Dying Dreams (Book 1 of Dying Dreams Trilogy) (24 page)

He scowled. “There’s no such thing as a nice elf.”

She was too tired to argue. She was too tired to stand, and she swayed a bit on her feet. Sloane was there instantly, his hands hot on her shoulders, steadying her. “Let me go,” she forced herself to say, though it was getting harder to remember why she didn’t want him to touch her.

He didn’t let go. “Look, Liza, I’m sorry. You’ll never know how sorry I am. I’m not even sure of everything I should be sorry for, but it doesn’t matter. I will do everything I can to make it up to you and make things right between us.”

“I kissed someone, too.”

He let go of her and she almost fell over. She used the forward momentum to move to Marcy’s door and let herself in. She slammed the door in his face and felt a little bit better.

She dropped her bag on the couch and headed to the bathroom. She was vaguely surprised he wasn’t pounding on the door, but she didn’t have the energy to think about it. She brushed her teeth, stripped out of her clothes, and pulled on the ratty t-shirt she wore to bed every night. She let herself out of the bathroom and moved, in the dark, to the couch. She could have lit candles, but she knew her way around the place even without light and she dropped onto the couch and prepared to snuggle down.

Except the couch was extra lumpy, and it moaned and moved. “God, you smell good,” Sloane breathed in her ear.

She melted against him for just a moment, before she reclaimed her senses and shot off the couch. “What the hell are you doing in here?”

He lit the candle on the coffee table and smiled. “You didn’t lock the door.”

She sank back down on the couch next to him and dropped her head in her hands. She could have sat in the chair or the love seat, but she wanted to be near him, even as pissed as she was. She was too tired to fight it any more. “So you just walked in and took up residence on the couch?”

“I talked to Reynolds and she told me you’d touched a body for her yesterday. I figured you might not have dreamed, yet, and I wanted to be here when you did.”

“How do you know I didn’t dream, yet?”

“Because when I saw you this morning you looked like you hadn’t slept.”

She groaned. “I’m too tired for this. I really want to scream at you or maybe beat you up, but I don’t have the energy. Please, just get off my couch and let me sleep.”

“Don’t you sleep in the bed?”

“It’s Marcy’s bed.”

“But she’s not here, is she?” He looked around like she might pop out of the darkness.

Liza sighed. “It’s complicated. If I start sleeping in the bed, it’s like she’s already moved in with Ellison and she’s not ready for that, even though she’s over there every night. She just wants to know she has a bed to come home to.”

He shook his head. “Women.”

“Really? Is that the tone you want to take with me right now?” She glared at him and he held his hands up and shook his head. “Good answer. Now get off my couch. I want you out of the apartment and I’m going to be even angrier if you stay, but I’m too tired to stay awake to see which door you pick.” She dropped down onto the couch, pulled the blanket around her and lay there wide awake, staring at the ceiling. She was so tired and all she wanted to do was sleep, but her body was wired and overtired and she couldn’t settle.

*SLOANE*

Sloane watched her from the chair next to the couch and wondered how he’d screwed up so badly. He was usually great with women, charming and understanding when he made the effort, which wasn’t often. Still, he was making the effort with Liza, or he wanted to, but his mind and his body kept betraying him. He wanted his hands and his mouth on her, to know that she was his, and then he’d feel better. He heard her sigh in the darkness and he knew she was still awake.

“
She
kissed
me
,” he said, and when Liza didn’t tell him to shut up, he went on. “She kissed me, and I missed you so much I couldn’t see straight. I only kissed her back to see if I could get you out of my system, but it didn’t work. It only made me miss you more, and then you were there, and you were so mad. I swear I didn’t sleep with her. I’d never even seen her before she attacked me in the kitchen.”

She shifted on the couch, but didn’t speak.

“I swear to you I will never kiss anyone other than you as long as we’re together.”

“We’re not together.”

“Then why do you care who I kiss?” he asked, tired of werewolf games and Liza’s denials and just physically exhausted. “I can’t stop thinking about you, or wanting you, every moment of every day. I want to be with you.”

“It’s not real. It’s just some stupid magical bond.”

“It is real. I liked you the first time I saw you.” He stopped. He didn’t want to lie to her, not now. “That’s not true. I was a little distracted the first time I saw you and I was still with Frankie. But every time after that, I’ve liked you more and more. You’re smart, and the bravest person I’ve ever met, and you throw yourself into everything you do with passion and determination. I want to be around you all the time. Bond or no bond, I’d feel the same.”

“You don’t know that. You don’t even know me.”

“I want to get to know you. Look, this bond isn’t going away, but my grandmother said if we fight it, it will only get worse. I already can’t work. I can’t go on like this. I’m just asking for you to give me a chance, to spend some time with me to see if maybe you want to be with me. This bond is going to drive me crazy, otherwise.”

“You’re a cheater.”

“I told you I didn’t sleep with Hetty.”

“It doesn’t matter. You said ‘love the one you’re with.’ That was my father’s philosophy word for word. Whether he just happened to be with his secretary at the office or some waitress he picked up after a business lunch, if my mother wasn’t by his side it was okay for him to cheat on her, because he couldn’t help but love the one he was with. He cheated on my mother over and over again, and she was so blind with love for him, that she let him. I never even saw her get angry.”

“I’m not your father. I’ve never cheated on any woman before. Not once.”

She kept talking like she hadn’t heard him. “I caught him once. I came home from school early, because I had a fever. My mother was out grocery shopping, and I found my father with his face in the lap of our next door neighbor, who was also married. They were so involved in what they were doing, they didn’t even see me walk in. He never knew what I’d seen and my mother never knew what he’d done, but I knew and I never forgave him. I promised myself I would never love a man the way my mother did. I would never be so consumed with love that I let him treat me like dirt.”

“Did he treat her like dirt?”

“What?” Her voice was laced with anger, but Sloane couldn’t let that stop him. If he backed down now, he’d lose her, and he was sick with fear that it was already too late. Of all of the stupid things for him to have said to her… He either had the worst luck, or he was doomed to failure in the relationship.

“Other than cheating on her, did he treat her like dirt?”

“It doesn’t matter how he acted the rest of the time. He cheated on her, he disrespected her, end of story.”

Sloane knew he should back away. He knew he was on shaky ground, but he couldn’t stop. “Since you won’t answer the question, I’m guessing he was pretty good to her, when he wasn’t cheating.” He saw her mouth drop open and he held up a hand. “I’m not saying it’s okay that he cheated. I’m just saying maybe she had an agreement with him, and she was okay with it. Some people have open relationships.”

“Is that what you’d like?”

“What?” Maybe he was too tired for this conversation, too. “God, no. If another man touches you, I’ll rip his hands off. It’s driving me crazy wondering who you kissed–”

“Arty.”

“Who? The old guy from the restaurant?”

“He’s not that old. For a faun. I went to talk to him about the bond, to see if it could be broken. It turns out the old guy image is his glamour to hide the fact that he still looks like he’s in his thirties.”

“Or the young guy image is the glamour. And he was so hot, you just had to kiss him?”

“No. I kissed him to see if I felt anything for him. To see if I could stop thinking about you.”

“And did you?”

“No. It only made me wish he was you. This fucking bond is making me crazy.”

“I thought you didn’t feel it.”

“I don’t.”

Sloane’s blood was already boiling, imagining her sucking face with a young Arty, but if there was one thing he hated it was being lied to. “You do. You’ve felt it all along and you let me think you didn’t. You let me think I was alone in this. You’re breaking my balls over kissing some wolf and you’ve been lying to me this whole time.”

“I’m sorry. I just couldn’t… I needed time…”

But Sloane was already up. He headed for the open door he could make out in the dim light and slammed it behind him. He couldn’t believe he’d been planning to grovel, to beg her to understand, when she’d lied to him. She knew what she was doing to him and she’d done it anyway. He paced the floor in Marcy’s bedroom and ignored the knock and Liza’s voice. It hurt him to ignore her, but he knew if he tried to talk to her he’d say something he regretted. Again.

Of all the dumb luck, to use the same line her cheating father had given her mother. He’d just been feeling guilty and angry, and that stupid song they played at the gym over and over popped into his head. He growled and paced until he calmed down enough to feel sleepy, then he stripped and threw himself into Marcy’s bed. If Liza wanted to help her friend lie to herself by sleeping on the couch, that was her choice, but he was going to take full advantage of the pillow top mattress and warm duvet.

He was just drifting off, when he heard a soft mew and felt a weight land on the bed. Great. He’d locked himself in the room with the damn cat. The cat curled up next to his feet, a warm, vibrating heat and he drifted off to sleep to the sound of purring.

He woke to Liza’s screams, and whatever anger he’d felt when he’d laid down to sleep vanished. He vaulted out of the bed and ran to the living room, slamming face first into the door and tripping over a chair before he made it to her side. Somehow, the noise didn’t wake her. She’d stopped screaming and was whimpering in her sleep. He could see tears streaming down her face in the dim light of early morning. His whole body trembled with the need to reach out to her, to touch her and make her pain stop, but he knew if he did, the pain would be wasted. She had to finish the dream and get every clue she could.

Her eyes popped open, wild and panicked. She looked around, but it took her a moment to focus and see him. “It’s okay. I’m here,” he said. He saw the relief on her face when she recognized him, and he wondered that he could have ever been angry at her. He knew before she did that she was going to throw up, and he scooped her up in his arms and rushed her to the bathroom. He held her hair while she sobbed and puked into the toilet.

If he knew of someplace to take her where Reynolds could never find her or ask her to touch another body, he’d do it in a heartbeat, but he knew that place didn’t exist and, even if it did, Liza wouldn’t go as long as she thought she could get vengeance for the women who’d been killed. When Liza had emptied her stomach, and flushed it away, she turned and wrapped herself around him. He held her as she cried, and when she started laying kisses along his neck and collarbone, he remembered that he was naked and that he wanted her. He scooped her up again and carried her to Marcy’s room. She just kept kissing him, like it was the only thing keeping her alive, reminding her that she hadn’t died last night.

He let her go and she made a sound of displeasure, until he slid the t-shirt over her head, exposing her round, full breasts and her creamy skin. He wanted her so badly his whole body rang with need, but he forced himself to hold back and touched her and kissed her so that she felt every moment. She growled and grabbed his shoulders. “I need you inside me now.”

He wasn’t going to argue with the pain and the need in her eyes. He left her long enough to get a condom from his jeans pocket on the floor, and he didn’t waste any time putting it on or sliding himself in her. “Oh, god, you feel so good,” he said. She moaned and slid a hand between them, touching herself. He didn’t think it was possible for him to be any more turned on than he already was, but seeing her fingers on herself almost made him lose it right there. He stayed perfectly still and tried to think of something unsexy, like… like… shit, he couldn’t think at all with the show she was giving him.

“Please, Sloane. Please,” she said, and he couldn’t hold back any longer. He pressed himself against her and looked into her eyes, driving into her with all the desire and longing he’d been trying to suppress. She met his eyes and asked for more. Begged him to go harder and faster, until he lost his mind. He was over the edge before he realized what was happening, and he looked down and saw that she was right there with him. They came together and he dropped against her, careful not to put his full weight on her.

“I’m sorry,” she said. “I shouldn’t have lied. I was scared. But I shouldn’t have lied. I’m sorry.”

“You don’t ever have to apologize to me,” he said, and he realized he meant it. He couldn’t imagine her ever doing anything he couldn’t forgive. “I’m sorry about kissing Hetty. I’ll never cheat on you. I’ll never do anything to hurt you. At least I’ll try never to do anything to hurt you.”

“I’m sorry I kissed Arty. I won’t ever cheat on you, either. I’m sorry I pushed you away, I’ll try not to do it again.”

Her words brought him a happiness and peace like nothing he’d ever experienced before. He kissed her to thank her and found himself wanting her again. She was right there with him, just as ready as he was, and he let himself get lost in her, until she was all he saw and heard and felt.

*LIZA*

Liza lay in bed next to Sloane, feeling more satisfied and happier than she’d ever felt before, when reality started to creep back in. “I’m still mad at you.”