Page 43 of Heir of Ashes
Chapter 15
I awoke sprawled on top of Logan. Well, not really. Only half my body was. My head was cradled on his shoulder, one arm around his broad chest, and one leg slung over his. Before I could quietly extricate myself, I realized Logan was awake, his fingers gently combing through my hair in soft, soothing strokes.
My heart skipped a beat, then went haywire, suddenly out of control. He paused, no doubt having sensed it. I made to move away, and his arm tightened around my shoulder. Not the one stroking my hair, but the other one hugging me to him.
“I’m not going to hurt you,” he murmured, resuming his gentle stroke from the top of my head to the middle of my back. “Relax.”
I did the exact opposite—I stiffened.
Pausing again, he asked, “Do you want me to stop?”
“Yes,” I answered instantly, my voice barely above a whisper.
“Why? Am I hurting you?” he asked in a reasonable tone.
My automatic yes was on the tip of my tongue. But it was a lie. I knew it; he knew it. His body was warm and solid and smelled faintly of soap. I knew if I moved away, he wasn’t going to try to stop me again. Besides, maybe my heartbeat wasn’t racing entirely out of fear. I relaxed a bit, and that was all the permission he needed. I closed my eyes and let myself enjoy the soothing caress of his fingers.
***
When I awoke again, Logan was no longer in bed. I stretched, yawned, and curled up again. I was relaxed, contented. I burrowed into my pillow and glanced casually at the alarm clock, bouncing out of bed in one leap. It was half past three in the afternoon!
Why the hell did Logan let me sleep this late? Why didn’t he wake me? Where was he? Had this been the plan—let me sleep so he could … what?
I padded barefoot to the half-closed closet and noted Logan’s bag was still there, but that didn’t mean shit. With a calmness I didn’t feel, I checked the bag with the JCPenney logo. The blueprints were still there. All seven of them. Alright, I exhaled softly. Hello there, paranoia. He hadn’t bailed on me. I left the bag with the prints inside the closet. Just then, I noticed the laptop on the desk. He wouldn’t leave that behind.
I recognized relief when I felt it. I didn’t want it. Sooner or later, one of us would leave. Getting attached was not in the plans. A friend would be nice to have, but this slight crush, coupled with the mistrust we each felt towards the other, would never help a friendship flourish. Besides, just because he stroked my hair until la-la land didn’t mean he wanted a friend.
Back in the PSS, I read a book called The Internal Wolf by a famous psychiatrist who wrote that emotionally-starved people tended to cling to the first person who showed them a shred of compassion. Was that who I was becoming? Was I so starved for compassion that I’d take it from a werewolf/vampire I didn’t even trust?
The ding of the elevator and approach of light footsteps intruded on my thoughts. It was Logan. I just knew it. I dashed to the bathroom, aware—and denying—that I wanted to be presentable before Logan saw me. It was a primal instinct, born thousands and thousands of years ago, passed down from female generation to female generation: vanity. Something I thought I had lost a long time ago. Turned out, it had been dormant, waiting for the perfect moment to resurface.
This wasn’t the perfect moment, damn it.I chastised myself even as I carefully shaved, then generously slathered the complimentary lotion over my legs.Fuck it, Roxanne. This isn’tthe time,the reasonable voice inside me chastised. I scowled at the mirror. Why not? Because I was bruised and patched with stitches? Because it was Logan? Because I was still trying to run and hide? Probably all the above, plus timing, I told myself, examining the stitches along my hairline. From a certain distance, they could be mistaken for hair, but the faint green bruise surrounding it was another matter.
I cinched the bathrobe tight, making sure there was nothing exposed that shouldn’t be, before leaving the bathroom to gather some clothes. My eyes zeroed in on Logan without my consent, lingering on his broad shoulders. He sat at the desk, clicking and typing on his laptop. I wasn’t sure if I was relieved or disappointed when he made no move to acknowledge my presence. A little of both, maybe.
What the hell is wrong with me? Get a grip, Roxanne, and get it fast.
I grabbed the first pair of jeans and a black sweater, some matching underwear—the new set I bought the day before—and crossed back to the bathroom to get dressed. My eyes moved back to Logan and zeroed in on his screen. What was that? I dressed in a hurry and returned to the desk. I came leaning to get a better look, and he changed the image to another one before I could make sense of it.
“What’s that? Where were you?” I asked, looking at him.
He hadn’t shaved today. He was dressed all in black: black long-sleeve cotton t-shirt and black jeans. It gave him a dangerous look. I looked away. I didn’t want to be caught staring. Again. He clicked on some folders and began downloading thumbnails without answering.
The first image was of a blonde girl, wearing some kind of school uniform. She might have been seven or eight, and she was smiling at someone who didn’t show in the picture. Logan clicked, enlarging the image, then turned to watch me.
“What?” I asked, taking another closer look at the girl, then shook my head. Something about her nagged at me, but … nothing. “Should I know her?”
Instead of answering, he showed me another photo. This one was of a blond man in a black business suit. Again, I found Logan watching me expectantly. I shook my head again. Whatever it was he wanted me to recognize, I wasn’t.
The third picture was of a forest-green BMW. The next two were closer pictures of the vehicle, showing the driver, a blonde woman, and the passenger, the blonde girl. Even before Logan clicked and enlarged the image, recognition jarred me. For a moment that felt like an eternity, I felt numb. Empty. A second passed. Two seconds. Then feeling slammed into me so suddenly, so hard, I had trouble breathing.
Hers was the image that haunted my nightmares and my dreams. An image I could draw with my eyes closed. That woman was my mother. The same blonde hair tied in a high ponytail, the same straight nose. She hadn’t changed much … except for the hair. Where it once bounced off her shoulders, it now seemed to be as long as mine. From this angle though, it was hard to tell for sure. If she’d aged, it didn’t show.
Logan clicked, and a closer image appeared, taken from another angle. This close … yet so far … A tightness gripped my chest, a heavy weight pressing against my lungs. Gone was all the anger and resentment of the past decade, leaving behind the joy, the longing. The love. Along with a tiny bit of doubt.
Who was that child? The gears in my mind began to turn. Without my prompting, Logan returned to the first image, the one where the child was smiling off camera. Now that I knew where to look, I could see the resemblance. The same pale complexion, the same large almond-shaped eyes. Although her eyes could be a dark brown instead of black like mine. Like hers. The little girl was my sister. I had a sister.
And then the implications hit me, cold and sharp. I had been replaced. The girl looked like an average seven or eight, but she could easily pass as a small nine. My mother had moved on. And the child looked like a miniature of her. That was what my subconscious had recognized. I might have inherited my mother’s black eyes, but everything else came from my father: the dark hair, the height, and even—she’d told me once—the bone structure.