AllFreeNovel
Share Us
“It’s a warning to the other three.” He said that without any laughter in his voice, which had me choosing to pretend it was a joke.
I said goodbye and hung up afterward, ready to end the conversation.
“Charming guy.”
Char’s voice made me jump, and when I looked over, I realized he’d taken a seat beside me at some point during my conversation.
“Hayden said I could call people,” I rushed out.
“I know.”
“So why do you look so annoyed?”
“I always look like this.”
“Not always.” I thought back to his smile, to how damn nice he’d seemed at first.
He sighed and bent one leg, then set his arm on that knee. “You know, one of these days you’re going to realize that nice isn’t always best.”
“I’m not asking you to be fake nice. It would just be great if you didn’t act like you hate me.”
“I don’t hate you.” His words came out so soft that I turned toward him, unsure I’d heard him right.
“Could have fooled me.”
“I pretend to be nice because it greases wheels and smooths things over. It makes life easier when you give people what they want. You’re different.”
“Lucky me. I just don’t have anything you need enough to pretend, huh?”
He shook his head but didn’t look my way. “Why haven’t you told your sister and the Quad about us? About what’s really going on? If you did, they’d come out and help.”
“If I did, they’d kill you all.”
“Like they’d be the first people to try. That can’t be the whole reason.”
I sat there for a moment, the sun making me sweat, my brain working through everything before I offered him an answer. “I’ve lost most of the people in my life that mattered to me. I lost my mom, my father, my sister, the bodyguards. Even if I’ve gotten some of them back, in some way, I still went through losing them. If I told Nem what was going on, if I told her about Lorien, she’d rush out here. Whether it was safe or not, what the dangers were, those things wouldn’t even occur to her. She’d show up here ready to destroy Lorien.”
“And? Last I checked, she seems more than capable of doing that.”
“In California she is, where all her power is. Here, though? She’d be at a disadvantage, especially because Lorien knows about her. He knows who I am, so he’d see her coming. I can’t lose anyone else, especially not because they were protecting me.” I thought back to that night, to when my father had pointed that gun at me. “When my father shot me, Nem had been ready to take the bullet. If she could have, she’d have thrown herself in front of me without thinking about it. Too many people value my life above their own, even though I’m nothing special.”
“Nothing special, huh?” He snorted as he asked that, his tone that sarcastic mocking that he so often used.
“I’m really not. I grew up around people smarter and tougher than I was. Nem came fromnothingwhen she came back for me, nothing but her skills and her backbone and she toppled the strongest crime family on the West Coast. Everyone around me has always been amazing, and me? Even when Hayden and I were attacked, and I had the gun, I couldn’t pull the trigger.”
I blew out a long breath full of frustration. “I’m weak, and other people always end up paying the price for that. So, no, I’m not going to call my sister and have her risk herselfagainfor me. I can’t handle anyone else getting hurt for me, not ever again.”
Char said nothing, staring up at the house along with me. I’d expected him to tell me I was wrong—that was the usual response.
Char never did the expected thing, though. Instead, when he spoke, his voice came out incredibly soft. “Do you know why I started pretending to be other people? It was when I turned seven. I was getting shuffled from foster family to foster family, usually because people said my attitude was hard to deal with. I watched other kids get picked and settle down, and you know what? They were all sweet. They smiled and they said the right things and they never got angry. Me, though? No one wanted me. So on my seventh birthday, when I was sitting alone at a café with a candle I’d stolen from a supermarket stuck in a cupcake that I’d saved up to buy, I finally realized that the world doesn’t want real. I became what others wanted, then. I smiled and became the perfect little angel. The next year, on my birthday, I sat at the table with my new family, with the cake they’d made for me, and it proved everything I thought. The world didn’t want the real me.”
His words burned, made me think about all the times when I’d chastised him for not being nicer, when I’d wanted the him he’d shown me that first day. I’d done the same thing, basically, had proven to him that the real him wasn’t good enough.
So I leaned to the side until my arm pressed against his. “I won’t deny that it’d be nice if you liked me—even a little—but I don’t want you to be anyone other than who you are.” I let my head rest against his shoulder. “Because this guy right here? He’s not so bad.”
Neither of us spoke again, letting the sun and the scent of the flower and soil fill the space instead.
These little moments between disasters made it all worth it.
