Hidden (Hidden Series Book One) (25 page)

I dressed as she cleaned and exchanged my
sheets for a fresh pair. Like he was waiting on her to leave, Nate
knocked on the door seconds after she vanished. I opened it. Not
Nate.

Emma smiled, and I managed to return it.
“Happy Birthday,” she said.

“Thanks.”

“I’m being used for my hands,” she said.
Nathan came from behind her on four legs. I kneeled down to pet
him. The smile was genuine now. I hadn’t seen him in his
friendliest form in days. Perfect. I didn’t need to confess
anything to this Nathan. I just needed to scratch behind his
ears.

“Hi there,” I said.

“Hope you have a nice birthday,” Emma said
handing me a folded square of paper. She skipped away, and I opened
the note.

“Good morning, babe. Follow me,” I read.

He ran down the stairs and to the kitchen
door. I opened it for him. There was another note on the table.

I hope you like pancakes
.

I petted him again and sat at the empty
table.

“He’s so lame,” Paul said, walking out of
the kitchen. He sat a plate of pancakes in front of me. “He agreed
to do my chores for a week if I went along with this.” Paul pulled
another note out of his pocket.

How am I doing? I thought you deserved some
servants this morning. In case you’re wondering why I’m not me, I
knew you’d convince me to sit and eat with you, and this is all
about you. You’ll see me later. How’s that for anticipation?

“I’m actually glad to see you,” I said,
leaving out why. He’d given me more time.

Emma giggled and closed the door behind her,
a pitcher of orange juice in her hands. She curtsied and poured me
a glass. “My lady,” she said. “This is very cute, by the way.”

“Yeah. Oh, how was the ball?” I asked.

She jerked her head towards the kitchen. “I
didn’t dance,” she said. I frowned. Paul must have not asked her.
“But I didn’t get chased out with pitchforks. I’d give it an A
minus.” We laughed, and she went back into the kitchen. Nathan ran
in behind her.

I ate the pancakes quickly. None of them
were exactly circles, more like lopsided splatters, but they were
good. After, I realized I should’ve eaten slower and made breakfast
drag. When this birthday surprise was over, I had to tell Nate
about my powers and my troubled mother.

“Dessert,” Paul said, sitting a bowl of
strawberries covered in whipped cream in front of me. “Not that I
ever thought Sparky was cool, but he’s lost any chance of it now.
Poor guy.” He pulled another note from his pocket.

Hey, babe. When you finish breakfast, I
have something for you in your room
.

I eased each strawberry into my mouth
slowly, delaying the inevitable. Emma took my dishes at the sink
when I’d nibbled each one to the stem. I crept upstairs. My door
was open. I searched for him, but he wasn’t there. He’d made a path
to my bedroom with pink flowers leading to another note on my
bed.

Happy Birthday, Chris. I don’t have to tell
you that I have no money, you know that. And here is where I resist
the urge to mention that you’re far too rich to be bothered with
someone like me (I just failed). A girl like you deserves the
world, and I hope to be able to give it to you one day, but today I
have breakfast and flowers from the garden of our next-door
neighbor. Don’t worry, I grabbed them last night. No one saw.

Thank you for being my girlfriend. I
can’t believe I get to kiss you. Oh, by the way, you’re a great
kisser. And I know you’re the only person I’ve ever kissed, but I
can’t imagine it getting any better. (This is where you resist the
urge to roll your eyes). Okay, Happy Birthday again. I’m glad you
were born, and all of those people who could’ve told you Happy
Birthday over the years and didn’t missed out. Now, they’ll have to
fight with me for your attention on every March 2
^nd
from now on. It’s my favorite day now. Without
it, there would be no Christine to make my life perfect.

I put the letter on the bed and wiped my
face. This made it official, I was going to wake up any moment now
and all of this would have been a beautiful dream.

“Happy Birthday,” he said in my ear. I
didn’t turn around, I didn’t want him to see me crying. “Do you
hate your cheap gifts so much that you wanted to cry?”

I shook my head, still caught up in his
words. I didn’t even think Catherine and Raymond were glad I was
born. I’d bet that March 2
^nd
sucked for them. I didn’t
fit into their love story. I was Juliet’s little complication
before she stabbed herself.

He forced me to face him, and I smiled. At
least he was happy I existed. God, I needed it to stay this way. He
lifted my chin and kissed me. His lips were so soft and warm, two
things I’d never be able to let go.

My heart squeezed a little. I sounded like
Catherine, obsessive and dramatic.

He chuckled against my lips. “You taste like
pancakes and strawberries,” he said.

“Did you make them?” He nodded. “They were
perfect. Just like you.”

“The fact that you are completely deluded
works largely in my favor.”

We laughed and fell naturally into another
kiss, a deeper kiss, from my impossible boyfriend that I had so
much in common with. We both didn’t belong in our families. His,
cold and unwelcoming. Mine, full of the kind of love and passion
that ends in death and leaves a child alone to worry about the
enemies they left behind.

As his lips pulled at mine, slow but
electric, I remembered a feeling that seemed so distant now – a
constant numbness I hadn’t been able to shake until I met him. My
heart and been cold and dead, but now it felt like lava slushed
inside of it. Alive and in love.

I wanted to tell him. The words were close
to spilling out, too soon, but definitely true. Just like my
mother, in love way too fast.

His lips slowed, moving to my nose then my
forehead. When he gave me a moment to rest, I yawned. I’d been up
all night.

“Sleepy?” he asked. I tried to say no with a
kiss. I missed his lips, and it landed awkwardly on his chin. He
chuckled. “Take a nap, baby. I have three times the chores to do.
Part two of your birthday will begin when you wake up.”

“Part two? I’m up. I’m ready.” But I said
that leaning against his chest with no energy at all. He picked me
up, pulled off my shoes, and tucked me in bed.

“See you later, Chris. Sweet dreams.”

I was in the cabin built for one again in my
dream. I rolled over in bed and bumped into Nathan. His beautiful
eyes fluttered open.

“Morning,” he said. I opened my mouth to say
it back, but he was shirtless, and my mind went blank, forgetting
everything but how to kiss him. “You know how this goes, babe. If
we don’t get up now, we’ll be here all day.”

He crawled out of bed, threw on a wrinkled
white tee, and picked me up. He carried me to the table set for
one. I sat in his lap as we ate breakfast in the quiet house.
After, we went outside to the forest I’d crept through with the
birds. He tossed a little rock at me and ran, starting a game of
chase. I ran through the beams of light the sun cast through the
trees. The black birds hopped around me as I tried to find him.
They were chirping, laughing, so was he in the distance.

Pure white butterflies fluttered around me.
When they cleared, he was there. We kissed in that beautiful
moment, and he took off again. I bumped into him seconds later. He
stalled, peaking behind a tree, not at all in the mood to play
anymore.

“Shhh,” he said. He crouched in front of me.
My heart pounded as he pulled a knife from his back pocket. “Come
out! I dare you!” The bush ruffled in front of us. “Go inside,
Chris!” he ordered.

I ran for the door just as a huge man in
black leather revealed himself. Nate charged and tackled the
hunter. They wrestled in the dirt, grunting and growling, until the
hunter went limp.

“Who’s next?” Nathan yelled. “You’ll never
get her as long as I’m here!” He wiped the bloody knife on his
white shirt. We waited, both listening for the sounds of another
hunter. We only heard the forest. For some reason, it felt like our
forest, like we lived here and had been living here for years,
alone and secluded and waiting for danger. Just like my
parents.

We went into the cabin and cuddled in the
chair in front of the fireplace.

“It’s okay, baby. You’re safe. It’s my job
to make sure of it every day,” he said, rocking us. “I’ll kill a
million hunters to protect you. All that matters is that we’re
together, Catherine.”

Nate disappeared, and I was in the chair
alone. I walked through the house, looking for him, wanting to yell
at him for calling me her name.

I jumped. Two bloody bodies were lying in
the hall. A woman with dark curls covered the man completely. I
inched closer, crying, and kneeled so I could see her face.

“Mom?” She didn’t answer. “CC?”

I nudged her shoulder, and her body flipped
over. I gasped. It was more than a resemblance. Her face was the
mirror image of mine, and her hand was on a knife that was through
her stomach.

I looked over to see Raymond and screamed.
He wasn’t my father, and that wasn’t my mother. Nate and I were
bloody and dead in our little home.

“This isn’t real. This isn’t real,” I said
until my eyes opened in my room. I wasn’t relieved to be out of the
dream because most of my dreams had some measure of truth in them.
Just this week alone, I’d dreamed of leaving school and I did, that
same day. The night after I kissed Nathan in my sleep, we’d kissed
for hours in the living room.

I got out of bed, fighting tears. Even the
beautiful parts of the dream were frightening. Nate and I lived
alone and secluded. That could come true. He couldn’t have a normal
life with a copy for a girlfriend. And a hunter interrupted our
happiness in the dream. That could happen too. That could happen
now.

I thought of Julian with purpose then,
wanting to hear something about the man who ruined my parents’
lives. I heard nothing.

I’d slept the whole day away. The sun was
setting in my room, marking the end of the day and the grace period
I’d given myself.

Truth time.

I knocked on his door a few times. No
answer. I searched the house. The living room was empty, and the
doors to the dining room were closed.

I went into the kitchen and found Remi
sitting on the counter, eating an apple.

“Hey, birthday girl,” she said, then rolled
her eyes.

“Hi.” I craned my neck to see if they were
out on the patio. Empty.

I turned to leave, but I heard something –
buzzing in the house for the first time.

“Were you in my room?” she asked. I didn’t
answer or turn around. “Of course not. You're not stupid enough to
steal from me. Not again anyway. I told you to stay away from him
and you didn't. So I guess we'll be scrapping soon. The panther
versus the witch who hates magic, should be interesting.
Unless
you're interested in sharing him.”

She laughed, a cackle too close to Sienna’s.
I shuddered, straining against the part of me that wanted to
strangle her.

“He's definitely interested. He told me so
last night when we spent two hours in a cramped storage closet
together.” I spun around. Her face lit up like I was doing exactly
what she wanted me to. “No one was really interested in us, so we
had time to slip away. Get to know each other a little better. I
bet he didn’t tell you about that.” The clatter around her grew
louder. “He has trouble keeping his hands to himself, doesn’t
he?”

I hunched my shoulders, finally giving some
form of a response.

Nate hated her. She smelled like bad milk,
so I knew she was lying, but I wanted to hear for myself. Because I
could now, I listened to her thoughts.

Look at her squirm
.
What else
could I say about Sparky? As if I’d ever let that dog touch me. I
just need to get her angry.

Get me angry? She didn’t like Nate?

And around that noise, I heard her devising
a plan to make me think they’d had sex while I was sleeping. And
deeper than that, in a voice with more tenor, more seriousness, she
wondered if that plan would get her what she wanted.

What she wanted?

Now I knew how they spotted hunters. I’d
been staring at her dead on, wrapped up in her thoughts, for nearly
a minute.

She took another bite of her apple and
smiled at me.

Damn, she can really stare.

I forced my eyes away then.

“And his lips! Leah, I can see why you were
being so slutty with him the other night. He really knows how to
bring it out of you, right?” she said. I tuned that out. What she
was saying without words was more interesting.

Why is she always so calm? This is annoying.
Oh, I know. I could run upstairs, grab my phone, and steal his
boxers. That would do it. I’ll scare the shit out of her and get a
picture of it.

Not today. I’d been scared enough.

I walked to the island and grabbed an orange
from the fruit bowl. That wasn’t enough to show her that I wasn’t
afraid. She was on to my bravery stunt. She smiled and bit into the
apple, slow and dramatic.

I’d show her dramatic. I opened the drawer
like I needed a knife to peel an orange. As I grabbed it, I
wondered how Catherine would handle one of these. She’d trained to
be an agent for years. I assumed that meant she used to fight. I
wondered if she’d made
me
good with a knife.

I threw it in the air, feeling certain
before I tossed it. It flipped several times then I snatched it. My
hand landed perfectly on the handle. The innate hunter in me
twirled the knife around my fingers, and I rammed it through the
center of the orange as I stared her down.

“I’d had enough after the hair in your
soup,” I growled. “You can’t imagine how tired I am of you, Remi.
If I were you, I wouldn’t tempt me.”