Cherry Red Summer (Emely and Elyas Book 1) (33 page)

“I wasn’t planning on making fun of you.”

“No?”

“No.”

“So what
is
in store for me then?” I said.

“I just wanted to know if you like him.”

“Why do you care?”

“Just because.”

I rolled my eyes. “If I tell you, will you let it be, then?”

He nodded and met my eyes.

“Yes, I like him.”

“A lot?”

“What kind of stupid questions are these, Elyas?”

“They’re not stupid questions,” he replied. “I’d just like to know if it makes sense to even keep pursuing you.”

“It’s never made sense, but that hasn’t stopped you so far.”

“So you like him
a lot
?”

I sighed. “Yes, I like him. But I can’t say much more because I’ve never met him in person. Satisfied?”

“Almost.”

“What does ‘almost’ mean?”

“It means I can’t understand why you like someone you’ve never seen more than you like me.”

“Elyas, I like pretty much anyone more than you, regardless of whether I’ve seen them or not,” I replied, noticing a half smile on his lips. God, why didn’t he
ever
take me seriously?

“So he’s different from me,” he inferred.

“You might say he’s the complete opposite.”

“But maybe you gave him a chance to show you what kind of person he is. Something you deny me.”

“I don’t deny you that; I already know you.”

“You
think
you know me.” He sighed, looking me in the eyes again. He paused, then opened his mouth, only to shut it again and look away.

Neither of us said anything, and with each breath I became more and more aware of how close we were lying to each other.
His scent.
It tasted like honey as I breathed it in, nearly making me lose my mind.

I closed my eyes. For months, I had been obsessed with what cologne Elyas wore. Last week—and I would never admit this to anyone—I had walked past a boutique selling perfume and cologne, and before I knew it my legs had carried me inside. I sneaked from shelf to shelf like an undercover agent, looking over my shoulder every five minutes. After an hour or so I had smelled every product that might in any way be made for men. I had even checked out a men’s energizing Q10 skin cream and a light-blue bath gel for babies. And for what? Nada. Leaving the boutique, I felt I had both struck out and reached a new low in my life.

I had only two options to resolve it: either I beat Elyas unconscious and hauled him to a laboratory to analyze his scent, or I mustered all my freaking courage and just asked him!

I liked Option 1 substantially better, but its implementation would entail complex planning. So I decided on Option 2, and after twenty deep breaths, went for it.

“Say, Elyas, what kind of cologne is that you wear?” I twiddled my fingers.

“Hmm?” he asked, distracted. “Why do you ask? I don’t use any.”

“Very funny. I smell it all the time.”

“No, really. I don’t use one,” he insisted, frowning at me. “I basically never use cologne or aftershave. You must not be smelling me.”

“Where does that smell come from then?” I asked.

“What smell? I don’t smell anything.” He pulled his T-shirt to his nose and sniffed. “Maybe you mean my laundry detergent?”

Wait a secon
d . . .
Something was wrong here
. . .

“Or my deodorant? I’ve been wearing a new one for a couple days,” he continued.

I ducked deeper and deeper into my sleeping bag. Was I the only one who was hearing bells? Yes, alarm bells. Not goo
d . . .
not goo
d . . .
not good at all. God, could it be true? Now I wasn’t lying next to Elyas-with-the-nice-cologne. No, I was now lying next to the I-naturally-smell-good jerk.

“Why do you ask? D
o . . .
do you think I stink?” he asked, surprised.

Ha, that’d be nice. His smell was practically driving me insane, and he was worried I thought he stank.

“A little,” I said.

“A little?” he repeated, alarmed.

I giggled.

“Come on now. Seriously?”

“No. Calm down. You don’t stink,” I said pulling the sleeping bag back down.

I could see the relief in his eyes. “But?” he asked.

Oh, great. What had I gotten myself into?

“That’s all. You just always have
a . . .
smell,” I answered.

“And what, may I ask, do I smell like?”

I bit the inside of my cheek. “Hard to say. Somehow tangy and sweet.”

Elyas smelled his T-shirt again. “Sweet
. . . ,
” he mumbled, not seeming to know what I meant.

Maybe he didn’t actually smell, and I was just imagining it? Phantom smells? Was there such a thing? No, dammit. I was not imagining it. I had smelled him, just now. How could someone naturally smell like
that
?

“Did you know,” Elyas said, “that I think
you
smell good?”

Shivers went down my back. “Elyas,” I said. “Drop it.”

“Why? Because you don’t want to hear it, or because you won’t believe me anyway?”

I didn’t answer.

I was breathing hard and he rolled onto his side to face me. “You’re never going to believe anything I say, huh?”

I looked into his turquoise-green eyes, which suddenly seemed so close, and my palms suddenly felt sweaty. “I’d love to believe you,” I said, surprised at my own honesty.

“So why don’t you?” he whispered.

Because I cannot wrap my brain around the idea of someone like you being interested in me.

My throat was dry, and I swallowed. “I don’t know.”

“You don’t trust me, is that it?” His voice sounded thin.

I shrugged.

“Emely,” he whispered. “I don’t lie to you. What I say to you, I mean.” He hesitated a moment. “Even before, around the campfire.”

“That you think I’m uptight?”

He chuckled. “No. I meant when I said I like you. To be exact, I like you a lot, Emely.”

All the hairs on my body simultaneously stood on end.

“Do you believe that?” he said.

“
I . . .
I don’t know.”

“And if I were to swear it’s true?” The soft timbre of his voice enveloped me like a veil of mist.

“I
. . .
” I nestled down into my sleeping bag again. “I mea
n . . .
What are you trying to say?”

He looked at me for a while. “Give me a chance, Emely. Just one,” he whispered.

Nurse, we need the defibrillator!

My pulse stopped for three seconds, and the feeling in my gut intensified.

“Emely, what do you have to lose if you try to believe me? Just give me the same chance you give everyone else. Give me a chance to prove that you can trust me, and stop assuming everything I say or do is bad. Give us a chance to really get to know each other. That’s all I want.”

What did I have to lose?

Not much. Just one totally trivial, minor thing.

My heart.

I looked at my hands. Elyas seemed so sincere, so honest. Did I really have such a mistaken image of him? Was I the one ruining everything because of my never-ending mistrust?

Mayb
e . . .
Maybe I should at least
try
to believe him? Give him the chance he had so sweetly asked me for?

Despite my fear, everything pointed to yes. I finally made a decision that was almost impossible to let pass my lips.

“Don’t screw it up,” I said.

I could only hope and pray that he even partially grasped how much trust I had just placed in him. A smile swept over his face, finally reaching his eyes, which danced. “I won’t,” he whispered, quietly but resolutely.

His gaze was so penetrating I felt an invisible band I couldn’t resist draw me closer and closer to him, although I wasn’t moving an inch.

I nodded.

“Can we go to sleep now?” I asked.

“Of course,” he said, smiling.

“Well, the
n . . .
sleep well, Elyas.”

“Sweet dreams, sweetums.”

I looked at him for a moment, and then rolled onto my side, turning my back to him.

Sleep.

I suspected I wouldn’t sleep.

Lying in the tent awake for more than an hour, I tried to force my body and my mind to relax—for nothing.

I even tried counting sheep, but the sheep alternately had brown hair, turquoise-green eyes, or tender hands that wanted to massage my back instead of just jumping over the stupid fence.

Unlike me, Elyas had evidently found his way to sleep, no problem. He hadn’t moved for ages. The rain had since eased up, and the only sound breaking the quiet was Elyas’s soft and regular breathing. I couldn’t explain why I thought so, but it was one of the most beautiful sounds I’d ever heard. Just the simple sound of breathing in and breathing out. Something any human being did thousands of times every day. But when Elyas did it, it seemed more meaningful somehow.

And some people hide behind a mask because they’re afraid of being hurt.
Sebastian’s words echoed, and I wondered whether he had been referring not to me or Alex, but to Elyas. Were all of his brazen advances and jokes ultimately hiding genuine feelings?

No way.

Or?

I tossed and turned through my thoughts, never coming to a resolution. The only thing I felt for sure was a strong urge deep within, and if I gave into it, I would be lying in his arms in a split second.

It was crazy—and I couldn’t get around it. I wanted to cuddle up to him.

He probably wouldn’t wake up if I did, but I didn’t dare. As long as there was the least chance he might catch me, the risk was too great.

I tried to suppress what I wanted, turned my back toward Elyas, closed my eyelids, and rededicated myself to the fruitless enterprise of trying to fall asleep.

After a while I heard a soft rustling next to me. Before I could figure out what it was, it fell silent again, but I listened for it anyway. Then it started again. This time it didn’t stop. It came closer, as though Elyas were scooting closer to me. I lay motionless, unable to move.

When his stomach touched my back, I held my breath. Slowly, and almost imperceptibly, he pressed the rest of his body against mine. His knees nestled in behind my bent knees, and my heart pounded in my throat—every second, I was afraid Elyas would hear its loud pumping. Instead, he gently laid his arm around me and held my hand, which rested on my chest. The spots where we touched turned warm. The warmth flowed over me, seeping into my skin through my pores and down into the deepest parts of me.

His face snuggled into the back of my neck, and I felt his nose stroke my skin as he took a deep breath. My body was paralyzed. I lay there pretending I was asleep, lying in his arms, absorbing every moment of it. A sense of well-being flooded me, rushing through all my cells, building in the middle of my chest.

There was only one other moment in my life when I could remember feeling this same kind of warmth, this tingling weightlessness in my veins. Seven years ago, it was a feeling unleashed by none other than this same person cuddling behind me. I realized there would probably never be another person who could make me feel this way.

So many people spend their whole lives searching in vain for their other half, the missing half who completes them. But since it was easier to find a shadow on a cloudy day, people settled for what they could get, over time suppressing the idea that something deeper might be out there waiting for them.

I had resisted Elyas. More than resisted, actually. But my resistance never had a chance—I couldn’t steer clear of something I had no power over. It was fate, and sooner or later I would have to bend to it because Elyas was exactly that person for me. I felt a deep-seated, supernatural, almost magical connection to him. Whenever I looked into his face, I knew who I was. And when he looked into my eyes, I turned into the person I always wanted to be.

There was only one thing more depressing than not finding one’s missing half: finding him but fearing you would never have the same meaning for him that he has for you.

At this moment, lying in his arms as our sleeping bags seemingly disappeared and became a bed of silky-soft feathers, I saw how it could be
. . .

This night, this one night, I wanted to feel what I had never felt before. Just for this night, I wanted to make my dream come true and lose myself in the two of us.

I closed my eyelids, feeling the warmth of his body and the rhythm of his breathing. Slowly, as though I were moving in my sleep, I nestled back into him, and his arm held me tighter.

I realized I hadn’t fallen for Elyas. I was irrevocably in love with him.

C
HAPTER
21

A
UF
W
IEDERSEHEN

M
y back was sore, and I stretched. Why didn’t they make tents with spring mattresses? I grumbled over the loudness of the birds singing songs to each other and decided it was much too early to get up. I rolled over, my eyes still closed.

“Mmm,” I said softly. It smelled so good her
e . . .
sweet, tangy, fres
h . . .
kind of like
. . .

I opened my eyes and found myself looking right into the face of a sleeping Elyas. His nose was only a couple of inches from mine. He was lying there so peacefully, so relaxe
d . . .
almost like an angel.

Strange, I thought, that
angel
was the first word I thought of, when all this time I would have sooner compared him with a devil. But right now,
angel
was the right word. His closed eyes and carefree expression gave him the innocence of a little boy.

For the first time in my life, I didn’t feel small in his presence, and for the first time, I felt I could watch him, unhindered. His smooth, incredibly soft skin, his delicate cheekbones, his eyelids, his straight nose, an
d . . .
his lips.
So sensual, such a beautiful color. I could still taste that first kiss.

I stretched out my hand, intent on running my fingers through his cinnamon-colored hair and taking in the contours of his skin. But the instant before I touched his face, I pulled my hand back.

My eyes studied what my hands could not touch. It sounded absurd, but I knew that this was what I wanted to see every morning until the end of my days. I would never tire of watching him.

I memorized every detail of his face, every unevenness of his skin, trying to store it like a mental photograph I could pull up any time I wanted.

I scooted closer to him, captivated by his aura and robbed of any control of my own. I carefully rested my head under his chin and snuggled in, with my hands drawn up to the base of my neck. I felt like I was floating upon the sense of warmth and safety that enveloped me. I closed my eyes and fell asleep for the second time in his arms, a smile on my face.

Loud clattering woke me. This time, I instantly remembered where I was and with whom. I had sensed him even in my sleep. And, for once, my dream was waiting for me in reality. But when I opened my eyes, a gloomy, dull feeling spread outward from my gut.

Elyas was gone.

I was by myself in the tent. All that was left—the only evidence it had really happened—was his scent.

Where had he gone? Had I bugged him by snuggling so close? I shook my head. No, last night he had done the same thing. I couldn’t explain his absence and started to shiver. It felt at least ten degrees colder in the tent without him.

I lost myself in the memories and was trying to regain warmth in my limbs when the zipper on the tent shot down.

“Emely-Bemely,” Alex squeaked, crawling through the opening.

“Lo and behold,” I mumbled. “What did you say again? Something like ‘I’ll be right back’?” I would never let on that, in retrospect, I was grateful she had gone.

She knelt in front of me. “Oh, I know. But Sebastian was so sweet. Sweeter than chocolate! What else could I do?” She rocked back and forth.

So much cheerfulness this early in the morning was too much for me.

It was written across her face how she was dying to report every last detail. I rolled my eyes, ran a hand over my face, and sighed. “All right. Spit it out,” I said.

“Oh, Emely!” she said, holding her hands over her heart. “It was so beautiful! I love him, I love him, I love him, I love him!”

“So things got rolling?”

“Yes! And it was so great. He was so tende
r . . .
His hands, Emely. I’m telling you: his hands!” She melted away. “Sebastian is the embodiment of a sex god! I can hardly walk!”

“Oh God, Alex
. . . ,
” I moaned. “Too much information.” Not only was there too much cheerfulness this early in the morning but also too much sex being had by other people. I pulled myself up, rummaged through my backpack for my toothbrush and toothpaste, and then crawled past Alex out of the tent.

“Don’t you want to hear about it?” she asked, following me out. She stood next to me as I squeezed some toothpaste onto my toothbrush.

“Yes, but not at this hour,” I said, shoving the brush into my mouth.

“It’s two in the afternoon,” she said.

“Oh,” I said. It made sense, though, considering how late I had been up last night.
Last night
, I thought, drifting off again until Alex chimed in.

“Say,” she said, crossing her arms skeptically, “can it be that I saw Elyas coming out of your tent earlier?”

My heart stopped for a second. God, did nothing escape this woman’s notice?

I looked in another direction. “Yeah, and I wonduh who I have to fank for ’at?” I said, my mouth full of toothpaste.

“How is that our fault?”

I spit out my toothpaste. “Take a wild guess. It has something to do with a sex god and no longer being able to walk.”

“Oh, right.” She looked down at the ground but smiled. “Sorry. It wasn’t planne
d . . .
At some point Elyas was just gone.”

“It’s ferfectly underfandable,” I said, brushing some more. She stared at me expectantly. The cells of my brain ran at full power until I finally remembered.
Dammit!
I had completely forgotten to
complain
about Elyas’s visit. I wonder if I could make up for that now, or would it incriminate me more?

“An
d . . .
?” she finally asked.

“And fwat?”

“Well.” She pursed her lips. “I’m just wondering why Elyas had such a goofy smile on his face.”

Maybe he was he just gloating that he had finally finagled me into cuddling with him.

Shit
. I had promised not to assume the worst about him. But easier said than done.

“How fould I know why he wuv fmiling?”

“Emely.” She started tapping her foot. “If something’s going on and you don’t tell me, I’m going to kill you!”

“Oh, nonfenf,” I said. “Nofing’v going on!”

Not yet, at least.

Probably not in the future, either!

“Speaking of murder,” I said after rinsing out my mouth, “you are officially a stupid cow for telling Elyas about Luca.”

She held up the palms of her hands and shook her head. “I didn’t tell him, I swear!”

“Then how does he know about him?”

Alex thought for a moment; then her eyebrows rose. She ran the toe of her shoe over the tips of the grass. “Mayb
e . . .
possibl
y . . .
perhap
s . . .
from Sebastian?” Her voice got high.

“From Sebastian?” I stared at her. “You told Sebastian?”

Had she gone totally nuts on me? She did
not
tell a budding clinical psychologist that I, at the age of twenty-three, had an e-mail boyfriend. He probably had prescriptions in his drawer for serious psychoactive pharmaceuticals already made out in my name.

To top it all off, Sebastian was Elyas’s best friend. Had this woman no sense of propriety?

“Please don’t look at me that way. It’s not what you think,” she said.

“Bu
t . . .
?” I motioned for her to continue.

“A couple of weeks ago, Sebastian asked me if there was a guy in your life, because you’d never mentioned one. He didn’t have any evil intentions; he was just interested.”

I raised an eyebrow.

“I was just honest and told him there wasn’t a guy in your life right now, apart from one you’d been writing e-mails with.” She shrugged.

“Should I start forwarding the e-mails directly to him? Or would he prefer you tell him about them?” I snarled.

“No! I didn’t go into detail at all—seriously! I just painted a rough picture.”

I sighed.

“Are you mad?” she asked cautiously.

“Yes! But that’s never concerned you before.”

“Good, then you can finally tell me what happened with my brother.”

“I did already.
Nothing!
”

“You must have done
something
.”

“We just talked and went to sleep,” I said. “Separately!” I hastened to add.

“You two have been talking an awful lot lately,” she remarked.

“Alex, you’re being ridiculous, trying to interpret something that didn’t happen. You’re not happy unless there’s a scandal going on, right?” I turned and went back inside the tent to change.

She pestered me a while longer but couldn’t manage to squeeze a peep out of me. Once she was sick of trying, she changed topics and volunteered details about how Sebastian had pestered
her
. If I held my hands over my ears, she spoke louder.

Once I was dressed, we joined the others, who were sitting on blankets around the ashes of the campfire, having breakfast.

At the sight of Elyas, I got a strange and hard-to-describe feeling in my stomach that reminded me of the moment you look into the other person’s eyes after having sex for the first time.

My head knew I was being silly, but my gut didn’t understand. “There you guys are,” Sebastian said. “We’ve got beer and Snickers for breakfast. What may I serve you ladies?”

Beer and Snickers? It sounded like Alex had been cooking.

“That’s a tough call,” Alex answered. “I’ll take a kiss!” she said, giggling as she sat on his lap to claim her breakfast. Apparently not everyone experienced that embarrassment thing when they looked into the other’s person’s eyes after having sex the first time.

I put my hands in my back pockets and looked around. The only free spot where the ground wasn’t wet was next to Elyas. Why didn’t that surprise me? I hesitantly walked over to him. He smiled as he noticed me approaching. “Good morning, woman of my dreams.”

“Good morning, pain of my ass,” I said as I grabbed a Snickers and sat near him but with ample distance.

“Did you sleep well?” he asked.

Oh, great. I was in for some serious harassment now. He had noticed me cuddled up to him when he woke up. I averted my gaze and worked on opening my candy bar. “Tent floors are so uncomfortable. How did
you
sleep?” I peered cautiously at him.

“Yea
h . . .
kind of uncomfortable,” he mumbled, looking at his feet. Then we looked into each other’s eyes. “But how could I have slept poorly with you at my side?”

I rolled my eyes.

“Hmm, no good?” he asked.

“Uh-uh,” I said. “Too forced.”

He took a heavy breath in acknowledgment.

“Emely, we were just talking about you,” Andy said.

I looked at him and then around at the group. “About me?”

“After we caught Elyas coming out of your tent, we were concerned for your virginity.” He didn’t even try to deadpan it and just smiled. Great. It was so lovely to find out people had been making fun of me behind my back. I glared at Alex, who had gotten me into this miserable situation, and decided on the only solution I still had available.

“You know
. . . ,
” I began, coyly twirling a strand of my hair around my finger, “at first Elyas made an effor
t . . .
But then,” I continued with a disappointed tone, “he finished the whole thing a littl
e . . .
early
.”

“What?” Elyas said, choking on his candy bar.

“Premature ejaculation isn’t anything to be embarrassed about, sweetie. It can happen to anyone!” I winked at him as everyone laughed.

Andy in particular couldn’t stop. “What’s this we’re hearing about you, Elyas? You’re a quicker draw than McGraw, eh?” He laughed loudly at his own joke and slapped his knee. Elyas rolled his eyes and patiently submitted to the humiliation. Eventually, after everyone had turned to other conversations, he leaned over to me with a suggestive smile.

“Emely,” he whispered. “We can go back into the tent right now so I can convince you of my stamina. And, believe me, sweetie, you’d be surprised.”

Images—so many images! All in my head at once!

I tried to shake them out as my cheeks radiated warmth. My blushing put a smug smirk on Elyas’s face. I definitely preferred the innocent-looking, sleeping Elyas; I got along with him much better, at least.

“Do you have the same images in your head right now that I do?” he whispered. I turned even redder, if that was possible.

“If you’re picturing your neck in a guillotine, then yes!” I said.

He chuckled. “I don’t believe one word you say.”

“You should.”

“And if I don’t? Are you going to glare me to death or something?”

“You haven’t the faintest idea how often I’ve wished I could.”

Still smirking, he took a sip from his water bottle. “Oh, believe me. I do.”

I shoved a piece of Snickers into my mouth and chewed, disgruntled. “You could have spared us all the laughter,” I said. “The next time you come into my tent, make sure no one sees you.”

“The
next
time?” Elyas raised an eyebrow.

“Oh shut up. You know what I meant,” I said.

He just kept grinning. “Anytime, sweetie. I thought spending the night with you was really nice.”

I didn’t answer and took another bite of my candy bar. God, I didn’t even like Snickers.

After “breakfast,” the group dispersed and got busy taking down the tents. Most of us finished quickly, but my best friend and I had the same trouble taking ours down that we’d had putting it up. Alex apparently thought she could talk a tent down. If she kept on blathering this way, it wouldn’t surprise me if the rain fly came down on its own.

Elyas, Sebastian, Andy, and Sophie stood near us, talking about the best route to take home. I overhead Elyas saying he’d rather take a different route, but the others weren’t into his suggestion.

What were they all standing around talking for, anyway? They could have come over here and helped us with our tent.

“Some boyfriend you got there,” I told Alex, pulling one of the tent stakes out of the ground. She was still fiddling with the two poles she hadn’t been able to get apart for five minutes.