Gradually, the shaking of my muscles slowed and then subsided. I was left feeling completely exhausted.
Feeling better?
Yes.
Good. Get some sleep.
Want to stay like this with you.
I won’t let go. I’ll keep you here. I wasn’t sure if he would be able to do that or not, but I was fading fast and I knew I wouldn’t last much longer. Something niggled at the back of my brain and I roused myself enough to remember I wanted to ask him something.
Do you ever talk to your old roommates?
The question was random and momentarily startled him. I felt some of our link slip away so I made a small sound of protest and he came back, wrapping me in his mind. Why would you ask me that?
I thought maybe they could help.
They can’t. Stay away from them. They’re dangerous.
I didn’t care how dangerous they were. They could get me a Lucent Marble. You said they weren’t as bad as China.
No one was as bad as China. An image of Sam’s old apartment slipped into my mind. It confused me because I hadn’t been thinking of that place. Then an image of China and two guys sitting on a couch entered my mind. They were all arguing. All of their faces were screwed up in angry expressions. It was like I was sitting right next to them.
Then it hit me.
These weren’t my thoughts. They were Sam’s.
I was so closely linked with him that apparently I was seeing his thoughts. I hadn’t known that was possible. I pushed away my surprise and I tried to get a good look at the two roommates, but it was hard because Sam wasn’t looking at them or remembering them—he was looking at China. I tried turning his head to see the others, but it didn’t work that way. These were memories and they didn’t change.
Sam? I asked tentatively.
The memory faded but I was left with an idea. Yeah?
Do you know where your roommates went after you made them leave town?
It doesn’t matter. Another memory of the last day he saw them flashed through his mind. It was right after he killed China and we were walking through the woods. Both hellhounds showed up and Sam expected a fight. I could feel the anxiety Sam felt as he was worried how he would protect me against them. I tried to pay attention to their appearance, but all I could really note was that they both had dark hair and dark eyes. Beyond that, Sam barely registered them. He was too busy thinking about defending me and sending them on their way.
But there was something else, too.
A sadness. He once liked these guys. But they were too volatile, and having them around me was a gamble Sam wasn’t willing to take. So he forced them to leave.
The only people who truly understood what it was like to be a hellhound.
I barely noticed the tears that streaked my cheeks. He had given up so much for me. So much I hadn’t even known about. And now he was trapped in hell.
You have no idea where they went? I pushed.
They can’t help me, Heven. They wouldn’t. I know you’re only trying to help, but please just let it go. They’re dangerous.
Okay.
Yeah? Sam asked. I could hear the partial disbelief in his voice that I would agree so easily.
Yeah. You won’t let go of our link? I wiggled beneath the blanket, wanting closer to him, knowing it was impossible.
I promise.
I relaxed into him, concentrating on only him. If I really tried, I thought I could catch a hint of his deep scent.
Just the hint of his scent made me feel better than any nasty drink Gemma could concoct. I pushed back the guilt that crept into my mind. Guilt over the little peek I took into Sam’s mind.
Without knowing it, Sam had given me exactly what I had been hoping for. Just to be sure, I called up the image one last time before falling asleep. It came easily and I smiled.
That information wasn’t going anywhere. My photographic memory wouldn’t forget what I saw.
Chapter Three
Sam
Water at night is an abyss. It’s a never-ending blackness that one must push through, and though I’m the strongest swimmer possible, tonight I feel like my limbs cut through sand. Yes, I can see in this dark, murky water, but I don’t want to. I want to close my eyes off to what I just did, because it was horrible and wrong.
Yet, I would do it again.
Before pushing off the bottom of the lake, I glance back once more. Long blond strands of hair float out around a shockingly pale face. A face that was once beautiful, a body that was once full of life is now sentenced here in this wet world of shadows. Her only crime was that she looked like the girl I love.
Heavy with guilt, but full of determination, I push away from the body. As I go, ripples in the water cause it to shift and move. One of her hands seems to float out away from her, reaching toward me, almost pleading. Don’t leave me here. Don’t I deserve better in death?
Yes, she does.
But it’s too late for her.
I turn away.
My eyes opened and stared up at the black ceiling. So much darkness, so much shade. I could feel the tendrils of evil reach out to me. It was hard to concentrate, hard to feel when I was remembering the sinful things I’d done.
I sat up, brushing away those thoughts. The only way darkness would wrap itself around me was if I let it. I had too much to live for to let that happen.
But some of us weren’t that lucky. Some of us hadn’t survived. Like Andi. I kept thinking of her. I was being haunted, it seemed, by the things I’d done, the bad things. Whether it was the darkness’s way of taunting me, showing me that I do belong here, or my conscience trying to tell me to make amends, I don’t know. All I know was that it was increasingly harder to feel at peace with myself.
I felt unsettled. Guilty. Dirty.
There was a girl at the bottom of a lake because I dragged her there. Yes, China is the one who killed her, who defiled her body and took away her life. But how was I any better? I hadn’t allowed her one dignity in death. I sentenced her to a watery grave. An eternity of solitude and unrest. And what of her family? The police tagged her as a runaway and said she’d be back. But her family didn’t believe that. Her boyfriend didn’t believe that. I used to pretend to not see the hollow look in his eyes and the forlorn faces of her friends in the hallway at school.
She wouldn’t. They would whisper at school. Andi wouldn’t leave like that. She liked her life. She loved us.
The last weeks of watching Logan suffer, the sleepless nights, the gut-gnawing worry over his wellbeing… is that what her family felt every single day since that night? Does her mother go into her room and sit, wondering what happened to her child, knowing in her heart it was something bad?