Wings of Darkness: Book 1 of The Immortal Sorrows Series (29 page)

     I lay in the semi-darkness and
listened to the beat of my own pulse.  If I concentrated hard, I could
hear the much faster drumming of Jazzy’s little heart. It was there, just
beneath that rumbling purr of hers.  I stuffed my pillows under my head at
a more comfortable angle and was rewarded with an indignant whine from my
cat.  She was such a diva.

     I wondered if Alex had really made
it home ok, or if Asher had landed him in Siberia, or someplace equally
unpleasant. I thought about calling to make sure he was alright, but it was
already pretty late, and what could I say?  I didn’t know if he remembered
anything that had happened. Also, I didn’t want him thinking I was a crazy,
stalker girl.

      For all I knew, Asher had
wiped his memory of the night out completely.  I hated to think about what
kind of memories Asher might plant to wipe out the date we never got to
finish.  If he kept messing with his head like that, he would give him
brain rot, or something worse.  I didn’t want anything bad happening to
Alex, not because of me.

     Alex was a problem, for sure; he
obviously liked me, and he wasn’t playing games about it like a lot of high
school boys would.  I felt bad about him, but I didn’t know what to do
about it, not without coming off as a heartless bitch.  He was a great
guy, and if I had never met Asher, I would have been thrilled to be with
him.  But I
had
met Asher, and I would never be the same again, because of him. 

     I was something different, now. I
wanted more than what Alex could give me.  I also knew, without a doubt,
that if I had kissed Alex the way I’d kissed Asher, it probably would have
killed him.  It was probably a good thing that Asher had interfered, the
way he had.  I was poison, and the messed up thing was, I was pretty much
ok with that.

     Asher was the one I wanted. 
The thought of him thrilled and terrified me. Not because he was Death, either.
There was so much more to it than that.  It was because, well, whatever
he’d turned me into, he was my match.  He could handle whatever I threw at
him.   We couldn’t break each other.  Something inside me
recognized and accepted him just as he was, and wanted him, anyway.

     And there was the irony; no matter
how much I wanted Asher, I couldn’t have him, either.  Fate had made sure
of that.  I was poison for him, too.  The minute I gave into what I
wanted most, the trap would snap shut on both of us, and that crazy bitch would
win.

        I groaned and
flipped over onto my back.  Jazzy made a huge production of fluffing and
rearranging herself because of my thoughtlessness.  Drama Queen. What did
she care?  She slept twenty hours a day.  Must be nice. My eyes
closed as I waited impatiently for sleep.  Which still didn’t seem to be
happening.

     All I could see was the stricken
look on Asher’s face, when he’d tried to kiss me again, in the funhouse, and
I’d turned my face away.  How could I explain to him that I did it for
him?  I was ashamed of myself, for acting like that, but what else could I
do?  Pushing him away was the only way to save him.  He was so
stubborn; even if I’d warned him about Fate’s stupid little game, he wouldn’t
have listened.

     Jazzy got a little too enthusiastic
with her fluffing, and I winced as she caught the top of my ear with a
claw.  I sighed, disgusted. I should be worried about surviving all the
things Fate had in store for me. I should be worried about my family and
friends.  Instead, I was keeping myself awake by worrying about my love
life.  Asher’s friend was right; my love life
was
a mess. Oh, well, I could always get a
few more cats and die alone, probably wearing a ratty bathrobe, and smelling
faintly of cheese.  I was well on my way to becoming a crazy cat lady,
anyway.  I might as well get it over with.

     I closed my eyes and forced myself
to breathe deeply, and evenly.  I started to feel the effects of the
sleeping pill: my limbs grew heavy, and I felt kind of dizzy.  The
headache had backed off, a little. That was something.  Maybe I would get
to sleep, after all.  At least my mind wasn’t racing a mile a minute,
anymore. It seemed that when it came down to it, my mind wanted to concentrate
on only one thing.  That kiss.  I fell asleep, finally, thinking
about that stolen kiss.

      It didn’t surprise me that I
would dream of Asher. Sometime in the night, that unmistakable scent of spiced
leather surrounded me.  I felt myself smiling in my sleep. Warmth
enveloped me as the bed seemed to sink in the middle.  I rolled into the
dip and curled against his side. He was so warm and solid.  Here was
happiness, and safety. Here was everything I wanted.  I sighed, content
and happy, for the first time in ages, and stretched out against him.

     A large hand played against my neck
and a shiver ran through me. I’d missed him so much; missed the connection I
felt every time he touched me. “Am I dreaming?” It came out as a sleepy mumble.

    The hand stilled, hesitated. “Yes,” he
said, quietly.

     I smiled, delighted. I might have
even giggled a little bit. “Good.”  If I was dreaming, then it didn’t
really matter what I did. I wrapped my arms around him and buried my nose in
his neck, inhaling deeply.  “You always smell so good.”  His arm came
up and I felt him playing with my hair.  I arched my back like a cat,
shamelessly begging for attention.  A tiny butterfly kiss landed just
below my ear. “I missed you, so much.”

     “As I have missed you.  Sleep,
now. You need your rest.”   

    I certainly couldn’t argue that
point.  I was exhausted, and it was the best sleep of my life: deep and
peaceful.  Until I rolled onto Jazzy’s tail in the wee hours of the
morning, and was rewarded with a screaming, clawing, highly violated cat. 
That’s when I realized that Jazzy wasn’t the only one I shared my bed with. For
real.  Asher wasn’t a dream, after all.  Jazzy and I weren’t alone.

     I didn’t stop to think, I just
reacted.  Unfortunately, that reaction involved a hard kick to the spine
that landed Asher out in the middle of my floor with a loud thump.  It
shocked me that I’d been able to move him, at all, but I was much stronger than
I looked, these days.  I probably should have felt worse about booting him
into the floor, but he kind of deserved it.  I didn’t invite him to take
up most of my bed.

      “Holy freaking crap!”  I
sat up and flipped on the bedside lamp.  “What the hell were you doing?” I
wanted to scream at him, but remembered that my dad was asleep down the hall,
and it came out in a strangled whisper.

     Asher swept a hand over his eyes as
he picked himself up off the floor. I don’t think I’d ever seen him look more
human, or more annoyed. “I was sleeping,” he bit out, shortly.  “As you
were, before that little she-demon woke us both up.”  The little she-demon
just glared at him from my pillow, as she washed her paws.  Clearly, she
wasn’t impressed with him, either.

     “No. I mean what the hell were you
doing in my bed?”

     Asher brushed himself off and lay
back down on my bed, with his hands laced behind his head, looking for all the
world, perfectly relaxed.  “I thought I just explained that.  I was
sleeping.”

     “You know exactly what I meant,” I
hissed at him.  I was mortified; what had I said, or done in my
sleep?  He was messing with me, and on purpose.  I jumped up, pacing,
until I noticed him smiling.  His smile cracked open and laughter rumbled
out, deep and low.  It did funny things to my insides when he laughed like
that.  Which only annoyed me even more.  “What is so damned funny?”

     Asher pointed at the mirror behind
me.  I spun on the rug, hands on hips, and stopped dead in my
tracks.  Oh. My. God.  My hair looked like I’d been tortured and
electrocuted, but not necessarily in that order.  Some of it hung past my
shoulders.  Some of it still remained in the top-knot.  Most of it
stood up in nearly-black spikes around my head, and the purple streaks made it
all the more interesting.  Kind of like modern sculpture gone hideously
wrong. 

     I yanked the hair tie out and beat my
hair into submission, even before I grabbed the fuzzy, pink bathrobe from the
hook next to my door.  I had on pajama bottoms, but the little blue tank
top left me feeling far too exposed.

     “Jazzy likes to play in my hair
while I sleep.”  My voice came out sounding sullen. I shouldn’t have to
defend myself, or my cat to him.  He wasn’t supposed to be tucked into my
bed in the first place.

     Asher watched my hasty movements,
his eyes crinkled at the corners.  At least he was no longer laughing at
me outright. “You drool in your sleep, you know. It is entirely
charming.”  He smiled broadly.  Damn, if he ever gave up being Death
incarnate, he could be a comedian.  Funny bastard.

     “Be glad I didn’t fart,” I said
spitefully. “Nobody asked you, anyway. It’s four in the morning.  You’re
not supposed to be here.”  I was tired of repeating myself, but he didn’t
seem to grasp the gravity of this situation.  That, or he just didn’t
care.

     He rolled over on his side, patted
the mattress next to him.  “Come back to bed.  I promise I will not
bite.”

     I snorted.  “I’ve heard that
before.  You can’t be trusted.”  I crossed my arms over my chest and
stood awkwardly next to my bed.  “Go away.  I’m tired.”

     “So am I.”  Asher’s voice
gentled, enticing me.  “Come lay down.  It has been a long
week.  I have missed you.”

     “If you missed me, that’s your own
fault.  You were the one who decided to leave me.”  I eyed him
suspiciously.  “I didn’t think angels had to sleep.” 
Mistrusting?  Nah, not me. He’d already proved that he couldn’t be
trusted.

     “I do not have to sleep, just as I
do not have to eat, but occasionally, I like to do it anyway.  I would
love to do it, now.  If you would just be a good girl and cooperate.”

     “You can’t be in here.  My dad—“

     “Is still snoring happily away down
the hall.  Now, shut the light off, if you please.”  He rolled over
onto his back and threw an arm over his eyes.  He took up most of my
full-sized bed. Even his feet were hanging over.  At least he had taken his
boots off, before climbing into bed with me unannounced.  There was just
something intimate about his socked feet dangling off the end of my bed. 
I felt myself begin to blush.    

     Had I really not known he was
asleep next to me? 
Really
?
But I did know, didn’t I? If I were being honest with myself, then yes. 
I’d dreamed of him.  I’d
loved
dreaming of him.  Oh, hell, what had I said in my sleep? What horrible
things had I done in my sleep? If it were possible to die of embarrassment, I
probably would have. 

     I shifted from foot to foot. 
He didn’t seem to be leaving.  I could go sleep in the guest room, but it
was my bed, after all.  Also, I didn’t think I could come up with a
reasonable explanation for my dad, should he find out that I’d switched rooms.

     I sat down on the edge of my bed,
poised to run should he lay so much as a finger on me.  “I’m still mad at
you, you know.” 

     “I know.” He sort of sighed, as he
said it.

     It was really late, or really
early, depending on how you looked at it.  I got up long enough to jump
under the covers, bathrobe and all.  I turned my back on him as I shut out
the light, and curled into the tightest ball I could, in an effort to make
myself smaller.  “Stay on your side of the bed.  Above the covers.”

     “Alright,” came his careful
answer.  “May I ask how long you plan to be angry with
me?”    

     “A very long time.  You did a
terrible thing.”  I was glad it was dark, and he couldn’t see my crossed
fingers.

***

     It had been three days.  Three
long days of not talking to Asher any more than I had to.  It was killing
me because I really wanted to.  I wanted that easy way we’d had with one
another before the shit had hit the fan, and Fate had made it clear that there
would be no happy ending, not for anyone. 

     Asher seemed content not to force
the issue.  A man would have pushed and pushed to get a reaction out of
me; forced an argument, just to get it over with.  Only, Asher wasn’t
human.  He’d had all of eternity to learn, and practice patience. He
seemed perfectly happy to wear me down just by close proximity. And it was
working.

     By day, I could sense him close to
me, even if I couldn’t see him, and every night he slept next to me. 
Never touching.  Never talking, unless I said something, first.  He
was just there, always close enough to reach out and touch. That was the worst
part; I wanted desperately to curl up against him and know that everything
would be alright. And I couldn’t.  I remembered Fate’s warning, only too
well.  She wanted to watch his heart be broken.

     There was only one way out that I
could see; if I couldn’t pull off what she wanted, she had no further use for
me.  My family would be out of harm’s way.  Asher could go about his
way as though he’d never met me, which would be better for him, in the long
run. Wouldn’t it? As for me, well, what did it really matter what I
wanted?  I was willing to pay the price, to keep them all safe.

      I had to tell him. There was
no other way around it. I just wasn’t sure when I would do it.  No time
would be the right time.  It sounded crazy to come out with, ‘Oh, by the
way, you can’t fall in love with me, because the minute you do, I have to break
your heart.  That really sucks, because I think I may love you, too.
That’s why I’ve been such a hateful bitch to you for days. Sorry about your
luck.’ 

     Even thinking about it made me
squirm in humiliation, but I had to tell him. No matter how embarrassing it
might be, for me.  I would just gloss over the part about maybe being in
love with him.  He needed to know the truth, but not the whole truth. I
could keep that little tidbit to myself.