Dark Secrets (72 page)

I sat down and the
door closed behind me, giving my head support as I drifted away,
feeling my seatbelt clip around me a second later, followed by a
cool kiss on my hand, then nothing more until the quiet thud of
door woke my mind a little.

“
Shh,” David
whispered into my brow, lifting me from the car.

Quietly conscious of
his embrace, I rolled my head into the hollow of his shoulder and
fixated on the gentle, soapy smell of his shirt, seeping into my
nose with each restful breath.

“
Oh, she’s
exhausted,” Dad’s voice hummed as a pale ring of light broke the
darkness under my eyelids.

“
Shall I carry her
upstairs?” David asked, holding me a little closer.

“
Uh, yeah, sure. No
need to disturb her further.”

The front door closed
behind us. I stayed in the blissful elation of dream world, in
David’s arms, until the cold touch of my pillow fell along my cheek
and I sunk into the softness of my mattress. My shoes came off and
a still silence filled the room; it sounded like no one was there,
but I could feel David’s presence. “Goodnight, my love.” He pressed
a cold kiss to my brow.

I lifted my mind out
of sleep just long enough to whisper, “David?”

“
Yes,
sweetheart.”

“
Stay with me
tonight?”

“
I planned to,” he
whispered, and the bedroom door closed, leaving me in
darkness.

Outside, the sound of
Dad’s voice farewelled David as his car pulled away from our house.
And the only other sound, after Dad’s footsteps trailed away behind
his bedroom door, was the quiet, rhythmic tick of the clock on the
wall by the front door, timing my dreams while I slipped
away.

Just before the grasp
of sleep possessed me, two cool, strong arms fell around my
shoulders, and I let myself wander into the peaceful harmony of the
night, against David’s chest.

Chapter
Twenty-Five

The sweet,
chocolaty smell of David stirred my senses through the night,
waking me with surprise when I looked up and saw the golden morning
sun on his cheek. “You stayed!”

“
Of course.”
He stretched his arms out above us. “You asked me to.”

“
Hasn’t
mattered in the past.”

“
Yes, well,”
he said, his arm landing back down around my shoulders. “In the
past, I didn’t only have two days left with you.”

That put a dampener on
the day.

“
Sorry.”

“
It’s
okay.”

“
No, it’s not.” He
rolled me onto my back, his long body against the length of mine.
“Just don’t think about it. In fact—” He couldn’t help but smile,
his eyes drifting to a thought. “Why not go back to thinking about
that dream you were just having?”

My mouth popped open.
“You saw that?”

“
My love—” He kissed
my nose, “I saw everything.”

“
God damn mind
readers!” With a feisty huff, I threw the covers back and headed
for the shower—and maybe a few minutes of unheard
thoughts.

“
Your thought
patterns are not mollified by short distances, Ara. I can still
hear you,” he called out as I shut the bathroom door.

“
Argh! Stop it.” I
covered my ears, as if that would help, but I couldn’t stop seeing
those images; David and I—naked, tucked in a loving embrace. And
the worst part was, all of it was my own imagination forming dreams
out of desires. It was like writing a porn entry in a diary and
having someone read it out loud. It was just too personal to
share.

I took off the jeans
and green sweater I slept in last night and stuffed them in the
laundry basket, burying my undies and bra in case David needed to
use the bathroom.

“
I’ve already seen
your underwear, my darling girl,” he called out. “You don’t have to
hide them now.”

My shoulders dropped
with a vocalised breath. At least there was one good thing about
having a mind-reading vampire boyfriend—I’d had plenty of practice
at emptying my thoughts and focusing on nothing. I was sure, in
some odd way, that could be a good skill to have.

“
Speaking of skills,”
David said from just outside the bathroom door, “we need to
rehearse for the benefit concert. I’m not even sure which song
we’re supposed to be playing now.”

I reached into the
shower and twisted the faucet on, then stood back and waited for
the water to get hot. “Um, we’re doing that one from that movie—the
one Nathan liked.”

David chuckled softly.
“He liked a lot of movies, Ara.”

“
Well, you know which
one I mean,” I said, getting frustrated. “I can never remember the
title.”

“
Are you still doing
a solo performance?” His voice echoed slightly too loud through the
door, making me cringe a little in case Dad should hear.

“
Yeah, and we’re also doing
Somewhere
Over the Rainbow
.”

David didn’t respond.
I waited, looking over my thin body in the reflection of the shower
glass for a second, but when the silence lasted, I stepped into the
welcoming steam whorls and ran my hands over the water falling
through my hair. The running water and locked doors offered me a
kind of privacy I wasn’t used to anymore—one where I could imagine
my thoughts were unheard...just like my shower singing.

“
Ara!” I jumped out
of my skin at the sudden thud on the door. “Save some water for
future generations, please.”

Geeze
. “Yes, Dad—just rinsing my
hair.”

“
It doesn’t take your
mother that long.”

By
mother
, he meant Vicki.
“She has short hair, Dad.”

He groaned
aloud.

“
Hmph. You’d do a lot
more than just groan if you knew I had my boyfriend in my room
right now,” I said under my breath. Thing was, Dad would freak if
there was a boy in my room, but I bet he’d take it really well if I
told him David was a vampire. I think he’d see it as a rare
opportunity to hear tales of History firsthand.

I sighed heavily,
feeling the full weight of everything I learned about David and his
history yesterday. I pictured him there still, by the grave, but
when he folded over and buried his face in his hands to hide his
tears, it was
my
name carved in stone behind him. And one day, that scary
thought would be a reality.

Slowly, my hand rose
up through the swirling steam cloud and rested against the foggy
glass. Droplets of water melted around the base of my palm, and as
I exhaled a breath of sorrow, the delicate touch of David’s long
fingers appeared on the other side of the cold barrier. “Don’t cry,
Ara,” he said in a deep, soothing whisper. “Please,
please
just don’t
cry.”

“
How can I not cry?”
We rested our heads against the glass. “I don't want you to hurt
that way, David.”

“
I know.” He shut his
eyes tight.

I could feel a kind of
magic between us that I was sure I’d never find anywhere else in
the world; it was like, even though our flesh wasn’t touching, I
could feel him against me—feel him from somewhere deep within. And
when he wasn't around, I felt a kind of emptiness that seemed
unnatural. “I don’t know if I’m strong enough to miss you for the
rest of my life,” I whispered, watching the hot, steamy water run
wasted down the drain below my feet.

“
Then don’t.” He
exhaled, and as quickly as he’d appeared, he was gone again,
leaving my hand against the glass, alone.

The phone rang while I
struggled, in the privacy of my wardrobe, trying to pull my light
blue cotton dress over my head; it rolled up, catching on my
not-quite-dry skin, and stuck halfway down my waist. I tugged
harder, a rise of frustration nearly turning to tears. I didn’t
want to miss that call if it was Mike ringing before he got on the
plane. What if it crashed and I never got to hear his voice again?
What if it—

“
Hello.” David’s
melodious voice filled the room.

I froze,
listening.

“
Yes, she’s getting
dressed.”

Oh, God, don’t tell
him that! He’ll freak out, thinking you’re watching me, or
something
. I pulled my dress down and
tripped all over myself to get out of the wardrobe. “I’m here.
Gimme the phone.”

David grinned, holding
his index finger up. “No, no, nothing like that.”

“
David,” I huffed
impatiently, offering a flat palm.

“
Yes. It’s all she’s
talked about for the last couple of weeks,” he said, then
laughed.

“
Okay, okay. That’s
enough.” I snatched the phone from him and, assuming I knew who he
was talking to, said, “Hi, Mike.”

“
Hey, baby girl.
How’s things?”

“
Great. You at the
airport?”

“
Yeah, just thought
I’d make sure you hadn’t forgotten me.”

“
Yeah right. It’s all
I’ve talked about, isn’t it?” I poked my tongue out at
David.

Mike laughed. “Well,
I’ve been looking forward to it, too. And I expect the biggest hug
you’ve got tucked into those skinny little arms tomorrow,
Ara.”

“
Oh, trust me, I’ve
been practicing my squeezing,” I said.

“
With David?” he
teased.

“
Uh-huh, but
you
get a different kind of squeezing.”

“
Oh, fine then, I
know where I stand.” I could hear the amusement behind his feigned
insult.

“
Still in exactly the
same place as always,” I added.

“
Okay, well, have fun
today, and…I’ll see ya tomorrow.”

“
Yep, bye.” I had to
dig my heels into the carpet to stop from bouncing around like a
little girl. And as the phone disconnected, severing the lines of
communication to my best friend, an empty feeling swallowed my soul
for a second until I looked at David. But he looked
troubled—leaning back in my chair, drumming his fingers on the
desk, his thoughts a million miles away. “David?”

He looked up at
me—snapping out of his stare.

“
What is it?” I
asked.

“
You’re right.” A
very cheeky grin lit his eyes. “He did not approve of my being here
while you were getting dressed.”

“
So?”

“
So, he’s overprotective. I know the sort, Ara, he
will
ask questions about
me.”

“
Can you read his
thoughts over the phone?” I said as I walked over and leaned my
butt on the desk.

David shook his head.
“No. I can only read certain electrical wavelengths—which don’t
communicate over the phone. But I’ve been around humans and been
subject to their thought-patterns long enough to make conclusions
from very little detail.”

“
Like one of those
cool detectives on those crime shows?”

David laughed, resting
his chin on his hand. “Yeah, something like that.”

“
And you think you’ve
summed Mike up, huh?”

He scratched the
corner of his brow, taking a deep breath. “All I know is it’s a
good thing I won’t be here during the day. I can’t be around you if
he is.”

“
Why?”

“
I might be tempted
to kill him,” he muttered with a certain amount of animosity; my
mouth fell open a little. “He thinks he has some claim to
you.”

“
Really?” My cheek
tightened on one side with a half-smile. “You know, you’re cute
when you’re jealous.”

“
Ara, be serious.”
David leaned forward, elbows over his knees, looking at the floor
between his feet. “I don’t know, maybe I should leave now. It’s
just too risky. If he gets wind there’s a guy in your room every
night, you know what he’ll do.”

“
Look.” I sat on the
desk, letting my bare feet dangle. “You might think he’s got some
weird Spidey sense that can track the scent of another male like a
mother to cigarettes on her son’s breath, but I’m not sure I really
care if he finds out I have a guy in my room at night—not right now
I don’t.”

He looked up at me.
“Ara, if he finds me in your room and we’re forced to meet in
person, it will only be a matter of time before he starts asking
all the wrong questions.”

“
And I’ll give all
the wrong answers. I won’t tell him the truth about what you
are.”

“
It’s not the
questions he asks you that I worry about—it’s the ones he asks
himself.”

“
Well, will it be
that bad if he figures out what you are?”

“
You mean aside from
the fact that he’d steal you away from me, take you across the
country, lock you in a closet, then fly back here and start a
pitchfork rally against me?”

I laughed, rubbing my
hand over my neck where droplets of cold water dripped down from my
hair. “You know, the chances are he’ll figure something’s not
right, anyway. I mean, especially when I refuse to laze around and
watch movies with him at night.”