“What I don’t understand is why you all keep referencing Bram instead of Koda,” Felice went on, turning her whole body to face mine. Her arms hung at her sides, and even with her dress and hair wet, she looked like a goddess. A goddess who just crawled out of a natural spring and wound up in the depths of hell. “Does Koda have multiple personalities? Is Bram one of them?”
“Oh, honey, that’s not the half of it,” I whispered, tilting my head, leaning toward her in spite of myself. She smelled like rain, like nature. She smelled good, the exact kind of smell I could lose myself in.
“What?” Felice frowned again, this time at me. She did not, I noticed, try to move away from me. She simply met my tall stature with an upturned nose and that gorgeous frown. “And do not call me honey.”
I chuckled as the room lit up brighter with lightning. After the thunder died down, I listened to the hard splattering of the rain on the glass beside us. “I think I’ll call you whatever I want to,” I murmured, causing her cheeks to turn red. “But all that aside, Koda isn’t like us. We all have our demons, but his…his is real, and his name is Bram.”
She stared at me, her lips parting.
“Bram is the devil on your shoulder, while Koda is the angel on the other. They share his body, but sometimes Bram seeks control, and when he gets it…” My mind flashed, memories rising to the surface that had no place here. The last time Bram had taken control, it hadn’t been good. “When he gets it, bad things tend to happen.”
Her eyelids shut, her breathing slow. “I knew he seemed like a different person. I just…I never thought—” Before Felice could say anything else, a steady rhythm of knocking entered the room, and both she and I glanced toward the door.
That…did not sound particularly Bram-like. If Bram was on the other side of the door, he would’ve tried to kick it in or something. Something brutal, something louder.
Neither Felice nor I moved right away. A minute later, someone on the other side of the door spoke, “It’s Dagen. Payne found me, told me what’s going on. He said I should come to your room—” He sounded as he normally did; no more frantic and no more calm. Regular Dagen. Not surprising, since he was always so wrapped up in his own paranoia.
I was slow to move away from Felice—perish the thought, since being close to her was all I wanted right now—and to the door. With my hand resting on the knob, I paused to ask, “Are you alone?”
“If Bram was with me, I doubt I’d be able to think with a level head,” Dagen answered through the door, making a lot of sense. “Or think at all, considering what Bram likes to do.”
Unlocking the door, I opened it, allowing Dagen to slide in. Once it was locked again, I turned to watch Dagen, the man already pacing the length of the room. “Well,” I said, grinning, “now the real party can begin. Who wants to take off their clothes first? Usually I volunteer, but I figure I’ll be a gentleman and let one of you go first.”
Dagen simply glanced to me, as if I was nothing more than a pesky fly buzzing around his head, causing him mild irritation. Felice, meanwhile, looked horrified that I’d even suggest something as outlandish as a threesome.
Trust me. There was nothing crazy about a threesome, even if two of the three people didn’t particularly like each other. Sex was merely a great stress reliever. Everyone should try it.
“Now is not the time for that,” Dagen said, shaking his head. Outside, thunder boomed, and the lighting in my room flickered but remained on. Both he and Felice glanced to the light hanging on the wall, as if that particular furnishing held the answers to what was happening here.
Truly, I’d never seen a storm this bad before, and I’d been here a long, long time. So long it was hard to remember what it was like out there, in the outside world. Once Grimmstead got its claws in you, you were never let go. Never released. You became a prisoner of your own mind.
Almost as if by fate, while both Dagen and Felice were staring at the electrical fixture on the wall, I happened to glance down at my hand—and what I saw nearly stopped my heart cold. My hand was not my hand.
It was pale, thin, and bony to the extreme.
As I stared down at it, I blinked, but even after blinking, all I could see was the shaking hand before me.
Shit. Fuck. No.
I said nothing as I held my hand to my chest, moving past Dagen and Felice and heading straight into the bathroom in the corner. I shut the door and flicked the lock, my nerves heavy with anxiety.
“Ian,” Felice’s voice spoke on the other side of the door, “are you all right?” Such concern. Was it real?
I couldn’t help but wonder that. She didn’t know me, not really. No one did. No one knew just what kept me up at night, why I had to drown myself in the bottle and whatever else I could get my hands on here. She probably thought I was suave Ian all the time.
I wasn’t. What I was was so much worse.
“Yes,” I spoke, still eyeing up my shriveled, old hand. “Just a…just a moment.” My voice cracked at the last word, and I winced, hoping she and Dagen didn’t hear it. The front I constantly put up was cracking as I stared down at my hand. Even the fingernails looked nasty and gnarly. There was nothing about this hand that looked youthful and carefree; just the opposite.
My body lurched to the vanity, my heart beating wildly in my chest as I slowly lifted my eyes to stare at myself in the mirror. When I saw my reflection, I wanted to vomit.
It wasn’t supposed to be like this. I wasn’t supposed to be like this. The picture that seemed to follow me around, no matter where I went or what I did always looked haggard, but me? Never before had I looked so old.
Cheeks sunken in, my nose looking weird on my face, nothing but cartilage. My lips were thin and dry, deep hollows beneath my eyes, as if my eyes themselves had fallen into my head. I looked a fright, an ugly, old thing, and I measuredly lifted both hands to my face, running them along my gaunt cheekbones.
To my utter horror, I felt it. I did not feel the smooth skin that should’ve graced my face; instead I felt the sandpaper-y flesh that stood in the mirror, the deep curve of my cheekbones and the dried, cracking texture that made up my mouth. The mirror wasn’t just showing me…I really did look like this.
Fuck. No, no this couldn’t be.
I could hardly breathe, could hardly stand to look at myself in the mirror. If I looked like this, no wonder Felice wasn’t falling prey to my charms. How could I have any charm when I looked like a simple breeze could knock my bones apart?
My hands moved to run through my hair—felt like dried straw, and, I found out quickly, it was falling out in clumps. My hands returned with two clump-fulls of hair, and I immediately dropped them in the sink, stepping back until my spine hit the stone wall behind me.
No. No, this wasn’t real. This couldn’t be real.
That’s what I repeated to myself over and over as I sunk down, curling into myself as I tried to block out the world. Now was not the time to lose myself in my fears, but honestly, I couldn’t help it. I couldn’t stop it. There was no way I could ever buck up and pretend like everything was okay.
I was never going to leave this bathroom, not while I looked like this. If that meant I would die here, then so be it. I would rather fall over and die right here than let anyone look at me like this.
There was no point in life if there was no beauty in it.
Chapter Sixteen – Felice
Ian didn’t exactly sound okay, but I let him be, mostly because I still couldn’t believe what he’d so easily suggested. Taking off clothes? Vastly inappropriate, though I supposed I couldn’t champion inappropriateness after having sex with Payne. Yes, I’d definitely crossed a line there was no coming back from, but I’d learn how to deal with it later.
Dagen was pacing the room, and as the storm waged outside, lightning and thunder booming in the distance every so often, I couldn’t help but ask, “Does he always make comments like that?” Why I felt like talking about the threesome was beyond me. I should just let it go
and hope, pray that Payne found Lucien.
Bram…I didn’t know what to think about Bram. Koda was Bram? They were two separate personalities, but by the way Ian had spoken of them, it sounded as if they were both aware of each other, and I was pretty sure that wasn’t how it normally worked.
Dagen slowed his pacing as he neared me, his eyes flicking to the window behind his glasses. “Yes. It’s in his nature. He’s always seeking release, especially during times like these.” He glanced over his shoulder, as if he heard something, but I heard not a thing.
I was surrounded by strange men, men who were both lost souls and criminals. I should’ve known this wouldn’t be a simple and easy job. Was it worth it?
Dagen’s black eyes were slow to return to me, and he tore off his glasses, starting to furiously wipe them on the hem of his white, button-up shirt. “He came to me the other day actually, trying to convince me in joining him to seduce you.”
The way he said it, so matter-of-factly, made me blink in shock.
“What?” I grew warm in certain places. Ian had purposefully thought about having a threesome with Dagen and I? That was just…stupid.
Kind of hot, but stupid. I wasn’t into that.
Then again, before today, I would’ve claimed not to be a fan of spontaneous sex in creepy basements, so maybe I wasn’t the best judge of what I was and was not into.
“He believed you would succumb to us both, whereas you firmly reject him when he’s alone,” Dagen explained, putting his glasses back on. His eyes were such a dark color, they were near pupil-less. “He doesn’t like to be rejected.”
“Obviously,” I whispered, folding my arms over my chest. No matter what I did, I couldn’t get the notion of a threesome out of my head. How would that work? Who would go where? Of course, such were questions I shouldn’t be asking myself anyway, as it would never happen. I couldn’t keep having sex with these guys. I mean, technically the only one I’d had sex with was Payne—and Lucien if you counted that dream—but that was it. I should work on keeping my numbers steady, not increasing them.
No more sex. Simple. More self-love in the bath.
Again, Dagen looked over his shoulder. “Do you…do you hear that? I swear, it’s getting louder.” Almost as if on cue, thunder roared outside, practically shaking the ground below us.
“The thunder?” I asked. “Yeah, I—”
“No,” he whispered. “That.” When he said it, I heard absolutely nothing but the storm outside, pounding on the window a foot to my left.
I was about to tell him that I didn’t hear anything—this seemed to be Dagen’s quirk, which I’d gladly take over Ian’s penchant for inappropriateness—but then the ground literally started to shake. Yellow lightning flashed outside, blinding me for a few seconds. I fought to keep my balance, to not fall over.
And then the electricity cut out, throwing us into blackness.
Mostly blackness, for the storm still raged outside, bits of grey light shining through the window.
“What’s happening?” I asked. I had to grip the windowsill behind me. The world had gone topsy-turvy, the ground shaking so much it was near impossible to keep my balance.
Dagen made it to my side, throwing his arms around me—not me, per se, but more like the windowsill—breathing out, “Feels like an earthquake. That’s never happened before. I—” His arm brushed mine, and instantly whatever else he was going to stay stopped.
So did the trembling of the earth below us.
I couldn’t even ask if Ian was okay in the bathroom, because through the darkness, my eyes were firmly on Dagen’s face. We stood so closely, I was able to see every prickle of stubble on his chin, the way the dark bags hung under his eyes. This man clearly didn’t take care of himself. Maybe it was because we stood so close, or maybe it was because the earthquake had stopped, but I lifted a hand and gently touched his jawline.
Dagen kept his hands on the sill behind me, not pulling away.
For just a split second, I was able to forget about the situation. Forget about the chaos outside and the fact that Ian was less than ten feet away, behind the bathroom door. For just that moment, I was able to lose myself in the blackness of Dagen’s eyes. Such dark eyes, they seemed almost soulless, but I wasn’t afraid of him, even if I should be. It was more than clear to me by now that none of these guys were normal.
I should pull my hand off him. I shouldn’t touch him. I should duck under his arms and no longer be sandwiched in between him and the wall beneath the windowsill. But I didn’t. I didn’t move away, didn’t drop my hand. My hand roamed his face, slowly coming to cup his entire right cheek.
He breathed out, a slow, uneven breath that told me he was feeling something. So was I, actually.
“You,” he whispered, stepping forward, leaning his whole body against mine. My lungs hitched at the sensation of being caught between a rock and a hard place—in this case, a stony wall and a firm, unrelenting body.
I dropped my hand from his face, resting it on his chest. Dagen was the thinnest out of the guys, probably because he didn’t take good care of himself, but somehow I was lured to him the same way I was to the others. Like a moth to the flame, I couldn’t resist any of them, even though I should.
Touching them was…like touching life itself. Like recharging my soul. I needed more.
“I don’t hear it anymore,” Dagen murmured, sounding amazed. He was only a few inches taller than me, which made it easy for him to angle his face toward mine, his breath hot on my cheek. “You make it stop. Nothing’s ever made it stop before.”
I had no idea what he was talking about, but it sounded like a good thing, didn’t it? If I could help to lessen his paranoia and anxiety, wasn’t that a good thing? Maybe it was the heat of the moment, my nerves causing my walls to crumble, but I didn’t care.
Dagen’s mouth neared mine, and I couldn’t stop myself. I tilted my chin up and let him kiss me, let his slow-burning passion wash over me like a gentle wave on the shore. Every care in the world was gone, every urgency I had moments ago utterly vanished. There was nothing else in my mind except the way his lips felt on mine, how his stubble scratched my chin, and how his arms were slow to wrap around me, no longer holding onto the windowsill.
I lost myself to the slow and steady push of his lips, wishing I could taste more of him, feel more of him. Clothes suddenly felt ridiculously constricting. My dress was still pretty wet anyway; it wouldn’t be too strange to take it off, would it?
Or maybe Dagen could take it off…
It was as I thought that particularly salacious thought that the ground below us started to shake again, blindingly bright lightning gracing the sky outside, thunder following suit mere moments behind.
Our kiss broke apart because of the quake. This one was stronger than the last one; even though we held onto each other, we still fell to the floor. We released each other only to be on all fours on the ground.
Dagen breathed hard. “I need—”
Whatever it was he was about to say, I didn’t get a chance to hear him. I heard shouting in the hall, and as the quake ceased, I met his stare in the darkness. “Did you hear that?” Now it was my turn to ask him that question, apparently.
“Felice” was all he could say. No more, no less.
Well, even if he was too concerned with continuing our kiss, I heard it. I got to my feet, glancing down at him. “Check on Ian. Make sure he’s okay in there.” I started toward the door, bumping the corner of the bedpost—ouch. That was definitely going to bruise.
“Don’t go out there,” Dagen warned, finally in his own head enough to come after me.
But it was too late.
Almost like magic, I walked into the hall, unable to resist the gut feeling I had to keep going. A loud slam came from my left, and I nearly jumped out of my skin as I turned to view the closed door. The only reason I saw it was because of all the windows on the other wall; the bedrooms in both wings hugged the south side of the building; t
he hallway the north.
I didn’t close the door behind me, and I bet Dagen didn’t, either. Maybe everything was off whack because of the quakes? This was an old building.
My feet took me to the door, and I tried to open it, but I couldn’t. As I released the knob, I saw it twisting and turning in the darkness, but the door didn’t open. “Are you okay in there?” I asked loudly after glancing both ways down the hall, only once I was sure I was alone.
Alone with a psycho maniac running around. Great. Didn’t know what took me over and caused me to walk into the hall; it was almost like I had no choice, like someone or something was controlling me.
“Yes,” Dagen shouted, his voice muffled. It…sounded almost exactly like the shouting I’d heard coming from the hall a minute ago. But there was no way it was the same, because that just…wouldn’t make a lick of sense. “But I can’t seem to open the door. I don’t think it’s locked—”
Well, I was a sitting duck out here, regardless.
“I’ll see if I can find Lucien or Payne,” I said, hoping while I was searching for them I didn’t run across Bram. Bram, Koda, whoever he was. Whatever name he chose to use. Had to avoid that psychopath.
That’s what happened that day in the library. Bram took over, had me pinned against the window, his hand curling around my neck. And, stupid horny me, I kind of got turned on from it. There was nothing sexy about that. Nothing at all.
Stupid brain. Stupid Grimmstead. Stupid job. Right now, it was all very stupid.
Stupid and dangerous.
“Felice!” Dagen called from Ian’s room. He probably wanted me to stay, but I couldn’t. I had to go, had to do something. This day just kept growing weirder and weirder as the hours wore on.
“I’ll be back,” I said, turning on my heel as I hurried away. I slowed my pace as I reached the grand staircase, throwing looks around the dark halls. Hardly any light came in through the windows on the walls; it was only when lightning graced the skies that I was able to see more than five feet in front of me.
Grimmstead Academy: A Villainous Introduction Page 17
