my smile fell like it was slapped off my face by reality’s pimphand, and I stop dead in my tracks. Smooth was no friend. He had known all that time that Luca killed my parents. He would certainly know that I was the one who killed Luca. If he was here right now, that could only mean one thing: he was looking for me, to kill me.
I quickly got a hold of myself and silently ducked behind my car. The wheels in my head were spinning like mad. How did he find me? Luca must have told him this was the school I wanted to attend. That was why he was here instead of at my house. He didn’t know where Carmella and I lived, and he showed up here to see if he could find any information about my current assumed name and address. I knew how Smooth operated. He probably sweet-talked one of the receptionists and got into the computer system. But the question remained, did he find what he was looking for?
I abandoned my quest for Killian and made Smooth my new target. I had to follow him, see where he went next. If he had indeed found my address, he might be on his way to my house. And if that were the case, I needed to stop him before he got to Carmella. I didn’t want to hurt him, because even though he had lied to me for seven years, I still kind of liked him. But I would do what I had to do to keep Carmella safe.
He crossed my path and climbed up the staircase I had been looking for, which was hidden behind the elevator, of all places. When he was out of sight, I darted across the driveway to follow him up the stairs. I ascended the stairs with as light a step as I could manage, being extremely careful not to make a sound.
When I made it to the top, I found Smooth sauntering across the second level toward a black Benz that blinked its lights as he approached. I was about to go back to my car to follow his car out of the garage when my peripheral vision caught another figure moving toward Smooth.
The figure said something, and Smooth stopped and said something back. They clearly knew each other. Had Smooth brought reinforcements with him? Of course, he did. Smooth wouldn’t have come unprepared. With my powers to protect me, he would need a whole firing squad to take me out.
The longer I watched their exchange, the clearer it became that the two were not friends. By the aggressive gestures Smooth made, their conversation was heated.
The figure came closer to Smooth, stepping under a spot light.
I gasped, s
lapping my hands over my mouth to muffle the sound as an afterthought.
The person arguing with Smooth was the very person I had come here to find—Killian!
I didn’t think that I would ever be wounded by another betrayal again, but my heart squeezed in pain at the site of my romantic interest fraternizing with my enemy.
The gears in my mind spun out of control, threatening to unhinge. My brain connected the pieces, concocting a vivid story. Not only was Killian like me, but he was my replacement. I didn’t know if Smooth just found him after I left or if Killian had been in their back pocket all along. Hell, for all I knew, Luca’s empire had people like me stashed away all over the country. Smooth sent him here to find me. Fight fire with fire. But killing me would be too easy, too fast. Torture was a much sweeter revenge for the death of their boss.
And what horrible torture it was. The betrayal was the worst torture of all. Worse than if he had just killed me. He used whatever power he had to make me think there was something between us. He made me fall for him. And fall for him I did, hard. Against all my better judgment. I was stupid.
Through tear-blurred vision, I watched Killian close the distance between him and Smooth. He grabbed Smooth’s collar and pushed him against the car. Their volume got louder, but I still couldn’t hear the exact words, only the angry register of their voices.
And then everything went silent. I wiped my eyes and squinted at them. Smooth’s body went rigid, and right before my eyes his soul was stripped out. Vacant of life, the suddenly limp vessel collapsed on the hard cement floor beside the car.
With my hands clamped even tighter over my mouth, fresh tears poured down my face. Smooth was dead! Even though I knew he had come here to kill me, his death still wounded me. He wasn’t completely a bad guy, just a somewhat lost guy who had made bad choices. Now he was gone.
Killian stood over the body of his victim, his shoulders sagging as if in a sigh. His face was in a shadow again, so I couldn’t gauge what he was feeling or thinking. After a very long moment, he picked up Smooth’s body and carried it away.