Kill Me Softly

by Sarah Cross

  He looked lost suddenly, and she didn’t want him to be sad, to think about the past when she was here now, ready to do everything right.

  She threw her arms around his neck, swayed toward him, off balance, and kissed him violently, possessively. Come back, she thought. Stay with me.

  “I bought—a sexy nightgown,” she said. “Do you want to see it?”

  His hands tightened around her waist, fingers clutching at her blouse. “Yes. But I don’t think that’s a good idea. I think—” His voice turned low, a jagged whisper in her ear. “I think—that if you’re not sure about this—you should tell me. Right now.”

  “Who’s scared now?” she whispered back. “Don’t I feel shh—”

  He kissed the words out of her mouth, swallowed her flimsy attempts at seduction, until she realized she didn’t have to convince him. He was back with her, in the present … and he wanted her, too.

  His lips tugged at hers and she clung to him, her hands slipping against his jacket like she was trying to take hold of water, like she couldn’t pull him close enough. Every time they broke apart, their breaths cut the air with twin gasps; and then their lips met again, frantic, like kissing was more important than breathing.

  Mira started to feel dizzy, high, like the world was spinning. She tipped her head back, giving in to it, and Felix trailed kisses down her throat, his arms wrapped tightly around her, his lips wet on her skin … until she became almost numb to his touch. The world around her grew tinged with gray, and the feeling in her body flickered out, like a dying light.

  She shuddered when he let her go, suddenly cold, like her warmth had been stolen. Her strength was gone; her limbs turned heavy and the glass counter tilted to meet her. As she collapsed, she knocked the bouquet and everything else to the floor, then stared dazedly at the mess of spilled water and flowers. The crash had sounded muffled to her ears.

  I think I’m sick …, she tried to tell Felix, but her mouth wouldn’t form the words.

  Across the room, Felix slid down against the wall. He’d torn himself away from her, put that distance between them as if it had to be done, and now he was speaking softly to himself. His eyes seemed to burn; he looked feverishly gorgeous—and haunted. Then he pulled himself together. He rose to his feet hesitantly, like he was wary of coming near her.

  Felix, she tried to say. Something’s wrong with me. … She lay with her cheek pressed to the glass, feeling like consciousness was a thin stream inside her that was slowly bleeding out.

  At last, Felix lifted her off the counter and into his arms, cradling her head because her whole body was drooping, and carried her into the elevator. He didn’t speak—was he scared? He didn’t … but then she stopped wondering, because she was too exhausted. She gazed at their reflections in the mirrored walls instead. Felix was still lit up with that feverish glow, but Mira barely recognized herself. Her muscles were limp, her eyes dull.

  The elevator doors dinged apart and Felix carried her down a silent hall. It looked exactly like all the other halls in the hotel: same carpet, same paintings, same row of white doors. Her eyes closed as he opened one of the doors and slipped inside. She felt him lay her down on an unmade bed, the sheets twisted like rough waves beneath her. And then he was gone.

  He’s going to get help. …

  She slept.

  CHAPTER TEN

  MIRA AWOKE TO HUSHED MALE VOICES coming from an adjacent room. She pushed herself upright and shoved her hair out of her face.

  She was sitting in a messy king-size bed in a mostly dark bedroom, still wearing her street clothes but not her shoes. Daylight filtered in through the half-open door, and dimly, she could make out posters on the walls: skulls, band logos, a model posed in sexy lingerie. There was an electric guitar propped in one corner, an acoustic guitar on a stand nearby. Rumpled clothes covered the floor, and a pillow and blanket were stretched out on the floor next to the bed, like someone had spent the night there.

  “She was out when I got here,” the first voice said. “I thought she was dead until I found her pulse.”

  “I could kill him,” the other voice offered politely.

  “No.” A sigh. “You couldn’t. That’s not what you do. That’s not how we solve this.”

  Mira crept out of bed, her legs quivering like Jell-O, and grabbed the door frame for support. Peering out, she saw Freddie and Blue in the suite’s living room. Freddie was pacing in front of the TV, the sleeves of his button-down rolled to the elbows. Blue perched on the arm of the couch, in a black Joy Division T-shirt and ratty jeans, looking agitated.

  Was this Blue’s room?

  “Hello?” she called uncertainly.

  Blue sprang up from his seat. “Hey, how are you feeling?” She could see his throat move as he swallowed. “You were out for a while.”

  Blue led her over to the couch, and she took his arm gratefully. She didn’t feel like she could walk properly. Her knees kept buckling, and finally, Blue scooped her up and carried her. She was too embarrassed to even say thank you.

  As Blue eased her down, she noticed Freddie watching her—his eyes shining, body leaning toward her as if under a spell—and she was sure Blue had told him about her mark.

  “So,” Blue started uneasily, “how much of that did you hear?”

  “Just the part where Freddie offered to kill someone.”

  “That …” Freddie scratched the back of his neck, flustered. “That was … a misunderstanding.”

  “You guys, seriously, what’s going on?”

  Blue shrugged. “Nothing. Freddie was just talking. He does that.”

  “And if I were to threaten someone … I would only do it to protect you,” Freddie added. “That’s what I’m here for.”

  “I don’t need to be protected,” she told him.

  “Actually, you do,” Blue said. He wasn’t being obnoxious—he was serious, which was worse. He was messing with something—turning a key card around and around in his hand.

  “Is that my passkey?” she asked.

  “Was your passkey,” Blue said. “If you need to open any doors, you can ask me.”

  “Felix gave that to me,” she said, bristling.

  “I know he did.” Blue folded his fingers around the card. “I’m taking it back.”

  “You can’t just steal my property.”

  “I’d like to see you stop me. You can’t even walk.”

  “I’m not some outsider,” she snapped. “I belong here. I’m one of you. You can’t keep hiding things from me.”

  “Hiding things,” Blue said calmly, “is what I do. So good luck with that argument.”

  “Mira, he’s just trying to help,” Freddie said. “There are things about Felix you’re better off not knowing.”

  “God. I am so sick of this! I get that you don’t like him,” she said to Blue. “And I get that you like me,” she said to Freddie, “that I’m supposedly your princess, but you can’t just—” She shot to her feet, her fists clenched; and then her legs gave out and she flopped back onto the couch.

  Pathetic.

  Freddie dashed to the minibar to get her an orange juice.

  “You need to get your strength back,” he said.

  “I feel like crap,” she complained.

  “No shit,” Blue said.

  No shit, she mimicked in her head. Jerk.

  At least he was acting like himself again.

  She took a few sips of juice before she asked them where Felix was.

  “In hell, I hope,” Freddie muttered.

  She glared at him. “A real answer, please?”

  “Working,” Blue said. “You’ll have to deal with us. Do you think you can eat something?”

  She shrugged, which he must have interpreted as a yes. He ordered room service, and while they waited for food to be delivered, Blue managed to find Disney’s Sleeping Beauty on the Dream’s movie channel, which she thought was particularly sadistic of him. Freddie hummed the songs and mouthed the dialogue as
he watched, as rapt as a little kid.

  Mira choked down breakfast, and little by little, her strength returned—but she was very, very tired. She wanted to curl up in bed, close her eyes, and sleep.

  But sleep felt like a fateful punishment right now. If her curse went according to plan, she’d soon have more than enough of it. So she fought the heaviness of her eyelids and watched as Aurora, aka Briar Rose, aka Sleeping Beauty, returned to her ancestral home—her castle—after sixteen years of living peacefully in the forest, only to be lured to the top of a tower by a sinister green light, to find the last spinning wheel in the kingdom—the one that would spark her curse. And in the green glow that gave her the pallor of a corpse, the princess pricked her finger and collapsed into enchanted sleep.

  “Can we go now?” Mira asked, swallowing the last uncomfortable bite of her toast.

  “We haven’t seen the prince save her yet,” Freddie said.

  Blue clicked the TV off. “You know how it ends, Knight. Let’s do something else.”

  The three of them ended up at Rafe’s house—a sprawling, dove-colored mansion where Rafe lived alone, unsupervised except for the police cruisers that came by almost daily to respond to noise complaints. Rafe was asleep somewhere, snoring like a bear, and wasn’t expected up before late afternoon—but the band members all had keys to the house.

  Curses & Kisses held their practices in the palatial foyer, under a gaudy chandelier dripping with crystal teardrops and women’s underwear. Blue’s drum kit took up permanent residence there, since he never practiced at home.

  Mira settled on a torn-up antique couch to watch Jewel and Freddie run through an acoustic version of their set. The couch fit right in with the mansion’s broken-down baroque decor: the velvet upholstery was held together with duct tape, and smelled like it had been marinated in beer.

  Blue lounged at the opposite end of the couch, playing a racing game on his phone. Over the course of four songs—two about love, two about heartbreak—he didn’t say a word. Mira got the feeling he was deliberately ignoring her.

  “Am I that boring?” she finally asked.

  “I’m trying not to like you,” Blue said.

  “You can’t even talk to me?”

  “I’m careful,” he said, still focused on his game. “If I talk to you more, I might like you too much. If I like you, I might be nice to you. And if I’m nice to you, you’ll start to like me back.”

  She laughed. “No, I won’t.”

  “You’re that sure.”

  “Positive,” she said. “I don’t like jerks. And as for former jerks … I don’t forgive them that fast. So you can stop avoiding me,” she said, poking his phone and sending his pixel race car off the track. “Why are you so opposed to people liking you anyway? You have friends.” She gestured to Freddie and Jewel. “Are you just afraid to make new ones?”

  “Freddie and Jewel grew up here. They know a lot more than you do.”

  Mira rolled her eyes. “So tell me what I need to know. I’m getting really sick of—”

  Blue shook his head, teeth clenched. “I’m. Not. Allowed. It’s part of the curse.”

  “But Freddie knows. Jewel knows. You guys are always making cryptic references to how ‘dangerous’ Felix is. How do they know?”

  “They know because they know what signs to look for. And because they saw it in action.”

  “Can they tell me?” she asked.

  “No. It’s something you have to discover for yourself. And I hope you never do. That you never want to.”

  “You realize this is maddening, right? You guys keep telling me there’s all this bad stuff I need to worry about … but no one will tell me what it is. No one wants me to know anything. What’s the point of that?”

  “I don’t know. I guess I want to warn you. But I can’t tell you the whole truth.” He took a deep breath; blew it out, agitated. “Mira. If you were … innately horrible, if you’d done something unforgivable, something you could never make up for or take back … would you want people to know?”

  “What did you do that’s so horrible?”

  Blue shut his eyes, like he couldn’t bear to look at her. Then he got up abruptly and stalked out of the room.

  She followed him.

  Until her head lolled back like a broken doll’s, he’d thought that she was overcome. Swooning. like he was doing, inside.

  Her hair hung down in burning red ringlets, silky to the touch. Her pale eyelids were lowered, her skin cool. Her arms hung slack, bumping the floor as he lowered her, as he laid her on her back, his own heart racing in panic.

  He pressed his ear to her chest, fumbled with her wrist, searching for a pulse.

  Somewhere—in the light—the party was in full swing. His friends were laughing, having a good time. Jewel teased out the last notes of a song, and then Freddie’s guitar tapered off, and the stereo came back on.

  He pressed his lips to her neck, seeking the vital, vibrant feeling he’d had while kissing her. The sensation of being truly alive.

  But she had no more life to take. And so he felt nothing.

  “I didn’t mean to upset you,” Mira said when she caught up to him.

  Blue was crouched in the middle of a dim room; the sheet-covered furniture crowded around him like ghosts, the air thick with dust and the stuffy smell of windows that never opened. He was holding his head like it hurt.

  “Be a good girl and go away,” he said.

  She lowered herself to the floor next to him. “Blue … don’t be like that. Talk to me. Be honest with me for once. Just try it.”

  She bit her lip—not sure that this was the best tack to take. But … maybe, if she seemed calm, Blue would feel that way, too.

  “You want me to be honest?” He lifted his head, unfolded his arms, and touched her cheek. His touch was so tender it shocked her—like cold water thrown in her face.

  “When I first saw you, I thought you were beautiful. You looked like you needed someone—and I wanted to be that someone. I knew … that if I felt that way … Felix would, too. So I tried to get rid of you.”

  “Because you don’t like fighting with him.” Her breath felt like it was trapped in her chest.

  Blue’s fingers traveled up her cheek and into her hair. “Because I don’t want him near you. I don’t want either one of us near you. But … you asked me to be honest. So …”

  “You were mean to me because you liked me,” she said. “I don’t get that. It makes sense if you’re five years old. But—”

  “Shhh.” He pressed his forehead to her forehead. The heat from his skin sank into hers, became a part of her, and she closed her eyes. Suddenly, she wanted to be quiet more than she wanted anything. She was hanging on words he hadn’t said yet.

  “I didn’t want to give you a chance. I didn’t want you to give me a chance. It was bad enough I tried to give you a place to stay, come to your rescue, whatever stupid, clichéd urges I had. I should’ve been a lot worse. Because, see? You’re still here. You’re still talking to me. Still letting me say this.

  “You shouldn’t do any of that,” he whispered.

  His breath skimmed her face. His touch was soft and warm, and it was a little like lightning—sparking something in her. It didn’t burn the way it had when he’d touched her mark. This was different. More intimate and more demanding.

  “Blue, this is …” Strange, she wanted to say. But strange was a lie.

  “I want to tell you how pretty you are. I want to dance with you,” he said. “I want to know why you read plays and which ones are your favorites. I want to hold you on the beach at night; and I want to make you laugh. I want you to like me—that’s my nature. That’s what I have to resist. It’s so much safer when you hate me, Mira. Because if you wanted me, if you loved me, I could take everything from you. Without even meaning to.”

  “What—what do you mean, everything?”

  “I mean you’d have nothing left.” His voice was raw, hollow. “But you don
’t like me. That’s good. That’s safe. Except Felix finally kissed you.”

  “What does that have to do with anything?” The spark she’d felt went cold, like someone had washed it away with the sudden, uncomfortable awareness that she was letting Blue touch her and confess things she shouldn’t hear—when she’d spent the night kissing his brother.

  “He kissed you and you … you must really like him. You must be in love with him or something.” Blue shook his head, his jaw tight. “Because he’s perfect, right? Too good to be true.”

  “I still don’t see what that has to do with anything.” Mira said it stiffly this time, already drawing away from him. Blue’s words felt like an accusation—like being in love was a mistake she’d made. But he didn’t know she felt that strongly about Felix; he had no reason to say that to her—unless he was messing with her head again.

  She was so tired of that. Tired of trusting him, and then regretting it.

  She backed away from Blue, and he retreated to the window seat, coughing as more dust rose up around him. Mira started for the door, but he called after her.

  “Wait,” he said. “Whatever you do, don’t go into the grotto. It’s unsanitary.”

  Idiot, she thought. Back to being obnoxious again.

  “I thought we were being serious,” she snapped. “Thanks for letting me know this is all a big joke to you.”

  “Sorry,” he said. “I just wondered if you’d listen. If someone told you not to do something …”

  He sounded worn-out, defeated. Because he liked her and she liked his brother? She didn’t know. She wasn’t going to think about it anymore—not when it could be one big mind game. She never knew with Blue.

  “I came here,” she said. “I came to Beau Rivage when my godmothers told me not to. So, no, I don’t always do what I’m told. Don’t tell me what to do and you won’t be disappointed.”

  Blue grimaced. Raised his fist to his mouth and coughed again, so it sounded like his lungs were tearing. When he finished, his eyes were wet.

  “Do one thing I tell you. Just one,” he mumbled. “Felix and I are called Romantics. Find Layla. Ask her to tell you what that means. You need to know.”