by Mary Martel
There was someone out there, I could feel them, and they were watching me.
What felt like years later, I made it to the door. I slapped my open palm on the door over and over again. My heart sped up to an almost unbearable speed and I was afraid it was going to leap right out of my chest, so it could run away from me.
Slap! Slap! Slap!
What the hell was taking him so long?
I imagined him wearing that ridiculous black robe, sprawled in a chair with his legs spread wide with some faceless brunette kneeling between his open legs. His eyes were screwed up tight, his lips pursed in a grimace and his crotch was hidden from view due to the bobbleheads ministrations. She was a person I had made up in my mind, conjured out of thin air. Nameless. Faceless. Not real. And I hated her.
Holy crap! I needed to get a grip before I lost my mind.
I glanced over my shoulder hurriedly, just to make sure there wasn’t really anyone behind me, ready to murder me. There wasn’t. The driveway, tiny yard and as far as I could see, remained empty and void of human beings.
I let out a relieved breath and turned back towards the door when I heard it opening.
About time.
He needed a doorbell.
Dash stood in the doorway, frowning down at me.
Slutty bastard.
At least he had more clothes on than his little black robe, sort of. Black, drawstring pajama pants. Bare feet. Naked chest on display. He wasn’t wearing a shirt. And his nipples were pierced. Like Quinton’s. Black barbells decorated each nipple, and I was staring.
Damn it.
I cleared my throat and blurted, “There’s someone out here, spying on me. Maybe it’s one of your girlfriends.”
I winced. I had sounded like a jealous crazy person.
He didn’t seem to care.
He grabbed my free hand with one of his and pulled me into the house. His eyes scanned the driveway right before he slammed the door shut.
“What are you talking about?” He hissed at me.
Okay, maybe he did care that I sounded like a crazy jealous person. Or, maybe it was the small fact I had showed up at his house out of the blue and hadn’t bothered to call first and let him know so he could get rid of his date. Wouldn’t want your little high school soon-to-be life partner (or whatever) to show up and cramp your style so you couldn’t get your rocks off.
Again, slutty bastard.
He shook my arm roughly.
“Ariel,” he hissed my name. “Talk to me.”
I sighed and told him the truth. Not the part about me imagining him getting frisky with some faceless bimbo. I kept that part to myself. I didn’t think it wise to share that with him. Not at this point in time. Probably not ever.
“Julian,” he yelled making me jump.
“You are going to stay in here where it’s safe,” he told me in a much quieter, gentler voice. “Julian will stay inside with you while Damien and I go outside and take a look around. If there’s someone out there we will find them. It’s probably just a hunter, though. The assholes are constantly trespassing on my land.”
I loved that he didn’t think I was a crazy person and he was going out to investigate on my behalf. He didn’t have a security panel by his door like at Mr. Cole’s house that let me know there was a security system. I kind of hated the one at Mr. Cole’s house. It beeped at me all the time and made me rush around to do things for it. Punch in the code, activate, deactivate. Beep. Beep. Beep. The thing was bossy and annoying, but it did do one thing very well, which is what it was supposed to do. When it was activated, and all the doors and windows were locked, I felt extremely safe being there. Dash going outside to check things out for me would go a long way towards making me feel safe staying here. Quinton had told me there was a bedroom here for me, I hoped it wasn’t on the main floor.
Feet thundered on the stairs, more than one set. Julian and Damien coming down the stairs. I hoped they didn’t have a girl with them.
Dash turned towards the sound of approaching footsteps, exposing his bare back to me.
I gasped in shock at what I saw on his back. My eyes filled with tears as they raked over his skin. Scars. So many scars. Thin, white lines crisscrossed all over the entirety of his back. The scars looked old, the skin raised where it overlapped others, it looked to be several layers deep.
My heart made a valent attempt to crawl up my throat so it could come out of my mouth in the form of a sob. Something I’m sure he wouldn’t appreciate hearing.
It looked like he’d been whipped. For years. And years.
I placed my palm on my chest, trying to slow down my heartbeat.
He whirled around to face me, hiding his back from me. He leaned towards me, threateningly. I backed up until my back met with the door. My bag slid from my arm, crashing into the floor.
With a face full of thunder, he snarled, “Not pretty enough for you, princess? What’s the matter, don’t like what you see? Don’t worry, Ariel, you won’t ever have to touch me.”
With that, he turned around and stormed off, further into the house. I stared after him with a world of heartbreak in my eyes and tears trailing down my cheeks. I hadn’t done anything wrong and yet I’d still managed to mess everything up.
I swallowed thickly, painfully. I didn’t want Dash to hate me.
Who had done that to his back? Quint had said that Dash’s mother and grandmother had treated him horribly. Were they responsible for those horrific scars on his back, hadn’t Quinton said something about his grandmother whipping him? I couldn’t remember exactly what Quinton had said to me about it. Did he have more somewhere else I hadn’t seen? I hoped not. Somehow, it would seem a whole lot worse if his family were the one’s responsible for it. It would also make what happened between my mother and I seem just a little bit less horrible. Which didn’t make me feel very good to think but I kind of liked that I wasn’t the only messed up one in the bunch. It made fitting in with them seem a whole lot more realistic.
“What the hell was that?” Julian asked cautiously.
He and Damien stood across the room, watching me, both looking extremely upset.
I sighed, completely forgetting about the creepiness outside due to the fact I had so much bullshit to deal with inside.
Boys.
You really didn’t need more than just the one. More than one was a headache.
Chapter Twenty-Two
I didn’t know Julian or Damien very well. One seemed nice and had always been sweet to me. The other one had a nice, non-complicated girlfriend who had sex with him whenever he wanted her to and she was older than me.
Both had seen me naked and neither would I consider a friend.
And, right now, both of them looked worried.
I didn’t want to deal with this. Which seemed to be the story of my life now.
“Ariel,” Julian prompted.
Julian had honey blonde hair that was buzzed extremely close to his head. He was tall and thin, but somehow still muscular. He had light brown eyes and a gold lip ring on his bottom lip. He wore blue jeans and a plain black, short-sleeved t-shirt. He didn’t have any socks on either. If you took the lip ring out, and with the right clothes, Julian looked like he could fit in anywhere. If not for the magic, I wondered if Julian would still be best friends with Quinton, Damien and Dash. His personality didn’t seem to fit in with the rest of theirs. Quint was Scary. Dash was angry. Damien seemed haughty. And Julian, well he seemed sweet.
Damien hadn’t made a very good impression on me, but he was really pretty to look at in a cold, untouchable sort of way.
He had a thin, sharp, angular face. His hair was blonde. Long on top, shaved on the sides. He had light brown eyes framed by extremely thick, feminine lashes. His skin was tanned to golden perfection. He wasn’t dressed casual like the others but instead wore black slacks and a dark blue long-sleeved button up dress shirt. He wasn’t barefoot either and had black socks on his feet.
People who wa
lked around barefoot were weird. My feet always got cold.
“I think there was someone outside when I got here. Dash was going to go check things out and…” And, what? I didn’t know how to stay quiet when faced with someone else’s horrible truths.
“What?” Damien asked cautiously. I think it was the first time he had ever spoken directly to me. “Who was outside? There’s no one around for miles.”
I puffed up my cheeks and blew out a large breath. Now this one, he would think me a crazy person.
“Julian,” Dash said coldly as he walked back into the room. “You stay inside with her. Damien and I will check things out outside, make sure there’s no one creeping around.”
He wouldn’t even look at me. Holy crap. Panic threatened to choke me. This was not good. We weren’t friends yet, but we were going to get there, I knew we were going to get there. And I liked him. His quiet intensity and the depths of darkness in his eyes. The way he watched everything, always so serious. The fact that I had only seen him smile the one time and it did funny things to my heart. All things I found endearing about him. He was closed off, guarded, and he reminded me a whole lot of myself.
And I knew myself, I knew how this was going to go if I didn’t fix it now. If I didn’t find some way to fix this now, it would fester and nothing good would come of it.
Think, Ariel Kimber, think.
I completely understood why he’d snarled at me and had had a similar reaction when someone took notice of my scars.
That was it, the key to solving this problem.
I stepped around my bag and walked directly towards where he was standing, avoiding me. I unzipped my black hoodie as I walked the last few feet to him, not stopping until I was directly in front of him.
He watched me with caution. Yeah, I didn’t blame him one little bit. I definitely shouldn’t have come here. Too late to turn back now.
“What are you doing?” He asked quietly. This time he met my eyes easily, curiosity shining bright in them. Also, there was fear in there. Fear of what? Me? Were they all afraid of me on some level? What the hell.
“Give me your hands,” I ordered as I held my hands out to him, palms up. I waited patiently for him to place his hands in my open, outstretched ones.
He didn’t make me wait long.
Without taking his eyes off of me, he laid his hands gently in mine. I let out a relieved breath. Honestly, I hadn’t thought he was going to do it.
Before he could change his mind and pull away from me, I stepped closer, getting into his personal space.
Before I could think better of it, I lifted his hands in mine and placed them against my chest. His warm palms rested against my skin, covering my collarbones.
Covering my scars.
He stiffened as his gray eyes bored into mine.
“What are you doing?” Damien asked curiously from beside Dash. I was glad to hear he only sounded curious and not like an A-hole.
Dash ran his thumbs across my collarbones and I closed my eyes tight to ward off the light that had started shining bright in his eyes. Compassion and something far, far sweeter.
“What did this?” he murmured.
Interesting choice of words. What, not who.
“Doesn’t matter,” I whispered back. I stepped back, and his hands fell away. Quickly, I zipped my hoodie back up, covering my scars once more. “I just wanted you to know that you and I aren’t so different and as long as my scars don’t bother you, yours won’t bother me.”
“Ariel-”
I cut him off. Whatever he had to say, I was sure I didn’t want to hear it.
“Quinton told me that you have a room here for me. I thought I would try it out, if that’s okay with you. I don’t mean to impose, and I probably should have called first. But Mr. Cole went out of town on business and I don’t want to be in the house alone. I don’t want to stay in the big house with the guys because… Well, I haven’t been over there since… you know.” I shrugged helplessly. Understanding filled his eyes and I knew I needed to explain no more. “So, do I have a room here or what?”
Rude. I could be so unbelievably rude when I was uncomfortable.
His face was incredibly soft, and he seemed completely unaffected by my rude tone.
“Yeah,” he said softly. “You’ve got a room here. It’s upstairs. Julian will show you the way. We’ll be back in no time.”
He raised his hand and gently brushed my hair back, tucking it behind my heavily pierced ear.
He stepped around me and sauntered towards the door. He’d put on a flannel shirt he hadn’t bothered with buttoning, but it did the job of covering up the scars on his back. And he was still barefoot.
“Come on, Damien,” he called over his shoulder before opening the door and walking outside. I almost smiled when he didn’t bother closing the door behind him. Maybe my habits were catching.
Damien scooped up a pair of shiny black dress shoes and then he was out the door behind Dash. He actually managed to close the door behind him.
That left me alone with Julian.
He walked right passed me with a small smile on his face. He picked my overnight bag up off the floor and ushered me out of the room. He herded me through the house and up the staircase.
“Up you go,” he mumbled as he placed his hand on the small of my back and he ushered me up the stairs.
I wanted to snap at him that I didn’t need his assistance in walking up the stairs, I could do it myself. I chewed on my lips to stop the words from coming out. His over friendly manner rubbed me the wrong way. He was the nicest person all the time. It was absurd. What did he have to be so nice and friendly about?
I was in a bad mood. It was based off of several things. Being here with people I wasn’t entirely comfortable with, feeling like someone had been watching me, making my skin crawl, Hurting Dash’s feelings. And, lastly, but certainly the most important, exposing part of my history to Dash in hopes of making him feel better. I shook my head angrily. First Tyson, now Dash. Who was next, Julian?
I did not think so.
I stomped up the stairs, shaking off his hand and made it to the landing before he did.
There were three doors, all of them closed.
He gestured to the left and I moved to the closed door he’d directed me to.
His hand curled around the doorknob and he paused. His lips curled up in a boyish smile, a smile that said he had a secret and it was a good one.
“Something for you to remember,” he said. “Tyson never forgets anything. Not one single little thing.”
Julian turned the knob and pushed the door open. He stepped into the room with me coming in directly behind him. What he’d said about Tyson didn’t really register until after I had stepped into the spacious room.
It was a spacious room for a normal sized house. Which meant that it was half the size of my bedroom at Mr. Cole’s house. The perfect size for a bedroom because the room I had at Mr. Cole’s house was way too big for me, I would never be able to fill it with stuff and the space was wasted on me.
The floors were a gleaming dark wood and looked recently polished.
The walls were a sweet, sunny, canary yellow that made me want to laugh and cry at the same time. Now I got it about what Julian had said about Tyson. Canary yellow was my favorite color and I had only told Tyson, it had been on the second day of school.
There was one window facing the front of the house and the driveway. The window was framed by black, gauzy, see through curtains.
I stood in the middle of the room, moving in a slow circle, taking everything in.
The bed looked to be Queen size and the metal frame was painted a light, girly purple. The comforter was black and covered with yellow, open bloomed roses. Not all that different than the comforter I had on my bed at Mr. Cole’s house. Tyson really had been paying attention. I wanted to know what color the sheets were. There was a pile of black and purple pillows at the head of the bed. One of the black ones even had
silver sparkly sequins on it. Sparkly wasn’t really my thing but I appreciated the attempt towards girly that they had made for my benefit.
A wicker love seat sat alongside the wall beside the window. There was a white padded cushion on the seat and the love seat was loaded down with more black, decorative pillows. At least there were no sequins or sparkles this time. It didn’t make up for there not being a window seat and if I stuck around I would probably trade out the pillows for my own girly ones.
A thick, black, hand woven circular rug lay on the floor in front of the love seat. Everything had looked brand new until I got to the rug. I didn’t much care for the thought of them spending money on me. I had a bed and a dresser at Mr. Cole’s that were more than perfectly suitable for me and they could have easily been moved here. Now what would be done with them? Perhaps they could move it to Quinton’s house so Mr. Cole wouldn’t have to do anything with it.
There was another matching rug laid on the floor beside the bed.
A tall dresser was against the wall opposite the bed. A black framed oval mirror hung on the wall above the dresser.
My eyes skirted through my reflection in the mirror and I took in the rest of the things decorating the walls. A black and white Bad Religion concert poster had been framed and hung on the wall. It made me smile. I had never hung up posters of the things I liked up on my walls before. A framed Boondock Saints movie poster hung up on different wall. Norman Reedus stood shoulder-to-shoulder with Sean Patrick Flanery and they looked brutal but delicious standing together.
A tall, black bookshelf was pressed up against the wall behind the open bedroom door. A few steps closer showed me that half the bookshelf was empty, and the other half was filled with books about magic, the history of witchcraft, rituals, candles, spells, you name it. Some of the books looked old and worn and I wondered where they had come from.
Julian remained silent as he stood back, silently watching me take everything in. I appreciated him standing back, giving me space. If it had been Quinton or my Salt and Pepper twins they would have been in my space and drilling me with questions and the twins wouldn’t have been able to remain quiet. Tyson would have probably been able to give me silence, but he wouldn’t have given me space, I knew that much.
