Inception (The Marked Book 1)

by Bianca Scardoni

  “I don’t hate you,” he said gruffly and then lowered his voice. “I just don’t want you in my life.”

  I wasn’t sure what was worse; the fact that he didn’t want me in his life, or that it was hurting me so much to hear it.

  “You need to tell my father you’re quitting All Saints,” he went on as though he hadn’t just sliced me open with his words. “The sooner you do it, the better.”

  “I don’t need to do anything,” I snapped back, angry at his audacity. “Where do you get off coming here and demanding I quit my job?”

  “That’s not what I’m doing.”

  “Isn’t it?” I didn’t understand what this was about or why it even mattered to him if I stuck around at All Saints or not. There had to be more to this. Something or someone else behind it. “Is this about Nikki?”

  “Nikki?” His tone matched the confusion in his eyes.

  “Because you’re back together?”

  “I’m not back together with Nikki,” he said wryly.

  Something akin to relief coursed through my body just then, surprising me by its presence.

  Why did I even care if he was with Nikki or not? Did I dislike her so much that it gave me joy knowing she didn’t have him? It had to be that, I decided, because I wasn’t ready to entertain the alternatives.

  “So if this isn’t about Nikki, why are you pushing me to quit?” I asked, still trying to make sense out of this.

  He shrugged lazily. “I just figured you would, now that you know the truth.”

  “What does that have to do with anything?”

  He arched his brow at me—a silent jab. “You didn’t think it was a coincidence that we ended up going to the same school and working at the same job, did you?”

  “What are you saying?”

  “Do I have to spell it out for you?”

  “No, you jerk, but you could stop talking in riddles.”

  He lifted off the desk and took a couple of steps towards me. “I’m saying that it was a setup,” he said huskily, closing the distance between us. “To get us together—”

  “Together?”

  “—But since we all know that’s not going to happen,” he continued, his eyes flicking down to my parted lips. “There’s really no need for you to be working there anymore, is there?”

  My heart was pounding hard against my rib cage, though I had no idea why. There was something about the way he looked down at my mouth that made my pulse go mad.

  I took a step back as I tried to get my wits together. There were too many emotions surging, too many questions.

  “I don’t understand. Why would they want to” —I paused, wetting my lips— “get us together?”

  “Use your imagination,” he said, cocking his head to the side.

  When my cheeks flushed red, he narrowed his eyes and shook his head as though he knew where my mind had gone.

  “They were trying to manipulate the situation to get to me, so that I’d cave and resume my duties as a Keeper.”

  “Using me as the bait?”

  “Something like that.”

  I choked out a laugh. Hopefully they had a backup plan.

  “So when you say ‘resume your duties’, does that mean you’re not working for the Order anymore?” I asked, trying to digest this new piece of information. At least this would explain why he had been refusing to train with me. “Can you even do that—quit?”

  “I guess you could say I excommunicated myself.”

  My eyes widened. “Why?”

  A pained expression crossed his face but he buried it just as quick as it appeared. “The ‘why’ is complicated.”

  “When did this happen?” I pushed, hungry to know more.

  “Three months ago, right after my sister—” He stopped short as though he couldn’t bear to say the words out loud.

  A heaviness washed over me. “Was she the reason you quit?”

  “No, but it made leaving easier. Look, I didn’t come here to talk about Linley—” His marshaled expression cracked at the mere mention of her name. He squared his shoulders as though digging deep for strength.

  “I’m sorry,” I whispered, reaching out to console him.

  The urge to comfort him was curiously overwhelming, but he stepped away from me before I could touch him, taking a seat on the edge of my bed instead. He was drawing a clear line in the sand and every inch of my body was painfully aware of it.

  “I didn’t mean to—”

  “It’s alright,” he said in a tone that made me believe it was anything but. “Forget it.”

  There was something about the way he reflected back to me that chipped away at my protective wall. It was like looking into a mirror and seeing the person I was when I’d first lost my father. Closed off, harrowed, unwilling to let myself feel the pain. In a lot of ways, I was still that person.

  “It’s hard for me too, you know.”

  “What is?”

  “Talking about him…my dad.”

  He didn’t answer.

  Neither one of us filled the silence, the room suddenly heavy from the strain of our combined loss. I wished I could know what he was thinking; what was going on behind that thick, impenetrable facade of his. Did he think I couldn’t understand his pain—his grief—because my sister was alive and well? Or did he not trust me enough to confide in me?

  “She would have been twenty next month,” he said after a long pause. His eyes were painted in sadness, shades of despair so agonizing that it hurt just to look into them. “I still pick up the phone to call her sometimes, like she’s still here.”

  I stepped towards him but stopped, weary of the line.

  “How screwed up is that?” He looked up at me expectantly, his voice full of vulnerability. This was a different side of him, a side I’d never seen. It seemed completely incongruent with the hard exterior I had grown accustomed to.

  “It’s not screwed up...it happens to me, too.”

  “You’re just saying that.” Disbelief stained his tone, though there was something else hiding in there, something that sounded a lot like hope.

  “It’s the truth,” I insisted, watching his expression soften. “Like right before I open my eyes in the morning, my dad is still alive, and I swear everything is right in the world.”

  His eyes stayed on me as I moved to take the seat beside him. I could almost feel the grief radiating off of him. Or maybe it was my own grief, I wasn’t entirely sure anymore.

  “But then I wake up and remember that he’s gone and he isn’t coming back, and all the pain and guilt comes rushing back to me.”

  I could tell he knew what that felt like by the way he lowered his head, and in some strange way, it made me feel connected to him. Less alone.

  “Most of the time I feel like I’m just waiting. Waiting for him to come home, waiting for it to stop hurting, waiting for it to be okay to live without him again, but it’s like it never happens.” I pressed my lips together and dropped my eyes, feeling overexposed. “Sorry, I’m totally rambling and I’m not even helping.”

  “I like when you ramble.”

  My head popped back up, surprised by the softness in his words. He seemed distracted and unaware of the comment.

  “What if it doesn’t happen?” he asked without meeting my eyes. His body was facing forward, concentrated on some unknown marker. “What if it never stops hurting?”

  “I don’t know,” I shook my head. “I try not to let myself think that way. I have to believe it’ll get better.”

  “And if it doesn’t? Do you think you could live with the pain for the rest of your life?”

  “I guess I would have to.”

  “What if you had another choice? What if you could change the past?” His voice was low, controlled. “Would you do it?”

  “Like if I had my own time machine?” I resisted the urge to laugh considering the gravity of it.

  “Something like that.”

  I didn’t have to think about it.
I knew without a doubt that if I could go back in time and change things—warn him about what was coming—I would do it. “In a heartbeat.”

  “Even if it goes against the rules? Even if other people get hurt because of it? Would you still do it?”

  “I-I don’t know. Why are you asking me this?” I suddenly felt suffocated under the weight of the conversation.

  “It’s just a hypothetical,” he said curtly. “Would you do it?” His eyes met mine, stirring me with their depth.

  Would I sacrifice innocent people so that I could have my father back? I felt the shame before I gave my answer. “I would give anything to have him back,” I admitted, dropping my head.

  I wasn’t sure what that said about me but I imagined it wasn’t anything great.

  He pushed his knee up against mine.

  “I would too,” he said in a gentle voice that made me warm. “There’s nothing I wouldn’t do for someone I loved.”

  His words felt intimate, sacred, like I shouldn’t have been allowed to hear them. It made me wonder what it would feel like to be loved in that way by someone...

  To be loved in that way by him.

  He pulled his leg away from me, steering me back from my errant thoughts. “It’s getting late.” His eyes were pinned on the door. “I should probably go, let you get back to sleep.”

  I nodded and then rose with him even though I wasn’t sure how I would ever get back to sleep after everything that had been said tonight. My mind was still reeling from the eddy of emotions circling inside of me and showed no signs of slowing down. I had to get some of it off my chest before he left.

  “About what you said earlier tonight,” I began cautiously, following him to the balcony door. He turned to face me, his eyes distracting me with their intensity. “I just want you to know that I respect your decision not to be a part of this thing anymore, whatever your reasons are. And I’ll keep my distance if that’s what you want.” I nodded into it, affirming it as my truth. “But I’m not going to quit my job at All Saints. I just thought you should know that.”

  I braced myself for his reaction.

  “Okay.” He answered too easily, almost as though he had been expecting my refusal all along.

  “Really? That’s it?”

  “Things would have been a lot easier if you never moved here,” he muttered and then stepped out onto the terrace, his dark hair blending into the night.

  “Well, I’m sorry your life is worse now that I’m in it,” I called out after him. “If it makes you feel any better, I wish I never moved here, too.”

  He stopped abruptly as though I had just flung an insult at his back. Heart pumping, I felt my temperature spike with anticipation when he turned around and walked back over to me, stopping just inches from where I stood in the doorway.

  “I don’t,” he whispered, leaning in. His face was so close to mine that I could feel his breath on my lips. “I said my life would have been easier, not better.”

  “Oh.” My voice was a murmur, barely audible had it not been for his close proximity. “So then, um, are you saying that you’re...I mean, are you happy that...” Jeez, Jemma, speak much?

  His dimples pressed in, a prelude to his barely there smile. “Yeah, something like that.” He pushed off the door-frame and walked away without saying another word.

  Before I could formulate a guess as to how he was going to get off the balcony, he’d already cleared the railing and launched himself over the ledge in one fluid movement. It was completely elegant, and reckless, and stupid. Not to mention, impossible to land.

  In a state of panic, I ran to the railing and peered over the edge, praying I wouldn’t find him splayed out all over the concrete below like tattered road kill. But what I found was even more disturbing. I found absolutely nothing. Zilch. Nada. No sign of him whatsoever.

  It was as though Trace Macarthur had just jumped off my balcony and vanished into thin air.

  21. CHEMISTRY

  I had two missed calls from my sister when I walked into school the next morning, already frazzled. I had yet to take any of her calls since I left her that message over two weeks ago, and with good reason. I was angry with her for lying to me, for hiding the truth from me for all these years. And it didn’t matter that I knew I’d forgive her (eventually), right now I was still mad as hell and I wasn’t ready to let any of it go.

  Not to mention, there were slightly more pressing matters to contend with, like training with vampires and ex-Keepers who appeared to vanish into thin air.

  “Whoa!” cried Benjamin, grabbing my shoulders to steady me after he blew out of the main office, nearly running me over in the process. “I just saved you from a serious face-plant right there. You owe me big time.”

  “I think you almost just caused my serious face-plant so I’m not sure that qualifies as an actual save.”

  “You say tomato,” he laughed, walking backwards down the hall. “I say you owe me.”

  “Hey, Ben, hang on a sec.” I took a few rushed steps to catch up with him and then lowered my voice. “Have you seen Trace this morning? I need him.” I paused to cringe at the playback. “I mean, I need to find him. Is he here today?”

  His dark blond brows shot up. “Freudian slip?”

  “No. Lack of sleep slip. I mean, it’s a lack of sleep—there’s no slip.” I broke eye contact and adjusted my schoolbag awkwardly. “So? Have you seen him?”

  “Yeah he’s around here somewhere. Probably at his locker checking his pretty self out in the mirror again,” he grinned, running his palm over his buzzed hair.

  “So he’s really here? Like, you’ve actually seen him?”

  “Yes, I’ve actually seen him,” he repeated mockingly, though his smile quickly dissipated once he noticed my expression. “Are you feeling alright, Jem? You look a little pale.”

  “What? No. Yeah, I’m totally fine.” I tried to laugh it off but it came out unnatural and pitchy. “I lent him my Chemistry book yesterday. I’m just trying to get it back before class.”

  That sounded completely legit. But then why didn’t he look convinced? Shoot. Did Trace even take chemistry?

  “Jemma!” Saved by the freaking bell.

  I turned around to see Taylor coming up behind us carrying a bucket of soapy water. I was happy to see her up until I caught wind of the troubled look on her face, and then not so much.

  She shook her head. “Just don’t freak out, okay?”

  “Wow, Tay. Way to stay calm. I think you missed your calling as a crisis counselor.”

  “Shut up, Benjamin!”

  “What’s going on?” I asked her, already worried.

  “It’s not that bad.” She grabbed my wrist and started towing me down the hall, the bucket hanging rigidly from her other hand. “We can totally clean it. And hardly anyone saw it. It’ll be like it was never even there to begin with.”

  Okay, now I was freaking out. “What are you talking about?”

  She didn’t answer until we rounded the corner, only adding to the dramatics of it all. She stopped in the middle of the hall and pinned her eyes on the target.

  I followed her gaze...to my locker.

  The letters S-L-U-T were painted across it in big, black marker for all to see. And all were definitely seeing. Dozens of other students were walking by, pointing and snickering, obviously chomping at the bit for the chance to spread this newly acquired piece of intel all over the school.

  False intel.

  Not that it mattered though. The truth seldom ever did in the face of a juicy lie.

  “It’s not that bad,” she said, her tone lacking conviction.

  “Really? How can it be any worse?”

  Ben stalked up to the locker and began rubbing his finger over the marker in an attempt to erase it, or merge with it, I couldn’t tell. “It can always be worse,” he said without turning back. “It’s permanent marker.”

  I groaned.

  Taylor tightened her arm around my shoulder as we sto
od side by side, staring at my locker like a scene from some tragic car wreck—a car wreck that was my life.

  “Morning, ladies.” Caleb appeared smiling next to us, along with a far less chipper Trace. “Why are you all…oh.” He dropped off as soon as my vandalized locker registered. “Damn.”

  “I know, right?” Taylor was taking it pretty bad. She picked up the bucket and moved it to the base of my locker.

  “Any idea who did it?” asked Trace, his eyebrows furrowed.

  “I’ll give you one hint,” said Taylor ringing out the excess water from the rag. “Her name starts with Nikki Parker.”

  “Nikki?” His tone was dripping with skepticism as though he couldn’t even fathom Nikki doing something like this. What planet was he living on anyway?

  I rolled my eyes at him.

  Even though I had no proof that she did this, I was willing to bet more than a pretty penny that she absolutely could do something like this and most likely did. If not her, then who? I couldn’t think of a single person who had it in for me even half as much as Nikki did on a good day. Clearly, the girl had issues. That much had already been established.

  “It’s not coming off,” cried Taylor, throwing the rag back into the bucket just as the first bell wailed around us.

  “I’ll take care of it,” said Caleb, reaching for the bucket.

  “And what exactly are you going to do? Wave your magic wand around and make it disappear? It’s permanent marker, Cale.”

  Caleb looked at Ben strangely before answering her. “I have a special cleaner in my locker. Industrial strength. It should get rid of it, no problem.”

  Taylor started saying something back to him but I’d already turned my attention to Trace who was watching from the sidelines. I had some unfinished business to settle with him.

  “Can I talk to you for a minute…alone?”

  Everyone piped down, their eyes suddenly heavy on us.

  “...so that you can give me back the history book I lent you yesterday,” I added choppily.

  “Chemistry.”

  I turned to Ben with doe-in-the-headlight eyes. “Huh?”

  He was grinning. “Don’t you mean your chemistry book?”