Nocturne

by Heather McKenzie

  Lisa swore. Words I’d never even imagined existed were slung about the room with bloodcurdling fury. They were followed by a moment of stunned silence before Thomas spoke.

  “Has anyone asked Kaya what she wants to do?” he asked.

  No one answered.

  “I mean, it is her life we’re talking about. Should she not be included in this conversation?”

  I dipped under the water again, holding my breath, letting the bubbles escape from my lungs… Worry for Luke was eating me alive. Thomas knew that. They all knew that. Oliver was talking when I came up for air.

  “…at least we only have Henry to deal with now Rayna is out of the picture. Thankfully, that bitch is dead.”

  There was no mistaking the sound of a shocked inhale, maybe even feet stumbling backward. “What do you mean?” Seth said, his voice catching in his throat.

  “Rayna was shot. She’s dead,” Oliver said carefully.

  Seth seemed caught off guard. His voice rose in pitch. “You saw this? You were a witness? It’s for sure? She’s… dead? No… no… Can’t be… not… yet…”

  Lisa’s tone was barbed. “What the hell, Seth? We wanted her dead, remember? What’s going on with you?”

  I sat up a little straighter in the tub now, wanting to hear what they were saying.

  Seth was rambling. “I… well, I mean, I just didn’t know she was, uh… I just thought… I thought that maybe she—”

  “She… what?” Lisa demanded.

  “I—uh, damn it, I’m hungry! That is all, Lisa. I’m going to my room.”

  “Not without me you’re not!”

  A slamming door shook the walls. I rubbed at my eyes and cranked the hot water all the way open. The bathroom was already filled with steam and the water was scorching hot, but it wasn’t taking away the chill in my bones. I drifted beneath the surface again, fading into it, holding my breath. Trying not to think about Luke, or Seth, or Lisa, or Rayna… The running tap hurt my feet, the water scalding, but I was too tired to care. I kept holding my breath. Soon a thick, eerie darkness started to creep toward me. My heart was pounding, but the voices in the other room had finally disappeared. Then so did the sound of the tap running. Everything was quiet. Blissfully quiet. The chill had gone, too. I was fading easily into darkness…

  Until I was violently pulled out of the scorching water.

  “Kaya, what the hell? Are you trying to drown yourself?”

  Oliver had a hold of my arm. He’d yanked it so hard I wondered if my shoulder came out of its socket. It brought my head sharply back to reality as his hands slipped under my armpits. All I could do was fall against him. The blackness wanted to creep back in, but now it wasn’t welcome. Had I almost drowned?

  Oliver threw a towel around me, then turned off the tap and pulled the plug.

  “How did you get in here?” I stammered, then noticed the bathroom door no longer on its hinges.

  He sat me down on the edge of the tub, his eyes wide. “Were you trying to cook yourself?”

  I didn’t know what I was trying to do. Water poured from my sopping hair to the bathroom floor, soaking Oliver’s socks. He had a towel in the sink and was running it under chilly water. His eyes were misty when he flattened it to my forehead.

  Thomas politely knocked on the doorframe. “Hey, is everything all right in there?”

  “It’s fine,” Oliver and I said in unison.

  The cold water on my face pulled me completely away from the darkness now. What was I thinking?

  “You could get heat stroke, pass out, and drown! Damn it, Kaya. That water was way too hot… way too damn hot… What the hell?”

  I was pink. I was dizzy. And Oliver was frazzled. The big lug, all tough and nothing but muscle, was patting the cloth to my neck and then my cheeks, like he used to whenever I was sick with fever. And now I was just… done. I felt my eyes closing. My limbs evaporating. I didn’t even have the strength to put an arm out when I started to slip off the tub. I didn’t even have the energy to give him hell for invading my privacy.

  “Put this on…” Oliver was saying, and the towel was taken away from me.

  Often, Oliver had seen me naked, and I’d never cared. Still didn’t. I closed my eyes, unable to keep them open any longer, and a shirt, smelling of his cologne, was pulled over my head. Then I was up and in his arms—as I’d been too many times to count—and carried to bed. The television was on, and the smell of pizza was in the air, but I kept my eyes closed. A pillow was placed under my head and the cloth back on my forehead. Oliver was telling Thomas how careless I had been as he made me drink water. He fanned my overheated body with a magazine, and I peeled my eyelids apart to see that smooth stretch of dark skin over his chest; he had literally given me the shirt off his back.

  When my body returned to a normal temperature, Oliver moved to a chair by the window and now sat gazing out at the night. I could hear Thomas shifting around, trying to get comfortable on the other bed. I’d hoped to fall asleep, but a few things were keeping me awake.

  “Thomas?” I said after a while, hoping he was up, too.

  “Hmm?” he said sleepily.

  “Are you all right?”

  Oliver sighed heavily.

  “Yeah,” Thomas said. “Good as new.”

  “Did you betray me?” I held my breath for an answer.

  “What do you mean—”

  “Sindra.”

  “Oh,” he said. “I hoped you wouldn’t find out. But, well, she made me an offer.”

  Oliver shifted in his chair. I would have bolted upright if I could have moved. I wanted to know… and I didn’t at the same time. “What was that offer?” I whispered.

  Thomas’s breath caught as he sat up. Wincing, he inched to the edge of my bed. “I wasn’t with Marlene when Ben, uh… attacked you in the bunkhouse.” Oliver gasped, but Thomas continued. “Sindra approached me in the barn. She offered me a check—three hundred and fifty thousand bucks if I guarded you with my life for two months. All I had to do was say yes and it was mine.”

  My heart sped up. “And… what did you say?” I would run from the room if he had taken her offer. I thought of our time together, our moment, and the way he seemed to care for me. I cherished our friendship. If he had been paid to do that…

  I forced my eyes to open, to stare at him fully while he fidgeted.

  “I said yes,” he said.

  I felt my stomach flip into my throat.

  “But…” he added, gaze settling on mine. “I didn’t take the check. I ripped it up in front of her. Nobody has to pay me to guard you with my life. That I’ll do of my own free will.”

  Tears of relief flowed. I couldn’t stop them. I believed Thomas, wholeheartedly, and when his hand reached for mine, I clung to it.

  “I’m sorry I didn’t tell you sooner,” he said sincerely. “There just never seemed to be the right time. I didn’t want to keep it from you, but—”

  “It’s okay. I understand.”

  “Thanks.”

  “Ben’s dead,” I blurted out.

  “I know.”

  “And I—I shot people. I shot a man. He was just trying to show me a picture, and I shot him.”

  “It had to be done,” Thomas said.

  “And… Luke. I failed him. I failed—”

  His hand was on my shoulder. “Shush now. It’s not your fault, and you know that.”

  “And drugging you… I’m so sorry for that.”

  He laughed. “It probably was for the best. And hey, if you can forgive me for not telling you about Sindra, I can forgive you for knocking me unconscious.”

  I brought up what we were both thinking. “Can you forgive me for pointing a gun at your head?”

  He didn’t hesitate. “You wouldn’t have shot me; we both know that.”

  I didn’t know that. I was ready to do anything for Luke. And that scared the hell out of me.

  “I’m sorry you had to go through all this. I wish things were different,�
�� Thomas said.

  “You know, I thought… I thought maybe if I saw Rayna face to face, that she would change her mind about me. I thought that my mother would want suddenly to be my mother.”

  Thomas sighed and stretched out next to me, his body a safe distance, his hands folded under his head. “I’m sorry that didn’t happen, Kaya. At least you have family, though—maybe not blood related—but people who truly love you.”

  He was referring to himself. And Oliver. That wasn’t lost on my fatigued mind.

  “I just… I can’t… I don’t know…” Words failed me.

  “Hey relax,” he said. “Take in a deep breath. Now… I haven’t told you about cherry angel food cake yet, have I? Well, cherry is great. If you pair it with cream cheese icing and…”

  I slept fitfully, if at all. Thomas’s voice was soothing and had lulled me to sleep, but dreams of blood and guts and the picture that man in the barn had been holding out to me made me wake in a cold sweat. I’d drift off again, only to jolt awake with the vision of Luke’s eyes, so blue, so pained… pleading… Sleep was just not happening tonight.

  I was glad the television was still on, the grey light of it allowing my eyes to quickly take in my roommates. Thomas was sound asleep, flat on his back next to me, and Oliver was stretched out on the other bed. The clock on the nightstand said it was four in the morning, and the pitch black on the other side of the flimsy curtains confirmed that.

  “Can’t sleep?” Oliver murmured.

  His feet hung over the end of the bed. He was fully dressed on high alert, blankets flat and unused beneath him.

  “No.”

  “Me neither.”

  I stood, muscles not happy about doing so, and reached for an empty glass next to the television. My mouth was so dry I could barely swallow, but five feet to the bathroom for water seemed too far to walk. I couldn’t decide what to do—bed, water, or just sink to my knees and crumble to the floor.

  “Answer me one question, please,” Oliver said.

  I turned to face him; he’d been thinking about this for a while. “Okay.”

  “Are you… in love with… him?” Oliver asked with a slight head tilt in Thomas’s direction.

  I could be honest. “No. I mean, I love him. But not like that.”

  “Not like Luke.”

  All I could do was nod; not like Oliver, either.

  “All right,” Oliver said.

  The heater whirred. Thomas snored. I debated sleeping on my feet.

  “Bring me the glass, Kaya,” Oliver said.

  It wasn’t a command like the old days. Nor was it a direct order. I slowly padded over to him and he sat up, reaching for something beside his bed.

  “In honor of Stephan, I figured I’d give scotch a try.” He produced a half-empty bottle of amber liquid with a familiar label.

  Stephan. The sound of his name hurt my heart. “I miss him so much.”

  Oliver filled my glass. Together, we took long swigs, the fire in our throats barely registering among so many other painfully unspoken things. I found myself sitting on the bed next to him, looking through the curtains at the moon that was about to leave the sky. I didn’t care that his shirt barely covered my thighs or the dim light barely concealed my tears; it was Oliver.

  “I’m going to get Luke back for you. I promise,” he said.

  I couldn’t believe what I was hearing. He truly wanted to help me even though I’d left him.

  “He saved my life,” he added. “He made me realize a few things about myself.”

  I could barely swallow. Not from Oliver’s offer to help me, but from the startling realization of what it was between us that would never fade no matter what we were faced with. It really and truly was love. Different from what I felt with Luke, different from what I felt with Thomas, but it was love just the same.

  “Thank you,” I muttered, and I crawled up next to him like I had so many times. Only because I wanted to, I laid my head upon his chest, moving into the comfort of his arms.

  “Kaya, I’m—”

  I cut him off, shaking my head at him not to speak because I knew what he was going to say… and the familiarity and safety of him, along with his earnest desire to care for me, was obvious. He’d fought his demon—whatever is was—and he’d won. What was done was done. The past… was the past. He didn’t have to tell me how much he loved me.

  I peered up at him. “I love you, too.”

  I watched the sun come up, not even remotely sleepy even with the amount of scotch I’d consumed. I didn’t dare move, although every fiber of my being ached to pull Kaya even tighter to me and never let her go. Relishing every single second of her warmth as she breathed, her body warm and soft against mine, I realized I might never have a moment like this again.

  “Whatcha lost in thought about, Oliver… pancakes?” she said softly.

  I gulped. I hadn’t realized she was awake, and I couldn’t help but tighten my arms protectively around her. I cleared my throat. “Just thinking that I… really don’t want you to run away again.”

  She lifted her eyes to mine. “I’m sorry. I thought I was doing the right thing. For… everyone.”

  “I know.” I reached across her, my face coming a bit too close to hers, and pulled a corner of the sheet over her bare legs. I couldn’t think straight with that glorious skin of hers shining like a pearl in the moonlight. “You have to understand, Kaya, that me and Luke, and Seth and Lisa, too… we are all here and in this with you because we want to be. This whole mess is bigger than you. We chose to get involved, knowing the risks. The sooner you realize that, the better.”

  She bit her lip. “I do. I understand. I just wanted Luke—and you—to be able to opt out before things got even crazier. Before one of you got hurt.”

  “If the roles were switched, if Luke was the one in your situation, would you opt out? Would it change your feelings?”

  She answered quickly. “Hell no.”

  “Well, it doesn’t change ours either.”

  Her heart sped up slightly and her body tensed. “Oliver, there’s something you need to know.”

  She pulled away to look me square in the eye. It felt as if her eyes were peering right into my soul. I used to say things to her in my mind, hoping to convey to her all the thoughts I could never get past my tongue. All those years watching her grow into the woman she was now, becoming stronger than I ever imagined, more beautiful than my heart could handle, stirred that part in the center of me that gave me a reason to live. I felt that now, in the dim light, under the steady glow of her remarkable green irises. She was so beautiful my chest ached to touch her. So I told her that—in my mind of course—just like I used to.

  “Oliver?” she stammered.

  “Uh-huh…” I said, trying to get my expression back to neutral.

  “I own it all. The estate, Eronel Pharmaceutical and the sister companies, and a massive trust fund. Henry has only been looking after it until I turn twenty-one, and then I can legally do what I want with it. The reason he wants me back so badly is not to protect me; it’s so he can get control of my inheritance.”

  I wasn’t shocked to hear any of what she was saying. It made perfect sense. “And how will he gain control?”

  Her eyes drifted to the window, and she suddenly looked uncomfortable. “He needs you and me to make him an heir. He wants… a grandchild. By murdering the three of us, all rights of my inheritance would bypass John Marchessa and land back in his hands. Hence his reason for wanting us to be… together.”

  I shifted uncomfortably, too, because I wanted nothing more than to make a child with Kaya, and not just for the act of making love to her. I didn’t want kids. I hadn’t wanted kids—until now. Something had switched on in my head when I pictured the life we created growing in her womb. My child… my baby…was now lost forever. I’d never even mourned it. In fact, I’d been happy about the miscarriage. But now? I allowed myself to gaze at her slim body, stretched against mine, and every par
t of me wanted it back so bad.

  She was holding back tears. “We can never be together, Oliver. Even if I wanted to be… with you… I couldn’t. I would be putting your life in danger even more than I am now. Also, technically…” She swallowed hard. Whatever she was about say was difficult. “You and I… are brother and sister. Stephan told me Henry adopted you when you first came to the estate. That’s the loophole to claiming my inheritance.”

  Well lucky me. Torture and adoption went hand in hand, didn’t they? “Well, that sucks,” I said, barely managing the words.

  She quickly changed the subject. “That necklace you destroyed… it held a drop of Lenore’s blood. It would have solved all this. A DNA analysis would have proved I am not a blood relation to the Marchessas. I would have been free of all this mess.”

  I felt the blood drain from my stupid head. “Oh my God, that’s why you were so angry with me. Kaya, I’m so sorry—”

  “No… No, Oliver. It’s okay. Really. You didn’t know. And honestly, I have decided it is for the best. I want the inheritance now. I want to use it to make a difference. You did me a favor by making me realize that. I will clean up the mess Eronel has left behind and shut down whatever else Henry is up to. I can’t imagine what is so important he would want to murder his own family for, but I will find out. And I will stop him.”

  I reached for the scotch and unscrewed the lid. Not because I wanted some more, but because I didn’t know what to say or do.

  Kaya cleared her throat nervously. “Anyway, now you know the danger you face,” she continued. “There’s a heavy mark on your back as it is, and multiplied tenfold just by being with me. If you’re caught, who knows what would happen to you. I won’t run away again, Oliver, but I am officially giving you the opportunity to opt out.”

  Her eyes shone, and her bottom lip quivered ever so slightly. The sun coming up was playing with her hair and lighting up the places where the sheet had fallen away from her flawless skin. I put down the bottle and slowly pulled her back to me. Her body returned to mine, and I had the slightest hope that maybe someday her mind would follow.