Find Me If You Dare (Dreamcatcher Book 2) (32 page)

he cabin was crowded with only one bedroom—a room that Ivan won in a game of Rock, Paper, Scissors with Vinny. So, Kayla and I opted to sleep outside, and Nolan agreed to take first watch. We set up a “perimeter,” marking with twigs where Kayla would throw up the walls of the warding spell to keep out the Nightmares. The air was a bit humid, though the temperature had to be in the mid-sixties, but we decided to build a fire anyway, for light and in case the air cooled. After I piled the wood, she used her magic to ignite it. Flames roared to life.

“You’re getting stronger,” I said. Even after a long day like today, she didn’t appear weak at all.

She sat beside me and touched the back of my arm. “Yeah, well, I ought to be. God knows I’ve been practicing my butt off.”

I tried to chuckle, but my mind was elsewhere. What would happen if we didn’t stop Richard? Would I lose everything—lose Kayla? She was the only good thing to come out of my two hundred years as a Protector. For over a century, I’d regretted accepting the offer and turning down the chance to die peacefully and go to Heaven. If I hadn’t been so afraid to leave my family, I wouldn’t be involved in this war and stopping some messed up version of the Apocalypse. I wouldn’t have lost so many loved ones or been so lonely for so long.

But I also wouldn’t have met Kayla.

I closed my eyes, shutting down as Kayla traced my muscles through my shirt with her fingertips. A soothing chill ran through my body, and goose pimples rose on my skin. I focused on that, on how the happiness Kayla brought me trumped everything. Soon, this war would be over. I’d have seventy, eighty years or more with her, and the beautiful brunette beside me would warp the tragedies of my life.

I hoped.

“What happened tonight?” she asked. “You’ve been different since you came back. Quiet. And you’ve barely made eye contact with me. Seth said you wouldn’t talk to him, either.”

I growled, leaning away from Kayla’s touch. “I’m fine. Just… thinking. Can we please go to sleep?” I asked, without meeting her eyes, then grabbed the pillow I’d snatched from the sofa. I lay back, holding an arm out so she could join me.

“Yeah, okay.” Her head found its usual spot on my chest, and an arm draped over my stomach.

For minutes, I stared at the clear, summer sky. Bright stars lit up the scene, scattered like someone had tossed glow-in-the-dark beads on a black backdrop. A soft breeze rustled the trees, cool enough so August’s mugginess didn’t bother me but warm enough that I didn’t shiver without a blanket. The smell from the fire wafted in the air, and out of the corner of my eye, light gray smoke slithered toward the sky.

Amazing how beautiful the world could still be while evil burned it to the ground.

Kayla sniffled, and her chest staggered against my side. I touched her cheek. It was wet.

“Hey.” I rolled my body just enough that I could see her face. In the firelight, I couldn’t perceive much, but the flames glistened in her watery eyes. With a thumb, I wiped the tears from her cheeks. She didn’t meet my gaze. “Talk to me, love.”

“I thought you wanted to sleep.” Her tone was hard.

I sighed and scolded myself.
Brilliant job, Daniel
. I tucked dark hair behind her small ear. “I’m sorry I snapped at you. I’m exhausted. For the first time, I feel as old as I am.”

I’d expected that to get a smile, but her face stayed cold. A tear rolled down her cheek. I caught it. “Kayla, forgive me, please. You know I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

Another droplet fell. I blinked slowly, a boulder dropping in my stomach. After everything we’d been through since fleeing China, this was not how I wanted today to end. I pinched the bridge of my nose.

“I know,” she whispered at last. “It isn’t you. Not really.”

I dropped my hand from my face to find her looking at me.

“I’ve tried to be strong, for them—for you,” she continued. “I’ve tried to be brave… But every time something happens, you close up and shut me out, and I try not to cry. I try to pretend it doesn’t hurt. But I’m scared, and no one else seems to be. And then I wonder what’s wrong with me, why can’t I be more like you or Sam or Lian—”

My eyebrows furrowed. “Oh, Kayla, you don’t want to be like me.” I cupped her cheek. “I love your warmth and your compassion. I love your emotions, your ability to fight in the midst of your tears. These things about you… they don’t make you weak. They make you stronger than the rest of us. I don’t know about Lian, but Sam and I… we’re broken, Kayla. We stuff down the pain until we explode and hurt those we care about. I’m just as terrified as you, believe me.”

“Then show me. Please,” she said. “Prove to me I’m not alone.” Her voice shook, and her hand pressed against my chest.

I kissed her softly. “Baby, you’ve never been alone.”

For a few seconds I paused, mustering the courage to open up a little, to tell her things about myself I’d never told another, not even Seth or Adrian. If I could face hundreds of Nightmares, I should be able to handle vulnerability.

“I was afraid to leave Lena,” I admitted, my heart racing. “At first, simply because she asked me to stay, and I didn’t want her to be frightened after losing her mum. After so much death and not being able to stop Richard, we’d finally saved people. But then, it morphed into more. She reminded me of Tabbi, yes, but it went beyond that. The way she looked at me, like she trusted me, no matter what, to protect her… I felt, I don’t know, responsible for her.”

I scratched my forehead, and Kayla stroked a thumb down my chest. No longer did she cry, but her eyes glistened, and they were so full of compassion and love. My fear of opening up to her vanished.

“In the first few years after I died and became a Protector, I watched my siblings get married, have families, and share memories into their seventies. This forever-seventeen thing is a curse, and… God, I really do feel old sometimes. I missed out on so much, and I think—” I froze. It hit me, in that moment, what I was truly feeling.

The day my brother James had had a son, he’d named him “Daniel,” in memory of me, and I’d felt it then—that longing to be a father, to have a child look at me the way my nephew had looked at my brother.
That
was the look I’d seen in Lena’s eyes, the gaze that had captured my heart. I’d stopped checking on little Daniel after he’d had a son of his own. It was too difficult to witness such joy and never be able to experience it. Until now, I’d stuffed that pain, that discomfort, away.

My stomach twisted. Seth was right. I’d gotten attached again, but for an entirely different reason this time.

The sad look in Kayla’s eyes told me she knew exactly where my thoughts had turned. “I’m sorry,” she said. “I guess when you’ve lived as long as you have, it’d be hard not to think about that kind of thing.”

I nodded and cleared my throat. “With all that’s happened… I guess it opened old wounds and crashed down on me all at once. I didn’t mean to ignore you or make you feel unworthy of opening up to.”

Her gaze lingered on mine, reading deep into my soul. But while I’d never tasted more vulnerability in my life, I had also never been so relaxed. It was freeing to let someone in and wear my emotions on my sleeve, knowing they wouldn’t see me as weak. I’d been so wrapped up in keeping her safe that I hadn’t stopped to question what it would be like to lean on each other and fight side by side.

Best feeling in the universe.

Kayla ran her fingertips along the stubble on my jaw. I couldn’t remember the last time I’d shaved. “Maybe we can check on Lena tomorrow?” she asked.

I grinned. “That sounds perfect.”

Her mouth rose in a soft smile, and she slipped her hand behind my neck. I leaned forward and met her kiss, drawing her close in my arms. We snogged until our lips were raw then fell asleep, our bodies twined together beneath the bright stars.

It was first the chill that stirred me, not enough to snap me from my drowsy haze but enough to realize that Kayla was no longer by my side. I mumbled her name, patting the ground next to me. Empty. I opened my eyes just a crack to find the fire low and the sun barely peeking above the horizon. Where would she have gone?

A familiar, blood-curling scream traveled on the breeze.

Kayla.

I pushed myself off the ground, eyes wide open, and toppled to a knee, my right leg asleep. Damn it.

Kayla screamed again from somewhere in the distance, louder this time, and adrenaline pumped through me like I’d shot myself full of amphetamines. Kayla was outside the warding spell. A Nightmare could have her right now.

I sprinted around the side of the cabin and a short distance up the mountain, shooting my stare right and left.
Kayla, where are you?
I called out to her.

Another shriek tore through my chest, and I followed the sound.

Behind a large tree, Kayla thrashed in Nolan’s arms. Not good.

“What happened?” I shouted, crossing the distance in a few quick strides and crouching next to her. Every muscle was tense in her body, and blood trickled from the palm of her right hand. My heart twisted. She hadn’t been poisoned, and no Nightmares were in sight. How the hell was this possible?

“I don’t know. I was pissing when she wandered out here in a daze.” Nolan’s voice shook. “When I caught up to her, she started screaming. I can’t wake her.”

“Kayla.” I took her face in my hands. “Kayla, wake up.”

Again, she screamed, thrashing in Nolan’s arms.

Sweat formed on my brow. “Follow my voice, love. You’re having a nightmare. Baby, wake up.”

Kayla’s nails dug into my forearms, and her eyes popped open. Her irises spun, the color of liquid gold, but there was no pupil. I stumbled, falling to my knees. The urge to run away was like a siren song.

“You have until sunset tomorrow to bring her to me,” Kayla’s voice said, deep and lyrical, a hint of a Welsh accent lacing every word.

Richard.

My chest burned as an animalistic growl grew in my throat. He’d possessed his own
daughter?
“Never happening.”

Kayla leered, her face as dark and mischievous as the version from my nightmare. “I can feel her trying to push me out. She’s fighting so hard, screaming for you to give me whatever I want. Such a good little girl.”

“Fuck you. Get out of her head.”

Kayla’s mouth made a
tsk tsk
sound. “Daniel, don’t you know by now that I always get what I want? If you fail me, you will watch her die. Let me give you a preview.”

Again, Kayla’s face twisted into agony, and she screamed, her nails burrowing deeper into my skin.

“Stop!” I yelled, bile rising in my throat. But Kayla’s volume increased. “All right. You have my word. Stop!”

“What?” Nolan interjected.

I shot him a glare.
Shut up.

Kayla continued to thrash and shriek. Thick veins were visible through the skin on her neck and forehead. Rivulets of blood rolled down my arms from where her nails dug in.

I shook my head. “Richard, please. Sunset tomorrow. I promise. Just tell me where.” My throat burned, and my voice shook. I couldn’t lose Kayla. I couldn’t. I’d do whatever I had to.

Kayla’s cries diminished, and the lines in her face softened, a soft sheen of sweat covering her forehead. Her eyes glared into mine again. “Garnant—where it all began.”

Wales,
I told Nolan.

“How do I find you?” I asked Richard.

A devilish grin split her face. “I’m sure you’ll figure it out.”

Her eyes rolled into her head, and a violent seizure overtook her body.

“Richard, let her go!” By now, I stared at her through blurred eyes. Her lids snapped closed, and her body stilled.

My heart stopped.

I pressed my fingers to her neck. No pulse. “No, no, no. Kayla, baby, please, come back to me.”

“Jesus,” Nolan whispered.

I looked at him, barely able to breathe. This couldn’t be happening. He wasn’t supposed to kill her; I’d agreed to his terms.

Kayla gasped and sat up with a shout, swinging her arms as if she were batting away an attacker.

I grabbed her wrists and let out a loud breath. “Hey, it’s me, love. You’re safe.”

Her irises turned to their beautiful shade of hazel as her pupils widened, locking on me. She exploded into tears. “Oh my God,” she said between cries. “Daniel, you’re alive. But I thought… I thought—”