She lurches from the ground, onto her feet, and attempts to sprint past him, but he punches with thick, hard knuckles that connect with her head, behind her ear. Her head swings from the force and her body twirls. Lights twinkle behind her eyes with each throb of pain.
He hit me. Matt hit me.
Another crack to her cheek. Pain pounds her like a hammer. She crashes back against the kitchen cabinet and slumps to the floor. Darkness slides in, tunneling her vision. She can barely focus enough to see him standing over her or the ferocious snarl on his lips. This can’t be Matt. He’d never do this to her. Something is wrong here.
She reaches up into the sink behind her and feels for something, anything. The blade of a knife; it bites into her palm as she grips it. She feels for the handle and clasps tight. Matt punches her again—a blow to the same cheek. Her head smacks against the cabinet behind her. Another punch on the opposite cheek.
Crippling agony.
Light fades.
Matt raises his fist again. She can’t take any more with unconsciousness threatening to drown her. She must fight back. But he’s her best friend. Her only friend. The agony of knowing that she has to fight her friend is almost more unbearable than the pain in her body.
Memories flicker in her mind from when they were kids and would talk all night to each other about anything but the painful existence they lived.
She recalls escaping from the house with him when their foster father was unconscious after one of his drunken tirades and heading to the local park where they stayed all day playing on the swings and slides until twilight came.
She remembers when her foster father had slapped her across the face and Matt ran at him, growling angrily and punching him fair in the nose.
Another fist to her ear snaps her back to present time. Sound fades.
Matt’s fist is poised, and she knows with every ounce of her intuition that he won’t stop until she’s dead.
There’s no other option now, either she uses this knife to fight back or she dies.
Ariana rasps a breath and digs deep for any remnants of strength lingering in her battered body. With a desperate groan from the back of her throat, she lunges at him, despite the agony, and slams the blade into his chest.
Matt stops and gasps, his eyes widening. He looks down at his chest, hands jerking toward the blade. He pulls out the knife. Red, viscous blood gushes from the wound and stains his white shirt.
She watches the knife in his hands. Her heart is screaming in her throat. He staggers forward, closer. She swallows down a shriek and raises her hands to protect herself.
But then he wobbles backward a step, two, three, falls against the counter behind him, and slides to the floor. The blade drops with a bloody clang. A final wheeze rushes from between his lips and he stills, frozen in death.
Ariana’s body trembles. Tears flood her cheeks. Blood dribbles from her nose.
“Oh my God, oh my God, oh my God.” She spies her phone on the ground and falls onto her knees beside it. Her head and face are throbbing and her eyes are swelling closed. She clasps the phone in a weak fist and attempts to stand, but she wobbles and falls back against the kitchen floor like a heavy sack of oranges.
The coppery scent of blood floods the air, making her gag.
On hands and knees, she crawls into the next room to the side table and reaches up, patting across the tabletop. Her trembling fingertips flitter over a smooth card and she sighs, almost cries from the relief. She pulls the card down and turns her cellphone on. Barely able to see anymore, she dials Hadeon’s number.
He answers immediately. “What’s the matter?”
Ariana struggles to find her voice; the effort makes her skull feel like it’s splitting open. “I didn’t know who to call.”
“Where are you?” he asks, voice thundering.
“At home.” She tells him her address.
“I’m on my way.”
“Wait, you don’t understand what I’ve done. I…I k-killed Matt,” she says, breaking off as a sob explodes from her throat.
“We’ll handle it once I’m there,” he says without any hesitation, and he hangs up.
The room spins around Ariana’s head as dim shadows creep in.
* * * *
A loud bang sounds at the door. Ariana flinches and drags her eyelids open.
“Ariana,” comes Hadeon’s booming voice.
Relief floods her body, and she tries to stand but can’t, the pain is too great. She attempts to speak and manages a whisper. “I’m in here.”
The locks tinkle and both release with a pop. The latch snaps. Hadeon bursts through the door, his expression fierce, and slams it behind him. He finds her lying in the fetal position.
“What happened here?” he says, rushing to her side and crouching beside her. He strokes blood-crusted hair off her forehead and picks her up into his arms. With long strides, he carries her to the bedroom and lays her on the bed.
“I killed my best friend,” she says, unable to look at him.
“Good. Good girl. Now, let’s get you fixed up. How did you mend your ankle?”
She blinks, baffled by his understanding. She has just killed a man and he is commending her for it?
“How did you mend your ankle?” he repeats louder.
“The spell,” she says, each word swimming through sticky, black tar.
He takes the book from her nightstand.
“The name?” he says.
A tear rolls onto her cheek. She thinks, swims through the muddle. She peers up at him, raises a hand, and pushes the book away. “It hurts too much.”
“It can’t be any worse than this,” he says, his expression pleading with her as his gaze traces a path across her face.
“I…I can’t.”
“Ariana, I’ll keep you safe.” He sets the book down and strokes the hair from her forehead with large, gentle hands. “You need to do this.” He stops and breathes in deeply. “I can’t bear to see you like this.” A shadow falls across his face, a shadow of anguish.
Even through the reeling and the agony, she finds it peculiar that he looks so worried about her.
He lifts the book again, but she pushes it away. She doesn’t need to see the spell again; the words are a part of her now, linked with every cell in her body.
She parts her lips and chants, voice wispy, “Of love and life that burns within. Use that flame to solder and mend. Make broken flesh and bones whole again.”
That now-familiar sensation of possibility blankets her. A warm glow begins in her chest. The sensation quickens her pulse, for she knows what comes next. She grips the bedsheets as the warmth ignites into a roaring fire and storms toward her face.
Ariana’s back bows as a scream tears from her throat. The agony—the horrific, terrifying torment. She screams again. Her face feels like it’s caving in and each bone is being shattered to dust; like every vein is popping and every ligament snapping.
The blackness falls fast this time. She wills it to find her and dives as deep as she can into its numbing embrace.
* * * *
Hadeon’s face, his deep, dark eyes and grimacing expression, is the first thing Ariana sees when she wakes.
“Good afternoon,” he says, almost cracking a smile.
She sits up, ramrod straight, her gaze darting around the room.
Hadeon rests a hand on her shoulder. “Slow down.”
Ariana nods, breathing hard. She pivots her legs over the side of the bed and presses her feet to the floor. She flinches when she sees crusted red stains on her arms and dress. Her blood. Matt’s blood.
Memories flood her thoughts, of slicing a knife into Matt’s chest, of the intense pain she felt. She touches her cheekbones and swivels her jaw from side to side. The pain is gone—miraculously gone—but the emotions remain.
“He tried to kill me, Hadeon,” she says, throat thick and achy with tears. “And I’m sorry I called you, but I…I didn’t know what else to do. I remembe
r how you told me if I ever need help to give you a call, and I feel like I can trust you. I can trust you, can’t I? I mean with all this mess. I know I could go to jail for this, but it was self-defense. Honestly.” Her voice quakes and cracks as tears form and roll down her cheeks. She wipes at them with the backs of her hands, hating herself for crying and for showing weakness. “I had no other choice. He was hitting me. He was going to kill me.”
Hadeon presses a finger to her lips. “I understand. You can trust me. I’ve dealt with it all. No one will know. The police won’t come knocking at your door.”
The relief his words bring slide right over her like a warm, cozy blanket. “Why would you do that for me?”
“Because I told you if you need me, to call me. And you did. End of story.”
She wants to believe that he has dealt with the situation. She hopes she can trust that his motivations for doing so were good, but life has taught her to not be so naïve.
Ariana jumps to her feet. “No, not end-of-story. Not end-of-story at all.” She marches out of her bedroom, brave until she rounds the corner at the end of the hall leading to the kitchen. She stops, breathing deeply, and can’t bring herself to take another step.
Hadeon joins her at her side. “The body’s gone. I’ve cleaned the floor and cabinets. I disposed of the knife. There’s no trace that this morning ever occurred.”
Her chest is heaving as she takes one small step after the other and peeks around the corner at the kitchen floor.
Nothing.
Gaining confidence, she draws closer, eyeing all the kitchen surfaces.
Nothing.
Ariana falls back into Hadeon’s arms, her legs melting with relief. “Oh, thank you. So much. Thank you.”
He holds her to him for a long moment, not saying anything. Simply being her rock. My gentle warrior, she thinks, sinking back against his hard, towering body. She could become lost in his confidence, his dominance, his…
Ariana clears her throat, straightens, and steps away from him—too much tension or energy, something, thick and intense. She heads to the kitchen, flops onto one of the breakfast-bar stools, and lowers her face into her hands.
In a matter of days, her world has been flipped around and she has been ricocheting off everything that has stepped across her path. It started with that stupid spell book. Ariana lifts her head and peers at Hadeon, still standing near the hall, watching her.
What has he got to do with all this? Mr. nothing-shocks-me-or-frazzles-me.
Her eyes narrow. “How did you know I fixed my ankle with a spell?”
“You don’t need to know why.”
Anger stirs at his no-answer, but she remains controlled with deep breathing. “How come you’re not all weirded-out by everything you just saw—Matt, the spell, and my face magically healing?”
He shrugs. “It takes more than that to…weird me out.”
She squints even more. “Who are you?”
“I’ve already told you all you need to know.”
The anger takes hold again, stirring deeper, stronger, and she can’t control what it makes her mouth do. “You know what, Hadeon—”
“Don’t say it,” he snaps.
She stands and tousles her hair with energetic fingers. “I just want to know what’s going on.” Her voice shakes, despite her best attempts at keeping it steady. Her throat tightens. “I’m…” She stops and shakes her head. “Nothing.”
He draws closer. “What, Ariana? You’re what? Scared? Is that what you were going to say? Because if it is, you should be. You should be scared. What’s with the tough act all the time? Let yourself feel something for once. Let yourself experience an emotion other than anger and antagonism and lust. Those three things get you nowhere, except to shut everyone out of your life. Even those trying to help you.”
But that’s what she does, she closes herself off from everyone and everything, that way she doesn’t get hurt. “I don’t need anyone’s—”
“Help?” he finishes for her. “Yeah, you’ve already told me that. But you sure needed me this morning.”
She lowers her head. Tears sting her eyes. She lets them come now and gives them permission to have their way with her. Her chest heaves with pain, with such sorrow, and a sob sounds from her throat.
“I killed Matt,” she says, tears falling down her cheeks. “He’s my friend. My best friend. Do you know how that makes me feel? Like I’m evil. How dare he?” she shouts, pointing to where Matt’s body once lay stiff and bloody. “How dare he make me feel like this? How dare he…” She chokes on her words, overtaken by the tears wracking her body. She covers her face with her palms and cries harder than she ever has in her life. Harder, she is sure, than she ever will allow herself to do again.
Hadeon wraps his arms around her and pulls her against him. She nuzzles into his strong shoulder and cries so much she can barely breathe. He smooths a hand over her hair, rubs at her back, and allows her to release the pent-up emotions stewing inside.
“You did what you had to do, Ariana. Now, if you’re going to survive this, you must be proud and walk tall away from it.”
Ariana lifts her head from his chest and peers into his eyes. Despite the rugged exterior, she finds compassion within him. “Walking away from it won’t change what I’ve done.”
“No. But neither will dwelling on it.”
“I feel like such a terrible, terrible person. Regardless of why it happened, I’ve stolen his life.”
“You feel like that because of who you are on the inside. Not a terrible person at all, but a beautiful soul who was forced into a corner and had to fight her way out of it any way she could.”
Ariana nods, contemplating his words.
“Shut it down. Step away from it. Face forward, always forward, Ariana because if you don’t, you won’t survive.”
Ariana shudders. But in a way, she knows he’s right.
Never look back. You know how it works. You’ve been doing it your whole life.
Ariana rolls her shoulders. “I’ll try. No looking back.”
“Good. You’re coming to stay with me. Long term. So if there’s anything here you consider sentimental, be sure to pack it.”
She hastens away from him, shaking her head. “No way! I’ve worked too hard to get this place, to keep this place, and to create a life for myself. Without this, I have…nothing.”
Hadeon strides to the front door and opens it. The afternoon light blasts through and hinders her vision for a moment. Taped to the top of the door, just above the long scratches, is a piece of paper.
She strides over and stands on tiptoes to read it. An eviction notice. “Argghh. I gave him the rent money.” She shakes her head, gauging Hadeon’s enormous frame. “I’m not living with you. I can’t.”
He arches a brow. “What are your other options? It’s not safe out there. You’re not safe in here. You have nowhere to go.”
She stamps her foot. “Damn it!”
A small smile flickers across Hadeon’s lips and then his usual grimace returns. “As soon as you’re done with your little-girl-drama-queen display, we’re leaving.”
Ariana glares at him, scowling. “I’ve had a tough day. Cut me some slack.”
“Yeah, and we’re all victims until we start to believe we are in control of our own destinies and then we become creators.”
Her mouth opens and snaps shut. She groans, spins, and marches away to find a suitcase so she can pack some clothes.
His voice follows her up the hall. “And if it makes you feel any better, turns out Matt was already dead by the time he got to you.”
She stills. Already dead? Matt certainly didn’t look or feel dead as he struck her with his fists. But then again, that man, that demon, who had done everything he could to kill her was not the Matt Ariana knew and loved. Her Matt would never have hurt her.
Is this what Hadeon means? That somehow Matt was killed before she even saw him outside the bar, and it was his shell, taken
over by something else much more sinister, who died on her kitchen floor this morning?
Relief washes over her with that thought. It eases some of the culpability she feels for Matt’s death. But she soon shudders because if Hadeon is right, and her best friend was possessed by some demon, it means her life has taken another massive leap toward crazy.
Chapter 5
Ariana rides the elevator to Hadeon’s penthouse apartment, the only apartment on the twenty-third floor. The doors open. They stride into a foyer. Hadeon holds her lone bag of clothes.
The expanse beyond the foyer is what catches Ariana’s attention. An entire wall of glass offers endless views of the sprawling city glittering under the twilight moon like a jewel.
It’s an amazing apartment, but she can’t enjoy it because her entire world has been tipped upside down. It’s hard to see past the hazy gloom.
She studies the interior of his apartment: honey-colored timber flooring, warm beige walls, and furnishings in dark hues. Virile art in rich, inviting colors adorn the walls—masculine, sensual.
Hadeon walks down the long hall. She skips to catch up while eyeing the plethora of rooms, a study, library, and bathrooms. Ricardo must pay well. Though she knows that explanation for why a bouncer could afford a place like this is too ordinary. And normal is not the order of things at the moment.
“This will be yours,” he says as they walk through the door at the very end of the hall.
The room is a modest size with a forgettable view. The walls are cream, but behind the king-sized bed is graphite-colored silk wallpaper. Blush and ivory cherry blossoms blooming from thick branches spatter across the material. The bedspread bears the same design and coloring, while the sheets are bright cherry red.
“I’ve always loved cherry blossoms.” She spins in a circle. “It’s as though this room was decorated for me.”
Hadeon opens a door at the side of the room on an en suite bathroom. He points to another door. “The walk-in closet is behind there.”
Ariana nods and rubs her fingers along the silk covering her bed. She touches the bloom of a blossom—so lifelike, it feels velvety beneath her fingers. Falling back onto the bed, she stretches her arms above her head and sighs.
The Book of Spells and Such Page 5
