It wasn’t exactly true. Before Kyan had come to Estwood, Dylan had been a lot more sociable. It had been a long, hot summer of drinks on the beach, parties, sports. He was more than comfortable in a group of people – as long as those friendships remained surface-level.
He’d laughed, he’d played in the college rugby team – extremely carefully and right up until he’d hurt someone badly enough that they had to go to A&E. He’d even flirted with the edge of drunkenness on many a night out since basically nothing could break through his un-turned Empyrean tolerance. Since then, however, the close brushwith the Wake had made him suspicious, cautious, and closed him up tight as a suture.
Still, a flash of interest went through Callum’s dark eyes. While it might seem like Dylan had baited the other Empyreal’s curiosity, it felt more like the other way around: that Dylan had been baited by Callum, by being interesting enough that someone like him would even want to hear more. Dylan could almost mistake it for genuine intrigue.
But nothing Callum did was by accident. Evidenced by the damn phone number he’d slipped in Dylan’s pocket. Each digit marched through Dylan’s mind on a constant loop. He would find himself reciting them when he was wrist-deep in too many kneads of dough, or dusting pastries, only to realise he had no sugar left in his sieve and he’d been standing there for ten minutes.
He didn’t want to stand here and talk. He wanted to pace. He wanted answers. He was already anxious enough about the Wake’s hunt order and the blood-laced secrets that had drawn them all back together.
Except Verin still wasn’t done with the samples and had kicked him out of the library for lingering around and ‘distracting him with all the tense silence’.
‘It will take Verin hours, maybe days,’ Callum said. ‘I wouldn’t hound him, he might bite you.’
Dylan’s eyes narrowed.
Callum smiled slowly but closed his book. ‘Can’t sleep?’
Dylan looked for an out, but as much as he wanted to stalk away, something rooted him in this gothically luxurious room with the Empyreal he’d been barring from his thoughts since last November.
‘No,’ he said instead.
‘Is the memory mining preventing you?’
There was no annoyance in the question, only a seriousness that surprised him.
‘No.’
‘You got any more words in that pretty mouth, Dylan?’
Scorching heat bled through him and he fought the urge to say it again.
Callum’s laugh was a caressing rasp. ‘Whatdoyou remember?’
‘Shockingly, I don’t want to talk about it. It’s a bit harder than you’d think, digging out a traumatic memory to replay over and over again.’
His family had helped him unwind after each session, reminding him what was real and what wasn’t; that he was safe. They even tried weeks with breaks in between. But every time they checked in, he wanted to check out of the conversation, finding himself mentally and emotionally removing himself from the memory, which was no doubt making it harder.
Callum’s eyes remained on his, undeterred. ‘I can imagine.’
Anyone could have said it, but the tone and the serious look … Callum knew very well what it was like.
Dylan found he didn’t like the idea that something could shadow those eternally glinting eyes. Couldn’t imagine this eloquent, powerful man as anything other than those things.
For half a moment, he almost allowed himself to explain his standoffishness, his difficulty. But how could he explain the kind of subtle, drowning panic that rose when Bells gently tried to take him back to that night? That he could barely stand to look at her innocent face as the veins in her eyes darkened like a slow wave of blood crossing over them?
Blood.
Had there been much blood that night? What if there had been a knife in the blurred fight? What if he had to watch it like some horrific repeat performance? The stabbing, again and again. What if the blood of their mother had spattered over him and he’d blocked it out?
He couldn’t see the moment of her death. Just that figure. Huge and unyielding and overpowering.
Something stronger than fear chased up his throat. An awful kind of despair.
He couldn’t help her, even though he’d screamed to, even though—
‘Hey.’
Callum had risen and come closer, what looked like genuine worry flittering across his features. Dylan schooled his, slamming a wall down on the memories, the old, unshed tears. He hadn’t cried since that night. Not really. Callum might be able to hear his heartbeat increase, scent the sweat misting his palms.
