My Soul to Steal

17

THAT NIGHT, AFTER my father went to sleep, Alec came into my room and we took turns sleeping in two-hour shifts. True to her word, Sabine stayed out of my head, but because Avari had made no such deal with Alec, and especially since I’d evicted him from his earlier occupation, I shook him awake every time he so much as grunted in his sleep, and every single time, I made him tell me what color my first bicycle was.

He passed the test each time. We’d dodged a bullet, but I was far from sure we’d be able to do the same thing night after night. Especially considering how exhausted I was the next morning, after nearly a week without a decent night’s sleep.

Friday was a blur of desks, textbooks, and piercing school bells, made even more miserable because Nash ignored both me and Sabine again. All day long. And I have to admit that once I was sure no more teachers had died, I kind of mentally checked out of the school day. I was just too tired to concentrate.

Until some sophomore, bitter over not making the basketball season cheerleading squad, was caught dumping bleach from the custodian’s closet all over the cheerleader uniforms hanging at the back of the team sponsor’s classroom during lunch. That woke the whole school up.

As Principal Goody escorted a gaggle of pissed-off cheerleaders to the office to call their parents, she stopped in the hall and I heard her tell the team coach she’d be glad when this week was over.

I knew exactly how she felt.

That night, I had to work, with neither Emma nor Alec to keep me company. After my shift, I checked my phone for missed calls and found a voice mail from Nash. I listened to it in my car, in the dark, with nothing to distract me from the intimate sound of his voice in my ear.

“Hey, it’s me,” he said, and just hearing from Nash made my chest ache, after two days of near-silence from him. “I’m sorry about the other day. Are you working? You wanna come over tonight? Just to talk? We could order a pizza, and Mom made some of those fudge cookies before she left for work.”

He paused, and my sigh was the most pathetic sound I’d ever heard.

“Anyway, I figured if I invited you, you wouldn’t feel like you had to sneak in under the cover of…Tod. Give me a call?”

Then the phone went silent in my hand.

I dropped my cell onto the passenger seat and started the engine. Then I turned the car off and stared out the windshield.

Nothing had changed. Nash was still recovering from a serious frost addiction, I was still trying to forgive him for what he’d done, and his ex was still marching toward a very messy boyfriend coup.

But then again, maybe nothing would change until I gave him a real chance to make things better. Maybe I never would be able to move on until I either forgave him or let him go.

And I desperately didn’t want to let him go.

I’ll just stay for a few minutes. I’ll have one slice of pizza. And maybe a cookie. A cookie never hurt anyone, right?

Besides, I hadn’t had a chance yet to tell him what was going on with Alec, because he’d been avoiding both me and Sabine at school. So I’d stay for a few minutes. An hour, tops.

I’d definitely be home before curfew….

TWENTY-FIVE MINUTES later, I knocked on Nash’s door, suddenly wishing I’d changed out of my uniform shirt. I’d considered it during the drive, but in the end I dismissed the thought—dressing up might send the wrong message.

If I came in my uniform, he’d know I was just there to talk. That I wasn’t trying to look good or to take things beyond that first crucial private conversation. I’d made the right choice.

But I still wished I’d changed.

Nash opened the door in nothing but a pair of jeans, and suddenly I wished he’d changed. He was really hard to talk to when he wasn’t fully clothed.

A relieved smile lit up his face when he saw me, and I couldn’t resist a small grin of my own. “I didn’t think you were coming.” He stepped back to let me in. “I called three hours ago.”

“I was at work. They make us leave our phones in our lockers.” But even after my shift, I hadn’t called to let him know I was coming because I wasn’t sure I’d actually go through with it until I rang the doorbell. Being alone with Nash was hard. Even without his Influence working in his favor—which he’d sworn would never happen again—he was temptation on two feet. When I was with him, I wanted to touch him, and when I touched him, I wanted to touch him some more, but that would lead to all things sweaty and illogical, and logic was the only weapon I could deploy against the lure that was Nash, and the traitor that was my own heart.

He closed the door at my back, then leaned against it, and my pulse rushed in my ears as I pulled off my jacket and dropped it on the back of a chair. “Did you eat?” he asked, while I stood there like an idiot in the middle of his living room.

“Just some popcorn on my break.”

“I’ll call for pizza.”

While he dialed, I sat on the couch and tried to get comfortable. We’d never really hung out in his living room, but I wanted to make it clear that I had no business in his bedroom. Not tonight. Not while we were still feeling things out. Figuratively.

When he hung up, Nash sat next to me, and I twisted to face him, leaning against the arm of the couch with my back to the end table lamp. Light from over my shoulder lit his face enough for me to see the browns and greens in his eyes, alternately twisting contentedly and churning with nerves.

I was relieved to realize he was nervous, too. He understood that he was getting a second chance, and he obviously didn’t want to mess it up.

“Hey, I thought you should know you were right about Sabine.”

He shook his head slowly. “I don’t want to talk about Sabine.”

“I’m just saying, she didn’t kill them.”

“I know. I still don’t want to talk about her.”

I smiled. “Looks like we still have things in common.”

“I sure hope so.” He reached out for my hand and curled his fingers around mine, and my pulse leaped just like it had the first time we’d touched. How could it possibly feel just like that still?

I hesitated, tempted to drop the subject and continue exploring a potential reunion. But Nash deserved to know the truth, and frankly, I didn’t like the pressure or responsibility that came with being the only one who knew Alec’s secret. “Wait, there’s more,” I insisted.

“I like more…” His eyes flashed, and my heart beat harder.

“It’s Alec,” I said, and Nash froze.

“What’s Alec?” He pulled his fingers from my light grip and scowled. “You and Alec…?”

“No!” I rolled my eyes and crossed my arms over my chest. “Why does everyone keep saying that? He’s old, no matter how young he looks!” And he had much more important things on his mind than dating. I took a deep breath. “Alec killed them. The teachers.” I frowned. “Well, not him, exactly. It was actually Avari, but he was using Alec’s body. It’s kind of a long story.”

“Then you should probably talk fast.” Nash’s irises churned too fast for me to isolate individual emotions, but his lips were pressed thin, his hand clenched around the back of the couch.

“Okay. It turns out that Alec’s only half human. His other half is hypnos, and Avari somehow scraped together enough power to possess Alec and feed through him. Which only gives him more power. And evidently kills people.”

Guess that wasn’t such a long story, after all.

Nash’s frown could have blotted out the sun. “And he’s sleeping on your couch?”

Actually, now he was sleeping half the night in my bedroom, where I could watch him for signs of possession. But all I said was, “He’s not really sleeping much at all, since we figured out what was going on.”

“Kaylee, you have to tell your dad.”

I shook my head. “He’ll kick him out.”

“That’s kind of the point.”

“No, Nash. If my dad kicks Alec out, who’s going to make sure he doesn’t get possessed and kill someone else?”

“Let your dad worry about that.” I started to shake my head again, but Nash cut me off. “If you don’t tell him, I will. This is too dangerous, Kay. Swear you’ll tell him. Tonight.”

And finally I nodded, feeling almost as relieved to be free from the responsibility as I felt guilty over having to break a promise to Alec. “Fine. I swear.”

Nash’s hand relaxed on the back of the couch and he slouched a little, obviously more at ease now that he had my promise.

“So…how are you?” I asked, ready for a subject change. I didn’t want to bring up the issue that had separated us in the first place, but I felt like I should know how he was doing. For real. I wanted to know.

“I’m better now.” Now that I was here. He didn’t say it, but we both heard it. Then the heat in his gaze gave way to a different kind of intensity. “Kaylee, I’m so sorry for everything that happened. I wish I could take it all back. I wish I could do so many things differently….”

I squeezed his hand. “Nash, you can stop apologizing.”

“But you haven’t forgiven me.”

“Not for lack of apologies.” I glanced at our intertwined fingers, enjoying the familiar warmth and the way our palms seemed to fit together. “It’s just a lot to deal with. Doug died because we did too little, and we did it too late. And Scott probably wishes he were dead.”

Surely lifeless oblivion would be better than living with Avari’s voice constantly in your head, telling you things you don’t want to know, demanding you do things no sane person would do….

His hand tightened around mine, and his gaze seemed to burn a hole right through me. “What else can I do?”

“I don’t think there’s anything else you can do,” I whispered. “It’ll just take time. And for now, this is nice.” I tried on a small smile and held up our linked hands, but Nash only frowned.

“Nice is good, but it’s not enough. I want you back for real. I want to talk to you at lunch, instead of staring at you while you eat. I want to see the smile on your face and know I put it there. I want to hear your dad’s voice get all low and pissed off, like it only does when I’ve stayed over too late.”

I grinned. No one could piss off my dad like Nash.

Except for Tod.

“You know why he sounds like that, don’t you?” Nash asked. “It’s because he knows how I feel about you, and it scares him. He knows that he’s missed most of your life, and you’re not a little girl anymore, and I’m proof of that. He knows what I know, and what you’ll let yourself know some day—that you love me. And it scares the shit out of him.”

I couldn’t breathe around the fist-size lump in my throat. That lump was all the words I was dying to say but shouldn’t, all rolled up into one word clog, refusing to move. I couldn’t let them out—couldn’t expose so much of what I really felt while I still wasn’t sure I could completely trust him—but I couldn’t swallow them, either. Not anymore. Because whether I wanted to say them or not, whether they would actually change anything or not, they were true.

“Kaylee?” Nash’s focus shifted between my eyes, searching for something inside me. “You can’t tell me there’s nothing left for me in there. I know there is. I can see it in your eyes.”

“No fair peeking,” I mumbled, and he chuckled.

“Nothing about this is fair.” He hesitated, swallowing thickly, like he needed something to drink all of a sudden. “I know I don’t deserve a second chance, but I’m asking for one. Let me prove how serious I am. Just one more chance.”

I stared at him, studying his eyes. And all I found in them was sincerity and heart-bruising need. He meant it.

So instead of answering, instead of thinking, I leaned forward and kissed him. For once in my life, I let my heart lead the way, while the rest of me held on tight, helpless and scared, along for the ride.

Nash kissed me back, and it was like we’d never broken up. And for the first time, it seemed possible that we could just pick up where we’d left off and forget all about that messy little pit stop on the path to forever.

But that wasn’t right, was it? Was forgetting even possible?

In that moment, I just didn’t care about roadblocks thrown up by my brain—my heart and my body were committed to crashing through them. So I set the hard questions aside and focused on Nash. On the way he tasted, and the way he felt. Of the warmth of his fingers wrapped around mine and his free hand sliding up my arm and over my shoulder to cup the back of my head.

My mouth opened against his, and I welcomed him back, while my body welcomed back the heat he awoke in me, which had lain largely dormant over the past three weeks. But Nash was very careful, his eagerness very controlled. He was hyperaware of my boundaries, and reluctant to even approach them after what had happened the last time.

His caution was both blessing and curse. It was like trying to scratch an itch with gloves on—his passive caresses only made me want more. And maybe that was the point. Maybe he was leaving it all up to me, how far we went and when. Which would have been awesome, if I weren’t trying to quench a thirst for him which had been building for the past twenty-one days.

“Nash…” I groaned, when his mouth finally left mine to travel down my neck.

“Too fast?” He started to pull back, but I wouldn’t let him.

“No. I just wanted to say your name without being mad.”

He grinned and leaned with his forehead against mine. “That’s my favorite way to hear it. But this is too fast. We have to slow down, or we’re going to wind up in the same position again—without the frost. Or the Influence,” he added, when I frowned.

“But you’re not…”

“Kaylee, I need to slow down.”

“Oh.” I tried to banish disappointment from my voice, but he heard it, anyway, and I think that made it worse for him—knowing that I wanted more. But he was doing the right thing, and so should I. “Um…okay. I’m gonna get a Coke. You want one?” I stood, straightening my shirt.

“Yeah. There’s some in the fridge.”

I’d made it halfway across the room when a car rumbled to a stop outside, and a wash of bright light traveled across the living room through the front window. “Must be the pizza.” Nash stood, already digging his wallet from his back pocket, and I shoved open the swinging door into the kitchen, pleasantly surprised by the quick delivery.

But when I pulled open the fridge, a familiar, disembodied voice spoke to me from the other side of the door. “It’s not the pizza,” Tod said, and I slammed the door shut without grabbing the cans. But the kitchen was completely empty.

“Where are you?” I demanded in a whisper, as the front door creaked open from the living room. “And how do you know it’s not the delivery guy?”

Tod suddenly appeared between me and his mom’s small kitchen table, wearing a royal blue polo with a stylized pizza—missing one slice—embroidered on the left side of his chest. “Because I have your pizza right here, and I didn’t drive.”

I laughed. I couldn’t help it. An undead reaper was one thing. But an undead pizza delivery driver? The jokes wouldn’t stop coming.

“It’s not funny!” Tod snapped. “This was your idea.”

“I was joking!” I hissed, opening the fridge again.

“Well, I wasn’t. Being dead doesn’t have to mean mooching off all my friends, right?” he said, and I shrugged, pulling two cold cans from the top shelf. “Plus, you were right about the free pizza.”

I couldn’t resist another grin. “So…is there a family discount?”

“Hell, no. Nash is paying full price. Plus tip.”

Before I could reply, hushed voices from the living room caught my attention. “Who’s that?” I demanded, setting the sodas on the table. I headed for the swinging door, but Tod grabbed my arm before I’d made it two steps.

“It’s her, isn’t it? That’s Sabine’s car? You saw her?”

He nodded reluctantly, brushing a curl from his forehead. I started forward again, and again he pulled me back. “Let go. What, you’re on her side now?”

“I’m just trying to keep this from going bad, fast.”

“Shh…” I said, when I realized I could make out words from the other room.

“Kaylee’s here?” Sabine said, obviously refusing to be shushed by Nash. And it’s not like she didn’t know I was there—my car was in the driveway! “I thought it was just going to be us.”

“I didn’t think she’d come. Bina, please go before she hears you.”

I couldn’t hear what came next, so I snuck closer to the door. Tod clenched his jaw, but let me go.

“Sabine, no! I’ll make it up to you, but you have to go n—”

Then there was no more talking from either of them, and my blood boiled.

I shoved open the swinging kitchen door and froze with my foot holding it open, unable to truly process what I saw. Sabine Campbell had her shirt off, and she’d latched onto Nash like the parasite she really was. She had him pressed against his own front door, her tongue surely halfway down his throat. But the worst part…

He held her shirt, dangling from one fist—and he was kissing her back.

I couldn’t speak. I couldn’t even form a coherent thought until Tod cleared his throat at my back, and Sabine reluctantly peeled herself off my boyfriend.

Nash’s face flamed, but Sabine only grinned. “Hey, Kay. Sorry I’m late to the party, but the more the merrier, right?”

“You two look merry enough without me,” I snapped through clenched teeth. Then I stepped forward and let the kitchen door swing through Tod, who barely seemed to notice.

“Kaylee, wait…” Nash pushed Sabine away from him. “I didn’t… She…”

“I know. She was all over you like a tick on blood.” But I also knew that he hadn’t pushed her away. He may not have started it, but he’d let it happen, and I couldn’t help wondering, if I hadn’t been there, how much farther he would have let it go.

I glanced pointedly at the shirt he still held in one hand, and his cheeks flushed nearly scarlet.

Nash whirled on Sabine and shoved the shirt at her and she took it, reluctantly covering herself. Then he pulled open the front door, grabbed her arm, and shoved her onto the porch, still clutching the material to her chest. “Don’t come back,” he growled, an instant before slamming the door in her face.

“Kaylee…” He turned to face me, leaning against the door.

“You didn’t stop her.”

“I was about to…”

“Yeah. You can tell from how far down her throat your tongue was…” Tod said, sarcasm threaded boldly through each word.

Nash turned on him. “This is none of your business. What are you even doing here?”

“You owe me $15.99. Plus tip.”

Nash looked confused until he noticed Tod’s uniform. “I’ll owe you,” he finally snapped. “Get out.”

“I’m going, too.” I headed for the door as Sabine’s car started in the driveway.

“Kaylee, wait.”

“Where’s her bra?” I asked, my hand already on the doorknob.

Nash closed his eyes and exhaled slowly, miserably. “She wasn’t wearing one.”