The Darkness in Dreams

by Sue Wilder

  “About?”

  “Those dreams that keep you from sleeping.”

  Lexi watched a line of red ants move in her direction, a long train of mindless units working with a collective brain. Another shiver touched her. While she respected every life form, ants were intrusive.

  “Are your dreams unusually realistic?” Arsen asked.

  Lexi smirked at him over her shoulder. “Well, there’s a lot of energy when I dream. I live in a New Age sort of town. Spooky vibrations in the air.”

  “Is this as serious as you get?”

  “No, I can be worse.”

  “Marge never mentioned this aspect of your personality.”

  “No, I don’t imagine she did, or you’d have charged her more for your intervention.”

  Arsen laughed, a rich, warm sound layered with such joy Lexi leaned into it before stopping herself. The man was irritating as hell, but so persistent Lexi found him hard to resist. If she’d ever had a brother he would have behaved the same way, and suddenly her body hurt. No, it was her heart that hurt, swelled up with all the grief and emptiness and stupid hope, and after everything, how utterly pointless was that?

  Maybe she’d inherited the crazy gene after all, because what normal mother named her kid Galaxy, unless it was a big middle finger to a grandmother who’d gone by names like Moonbeam and Star Flower during periods of her life? When Lexi was seven, her mother had experienced a “great moment of realization.” She’d packed Lexi, a stuffed bear named Waldo, and a pink blanket into a paper bag and left them on her grandmother’s door step.

  “You’re old enough to understand, Galaxy,” the mother said, while tears ran down the child’s face. “This is my life. You’ll be fine. I never wanted a kid, anyway.”

  Lexi had survived, thrived in her grandmother’s care, and after a time her life took on the kind of lonely that only bothered her at night, when she set the table for one and realized that wouldn’t change. Lexi accepted it, called it independence and it was, but there was a cost.

  Life came at a cost, and now she had what everyone wanted: freedom, with no socks to pick up. Few people were allowed close and even fewer into the space that broke a heart. Marge called it self-protection but Marge was being kind. Lexi understood the truth when the hours stretched and the silence crushed. When she feared the one bright chance for love had been squandered long ago and she would never get it back.

  So, she’d made a home in Rock Cove, where people were friendly but never became friends. A small town, where excitement came from the Ooh-la-la parade every summer and the day-trippers looking for whales in the winter. Her small business combined research with her talent to read the earth, one of those New Age opportunities others dismissed. Lexi found locations for the specialty retreat market, yoga and self-help seminars. She focused on the paranormal back stories, the haunted ghost sightings and spirit mountains—and there were more of those in the Pacific Northwest than people would acknowledge. The days filled with a rhythm of their own and the nights filled with dreams, and if there were issues beyond her endless, empty life, it was because those dreams were so intense she couldn’t sleep for days.

  And there you had it, the real reason Marge arranged this intervention. Lexi had mentioned that detail to her therapist, too.

  The breeze picked up, catching wild strands of blond hair and tossing them into her face. She brushed the annoyance aside and stared down at the ants. The mindless machines moved forward and it was time to bring this intervention to a close.

  “As nice as this conversation is, Arsen, if that’s even your real name, I want to go back to Rock Cove.”

  “I can’t let you do that, Lexi.”

  “Can’t? Or won’t?”

  “It’s complicated.”

  “Situations like this usually are. Complicated and messy and full of legal liability. How long have you been following me, by the way? I’ve seen you at least three times before now.”

  “I was checking up on you,” Arsen said.

  “Not your job.”

  “Marge thought we might have a unique perspective on your dreams.”

  “I don’t think so.”

  “Why don’t you think so?”

  “My dreams are vivid.”

  “How vivid?”

  Lexi couldn’t answer. Instead, she leaned back, pressed her spine against the rock. Exhaustion was overwhelming. The air was warm and the sound of Arsen’s voice softened, not the words, but a male timbre until the comfort wrapped around her.

  Lexi relaxed. Her resistance dissolved in front of her like mist beneath a morning sun. She felt the comfort seeping into her lungs, anxiety seeping out as she breathed. Slowly, without even realizing it, she let go of the reluctance to talk about the dreams. About why she couldn’t sleep after the night terrors tore her awake. Why there were other dreams so detailed she thought they were real.

  “Have you ever been shot, Arsen?”

  “Yes,” he said, so far away Lexi could barely hear him.

  “So have I, in dreams. And I can tell you what it’s like, how I’m riding a bike down a dirt road. It's night, and there are trees on either side of the road. The bike jangles so loudly I worry that the noise will give me away. I have on my wool coat and the brown shoes that are too big, so I’ve stuffed paper in the toes to keep them on my feet. Only I’m afraid about the paper, too, because it might let the stupid shoe fall off my foot. The handle bars jiggle. My hands are sweaty and they slip and I pedal harder until I round a bend and they’re waiting. All I see are flashes of light. I don’t feel pain like they say; the impact knocks me to the ground with such force I can’t describe it.

  “But I can tell you how it feels to fall in a ditch,” she continued. “The sharp way my legs get caught in the broken spokes. I hear the crunching of their boots and know mud is on my face—it’s cold and smells of rot. I know I’m thirteen years old and haven’t lived my life yet. I even know my name. It’s Gabrielle, and I have a little white and brown puppy I named Cammi, because it was the name of a warrior girl in an old story my meme told me, and I wanted to be like the warrior girl. But I’m not. I’m lying in a ditch and I can’t breathe. I ask why it hurts so much. And a voice says it’s because I’m not dead yet.”

  Her breath came hard in her throat. Her eyes were closed and she was lost.

  “Do you dream like that, Arsen?”

  CHAPTER 3

  Her voice was an irritation. It was the way she caught her breath at the oddest times or dipped her head. He found himself listening, and he didn’t like it.

  Christan had been created for a single purpose. His morality was predetermined and the details were not his problem. He was controlled by the Calata of Six, although once there had been Seven, and that had not been his problem, either. Enemies feared him. Friends did, too. He was the terror in the dark, the icy wind before the warm rush. He’d learned there were no true immortals, only those who were harder to kill, and Christan thrived, locked in his solitary world until the day she held out a hand, inviting him into her world.

  Before her, Christan had been different. He was an enforcer above all others. Death was his intimate friend. He craved the vicious battles and impossible needs. The blood. Existence mattered, but he took risks and had nothing to lose. His life was meaningless, tied as it was to immortals who reeked with power, who used him to manipulate humans whose lives were fleeting and powerless.

  But she, she changed him, rescued him. Taught him how to be more. How to feel. How to love. In that first life, in the lifetimes after, until all she had left to teach him was hate.

  Christan levered away from the rock. At his worst, he was predatory, violent, and he’d stayed too long in the Void. No one remained unscathed in that place between space and matter. Now he wondered if he’d lost all traces of human connection, become too empty to ever find a way back. The Void had been filled with both memory and oblivion, but even oblivion hadn’t isolated him from an awareness of her. That he hadn’t ex
pected. Christan had known every minute of every life she ever lived, with him, and without.

  To be watching her now, counting the strands of her hair. Blond, like a shaft of sunlight in winter. It still drifted, in that silky wave around her face. Skimmed and hid her breasts when she leaned forward and he would fist his hand...

  But memory made him volatile. When he’d gone to her office, he’d felt a wave of aggression so startling it had alarmed him. His body had grown hard, the muscles so tense he thought his bones would break. He’d wanted to pin her to the wall. He still wanted to pin her to the rocky wall behind her head. Her legs were long and the jeans she wore reminded him of something else. Once, maybe he would have given her a second chance. But not now.

  “Arsen.” Using their telepathic connection, Christan reached out for his second-in-command.

  “Tell me what you want to know, and I’ll ask her.”

  “Nothing. Her dreams hold no interest.”

  “Christan—if she remembers, it will be hard on her.”

  “She has no meaning in this lifetime.”

  “Give yourself time. What you’re experiencing, we’ve all been there. It passes.”

  Christan wasn’t as sure. Power burned until the air vibrated hot and electric. He wanted to shift and run, release the energy pounding in his veins. This girl reminded him of what they’d once been and what they’d become in their mutually destructive dance. He’d been no innocent but neither had she, and somewhere, in his darkest recesses, faint traces of those emotions still lived.

  “One of us is consumed by duty,” he thought, barely aware of the words.

  Arsen’s voice echoed in his head. “One of us is blind.”

  Lexi opened her eyes and saw the man who wasn’t named Smith. She watched his hands, imagined the strength in his touch, studied the bronzed skin of his fingers relaxed against the muscle of his thigh. He hadn’t talked to her since that morning. Hadn’t said a word. She knew immediately he was dangerous and she trusted her feelings. She had never been so aware of a man. So… alarmed. He was dressed as he’d been for their meeting, in a white Armani shirt and black jeans, looking in total command while she sat in the dirt with hair in her face.

  Her eyes watered from the gritty breeze. She clasped her hands together, realizing it was the sheer physicality of him that overwhelmed her. When he walked through the door that morning he was so exquisitely beautiful she hadn’t wanted to look. He actually affected the environment. Changed the air in the room. The memory of their conversation lingered like the remnants of a sweetly bitter wine.

  He had introduced himself. She had motioned him to the client chair, upholstered in burgundy leather and guaranteed to soften the aloofness of her glass desk. They’d stared at each other until she pushed back and turned away, covering the retreat by reaching for a yellow legal pad.

  “What can I do for you, Mr. Smith?”

  “I was referred here.”

  “Who may I thank for the referral?”

  “An acquaintance in Montana.”

  The only client who’d asked for research in Montana had been Wallace. The connection left her uneasy.

  She had picked up a gold pen and pretended to write, out of courtesy, because there were no real words on the page. Their conversation had continued until she understood this dark-eyed man was not a polished event planner like Wallace. His complete stillness had her heart stuttering. The cuffs of his shirt had been rolled back over hard muscles, revealing tanned forearms and the edge of a tattoo.

  She had noticed, her eyes moving compulsively to the pagan lines. Most tattoos had a faded look, as if the skin had been washed too many times. But these marks writhed in amber, black and brown, alive beneath his skin.

  Lexi knew he watched as she stared, knew he was waiting for a reaction. A thread of alarm had wrapped around her spine and her breathing slowed. Nearly stopped.

  They didn’t speak. Her fingers flexed, and the pen dropped from her hand, rolled across the desk, tipped over the edge. It landed on the floor with a soft plop and rolled against his booted foot, where it wavered, as if a pen could decide for itself whether the journey would end or continue on.

  He had stared at the pen for a long moment.

  “What were you listening to, before I came in,” he’d asked. “I heard music and a voice on your phone.”

  The man was referring to the relaxation app Wallace had loaded onto her phone—without her permission, but Wallace was a wealthy client out of Portland who didn’t recognize personal boundaries. He worried about her stress levels, wanted feedback on the app he was investing in and out of curiosity, Lexi had accessed the program. She’d waited until she was alone; she hadn’t been willing to do it when Wallace was in the room.

  And the strangest thing had happened.

  As Lexi had listened to the melodic voice, the chants and the ringing gong, she’d fallen into a fugue state so deep she couldn’t move, had been drifting on the verge of sleep.

  And then a hand touched her arm.

  The touch was so tactile Lexi had jolted awake, only to realize she was alone in the sterile office.

  The memory of that deep sense of relaxation flooded back and Lexi thought about the soothing quality of Arsen’s voice. She noticed how her hands rested on the sand. Turning her head a few degrees, Lexi studied the withered grass.

  The train of red ants continued to chug in her direction. When they crossed an open stretch of ground, a small stick stood in the way, and the mindless machines swarmed. After determining the stick was not alive, the front few ants picked it up in their little pincers and hauled it out of the way.

  Lexi thought about that state of relaxation again and looked at the ants.

  And decided they were an omen.

  “You got lost for a few minutes.” Arsen’s voice pulled Lexi back to their conversation and she turned her head in his direction.

  “Sorry. I do that sometimes.”

  “Still curious about how you got here?”

  “I’m sure you have some logical explanation.” Lexi wondered if he heard the sarcasm in her voice. Probably. He was an intervention guru, after all, helping people who refused to confront their problems and seemed to think she was one of them. He probably got sarcasm a lot.

  That thought made her irritable. She glanced down and noticed that her clothes were different. Not the professional silk blouse and pencil skirt she’d been wearing in her office, but jeans and a slim white tee, and what could possibly be a favorite pair of tick repellent wool socks. And her hiking boots.

  Somehow, Arsen had located her boots in the back of her closet. And her backpack. She recognized it in the pile of backpacks tossed against the rocks. No phone, though, and wouldn’t he have a nifty little explanation for that if she bothered to ask.

  Obviously, planning had been in place. Lexi laid her palm against her thigh, pressing hard. The red train with biting pincers snaked to within two feet of her left foot, bringing the omen closer. She moved her foot to the side and dug her heel into the sand.

  “You were in your office on Monday,” Arsen said.

  Lexi looked at him.

  “This is Tuesday,” he added when she didn’t ask.

  It took several seconds before Lexi put it together. “Did you drug me?”

  Would Marge have even allowed such a tactic? Lexi had read about extreme interventions where reluctant clients could be snatched from the streets. But no, Marge was strictly by the book. She wouldn’t have approved, and Lexi worked back through her memories, finding nothing between her meeting Monday morning and the moment an hour ago when sunlight warmed her face. She’d opened her eyes, feeling stiff but not wanting to move. With no recollection of the missing time.

  Arsen was watching as if he knew what she was thinking. He let her sit while her expression changed and the breeze played havoc with her hair.

  Finally, he said, “There was a little trouble.”

  Lexi narrowed her eyes. “Define trouble.�
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  “You were running.”

  “As in jogging along the 804-footpath running? Normal running?”

  “Not normal running.”

  “Then what kind of running, exactly?”

  “Panic,” Arsen said, tossing twigs into the fire they didn’t need for the heat. “Screaming, tripping, falling. I’m surprised you don’t remember.”

  Lexi took a moment to respond. “Technically… it sounds more like kidnapping.”

  “Nah, technically it’s saving. All that running, screaming, falling? Falls under the heading of saving.”

  The red ants were within inches of her foot, entirely too close, even after she’d moved out of their way. Lexi shifted and very deliberately squashed one ant beneath the heel of her hiking boot before looking up to meet Arsen’s gaze.

  “That doesn’t earn you a get-out-of-jail-free card, Bucko.”

  “That’s too damn bad, Slick.”

  More twigs disappeared into the fire, crackled in the silence, and right then Lexi knew she needed to pay attention. No more charming banter to disarm. She’d lost a full day, with not normal running, where she’d been kidnapped or saved, depending on your definition of the words.

  And maybe Marge had introduced Arsen as an intervention guru that day at the Coffee Universe. And maybe he had gotten her to talk about her dreams when under normal circumstances she would not have shared the details.

  But Arsen knew things he never should have known. He was telling her things she couldn’t recall, and she was no longer giving the intervention guru the benefit of the doubt.

  CHAPTER 4

  “You’re not an intervention guru, are you?” Lexi’s gaze flicked toward the dark man who stood so silently he almost disappeared. “Just like he’s not an event planner.”

  “We lied to you about that.”

  Arsen had intended to shock her. And they’d boxed her in against exposed gritty lava rock that merged into the slope of a rolling hill. Arsen sat in front of her, while the dark-haired predator leaned against the rocky protrusions closest to her hill, closing off all avenues of escape. Not that it mattered, Lexi realized. There was nothing she could detect through the earth energies, no animal or human presence within a thirty-mile radius. They couldn’t have found a more isolated place if they’d tried.