“I’m sitting here trying to come up with a plan that keeps us together.” She held up both hands, palms up. “I’ve got nothing.”
“Me, either.” Asher ran a hand through his hair, mussing it until it stood on end.
“So we’re going to do this?” I asked.
Lucy balled up her napkin and tossed it on her plate. “I’m in. I’m tired of being the hunted. It would make a nice change to do the hunting for once.”
Her fierce expression unnerved me, though I’d had the same thought moments ago. So far she’d listened when Asher or I had given her orders. We’d kept her safe, but this would be different. More dangerous. I wanted to hide her away somewhere, but there wasn’t a place far enough away where she would be out of reach from the people after us. She wouldn’t let me coddle her anyhow. Not when our father was held captive and we could save him.
Asher nodded. “I’m in, too.”
“Okay,” I said. “It’s a plan.”
It should have made me feel better to have a strategy. Instead, a creeping sense of dread tangled with my nerves. Our time in California had brought nothing but pain and terror. What would our return bring? And why couldn’t I stop wishing that Gabe was here to help?
Two towns over, we found an empty house with a FOR RENT sign on the lawn. A little online research had helped us secure lodging more than once. Homes listed with descriptions of “available for immediate move-in” were right up our alley. That often meant that the house sat empty. If I felt guilty about breaking into somebody’s place, I got over it pretty quickly when I thought about what my enemies would do to Lucy if they caught her.
At first, we’d stayed in motels, but we’d been too easy to track. People noticed three teenagers checking in without parents. Last October, we’d nearly been caught at a motel in North Carolina, and we’d had to adjust our strategy. If that meant my morals had adjusted, too, I could live with it.
The vacant single-story Tudor-style brick house sat at the end of a long lane of similar homes. We were far enough away from the neighbors that we felt safe using our camping lantern to guide us through the dark, empty rooms. It wasn’t much: just two bedrooms, a bathroom, living room, and kitchen. Our quiet voices echoed, and shadows slid across the walls, as we unpacked the gear we traveled with.
I picked a bedroom and unrolled my sleeping bag on the bare carpet. Usually, I waited for Asher to choose first and settled beside him, but that habit was quickly becoming pathetic considering how he avoided me. The white paint and lack of furniture in the room gave no clue to the type of people who had once lived here. In the living room, I could hear Asher greeting his sister on the phone before he handed it over to Lucy.
“How is she?” my sister asked Lottie.
A few seconds later, she asked, “Can you tell her that I miss her and I love her?”
Every time we spoke to Asher’s sister, Lucy had the same questions. And always, the hope in her voice soured to overwhelming disappointment because Laura hadn’t magically woken up from her coma. I sank down on my sleeping bag and turned my hands over to stare at the useless limbs. I hadn’t been able to help my stepmom any more than I’d been able to save my mother. It was the head injuries. My mother had died of hers. What if Laura never woke?
I stretched out, sliding into the sleeping bag to stare at the ceiling rafters, easing up on the reins I kept on my emotions. I wanted two minutes to hide and grieve. Two minutes when I didn’t have to pretend everything was okay for Lucy. Two minutes when I wasn’t trying to figure out how to be there for Asher when he hated being in the same room with me.
I sensed him before he spoke, and I steeled myself for another un-confrontation.
“You didn’t want to talk to Lottie?” he asked.
Asher braced himself against the doorway, with a hand on each side of the frame. He wore an awkward expression on his face as if he couldn’t decide whether or not to enter the room. I couldn’t handle another rejection, so I didn’t extend an invite.
I shrugged. “I overheard Lucy. Nothing’s changed?”
He took one step into the room. “No. Laura is stable, but no change.”
Four months of status quo. Lucy would cry herself to sleep tonight, and I couldn’t fix things or make her feel better. We fought against a tide that kept coming no matter what I did. Tonight, I could be towed under the surface and drown if Asher said the wrong thing.
“Did Lucy get settled?” I asked, changing the subject.
“Yeah. She’s at the end of the hall. She said she was going to turn in.”
He took another tentative step forward. For a second, a blissful, hopeful second, I thought maybe Asher finally wanted to talk. I lowered my mental wall, and Asher took two hurried steps backward. Let him go, Remy. Defeated, I rolled to face the wall, flipping the switch on the lantern by my head.
“Alright. Good night, then,” Asher said.
I sensed him lingering in the doorway. I used to be so in tune with him that I could guess what he was thinking, even though I couldn’t read his mind. Now I had no clue where his head was at, except that he wanted distance from me. Well, he could have it because chasing after him was killing me.
“Remy. I’m sorry,” he said, his voice a guttural whisper. “I’m not trying to hurt you.”
I’d forgotten to raise my walls back up. He could hear my every thought. I sat up and faced him. Asher could see my expression with his Protector eyesight, but I could only make out his shape in the dark room.
“Talk to me. I don’t understand what changed. We were okay until that day in Townsend Park. You’ve changed,” I said.
The park with its labyrinth had been our place, until the day Franc followed us into our retreat. He’d used the woods against us, capturing Asher and luring me in after him. We’d escaped, but my family had paid the price.
“You haven’t,” Asher responded. Before I could question that bittersweet statement, he continued, “I have changed. The things they did to me . . . What happened . . .”
Everything in me yearned to reach out to him, but he wouldn’t welcome it. “Will you tell me what happened?”
I knew only the barest details of the time Asher had been held hostage. During the weeks he’d been tortured, I’d thought he was dead. When Gabe and I had rescued him, we’d been stunned at the damage to his body. The wound from the bullet that had grazed his head. The weight he’d lost. A half-dozen broken bones, and more bruises and cuts than I’d been able to count. The way he’d carried himself had changed, too. Before he’d moved with a kind of arrogant confidence, but now he held himself back, tense and watching.
“Asher?” I asked when the silence stretched on. “Please, come here.”
He wasn’t able to talk about what happened. I could accept that. If he understood that I wouldn’t push him, then maybe he wouldn’t be afraid to be near me.
It’s okay, I thought. I just want to hold you.
“I can’t . . .” he whispered.
I squeezed my eyes closed and rolled away from him. “That’s okay. I’ll see you in the morning, okay?”
I was proud of how my voice didn’t break when I wanted to crawl into a hole and lick my wounds. I should be used to this kind of rejection. My mother had avoided my touch, too. How could I fault Asher for feeling the same after everything that had happened to him? I’d withstand ten times the pain to touch you, he’d once told me. That was before my powers made him able to feel everything that Franc’s men did to him. I fiercely wished we could go back to the days when the return of Asher’s senses meant hours celebrating with kisses and heated touches.
I started when a warm hand sifted through my hair, lifting the strands off my nape. I hadn’t heard Asher cross the room, but I sensed him kneeling behind me. I stilled as he trailed a hand over my shoulder and then down, down to trace the indentation of my waist and the curve of my hip. Even with the sleeping bag and my clothing providing a barrier between us, my skin lit up, awakening and leaning toward hi
m like he was the sun. It had been so long since he’d touched me like this.
“I miss you, too, mo cridhe. It’s not about you.”
He’d been listening to my thoughts again.
“Isn’t it?”
I didn’t say Gabe’s name, but then I didn’t have to. Somehow I’d bonded to both brothers, and they thought I had done it on purpose. They could both read my mind, and our powers had increased before my healing ability had begun to make Asher more mortal. I’d thought he no longer blamed me for bonding to Gabe, but maybe he couldn’t let it go.
“It’s not Gabe,” Asher ground out. He reached for my shoulder again, pressing until I rolled to my back. “Can we not talk tonight? Let me hold you. Can that be enough?”
More hope unfurled inside me. I didn’t know why he’d changed his mind, but I didn’t care. I nodded. He unzipped my sleeping bag and slid in beside me, curving my body into his. Until that moment, I hadn’t realized how cold I’d been, freezing from the inside out every time he shrank away from me. Asher pulled the top of the sleeping bag over both of us, his arm wrapped around my waist, a heavy, comforting weight. His lips touched my neck again, and I shivered, thawing as heat settled in me, around me, over me.
I love you, Asher.
“Sleep, Remy.”
And I did, feeling more peaceful than I had in a long time.
CHAPTER THREE
I can’t breathe.
My lungs threatened to explode, and the haze of sleep snapped away as I woke to instant, complete terror. Hands crushed my neck, choking me. I fought them off even before I opened my eyes to a darkened room, but something constricted my movements.
I clutched at the fingers to loosen their hold, and my nails raked skin hard enough to draw blood. The grip loosened for a second, and I sucked in a deep breath. I threw out an elbow, and my other hand fisted in the cloth that bound me. The nylon slipped through my fingers. The sleeping bag. I remembered Asher sleeping beside me.
My eyes adjusted to the faint early dawn light coming through the curtain-less windows. The light threw shadows across Asher’s face as he leaned over me, ignoring the arm I used to fend him off. Unseeing eyes stared into mine.
“Asher!”
The expression on his face didn’t change. I pushed against his chest, trying to scramble away from him. The sleeping bag cut off my escape, and his fingers clamped around my wrist with brute strength.
“Asher,” I croaked. “Stop!”
My scream turned into a meek whimper when his body landed on mine, his weight heavy and suffocating. His hand covered my mouth and nose, cutting off what little air I had.
Pure animal instinct kicked in. I couldn’t lash out with my legs, bound as they were by the sleeping bag, so I bucked my hips. Then I cuffed him in the temple with my free hand, hitting him over and over again with my fist. Nothing worked. Spots popped against my closed eyelids.
On the verge of losing consciousness, my powers took over. Hot red light sizzled through the room, and Asher’s face blanched as my pain struck him. He focused and saw me beneath him, his hands wrapped around my neck. His eyes rounded, and he threw himself back, tearing at the sleeping bag’s zipper to release us. Finally free, he shoved away until his back hit the opposite wall.
I gasped and coughed, my lungs greedy for air. My harsh breathing morphed into frantic sobbing as I stared at him.
You tried to kill me.
“No! Oh God, Remy. Not you. I’m sorry, I’m sorry, I’m sorry . . .”
His tortured apology went on and on. He held out a hand toward me. My heart launched into my throat, and I was on my feet before the thought of escape had fully formed. I raced out of the room, searching for the bathroom. I slammed the bathroom door behind me and twisted the lock.
Asher tried to kill me.
I braced myself against the counter, my knees too weak to prop me up without help. In the mirror, my eyes looked wild with my pupils swallowing the blue irises. My lungs burned, and my heart galloped around a track in my chest.
It had been my stepfather all over again. Dean used to hurt me, and I hadn’t been able to stop him. If I hadn’t used my powers on Asher, he would have . . . The violence and fear and adrenaline unleashed sobs that hurt my chest as they escaped out of me, and I shook uncontrollably as I sank to the floor. I pressed my chilled cheek to the wall, letting the tears fall as I relived the sensation of my boyfriend’s hands around my neck, suffocating me.
This was a new kind of nightmare. Asher was coming apart right in front of me. He’d been the one person I could count on, the one person who had my back, but I couldn’t trust him anymore. My feet had been swept out from under me, and I didn’t know what to do.
I couldn’t hide in the bathroom forever, though. A long time later, I fought back the tears and scrubbed my wet cheeks with a cheap, scratchy towel, pulling myself together before I opened the bathroom door. I peeked in the other bedroom first to check on Lucy. My sister had slept through everything, and why not? I hadn’t been able to scream with Asher cutting off my air. I shuddered, glad that she hadn’t seen what he’d done.
The walk to my bedroom took all of my courage. Asher hadn’t moved from his spot on the floor. His elbows were propped on his raised knees, and his chest heaved as he gripped the hair at his temples in both hands. He’d been crying, too. Part of me, the part that loved him and knew he hadn’t meant to hurt me, wanted to comfort him. Another part of me wanted to lash out at him for turning me into that thing I hated—a small, cornered animal. I threw up my mental walls to gain a measure of privacy, feeling too exposed.
He looked up and his gaze dropped to my neck. His face twisted in anguish. “Tell me you’re okay,” he pleaded.
“I’m okay,” I said, but my husky voice belied my words.
I eased to the floor across the room from him, unable to bring myself to sit any closer. He was fighting his monsters right in front of me, but I couldn’t help him when he’d brought all of my demons back to life, screaming for blood. My toes curled into the carpet, and I let my hair swing down to hide my face. I eyed him warily when he crawled toward me. One of his hands tentatively brushed my hair aside, and I jumped as if he’d hit me. He lowered his head, and his cheeks burned a fiery red.
“Will you let me help you?” he asked, his voice colored by shame.
I didn’t need his help to heal my injuries. It was too soon for him to ask me to lower my guard when my anger and hurt were barely banked.
“Please let me do this.”
He raised his gaze to mine, inviting me to see his naked expression. He was torturing himself for attacking me in his sleep, and he teetered on the edge of control as he waited for me to blast him. I could destroy him, and I think maybe he wanted me to punish him. This is Asher, I reminded myself.
I tipped my chin in a nod and lowered my defenses. His fingertips touched my toes, as if he didn’t trust himself to get closer. With his help, it took only a minute to heal the wounds on my body. The marks disappeared from my skin, and the pain faded to a memory. I wished I could forget the rest as easily.
“What happened, Asher?” I asked.
He shook his head, his green eyes bleak. “A nightmare,” he whispered. “I didn’t know it was you, Remy. I swear it. I would never hurt you . . .”
His sentence broke off because he knew exactly how much he’d hurt me. Red marks marred the skin on his wrist and neck where I’d transferred my injuries, and bruises formed on his forehead where I’d hit him. I didn’t know what to say, so I let the silence stretch on and on.
Asher moved to sit beside me, his shoulders hunched as he rubbed his neck. “I was dreaming. I was back in that prison with Alcais and your grandfather’s men. The things they were doing to me . . .” He gulped. “Somehow I felt you next to me and you were one of them. I struck out. I swear I didn’t know it was you.”
The anger didn’t fade so much as the sorrow outweighed it. I leaned toward him, brushing his shoulder with mine. “I believe
you,” I said.
Dean had been an abusive bastard who’d enjoyed causing pain. If I’d thought Asher was anything like my stepfather, I would have taken Lucy and run as far and as fast as I could.
My words didn’t make him feel any better. He jerked his head back, hitting his head against the wall once, and I started. “I’m so sorry, mo cridhe. What the hell is wrong with me?” he asked, his voice raw.
The past wasn’t letting him go. I should have recognized what was happening to Asher. The edginess and over-vigilance. The distance he’d put between us. The constant sadness in his eyes. Hadn’t I been like him when I’d lived with the constant threat of my stepfather attacking me?
I touched his jaw, turning him to face me. “They hurt you, Asher. We’ve been so busy running, hiding, surviving that you haven’t had a chance to stop and deal with what happened.” I paused, knowing that his pain might never go away. Tonight was proof that my old wounds still lingered under the surface. “Maybe . . . Maybe it would be better for you to go to Lottie.”
My chest ached as I forced the words out. I didn’t want him to leave, but what if he needed the distance to find some measure of peace? It hurt him to be near me. He’d made that clear. I reminded him of everything that had happened to him, and everything that could happen if our bond made him more human. If he went to Lottie, he could at least be rid of that worry. Truthfully, he’d left me already.
Asher’s jaw tensed as he read my thoughts. “Do you really think I’d leave you to find your father on your own? Give me some credit,” he snapped.
His anger sparked my own. Nothing I said or did made him happy. I was trying to do the right thing, but where he was concerned I couldn’t seem to manage it. “I’m sorry, but I’m not a damned mind reader like you. And you refuse to talk to me, so how would I know what you’re thinking?”
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