Devil Inside (10 page)

             
“I understand,” he said simply.

             
“Shouldn’t we call the police or something?” she asked, finally looking up at him.

             
“No,” he answered flatly.  Harley opened her mouth to protest but Levi interrupted her.  “We need to stay here.  No one knows about this place and shouldn’t be able to find it.  I don’t know if those Burners were after me or you, or even Jamie, but they’ve got our scents now and it won’t be hard for them to find it.  If there are Burner’s really after one of use, those two’s friends won’t be far behind them.  I heard sirens as we were leaving which means someone called the police.  There’s just too much attention on the scene right now—we would be risking our own lives as well as the lives of others if more Ignis were to come looking for us.  They aren’t likely to find us here.”

             
“But the police are going to want to know what happened.  They will want to know what happened to me!  People are going to think I’m dead—or, Jesus!  They might think I did this!”  Harley could feel the panic rising again.

             
“Calm down, OK?  We will deal with all of that soon.  Right now, you need to rest.  Collect yourself and we will figure out what to do.”

             
Harley wanted to argue but Levi was right about one thing.  Whether the Ignis were after her or Levi, if they went back and—IF Harley believed him—they decided to attack again, they could be endangering anyone who was in the way.  Not to mention the fact that—IF Harley believed him—she didn’t want to face more “creatures” or whatever they were.  Her nerves were shot and now that the adrenaline was wearing off she could barely think she was so tired.

             
Harley slid herself off Levi’s lap and he let her go.  Using the table and the chair that Levi had been sitting in, she pulled herself to her feet.  He didn’t help her stand, but he stayed close, spotting her in case she fell again.

             
Harley looked down at herself, assessing the condition of her clothes and skin.  “I really need a shower before I can sleep.”

             
“Of course.  The bathroom is on the left.  There are towels and everything you need in there.  I’ll find you something to wear while you shower.”  He seemed relieved to not have to tell more of his story and Harley was relieved to not have to hear any more of it right now.

             
She started to walk away but Levi’s voice stopped her.  “I’m sorry,” he said simply.

             
“Me too,” she answered wearily, turning away and escaping into the bathroom.

             
In the bathroom she pulled her clothes off, carefully, trying not to touch the bloody parts anymore than she had too.  She climbed into the shower and turned the water on as hot as she could stand it.  She sat underneath the stream, letting the water wash away the blood and winced when the water sprayed against her skinned knees.  She watched as the “man’s” blood washed off and mixed with her own blood before draining away.  Now that she had cried out the pain she felt numb.  She considered what Levi had told her.  It was an unbelievable story—but did she believe it?  It seemed a part of her had already decided to believe it.  She was still here.  Had she completely disbelieved it she would have ran out of the house or found some kind of way to get away from Levi at least.  She certainly wouldn’t be taking a shower, preparing to stay the night with an insane man. 

Harley wondered if there was even a remote chance that she would have believed him if they hadn’t been attacked.  She tried to picture hearing this story not having just been attacked by two strange madmen.  Not having just seen her best friend killed.  She didn’t deny that it could be the reaction to the attack, or the alcohol or maybe even her tender feelings toward Levi that made her want to believe his story.  Regardless, she didn’t feel in danger from Levi but she wanted to wait until some of the shock had worn off before she made a final decision about his character.

              Harley could tell that the bathroom door had opened because of the cool draft that drifted into the shower.  She didn’t say anything, preferring to let Levi think that she hadn’t realized he had come into the room.  She didn’t know what to say to him and wanted to avoid talking any more for now.  She could see his silhouette through the shower curtain as he laid a stack of clothes on the closed toilet lid and left the bathroom quietly.  She remember all the times that Jamie had burst into the bathroom while she was showering—to ask her questions, to tell her something funny or ask her opinion on something.  They were the kind of friends who didn’t need boundaries.  The loss of her friend left a raw wound in the middle of her chest.  She didn’t know what she was going to do without Jamie.  Who was going to be the voice of reason for Harley now?  Her last connection to a real family was gone.  Harley pushed the despair down, only allowing herself to deal with small bits at a time.

             
Harley pulled herself to her feet, resolving to deal with the madness of the night as best as she could.  She quickly washed and shut the water off.  Levi has left a large tee-shirt—obviously one of his—for her.  It was a black tee-shirt with a tribal looking pattern on the front.  She thought it was a band’s logo but she couldn’t remember which band.  He had also left a pair of boxer briefs that looked—hopefully—new.   Both pieces of clothes were too big for her, but were vastly better than the blood soaked clothes she had been wearing, which were no longer crumpled on the floor.  Levi must have taken them away.

             
When she left the bathroom she found Levi pulling the curtains carefully closed over the windows.  He looked over his shoulder at her when she stepped out.  “You can have the bedroom.  I’ll sleep on the couch.”

             
“Why?”

             
“I just kind of figured you wouldn’t really want me sleeping with you.  You haven’t figured out if I’m a crazy person yet, right?” he asked somewhat regretfully yet reasonably.

             
“No.  Not really,” she answered honestly.  She took a deep breath, “but you can sleep in the bed too.  I guess if you were going to kill me, you would have by now.”  Levi sensed what she refused to admit.  She didn’t want to sleep alone.  Sleeping with a potential psycho—yet non-dangerous person—was better than sleeping alone right now.  Not when every time she closed her eyes she saw either crazed, glassy eyes—or sad pale green ones staring back at her.

             
“Sure,” he nodded.  “You go ahead and get in bed.  I’ll finish locking up.”

             
Before turning to the bedroom she surveyed the small cottage again.  “Where are we anyway?”

             
Without looking at her Levi answered vaguely, “Just one of the many places the Praesidio use for Nocte shelter.”

             
Harley didn’t press for more details, the words Praesidio and Nocte threatened to send her head spinning off her shoulders.  Instead, she shook her head and turned towards the other door leading off the main room.  She opened the bedroom door to find a spacious bedroom with a large and comfy looking bed.  She didn’t even care that her hair was still wet; if she didn’t get into bed soon she would collapse on her feet.  She climbed into the bed and turned away from the door.  The mattress was soft and she sank into it gratefully.  A few minutes later she heard Levi come into the room and shut the door behind him.  He climbed into bed facing her but saying nothing.  When she didn’t move closer to him he reached out and pulled her across the bed to his chest and she let him.  She gave in and wrapped a leg over his hip and tucked her head under his chin.  She sometimes wished she didn’t feel so comfortable with him but she couldn’t deny that she did and right now she needed some comfort.  Neither Levi nor Harley spoke, preferring to let the silence carry them both off to sleep.

Eventually, Harley felt Levi relax as sleep overtook him.  She wondered if it was because dawn was approaching.  She didn’t know if he had to sleep during the day not.  She was surprised at how easily this line of thinking came to her; she realized that a part of her really did believe him.  She was a little envious because she didn’t think she would ever be able to sleep again.  Every time she closed her eyes she came face to face with the horror of what had happened.  Harley forced herself to focus on the tattoo on Levi’s arm.  She tried to make out the intricate lines and details.  She now realized that the symbols and pictures were probably more just art or fancy designs.  They seemed to have too much pattern and detail to be random.   She could see black eyes and black flame intertwined with swords.  She wanted to touch the pattern carved into his skin but she resisted the temptation.

Harley tried to distract herself by focusing on counting the breaths that she took like they were sheep.  She concentrated on making sure each breath was drawn in and held in for the same number of seconds.  While at the same time she alternated between feeling trapped by Levi’s arm across her body and comforted him next to her.  Finally, Harley had forced herself to relax enough and hypnotized herself enough that sleep pulled her in and she drifted off to fitful dreams.

Harley opened her eyes slowly.  She felt like she had been hit by a train, and all the reasons why came tumbling down like bricks from the sky.  First the pain in her knees flared when she stretched her legs out, pulling at the raw skin.  She wanted to believe Jamie’s death had been a horrible nightmare but her brain had enough of avoiding the truth and didn’t hold back as it flashed through the events of the night.  Harley drew her legs up into a fetal position and gritted her teeth again the tears that threatened to spill.  She took several deep breaths, forcing the pain back down.  She refused to give into despair.  If she let go and let it all come crashing down, she felt like she would never find her way back out of it.

Harley rolled onto her back and realized that Levi was not in bed with her anymore.  The room was dark and she couldn’t hear any sounds from the rest of the cottage.  Sitting up she was startled to realize that she had slept for over twelve hours.  From lack of light around the edge of the curtains she could tell that night had already fallen.  She took stock of her condition this morning.  Her entire body hurt and she felt as if she had slept fitfully the whole night.  Her body was heavy with too much sleep but her brain had come awake too quickly for her to have ever really been deeply asleep for long.

Harley rubbed her face slid out of bed.  Levi wasn’t in the main room of the cottage either.  She stumbled around until she found a note that he had left on the refrigerator.  He had left to collect some things that they would need from the store.  He asked her to not leave before he got back.  She didn’t know where he thought she would go; they were in the middle of nowhere and she didn’t have a car or a cell phone.  She had dropped her purse with the rest of her bags the night before and hadn’t taken the time to pick it up before fleeing.  Harley found a can of soup in the kitchen among some other random nonperishable food.  She didn’t know how long Levi would be gone and she was starving.  Apparently, her body had used up all its reserves in self defense last night and now it needed to replenish itself in a desperate kind of way.

The first few bites of food brought a painful kick to her stomach.  It had been a long time since she had eaten and her stomach was still dealing with her nerves.  Her hand shook as she spooned broth and noodles to her mouth.  She knew it wasn’t just nerves that caused the tremors.  She felt raw and broken, inside and out.  As Harley ate she reviewed the things that Levi had told her the night before.  The logical part of her brain determined that he was crazy.  If he really believed this stuff then he belonged in a mental institution.  On the other hand, she couldn’t deny that there was some truth to his story.  And there were things in the world that people couldn’t explain.  Maybe this was one of them.  She needed to create a plan of action to bring some kind of order to the chaos.  First thing was first; she needed to figure out what she was going to tell the police about the night before.  Then she needed to figure out if she was still in danger.  And she definitely needed to get some more answers from Levi.

After putting her bowl in the sink she went to the bathroom to wash her face and see if she could find something to brush her teeth with.  She looked in the mirror and barely recognized herself.  Despite having gotten so much sleep during the day she looked like she hadn’t slept at all.  Her dark green eyes were blood shot and she had dark bags under them making her look older than her twenty-five years.  Her entire body was sore and her skinned knees burned.  She looked through the cabinet until she found some peroxide and used toilet paper to clean the scrapes.  Afterwards she paced around the main room of the cabin trying to figure out what to say to the police but questions for Levi kept interrupting her train of thought.  She alternated between pacing and trying to sit calmly as she waited for Levi to return.  Her entire body crawled with anxiety and she could never sit still for long before needed to get back up and continue pacing.

Night was well established before she saw headlights heading towards the cabin.  She followed them to the back door and peered cautiously out the window to make sure that it was Levi.  It was—Harley was surprised by how relieved she was to see him.  He wasn’t wearing the “special-ops-all-black” anymore.  Instead he was wearing jeans and a long sleeved red tee-shirt with a black ski cap.  Casual was a good look for Levi and she was surprised by how attracted she still was to him despite the fact that he was a potential psycho.  It was like her body was trying to distract her and focus on the nearest thing that wasn’t pain.  She smirked and shook her head at herself.  Keeping careful watch on his surroundings he pulled a large duffel bag from the cargo area along with several shopping bags.  Harley unlocked the door and held it open for him giving him a small smile that he returned.