The Game Series (37 page)

The monsters in my mind then were much less worse than the ones I faced daily. They were nicer than the monsters I still face now.

I roll over, leaving the light on, and bring my knees to my chest. My thick blankets cover me the way my thin ones used to, and I curl up the way I used to under the bed. My need to protect myself, to protect my body outweighs all else.

In my mind, I am five again.

And we’re back to it.

Another day of lies. Another day of pretending. Another day of wishful glances, discreet smiles, and banter with an underlying meaning only we understand.

Another day I have to remind myself that we
chose
this. We chose to be secret and not tell Braden. I’m just not sure how much longer we can keep it this way. Someone will find out eventually no matter how careful we are.

Hell, Kay and Lila are already halfway there.

“Just tell me who,” Lila begs me. “I won’t tell anyone, I swear.”

“It’s not a big deal. It was just one night. You guys are always telling me I need to get some, and I have, so leave it at that.”

“You’re kiddin’ me!” Kay exclaims. “I want the details!”

“Maybe I don’t want to give you the details.”

“Maybe I can keep buggin’ the shit out of you until you give them to me.”

“Maybe I still won’t give you the details.” I shake my head. “Seriously, you guys, I’m not giving you what you want.”

Maddie grins. “Stubborn.”

“No, just private.” I wink.

“Boring,” Lila counters. “Boring is what it is.” She sighs. “I and Maddie have shared our deets before, Kay has given us enough to write a damn book, and it’s only you left to share – which you haven’t this year. At all.”

“There’s nothing to share!” I protest, ignoring the guilt at lying yet again. I know full well there’s a
lot
to share. “It just happened. It’s not going to be mentioned again, so there we go. Conversation over.” I check the time on my watch and grab my books, standing up. “I have to get to class. I’ll see you later.”

“What are you hiding, Megan Harper?” Lila yells after me.

I shake my head, chewing the inside of my lip, and keep walking.
Nothing,
I want to yell over my shoulder.
Aston,
is the word that crawls up my throat. I stay silent, making my way through the few people still milling through the hallways laughing and joking.

I turn the corner to the stairwell, and Aston is standing at the bottom of the stairs. I double-take as he looks around the empty area and walks toward me. His eyes find mine. His broken, weak eyes. My stomach knots, and I’m relieved when he wraps his arms around my neck and buries his face in the hair falling around my neck.

My arms slide around his waist, and I hold him with the tightness he holds me, trying to ignore the heavy, deep breaths he’s taking. Trying to ignore the heaving of his chest and the shaking of his body. He nudges my hair aside and kisses my neck softly, breathing in deeply. I pull my face back and look into his eyes. He blinks once and dips his head. His whole body tenses when his lips crush mine and he’s shaking with more than just his pain. He’s shaking with the need to let it all out but not being able to. He releases me suddenly and walks the way I just came.

I stare after him, my heart feeling like a lead weight in my chest as reality sinks in. He said I make it better, take the pain away. I’d bet anything he spent the night tormented by his past, by the nightmares and flashbacks he tries to run from. Telling me on Saturday, then the conversation with his Gramps on Sunday must have been the trigger.

And five seconds is all I get to hold him. Five risky, stolen seconds and one desperate kiss is all I can have to take the pain away.

I shoulder my bag and head up the stairs to class, unable to take him off my mind. All I can see in front of me are his eyes. Even as I sit at my desk and open my books, the words blur and I picture the pain etched onto his face. I picture the scars I’ll never understand.

Because he was right. The worst scars are the ones you carry inside, the ones you hide from the rest of the world.

But I don’t have the scars. I lived a happy, sheltered life in a nice area, a million miles away from the reality of some people’s lives. The most horrible part of my childhood was my mom filtering my reading material and the best when Nanna told her to give it up and let me read what I wanted. I’m naïve and blind to the lives of people outside my own. I know this now, and I’ll never understand Aston’s pain. I’ll never understand the things that circle his mind each day, the words that poison it.

“‘Hell is empty and all the devils are here’,” my professor quotes from her copy of
The Tempest
, the words slashing through my musings. “A powerful statement – and very potent in a time where belief of the devil was very real. What did Shakespeare mean by his words?”

“He meant exactly what he said,” I say, my eyes focusing on the fifty-something woman pacing the front of the room. “‘The devils are here.’ Whether or not he believed in God he would have believed that each of us have free will as the bible teaches us – the free will to be either good or evil. The people that chose to be evil, to steal, beat, murder, they were the devils. They still are.”

“So you agree, Megan?”

“How can you not? I’m by no means religious, nor do I pretend to be, but I’m not blind to the world. If there is a God, a greater good, then there must be a devil and a greater evil to balance it out. The greater evil is in the people sitting on both death row and a park bench. If there is a hell, it’s most definitely empty. Ask anyone who has been unfortunate enough to come into contact with one of those people and has demons of their own left over. They’ll tell you that the devils are here disguised as one of us.”

“So you’re saying you could be sitting among devils and not know it?” Her eyebrow raises and she pauses in her pacing.

“You walk among them daily, whether or not you realize it. We all do, and we probably know someone that has demons inside their mind and not know it.”

My professor nods, moving onto someone else.

Demons. Just like Aston has.

Demons from the evil that spawned them.

Shakespeare was right. If there is a devil, he’s definitely on this Earth.

~

Green-gray eyes. Chestnut brown hair with a hint of copper. Nice broad shoulders and the lingering of a summer tan on his skin. And as boring as a lecture on psychics in a monotone voice.

Which, in fact, could be what he’s talking to me about right now.

I’m going to kill Lila for this one.

“I’m sorry.” I come back to the here and now. “What did you say?”

He bristles a little. “Did you listen to any of that?”

“Um.” A slight flush rises on my cheeks. “Not really. I’m sorry. I’m not great company right now. I have a few things, er, going on.”

“Do you want to talk about it? It helps, you know.”

Dude, I can’t even remember your name. I’m not about to tell you my life story.

“No, no, it’s fine. Thanks.” I attempt a smile through gritted teeth, hoping I’m a better actress than I think I am. “Maybe we should just finish up here.”

“Sure.” He waves toward the counter for our small bill, and I swallow my relieved sigh. He pays it despite my protests, and we step outside. “So, Megan …”

Oh, no. Please don’t.

“Mm?” I hope I don’t look as worried as I feel. Crap. I’m a terrible person.

“I know you’re not in the right kind of mood tonight, but maybe we could go out again sometime?”

Shit.
“Um.” I scratch behind my ear. What’s his name?
Double shit.
“Look, I’m not sure what Lila told you, but she’s kind of setting me up. It’s not you, I’m sure you’re a lovely guy, but I’m just not looking for anything right now.”

He smiles widely and shrugs a shoulder. “Yeah, she mentioned it. It was worth a shot though, right?”

“Uh, sure.” I smile again. “I think I need to go and have a chat with her, actually. Thanks for the meal.”

“You’re welcome.” He waves as he walks away, and I begin the walk back to campus, thinking over what I have to say to Lila.

I know how it will go. She’ll demand to know why I can’t possibly have any more dates, and I’ll make up some floozy excuse that’s about as believable as me saying I’m a Vegas stripper. But I can’t do this anymore. I can’t pretend to enjoy these dates. It’s not fair on me, Aston, or on the guys I have to go out with.

I jog the final stretch to campus as rain lightly begins to fall. A shiver runs down my spine as yesterday comes back to me. Nothing can compare to the way I felt as Aston pinned me against the hood of his car, kissing me like I’m his one requirement to live.

Maybe that’s why I can’t consider anyone else, why every date Lila sends me on will be futile.

Maybe it’s because when I look at other guys all I see is him.

I shake my hair out as I walk into the dorm room. Lila looks up from her books and grins. “How did it go? I gotta say, I expected you to be back a lot later–”

“This has to stop,” I say bluntly. “This dating thing. I won’t do it anymore.”

“Why? Was he an ass?”

I shrug my jacket off. “No, he was nice. Just like the last one. Shit, they’re all nice, Li. I just don’t care about any of them.”

“Let me guess – they’re not your Mr. Darcy?” She raises an eyebrow, and I throw myself onto the bed.

“Precisely.”

“Let me help you find him.”

“I don’t need your help to find him.”

“Megs, I just want you to find someone who makes you happy.”

“I’m happy!”

“I didn’t say you weren’t but I want you to find your Darcy. I want to help you do that.”

“I don’t need your help!”

“Megs–”

“I’ve already found him!”

Fuckshitohmygod.
I slap my hands over my mouth, my eyes widening to the size of dinner plates. Why did I say that? Fuck. Fuck. Now I’ve done it. This is it. Cover blown.

Well done, Megan Harper. You absolute fucking idiot.

Lila’s eyes widen slowly and she drops her pen onto the bed. Her jaw drops open, and I feel like everything is moving in slow motion.
Why the hell did I have to say that?!

“What?” she asks. “You found him? Who is he?”

“Um. Did I say that?” I laugh nervously. “Really? Ha. Um. I didn’t. I don’t. Shit.” I fall sideways on the bed and bury my head in my pillow, my heart pumping furiously.

“Nuh-uh!” she exclaims. “You are not saying that and then just flaking on me, Megan Harper!” Her bed springs squeak and she gets up. Her hands wrap around my arm and she yanks me up. I pull the pillow up with me, keeping my face covered, but she tugs it away. I smack my hands over my face.

“Um, I lied?” I try lamely. “To get you to stop?”

“No way! No. Way. I can’t believe you found your Darcy and you didn’t tell me.”

Yeah …
“I kinda … Can’t. Tell you.” I drop my hands.

“I’m your best friend! What do you mean, you can’t tell me?”

“Exactly what it says on the tin. I can’t tell you.”

“What are you? Romeo and Juliet having a secret romance? Forever destined to be star-crossed?” She snorts, jumping back on her bed. I bite my lip, and she looks at me seriously. “Megan.”

“Um.” Is that really all I have? Freaking “
um
?”

“Oh my god. You’re not …?”

“Um.” Again with it! I study English every day and I can’t think of a better word than that? This is going from bad to worse.

“No. Oh God,” Lila mutters. “Oh God.”

“I have a right to remain silent, right?” I pull my knees up and release my lip, replacing it with my thumbnail. I chew on it for a moment as she stares at me in shock. “Like in a police interrogation? I don’t have to answer without a lawyer.”

“You are! You’re babbling. You’re such a bad liar.” She takes a deep breath and shakes her head. “I don’t know whether to hug you or slap you.”

“I plead the fifth.”

“Megs, are you and–”

“Please don’t ask me anything, Lila,” I whisper, looking at her earnestly. “I don’t want to lie to you anymore.”

Silence stretches. I swallow. Chew my nail. Tap my foot. Lila stands and paces. I chew my nail. She paces.

“Aston,” she mutters, sitting back down. “When? How?”

I shake my head.

Recognition dawns on her. “When Braden took Maddie home. And since … He hasn’t slept with anyone. He’s always with you, isn’t he? The weekends – when I’m at the frat house – he’s here. That’s why no one has seen him. Damn.” She shakes her head. “You’ve really pulled this off without anyone finding out?”

She’s not going to drop this. I know it, but this is all my fault. Time to face the music.

“Somehow. But, Lila, you can’t tell anyone,” I beg. “I mean it. No one can know. You are the only person that knows.”

“And it’s the real thing? Not just sex?” She tilts her head to the side.

I nod and trace my finger along the pattern on my quilt. “There’s more to him than meets the eye. We’re not just sex. I …”

“He’s your Darcy,” she says simply. “He’s the rain to your drought. The every to your thing. Your soul mate decided by the universe, right?”