Sage's Eyes (32 page)

“I do hope you will come see us again,” his father said, crossing to me. “Perhaps your parents will relent and permit you to come to dinner, or maybe Summer will figure out a way to get you liberated long enough.”

I was a little surprised at what he was giving his approval to: deceiving my parents.

He could see the shock on my face. “Sometimes the ends justify the means. I am a believer in that. Nice to have met you, Sage. I love your name.” He reached for my hand and brought it to his lips. They felt more than just warm on my skin. When he raised his head, his eyes locked on mine, and I felt like something within me, something more than just my heart, was caressed by something within him. It was almost overwhelming, making my head spin just a little.

He looked at Summer and then turned and walked out of the room.

“What a charmer,” Summer said. “I can't tell you how often he has embarrassed me into being more polite than I had ever intended to be with some of the girls I introduced to him.”

“That's not a bad thing,” I said.

He laughed. “Let me show you my room. I have a surprise for you.” He took my hand, and we walked
out of the living room and up a short stairway to the second floor. His bedroom was the first one on the right. He turned on the light first and then stepped back for me to enter.

I stepped in and stopped quickly.

There on the wall, facing his queen-size bed, was a photograph of me that measured at least four feet by five feet.

His room wasn't very big, even compared with mine, which I always thought was smaller than most of my classmates' bedrooms, especially from the way they described their furniture, televisions, closets, and computer desks. However, houses of this vintage normally didn't have large rooms or high ceilings. Maybe that didn't matter as much to boys. He certainly didn't look embarrassed or ashamed, neither of it nor of my blown-up photograph.

I was surprised that he had nothing else on any of his walls, no sports posters, no posters of singers or movie posters, nothing. It was as if he had just moved to America. The room was spartan, with an old, dark cherry-wood dresser that matched the bed's headboard. There was a large, dull yellow, saucer-shaped light fixture overhead and light brown hardwood floors with no area rugs. The closet was on the left, and there was one nightstand on the right side of his bed, with a square-shaped clock on it and a small lamp
that also looked like a refugee from a thrift store. The bed itself was neatly made, with two large pillows and a light blue spread. There were two windows, both with their dark blue curtains closed. I wondered where he kept his books and did his homework. I imagined there were motel rooms that had more character and certainly more furniture than his room.

“I know it doesn't look like I have much right now. I haven't half unpacked my things,” he explained. “In the past, Dad's packed us up and left where we were almost before I could settle in. He gets a feeling for an area quickly. Before you ask, he likes it here.”

I still had my gaze fixed on the picture of me. In it, I had turned around in class and was looking at him, probably, but I didn't recall him snapping my picture, either on a smartphone or with a camera.

“When did you take that picture of me?”

“The first day I was in school,” he said.

“I didn't see a camera.”

He walked over to his nightstand, opened the drawer, and took out a camera that was so small it could fit in the palm of your hand. “Neat, huh?”

“No. Sneaky,” I said. “Why did you do it and then blow it up so big?”

“I have this thing for real beauty when I see it,” he replied. “I like waking up to your face,” he added without the slightest hesitation. “I go to sleep with you and wake up with you.”

I knew I was blushing.

He sat on his bed and looked up at me. “I want to
know more about you, Sage. I want to really get to know you.”

“I've told you everything. I haven't had as exciting and interesting a life as you have.”

He shook his head.

“What?”

“I don't believe that.”

“Why not?”

“You're holding back,” he said. He reached out for my hand. I didn't move. “I won't bite. I've been accused of many things but never of being a vampire.”

I stepped forward, and he clasped my hand and gently pulled me to him. We kissed. It was the longest kiss of my life. My whole body seemed to swirl, but in more of a panic than I had anticipated. Until now, his kisses were quick pecks on my lips and my cheeks. This kiss seemed to have fingers reaching deeply down inside me and touching places that slept comfortably in the sanctity of my youth. It was as if the sleeping sexuality within me was ambushed, roused, unprotected. His hands slipped down my back and over the crests of my buttocks, pulling me even closer and then turning me so I fell beside him on his bed. In an instant, he was over me, straddling me and then bending closer to kiss my forehead and trace the side of my face to my neck with his lips, lips that were so hot I thought they would burn my skin. Instead, they broadcast waves of heat down to my breasts and the base of my stomach.

I felt myself start to weaken, my resistance starting to crumble beneath the erotic weight of his hands,
his longer kisses, and finally the full pressure of his body against mine. It was all happening so quickly. I felt myself surrendering. But the alarms that sounded and the hardness that came to my rescue surprised even me, for there was a strong part of me that had wanted his advances, had craved his affection, and I thought had prepared willingly to surrender. From out of a dark place that I didn't know existed inside me, I could feel and hear a great
NOOOO
, and I pushed up on his chest, practically lifting him completely off me.

He stopped, surprised at my strength and my refusal to continue. “Hey,” he said, rolling onto his right side, “I thought you would want this.”

“I do, but not so fast,” I said.

He smiled and nodded. “You think I'm out to nail every pretty girl in school and began with you, is that it?”

“In the garden of suspicions, that one has flowered,” I admitted.

His smile widened. “How could I get a reputation like that so fast?”

“How else would you explain the rush?” I asked.

“Okay, okay. I was told to expect that you'd be different,” he said, and sat up.

I sat up, too. “Who told you that, Summer? Who told you that I would be different?”

“Never mind. I'm not complaining. If you want to know the truth, I kind of like it. You're the first girlfriend I've had who's been able to resist my charms,” he added, half kidding. “I love a challenge.”

“You didn't give
the rest of your girlfriends one of those pills on your first dates with them by any chance, did you?”

He laughed and brushed down his pants. “No. Never needed anything but my own animal magnetism and good looks.” He stopped smiling and reached for my hand again but held it more gently this time. “I didn't mean to rush you. You underestimate your own charm and good looks and overestimate my power to resist.”

“Oh, clever. Now blame me,” I said, rising.

He continued to hold my hand and sit there looking up at me, his eyes and his smile subtly changing from amusement to a suddenly deeper perception. “You need to realize and accept that you are head and shoulders above everyone else in that school, Sage. What applies to them doesn't apply to you. You're special.”

“Why do you keep telling me that? There are other girls who have grades as high as mine, girls who do more extracurricular activities, have more friends and certainly more boyfriends.”

“I'm not talking about any of that.”

“What are you talking about, then?”

“Your power to anticipate the future for others, even somewhat for yourself, and . . .”

“And what?”

“To persuade and control other people.”

I started to shake my head.

“No,” he said. “I saw what you did to Mr. Jacobs that day.”

“What day?”

“The day you
persuaded him to put Jan Affleck back to sing the solo part he wanted you to sing.”

“All I said was—”

“What you said wasn't enough to change his mind, Sage. He wasn't going to do it. He even resented your telling him how to run his chorus, and then . . .”

“Then what?” I asked. Inside me, I knew the answer, but it was something I had never recognized, something I had been afraid to recognize.

“Then you did what you do, and he changed his mind. You focused on him. You transmitted your will, and he easily surrendered to it, and quite abruptly, I might add. Even I was surprised. It happened in the blink of an eye, didn't it?”

I stared at him.

“You've done that before, haven't you?” he asked. I started to shake my head. He let go of my hand. “That's what I meant when we first came in here, Sage. That's what I meant when I said I really wanted to get to know you, when I said you were holding back. What else have you done? Who else have you controlled?”

“This is silly talk, Summer,” I said. I looked at my watch. “I'd like to start back to the mall.”

“What if I told you I've done similar things? Something told me that you suspected that, too.”

I stared at him. Could that be true? Was that why he said so often that we were alike? I was tempted to tell him more. Holding these secrets close to my heart was a lonely, scary thing at times.

“Your adoptive
parents suspect all this about you, too, don't they? That's why they're so hard on you, try to keep you so confined and under their control. They are afraid of you. Am I right?”

“This is crazy,” I said. “You're frightening me.”

“Okay, okay. Maybe I am rushing things. I'm sorry. I really like you. I was only trying to help you realize you shouldn't be afraid of anyone or anything, and if anything, you should be permitted to grow, to enjoy your powers, not resent them or be afraid of them.”

“I don't have powers,” I insisted.

“Call it what you like. It's nothing to be ashamed of. That's all I'm trying to say.”

I looked away. “I don't want to talk about this,” I said.

“Okay, let's go,” he said. “I'm sorry. Please don't be upset with me.”

I looked at him and nodded. “It's all right. Right now, I'm just worried about . . .”

“Everything,” he said, and smiled. “So am I.” He took my hand and led me out of his room, shutting off the light and closing the door. “Please don't tell my father I said any of that to you. He's been on my back lately about not making friends and having what he calls ‘normal relationships' whenever we do settle down somewhere.”

“He should understand how difficult that is for you because of how much he moves you two around.”

“Exactly,” Summer said.

When we reached the bottom of the stairs, his father called to us.

“Let's
say good night to him,” Summer said, and we turned to continue down the hallway to a room on the right. His father sat at a large, dark oak desk with a single lamp throwing just enough illumination for him to see what he was writing. I was surprised to see he was writing in longhand and not on a computer.

His face was cloaked in shadow, but he leaned forward into the light. “Leaving?”

“Yes,” Summer said.

“I wanted to say that I really do hope we'll see you again soon, Sage. I have a selfish motive to confess,” he added. “Summer can tell you. I like to read some of my new manuscripts to young women whenever I get the chance. I both enjoy and learn from their reactions. Many times I have changed things in one of my books because of a young woman's reaction, and I think, from what Summer's told me of you and from what I can tell, that you can be of great help to me. If you don't mind, that is.”

“No. I'd be happy to do that when I can, Mr. Dante,” I said.

“Oh please. Don't call me Mr. Dante. My given name is Roman,” he said.

I hesitated to ask, but it was just too heavy on my mind not to. “Roman Dante is a beautiful name. Why not use that instead of Belladonna on your novels?”

“Ah . . . see? She's asked an excellent question, Summer. She's a jewel. So,” he said, turning back to me, “what do you know about that name, Belladonna?”

Should I tell him about my adoptive parents, their heritage? “I know
what it was used for and how dangerous it was—it is,” I said.

“Yes, and that is love. Everything has another side to it, Sage. Never lose sight of that,” he said. “Besides, I can't use my real name. I've got to be mysterious now. My readers are drawn in by that romantic darkness. Do you know anyone who is like that, who needs that?”

“My uncle Wade,” I said.

“Ah. Magic. My old love. And you understand why. See? You'd better treat this girl well, Summer, or I'll be very upset,” he said.