OALN

by Jennifer L. Armentrout

  “Yeah, I’m a little sore and stiff, but overall okay.”

  She smiled but her eyes were still hooded with guilt. Which made no sense. She tried to smooth down her curls, but they sprung back into disarray as soon as she removed her hands. “I think I’m going to make you breakfast.” Before I could respond, she dashed off to the kitchen and I heard numerous doors open and close, pots and pans clanging against each other. “Okay.”

  Daemon stood and stretched. The muscles of his back were taut under his shirt. I looked away.

  “I care more about my sister than I do anything in this universe,” he said quietly. Each word punctuated by truth. “I’d do anything for her, to make sure she’s happy and she’s safe. Please don’t worry her with crazy stories.” I felt infinitely small. “You’re a dick, but I won’t say anything to her.” When I looked up, I found it hard to concentrate when his eyes were as bright as they were. “Okay? Happy?”

  Something flickered over his face. Anger? Regret? “Not really. Not at all.”

  Neither of us looked away again. There was a heavy quality to the air, tangible.

  “Daemon!” Dee called from the kitchen. “I need your help!”

  “We should go see what she’s doing before she destroys your kitchen.” He rubbed his hands down his face. “It’s possible.”

  Keeping quiet, I followed him out into the hallway, where the light spilled in from the open door. I winced at the abrupt brightness and suddenly remembered I hadn’t brushed my hair or my teeth yet. I cringed away from Daemon. “I think I need to…go.” He raised an eyebrow at me. “Go…where?”

  I felt my cheeks turn hot. “Upstairs. I need a shower.”

  Surprisingly, he didn’t fire back with the door I’d left open. He nodded and disappeared into the kitchen. At the top of the stairs, my fingers mindlessly went to my lips and then another shiver rolled through me. How close to dying did I come last night?

  “Is she really going to be okay?” I heard Dee ask.

  “Yeah, she’ll be fine,” Daemon responded patiently. “You have nothing to worry about. Nothing is happening. Everything was taken care of when I came back here.”

  I crept closer to the landing.

  “Don’t look like that. Nothing will happen to you.” Daemon sighed with real frustration this time. “Or her, okay?” Another gap of silence followed. “We should’ve expected something like this.”

  “Did you?” Dee asked, her voice rising sharply. “Because I was trying not to, I was trying to hope that we could have a friend—a real one—without them getting…”

  Their voices lowered, becoming unintelligible. Were they talking about me? They had to be, but that didn’t make sense. I stood in absolute confusion, trying to figure out what they could be talking about.

  Daemon’s voice rose, “Who knows, Dee? We will see how it plays out.” He paused and then laughed. “I think you are beating those eggs to death. Here, let me have them.”

  I listened a few more moments as they bantered back and forth like normal before I peeled myself away from my spot. Without warning, another stolen conversation quickly resurfaced. The night before, as I coasted in and out of consciousness in the car, I’d overheard both of them whispering worries that I couldn’t comprehend.

  I wanted to shrug off the nagging feeling that they were hiding something. I hadn’t forgotten Dee’s weird aversion to me going to the library. Or the strange light I’d seen outside the library that reminded me so much of the light in the woods, when I’d seen the bear and passed out, something that I’d never done before in my life. And then there was the day at the lake, when Daemon had turned into Aquaman.

  I walked numbly to my bathroom and flipped on the light, expecting to see my face busted up. I tilted my head to the side, a startled gasp escaping my throat. I knew my cheek had been scraped raw last night. The pain I remembered. And my eye swollen shut. But my eye was only slightly bruised, my cheek pink, as if new skin had already grown. My gaze drifted along my neck. The bruises there were faint, as if the attack had happened days ago and not last night.

  “What the heck?” I whispered.

  My wounds were almost healed, with the exception of my encased arm…but that too barely ached. Another loose memory poked through, of Daemon leaning over me in the road, his hands warm. Had his hands…? No way. I shook my head.

  But as I stared at myself, I couldn’t shake the nagging feeling that something was going on here. The twins knew it. Things didn’t add up.

  Chapter 11

  The Sunday before school was scheduled to start, Dee took me into town to pick up notebooks while she replaced almost everything she used for school with a new item. We only had three more days of vacation and then we had Labor Day. I was already yearning for it. Before we headed home, Dee was hungry as usual, and we stopped at one of her favorite places.

  “It’s quite a…quaint restaurant,” I said.

  Dee smirked, her sandaled foot continuously tapping. “Quaint? It would be quaint to a big city gal like you, but it’s the place to be here.”

  I stole another quick glance around. The Smoke Hole Diner wasn’t bad; it was actually kind of cute in an earthy, down-home way, and I did like the clusters of rocks and stones that jutted out around the table’s edge.

  “It’s a lot busier in the evening and after school,” she added between sips. “It’s hard to get a seat then.”

  “You come here often?” I found it kind of hard to imagine beautiful Dee hanging out here, eating hot turkey sandwiches and drinking milkshakes.

  But there she was, on her second hot turkey sandwich and her third milkshake. Ever since I met Dee, I had been constantly amazed by the amount of food she could consume in one sitting. It was actually a little disturbing.

  “Daemon and I come here at least once a week for their lasagna. It is to die for!” Her eyes lit up with a mixture of excitement and longing.

  I laughed. “You must love their food, but thanks for inviting me out today. I’m glad to get out of the house since Mom is home. She has been hovering over me every second she’s there.”

  “She’s worried.”

  I nodded, toying with my straw. “Especially after news broke about the girl who died the same night. Did you know her?”

  Dee looked down at her plate, shaking her head. “Not very well. She was in a grade lower than us, but a lot of people knew her. Small town and all. I thought I read they weren’t sure if she was murdered? That it looked like a heart attack.” She paused, her lips pursed as she looked over my shoulder. “Strange.”

  “What?” I asked, turning to see what she was looking at and turned back around to face her as fast as I could. It was Daemon.

  Dee’s head was cocked to the side, her dark hair falling carelessly around her. “I didn’t know he would be here.”

  “Oh, man, it’s he who shall not be named.”

  Laughter erupted from Dee, drawing attention from everyone in the diner. “Ah, that was funny.”

  I sunk in my seat. After the morning he and his sister made me breakfast, he’d avoided me and that was fine. I had wanted to thank him for sort of saving my life. A proper thank you that didn’t end in insults, but the few times I’d been able to catch him, he stopped only long enough to give me a look that warned me not to even think about approaching him.

  Daemon might be the most physically flawless male I’d ever seen—his face was something that any artist would die to get a chance to sit and sketch—no light reflected badly off him. But he could also be the biggest jerk on the planet.

  “He’s not going to come over here, right?” I whispered to Dee, who suddenly looked very amused.

  “Hello, sis.”

  I sucked in a deep breath at the sound of his husky voice. I slid my bandaged arm under the table. I was positive if he saw it, it would remind him of how inconveniencing I’d been.

  “Hey there,” Dee said as she rested her chin on her hand. “What are you doing here today?”

>   “I’m hungry,” he responded dryly. “This is where people come to eat, isn’t it?”

  I stared very intently at my half-eaten burger and fries, moving them around on my plate, praying to whoever was listening that I could fade into the rustic-colored booths until he left. I forced myself to think about anything—books, television shows, movies, Daemon, the grass outside—

  “That is, except you, who must come here to play with her food?”

  Aw, dammit. I plastered the brightest smile I could muster and steeled myself. My smile faltered the instant I met his eyes. He looked at me expectantly, as if he knew what I was really thinking, wanted me to fight back. “Yeah, see my mom normally takes me out to Chuck E. Cheese’s for dinner so I’m a little out of my element. Missing the ball pen and all.” Dee snorted and looked up at her brother. “Isn’t she great?”

  “Just lovely.” He crossed his arms, his tone as dry as ever. “How’s your arm?”

  His question took me off guard. My arm actually felt fine. I wanted the splint off, but my mom refused to let me even shower without it. “It’s better. It’s okay. Thank you—”

  “Don’t,” he cut me off, running a hand through a mess of black waves. “Your face looks a lot better, by the way.”

  I subconsciously placed a hand on my cheek. “Well…thanks, I think.” I looked at Dee with disbelief and mouthed the words my face to her.

  She exchanged an amused look with me before turning back to her brother. “Are you going to join us? We were just about finished.”

  It was Daemon’s turn to snort. “No, thank you.”

  I returned to poking my food around on my plate. As if the idea of eating with us was the most absurd thing.

  “Well, that’s too bad.” Dee didn’t miss a beat.

  “Daemon, you’re here already!”

  I glanced up at the sound of a very excited female. A small, pretty blonde waved from the main entrance. Daemon waved back, not as joyously, and I watched as she practically bounced over to our table. When she reached Daemon she stretched up and gave him a quick kiss on his cheek before wrapping a possessive arm around his.

  An ugly, hot feeling unfurled in my belly. He had a girlfriend? I glanced at Dee. His sister didn’t look happy.

  The girl finally looked down at our table. “Hey, Dee, how are you doing?”

  Dee returned her smile with a very tight one. “Great Ash, how have you been?”

  “I’ve been really good.” She nudged Daemon as if that was a private joke between the two of them.

  I couldn’t breathe.

  “I thought you were leaving again?” Dee asked, her usually warm eyes turning sharp. “With your brothers and coming back when school starts?”

  “Changed my mind.” She glanced up at Daemon again, who was beginning to shift uncomfortably.

  “Hmm, interesting,” Dee responded, her expression taking on a very catlike quality. “Oh, how rude of me. Ash, this is Katy.” She gestured over at me. “She’s new to our exciting little town.”

  I forced myself to smile at the girl. I had no reason to be jealous or to care, but damn, this girl was pretty.

  Ash’s smile faded. She took a step back. “This is her?”

  My eyes darted to Dee.

  “I can’t do this, Daemon. Maybe you guys can be okay with this, but I’m not.” Ash tossed her blonde hair back with a tan hand. “This is wrong.”

  Daemon sighed. “Ash…”

  Her full lips thinned. “No.”

  “Ash, you don’t even know her.” Dee came to her feet. “You’re being ridiculous.”

  The traffic in the diner literally stopped. Everyone stared.

  I felt heat, a mixture of embarrassment and anger, creep across my face as I stared at Ash. “I’m sorry, but did I do something?”

  Ash’s extraordinarily bright blue eyes fixed on me. “Yeah, how about breathing, for starters?”

  “Excuse me?” I said.

  “You heard me,” Ash snapped. Then she turned to Daemon. “Is this why everything is going to shit in a handbasket? Why my brothers are running around the country—”

  “That’s enough.” Daemon grabbed Ash’s arm. “There’s a McDonald’s down the street. We’ll get you a Happy Meal. Maybe that’ll make you happier.”

  “What’s going to shit?” I demanded. The urge to get up and rip out her hair was hard to ignore.

  Ash’s glare burned into me like twin lasers. “Everything is going to shit.”

  “Well, this was fun.” Daemon cocked a brow at his sister. “I’ll see you at home.”

  I watched them leave, boiling with anger. But under that anger was also hurt.

  Dee plopped back in the seat. “Oh, my God, I’m sorry. She’s a complete bitch.”

  I looked at her as my hands shook. “Why did she say those things to me?”

  “I don’t know. She might be jealous.” Dee toyed with her straw, not meeting my eyes. “Ash has a thing for Daemon, always had. They used to date.”

  My brain got hung up on the words ‘used to’ for a second.

  “Anyway, she heard about him coming to your rescue that night. Of course she’s going to hate you.”

  “Are you serious?” I didn’t believe her. “All of that because Daemon saved me from being killed?” Frustrated, I slammed my splint down on the table and winced. “And Daemon treats me like I’m a total terrorist. Ridiculous.”

  “He doesn’t hate you,” she replied quietly. “I think he wants to, to be honest. But he doesn’t. That’s why he acts like that.”

  That made no sense to me. “Why would he want to hate me? I don’t want to hate him, but he makes it hard not to.”

  Dee glanced up, her eyes full of tears. “Kat, I’m sorry. My family is a little weird. So is this town. So is Ash. See, her family is…is a friend of our family. And all of us have a lot in common.” I stared at her, waiting for her to explain how in the hell that had anything to do with Ash’s bitchiness.

  “They’re triplets, you know?” Dee sat back against the booth, staring listlessly at her plate. “She has two brothers, Adam and Andrew.”

  “Wait.” I gaped at her. “You’re telling me there is a set of triplets here and you guys are twins?”

  Her face scrunched up as she nodded.

  “In a town with a population of, like, five hundred?”

  “I know, it’s weird,” she said, glancing up. “But we do have it in common and all of us are kind of tight-knit. Small towns don’t do well with weird. And I’m sort of dating her brother Adam.”

  I gaped. “You have a boyfriend?” When she nodded, I shook my head. “You’ve never mentioned him before.”

  She shrugged, looking away. “It’s not something I thought about bringing up. We don’t see each other a lot.”

  I clamped my mouth shut. What girl doesn’t talk about her boyfriend? If I had one, I’d talk about him, at least mention him once. Maybe twice. I stared at Dee with new eyes, wondering how much more she wasn’t telling me. Sitting back, my gaze drifted beyond Dee, and it was like a switch being thrown.

  I started noticing things—little things.

  Like how the redheaded waitress with a pencil stuck in her bun kept glancing over at me and touching the shiny, black gemstone on her necklace. Then there was the old man sitting at the bar, food untouched, staring at us while muttering under his breath. He looked a bit crazy. My eyes flitted around the diner. A lady in a business suit caught my eye. She sneered and turned back to her companion. He glanced over his shoulder, and his face paled.

  Quickly, I turned back to Dee. She looked oblivious to it all, or maybe she was trying real hard to ignore it. Tension clotted the air. It was like an invisible line had been drawn somewhere and I’d skipped right over it. I could feel all of them, dozens of eyes, settling on me. All of their gazes filled with distrust and an emotion far, far worse.

  Fear.

  …

  The last thing I wanted to be wearing was a splint on my first day at
a new school, but since my mom was insistent that I’d wait until my checkup tomorrow after school, I was stuck with more than the ‘Look, a new girl!’ reactions I got the moment I stepped into the halls of PHS. I had those looks plus ‘Look, a new girl who’s been beaten up!’ too.

  Everyone stared as if I were a two-headed alien rolling up into school. I wasn’t sure if I should feel like a celebrity or an escaped mental patient. No one spoke to me.

  Luckily, PHS was easy to navigate and find classes. I was used to high schools that were at least four stories tall, had multiple wings, and open campuses. PHS had a couple of floors, but that was it.

  I found my homeroom class easily and sat through curious stares and a few tentative smiles. I didn’t see my neighbors until second period, and it was Daemon who strolled in seconds before the bell rang, with an easy smile on his full lips. Conversations practically ceased. Several of the girls around me even stopped scribbling in on their notebooks.

  Daemon had a sort of rock star entrance with that deadly swagger. He had everyone’s attention, especially when he shifted his trig textbook from one hand to the other and then ran his fingers through the tousled waves of his thick hair, letting it fall back over his forehead. His jeans hung low on his hips, so when he lifted his arm, he flashed a row of golden skin that somehow made math all the more interesting.

  A girl with reddish hair sighed next to me and said under her breath, “God, what I wouldn’t do for a piece of that. A Daemon sandwich should be on the menu.”

  Another girl giggled. “That is terrible.”

  “Along with the Thompson twins as a side dish,” the redhead replied, flushing as he drew close.

  “Lesa, you’re such a ho-bag,” laughed the brunette.

  I hastily averted my eyes to my notebook, but I still knew he’d taken the seat directly behind me. The entire length of my back tingled. A second later, I felt something poke me in my back. Biting down on my lip, I glanced over my shoulder.

  His smile was lopsided. “How’s the arm, Kittykat?”

  Excitement and dread warred inside me. Did he write on my back? I wouldn’t be surprised if he had. I felt my cheeks redden at the sparkle in his green eyes. “Good,” I said, tucking my hair back. “I get the splint off tomorrow, I think.” Daemon tapped his pen off the edge of the desk. “That should help.”