by G. Bailey
Chapter Twelve
“Dad, have you seen my blue swim cap?” I shout as I open the last box in my room and chuck all the things out of it onto the floor. I wanted to get to school a little early today because the coach told me the swimming baths are open early on Thursdays, so I could come in then. I also have a free period first, so I could get an hour of swimming in. Unfortunately, my old swim cap got caught in the washing machine because I accidentally put it in and it got ripped, so I need my spare one. I kinda wish I had unpacked all these boxes now. I glance at my party clothes, washed and folded on my dressing table, and hate how they remind me of what happened. Landon brought me back home and tried to make things better by watching TV with me and telling me silly jokes to make me smile. It didn’t work though, and I haven’t been able to shake the look in Maxx’s eyes as I walked away. Or the empty feeling I have felt since.
“No, but I have to go as I overslept and I’m going to be late,” he shouts angrily, and I sigh. I should have woken him up or something.
“Have a good day!” he yells, and I hear him running down the stairs a few moments later.
“Don’t worry, bye!” I shout back and keep pulling out books, more clothes, and stuff I didn’t even know I had.
“Bingo!” I say, finding my blue swim cap at the bottom and pulling it out. I pack my cap and swimsuit into my school bag before walking to the full-length mirror to check I look alright for a bus trip. I plait the front of my fringe, clipping it at the back of my head and pulling the plait out a little. I put on a little makeup and stand back, straightening my uniform and deciding I look okay. I sit down on the window seat, picking up my note pad and pencil, staring down at the drawing I did last night before bed. It’s a drawing of Iris, a glow coming off her, and I have filled in where I saw the swirls on her face. I don’t know why I drew her, maybe it’s because I got tired of drawing Maxx and Landon all the time.
I look out the window as the sun rises over the top of the guys’ house, the orange and yellow tones bouncing off the white bricks. It’s a magnificent view. I put my drawing pad down to look more closely out the window as a massive black Jeep pulls up in front of their house. I rub my arms, feeling cold as I watch four men get out of the Jeep. Two of them look younger, whereas the other two are massive bulky men that you would assume are bodyguards. They oddly all have white hair, I notice. The front door opens, and Maxx stands with his arms crossed, legs parted, and he looks ready to attack as he screams tension. My eyes widen as Maxx starts glowing a blue light, a bright blue that spreads across his whole body, leaving swirls on his skin. Swirls and marks that look the same color as mine. My heart beats fast, fast enough I can almost hear it as I stare at Maxx and know he had to have given me these marks. It doesn’t make sense otherwise. What is he? He can’t be human, that’s for sure. The four guys all start to glow white, but as I look closer it almost seems grey instead. What the hell are those guys? One of the white-haired guys turns to look up toward my house, like he could hear my thoughts, and I quickly jump away from the window. I stand still in the room, breathing heavily and trying to calm down. Maybe dad was right to send me to therapy. I mean I just saw my hot, arrogant neighbor glowing like a Christmas tree.
“Fuck…maybe the therapist is right and I’m crazy,” I mutter to myself as I pace by my bed, because if I’m going crazy I might as well talk to myself.
“You aren’t crazy…and we need you to come next door,” Landon says, his voice gentle, but it still makes me jump out of my skin. I stare fearfully as Landon steps into the room. He seems calm and relaxed. The very opposite to how I am currently feeling. He awkwardly rubs the back of his neck as he waits for me to say something.
“How did you get in here?” I demand, taking a step back, my breathing heavy in the quiet room.
“The front door was open, I walked in,” he says, shrugging his shoulders. “There is so much you want to know. Like why you have those blue marks on you? Why you survived that accident? Who you are?” he starts off, speaking slowly and placing his hands on his hips.
“And you have those answers?” I ask.
“Nope. You aren’t mine, or my type, as I kinda prefer guys if you didn’t notice. Maxx can give you those answers,” he tells me, and I frown at him. Why come over here if he wasn’t going to explain his glowing brother?
“Why should I trust either of you?” I ask in reply.
“Don’t trust us, just come with me because we need you. Maxx needs you,” he says, like it should mean something to me that Maxx needs me. I try to ignore the instinct to run out the room and across the street to help him. I don’t even know why he affects me like he does. Maxx clearly has a thing going with Iris, and he was a total dick towards me at the party.
“If you haven’t noticed, I don’t like your brother,” I make myself reply after Landon clears his throat.
“You are both stubborn and happen to be drawn to each other because of, well, a reason. It happens,” he shrugs and turns away. “I’m going to help Maxx, and I will wait downstairs for five minutes. If you don’t come down, we will disappear, and you can have a normal life.”
“And if I come downstairs?” I quietly ask.
“You will find out what really makes your soul come alive. What a part of you already knows, but the rest of you fights,” he cryptically tells me, smiling sadly before turning and walking out of my room. I stare at the door for only a minute before sliding my shoes on and running down the stairs. I want the answers and to help Landon. This has nothing to with Maxx.
“Good choice,” Landon says with a grin when he spots me at the bottom of the stairs, and he opens the door. I walk through the front door, and he places his hand on my shoulder to stop me. “Whatever you are about to hear, try not to scream and run. That reaction gets boring after the tenth time.” Somehow, I don’t think Landon is joking, and that is scary enough. What is the secret?
Chapter Thirteen
Landon walks into his house first, and I follow him in, shutting the door behind me and catching a glimpse of the two bodyguard-type men sitting in the Jeep outside. Landon walks into the living room through the now opened door, and I take a deep breath before following him in. Maxx is leaning against the door, and he doesn’t look my way as I walk to Landon’s side and face the two men sitting on the cream sofa that matches the light cream walls and beige carpet. I run my eyes over Maxx, how his arms are crossed tightly, how his whole demeanor is screaming tension. When Maxx still doesn’t look my way, I look back to the new people in the room. They must be twins, with matching white hair, tanned skin and dark grey eyes. Everything feels odd, and cold, about them, from their designer clothing and expensive watches on their wrists, to how they sit upright like they have sticks up their asses. Their eyes run over me, and I feel like I’m getting the same examination as I gave them.
“This is your mate?” the one on the left asks incredulously, leaning closer as he looks me up and down.
“Yes,” Maxx answers tensely, and I flash him a confused look, which of course he ignores. I hope he doesn’t mean mate in the sense of a soulmate, but I’m sure he just means mate like a friend. Which I don’t even know if Maxx and I can be classed as friends.
“I can confirm she is one of ours. A half…though I didn’t know it was possible for a light to have a half-dark mate,” the man muses.
“Dark? Light? Half? What the hell are you going on about?” I rapidly ask, placing my hands on my hips. “And while you’re at it, why don’t you explain how you all look like glowsticks sometimes?”
“You haven’t told her?” the twin on the right asks, chuckling low, and tilts his head to the side as he stares at me. I notice the scar across his right cheek, and how he has a slightly different nose and chin to his brother.
“We are aliens, aliens that are made of light…and some are made of darkness,” Maxx says, and I do the only logical thing that I can think of. I burst into laughter. I keep laughing until Maxx starts glowing again, and th
en I do the next logical thing. I freak out and go to run out the door. Maxx catches me around the waist just before the door, and I gasp as his arm brushes mine. I stare up at Maxx, feeling how warm he is as he is pressed against me, how his skin is flawless this close and how his blue eyes are more powerful than I ever thought they could be. An intense, pleasurable heat sweeps across my body, and I close my eyes, wanting more of it and having no idea why I can’t seem to think straight. I’m suddenly pulled away from Maxx and the feeling, as a cold one replaces it. I gasp and open my eyes to see one of the twins has me in his arms, glowing a bright grey color which actually makes his eyes seem black as I look up at him. He smirks down at me as the coldness intensifies and makes me uncomfortable.
“Let her go,” I hear Maxx demand, his voice a little breathless yet you can’t miss the downright possessive tone in it.
“That’s no way to thank me,” the man holding me jokes.
“I understand now. That must be difficult,” the other twin says. I stand up shakily and push myself out of his twin’s grip. Maxx looks ready to kill him, standing only a little distance away from us, and his hands are glowing a bright blue. What the hell just happened? The twin walks back to his seat on the sofa, like nothing happened at all, and Maxx seems to relax a little, still staying close to me.
“You understand nothing, Cameron. Now you know why I want this agreement, are you in?” Maxx asks as Landon comes closer to my other side and gently tugs on my arm to try and walk me away.
“We have some terms…but an alliance would keep us all safe. We want to live in this town, hidden, as much as you clearly do,” Cameron smoothly replies and nods at his brother who hasn’t taken his eyes off me since the conversation started. I turn, knocking Landon’s hand away and glaring at the guy.
“What terms?” I ask. “What the hell was that a moment ago?” No one answers me, but the other twin’s lips turn up in a smirk while Maxx just gives me a look that suggests I shut up. Part of me knows I should be scared…I’m in a room full of aliens. Real life aliens. But it doesn’t stop me from wanting to find something to throw at Maxx for being a dick.
“We will train your mate in exchange for my brother and sister moving into your house until we find something suitable in town. I have to deal with the followers we have. We also want a promise from Landon to our sister. Her mate is dead, and she needs protecting,” Cameron states, and Landon seems to choke on thin air at his words.
“What is a promise?” I ask, glancing at Landon who nods once at Maxx, looking glum about it. I remember Iris saying Maxx and she are promised, like an arranged marriage or something. Maybe it’s something the aliens do around here, but it makes me feel uneasy at the thought or reminder of how Maxx is linked to Iris.
“You really need to get her up to speed,” the other twin laughs at my question.
“Don’t tell me what to do, Austin,” Maxx warns the other twin, who is still staring. “We wanted to make sure of what she is before explaining all this to her.”
“Do we have a deal or what? We don’t have time to waste if this is going to turn into a fight,” Cameron effortlessly asks.
“You have a deal,” Maxx says and walks over to Cameron who stands off the sofa. I watch as Maxx’s hand starts to glow blue as he offers it to Cameron. Cameron’s own hand glows the grey color as he slides it into Maxx’s hand, and light bursts out from their hands, so bright that I have to turn away with my eyes slammed shut. When the light is gone, I turn back to see Maxx stepping back, looking tired. Cameron doesn’t look much better as he walks to the door, Austin following closely behind him.
“We will be back tonight,” Austin says, and just before he walks out the door, he winks at me, a big grin on his lips. “I look forward to training you, Ura.”
“I never told you her name,” Maxx bites out.
“I know,” Austin smirks, offering no explanation before he walks out of the room, the door slamming shut behind him.
Chapter Fourteen
“Where the fuck do you think you are going?” Maxx asks Landon who opens the closed door and glares over his shoulder at him. Maxx and Landon seem to have forgotten I’m here as they stare at each other, clearly exchanging some kind of conversation that I don’t understand. I’m still trying to process all the new information, and not having a clue how to deal with it. I actually don’t understand most of it, and that scares me. I feel like I’ve dropped into another world since I walked in here.
“Out. You need to explain everything to Ura because this is ridiculous now. I need to get ready to make a promise I don’t want to keep,” Landon snaps, sounding beyond stressed as he rubs his hands over his face.
“Land, we will figure it out,” Maxx says quietly, but it doesn’t sound like he believes himself. “You know being promised means nothing more than protection if you don’t want it to be more.”
“No, we won’t figure it out, but one of us has a chance to be happy here. Don’t mess it up, brother,” Landon says and flashes me a kind, sad smile before walking out. The door shutting seems to echo in the room as I awkwardly look back to Maxx, who runs his hand through his hair as he watches me.
“Landon said you needed me, and I came, despite how much of a dick you are…now explain to me what the hell is going on here because you owe me,” I tell him firmly. Nothing he could tell me would make me more shocked than the fact they are aliens. I knew something was up with them, but this wasn’t what I was expecting.
“I don’t owe you. I could have made the deal without you. Landon was interfering as usual,” Maxx replies, his asshole self coming back in full force.
“Are you going to explain this to me or not?” I ask with a sigh. “Or I’m going to leave, and I won’t be coming back.”
“Sit down,” Maxx demands, and his tone, the way he expects me to do what he asks, annoys me enough to hold my ground, so I cross my arms.
“No, why don’t you sit down?” I reply.
“Do you have to argue with everything I ask you to do?” he asks, crossing his arms like mine and looking close to picking me up and throwing me on the sofa. I ignore the fact that the idea of him doing that is actually kind of hot.
“Well, you have never tried asking me something nicely before...so what do you expect?” I reply with a little smirk that makes his lips tilt up a bit.
“Fine,” he grumbles. “Will you please sit your pretty ass on the sofa?”
“See, that wasn’t too hard to do,” I mutter, and he narrows his eyes on me as I walk around the sofa and sit on the end. Maxx sits on the sofa opposite me, with a small coffee table in the middle of them. Maxx spreads his legs and rests his hands on his knees before sighing.
“This is a long story, one I don’t have a clue how to really explain to someone like you, Freckles,” he says.
“I’ll try to keep up,” I dryly reply, waiting for him to start.
“Okay, so I told you that we are aliens, well that’s only what humans would call us. We are actually a race from another planet, and I can’t tell you our name because you would not be able to understand it or the language, so it’s pointless. We speak through light, only you can’t do that, I don’t think. Our planet was made of true light, like I am as well,” he says rather quickly, and he doesn’t give me much time to process it all.
“Another planet?” I ask, because I don’t even know what to ask about what the true light is or talking through light.
“A lost, very advanced planet…it was destroyed over a hundred years ago after a war broke out, and my race ended up destroying not only our enemy’s world, but our own as well, by accident. The planets were meant to share the true light, but in the end, that is not what happened,” he states, a flash of blue light shimmers across his skin.
“Wait, how old are you then?” I ask.
“Eighteen, Freckles,” he chuckles. “But I will live a lot longer than humans do.”
“So…you weren’t born on this other planet?” I enquire.
“No, my mother was, and she escaped here with my father after the war. I was born, and not long after, my father was killed here,” he says, and I can see it’s a struggle to tell that.
“By who?” I whisper.
“It wasn’t only the light that escaped to the nearest habitable planet, the dark that we fought did as well,” he tells me.
“Like Austin and Cameron?” I ask, and he looks surprised that I picked up on who they are.
“Yes, and like many others,” he states. “There are far more dark than light on Earth. We are outnumbered by your kind.”
“You think I am one of them? Is that why they think they are going to train me?” I ask, waiting for him to say it’s a mistake, and that I’m nothing like them.
“You are half of them. Light and dark both come from the true light, the same power source, but our ancestors have always fought each other. I do not know why your mother didn’t tell you your history, but it is true that you are a half-alien,” he tells me.
“My mums an alien? I’m half alien?” I ask and then laugh until I have to stop, and there is dead silence in the room as Maxx waits for me to process all this. I think back to the last time I saw my mother, my normal mum, in the kitchen. Her long, very light blonde hair was kept up in a bun, her usual suit was all perfectly ironed as she drank her coffee before going to work. Everything about my mum was normal until the day she walked out.
“You’re lying. You have to be,” I say, going with denial as a response.
“Believe what you want, but those guys only made a deal with me because of Landon and you,” Maxx says, shrugging his shoulders before leaning back on the sofa, and stretching his long arms across the back cushions.
“Why Landon? Why would they want a light promised to a dark?” I ask, figuring some of the crazy out and trying to leave the subject of who I am, and who my mother might be, behind.
