“You’re stronger than he is.” Emma says it with such conviction that I almost believe her.
“Thank you,” I nod into her. It’s not true, both Gage and I know it.
“It was over that girl, wasn’t it?” Emma is ready to beat the shit out of this dead horse and ride its bones all the way home, trampling our backs to get there. “You’re both head over heels, and now you’ve come to blows over her.”
“It was just a love tap.” I wink over at Gage. “Isn’t that right, sweetie?” I knock into his shin from under the table.
“Be quiet.” Gage sighs. “And yes”—he glances up at Emma—“it was over Skyla. I’m in love with Logan’s ‘girlfriend,’ but in my defense, I have visions that prove she’s going to marry me one day.” He glares over at me as Emma and Barron both stop breathing.
Barron clears his throat. “A daughter-in-law, Em, isn’t that great?” He gives a hesitant smile, clearly terrified of the impending wrath.
“A wife?” She says it amused, just this side of psychotic. Emma’s lips begin to twitch a million miles an hour, and I hope to God she’s not about to drop dead, no thanks to Gage and his future nuptial standing.
I take Gage in with his dark hair, those dimples you could jam your fists in, and I want to. I’m not amused. I’m downright pissed he chose to break the news to his parents like pulling the pin on a grenade at breakfast. Gage doesn’t care who he hurts as long as he gets Skyla in the end. He’s claiming her as his own, throwing his visions and his parents into the mix to rattle me.
I push back from the table and get up to leave.
“Stay the fuck away from my girlfriend.” I say each word like it were its own sentence.
Emma straightens and takes in a breath. “What he said,” she hisses at Gage before snatching her keys from the entry and taking off for work.
At least I’ve got Emma on my side.
***
West Paragon High melts in and out of the fog like a dream that’s about to turn into a brutal scholastic nightmare—school. Anyway, football season is upon us, and I do love that, plus Skyla is enrolled, so things are looking up already. Even Cerberus’s three-headed snarl looks a little prettier stamped over the gym just knowing she’ll grace the campus with that heavenly bod.
I scan the crowd for Skyla as students race through the halls of the administration building. The fall schedules are pinned to the boards, and everyone and their mother is craning their necks in hopes of a preview. I spot a stack of individual copies set out to the side, and I snatch up mine and Skyla’s. I scan the two of them, and my heart drops.
Shit.
I have no fucking classes with her and my prognosticating relation has every single one?
I glance over at Gage and wince with suspicion.
Skyla’s coming this way with Drake and Brielle but before she can get here Ellis blocks her off at the pass. Great. Now I’ve got Harrison to deal with.
“I got you in two classes.” Ellis slides his glasses up his nose. He must have lost his contacts. It’s hit or miss with the spectacles, but I know for a fact it drives the girls wild—at least that’s what he tells me. Let’s hope Skyla doesn’t have a weak spot for stoners with glasses.
“How do you know?” She turns her shoulder up in my direction as if evicting me from her line of vision.
“It’s posted up on the wall.” Harrison sports his killer grin as if he were about to score Skyla for himself.
“Oh. I thought we were registering.” She glances over at Gage before reverting her full attention to Ellis.
“Nope, just copying a list they were too lazy to send. Plus, this way they get you to sign up for the after-school stuff without infringing on their precious time.”
“So what classes do we have together?” She produces an ear-to-ear grin for no particular reason. If she’s trying to make me jealous, she’d have much higher success by indulging Gage in another liplock. On second thought, grinning at Ellis is a much better idea.
I step in between the two of them just as Gage takes off toward Brielle.
“Ellis, will you excuse us a minute?” I don’t take my eyes off Skyla. She’s got her hair pulled back, and her earlobe is taunting the hell out of me to take a bite.
He looks over at her. “You want me to leave you two alone?”
“Not really. What were those classes again?” She steps around me and takes a look at the paper in his hands.
“Sociology and Algebra Two.”
I balk at the thought of Ellis ever qualifying for higher mathematics.
“Algebra Two?” she asks. “You must be really good at math. I’m going to need lots of tutoring.” Skyla smears the words like she’s frosting a cake.
“Are you done?” I shove Ellis back a good foot in the event he didn’t pick up on the I’ll-be-kicking-your-ass-later look I just shot him.
“Enough,” Skyla shouts. “I’ll talk to you.” She glances back at Ellis. “Thank you. I look forward to your help.”
“For the record”—I touch my hand to my chest—“I tutored him in math two years in a row.”
“Like I said, you’re a real superhero,” she seethes. “So how long before you get your girlfriend’s diary back? A week? A month? Next two years? I really don’t want your excuses.”
“I’m not making excuses.” I lean into her. “I checked the schedule. You know how many classes we have together?”
“You and me, or you and Michelle?”
“You and me,” I whisper
Her face explodes with color. “How many?” She tilts her head, hopeful.
“None.” It hurts to even say it.
“None?” Her voice raises two octaves and solidifies the fact she still has feelings for me—or that her plans of cheating off my papers have been reduced to nil.
“What are the odds, right?”
“I don’t know.” She blows out a pressured breath. “What about lunch?”
“You have B, I have A.” I hand her a copy.
“Lovely.” You can practically see her mind reeling with possibilities.
Skyla steps away and examines her classes with great intensity. She glances up and makes a beeline over to Gage.
“Did you do this?” I can hear her voice rising from the swarm of the crowd, ripe with accusation.
He shakes his head while feeding her some bullshit line.
Michelle comes up and snatches the schedule from my hands.
“Nice,” she says, slapping me some skin for scoring two classes with her.
I glance over at Skyla, and sure enough, she’s glaring in this direction.
We lock eyes for a moment before she turns her back to me.
Skyla combs her fingers through Gage’s hair and takes a bold step into him until her body relaxes against his.
I get it.
Play with the fire that is Michelle Miller, and get burned by losing Skyla forever.
It’s as clear as those crystal blue eyes of hers.
Gage
The next day, the clouds press against the island with their dark-sooted bellies, holding the heat to the ground like a skillet. Every now and again, a light rain sprinkles down, cooling us off just enough to get us through the intense simmer of afternoon.
It’s cool in the bowling alley, and for once, I don’t mind logging eight solid hours in this overgrown box.
Even less so now that Skyla just wandered in with her stepbrother.
I speed over and say hello.
“You want a tour of the kitchen?” I ask, as Drake shoots off toward Bree like a missile. I’ve caught them on at least three occasions going at it full throttle in the utility closet, but I won’t tell Logan for fear of Brielle’s future paychecks.
Skyla gives a soft smile as I lead her over to the den of destruction. She takes in the stainless walls as the staff bustles around us. I have no clue why I offered to show her the kitchen other the fact that Logan might see her if I paraded her through any other part of the facil
ity. Selfishly, I want her all to myself, every minute of the day.
I lead her over to the freezer and open the door like an invitation.
“Walk-in,” I say. “Hang out in there a few minutes, and it’ll really cool you down.” I should know—I’ve been doing it all day.
“Can you get locked in?” She hesitates before slipping her arm inside.
“Nope.” I run my hand over the door. “Shuts just like a refrigerator.”
Logan comes over and pulls a sleeve of hot dog buns out of the rack behind us, rubbing up against Skyla in the process. He damn well knows we’ve been out of hot dogs since yesterday afternoon.
“Are you ready to work for me?” He raises his brows as if the proposition were far from fiscal.
“Maybe I will.” She twists her lips just shy of a smile. “I think I’d enjoy working with Gage.” She’s knifing him with my name, but I couldn’t care less—hell, I encourage it. I revel in the pissed-off expression on his face just the same.
“Him, I’m about to fire.” He gives a lazy wink in my direction before disappearing back into the kitchen.
“You guys usually get along?” A wave of guilt sweeps over her as if she were solely responsible—she is, but that’s beside the point.
“We’ve fought before.” I’ve never had my balls shoved so far up my throat as I have as of late, but that’s another story.
“Over Chloe?”
I try to laugh it off, but frown instead. Oddly, we did fight because of Chloe, but definitely not over her. It had everything to do with the fact that I knew she was dicking him around, in the most literal sense, and he didn’t care to believe me. I’m always right, and that seems to piss Logan off the most. It should, since it’s me that Skyla’s going to be with in the end.
“Why does Michelle have Chloe’s diary, anyway?” Skyla glances past my shoulder before meeting my gaze.
“She says her mother gave her a box of Chloe’s things. She found it.”
“I bet she read it cover to cover.”
“You’d think.” Michelle and Chloe were tight. She lived half of those things right along with her.
“So, were you and Chloe pretty close?”
“We went out a few times.” I tap my knuckles over the wire rack.
Why in the hell would I say that? To make her jealous? To up my value because another girl might have wanted me? Skyla is the only girl I need—want, and jealousy doesn’t fit into the equation of any relationship.
A loud pop goes off in the kitchen, and the scent of burnt toast explodes in the air. I rush over and try to toss the lid on the fryer just as a blowtorch shoots out of it and ignites the ceiling with flames.
“Skyla!”
Logan calls out her name as I try to douse the blaze with a discarded rag.
“Everybody out.” Logan barks as bodies stream for the exit.
I glance up in time to see Skyla bump into the grease bucket and knock it over.
“Get out now!” I shout, trying to push her out of the way as a wall of fire ignites between us. Skyla lands in a perfect tower of flames that shoot toward the ceiling with an unnatural ferocity. Fire dances around her in a perfect circle, taunting both Logan and me because we can’t reach her.
“Help!” She coughs it out.
Smoke fills the kitchen, dense and white like the murderous twin of the afternoon fog.
A piercing noise drills through the air as Logan forces down the flames with a hose, extinguishing them into a sea of grey clouds. I snatch a fire extinguisher off the floor and spray the vicinity around Skyla, ignoring the fact my back just combusted. Logan whisks her out the door, and I stagger through the white haze, trying to find the exit.
I hold my breath until it feels like my lungs are about to explode before I finally make it outside.
Logan holds Skyla by the dirt lot and I speed on over.
“You’re okay,” he tells her, landing a kiss over the top of her head
“Logan!” She buries herself in his neck. “What just happened?”
“I don’t know.” He looks up at me. “We’ve never had anything like that happen before.”
“Skyla.” I pant as I land beside them, my arms and clothes covered with soot. “You okay?”
Logan lands her on her feet as billows of smoke escape from the bowling alley.
“I’m fine.” She rubs her arms and shivers.
The fire department screams its way over. The red spasms of light give the canopy of clouds a blushed appearance.
“I checked the temp, and the oil was fine.” I say it dazed. “Do you think?” I look over at Logan, not wanting to finish the thought.
“I know.” Logan gives a slight nod, confirming my theory.
We stare at one another without saying another word, the implications too dangerous to mold into complete sentences.
“What?” Skyla shrills over the chaos. “This involves me. I was in that fire.”
I glance up at her. She’s going to know the truth at some point, and I want to be the person who she can rely on to deliver, so I give it. “Fire is the only sure way to kill a Celestra.” It felt like I held a loaded gun to her and voluntarily pulled the trigger.
“Fire?” Her expression darkens. Logan said her dad died in a fire, and I know she’s connecting the painful dots.
Brielle barrels over and lunges into Skyla. “I can’t believe you survived! They made us run out the back. I had no idea you guys were standing out here. The entire kitchen is destroyed.”
“I’m sorry,” Skyla whispers to Logan.
She thinks that fire was personally directed at her.
And most likely she’s right.
16
Logan
Butterfly Kisses
The next afternoon, I get the pleasure of eating up hours of my time with an insurance assessor. He’s a lanky man with what appears to be a general disinterest in life, and I follow him around like a lost puppy as he hems and haws over what the company is and isn’t responsible for, going as far as to elude if I pay him in free yearly bowling passes, he could throw in high-end replacements.
Skyla calls and says something about a stack of hundred dollar bills, old newspaper clippings, and a haunted house equipped with its own sweaty poltergeist, so I don’t waste any time. I saddle Gage with the freeloading insurance agent and tell him to give him the whole fucking place as long as he’s out of my way by the time I get back.
“Get a small bottle or plastic bag and collect some of the moisture.” I instruct her as I race over in the rain.
“You don’t get it,” she moans, exasperated. “The clippings were just weird. He’s psycho! I’m living with a lunatic.”
“I agree with you.” Her stepfather very much fits the mold. “The clippings are strange. But Skyla, listen to me—go right now and find something to capture that moisture. I’ll give it to my uncle, and he’ll analyze it.”
“Analyze it? It’s water.”
“It may be something more than that.”
“Like ghost water?”
I close my eyes for a moment and veer into oncoming traffic. The blare of a horn goes off, and I’m quick to right myself into the proper lane.
“I’m sorry,” she whimpers.
“You did nothing wrong. Listen, I’m coming over.”
“You can’t come over. My parents will kill me.”
I drive through the tunnel of trees, and the connection cuts out.
Doesn’t matter.
She couldn’t stop me, anyway.
***
I park low on the street and make my over to the backyard. I catch a glimpse of Skyla at the kitchen sink, so I head to the back door and give a brief wave.
Her whole person seizes at the sight of me.
“You know I’m afraid to look out this door,” she hisses as she lets me in. A smile breaks loose on her face, and I take the opportunity to quell her with a kiss.
Skyla takes me by the hand and leads me upstairs. It looks n
ormal enough, nothing seems out of its element, but I produce a glass vial from my pocket just in case. I happened to have an extra in my glove compartment from the night I did the blood draw, in the event she launched the first one at me for suggesting it.
“You get a bulk discount on those?”
“With you around, I might have to.” I push out a grin.
Skyla lets me know me that her parents should be back any minute before leading me straight into their closet. She flicks on the lights and points over to the corner.
A clatter emits from downstairs. “Help unload the car, please!” A voice booms from below.
Skyla jumps up like a reflex and takes off, leaving me among the coats and the shoes.
The air in the closet begins to glow with a distinct oily fog.
I carefully fill the vial with the smoky substance and get the hell out of Dodge.
***
It takes a small eternity before Skyla discovers me sitting in her closet, catching up on my vampire fiction.
“You should really consider putting a nice comfy chair in here,” I lament, stretching my legs. “It’s a great place to take your mind off things and relax.” I pitch the book over my shoulder. “Maybe a beanbag?”
“Funny.” She slides a pile of shoes to the side. “How are we going to get you out?”
“Don’t worry.” I try to withhold a smile. “I’m sure you’ll bring sustenance when needed. And we can do this.” I’m not one to let a Gage-free moment slip by, so I pull her in and push my lips over hers like a promise. Skyla exhales as she takes free reign of my mouth. Her tongue strokes mine with barely-there passes and begs me to press in harder, hungry for more. I pull back and take her in before things get out of control. “I want to show you something.”
“What?” She purrs, creating small circles over my chest with her nails. Skyla glances below my waist with promising immoral implications.
“Not that, but it’s a good idea for later.” I help her to her feet. “Up there.” I nod at the secret door to the butterfly room. “You have a chair we can stand on?”