Rachel Caine & Kristin Cast & Claudia Gray & Nancy Holder & Tanith Lee & Richelle Mead & Cynthia Leitich Smith & P. C. Cast (26 page)

I waited for him on the living room couch, staring out the front window. One hour and four minutes after he'd hung up, a dusty gray sedan pulled into my driveway. I raced to the foyer and paused to get my pulse under control. Then I pulled the door open.

Evan stood on my front porch, holding his guitar. He grinned, and his brown eyes flashed in the sunlight. I stepped back to let him in without a word.
I can do this. We don't even have to sing today
. This wouldn't go bad if I didn't let it.

“I couldn't stop thinking about you,” he whispered. I leaned against the closed door, and he stepped closer. “Every time I close my eyes, I see you. I dreamed about you.”

“What kind of dream?” I breathed, staring up at him, and my pulse became our shared rhythm.

“The best kind.” Heat blazed behind his eyes. He kissed me, and his mouth was hot. Scalding. Delicious. He pressed me into the door, and I let him, because kissing wasn't dangerous. And it was almost as good as what I really wanted. What he'd come for.

When my hands found his chest and his found my hair, when we were both breathing hard and craving two different kinds of pleasure, his mouth left mine. His lips trailed over my chin toward my ear, where his warm breath sent shivers through me. “I want to play something for you,” he whispered, and I shuddered all over.

“Now?”

“Now. Please.”

I could only nod. One song couldn't hurt, and if we didn't make room for a guitar between us, I would wind up making a whole different kind of mistake.

I pulled him down the hall by one hand, and only hesitated a moment in my bedroom doorway. I sat on the bed and he took the desk chair, his fingers moving across the frets before his jeans even touched the upholstery.

“This one's new,” he said. “When I was trying to find you, this melody kept playing through my head, and it took me a while to figure out what it is.”

“What is it?” I could barely breathe.

“It's your song, Mallory.” He smiled, and my heart beat so hard it hurt. “I'm still working on the lyrics, though.”

I was right. We're supposed to be together. We're supposed to
create
together.

This song was different from the one he'd played the night before. More hopeful, but just as passionate. Beautiful. Fresh and captivating. Was that how he saw me?

The notes rang clear, and I could almost feel Evan's voice sliding over me. Resonating within me. Filling me with precious warmth.

Then he felt the song change. Evolve. I was watching his face the moment it happened. At first it was a note here or there. This one extended, that one cut short for emphasis. Depth. Then there were fresh chords, lending a melancholy note to the beautifully simple chorus. Next came new words.

His eyes widened as he tasted the new lyrics. Testing them. Then he smiled and closed his eyes. He leaned back in the chair and kept singing. Kept playing. The notes flowed between us, tempting me. Teasing me. But I forced my eyes to stay open. If I closed them, I'd lose myself in the music. I'd lose us both. So I watched him, reining myself in. Reducing to a mere trickle the flood I wanted to let loose.

He wasn't ready for that. Neither was I.

When that first song ended, he set his guitar down and snatched a blank notepad from my desk and a pen from the jar. For five interminable minutes, he scribbled, and my heart beat to the rhythm of his pen scratching the paper. When he finally grabbed the guitar again, his eyes were bright and eager, but he was sweating in spite of the air conditioning.

That's enough
, my head said, while my heart argued otherwise. It would
never
be enough. Evan could sing to me for the next decade, and I would never be satisfied.

Neither would he. Not ever again. We would always want more.

“Are you hungry?” Food would give him energy and distract us both. “I can make some sandwiches,” I said, though that delicious warmth inside me faded a bit with each word. I headed for the hall, forcing my feet into motion when they wanted to rebel, but Evan's hand closed around my wrist.

He smiled, but his gaze was piercing. “I feel better than I have in months, Mallory. Like I have something to give. Something to say. Let me play for you. Please.”

What was I supposed to say to that? He wanted to play. And I wanted to let him.

“One more,” I said, and silently I swore the same thing.
One more, and we'll stop.
We would eat, or watch TV, or I'd find some
other
way to keep him busy, even if that meant diverting one appetite with another.

The next song was pain, raw and exposed. He bled through his notes, and I could almost see his scars. Whoever she was, she'd hurt him, and I wanted to kill her. To draw out whatever she had to offer the world, and drink her dry. Break her for hurting him.

My reaction scared me. How could I be so connected to him already?

He didn't stop to write after that one. Maybe he didn't want to remember. Maybe he knew he couldn't forget. Either
way, he started the next one before I could get up, and I couldn't stop myself. This one was remorse. His greatest regret laid bare, and I was almost ashamed to witness it. I cried with him, then kissed away his tears when his voice cracked, before they could fall on the strings. The vibrant wood.

Comfort kisses became something more, something deeper, but somehow wanting me became wanting to
show
me how much he wanted me—with a new song. I tried to argue, though I wanted the same thing, but his fingers plucked the strings even while we kissed. And when I pulled him up and took the guitar away, he sang without it. We wound up against the wall where his soft, throaty tune roamed as eagerly as his hands. And I didn't want to stop either one. I didn't know
how
to stop us. I was lost in the sound and the feel of him, and the physical element made the musical one so much harder to resist.

When he came up for air, he grabbed the guitar and pulled me onto the floor with him. He sat in front of me, his back pressed into my chest to keep me close, and temptation pulled at me mercilessly. My willpower wavered. I glanced at my alarm clock, and exhaled deeply in relief. Two forty-five. Andi would be on her way soon. I could relax for a little while. Enjoy one more song before she came.

Evan sang about a fractured relationship. About some girl who'd understood him and loved him, but resented his needs. I'd told myself I'd just listen this time. Stay out of the process. But the notes swirled through my head until I couldn't focus on anything else. I got mired in the words,
lost in the emotion, and began doling out new bits for it without even realizing what I was doing. And after that one, I forgot to check the clock.

Next came anger. The notes were violent streaks of red against the backs of my eyelids. The bitter melody scored my heart. But halfway through, something nagged at the back of my mind. Something wasn't quite right. It needed. . . .

I stood and raced into the hall. Cold silence dropped around me like dark curtains and Evan appeared in the doorway as I knelt in front of the back closet. He braced one hand against the doorframe, but I told myself he only looked pale because of the weak lighting. He was fine. He couldn't play so well otherwise.

What I wanted was at the back of the closet, propped carefully on its stand. I stood and offered it to him like sacrifice at an altar. He needed it to get through this song. To get it right. And surely one last song couldn't hurt.

Evan took the vintage Strat and studied it while I dove into the closet again for an amp and the wires. I wasn't supposed to touch the guitar. My mother saved it for special cases. For true

But Evan
was
a special case. My very first. I knew that deep in my soul.

He strummed while I hooked up the wires and the pedal, and his smile was so bright I almost didn't notice the lines around his mouth. The creases in his forehead. It wasn't getting bad yet. He just needed to rest, after one more song. . . .

Evan knew exactly what to do. The crunch and squeal of the electric guitar painted my room with his anger, slashed through pain and into fury so skillfully I couldn't breathe. At some point, my phone rang, and when I considered opening it, I noticed the sun was on the wrong side of the house.

Andi was late, but she'd be there soon. Everything would be fine when she got there. Any minute. . . .

After that, things got fuzzy. My head swam with melodies. Time lost all meaning, and my bedroom began to blur around me. Only the music remained in focus.

Evan became his music, and I knew him through his songs. Every note, every lyrical verse, tugged at my heart; each crunchy riff ripped through my soul. He showed me what he wanted and what he feared. What he loved and what he needed. And I drank it all in. He poured himself into the music, and the music poured into me.

Then, suddenly, he stopped, and there was only panting. Wheezing. His face scrunched in pain, a bitter reflection of the raw emotion he poured into his music. It was the song. It had to be. The song hurt him, but it was better to drain the wound, right? To let it all out, so he could heal. Stopping would be the worst possible thing for us both, right?

“What's that pounding?” The guitar sagged in his grip, as if he'd lost the strength to lift it the moment he stopped playing. But we'd only done a few songs. Right?

I shook my head, trying to clear the fog, but notes bounced around in my skull, obscuring all logic with terrible, unfathomable beauty. I frowned when his dull gaze
finally came into focus. Had his cheekbones always been so sharp?

The pounding came again, and someone shouted my name over and over. “Mallory, open up!”
Andi.
I glanced at the clock. Nine-oh-eight. At night? No wonder it was dark.

I trailed one hand down Evan's arm on my way to the hall, and as I passed the mirror, I saw that my eyes were fully dilated. Literally. The brown in my irises had been swallowed by my pupils, and black bled into the web of red veins.

Oh, shit
. No. It couldn't have gone so far already. Everything would be fine. Andi would fix it.

When I opened the door, she gasped, staring at my eyes. Then she brushed past me,. “I left my phone in the car and Carl made me work late. But I've been calling you for
three hours
. I drove by your work and the mall. Hell, I even tried the school.”

“Told you where I'd be. . . .” My words came out slurred, and I frowned in confusion. “In the email?”

“No, you just said Evan was coming over. You didn't say where. Mallory, what did you
do
?” But she took off toward the hall without waiting for my answer.

“We're meant for each other, Andi. I took what he had and made it more, and he fed it back to me, and it was
so good
.”

Andi turned on me, eyes narrowed in anger. She shoved me into the wall by my shoulders and held me there while the world swirled around me, notes hanging on the air. “You're drunk.” Disgust dripped from her voice in thick, bitter drops, but beneath that, there was

I heard it. I know envy like bees know honey. I cultivate it. I drown in it. But not this time. This time I was full of beautiful music, glutted on pure art, and I did it without her. That's why she was really mad. This time
she
was cold, and angry, and forgotten.

“Damn it, Mallory!” She let me go, and I followed her into my room. Her scared little gasp slid into the silence.

Evan sat slumped against the foot of the bed, his thin hands gripping the guitar. His veins stood out all over, like bruises tracing his body. His cheekbones looked like they'd slice his face open, and his eyes had sunk into the dark rings of flesh around them.

“No!” I dropped onto the floor next to him and cradled his face. “Evan? Say something.” He groaned, and I turned to Andi. “This isn't possible. It happened too fast. It was just a few songs.”

“Does this look like a few songs to you?” she demanded, flinging out both arms to take in the entire room.

Shocked, I stood and looked. For the first time in hours, I really
looked
. There was paper everywhere. On the floor. On the desk. On the bed. Loose sheets of it, notebooks, even Post-its, all scribbled with lines, and words, and slanted, sloppy notes, as if the composer had gone mad.

Tears pooled in my eyes as I glanced at Evan, but even through them, I could see the pencil on the floor near his right hand. It was worn down to a nub.

When had he written them? I'd never left him, yet I hadn't seen the scribbling. I remembered only music. Blissful notes. Painful melodies.

“He's dying,” Andi whispered, palms rubbing up and down the sides of her jeans, like she could wipe death off her skin. “You killed him.”

“No.” I staggered, and caught myself on the bookshelf. “Evan, wake up. . . .” I knelt by him again, and he opened his eyes.

He dragged in another shallow breath, and his chest rose. “What happened?” he whispered, and I closed my eyes.

“Tell him what you did,” Andi demanded, and I flinched. But I couldn't speak. So she spoke for me. “She gave you
genius
. But genius is short-lived, right, Mallory?”

My tears fell, scalding against my cheeks. Her words hurt so badly I thought I'd die. But looking at Evan hurt worse.

“What are you?” His dull, colorless eyes accused me silently, his mouth gaping open, lips cracked. He exhaled, one last time. Then his chest was still.

“She's your muse,” Andi whispered into the terrible silence.

I sobbed. Tears rolled down my face and dropped to the floor, but they were not musical. They were flat. Empty. That awful chill crawled back into my heart with cold, dead fingers. Even my screech of pain and regret was atonal. Ugly. And now I was empty. Cold. So hollow my heartbeat echoed.