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“I sleep better with you,” he admits sheepishly. I hesitate. As weird as it sounds, I know exactly what he means. Kaiden was always my safety net. Nothing bad could happen to me when he wrapped me in his strong arms and joked all my worries away late into the night.
Until he died on me.
I shut that thought down, fast.
“Do you have bad dreams too?” I ask, moving to sit beside him on the bed.
“Like you wouldn’t believe.”
“Your father?”
“Yeah. And other things.”
“Like?”
“Like losing you.”
“Kaiden, I don’t think—”
He doesn’t let me finish that sentence of course: he makes his move, turning to me and leaning in to press his lips against mine. It’s home. Pure perfection. Everything I’ve missed and longed for and didn’t know I needed.
It makes my chest tight. The emotions he stirs up make my head spin and pulse. I should be gutting him, but somehow I’m sighing into his embrace and deepening our kiss.
“I have to tell you something that I shouldn’t,” Kaiden whispers when he pulls away from my lips. He rests his forehead against mine but closes his eyes. I wait for him to explain, dread unfurling in my stomach, and after a beat he continues. “The game is starting soon.”
My heart swoops and sinks and suddenly I’m reminded of the reality of the situation. This is not one of the boys from my childhood that I fell in love with. I may not be able to help loving him still, but this isn’t some fairytale. He and his friends have tossed me into a nightmare without my permission, and no amount of late night heart-to-hearts are going to change that. The kiss was a mistake, a moment of madness stolen from a misplaced sense of nostalgia. Kaiden and I are too similar, too broken, to ever work together even if I could forgive him for deserting me when he promised he never would.
Sighing, I pull away from him.
“I think you should go.”
“No, please, Peony,” he begs.
“Don’t call me that,” I snap, twisting the end of my braid, annoyed.
“Sorry. Please, Odi. Don't make me leave. I promise not to talk about the game. Please…just let me stay the night. I just need the haunting to stop. One night of peace and I’ll leave you alone, I swear.”
Reluctantly, wordlessly, I agree to let him stay. I don’t know why, I really don’t. But it’s nice to have company – especially his company – again, despite everything. I shouldn’t let him. But I do. A thousand questions race through my mind, but I don’t ask a single one of them. I simply nod a beat after he reads the resignation on my face and then crawl under the covers.
“Turn the light out,” I tell him.
* * *
Several hourslater thrashing on the bed beside me jerks me abruptly from my deep slumber. I roll over to find Kaiden deeply embroiled in a nightmare. It’s a hauntingly familiar scene to me.
“Kai, Kaiden! Wake up,” I hiss, shaking his shoulder. He reacts to my touch but not in the way that used to work. He becomes more fevered, his thrashing more violent than ever. I have to pull back to avoid being hit, but I also know that he needs me to free him from his demons.
Unsure what to do, I hunt under my pillow for my phone, wondering if I should call Zie. I sure as hell don’t want to, and it would mean answering some difficult questions, but I don’t see what choice I have. Kaiden’s in deep and I can’t pull him out. It’s worse than anything I saw when we were growing up and he would sneak into my bedroom for refuge.
My fingers bump against my phone and I pull it out, pressing the button to light up the dark. Only, no light comes. There’s a light snick instead as I realise I’m holding my flick knife instead of my phone and I just released the blade.
I’m slammed down onto the mattress. Gasping for breath and winded from the weight of Kaiden’s tackle, I look up into his haunted silver eyes. He’s awake – the single deadly sound of my blade drawing him from whatever horrors he was embroiled in – but his eyes aren’t seeing me. His weight pins me to the mattress and his left hand has captured both of mine above my head. His right hand holds the blade to my throat, making my heart rate spike irrationally in excitement not fear.
“Kaiden, please.”
He stares at me, unseeing.
“Kaiden, it’s me, it’s Odile.”
