“It’s not useless. I’ll help you.” He looked down, his eyes softer now.
“And how, may I ask, are you going to do that?” I asked sarcastically.
He leaned in, his eyes scorching. “Like this.” He brushed my hair aside and touched his velvety lips to the base of my neck. My body trembled.
“Oh,” I exhaled roughly.
“How do you feel?” His voice sounded muffled as he etched his lips across my throat.
“That…depends.” I found it difficult to speak with the warmth of his energy flowing through my veins.
“Depends on what?” His eyes glanced up from underneath his lashes.
“On if there’s anything,”—my voice shook—“breakable in the room to give me away. You know…if I decide to lie to you.”
He laughed silently, his warm breath blowing against my neck. “Relax.”
That was easy for him to say. He had complete control over his powers.
I focused my eyes to the ceiling, heeding his advice and trying to relax, but I found it difficult as his lips drifted closer to the hollow underneath my ear. Ethan placed his hand on my arm and I almost lost it.
“Close your eyes, Allie. Concentrate,” he breathed, his fingers barely skimming the surface of my skin.
I did as he said. The energy in and around me stretched and retracted like a rubber band. I was losing it. I felt it gradually slipping away.
“Hold it,” he whispered, pausing his lips against my cheek.
“I’m trying.” I gasped for air, but I couldn’t seem to gather enough to fill my lungs. The intensity of our energies merging together was overwhelming. I couldn’t hold it steady.
Ethan slid his body over mine, testing me, probably to see how much I could withstand.
I opened my eyes, curious to see how he was able to remain in control.
It was a stupid idea.
His eyes locked onto mine as his lips moved closer. Then I lost it.
Everything I had concentrated on trying to contain instantly snapped, shattering every bulb in the room, leaving us in complete darkness. Thank goodness Jeremy was on the other side of the house.
“Oops,” I said, feeling the flush in my cheeks. Luckily, it was too dark for him to notice.
“You held on to it longer than I’d anticipated you would.” He sounded excited.
“Really.” I was sorry I couldn’t share his excitement. Could it be that he happened to get me all worked up and just left me hanging?
“What’s wrong? Aren’t you happy?”
“Of course—I’m happy. It’s just that…I still want more,” I pouted in the darkness. Not a whole lot more—I definitely wasn’t ready for that—but more kissing, for sure.
“Allie, we have plenty of time for that. Let’s try to get you under control first. Unless you don’t like my way of doing things?” he asked teasingly, sliding off me and landing on his side.
“No—I like your way,” I answered too quickly.
His body shook with laughter as he pulled me tightly against his chest. “Then my way it is,” he whispered.
I could tell he was still smiling.
We fell silent. The only sound in the room was the steady thumping of our hearts. Two musical notes beating in unison. I hated to ruin the moment, but I couldn’t shake the conversation I had with Jeremy.
“Ethan…” I paused, not sure how to word my question without causing him pain.
“Yeah,” he said, his voice low.
“What you told Jeremy earlier, about your parents, is that true?”
“Everything I told Jeremy was the truth.”
“I’m really sorry.”
“There’s no need to be sorry, Allie. It’s one of the cons of having a life of eternity. Eventually, everything around you dies. There’s nothing you can do about it except move forward,” he said, sounding distant.
“Couldn’t you save them?”
“No, I was still in Asteria when it happened. The Union army burned most of the plantations down to the ground during the Civil War. Mine was one of them. When I returned, the only thing left next to the Savannah River was the foundation. I was too late to save them, so I salvaged as much as I could from the remains of the plantation and tracked down a few of our former possessions that had been sold. I came back to Delaware; I guess because it was where I’d been turned immortal. I bought this place under the alias Daniel Thomas and would come back to visit. Sometimes I’d travel around for fun, but it just wasn’t the same, even though I consider the mortal realm my true home.”
“But you still had Kiera, right? And the rest of the people in your world?”
“Sort of. Kiera is the only one who understands. And that’s because she was once a mortal, like me. We both are still drawn to this world, but the others…they don’t understand,” he explained.
I fell silent, unable to think of anything more to say.
“It’s alright, Allie. Really. I’m not alone anymore. I have you.” He squeezed me tighter in his arms.
I fought back the tears brimming in my eyes. What would happen to him if he lost me? And, eventually, he would. It was only a matter of time. The moisture escaped and rolled down my cheeks.
“Allie? Are you crying?” he asked softly.
“No,” I sniffed, but it was useless to lie to him when the evidence dampened his chest.
“What did I tell you when you first arrived here? Didn’t I tell you not to worry about the future?” he asked as if he had read my mind. “We’ll be perfectly fine. I promise.” He kissed the top of my head. “Now, get some sleep. We have school tomorrow.”
I closed my eyes and snuggled deeper into Ethan’s arms, knowing that this was where I was meant to be. And there was nothing in this world, or any other world, that could tear us apart.
Chapter 13
Having Jeremy around was comforting. It had been a while since I’d seen him, and he and Ethan gave me something I never really had since Dad left. A family. I was ecstatic that Jeremy wanted to spend his entire summer vacation with me and Ethan. With us. But just because Jeremy was my best friend didn’t mean we didn’t have our fair share of arguments. He knew precisely how to tick me off, even when he wasn’t intending to. I think it was his way of testing me. To see how strong I really was inside. Game on.
This morning he had expressed his concern over where I would end up if my relationship with Ethan came to an end. I was glad Ethan had been in the shower. The raining water muted out our not-so-hushed voices. Especially mine.
Ethan knew I was angry with Jeremy as we walked out the door. But he didn’t know about what. On the way to school, he kept glancing in my direction, but I was still too agitated to talk. I was glad someone found Jeremy’s presence and ever-so-annoying sense of humor amusing. Because I sure didn’t.
“Allie, if he’s your best friend, why do you always get so mad at him?” Ethan finally asked after looking at me for like the tenth time.
“Because, even though he’s the best guy in the world, besides you of course,” I enunciated, “he knows exactly what’ll piss me off. And he does it on purpose. He’s always been that way.”
“And you still think he’s the best guy in the world?” His eyebrows pulled together, crumpling his forehead. “Besides myself, of course?”
“Yeah.” I nodded, content with my answer. But Ethan didn’t seem content, so I tried to explain. “We have a brother-sister relationship. I love him to death, but sometimes I could kill him, metaphorically speaking. Make sense?” I asked, hoping to clear up his confusion.
“Not really. But I guess I have time to figure it out.”
“Yeah—” I started to say as we pulled into the parking lot. But the sight of Erica leaning against her car, waiting for me, cut me short.
“Allie, breathe,” Ethan whispered, reaching his hand over and gently squeezing my knee. I didn’t even realize I had been holding my breath. Ethan pulled into the open space next to Erica’s car.
I opene
d my door to face her. “Hey,” I said, attempting to sound friendly while I mentally reminded myself that I needed to remain calm.
“I’m really sorry about yesterday. I didn’t mean to snap at you.” She looked at me, her ocean eyes brimming with regret. “I don’t want to lose you, Allie. You’re my best friend.”
I sighed. “You’re not going to lose me.” I stepped out of the car and wrapped my arms around her, hugging her tightly. “You worry about me. I know. But trust me this time. Ethan’s not someone you have to worry about. I’m completely safe with him.”
“Okay, I’m going to trust you with this one.” She lifted her brows. “But if he does anything, and I mean anything, to hurt you, you better call me. Deal?”
“Deal.” I smiled, confident that I would never need to call her. I let her go and she stood beside me as Ethan appeared at my other side.
“Oh, yeah, I almost forgot,” she said, walking next to us through the parking lot. “I need that book we found at Fort Delaware. Ben and I haven’t even started our essays yet.”
“Um…about that,” I hesitated.
Luckily, Ethan stepped in. “She barely had enough time to grab her necessities, so I’m sure it got chucked along with everything else in the house when the deputies cleared the stuff out.”
“Allie,” she whined, “I can’t believe you didn’t grab it.”
“Sorry.” I shrugged. “I wasn’t thinking clearly. I’ll write your essay for you. I’ll have it done by tomorrow.”
“You?” She raised her eyebrows. “You don’t know anything about the Civil War.” Erica pressed her lips together, suppressing a smile. I ignored that gesture.
“Ethan will help me,” I shot him a sideways glance.
“Sure, I might know a thing or two about the war.” A sly smile inched along the planes of his face. He made me want to laugh, but I didn’t want to blow our cover.
“If you two think you can pull it off, then have at it,” she said, sounding skeptical.
“Don’t worry, we’ll get it done,” I said, stepping through the doorway of the school.
Erica rolled her eyes and floated off down the hallway while I headed to my first period class.
Later that evening, I finished the essays, making sure all three papers covered different subjects on the war. My report was the hardest of the three for Ethan to help me with. It dealt with the living conditions and deaths of the soldiers in the Fort. Most of the names he had given me had once been friends of his. And he’d had no choice but to watch them die.
That night, Ethan’s heavy energy pressed down on me, mentally suffocating me, as I placed my head on his chest. Instead of moving away from him, I snuggled in closer. This was my fault. I had caused these horrid memories to resurface. And for what? Some stupid school assignment.
I continued to lie there, in his arms, even though his pain caused my joints to ache, until we eventually drifted away.
* * *
The next two weeks of school passed by in a blur. My junior year fizzled to an end. Mr. Brinkley gave me an A on my report on Fort Delaware, which brought my English grade up just high enough to save me from going to summer school. Both Erica and Marie took off for summer trips. Erica promised she’d call me as soon as she got back from vacation with her mom. We texted, but it wasn’t the same.
But the nights I spent with Ethan, those were unforgettable. Each night he worked with me for hours, trying to help me center my energy, but I failed every time. Over and over again, more bulbs shattered. I suggested he take up stock in utilities, but he only laughed. I was serious.
Jeremy began to venture out of the house, hanging out at the local pool hall and giving Ethan and I our much needed alone time for our secret training sessions. I knew Jeremy would freak if he heard the sound of busting glass. And there was no way I could explain to him what was going on.
He wouldn’t have believed me if I tried.
It was Friday night, and Jeremy had left for the pool hall right after dinner. I helped Ethan clean up the kitchen. Then I followed him upstairs to our room. It was safer to train upstairs—just in case Jeremy came home early.
Ethan flopped down onto the bed on his back, arms resting behind his head, while I loosened all the bulbs from the lamps in the room. It was easier to concentrate that way. When I was done, I sat next to him on the bed, in the darkness, and closed my eyes.
Since his earlier method of trying to teach me how to control my power—the warmth of his touch…the softness of his lips—had failed drastically, he’d switched to meditation.
“Allie, concentrate.” His voice was soft. “We’re going to try something different tonight.”
Warmth flowed into my cheeks as I struggled to smooth the roughness out of my breath. I pushed the images of Ethan and me away. Not thinking about him was difficult.
“Inhale deeply. Pull in the energy around you. Your energy…my energy. All the energy in the room. Focus solely on all that energy,” he said, guiding me.
I drew in a breath, the energy tingled my skin as it danced around me. My lungs filled with air, my muscles relaxed, and all my tension faded away. The negativity toward my so-called gift and myself were gone. The only thing left was the sound of Ethan’s breath. Slow and steady. In and out.
Tiny sparks of light appeared and disappeared in the darkness underneath my eyelids. Reds, blues, greens, and yellows. Sometimes they would appear scattered, like the stars in the sky, or the powdered glitter you brush on your face that shimmers in the light, and other times the lights would come together and form pictures. Flowers and shapes and faces of people I’d never met.
“Exhale slowly,” Ethan said.
As the air flowed gently from my lungs, the beads of light magnified, bringing with them an explosion of heat and colors that lit up my veins like a bouquet of Fourth of July sparklers.
“Now, place your hands out in front of you. Palms up. And bring them together.”
I lifted my arms from my sides and stuck my hands out in front of me.
“Continue the pattern. Push out the old and bring in the new. But visualize the energy this time. See it. Feel it. Bring it all together in the form of a ball.”
A ball? He wanted me to manifest the ball of light? Before I could have a full-blown panic attack, I quickly cleared my mind again. I could do this. I could. So, I imagined it, visualized it in my mind, glowing and sizzling and crackling like the orb Ethan had held in his hands.
The heat building in my body suddenly came together and shot into my palms. Hot. Hotter. Burning hot.
“Allie, you’re doing it!” he shouted.
I opened my eyes to catch a glimpse, and to my surprise, I really was doing it. But I couldn’t hold on to the flames any longer. I pulled my hands away from each other. “Shit!” I cried, shaking my hands in the air, trying to relieve the pain.
“Are you okay?” He leapt off the bed to fix the lights. Then he rushed back to me and grasped my hands, examining them.
“I think so…it was just hot.” I stared at him as he placed his hands over mine. Like always, my pain dissipated with his touch.
“I don’t understand what happened. Why would it burn you?” he mumbled, more to himself than to me.
“Maybe because I’ve never made it this far,” I said, amazed that I’d actually caused the orb to manifest, but disappointed that I couldn’t hold onto it. “Let’s face it, Ethan. I’ll never be able to do this. I’m not like you. You’re strong…and, well, I’m not. And you’re an immortal and I’m just some weird mortal with freakish powers I inherited from my loser father.” I lowered my eyes to the floor, feeling small, unworthy, and like a complete failure. Hating the fact that Ethan always had to come to my rescue, hating the fact that no matter how hard I tried, I would never be good enough for him.
“Allie,” he said, dropping my hands and lifting my chin. “You. Are. Strong.”
“I’m not, Ethan!” I tried to pull away, but he wouldn’t let me. “If I’m so st
rong, then why are you always coming to my rescue? Healing my wounds, fighting off my enemies, and controlling my power. A power that I should be able to control. Sometimes I don’t feel like I’m good enough for you. You deserve better.” My bottom lip trembled as the tears toppled over.
“I deserve you.” He leaned in to kiss the moisture off my cheek. “And you deserve me. We are meant to be together. Can’t you feel it?” His warm breath grazed my skin.
“Of course I can feel it. I’ve always felt it, even when I didn’t want to. But you shouldn’t have to save me all the time. It’s not right.”
“I don’t mind saving you, Allie.” His lips stretched into a smile across my cheek. “Besides, isn’t that what people are supposed to do? Save each other?” he asked, gazing into my eyes as he pushed me back against the pillows on the bed.
“So, where’s my part in all of this?” I watched him as he hovered over me. “When do I get to help you?”
“You already have.” A smile played at the corner of his lips. “You found something for me.”
“Really,” I answered sarcastically. “And that is?” I lifted my brows.
He leaned forward, his face so close the warmth of his breath tickled my nose. His mass of energy swirled around me, exciting me, quickening my pulse.
“My heart,” he whispered, placing his lips to mine as our energies merged.
I pulled away, leaving Ethan staring at me dazed and confused. “Sorry,” I said, smiling. “But shouldn’t we get rid of the lights again?”
His face relaxed. “No, because Jeremy’s about to walk through the front door.”
Just as he ended his sentence, the door downstairs slammed shut.
“How did you know that?” I narrowed my eyes, remembering Ethan had sensed Erica in the hallway the day Becca nearly killed me.
“It’s their energy. Everyone’s different, unique. Once you get the hang of things, you’ll be able to pick up on it too.” He slipped his body off mine and landed behind me as heavy footsteps proceeded up the stairs.
“Is he okay?” I whispered. Jeremy didn’t usually make this much noise.
Other Side Of Forever (Other Side Of Forever Series Book 1) Page 13
