He was ready for me.
I fought some more. And more. But the mist was shrouding my judgment, and I found myself unplugging from the outlet, moving toward him, hovering in front of him as the war waged on inside me.
Just a touch, I thought. That was all it would take.
Just a minute inside him and then I’ll leave . . .
As I leaned toward him, the dark mist made my sight murky, and I could barely see my hand reaching down, down, to connect with his neck. I held my so-called breath as his life force washed over me and I let myself seep into him.
Drown in him . . .
When I gently landed in his psyche, my feet brushed the ground until they found balance. A slow wind caressed a bunch of palm trees around me, whispering through the white sand.
Heat wavered over the skin of my solid dream-body, prickles of sweat languidly nipping at me as the hush of waves from the beach rolled and tumbled.
“Jensen,” he lazily said from behind me.
I turned to find him down the beach, sitting on a blue blanket. He was wearing board shorts, his white shirt open and tickled by the wind, his chest tanned and bare and just as muscular and washboard-absy as I’d always fantasized. He was looking at the water and not at me, and I knew what that meant in dreams—he was facing a change of life.
Was he ready to move on . . . with me?
But that wasn’t right. He should be with Suze, a human, a woman who’d already fallen for him.
Yet even though I knew I shouldn’t go to him, I did, and I gingerly sat next to him, keeping a space between us. Not that it mattered, because electricity danced there, pulling at me, urging me to cuddle up against him.
He smiled, pulling up his knees and resting his arms on them. “How’s this for relaxation?”
“Not bad,” I said. In the ocean, dolphins leaped into lazy arcs, playing. Dolphins . . . a dream symbol of emotional trust, of inspiration.
I exhaled—finally—the breath flowing out of my lungs like it’d been trapped for days. How long had it been since I’d felt the sun on my skin, like when I was young and tan and carefree at the beach with the real Dean?
But Dean, real or fake, wasn’t a part of my life anymore, so thinking about him was no way to spend my time with Gavin.
As I pushed both Deans out of my head, I snuck a peek at Gavin, but he was already lavishing a look over me. The need in his gaze overwhelmed me.
Shit. “Suze,” I said. “She’s still got strong feelings for you, and I’d be a crappy friend if I . . .”
“I know. And I’d be a crappy ex-boyfriend if I told her best friend how much I wanted her.”
All my best intentions melted. So did my heart. I’d wanted to hear him say that, but I’d never let myself need it. Yet here I was, needing, dying a little inside.
“We’re not together anymore,” he said, “because when you can’t let go of someone like I can’t let go of you, it’s not fair to the other person. Things with Suze . . . Well, our friendship became something I never anticipated. Then it hit a wall because we both figured out why we were together. And it wasn’t because of a normal bond between her and me.”
But . . . but . . . but . . . God, I could’ve made excuses all day. Should’ve made excuses. But when he got that look in his eyes again—the soft, hungry determination that told me he wanted to kiss me—I didn’t stop him.
And it wasn’t because of the mist this time.
He leaned toward me, slipping his hand behind my head, cradling me, bringing me close enough so that our mouths were a buzzing inch away. His breath warmed my lips, making them tingle.
So alive. So real.
“Jensen,” he whispered, like he was tasting my name, devouring it just before he pulled me to him and crushed his mouth down on mine.
My head reeled, a carnival ride with flashing lights and summer sin. His kiss was slow, warm, wet, his fingers tightening in my hair until I had to lean back my head, letting him do whatever he wanted.
I grabbed the front of his shirt, dizzy, holding on for dear life as his kiss deepened. He sipped at me, groaning low in his throat, and all I could do was pull him closer so he’d never go away, my heart chopping through every inch of skin, destroying every part of my body it came into contact with.
I ached like this with only one other person . . .
Don’t you dare think of fake Dean. Dammit. Get him out of your head—
The sound of a dog barking made my eyelids flutter, and we both backed away from each other, breathing hard. Gavin touched his fingertips to my face, and it reminded me of how Suze had touched the window of the clothing store when she’d seen that red dress and told me it would never fit her, and how she would never fit in Gavin’s life. . . .
I bent my head, shame attacking me as the dog’s bark came nearer. Dogs meant a lot of different things in dreams, but all I could think of now was loyalty. And I wasn’t loyal in the least.
“I would ask what’s wrong,” Gavin said, his tone strained, “but I don’t think I have to.”
“I make as bad of a girlfriend as a friend,” I said.
Just as he was about to say something else, that dog bounded up to us, panting, happy as hell, beautiful in the sunlight.
He looked more like a wolf than a dog—big and strong with gray fur. Dangerous and maybe even feral.
I lifted my hand to him, anyway, inviting him over. It was Gavin’s psyche, and he wouldn’t let anything in it hurt me.
“Great,” Gavin said in slow dreamtime. “Romance-blocked by a dog.”
But the wolf-dog had already come over to me, sniffing my skin, cuddling against my palm. My heart was immediately his, and that relieved me, because I already knew my heart couldn’t be Gavin’s.
Next to me, Gavin laughed without much happiness as the dog licked my hand. Was he wondering if my affections really changed that easily and quickly?
The wolf-dog laid its head in my palm, his eyes a soft and loving light brown.
Why did his eyes actually remind me of Dean’s?
Just as I thought it, the dog began to shift its shape, his ears flattening against his head, his fur sucking back into his body, his form going from all fours into the naked hunch of a man.
And there he was, fake Dean with his light brown eyes, razor-edged blond hair, tanned skin, and arrogant smile.
“Do you have a kiss for me, too, Jen?” he asked.
17
Gavin had stiffened next to me, his hands fisted. I raised my arm and barred his chest, blocking him from rushing fake Dean.
“I banished you,” I said to Dean. That was the only thing I could think to say to him, because what was he doing in here? And when he’d appeared in Gavin’s other dream with the fruit stand and the burning houses, had he been as real as he seemed now or had he been something Gavin had dreamed up?
But Gavin didn’t know him, so how could he have pictured him in the dream . . . ?
Fake Dean stayed hunched, still reminding me of a wolf-dog. Also . . . naked. Very naked. I tried not to gaze at those wide, surf-honed shoulders and his sun-warmed skin, his streamlined arms and . . . Well, everything else, too.
“Anything can happen in dreams, darlin’,” he told me. “Besides, you don’t really want me gone—admit it. Now, where’s that kiss?”
This time Gavin got to his feet, but it was in that dragging dreamtime, the seconds stretching out. Funny, because fake Dean had been talking in normal time.
Caught between two very different worlds, I thought. Dean on one side, Gavin on the other, me in the middle, not knowing where I belong.
Fake Dean held up a peaceful hand to Gavin, who controlled his breathing and didn’t attack. At the same time, Dean talked to me.
“Even in a dream you invited me, Jenny. What do you make of that?”
Great. Yeah, I’d thou
ght of him, and that had been enough to invite him before. Worse, I’d done it during my kiss with Gavin.
But . . .
“You were banished,” I reminded him.
His head whipped to the side, just like I’d slapped him. He held a hand to his cheek, and when he lowered his fingers, a red hand imprint marked him. I almost touched it in apology but didn’t.
I didn’t want him here. Did I?
“I was banished from your Boo World,” he said, turning his gaze back to me. “Not from everywhere else with you.”
Then he looked at me with one of those vulnerable expressions he sometimes gave me, but this time, it was like he wanted me more than Gavin ever could. I yearned for that need in him. It even heated me more than Gavin’s warm kiss.
Dammit. But this was fake Dean, the last thing I needed, even if my heart was bopping up and down like a kid who’d found a stash of Astro Pops and eaten the whole case.
Fake Dean must’ve known what he did to me, because he held out his hand, silently asking me to grasp it, to welcome him back.
God, why had I missed him so much? It made no sense whatsoever, but here I was, one second away from slipping my hand into his, feeling his skin against mine. And it wasn’t just because he looked like my old Dean. There was something about this soul that was exciting. One in a million.
In lethargic motion, Gavin started to go at him again, but Dean only kept looking at me like he’d be willing to endure an eternity of battles just to be near me again.
I didn’t want to see him hurt, even if he was nothing but trouble. Why the hell was his hurt my hurt, though? Crap, I’d solve that later, because now I just wanted this fighting to stop.
“No!” I yelled at Gavin, slowly springing up to grab him before he could bowl over fake Dean.
But as I deliberately forced Gavin aside, there was suddenly no more Dean sitting in front of our blanket. And as I realized that he’d just up and disappeared, I felt Gavin pull away from me, too, deserting me.
No more dream?
That became surreally clear as I was dragged up, up and away from the beach. Second by second, the landscape sank into a black hole, sand and palm trees fading, water evaporating, a blank white wall coming down at me—
I blasted out of Gavin, knowing by now how to control my speed, a little weaker after dream digging, but, more than anything, confused. As hell.
Gavin had jerked awake in his chair, his fists bunched in front of him like he’d been pulled out of a fight ring.
He relaxed, thumping back against the cushions. It was in his eyes—he remembered what’d happened, and the questions he had for me were still fresh.
I materialized and floated aimlessly, ready for him to call me out.
“You wanted to go with him,” he finally said, but there was no accusation there, just an open wound in his words.
Denying it would be the same as lying, and I’d put Gavin through enough already. “Even though he’s a liar and a joker and the wrongest thing for me to ever happen . . . yeah, I did.”
“You still do.”
When I didn’t contradict him, he wiped a hand down his face. I wished I were the kind of soul who instinctively knew how to ward off pain, but I’d spent the final months of my life proving I had no clue how to do that. Gimme some pot, I’d be good. Gimme a quiet apartment where no one could talk to me, even better.
And that went for dealing with other peoples’ pain, too. Still, I tried with Gavin, making a valiant attempt to let him down easy. He’d become my human project, my mission, the guy who had a guardian angel in me.
But I couldn’t be his girlfriend.
“If you didn’t know we had zero chance before,” I said, “you’ve now got solid evidence.”
“Because another guy—as strange as he was—is in your life? I have no idea who or what he is, but I’m in your life, Jensen. And you know that you can’t push me out of it so simply.”
Why couldn’t he let this go? He was making it so hard to do the right thing.
I tried again. “I’m sure fake Dean made it a point to come into your dream so you’d see that he won’t give up, either, and so you wouldn’t spend any more time—”
“Wishing things were different with us?”
Honesty. So blatant and bare. “Don’t say things like that, Gavin. You’ve got to stop.”
“It’s what I’m feeling.” This strong man, the person who’d held his family together until tragedy had torn it apart . . . He was opening all of himself to me, and there wasn’t anything I could do to make him feel better. Ever. Dreams would never be enough for us, and there was also the small matter of Suze, who was still crazy about him. Couldn’t he understand any of that?
But even from across the room, I was still lured by that life force of his. He emanated protectiveness, goodness, and a solidness that I hadn’t felt in anyone else.
I told myself that he didn’t love me as much as he was curious about me, as much as he was enthralled with something that seemed like it was wondrous magic, even though I was anything but.
He leaned back his head and stared at the ceiling, his gaze as blank as the disappearing paradise in his dream. “Looks I’ve got some shitty luck with women. A real thing for dead girls, huh? First Elizabeth, then you . . .”
Now he was getting angry. I would’ve gotten that way, too, if I were him.
“I’m sorry, Gavin,” I said. Then I added something stupid—the type of awkward comment you say when you want to cushion a blow. “But that doesn’t mean we can’t still be . . .”
“You really should go.”
Softly uttered, but snap quick and bone deep just the same. Now I was being banished.
“Will you tell Wendy I’m going to the forest?” I whispered.
He didn’t answer, so I left him to brood in that chair, and reminded myself that this was the best thing for him, for Suze, and for me.
Wasn’t it?
* * *
Packing away the new guilt I felt because now I hadn’t only hurt Suze, but Gavin, too, I went straight to Elfin Forest.
There the trees were frozen in spindly, shadowy poses under the moon, almost like bizarre bugs caught under the beam of a flashlight. It didn’t take me long to skim the woods and find Amanda Lee with the Spirit Stalkers, who were wearing matching black windbreakers and grouped in a circle, holding hands, a stationery camera propped on a tripod and capturing what I thought might be a séance. Hell, the burning candle in the middle of their circle was my first clue. Plus, Sierra, with her dark curlicue hair, red-hot lipstick, and glasses; J.J., with his spiky Simon Le Bon–minus-the-mullet hair; and 10, with her Bo Derek beaded braids, all had their heads bent while Sierra spoke.
“We’re friendly,” she said to the air, “and we’d love to hear your story. Come to us, whoever’s out there, introduce yourself . . .”
Gypsies were hiding behind logs, peering over them. Johnny Eagle, one of the hanged Native Americans, had come back, too, but without his group this time. He was leaning by an oak opposite Marg, like he was wary of her and that X.
They both waved to me as I landed, careful not to disturb the early-summer leaves. I waved back at them, but still gave Marg a cool look. Now that I suspected my killer hadn’t been vanquished, my suspicions about her were at full volume, keening inside my essence like a microphone that’d gotten too close to a stereo. That X . . . a perfect portal for evil.
Amanda Lee had been wandering around the outside of the ghost-hunter circle, and I supposed that was because she’d sworn off séances ever since she’d brought the dark spirit through that portal at the Edgett mansion.
Gavin’s name combed through me, and I allowed myself to think about him for an instant, sitting alone in his condo, nursing a broken heart. . . .
But then Amanda Lee saw me, and she turned away from the group and
headed for an old adobe building that’d crumbled so it looked like the half face of an Incan god or something. I guessed that she wanted me to follow her for some privacy.
I put Gavin aside carefully, covering him under a soft blanket of memory.
“Where’s Scott?” I asked when we were out of hearing range from the hunters. Hopefully they were too into the séance to notice Amanda Lee was gone.
“Scouring the forest for Daniel.” She was bunching her boho skirts with both hands as her voice came out in a low, tight whisper. “He told me what happened with your killer, and I’ve been waiting for you to show. Jensen, you realize I wasn’t the one who sent the dark spirit back to wherever he came from. That means he didn’t go anywhere at all!”
“I have that feeling, too, but here’s what we’ve got to ask ourselves: fake Dean was the one who said that since you brought my killer to Boo World, you need to take him out of it. What if he was giving me a load of shit?”
I thought of how he’d looked at me in Gavin’s dream, like he’d wanted to give me everything, his heart and his soul. Dammit, did that mean I should believe him?
On the tail end of that, a harrowing thought came to me about Dean. If he was a higher power and he’d been obsessed enough with me to take all these pains to get involved in my life . . . What if he was actually my killer’s mentor?
What if he had met the dark spirit in another dimension and arranged for it to come through that portal in the first place, and he’d been leading me on ever since?
I must’ve gone pale with the paranoia, because Amanda Lee asked, “What is it?”
When I told her, she put a hand over her mouth, shaking her head, but a cry from the ghost hunters made us both flinch.
We bolted around the adobe structure and over to them, and what I saw standing over the hunters’ circle was enough to make me go “Nggg.”
A ghostly shape in a black cloak hovered over 10, arms raised, hands like claws as it lifted the braids from the hunter’s head, making them stand on end.
Every Breath You Take Page 22
