by Fleur Smith
He couldn’t even pretend that he wanted to match her up with anyone else anymore. No, he wanted her for himself even though it was a selfish and terrible idea. What did he have to offer her after all? A forbidden love and eventual heartache.
Part of him was convinced it would all be okay. In the moments after his acknowledging the fact that he was in love with her—really acknowledging it down to his deepest core—his body had surged with the same feeling of rightness he’d had on a few other occasions. Even though he usually took that radiating rightness as a sign of approval by the formless entities that guided his existence, he knew it was wrong—little more than a trick of his mind. He’d convinced himself it was okay, only because he wanted it so badly. As a cupid, he knew how readily emotions and hormones could trick the mind and body.
Still, he wanted nothing more than to take Becca into his arms and confess his undying love to her.
Undying. he scoffed.
That was part of the problem. He was a cupid, a dead being reanimated with certain gifts to help humanity. He wasn’t supposed to feel love.
Or jealousy, he thought bitterly.
Even though he had, it wasn’t a simple matter of sweeping Becca off her feet, falling in love together, and then living a happily ever after. If he was right that Becca was the final match he was destined to make, then he would remain on Earth until her match with Drew was solidified and then . . .
He didn’t know what would happen then. It scared the hell out of him, but he knew there was no point dwelling on it.
“Evan?” Becca’s voice called for him.
He turned toward the sound of her voice, but didn’t have a chance to answer her before she spoke again.
“Why are you standing down here in the dark?”
“Well, it is a darkroom isn’t it?” He tried, unsuccessfully, to joke.
“I guess.” She flicked on the red safety light. “Are you okay? You’ve seemed a little off since the BBQ.”
No, I’m not okay. I’m madly, completely, undeniably in love with you. Only, there’s jack all I can do about it because you need to be with another human being and not some crazy, supernatural stalker. So, instead of loving you like I would like to do, I have to help you find a lasting relationship with someone else. Someone who isn’t me, but is probably better than me in so many ways. Maybe every way. He’s probably much more deserving of you, and yet I want you anyway. And it kills me that you want him instead of me.
Evan knew he could never voice the words. Becca was exactly the sort of person who would take the guilt of his emotions onto herself. She would find some way to feel responsible for his love and then he’d have to deal with the internal fallout that was sure to accompany the guilt on top of everything else. By hiding away his true feelings, he was protecting her—and therefore himself—from a lot of pain and misery. At least, that’s what he kept reminding himself each time he was struck with the urge to blurt out his feelings. Each time his mind whispered, Just tell her already.
“Yeah,” he said instead. “Some of my prior assignments are just a little out of reach at the moment, that’s all.” It wasn’t a complete lie. After all, he couldn’t sense most of his matches at all any longer. Even Karen, who should have still been burning brightly in his heart, was nothing more than a very dull sensation somewhere at the base of his skull.
“Will you tell me about them?” Becca asked as she moved around setting up little trays full of chemicals and other stuff that Evan had no clue about.
“Umm.”
“Oh wait, is there some sort of confidentiality thing? Like cupidlover privilege or something.”
He found himself staring at her lips as she murmured cupidlover and he liked the combination of those two words far too much. “No, it’s just there’s so many.”
Becca nodded, no doubt recalling their previous conversation about how plentiful his roster had been before her. “Well, tell me more about yourself then.”
“What’s to tell? I’m little more than what my assignments need me to be.” I’m on Earth only to match up lonely hearts—I don’t exist for any other reason. It was a pretty pitiful thought, but he couldn’t help thinking it.
He’d never really been one to dwell on the miserable side of life, but melancholy had taken residence within him at his realization that he’d done the one thing he never should have done. Once his love had broken the dam wall Heaven—or whoever it was he reported to—had built around his human emotions, feelings he’d not experienced himself for too many years had rapidly flooded into him. Love, lust, desire, and jealousy all mingled through his every thought. In fact, he was only a few sins away from owning the full collection.
“No, I mean what you were like, you know, before.”
“Before I died?”
“I wasn’t going to put it quite so bluntly, but yeah.”
“I dunno, I was just a normal guy I guess.”
“A normal guy?”
“Yep. That’s me, Mr. Normal.”
Becca was watching her hands and Evan longed for her to look up at him. “It had to have been difficult.”
“What being normal?”
“No. Dying,” she whispered the word scandalously. It was clear that she feared the word, and the probably concept behind it. It wasn’t surprising though, most people who hadn’t experienced it did fear the potential nothingness beyond the grave.
“It wasn’t as bad as I’d thought it would be,” he answered, wanting to spare her some of the truth. The agony of death was something he was unlikely to forget. Ever. It was both instantaneous and endless all at once. He’d always wondered whether part of the sensation he’d felt had been a result of actually going downstairs for a while before being plucked up for cupid duties. Of course, he had no one to confirm that with.
If he had briefly spent time in Hell, it was most likely wiped from his mind—although he tended to get hot flushes and prickles along his skin each time he thought the word. His thoughts spiraled into a darkness which he’d rarely allowed to inhabit his life since he’d first woken to his new cupified world.
A click and an explosion of light snapped him from his thoughts and he looked up in surprise. “Huh?”
“Sorry.” Becca held her camera in her hands. It was pointed at the desk in front of her, but Evan couldn’t remember her bringing it out—he must have been more lost in his past than he’d thought. “I was just testing my new flash.”
“It’s okay. I think I was a little lost there for a moment. Now, where were we? Oh, that’s right. You were going to show me the photos from our trip the other day weren’t you?”
“Yeah.” She gave him a shy smile. “But I won’t do all of them. It’s still weird having someone else down here with me.”
Evan’s heart sank. Doesn’t she want me here? Her heart was calling to him still, and she didn’t appear angry or uncomfortable, but he wanted to give her an out if she needed one.
“I—I can go if you’d prefer?”
“No. No, that’s, uh, not what I meant. It’s just that I don’t usually have anyone with me down here. It’s part of me that I’ve never shared with anyone.”
“What? Ever?”
She shrugged as if it was no big deal that she’d brought him down here to share this with her now. “It’s just that I put so much of myself into the images, and I don’t really like sharing them until I’ve seen the end results myself.”
“It’s really okay if you don’t want me here. I can see them when you’re rea—”
“Evan?” she interrupted.
“Yeah?”
“Shut up and help me over here, will you?”
He was so desperate to do as she’d asked that the instant she’d issued the request, he’d zipped to her side using his special ability for the second time that evening. She gasped when he suddenly appeared inches away from her side.
“I didn’t mean that way,” she said as she tried to recapture her breath. “Walking speed would have bee
n fine.”
“Sorry.” I just can’t seem to control myself around you.
Even as the thought crossed his mind, his gaze fell on the understated beauty of her face. The red safety light reflected lightly on her features, deepening the color of her lips and giving her a flushed and desperate appearance.
For half a second, he imagined being in close proximity to her for other reasons. He dreamed of slipping his arm around her waist, of pulling her against him, of pressing his lips to hers, and of feeling her tongue tangle with his. Realizing that his no-longer-lifeless appendage was lifting as his thoughts raced along the sordid path, he took a step away from Becca to give her some space—and to stop himself from impaling her leg with his desperate need for her.
“What do you need me to do?” he asked, wishing that he could stop the innuendo that seemed to drip off every syllable. At least, it did to his own ears.
Becca didn’t seem to notice, or if she did, she steadfastly ignored it. “Pick one.” She handed him a small magnifying tool, before flicking a switch. An ancient light-box hummed into action, displaying the negatives she’d developed after their trip to the cemetery.
“I don’t really know what I’m looking for,” he said. The magnifying piece was still sitting in his palm.
Becca smiled reassuringly at him before reaching and taking it out of his palm again. “You’re looking for any photos that catch your eye.”
She hovered the magnifying tool just above the negative strip and bent over to examine the photos.
Evan took the opportunity to check out her ass, at least until he realized what he was doing and shook himself out of his lust-filled stupor. He then copied Becca’s stance, leaning over the table and looking through the glass as best as he could from his odd angle. He figured they weren’t really designed for two people to look through together, but didn’t complain because his proximity to Becca gave him a chance to inhale her sweet perfume.
The light-box flickered and dimmed before Becca smacked it lightly, causing the humming to kick up a notch. The light glowed once more at what Evan assumed was the correct level of intensity.
As he examined the strips Becca had laid out, he was left wondering exactly what he was supposed to be looking at. Many of the images were just black squares with the occasional white streaks running through them.
“You have to imagine the image inverted,” Becca said. She was so close that her breath washed over him in a wave of peppermint-scented warmth.
The sensation threw his concentration completely and he had no idea how he was supposed to imagine anything other than holding her in his arms and tasting that peppermint during a perfect kiss.
“It can take a little getting used to,” Becca added.
“What’s that one?” He pointed to a square which held what looked vaguely like a person-shaped streak.
The white from the light-bed had reduced the effect of the red safety light, but it depended on the exact angle he looked at Becca from, so he might have imagined her cheeks flaming red momentarily as he pointed to the picture.
“That was just a test shot. It’s not really one I’d print. Why don’t we do this one?” She pointed to something that just looked like three grey lumps with a bit of white squiggle in a sea of black.
“Um, sure,” Evan said. He wasn’t convinced that there was anything decent on that photo, but she was the expert—well, the hobbyist.
Becca made the decision final by flicking the light-box back off again. The hum died away slowly, droning down to nothingness.
Evan stepped away, prepared to let her get to work to develop the squiggly lumps.
“No way, buddy,” she said as she reached for his arm and dragged him closer to her. “You are doing this one all on your lonesome.”
“I don’t know what I’m doing though. What if I ruin it?”
“I won’t let you destroy the negative, and it’s easy enough to redo a print if I need to.”
“Are you sure?”
“Look at you getting all nervous.” She laughed. “I’m sure. There’s not really that much you can do wrong. I mean the worst the thing you can do is that you get all the chemicals mixed up and they spontaneously combust.”
He swallowed heavily.
She nudged his shoulder with her palm. “I’m kidding. The worst you can do is screw up the print, and under my careful tutelage, I’m sure you won’t even do that.”
“If you’re certain?”
“Do you trust me?” Her gaze raked over his face, he was certain she was looking for any signs of doubt.
He nodded. “Okay, let’s do this.”
Becca guided him through the process step by step, and to his surprise it all went relatively well. At least as well as it could have gone when he spent over half the time trying to will away errant erections and the other half trying not to keep staring at her pretty pout and perfect breasts.
I really need to get my head back on straight, he thought.
When the image bloomed for him, just like it had for Becca when he’d watched her work on his first day with her, his mouth split into an excited grin.
Her emotions were buoying, dragging him back out of the darkness whenever his thoughts strayed to thinking about things that could never happen—like how good she would look in a wedding dress waiting for him at the end of the aisle.
It was only after they’d run through the whole process and had hung the photo up to dry that Evan had a good look at it. The image was a series of four headstones. One of them was eerily familiar, and it didn’t take him long to realize why.
“Becca, why did you take this photo?” he asked around the lump that was firmly lodged in his throat.
“I liked the way the sun was positioned behind that tree.” She pointed to a spot in the back of the image which demonstrated what she was talking about.
“Is that all?”
“I don’t understand what you’re asking.”
“This grave. Why did you take a photo of this particular grave?”
She seemed embarrassed, but Evan couldn’t figure out why.
“That’s my family’s plot,” she said. “My mom, my dad, my grandmother, and my great-aunt.” She pointed to each of the headstones in turn.
“Rose,” Evan said.
Becca spun toward him, an odd expression on her face.
“How did you know that?” she demanded.
Evan wanted to tell her everything, his burgeoning emotions, the uncanny resemblance—which now appeared to be the result of a familial link as well as the recycled soul that resided within her skin—and the story of his Rose, but looking into her confused and worried eyes, he knew he couldn’t burden her with it all. He decided it would be best to just leave it buried so that only one of them had to deal with the burden of impossible love.
“It’s written there,” he murmured, taking the coward’s way out and pointing to the image, refusing to meet Becca’s gaze.
“Oh, of course.” She looked away from him as she frowned. “Why did you want to know about the graves?”
He scratched his hand through his hair. “I just wondered, that’s all.”
Becca’s mood seemed to drop, and with it Evan’s plummeted. Without her optimism and happiness to latch onto, he was left to flounder in a sea of darkness that was of his own making.
“I think I’ve had enough time down here for one day,” she said, even though they’d only processed the one print. “I think I might just clean up and then head to bed.”
Evan nodded as she turned away from him, feeling like he’d missed the opportunity of a lifetime—or of his half-lifetime anyway.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Becca woke the following morning feeling torn. Something had happened with Evan in the darkroom. There had been something, some truth, on the very tip of his tongue that he’d withheld for some reason. She didn’t know why he’d stopped himself from saying what he’d wanted to, but she did realize it was out of character for him. Even in the
short time she’d known Evan, he’d been nothing but entirely honest with her. Sometimes a little too honest, in fact.
She wondered whether she should have pressed him for more. How terrible could his deep, dark secret really be after all?
Perhaps the secrets he was keeping were very deep and dark if he wanted to hide them when he’d revealed so much that could be considered bad. After all, she thought, he was—is?—dead.
He just didn’t seem like the sort of person—cupid—to have enemies, secrets, or a dark past.
As her mind ran through the possibilities, each one more ridiculous than the last, she sighed. The fact was, there was no way of her knowing what it was—not unless he opened up about it. Perhaps it was innocent, but terrible—maybe he’d received word of when he needed to leave and was just trying to make the most of their time together.
Despite the fact that she knew that he was keeping something from her, and despite her curiosity over what it might be, Becca was determined to not let it ruin anything else like it had destroyed the mood the previous evening. She was more than willing to enjoy her day at work as much as possible and then later her date with Drew. The thought of a proper, actual date with a real, red-blooded man who was clearly interested in her—and not likely to whine the whole night about what might have been with Miss Right who’d left him recently—was actually rather exciting.
She dressed as fast as she could and raced to the kitchen, prepared to eat whatever she could find in the pantry that could be eaten in a hurry. Instead, she found a cup of coffee and a plate of bacon and eggs waiting on the table. Next to it was a note from Evan.
“Had to go check on my next assignment. Will be gone all day. Catch you after the big date. Evan xxx.”
She swallowed down her disappointment at the words “next assignment.” She must have been right, he must have found out when he was leaving. She regretted not spending more time with him in the darkroom despite the mood that had descended on them both. The closer the moment he would leave loomed, the more she realized that she really wasn’t ready to see her personal cupid walk out of her life. Especially not when he was willing to put together hearty breakfasts and leave little notes for her. The attention he lavished on her was something she wasn’t used to but wasn’t ready to give up either.
