Oliver dropped his fork loudly, and Jacinda shot him a look. Ray leaned forward. “Something to say?”
“Maybe before you make this too exciting, you should point out to them that they’ll be moving around their whole life, fighting one thing after another. That sometimes people die.”
Ray nodded. “Those things are true. But we save people. Obviously, I have managed to have a great life, a great family. I do interesting work. I meet incredible people. There are good and bad things to the way everyone lives. Ours is that there is a risk, and we move a lot.”
My fingers tingled. It was an uncomfortable feeling, and one that happened whenever I got hit by sadness. This was happening. Colton and Thorn were going to go off and live a life like the Chees. They probably were perfect for it. But that meant that when this was over, they were going to live a life without me.
I was at a table surrounded by people. And yet once again, I was entirely alone. I was looking at loneliness down a path where my future was laid out exactly as it had once been. I forced myself to breathe.
Colton and Thorn had given up everything to get back to me, to help me. They said they wanted to be with me, that they were renting an apartment. I guess I had decided that was permanent. But what was the matter with me? I didn’t want to stay here. I was going north. I’d always told myself I would. We would beat this monster—this demon—and I’d go north. That was my destiny. It was my future. It was mine.
“You okay?” Thorn caught my attention, and I smiled. I’d missed a minute or two of conversation. I tried to catch up. They were making plans.
I took a sip of water. “Just a bit on my mind. All is well. Thank you for dinner.”
Jacinda reached over and squeezed my arm. “You’re welcome. Of course. I’m glad you enjoyed it. So, tell me about tomorrow. What do you have going on?”
All of their eyes were once again back on me. “I have school and community service. I think Colton is going with me, but I’m not sure now…” I faded off. Aaron was out cold because he’d saved me. I didn’t want anything to happen to anyone else.
Ray cleared his throat. “Colton, are you still planning on going? I want to keep Thorn on that computer. He’s finding things I can’t imagine.”
“Totally.” He grinned at me.
I nodded. Why did I have this big pit in my stomach? “Great.”
“Nice to have a team around.” Ray’s smile was huge.
I wondered why he was so happy about the whole thing. Was the world being overrun by monsters while the rest of us were oblivious? The food that had been so delicious sat like a stone in my stomach.
“If you don’t mind, I’d like to be excused,” I said.
Colton’s eyes narrowed thoughtfully. “You must be tired.”
I was, but I was also sad and afraid that I’d default to bitch-mode. Everyone else’s plates were empty, so I grabbed mine and the one next to me and brought them to the sink. Conversation picked up again, and I went about clearing and cleaning. The saucepan was going to have to be soaked, so I stood watching the soapy water fill it up.
A shoulder nudged mine, and I glanced over.
“We can do this,” Colton whispered.
“It’s done.” I reached for the towel hanging off the stove and used it to dry my hands. “I’m going to go to bed. Read one of Oliver’s fascinating and terrifying books.”
“Why don’t you come to my apartment?” he asked.
I lifted an eyebrow. Hadn’t he seen the giant poison cloud? The magic mojo of the Chees seemed to be keeping Erdirg away from us—me—so it seemed like a bad idea to go somewhere else.
“Maybe another night,” I replied, smiling to soften my refusal. His gaze roamed my face, but then he nodded.
“Mr. and Mrs. Chee, do you mind if Thorn and I spend the night?”
Gulp. Um. That seemed like it would be awkward. Jacinda seemed frighteningly open-minded to my interest in her sons, but I wondered if that open-mindedness would transfer to different boys.
“Of course,” Ray said immediately. “You can bunk down on the sofa or in Aaron’s or Oliver’s room.” His answer surprised me, because while he invited Thorn to continue his work on the computer, nothing he’d said gave any hint that they should stay here. It was very generous of him. Perhaps Ray shared Jacinda’s enlightened attitude. “Lacey will stay with Kelly. Girls with girls. Boys with boys.” I didn’t think I was imagining things when his smile seemed a little tighter.
But it was fine with me. After hearing about Colton and Thorn’s plans to follow in the Chee’s footsteps, I needed a little distance to get my head and heart on the same page.
“Thank you.” I didn’t argue. “I’m going to turn in. Kelly, I’ll leave the light on and don’t worry about making noise.” I smiled, turned, and didn’t glance back at anyone until I was in the room and the door was shut.
Then I pulled a fleece blanket printed with cat faces off her bed, dragged it over me, and shut my eyes.
Open your eyes.
The sun was on my face. It heated my skin, making it tight, and sweat dripped down the back of my neck. I forced my eyes to open, but it was too bright, like I was staring directly into the sun.
In front of me was a white passenger van, doors open for the faceless people climbing out of it. The door shut, the slam of metal so loud it made me jump.
Look around. The voice was familiar, and it took a moment for me to realize that it was my own. So I did. I looked around, taking in the scenery and the people who surrounded me, but everything was blurry and my eyes wouldn’t focus.
See. There was my voice again.
“I’m trying,” I told myself.
See everything. My voice was hard and demanding, but I didn’t know what I was looking for, and everything was out of focus.
“I’m trying!”
“Why did you have to make this difficult?” Jacinda’s voice roused me from my strange dream. I rubbed my eyes. Across the room, Kelly snored. Loudly. For such a small person, she certainly made a lot of noise.
Someone else sighed. “This is what parents do. They keep girls and boys apart from the same bed.” Ray.
“Oliver is over eighteen. Aaron is almost there, and Lacey is almost eighteen as well. Those two passed out in the living room are of age, too. All you have done is set up sneaking around and dragged Kelly into it.” Jacinda sounded pissed, and I winced. “Tomorrow, back off the rules. Let Kelly’s room be Kelly’s room, and the rest of them can fall in where they will. I’ve tried to fight this, but they’re all drawn together like magnets. You can’t keep the boys virgins, Ray.”
He laughed. “Fuck, Jacinda. Those are our sons you’re talking about.”
“We move them around constantly. At least let them have some good memories to go with the bad. That’s a wonderful girl in there. I’d wrap her up and take her with us if I could. Back off this tomorrow. Besides, I wouldn’t wish Kelly’s snoring on anyone. Poor Lacey needs to cuddle with Aaron, not have to sleep with a pillow over her head.”
He laughed, and I heard their footsteps retreating. “I told you we should have had her tonsils out years ago.”
They were an interesting, albeit strange, couple.
I turned again, trying to find a comfortable position. The earlier dream stuck with me. See? See what? Dreams were weird. My mouth was dry, and I needed water. I quietly got up, leaving Kelly snoring across the room. I could sleep through just about anything.
Thorn was on the couch, a laptop on his chest. His eyes were closed, and like Kelly, he snored loudly. I stopped to watch him for a second. He’d always been that way. Even when we were kids. Despite that noise, I’d loved sleepovers at his house. His family had been so normal. No dolls. Not too much booze. Not so much hatred. Then that had changed. But still, there were memories.
I didn’t see Colton. He must have been elsewhere. Maybe Aaron’s room, since Aaron was in Oliver’s bed? I didn’t know, and I wasn’t going to sneak around looking. I’d bee
n given a room. For tonight, I would follow the rules.
The television was on low, and as I padded into the kitchen to get my water, I listened to the news.
“The couple was last seen in their white minivan driving east on I-10. Anyone with any information on the couple is urged to call the number on the bottom of your screen.”
I shivered. I’d seen that van. Hadn’t I? Where had I seen it?
A figure appeared in the darkness. It took me a second to realize it was Colton. He walked from the back of the house where the bedrooms were toward me. “Lacey? You okay?” His voice was a low whisper.
I took a deep sip of my drink. “I’m okay.”
“Is that vodka or water?”
I blinked, taking a long second to realize he was joking. “Water. I don’t drink.”
“Oliver says Kelly snores. As bad as that one?” He nodded toward Thorn.
I smiled. “The same.”
“I used to have to go sleep on the porch of our bungalow some nights. But then, so did he because I talk in my sleep. One of us was always keeping the other one up.”
When we were little, Colton was the friend I had to compete with. He had a house that could rival Thorn’s. ATVs. Horses. I remembered hearing about a birthday party with a water slide and laser tag.
“Why are you up?” I asked.
He shrugged. “Couldn’t sleep. I was thinking about tomorrow. Your community service.” A smile crossed his face as he sat in a double loveseat and patted one side.
I placed my glass on a side table and settled in next to him. There was a blanket on the back of the sofa, and he settled it around us before reaching over and handing me my glass again. I’d just taken a sip of water when he said, “What made you draw peens all over the water tower?”
I choked; my gaze immediately went to Thorn, who I was certain would wake up. Colton was patient, rubbing my back in circles until I could breathe again. Then he lifted his eyebrows.
They were gone before the state championships, so they’d missed the drama. I thought back to that night. It had been so cold, and the wind shrieked in my ears.
“I had a feeling about the team.” I shook my head, because feeling didn’t sum it up. “It was more than that. It was a certainty that if I didn’t do something, then there would be a catastrophic event. It bothered me for days. My stomach was in knots, and every time I read a banner hyping up the school for the game, I felt sick.”
He stared at me intently, so I went on. “You know, the dicks weren’t actually me.”
His eyes widened. “What? Then why are you doing community service for it?”
“Because it was my idea.” It had been genius, and the set-up had taken a week. “I had detention that week with Riley Scully, do you know him?”
Chuckling softly, Colton nodded his head. “Yeah. Not a bad guy, just dumb.”
“Well, he’s also an excellent dick artist, and I commented on the one he had on his three-ring binder. I asked him if he’d heard of the dicks drawn on the water tower last state championship, and how the team was certain that was their lucky charm.”
“He didn’t buy that.”
I thought Colton had said he knew Riley. Lifting my eyebrows, I waited. Realization dawned on his face. “You are diabolical.”
I bowed my head. “Everyone was so busy looking at the water tower, they didn’t see little ol’ me letting the air out of the tires of the busses. And ummm, disconnecting the batteries. The team ended up getting delayed and missed a huge pileup on the highway.”
“You saved their lives.” Colton studied me. “They’d have been killed, or seriously injured.”
He got it. “I don’t even mind the community service. That pit in my stomach hadn’t been for nothing. I don’t know how I knew to push Riley, but I did. As soon as I saw that stupid dick, the idea came to me, and everything just settled.”
Colton drew me to him, and I leaned over until we were both reclining, me almost on top of him. “Do you remember anything else about the day we spent together?”
I blinked. “No. Why?”
He ran his fingers over my arm. “Because I think that you have these feelings a lot. I think… I think you might be psychic. Or sensitive. I’m not sure what to call it.”
Psychic? Like some weird woman on television. I didn’t like that word. “No. I’m not. Trust me—there’s nothing odd about me. I mean other than this. No.”
He kissed the side of my head, lingering there for a moment. “Okay.”
Thorn shifted slightly, and his snoring paused for a second before he started again at a slightly different volume.
“Really didn’t bother you to sleep with him like that?”
I lifted my head to look at him. “It didn’t. For the longest time, his house was a safe place. It just meant I could relax.” I twined my fingers with his. “What did I do that day that made you think I was sensitive? How did it even happen? What I remember is being in the car with you two. And things were happening physically. How did we get there? I just… I have nothing.”
He pressed his nose against my hair, breathing me in. “That morning you were having to clean up the gym. It was a mess from the spring pep rally. Streamers everywhere. You’d gotten into trouble for talking back to the principal earlier that week.”
Now that, I remembered. I rolled my eyes. That might not even have been the demon. The principal was just a douchebag.
Colton cleared his throat. “I came in because I had been sent to the gym to find my math teacher’s glasses that he left there. I volunteered. Hated Calculus. Anyway, I saw you in there. You’d never spoken to me. Other than to glare at me in the hallway.”
I shook my head. “Well, you were competition for Thorn. That’s how it felt. And he picked you.”
“I know you felt that way. I tried to talk to you because… Lacey, you’re hot.”
I snorted. “Thanks, Colt.”
He squeezed me. “It’s true. You were busy cleaning up. I started trying to help you, and we ended up getting locked in the janitor’s closet together. You. Me. The brooms. We knocked. Banged. It was a whole mess. But then I tried to put the moves on you the way I did with most girls. Turn on the charm. You had none of it. Nope. So we just talked. And it was perfect.”
I really hated that I couldn’t remember this. I mean, I would love to remember what I talked to Colton about in a broom closet for hours.
“Eventually, the janitor came. Let us out. It was lunchtime, so I followed you into the cafeteria. You were really shocked. I guess you thought I’d leave you alone but, fuck no. Now that I had your attention, I was keeping it. You tried to kick me from the table twice. I didn’t take the hint, on purpose. By the end of lunch, you’d decided you liked me enough to take the stares. That’s when Thorn arrived.”
I waited, but Colton didn’t continue for a second. “And?”
“He wasn’t thrilled. Took me aside. Told me you were his, had always been his. He’s my best friend, but I told him to fuck off. He’d never made a move. Time to get out of the way.”
I tried to imagine being in a similar position, but I didn’t have any friends who were girls. What would I do if one of them, someone I trusted and I thought of as my best friend, told me she wouldn’t move aside so I could date the person I liked? My stomach churned at that.
“What did Thorn do?” I asked.
“Smiled.”
My legs were scrunched up because while the loveseat was long, it wasn’t long enough for me to stretch out. It made it difficult for me to turn so I could see Colton’s face as he told the story, and when I tried, he just mushed my face back toward the cushion.
“He smiled?” The words were mumbled.
“Yes. Almost got him punched in the teeth, but I’d misjudged him because while he’d been waiting, he’d been planning. He knew exactly how he would tell you what he felt. I thought I had one over on him, but I didn’t. He told me to go for it. You could be with both of us until you decided which
one of us you liked the most.”
Was that still what they were waiting for? The idea made me anxious, but I forced myself to ask. “Is that what you still want?”
“No.” He shifted behind me, one hand pushing my hair over my shoulder. His lips were cool against the back of my neck, and I shivered. “No. Everything changed that night. I don’t know what would have happened if that thing had never appeared. I’d like to think we’d be back here, you and me and Thorn, going about our lives, not giving a shit what anyone thought, but I’m not sure. I changed that night. I couldn’t have survived what came after without Thorn.”
“It must have been so scary.” After all, Colton and Thorn were only a little older than me. It was as hard for them to be on their own as it would be for me. Not to mention, they hadn’t been able to remember everything right away either, and they had that compulsion pushing them out of town.
“It feels big,” I said, my face heated at how what I said could be taken in a sexual way, so I went on to add quickly, “the way I feel about you and Thorn. It feels bigger than something that happened in a day.”
“I know,” he replied.
“It makes sense when it comes to Thorn, he was my best friend for ages, but to have made a connection with you within a day, and for that to lead to how I feel now?”
He turned our positions so I wasn’t half lying on him anymore but seated between his legs, facing him. “How do you feel now?”
Was he asking for a declaration? I studied his face. There was nothing about his expression that was cocky. I didn’t think I’d ever seen him that vulnerable before. “I like you so much, Colt.”
His eyes closed, and he leaned his head forward until we were forehead to forehead. “Good.”
It would be easy to just go to sleep right now. Forehead-to-forehead, our bodies so close we were practically sharing air. But I still had questions, and I might never get another chance to ask them. Besides, I liked listening to his voice.
“How did we end up in the desert?”
Eyes in the Darkness (The Coveted) Page 18