Page 3 of Dark

Which was why there was no way I could tell her about the empty field east of town. Or the twenty-three goodbyes I recorded for her on my phone. And most of all she could never, ever find out about the last message, the one I found when I woke up in my car, sick and shaking, and had to cut the duct tape from my wrists with a piece of broken glass.

Realizing all the while she would never be safe as long as I was still around.

I blinked. Raindrops streaked down the windshield, blurring until they sparkled like fireworks. My index finger twitched. I gritted my teeth.

“Hayden?”

A spasm jolted through my wrist, causing me to drop the phone. Retrieving it, I punched the button to end the call.

I had no words for the sick, chemical need that had leached into my skin as the moon rose two nights ago. Or for that hour that would forever be etched in my memory where I’d driven in circles, tears streaming down my face. Searching. Starving. I wished there was brain bleach for the minutes I’d spent parked in the back of that strip mall lot, waiting for that lone person to walk out to their car, unable to explain what I was doing, some depraved part of me understanding when they left.

And something compelled me to follow.

At the last second, I managed to swerve off the road. Puked in the grass. But the thoughts didn’t stop. They weren’t mine, that much I knew. I would never hurt someone. And yet pulsing in the base of my skull, relentless as a migraine, that silent command thrummed. My heart raced. My fingers shook from the need to root around in the floorboard and find my keys. Pull back onto the highway. Find someone else.

Instead I fished around in the center console until I found the roll of duct tape from fixing the gear shift and the knife Meera insisted I have on hand, just in case. As far as what happened next… I didn’t want to die. Tears streamed down my cheeks as I wound the tape around my wrists, not allowing myself to think beyond the certainty that I couldn’t unwillingly do to someone else what had been done to me, that I couldn’t risk the possibility I might break free, drive home, and hurt Ellie.

And that meant I had to make sure. A single shallow cut. Ensuring I could do it only as a measure of last resort. I promptly blacked out from the pain. It was only when I awoke sometime later curled in the front seat, still shaking with raw, feral hunger, that I realized the flow of blood had stopped. That my skin had somehow knit itself back together while I slept.

That just like in fairy tales, I was now the monster who couldn’t be destroyed.

Rain plastered my hair to my cheeks the moment I stumbled outside. Across the street, the lights from the lone business still open blurred in and out of focus.

Dark was your typical retro-hipster coffee bar, serving commuters desperate for a caffeine fix on their way into Austin and locals searching for an after-hours hangout. Funky, recessed lighting. Stained concrete floors. Built-in bar by the window. Tables tucked in out-of-the-way nooks for the writers who didn’t want to be disturbed. Indie rock or demos from the new bands playing the club scene down in Austin piped in while you were waiting in line for your double espresso. Dark even had an open mic night every other Thursday that drew a decent crowd for coffee and dessert.

But what made Dark different from every other coffee bar out there was Ethan Caldwell. Local legend said he once poured a Texas longhorn in a paper to-go cup for the coach of the UT football team. At fourteen. I’ve never doubted it. Ethan was amazing when it came to pretty much any kind of art. He hated it when people crowded the counter with their cell phones out and started snapping pictures of his coffee creations before the steamed milk could dissolve into the espresso. But who could blame them?

Your typical coffee shop fare like hearts and tulips, he poured so many times a day, he no longer had to look. It was his signature art that drew people into Dark, the images that got shared and tagged and spread out over social media. The delicate snowflakes sprinkled with cinnamon he made every December for the Yule Festival. The skull I watched him pour for a little girl on Halloween. Swans and angelfish and celestial moons. And one time even a wonderfully detailed finger flipping the bird just for his brother Brody.

If anyone would have taken the time to pour latte art fifteen minutes past close, and in a freaking take-out cup, it would have been Ethan Caldwell.

I leaned around the corner, trying for a better look.

Which was when I saw her.

She was one of those girls who looked like she needed three hours of prep time just to run something out to the mailbox. Flat-ironed hair the color of prairie grass. Bubblegum-pink puffy vest. Designer boots suited only for roughing it in an air-conditioned mall. She let that pale, perfect hair spill over the counter like she was in a shampoo commercial. I swallowed, suddenly feeling like I’d been punched in the sternum, the low, familiar rasp of Ethan’s answer threatening to send a hand clawing in to rip out my heart.

I leaned closer, trying to hear what they were saying. My stomach knotted at the sight of their fingers brushing alongside that stupid paper cup. I sucked in a sharp breath. Ethan’s head whipped towards the door. Quickly, I flattened myself against the wall.

Stupid. Stupid.

Beside me, the bell on the door jingled. I jumped back just in time to avoid getting flattened. Shampoo Commercial Girl climbed into her candy-apple red jeep and bumped out onto Pecan with a perky salute of taillights.

The music from inside abruptly shifted to AC/DC, one of their older albums, loud enough to rattle the windows. A second later, the side door by the dumpsters banged open. I jerked back. Ethan Caldwell emerged in a black Dark apron, skinny jeans and his favorite charcoal-gray Cage The Elephant tee. At twenty-five, he’d lost the angular appearance he had as a kid, his lanky frame hard and defined. His face was dark with beard growth, hair mussed as if he’d been running his hands through it all day.

He chucked the garbage bag into the dumpster, and I caught sight of the leather cuff circling his right wrist. Something knifed through my chest, the unwanted memory of warm fingers and a pen trailing slowly over my skin forcing its way to the surface.

From nowhere, angry tears stung my eyes. Furious, I swiped them away. I knew coming back was going to feel about like slamming my head into one of the painted iron cows down by Lady Bird Lake. This time, I swore I wouldn’t let myself get dragged down.

For the record, I killed my own spiders, played guitar in an all-girls rock band, and would eat a salad only if it was slathered in something that actually tasted good. Growing up with a father who broke one promise after another taught you pretty fast there was no one you could depend on but yourself.

I swore the day Ellie and I woke up to find him gone it would be the last time I allowed myself to get attached. Promises were too easily made. And I wouldn’t let myself be discarded again.

The clouds shifted overhead, the wind whispering shhhh-shhhh as it stirred soggy leaves at my feet. Hands contorting into claws, I raked at my hair, long, dark strands tangling in my fingers. Moonlight skittered over the wet pavement, dizzying and lucent as a flashlight beam. My heart thudded like a sledgehammer, sick, shaky pangs of hunger swirling like poison in my blood.

Ethan started back across the parking lot, worn Vans sloshing through puddles on the asphalt. I staggered forward, a garbled whine choking in my throat.

The door slammed shut. He appeared in the window seconds later, mop in hand, tossing chairs up onto tables.