Reborn (20 page)

Chapter 27

“Siobhan,”
Jasper says, peering at me through the
gap between the wall and the
door. He lowers the chain and opens the door the rest of the way. “I really
didn’t expect to—”

I
slap him as hard as I can. Even so, he doesn’t flinch. He brings a hand up to
the place where my hand connected with his cheek, but I think it’s just a
reflex.

“I
guess I deserve that.”

“Yes,
you do.” I slip past him into his apartment. After a moment’s hesitation he
closes and relocks the door.

“So,
what brings you here?” The question lacks interest, curiosity. He almost sounds
bored.

“I—”
My reply catches in my throat. He’s wearing a black terrycloth robe tied
loosely at the waist, exposing a strip of marble-hard chest and abs. My eyes
linger a little too long on the bulge underneath his robe around the hip and
thigh area. When I look back up at him, he’s smirking in satisfaction.

I
swallow hard before continuing, “I’m here to help you.

I
don’t know how I expected Jasper to react to this declaration. Surprised?
Annoyed? Even anger would have been better than the uncontrollable fits of
laughter he lapses into. He’s laughing so hard he stumbles and catches himself
on the kitchen counter. I watch him in stunned, pained silence until he
eventually recovers himself. He gives a low whistle.

“Sorry
about that.”

“You
don’t sound very sorry.”

“Aw,
what, did I hurt your feelings?” His lower lip juts forward in a mocking pout.

“This
isn’t you.” I raise my voice in hopes that will steady it. “The army. The
rebellion. Tonight.”

“How
would
you
know that? You said it yourself: You don’t remember me or
us
.
Maybe I was always like this.”

“That’s
what Farrah said,” I tell him. Maybe he’ll back off if he knows he’s basically
agreeing with his mother. “That you were always meddling, always interfering in
others’ relationships. She said what you’re doing now is just an extension of
that.”

“She’s
right. I’m a meddler. Always was, until I met…” He clamps his mouth shut,
realizing what he was just about to admit.

“
Me
,”
I finish for him. “I saved you once. I can do it again.”

Chuckling,
Jasper wanders into the living room, turning his back to me. “You’ve been on
Earth for too long. I didn’t think you’d be the type to subscribe to that
clichéd female fantasy of saving the brooding bad boy from himself. I don’t
want to be saved. I don’t
need
to be saved.”

“Of
course you need saving! You’re doing horrible things!”

“Morality
is relative.”

“
Killing
isn’t!” I cry out. He glances back at me, eyebrows raised. It’s barely a
response, but it lets me know he’s finally listening to me. “You tried to kill
my friends. And Genie is dead because of you, Apate and Dolos. Because you
didn’t give her enough ambrosia.”

“Of
course we did!” he scoffs, his blasé façade crumbling, but only for an instant.
“Even if we didn’t, her death isn’t on our hands. She could have said ‘no.’
There were many instances when she could have backed out.”

“In
case you haven’t noticed, you’re kind of a hard person to say ‘no’ to.”

“Am
I?” A devilish smile creeps onto his face, his eyes glittering with something I
can’t quite identify. It’s beyond his usual mischief and playfulness. Something
deep, sinister and hungry.  “Why does the girl always have to ‘save’ him?” he
muses, the grin vanishing, although a dark yearning still smolders in his gaze.
“Why can’t she accept him for who he is? Is he so unlovable?” Suddenly he’s
towering over me, our bodies only centimeters apart.

“You
would have told me the truth about your plans from the start if you really
thought you were doing the right thing,” I point out quietly. I’ve never hated
more what the mere nearness of him does to me. I’m trying to maintain my
self-control, but I can tell he senses it’s caving. He strokes my cheek with
two seductive fingers before cupping my chin in his hand.

“Do
you think Good Jasper is going to make you feel like this?” he whispers. Before
I can answer—not that I had any idea what I was going to say to that, anyway—he
grinds his erection against me as he crushes me against his body, his
determined tongue invading my mouth. I lose myself in the kiss for a minute or
two, but then slam my hands against his chest and try to pull away from him.

“Stop,”
I grunt against his mouth. I turn my face away, feeling his lips graze my cheek
instead. He grabs my wrists and squeezes, hard, to still my thrashing. I
struggle feebly against him.

“You’re…hurting…me.”
I put all my might into breaking free, but at the same time he releases me, and
I trip backwards. I rub my wrists, holding them to my chest protectively. My
pale skin is red where Jasper held me.

“I’m
sorry. I…” Jasper stares at my hands and blinks as though emerging from a daze.
“I didn’t mean to hurt you.”

“I
guess everyone’s right. You are a monster.”

I
stomp past him and around the divider partitioning off his bedroom. In my
wrinkled cocktail dress and with dry but tangled hair, I crawl on top of the
bed, shoving a pillow under my head. I shut my eyes.

“You
still want to stay here?” Jasper’s uncertain voice comes from somewhere at the
foot of the bed.

“I’m
too tired to go home,” I say into the pillow. “Just don’t touch me.”

“I
won’t.”

The
mattress rolls as he gets in beside me. I drift off to sleep more quickly than
I thought I would. The next time I open my eyes, the red crystals of the
digital clock on the nightstand blaze three ten in the morning. Jasper sits up
in bed, hugging his legs. His skin is ghostly white in the streetlight
filtering through the blinds, his hair hanging in his face and swaying as he
rocks himself back and forth. He looks like a drug addict in withdrawal.

“What’s
wrong?” I ask, sitting up.

He
must have been crying, because he sniffs and wipes at his eyes. “I’m sorry
about earlier. You’re right—I wasn’t always like this. I’m not this monster. I
swear. Please help me, Siobhan.” I brush strands of his hair out of his face so
that I can look at him. “I accept your help. I don’t want anyone to die. I
didn’t want…Genie…”

I
scoot closer to him and take his hand in mine. “I’ll help you. Let’s just get
some sleep, for now.” He nods and curls up in the fetal position under the
covers. I cradle his head against my chest. We fall asleep like this.

***

The
rest of the weekend is a blur of bare skin, tangled limbs and blood red satin
sheets.

At
night I let myself forget why I’m really here and the questionable things
Jasper has done, surrendering myself to him completely. After each time we make
love I crash, lying spent in his arms, and I wake up a few hours later only to
find him looming over me, his erection urging my thighs apart once again.

During
the day, we make meals together, cuddle, talk—almost like a normal couple.
Spending this time with him has helped me realize there’s something else
between us—something that could transcend each of our faults, our mistakes, our
darkness. Something that would only become stronger and more real if I can show
him what it means to truly love someone.

Late
Sunday afternoon I’m still cocooned in bed when Jasper brings over two steaming
cups of black tea. I accept mine and sniff its pungent vapors in playful
suspicion.

“It’s
ambrosia-free,” he assures me. I sit up, propping my pillow between my back and
the headboard, and Jasper perches on the edge of the bed at my feet. “Just so
you know: You only need one more dose of ambrosia to become as fully Olympian
as you can possibly be. Only one or two drops needed. But it’s up to you.” I
shake my head as I take a sip of tea. Jasper sighs. “That’s what I figured. Let
me know if you change your mind, okay?”

“I
won’t,” I insist. “Thank you for respecting my choice.” I jab him playfully in
his back with my toes. “I feel like we’ve just had a breakthrough.”

He
gives a shy, fleeting smile, looking as though he’s about to say something, but
then changes his mind, instead blowing on his tea.

“What
is it?” I press.

Jasper
sets his cup on the nightstand and stretches out on the bed beside me. “So what
I’m offering isn’t…it isn’t at all appealing to you?”

“What
are you offering me?”

“The
chance to rule beside me on Olympus.” He reaches up and tucks a section of my
hair behind my ear. “To be my queen.”

I
straighten up, almost sloshing tea onto myself and the sheets. “I thought we
were trying to get past this, Jasper. You told me you wanted my help.”

“But
I don’t know what you want from me.” He whispers this fearfully, like a little
boy who knows he’s in trouble. Until this moment I’ve been unable to pinpoint
what he reminds me of, with the mood swings and the tantrums, but now I can see
him clearly, behind the wicked smirk and the black holes of his eyes: the child
still struggling within him, who doesn’t seem to know right from wrong or understand
the consequences of his actions.

“I
want you to choose
me
.” It’s what I’ve really wanted all along, this
selfish yearning my conscience has kept restrained in the back of my mind. Yes,
I want to protect my friends, protect Earth, but when I presented him with this
ultimatum, deep down I wanted him to prove his love for me by choosing
me
over Apate and Dolos, over their mission.

He
casts me a confused sideways glance. “I
am
choosing you.”

“No,
I mean—I want you to choose me.” I lie back down on the bed and put my head on
his chest so that I don’t have to look in his eyes. “If you really want to be
with me, you have to let go of this plan to build your army here on Earth and
overthrow Zeus. You have to find another way—”

“Siobhan,
I—”

“Or
just give it up. Stay here, with me.” I lift up my head and meet his gaze
resolutely. “We can have a relationship. We can be normal.”

Jasper
smiles, but sadness and regret tug down the corners of it. “You can’t really be
asking me to do this. We’ve been planning this for eons. It’s my time. It’s my
turn to rule on Olympus. Siobhan, I—I want you by my side, more than anything,
but if you turn me down, I’m still going through with it.”

And
there it is. I finally have my answer. I can’t say I’m surprised, but hearing him
say it still stings. After all of his hyperbole about “getting his wife back”
and my being “the love of his life,” it’s still not enough. His lust for power
consumes him, not his love for me—if you can even call it love. I don’t know
what Psyche was to him, but Siobhan Elliot is his possession, his chosen one,
his prize to flaunt before his kingdom if he overtakes the thrown. Ours is a
dark, delicious fantasy, but nothing more. It’s like grasping at the tendrils
of a dream upon waking—one moment you’re on the cusp of something incredible,
but when the fog of sleep clears you can barely recall what that incredible
something was—and if you do, it’s not the same. Reality sets in.

My
fog lifts.

“I
should get going,” I mutter, sitting up and sliding off the bed in one fluid
motion.

Jasper
reaches out as if to stop me, his fingers brushing then sliding off my arm.
“Now? We should talk about this.”

“Our
chapter meeting starts in fifteen minutes,” I explain without looking back at
him. “I’m going to be late.”

There’s
a pause, and I can feel him frowning at the back of my head. “I’ll drive you.”
He gets up and goes to his closet to get a shirt. I go into the bathroom,
splash my face with cool water, and slip back into the dress I wore to the
dance. It’s not business formal, but I hope it’s better than barging in wearing
panties and my lover’s Rolling Stones t-shirt.

As
we’re idling in front of the sorority house, Jasper takes my hand before I get
out of the car.

“So
we’re okay.”

No.
“We’re okay,” I assure him. He leans over for a loving, closed-mouth kiss. I
force a smile when it’s over. “See you later.” I get out and close the door.

“I
love you,” he calls out the window and pulls away from the curb. I steel myself
before walking into the house, even knocking lightly on the door before
cracking it open.

“It’s
just me,” I announce before coming in. The words echo off the walls back to me.
“Where is everybody?” I mutter, taking out my phone to double check my inbox,
but I don’t have any emails or texts saying chapter has been canceled. I don’t
hear showers running or footsteps pacing frantically upstairs; the entire house
is quietly poised, as if it’s waiting for something to happen.

“Victoria?”
I call out anyway, the heels of my shoes on the hardwood floor sounding
especially loud and intrusive as I explore the living room, even peeking into
the kitchen. “Tanya?”