Page 42 of Cardinal House

This darkness, it creeps from him, oozing possessively from his pores, tiny, clawing whispers of smoke extending towards me like reaching fingers, and I let them in. I invite it inside of me, this piece of him, and let it make itself a home there. It feels heavy. Tears springing to my eyes as Wolf’s hands still, their grip possessive. His own eyes burning into mine.

“You’re mine, Luna. And no one is ever going to take you away from me.”

Chapter 18

Luna

The sun is like lava, its rays licking over my exposed skin. My black hair is twisted in twin French plaits, a middle parting with one on either side of my head, they hang down my back, their tails kissing my lower spine. I have shorts on my long legs, only reaching the top of my thighs, my knees and lengths of my shins pushing into the cool earth, my weight depressing the tall, dry grass in the middle of the graveyard.

I hold a large white sheet of paper against one of the crumbling headstones, and then grab a crayon laying in the grass, a green one this time, the paper already peeled off of it. I rub the side of the crayon as hard as I can with taped fingers over the paper, watching as the words etched into the stone start to appear.

A tiny smile curls one side of my mouth, pulling at the wound in the side of my head. I was careful to braid over it when I combed my hair through this morning, managing to avoid injuring myself further, but it still hurts. Pulling the paper away from the stone, I place it atop the gathering pile I’ve already made, laying the green atop a pink one, and securing it with a small rock. Then I number the corner of the paper in purple pen, scribbling the same number down in a little notebook I procured from a room gathering dust inside the mortuary.

Purple, blue and white flowers dance in the warm breeze, the overlong grass swishing with this beautiful rushing sound I feel as though I’ve never heard before. My eyes close, achy fingers gripping the grass, I tilt my head back, face pointing towards the sky, I let the sun heat my eyelids, my cheeks burning, but it feels good. The air, the sun, the beads of sweat gathering in my hairline, at the nape of my neck, all of it feels foreign, good, sacred almost, in a way I fear this will all be snatched away from me.

As a dark cloud descends in my mind, I feel the coolness of a shadow pebbling my skin, and when I look up, my eyes opening, squinting towards the sun, I see a large dark cloud has swept across it, smothering its rays, seemingly appearing from nowhere. Goosebumps smattering up my arms, I frown, a trickle of sweat bleeding down the valley between my breasts.

“I’m like a bad omen when you’re out here,” Wolf grunts broodily from behind me, his deep voice gruff.

It sends a shiver through my entire body, as though my bones should quiver with disgust, but all that rocks through my veins like an unsteady heartbeat is pure, thrilling, lust. I may not remember much about my life, apart from the fact that bananas make me gag and the smell of cigars is ingrained so deeply inside of me it’s as though I can smell them on my skin even after showering, despite there not actually being any here. But I feel like I would remember if I’d ever felt like this before.

Darkly, obsessively, infatuated.

Wolf’s shadow falls across me as he approaches, he’s so tall it’s like being eclipsed by the sun. His upper body bare, sweat glistening on every darkly tanned, olive inch of his skin. The scar over his heart is lumpy and red, but healing, and he’s going to the hospital today to have it checked.

He has silver-grey basketball shorts on, the shiny, loose fabric swishing around the tops of his knees. He wears them extremely low on his hips, that dark trail of coarse hair thickening the further it tracks down from his navel. I want to thread my fingernails through it, scrape them across his skin. Claw until the skin is lifted and pink, then red and split, blooming with blood and little beads of weeping.

Craning my head back, twisting over my shoulder, I peer up at him as he finishes approaching, a small, plastic, orange container clasped in one hand, a frosty bottle of water in the other. His knees creak when he crouches down beside me, his elbows resting on them as he squats. Weight on his toes, heels lifted from the ground, the long grass tickling the sparse, dark hair on his legs.

“You have to eat,” he says roughly, planting the open lidded box beside my crayons, a sliced apple and cubes of cheese inside of it, along with a handful of blackberries that he let me pick this morning. “And drink,” the water plops down beside it, landing on its side. His hand comes to cup my cheek, the rough pad of his thumb brushing across my bottom lip. “You’re going to get burnt sitting out here during the hottest part of the day.” The back of his other hand comes to my bare shoulder, my body trembling as his knuckles scrape across my skin. “You need more cream on,” he scowls, grunting as he grazes his hand down my bicep, curling his fingers around my elbow.

“I’m fine. I like it,” I tell him, my lips wanting to smile, but they don’t. “It feels good,” I shiver as I say it, Wolf letting the circle of his fingers slide down to my wrist, lifting my hand to his mouth, he brushes his lips across the tips of my fingers.

“Yeah?” he whispers, gently nipping the tip of my index finger, since last night out on the porch, he hasn’t been able to stop touching me. “You’re going to be alright here with me gone.” I stare up at him, blinking as he sucks the entire length of my finger into his mouth, curling his tongue around it before grating along it with his teeth, popping it free. “Haisley will take care of you.”

Haisley.

That’s Thorne’s fiancée. Thorne, the oldest brother of the six Blackwell brothers. Wolf told me I’ve met him before, at the hospital, but I don’t remember. I’ve never met Haisley, and she’s coming to stay with me whilst Wolf’s older brother takes him to his check-up appointment. I don’t really want to stay here with a stranger, but I also don’t want to be alone.

“I want to come with you,” I whisper, my eyes heavy lidded as Wolf kisses every one of my finger tips.

It would be sweet if he didn’t bite them after, replacing the kiss with a feral clench of his teeth that leaves little blue bruise marks in each. It hurts, but I like it, so I don’t say anything. He smirks at me then, like he knows what I’m thinking as my eyes drag up from our hands unto his.

“I know you do,” he looks like he’s going to say more, but whatever it is, he keeps it to himself. “But I wouldn’t leave you in danger.” His eyes are so bright out here in the daylight, the dark cloud overhead finally shifting enough for me to feel the sun’s heat once again, they look like liquid gold. “Ever again.”

He explained to me what happened, the things he knows from the moment he last saw me in the hospital hallway to when he found me in the river. I swallow hard at the thought.

What happened to me in those thirty or so hours when we were apart?

“Wol-”

“Shhh,” he interrupts, pressing his fingers to my mouth now, “don’t say anything.” Wolf smells like lilies, teakwood, rich and warm with a subtle floral sweetness. “They’re coming up the driveway now,” he tells me, Wolf says the drive from the road to the house is miles long, it’ll take them a while to arrive.

I nod, blinking hard, trying to swallow past the dry feeling lodging itself in my throat. I’m not sure if I have friends or family, but I feel uneasy, the pit of my stomach roiling with acidy sickness at the thought of interacting with anyone but Wolf.

“It won’t be for long,” he reminds me again, but I can already feel the frown wanting to settle in my features.

“You said a few hours.”