I thought back to the school washroom. “Megan’s eyes, they were black, and she was so strong.” I whispered for fear that she or Maggie might somehow hear me.
“Did she hurt you?”
“No, not physically. I think she’s possessed. Her eyes turned black, like Sammy’s had and … .” My mouth dropped open.
“What?”
“They looked the same as Maggie’s had, when she went psycho on me in the bedroom at the Inn on my first day at work. Sammy’s connected with them. Maybe the witch has put a spell on them.”
I rambled on, suddenly on the verge of becoming hysterical; all the while I held on to the thought that Marcus had just told me he loved me. Although my heart still bled, I felt the wound mending. A smile tried to dissolve my frown, but it wasn’t strong enough to lift the corners of my mouth. I couldn’t allow his heart to break any longer. I loved him too.
“Brooke, Megan lied, and I don’t care what’s written on this paper.” As he said it, he crumpled Maggie’s letter into a tight ball and threw it across the room. “It’s obvious that the three of them are in this together, or maybe it’s like you said, Maggie has put a spell on them. Please believe me, Brooke.”
“I think Evan is one of them, too.” I relayed to Marcus the last words Evan had spoken to me and told him how the pendant had turned cold.
Marcus ran his fingers through his hair. “I guess that doesn’t surprise me. He’s been acting strange lately.”
“Marcus, I’m so sorry about tonight. I was having such an awesome time until I went into the washroom. I’m sorry I believed her, but it was Maggie’s letter too. Marcus, we can’t ever be seen together, she’ll … I love you too much to risk your life.”
When I realized what I’d said, I took a deep breath and held on to it. A warm feeling shot through me and surfaced in my cheeks. My gaze wandered, unseeing to the room on either side of him before finding his eyes again.
I watched as an adorable smile lit up his face, dissolving the darkness in his eyes.
“You love me?”
I nodded. “Yeah, I do. The nightmares … I felt the love every time you came to me, even though I hardly knew you. The light you brought, it was love.”
He nodded.
I looked down at my hand, at the picture I was holding of the two happy people with no idea at that moment that their doom was near.
“Just like Claire loved Christian,” I said.
“How do you know Claire loved Christian?”
“How can you not know when you look at this picture?” I patted the area over my heart. “I just know they loved each other.”
I flipped to the back of the picture. “1912; the same year that was carved into Claire’s gravestone. The same year she died … .” My voice trailed off sadly.
“It must have been awful for Christian.” Marcus turned his body so he could look at the picture with me.
“I feel their love, but I also feel a deep sadness, and it touches me,” I said.
He took the picture and studied it closely. “No wonder they were so much in love. Claire was beautiful. Just like you.” He kissed the top of my head. “Will you stay for a while?”
I nodded. “I’d really rather not be home when Sammy gets there.”
“You can stay here as long as you like.” He pulled me by the hand to the sofa.
“Oh, I’m sure your parents would like that.”
“My parents are really cool. They wouldn’t care if you stayed.”
“Well, I have to go back eventually, so Aunt Rachel doesn’t call my mom. If I get into any more trouble, Mom and Dad will probably send me to reform school.”
Marcus grabbed a remote off the coffee table. With the press of a button, he created the illusion of flame in the electric fireplace, which was set into the wall of beach stone that separated the two walls of windows. He tossed the remote on the table and slouched into the cushions on the sofa, offering himself to me as a pillow. I laid my head on his lap, facing the fireplace, and curled my legs up.
The moon was hidden behind the clouds, peeking out occasionally. The faux flames gave the room a cozy glow. Marcus stroked me like a kitten, from the top of my head down the side of my body and over again.
“I’m sorry I’m such a mess. If only you’d known how I was from the start, then you could have avoided me.”
“Brooke, I’d have taken you however you came.”
“I’m broken.”
“Then I’ll fix you.”
“What if I’m unfixable?”
“You’ll still be mine. And I’ll still love you, just as Christian loved Claire.”
“Claire was damaged too, you know. She was a witch and they killed her. She was only sixteen—my age.”
“You’re speculating. How do you know how she died?”
“Something Sammy said to me on the day I moved here. She told me an old story about two young lovers who were murdered on Skull Island.”
“Yeah, I know that one.”
“Well, we saw the bones in the well; you know, where we found the pendant? But there’s something I forgot about.”
“What is it?” Marcus asked, running his fingers through my hair, making it difficult for me to concentrate on the story.
“When we were in the well, I had a vision.”
“A vision?”
“Yeah. Remember when I blanked out, after you first found me?”
“Oh, so that’s what was happening when you were staring off into space.”
“Right. Anyway, I saw a boy and a girl, about our ages, chasing each other playfully through the woods. The scene was a happy one, until. Oh, my God!”
“What is it?” His hand stopped in the midst of twirling a strand of my hair between his fingers.
“I just remembered something. Some people came out from behind the trees and grabbed them. But what I hadn’t remembered, connected until now, was that the people were dressed in black robes. I didn’t know it at the time, but the happy couple had to have been Claire and Christian!”
“Well, that was then. You’re not Claire. You’re Brooke, and you have me to protect you, not Christian. And technically, we don’t know that anyone is a witch, although we definitely know that something weird is going on. Remember, I felt the warmth when we opened the trunk, and the energy when we both touched it. I also saw your cuts heal with my own eyes.”
“What a tragedy it was, they were both murdered. It’s so sad.”
“It’s obvious that Claire’s your ancestor,” he said.
“And Christian’s yours. It would be too much of a coincidence otherwise.”
“I know—the Day and Knight thing.”
I flipped myself over onto my back so I could look up at Marcus. With an urge I couldn’t resist, I lifted a hand to the front of his shirt and pushed it off his shoulders. I trailed my fingers down his arm until I found the double spiral tattoo. His muscle was hard beneath his soft skin. In my other hand, I held the pendant. A smile lifted the corners of my mouth when my fingers on both hands tingled. After a few seconds I held the pendant out to him.
He closed his hand around it and smiled back.
Suddenly, I needed to be closer to him, so I pulled myself up until I was sitting on his lap, the upper half of my body twisted to face him.
With an intensity that I could feel fluttering in my stomach, we stared into each other’s eyes.
“I’m glad you came for me.”
Before he could answer, I lowered my mouth to his. My hands gripped his hair, and I pulled myself tightly to him. One of his hands lay perfectly still on my leg, the other pushed against my back.
I wasn’t sure what I wanted. But I had to be close to him, really close. In my chest, my heart bled. In my head, a jumbled mess of emotions raged. I needed to be fixed, and he’d said he would fix me.
“I love you,” I whispered against his lips. His reaction was to wrap his arms around me and bury his face in my neck.
“I love you,” he
said back, his voice more emotional than I’d expected.
“I want to stay here tonight,” I said, cradling his head in my arms.
He pulled back to look at me. “Are you sure?”
I nodded.
“Then call your aunt and tell her you’re somewhere safe and you’ll be home tomorrow, so she doesn’t have the cops out looking for you.”
I pulled my cell phone out of my bag and sent Aunt Rachel a text instead; that way I wouldn’t have to talk to her. When I was finished, I turned the phone off and tossed it aside.
“Where were we?” I asked.
“I really think you should get some sleep. It’s after twelve and a school night. Let me tuck you in.”
“You’re not leaving?” I looked at him, suddenly scared.
“No, of course not. I’ll be right beside you, but you’ve had an emotional night and I just think that—”
I ended his speech with a kiss. I kissed his closed eyelids and brushed my mouth against his forehead. “Take me upstairs,” I whispered against his cheek.
He surprised me by pushing himself into a standing position with me still on his lap. I wrapped my legs around his waist and my arms around his neck and let him carry me up the log staircase.
When he stopped beside the bed, I unfolded my legs from around him and slid down. The rug was soft beneath my feet.
We were in the loft, one large room with a log railing and a view of the great room below. I understood now why the windows in the front of the house were two stories high. I imagined the view from the loft would have been breathtaking, had it been daylight.
My body was very much aware of Marcus standing beside me and tingled all over. I looked at him, almost playfully and said, “Let’s go to bed.” And then, to my horror, I yawned. I had to admit to myself that I was really tired. Marcus turned down the bedding. I pulled off my sweater dress and let it drop to the floor. My impulse made me feel awkward as I stood there in my bra and underwear.
Marcus turned and looked at me questioningly.
I lifted my hands in the air and said, “I’m not going to sleep in my clothes.” As if such a thing was unheard of. “Are you?”
He accepted my challenge and slipped out of his jeans and shirt, then turned down the soft blue duvet. Satisfied, I climbed into the big, soft bed, parking myself in the middle under the dim glow of the skylight.
I couldn’t believe the turn of events that had led me to this moment. A couple of hours ago, I thought my life was over, and now, Marcus was climbing into bed beside me. He loved me, and I loved him.
Megan’s acid words rang in my head, temporarily ruining my happy moment. “Maggie will hurt him,” she’d said. But why would Maggie hurt Marcus? Was it just to punish me because, for some unknown reason, she hated me?
I couldn’t think rationally. I was spent. Marcus yawned, making me yawn again.
“You see? You’re tired,” he said.
He rolled to his side, facing me. His leg slid across mine. I lifted my head from the pillow, so that my lips could find his in the near darkness. With our legs intertwined and our arms wrapped around each other, we kissed softly. His hand caressed the side of my body, while I explored the hills and hollows of his. The kiss changed, becoming more determined. Marcus’ lips became rougher on mine, his moans gruffer. I heard myself moan, and I needed air, but I wasn’t letting go. Then I heard his breath catch and felt him stiffen.
Marcus rolled off of me and onto his back. His chest heaved. He ran a hand through his hair.
“What is it?” I asked, breathless.
“I’m sorry,” he said in between breaths. “I didn’t mean to get carried away.”
“It’s okay,” I assured him, “you didn’t.”
He rolled back to his side to face me and picked up the newly glistening pendant, hanging down the side of my arm, and placed it back on my chest, and then he pressed his hand on top of it. My heart beat fast beneath his palm.
“Listen to me,” Marcus began, “you’re too special to take advantage of.”
“But—”
He shushed me with a finger pressed to my lips. “I mean it.” Then his finger traced the line of my mouth.
“You wouldn’t be taking advantage of me.”
“I would feel like I was.”
I sighed and laid my hand on top of his. “You’re really special, Marcus.”
“It’s because I love you so much. You mean much more to me than … .” He paused and changed the direction of his speech. “I mean, here you are in my arms. What more could I want?”
I smiled at my good fortune. “Well, good. Consider tonight a test then and you passed.”
He laughed.
I reached over and touched the smooth skin on his face. “I love you, Marcus. I’m so glad we met.”
“I love you, Brooke.”
His lips touched mine in a good-night kiss. I rolled over and pressed my back to him.
“I’m glad you’re fixing me.” I yawned, stretching my mouth until my jaw hurt.
So far, he’d removed the dagger from my heart and stitched me up roughly, but the turbulence still raged on in my head.
Chapter Twenty-Four
The next morning, I lay in bed staring out of the uppermost panes of glass into the fog—so much for the view.
I cuddled Marcus’ pillow close to my body while my mind wandered back to everything good that had happened between us in the short time since we’d met. I struggled to hold on to the new memories, however; they became obscured by the darkness.
Marcus was freshly showered when I came downstairs and into the kitchen area. He made us toast and hot chocolate for breakfast. After we’d eaten, and I was sure Aunt Rachel and Uncle Jim had gone to work, he took me home so I could clean up and exchange my dress for jeans.
“I should tell you,” Marcus said as we cruised through the patchy fog and up the shore in his boat, “Uncle Edmund is really old.”
“How old?”
“No one in the family knows for sure, but he has a Harvard diploma hanging in his hallway with his name on it dated 1916.”
“That’s old.”
“Yup. Of course, it’s highly unlikely that it’s really his, but we humor him.”
“Oh, I get it.”
We broke free of the fog and came into view of a slender strip of land, one of many islands that dotted the bay here.
“Yeah, he’s a bit eccentric. To the public, he acts old and confused. To the family, his mind seems young and sharp. We can’t figure him out. We think it’s just an act that he seems all confused around others, but we don’t know why.”
I wondered how he would act with me there.
A flock of seagulls took flight when we neared the wharf, only to return to the pebbled shoreline once the boat’s engine cut.
We walked down a sun-bleached wharf. Its last few planks were buried under a thin layer of sand, transitioning the wharf into a well-worn sand path. Farther up the path, cut through a hedge of wild rose bushes, an inviting opening awaited. A once-white gate, which hung from its bottom rusted hinge, had broken some time ago and lay open.
A vegetable garden spread out before us on the other side of the broken gate. In the middle of the garden stood an older gentleman with a thick crop of wind-blown, granite-colored hair. He held a bunch of freshly picked carrots in one hand. Perched atop the roof peak of a gray-shingled Cape house with a faded yellow door, two seagulls eyed us curiously.
We walked up the sand path in silence, stopping at the edge of the garden. Uncle Edmund didn’t hear us approach. He stood with his back to us, mumbling something inaudible. Marcus greeted him in a low voice, so as not to startle him.
“Hi, Uncle Edmund.”
Nothing. He didn’t turn. It looked as though he was counting the bunch of carrots he’d picked.
Marcus looked at me and shrugged. “Must be going deaf.”
We took a few steps closer. Marcus stepped in front and in a louder voice said, “Hi.” r />
Uncle Edmund’s hands flew up in the air, scattering the carrots over the garden. I jumped back, just as startled. Marcus grabbed one of his uncle’s arms to steady him.
“It’s me, Uncle Edmund, Marcus.”
“Wha … who?” Uncle Edmund steadied himself, picked his glasses up from a cord around his neck and put them on. “Oh, it’s you, Marky. Why didn’t you say so? You almost gave me a heart attack.”
Marcus looked at me and rolled his eyes. I suppressed a laugh.
“What brings my favorite nephew all the way up here?”
“I brought someone I want you to meet.”
“What? You brought someone? Who did you bring?” His tone had picked up an edge of panic.
Uncle Edmund spun in his tracks. Once he had me in his sights, he steadied himself. The intermittent breeze had blown strands of hair across my face. I pushed them away and tucked one side behind my ear. All of Uncle Edmund’s movements ceased, even his breathing seemed to stop. I couldn’t read his expression. I looked from him to Marcus, my eyes widening slightly.
“This is Brooke,” Marcus said, slightly louder than he’d spoken the first time. He came and stood beside me.
His uncle gazed upon the two of us with a look of awe.
“Amazing,” he said.
Marcus shook his head. “What’s amazing?”
Uncle Edmund blinked, narrowed his eyes back to a normal size and came out of his trance. “Do forgive me … .” He fumbled with his words, as if trying to remember what Marcus had called me.
I thought I’d better break the ice. “Hi, I’m Brooke. It’s nice to meet you.” I flashed him a smile.
“Brooke.” He said my name as if he were amazed at the sound of it on his tongue. He straightened his body from his slouch and cleared his throat. His eyes became more alert. A more refined, older gentleman stood before me now.
“I am very pleased to make your acquaintance, Brooke. Won’t you please come in?” He turned and walked toward the house, his head held high.
I glanced at Marcus, totally confused.
“You see? He does that when he feels completely comfortable around someone. Totally changes from befuddled to sharp and agile; although, I’ve never seen him change so quickly without knowing the person first.”