“But, of course I’ll go to Mike for a hug or some companionship, David—he’s my friend. But that doesn’t mean I’m going to forget I love you,” I said.
“Hasn’t stopped you in the past. Nay, the lake?”
“Oh, my God! Is this say whatever you can think of to hurt me day? Christ, David. You’re such an arse.”
“No, Ara.” He grabbed my arm. “I just love you. And I am so sick of losing you that the very idea of you getting in that car right now has me blinded with madness.”
I sniffled, shaking a little despite the heat. “You’re not going to lose me, David. I have to go away, yes, but I won’t let myself be with Mike. I swear it.” I touched my chest.
“Don’t.” He shook his head. “Don’t swear it, Ara; promises have never stopped you from doing what you want to do. So don’t make a promise to me, because I know you can’t keep it.”
“David, that’s a horrid thing to say.”
“I know, but—” He licked his lips, shaking his head as several sentences came to fruition, but only one came out; “Something’s different—it’s not like it was before.”
“What’s not?”
“Our love.”
The world rocked beneath me. “What are you saying?”
“Just forget it.” He turned away.
“No.” I grabbed his arm again. “I won’t just forget it. David, tell me what you mean.”
“I mean—” He towered over me as he walked closer. “All we do is fight. I can’t read your thoughts; I can’t even read your heart, anymore. Whatever the connection we used to have…” He looked over at Mike, then back at me. “It’s gone.”
“Gone?” My heart dropped into my knees. “You don’t love me?”
“I didn’t say that.” His voice softened, his eyes flicking over my face.
“Then what are you saying?”
“I’m saying I don’t trust you—like I did before. And I don’t even know why. I just know there’s something different about you, and I don’t trust it, whatever it is.”
“Different?”
“Just forget it.” He turned away again. “I shouldn’t have said anything.”
“Yes, you should.” I followed him. “That’s the real problem with this relationship, David. You never say anything. You never tell me anything.”
“Maybe I have good reason for that,” he said, walking faster.
“What reason? What have I ever done to prove you can’t trust me?”
“You never listen,” he hissed as he spun around. “You make misinformed decisions about what’s best; you let your heart control everything you do. If you would just grow up, just—” He held his hands up, shaping his sentence into a ball of frustration. “None of this would’ve happened if you were even a little bit more mature.”
“None of what would’ve happened, David?” I challenged, wearing my hands in a gesture of authority.
He ran his fingers through his hair. “Think about it. Just trace over everything we’ve suffered, Ara. It’s all because you couldn’t make up your mind—all because you have some deluded idea of what right and wrong is.”
“Deluded? Deluded! Damn it, David. Killing is wrong. That’s all I ever had a problem with. Why can’t you see that? Why do I have to take the blame for all of this, when, at any point, you could have shared yourself with me? Told me how you killed Rochelle, told me to watch out for your brother—that he might come after me. You could’ve warned me he could mind-link, saved me all this anguish for being in lo—” I zipped my words back in. He couldn’t know the truth of those dreams I had. Couldn’t know Jason ever mind-linked with me, other than the dream where he bound me.
David stepped carefully toward me, becoming taller as he grabbed my arm. “Being in what, Ara?”
I swallowed. “No one’s to blame here. Okay. Things happen, David. We can’t blame each other, or we’ll never get through this.”
He let go of my arm. “You’re keeping something from me. I can feel it.”
He stared me down, and I stared back, with the wall of everything at stake rising up in front of my thoughts, protecting them in case he got through. If he ever found out that I had loved Jason, anywhere in my heart, I’d never see him again.
“You’re right.” I took the route of deflection. “I do love Mike. And the spirit bind complicates things. But it always has. It’s never been any different.”
Mike wandered back to the car then, shaking his head. David and I watched him for a minute.
“But you don’t need to worry. I promise—” I emphasised the word he said I could never use, “—that nothing will happen between Mike and I.”
David looked to be caving, like he might take me in his arms and kiss my head. But he stiffened, becoming that hard man I’d seen a few times now, and looked over at Mike before glaring back down at me. “I wish I could take your word. I really do. But I don’t trust either of you,” he said, and disappeared, leaving me in the wake of his suspicion.
My chest heaved and my gut churned, calling up the rise of bile I’d held down all day. I folded over.
“Ara, baby, he’s just scared, okay?” Mike lifted me to stand.
“No.” I shook my head, searching the entire lakeside park for my vampire. “No. He believes it. He really believes I’m going to cheat on him.”
“Come on.” He made me walk to the car. “We’ll worry about it later, okay. You can send him a message on Facebook when we get you settled at the manor.”
“He shut his Facebook account down, Mike.”
“He did?”
“Yes. Dead people don't go on Facebook.”
“Oh. Right. Well, you can send him a text. Okay?”
I nodded, not feeling any better. “How can he have so little faith in me?”
“I don’t know, baby. But he knows you better than any of us. Maybe he’s right.” He shrugged; I glared at him. “Or maybe not. I don’t know. But, he clearly thinks very little of me, too, to think I’d ever cheat on Em. I may love ya, baby, but I’m not that sort of man. You know that, right?”
“Yeah, I know.” I looked back at the house as I hopped in the passenger seat of the car. “I’m sorry you got dragged into that, Mike.”