Darksoul (29 page)

He turned to get the black instrument case. Was it me, or were the tips of his ears red? “It’s a viola.”

Even better. “Play for me.” I slapped my hands together as if in prayer. “Please.”

He spared me a
sidelong glance.

“Pretty please?” I said, jutting out my lower
lip. “Pretty please with a blowjob on top?”

H
e played for me.

We laid out blankets and pillows in front of the
living room’s sweeping windows. I curled up in the comforter and tried to get him to come closer, but he wanted to play as far away from me as possible. Sure. Whatever floated his boat. He’d turned off the lights and the room was dark. So dark that I couldn’t see him. The only source of illumination was the faint moonlight slanting in through the glass. Outside, snow began to fall.

My eyes
were drifting shut when he started to play. It was a soft, low sound, confident and soothing. From just a couple of notes I could tell that Ash knew what he was doing. I wanted to open my eyes; I wanted to sit up and turn to him and I wanted to tell him how good he was. But my lips parted with a yawn and I felt myself being dragged under.

Ash was good. No. He was fantastic. An even better viola player than a drummer. I’d tell him tomorrow. I’d tell him how much I liked it, how lucky his future girlfriend would be, how badly I wanted to be that girl…
Wait. No. I couldn’t tell him that. So I’d tell him how much I liked it, how lucky his future girlfriend would be…if he got a girlfriend, that is…damn it, fix your commitment issues, you asshole, and break my other lung already…

The notes continued to rise and fall. Lulling.
Hushed. But too soon, the song was over, and the gentle sound faded away until it was nothing more than a whisper. I heard Ash moving. Packing up his instrument. Moments later, when I tried to open my eyes, I saw a dark silhouette lying on its side next to me. A midnight snake slithered across its torso and settled around its neck.

Another yawn
. “If you think I’m going to give you a blowjob,” I said sleepily, “you’re sadly mistaken.”

I fell asleep with his
quiet laughter in my ears.

I woke in
his bed. Alone.

Blinding sunlight streamed through
the curtains, washing across the white comforter. The clock on the bedside table read 10:08 AM. Beside it sat a half-finished box of cigarettes, along with a lighter, two crinkled Milky Way wrappers, and his drumsticks. For a second, I lay there, heart pounding. I’d stayed over. At Ash’s upscale apartment. Slept in his shirt. In his bed. With the blankets he always used.

Was it
bad that I wanted to curl up a little longer and hug his damn pillow to me?

No.
Terrible idea. He’d probably walk in on me. Right. And then I’d look like a lovesick freak.

Yawning, I got out of bed and
groggily made my way to the restroom. He’d left a new toothbrush and a towel for me, and I made good use of them. No shower. Just a quick splash of water on my face, and I was done.

Minty-fresh and ready to face him,
I walked down the hallway and stopped when I heard his voice. I carefully inched closer to the corner. Peeked around it. He was in the kitchen, barefoot, hair tucked under a backwards baseball cap and sweats hanging too low on his hips.

“—didn’t even buy her flowers,” he
said, and after a moment I realized he was talking to his phone, which lay face-up on the counter. He flipped the omelet he was making and pressed it down. To my surprise, it didn’t smell bad. What the hell was I saying? It smelled like heaven. “What the actual fuck, Nikolai, do I have to teach you how to be a gentleman?”

“I didn’t see the need,” came the calm response.

When Ash turned to get something from the cabinet, I scrambled back. Plates clinked. “It would’ve been just a trip to the store.”

“You mean the trip you’d already made?”

Ash remained silent.

“I rest my case,” said Hunter.

Click
.

I
waited for Ash to continue, but there was nothing. No movement. No sound. Cringing, I edged up to the corner and blinked when I saw that no one stood at the stove anymore.

Behind me.
“So is eavesdropping something you do often, or…?”

Startled, I swiveled around—and bumped straight into Ash’s bare chest.
I flinched. Fuck.

“
You’re quite lousy at it, so I’m assuming you’re a novice.” Looking amused, he nodded at the kitchen. “Breakfast is ready. Go ahead. I’ll join you in a moment.”

“Uh—”
I took a step away from him and scratched the back of my head. “Yeah. That was so not the proper way to say good morning. So—g-good morning.”

His eyes softened with laughter. “Good morning.”

By the time I made it to the kitchen island, he’d gone to his room and closed the door behind him. I heard the quiet click and wondered what he wanted to do in there. But my curiosity didn’t last long. I was too busy being awed at what was laid in front of me. Two plates stacked with golden pancakes. Omelets. Bowls of fruit. Orange juice. Even coffee. The whole deal. It looked like something out of a magazine. Like something that couldn’t be real.

“I can’t believe you can
actually
cook,” was the first thing I said when he came back. I’d already wolfed down the omelet and was shoving half a pancake into my mouth.

He took the stool across from me, the side of his
lips tilting up. “Well, I’ve had lots of practice. Breakfast in the morning after sex never cooks itself.”

I c
oughed. “What?”

He picked up his knife and fork and
started to work on the omelet. There was something sophisticated about the way he did it, as if he were sitting at a royal table in England rather than a random kitchen. “You can’t think I make girls cook for me after a wild five-hour sex marathon and two hours of sleep. They’re exhausted.” His eyes flicked up and met mine, glittering a roguish hazel. “If you know what I mean.”

I opened my mouth, and then closed it again. “You know what,” I
said. “I like that. Yeah. Cook for them, you ass. Be nice to them.”

“Of course I’m nice.” He cocked his head to
the side. “Well, a little. No one likes an actual jerk.”

“I think
the word ‘jerk’ perfectly describes you. You literally screw the poor girls and leave them with broken hearts.”

“Clearly you’ve misunderstood how I work.
I don’t fuck with girls who form useless attachments. More specifically, I don’t fuck with virginal prudes. They always expect more than I’m willing to give, and then end up destroyed when I don’t deliver.”

“
Huh.”

He regarded me through hooded eyes. “I like them experienced. Other girls might ca
ll them sluts, skanks, whores—”

Ew
. “I wouldn’t. First, those words are ugly as fuck. Well, not uglier than the word ‘obstreperous.’ Or ‘rumbustious.’ Or anything with an ‘us’ at the end. Circus. Pus. Abacus. Disgusting. Should I shut up now?”

“No, please.” Was he trying not to smile? “Continue.”

“Yeah, well. Terrible words. So what if a chick has sex?” Stabbing my pancake, I grumbled, “People make such a big deal out of nothing. A girl likes to have fun and she’s the scum of the earth. But if a dude screws a hundred women, he’s crowned the king of North America. Let me do the same thing. Hate Incorporated and three church pastors will show up at my door.”

The pierced corner of his mouth twitched. “Well, contrary to what everyone might think, girls who like casual sex are wonderful.”

“Thank God you didn’t say they’re easy. I would’ve punched you in the throat.”

“No,” he said. “
They’re amazing. They know what I want, and I know what they want. I make breakfast for them in the morning. They don’t think it means I want to cook for them for the rest of my life. And then we’ll forget about each other a week later, blissfully continuing with our lives as if nothing had happened.” He lifted his cup of coffee at me. “It’s fantastic. You should try it.”

I
sipped my orange juice, bringing one knee to my chest. “Maybe you should consider getting an actual girlfriend.” It’d make my life a thousand times easier.

“Waste of my time.”

“You can’t be serious.”

“It’d
require caring. Calling, talking, pretending I want to take the girl on a date…what a pain.” That last part was said in a mutter. Suddenly, he whistled and called, “Thera.”

I jumped when she slithered past me,
so fast that she was only an indiscernible blur of midnight and silver against the wood floor. She wound her way up his body, curling herself across his shoulders. He sliced off a piece of sausage and fed it to her on his fork.

“It’s not a pain,” I said. “You just have serious commitment issues. Like, it’s almost comical. I’m talking bad-romantic-comedy comical. ”

“Hmm,” he murmured. “I’m afraid that’s not it.”

“Oh?”

“Commitment isn’t an issue for me.”

I arched an eyebrow.
“Really.”

“Especially since I’m already committed to someone.”

“Uh-huh.”

“The skeptical look on your face is hilarious.”

“I don’t see you laughing.”

“That’s because I’m crying inside.” He rose and nodded his head at my empty plates. “Done?”

I forced him to let me wash
the dishes. He put up a fight but eventually stepped aside, leaning against the kitchen island as I took his place at the sink. For a couple of minutes, there was silence.

Then:
“I don’t get it.”

“Don’t get what?”
I asked, focusing on lathering the plates right. Last thing I wanted was for him to have to do it again.

“I’ve been studying you for months. Seeing how you
act around him. And I just don’t…”

I glared at him over my shoulder
. “Why the hell are we back to this?”

Ash
thoughtfully ran his thumb across his bottom lip. “I spoke inside your head. Tried to give you hints. Nothing. Sent you on a date. Nothing. I got you to kiss him, for crying out loud—imagine my disappointment when the next minute the two of you are acting as if nothing happened.” Looking down, he muttered, “What a fucking conundrum.”

“Listen, Ash—”

And then something about what he’d said struck me. I scrunched up my eyebrows. Speaking inside my head? No. Hunter had done that. Unless—
Startled at the impossible realization, I swung around.

The sodden plate slipped from my hands and shattered on the floor.

Hunter stood where Ash had been standing a moment before. Wearing Ash’s gray sweats. With Panther coiled around his neck. The world felt as if it’d tipped on its side. As if everything had been twisted upside down.

“Hmm,” he murmured, pushing off the kitchen island. I stayed frozen still. He reached out as if to brush the back of his forefinger against my cheek, and I instinctively recoiled. “See?” he said, looking exasperated. “Why do you pull back? What in hell do you think Hunter’s going to do to you?”

This wasn’t happening. “I don’t—”
Heaving, I reached back to grip the counter for support. “What is—”

“This might be more familiar if I had my wings. Here.” Be
hind him, the edges of his bladed feathers curled out of his back, slowly, gracefully, and then they unfurled to their full, deadly width. Sunlight streamed in from the floor-to-ceiling windows and outlined their sharp tips in molten gold. “Better?”

“Where is—” My throat closed off. What the fuck was going
on here?

“Stay with me for a minute. Okay?” He pace
d. The tips of his wings trailed across the ground. “After months of interacting with you as if I were Hunter, I still don’t understand why you think there’s no attraction there. It’s clear, at least to me, that you like something about him.” He stopped, his lashes falling. “And about this whole mess—I’m sorry. When you confused him for me, I had to take it as my chance. Hunter is…what should I call him? He’s a fucking emotional turtle. If I tried to ask him about you, he’d clam up. So I had to see for myself, had to read you from another point of view than mine. I had to see it from his.”

I slid out of my spot and,
barely breathing, backed away from him.

When he saw that, he said, “Oh
, come on, Zel. Don’t freak out—”

I turned to run the hell out of here—and
whammed straight into a black-clad chest. Fuck. No. Please. I squeezed my eyes shut, and then, cringing, looked up. Tousled white-blonde hair. Unreadable gray gaze. Lips: straight and rosy. Facial expression: cool.

“This is a fun game,” Hunter said. “Here. Let me try.”

His hair rippled and the strands turned black. Dark lashes canopied distinctly hazel orbs. Gauges on his earlobes. Lip ring hugging the corner of his mouth. Eyebrow piercing in place. Even the tattoo on his neck—all of it was there. A frighteningly accurate imitation of the real thing. He reached up and circled an arm around me and brought me into his chest. My breath hitched as he leaned down.

“Pretend,” he said
quietly against my hair, “that I’m the real Asher. Just for a second.”

“Hunter,” I heard Hunter’s voice say. I wanted to curl into myself and die.

“Do you want to know what I write in that little notebook of mine?” said Hunter-turned-Ash. Suddenly, ice rippled down his other arm and Syivhail’s jagged tip pointed at something behind me. “Take a step closer, Asher, and I’ll rip your heart out.”

Ash-turned-Hunter. That’s who that was. Ash wearing Hunter’s skin. “Don’t tell her.”

“Well, well. Not so fun now, your little game.” Hunter backed us away. I stayed frozen inside his tan, Ash-y arms. “It’s about time I repaid the favor. Don’t you agree, Zel?”

“Stop,” I whispered.

“Not until you hear this. A poem I wrote in my book. It’s about you.” Hunter’s lips came dangerously close to my ear. “They’re all about you, love.”

“Don’t you dare,” said Ash.

“It’s in another language,” said Hunter, his voice smooth and British. “I could translate it for you, if you’d like.”

Ash-turned-Hunter: “Shut up.”

Hunter recited something in soft French, and I thought I felt him smile against the crown of my head.

“Well, in the spirit of pretend
ing to be each other,” said Ash, “I might as well give it a go again. Let’s play a guessing game, Hazel. If you can tell me how many drawings of you I have in my sketchbook, I’ll tell you how many times I’ve thought about you in the last—”

Hunter had already let go of me.

Wide-eyed, I turned—just in time to see a black-haired Hunter pin a blonde Ash to the floor, keeping him down by the throat. Their appearances rippled, blonde tufts turning black, black strands rippling into brilliant white-gold; deadly silver wings were pinned under Ash, making a soft metal-against-metal sound as they flicked up and stirred, and ice shards made up Hunter’s left arm. I closed my eyes and blinked and wished it would be gone. That they would both be gone.