Stained

by Ella James

  Cayne pulled his right arm inside his shirt. He groaned, and Julia decided sadism was not her thing.

  “Stay still.” She took a small pair of scissors from the first aid pile. Her stomach lurched when she lifted the back of his shirt; it was soaked with still-warm blood. Holding her breath, she cut it in half.

  Cayne didn’t flinch as she peeled the fabric off the wound on his back, making it bleed anew.

  As she moved to examine his chest, he snatched the shirt from her, dabbed two mean half-dollar holes on his chest, and with quick precision, stuck two fingers into the top hole. He swore softly and pulled out a bullet.

  Julia slid to the floor.

  The slug clanked on the sink. After a few labored breaths, Cayne seemed fine. He washed his hands and splashed his face. As water dripped off his chin, he started to unravel the gauze.

  “Wait.” Julia pulled herself to her feet and handed him an economy-sized tube of Neosporin.

  Cayne smiled tightly and shook his head.

  “You—”

  “Don’t need it.” He held out the gauze and she took it, feeling a little light on her feet. As Julia used the coarse gas-station paper towels to mop the blood away and wrapped his chest with gauze, she could have sworn she saw the wounds shrinking.

  By the time they left the bathroom, her head was spinning. Cayne, though more snarky than usual, seemed almost fine. He took her elbow and led her past the cashier, who was mopping blood off the floor; she smiled and waved as if strange guys almost bled out in her store every day.

  In the parking lot, a man stepped out of his Volvo and handed Cayne a bomber jacket. Julia helped him into it.

  The walk to the hotel seemed to take forever, and by the time they reached their door, Julia was burning with questions, but she knew she wouldn’t get far.

  “What should I do for you?” was what she settled on. She had a clawing urge to heal him, even though he’d said he didn’t need it.

  Cayne eased himself onto the couch, and a spasm of something—maybe pain—crossed his face. Then he sighed. “You’ve done it.”

  Julia felt fussy, so she fetched an über-fluffed pillow from the bedroom and a bottle of water from the minibar. She stuffed the pillow behind his back, stuck the water in his hand, and propped her own hands on her hips. “Are you sure you don’t need anything else?”

  He grinned. “I should get shot more often.”

  When she felt sure there was nothing more that she could do, she fled to the shower, where she shed a few post-trauma tears. Now more than ever, she wanted to know the secret of what he was, felt he owed her an explanation. But the shooting seemed to have changed her personality.

  It was just the trauma, and it would have to wear off…but Julia was curiously, stupidly, unacceptably tongue-tied. Her cheeks had blushed practically the whole way home. Her hands were clammy. And inside their suite, things had gotten even worse.

  Her stomach was in knots, and she seemed to have split personalities; one wanted to slap Cayne, and the other—God, she really hoped he told the truth when he said he couldn’t get into her mind—wanted to put her arms around him and snuggle her face into his shaggy hair.

  There was something wrong with her.

  Of course, when she got out of the shower, Cayne, twice gunshot Cayne, seemed normal. A big, quiet, mysterious, obviously not-normal normal, deep in sleep.

  He woke up maybe an hour later in a mood; he was quiet, taut, over-obsessed with the windows and doors. As she fell asleep, he took up his usual post, beside a peacock-sized flower arrangement, watching her and the room. Maybe it was her imagination, but his eyes seemed to linger on her a little longer than usual.

  Chapter Eight

  She was drifting, gliding under a moonless sky, in the shadow of a million stars, over a bare landscape of stone and dirt, through wisps of clouds. Miles and miles ahead, her destination jutted from the dead earth: a crystal pyramid, sparkling in its perfection.

  It was the new Babel, a tower that touched the sky, a ladder to the gods. But the sun god peeled away the night in strips, and the light showed someone hovering above the pyramid’s tip; Cayne, circling, searching for her.

  Now she was frantic, beating her wings and desperate to reach him, filled with an urgency she didn’t understand.

  And the closer she came, the closer the sun, and the night was completely gone and Julia was flying at breathtaking speed.

  The heat was too much. She felt her wings molt, white feathers fluttering off her bones in bundles. She began to sink, falling farther from Cayne, who was shedding his charcoal feathers. He flapped like a wounded bird, and she screamed when his face melted and his body fell. It bounced off the tip of the pyramid, and she watched it catch fire as it slid down the side.

  Her skin began to peel as she screamed, and her eyes burned out of her head, but she could still see the sun as it drew closer and closer to the earth, as the desert erupted and everything burned, and the light came closer and closer and closer for a kiss…

  *

  Someone was shaking Julia’s shoulder. She snuggled deeper into her cocoon and covered her face with the satiny sheets. The shaking became more insistent, and her eyes popped open: Cayne.

  She let her stomach recover from its emergency nose-dive. She was

  hot—sweating; the sheets stuck to her legs. He shook her again and, more than mortified, Julia jerked the sheet off her head.

  Cayne’s face glowed in the morning light; the sun-kissed trimmings on the ceiling, the velveteen wallpaper, and even the sparkling chandelier paled in comparison.

  He was wearing clean clothes, underneath which, she was willing to bet, his wounds were smooth scars. His rich brown hair fell past his ears in the usual not-brushed-but-not-stringy look that made longish hair okay—at least on him.

  Julia smoothed her own crazy locks and waited while he stuck his hands in his jeans pockets and rocked back on his heels, like he was putting off whatever he had to say.

  “What is it?”

  “Samyaza’s gone. He’s traveling west.” There was a phantom pause while he inhaled, that broad chest rising and falling. “I’m going after him.”

  “Oh, okay.” Her own decision was almost immediate. “Me too.”

  “You think so?”

  “Didn’t you say he would kill me, like, for sure? I’m still in danger, aren’t I?”

  She was surprised when Cayne nodded.

  “Transportation’s going to be a problem. I can get around by myself, but not with you.”

  “You don’t have a car?”

  “No.”

  “Do you have a motorcycle?”

  “No.”

  “A bus pass?”

  “No.”

  “Then how do you…” Julia sighed as he smirked. “Should I even ask?”

  “No.”

  “I guess it’d be pointless to ask how you know where he’s headed.”

  Cayne grinned as he walked over to the window; he pulled the curtains back, stared down at the city for a second, then said he’d “go find something,” which in Cayne-speak meant that someone would give him a car. Julia banished the disapproving voice of her childhood Sunday school teacher from her head. Desperate times.

  While she gathered their few belongings, Cayne “borrowed” a sleek black Infiniti. She met him in the parking lot and whistled.

  “Wow.”

  “You like my ride?”

  Julia rolled her eyes and opened the passenger door. She wondered, as she buckled in, when the owner would realize his or her car was missing. She thought about asking Cayne, but he was intent on figuring out his seatbelt, so she closed her eyes, folded her arms, and relished that new car smell.

  Then her head banged into the window. Julia shrieked as the car shot out of the parking deck and jumped a curb. A glance at Cayne showed him wide-eyed with teeth bared, wresting with the steering wheel like it was a living thing.

  “STOP!”

&nbs
p; The car spun past an open-mouthed valet and barely missed a limo.

  “Shit! The breaks! The breaks!”

  But he stomped the pedal again, and they lurched through a gate and crashed into Union Avenue.

  Like a lightning bolt, it struck her that he didn’t know gas from breaks. “The one on the left!” she shouted. “Left!”

  Cars, trucks, and vans sped toward them, and as their horns blared Julia went limp. She clamped her eyes shut and screamed, “ON THE LEFT!”

  Their car spun, breaks squealed, metal crunched metal. Nothing touched them.

  When Julia opened her eyes they were parallel with the curb on the other side of the street, facing a stream of oncoming traffic. Cayne seemed confused; he was peering at the speedometer. Julia couldn’t stop shaking. Even her teeth knocked together.

  The wailing sirens snapped her out of it.

  “Shit.”

  Cayne glanced at her. “It’s harder than it looks.”

  “Obviously!” Julia threw her door open, heedless of the van beside her. It swerved into the other lane, and out of the corner of her eye she saw the nose of a black Mustang kiss the trunk of a beige Corolla. The sirens were closer. “Shit!”

  She ran around the car, flung Cayne’s door open, and grabbed his arm, slinging him out of the seat. “Passenger side! Put it in park first!”

  He opened his mouth, but Julia shoved him. “Go around! Get in the passenger’s seat!”

  He did, and she slid behind the wheel. “Listen,” she said, waving at the trail of cars before shifting into reverse. “We want to get let into traffic. Then we need to get out of here fast.”

  Cayne nodded, and the cars did what she wanted. What he desired. Everyone stopped to let them in, then moved to the right lane, leaving the left open for Julia. To fly. She didn’t breathe again until I-55 North, and when she did, she had to refrain from screaming.

  “Cayne,” she said, breaking a long, tired silence, “when exactly is the last time you drove?”

  “I don’t think I ever have.”

  “Never?”

  He looked chagrinned. “Yeah.”

  She shook her head, unable for a moment to comprehend. “You have never driven a car? Never ever. Ever. Driven a car.”

  Cayne rubbed his head.

  If she hadn’t been driving, Julia would have stared. Heck, she stared anyway. And he stared back. Face innocent. Eyes challenging. For a moment, she was speechless. Then she was rambling. And then she started laughing. The giggles bubbled through her body, soothing her nerves, loosening the knots in her chest. Cayne chuckled with her.

  “I thought I’d be a natural,” he admitted.

  Julia cackled again. It went on longer than it should have—nerves.

  “How is it,” she asked when her cheeks stopped hurting and she could breathe again, “that you never learned to drive?”

  He shrugged. “Just never learned.”

  Chapter Nine

  The sun was almost kissing the horizon; it painted the road pink, like cotton candy. Carnival tents popped up on the right, outside a small strip mall, just far enough away to be tempting. Julia ignored them. She had her own freak show.

  “So you don’t ever eat anything but crap? No fruits and veggies?”

  “Nope.”

  “Not even apples?”

  “Nope.”

  “What’s wrong with apples?”

  Cayne’s lip curled. “They taste like sweet tree bark.”

  Julia laughed. “You eat bark, do you?”

  “Who doesn’t?”

  “Um, normal people. They eat fruit, too. And salads. And they drive.”

  “What are you trying to say?”

  “You’re a strange one, bark boy.”

  Cayne frowned. “Leaf me alone.”

  It was laugh-out-loud corny, and Julia giggled for a full minute. She sighed when she finally got herself under control. She was comfortable. Things were okay. Maybe that was why she hadn’t yet pressed Cayne about any of her pressing questions. A part of her—a large and forceful, negligent, and foolish part of her— wanted things to go on as they were.

  After they’d escaped Memphis, they’d spent three mostly silent hours in the car, and the craziness of what Julia was doing hit home. She was going who-knew-where with who-knew-who—who couldn’t drive but could control people’s minds—in search of a half-demon that had tried to kill her and would probably love to try again. Wasn’t that enough to swallow? She wasn’t sure she could handle knowing more, at least not quite yet.

  She drove faster than she ever had, counting on Cayne to keep the cops away. When her energy finally waned, somewhere in Southern Missouri, she pulled off the Interstate and into the almost-empty parking lot of a hotel called the Lucky Deuce. She was going to have to teach Cayne how to drive.

  Julia explained the pedals, the blinkers, ten and two, stoplights and stop signs, merging, even parallel parking—everything she could think of. She felt a sharp prick of sorrow when she realized she was teaching him the same way Suzanne had taught her just a year before. Mr. Perceptive noticed her sad moment, but he didn’t press.

  Fifteen minutes later, she gave him a passing grade, and after convincing him to stay under 90 miles per hour (too fast for her liking, but a whole lot better than 120), her shoulders began to unknot.

  She passed the time trying to get to know Cayne. Of course, she couldn’t ask any of her burning questions. Not until she buttered him up. So she spent an hour lobbing softballs. Sure, she was interested in his favorite animal (the leopard), but after an hour learning his likes—rare steak; pizza with anchovies; reading mysteries (how fitting); ’60s and ’70s rock, especially The Rolling Stones (and especially the song Sympathy for the Devil); Vivaldi’s “Four Seasons”; bagpipes; the first few weeks of autumn—and his dislikes—nearly every vegetable; every fruit; rain clouds; crossword puzzles (he claimed he didn’t understand any of the pop culture questions); and television, since he didn’t care enough to watch it—she was ready for something meatier.

  “So you’ve really never done this before?” she asked as she stretched her arms. The ride was so smooth she could have fallen asleep. It had been that way since Cayne took the wheel.

  “Had a conversation?”

  Julia rolled her eyes. “Driven.”

  “Never.”

  “Hmph. Boy wonder.”

  “What?”

  “You’re a prodigy.”

  “Oh?”

  “Very impressive.”

  Cayne nodded. “I’m forced to agree.”

  “You’re very humble, too.”

  He winked. “Very.”

  Julia giggled, and she had to resist the urge to touch his arm. It was weird.

  The twinkling lights of the city had faded away, and rows of fir trees shadowed the land that framed the road. Julia remembered her first Christmas with Harry and Suzanne, and it left a bitter taste in her mouth. She searched for something to clear her mental palate, but everything brought her back to the life she’d lost. Thoughts of friends were no good, so school was out. And of course Harry and Suzanne were way off limits.

  She glanced at Cayne and imagined his face covered with ice cream. He loved the stuff, and could never pass up a chance to get a few free cones.

  It was their last day in Memphis, and they were at the zoo. He was being difficult—she couldn’t remember how—and she’d decided to smash his cone into his face. She’d laughed at his floored expression, and he’d chased her, trying but failing to replicate her feat.

  Julia smiled.

  Of course then they’d left, and their path took them to the park where Cayne got shot. More bad memories.

  She wrapped her arms around herself, remembering how helpless she’d felt.

  “Cayne?”

  “Mmmm?”

  “About yesterday…” He tensed, but Julia was determined to get at least one question answered. “How did that guy manage to shoot you?”

&nb
sp; “I assume because I didn’t want to be involved.”

  Julia waited for him to elaborate, but he didn’t seem to want to do that, either. She sighed. “Well, how do you feel now?”

  “Fine.” He stared straight out, lips pressed flat. Then took one hand off the wheel and turned to face her. “Turn on the light.”

  Julia did, and he pulled up his shirt, revealing omigod AMAZNIG abs. Seriously. Her throat went so dry she thought she might choke. “See?” he said, and she did choke just a little. She blinked and came back down to Earth, realizing that his hand was resting atop a shiny pink scar just below his ribcage.

  She couldn’t help gaping, though for a totally different reason. “Wow.”

  Cayne arched a brow and turned the light back off. Julia laid her head on the window. “I guess you wouldn’t want to explain—”

  “You guessed right.”

  She poked out her bottom lip. “You don’t trust me,” she said, and the hurt in her voice was more real than she meant it to be.

  He smiled softly. “It has nothing to do with you.”

  “But it affects me.”

  “I know it does.”

  His admission took Julia’s curiosity to wild new levels, but what could she do? Cayne’s brow furrowed.

  “You know,” he began, and Julia held her breath. “Now that I think about it,” he said, “I do like grape juice. Does that count as a fruit?”

  *

  The trees gave way to fields of moon-white corn. Julia imagined stopping at one of the brightly lit farmhouses that winked at the road. She wondered what the night would look like from behind the panes of an attic window. She on a straw mattress, Cayne a silent shadow above her.

  They hadn’t spoken since the moon rose, but it was a cozy kind of silence. Julia loved the way the dim light glistened on streams and tractors and grain silos. The way it turned his skin white.

  “Cayne?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Are you tired of driving?”

  He shook his head.

  “Won’t you get tired? I was thinking we should stop soon.”

  “Can you sleep here?” He waved at her seat.

  “In the car? Yeah.”

  “Then we don’t need to stop.”

  She remembered what he’d said that morning. I can get around by myself... How exactly? She almost took another shot at finding out, but instead asked, “Where are we going?”

  “I’ll know when we get there,” he said. “All I have to do is find him.”