CHAPTER 11 #2
Carter leaned forward now, further, stretching further into the sunlight. “I—I like you, Eleanor,” he admitted. “I think you’d be perfect… for what I need.”
I pinched a pawn. Perfect for what I need. The words did nothing. There were no sparks, no butterflies, no excitement. Carter was choosing me, and it was like my body was asleep, unable to react.
A loud chirping noise filled the air like a bird had gotten into the game room. Carter jumped at the sound. “Sorry,” he said, pulling his phone out. He glanced at the screen, angling it toward his chest. “If it’s all right, I’m going to take this.”
I was actually relieved for the call, desperate for space to breathe. “Go ahead.”
He rose from the board, pointing a finger. “No cheating.”
I gestured to his camera. “There’d be evidence.”
Carter smiled when he left.
I tried not to let my relief be visible, since his camera was still recording, but I slumped forward.
Surely he hadn’t been about to ask for my hand in marriage, but his sudden intensity had thrown me.
And fate? When he came back, would he jump back into that conversation?
At least it was almost the top of the hour.
Jamie would be finished with book club soon.
With my racing thoughts, I was suddenly too aware of the window beside me. The sun set lower, streaks of gold filtering into the room and across the chessboard. Beckoning me to look at the sky. To look at the serenity garden. To look at the place that’d been as scary as a monster in the dark.
And like a siren singing its song, for the first time in four years, I looked my nightmare in the eye.
The garden was beautiful. You’d never have guessed a fourteen-year-old lit it on fire once upon a time.
The gardeners at Alderton-Du Ponte had the rosebushes replaced with ones that looked similar but lacked the “award-winning” title.
Flowers bloomed at the base of the bushes, pink instead of lavender.
A large tree sat in the middle of the garden, with flowers blooming at its trunk, its large limbs full of leaves and filtering sunlight.
And there, just in front of the tree, sat an outdoor chess table with two wrought-iron chairs on either side of it.
Magical. Haunted.
There were no pieces, so if anyone wanted to play chess at that table, they’d have to bring their own—or find their own. Beck and I had hunted around for makeshift pieces when we’d wanted to play, scouring the ground. Rocks for pawns, sticks for rooks, flower petals for queens.
I’d only ever played out there with Beck.
I’d only ever been out there with Beck.
C-U-R-S-E-D.
“Thirsty?”
A shocked gasp wrenched out of me, and for how silent the room had been up until then, it’d echoed loudly in my ears. And then, a second later, an iced coffee appeared in front of me.
I knew the voice, but I still traced the arm up, finding that my nightmare had come to life.
Beck’s expression as he stood before me was neutral, no smirking grin or glittering eyes. He had a heather-gray sweatshirt on, hood drawn up over his head, shielding most of his blond hair. It peeked out at the sides, though, feathering over his forehead.
Beck gave the cup a shake, and the ice gave a death rattle. “No?”
My voice was more incredulous than outraged. “How do you always know where I am?” My gaze dropped to the camera, where the red light still blinked at me. Without thinking twice, I reached over and pressed the button, stopping the recording.
“I’m psychic.” Beck set the coffee down on the chess table, and I immediately snatched it up before its condensation could hurt the wooden surface. “Just kidding. Jamie told me.”
“Jamie told you I’d be playing chess?”
“More accurately, Jamie told me he had book club tonight, that you usually go with him, and that he thought you had invited Pebble Brain to come play chess with you.” Beck eased himself down into the seat Carter had vacated just minutes earlier. “I don’t see him.”
“He stepped out for a moment.” I brought the coffee up to my nose, inhaling deeply, still not taking a sip. Even from the scent alone, I knew what it was. Iced brown sugar shaken espresso. “It’s convenient, isn’t it? That the moment he had to go is the moment you show up?”
A slow smile started to touch Beck’s mouth. “What are you insinuating?”
“That you somehow got him to leave the room on purpose.”
“Me?” Beck dramatically pressed a hand to his chest. “I don’t have his number.”
I raised an eyebrow. “How do you know he got a phone call?”
Now, that slow smile bloomed in full force, sheepish but not embarrassed. Caught. Beck cursed softly under his breath and then began resetting the chessboard mid-game. “Play with me.”
“Beckham—”
“Just once, for old time’s sake,” he said, putting my white pawns back in place. “I want to do everything with you that Pebble Brain gets to do. Play with me.”
“We’ve already played before,” I reminded Beck, tamping down my budding nerves. “So, really, he’s doing something with me you’ve already done.”
“It’s been a while, though. Play with me now.”
Why should I? I wanted to demand. Why should I do something just because you say? I knew what his answer would be. In Beck’s simple world, where things were tit-for-tat, it made sense. B-E-C-A-U-S-E.
In my world, nothing Beck did ever made sense.
I took a long sip from the iced coffee, the bitterness of the espresso washing over my tongue, chased away by the brown sugar. Beck watched me drink, and even though I didn’t actually believe it, I couldn’t help but wonder if he’d poisoned it.
“You’ll still lose,” I told him, speaking with a haughty air I didn’t feel. I set the iced coffee down on the table beside us, beside the flowers Carter had brought, away from the chessboard. “You were terrible when we used to play.”
“Let me show you how good I’ve gotten.”
B-A-I-T. I knew it was. B-A-D I-D-E-A. I knew it was that, too. “How did you know the kind of coffee I drink?”
“I heard him order it.” Beck slid his pawn forward two spaces, claiming the first move. “At Crushed Beanz. I was sitting at the front table. You didn’t see me when you walked in.”
Had he been there from the beginning? “Why were you there?”
“You know why I was there.” Beck jutted his chin at the board. “Your move.”
“How long were you there?” Unease gripped me. “Were you there for hours, just waiting for me to show up?”
“No,” Beck said patiently. “Because Carter said he’d pick you up at six.”
I let out a little breath.
“Your move, princess, or I’ll move one for you.”
With an exasperated sigh, I all but flicked my pawn forward a space.
Beck sat up, pleased that he’d gotten me to cave. He looked over the board with a quickly bouncing eye, much like how Carter had. I didn’t anticipate the match lasting that long.
I glanced at the doors. “Carter will be coming back.”
Beck moved another pawn forward, directly behind the first he’d moved. “Maybe.”
“The camera stuff is his. He’s at least coming back for it.”
“Are you filming an ASMR thing?” Beck glanced over at the camera. “Using you for content, is he?”
My fingers paused on a pawn, not lifting it from the board. “You haven’t told anyone… right?”
A flash of something genuine darted across his expression, almost like offense. “It’s not my secret to share.”
Surprise made my stomach feel tingly. The soft clack of wood against wood was the only sound between us for a few long seconds. When he moved his pawn into the right space, I swiped it up with my own. “You had a hand in it, didn’t you? Who called Carter?”
Beck examined the board with a lazy sort of pondering. “Lydia.”
“Lydia?” Carter had excused himself for a phone call from Lydia? “Why would she—”
“How come you didn’t take Pebble Brain to the serenity garden’s chessboard?” Beck asked, cutting me off again easily. “If Mr. ASMR wants to film it, wouldn’t that have been a better space?”
You know why I wouldn’t take him there, I wanted to say. You know that’s our place. “There aren’t any chess pieces for that board,” I said instead.
“You could’ve found some, like we used to.” He moved forward another pawn. “Rocks, flower petals, leaves—what did we use for the kings?”
“My necklace,” I answered him automatically, refusing to seem unsettled. “We used the charms on my necklace.”
Beck’s eyes dropped to my throat, eyeing the chain that hung there. The two pendants that were clustered together—the teardrop opal and the silver four-leaf clover. “Why do you still wear it?” His voice sounded strange. “I’m sure you’ve got prettier things.”
I looked down at the board, sliding my knight around without thinking, because I wanted to make a grand move that made me seem unshaken. Why? I wanted to echo. Because I could never bring myself to take it off.
“You never answer my questions,” Beck grumbled. He slid his rook up a space. A useless move. “Does Pebble Brain ask you all the right questions? Is that it? Does he say all the right things?”
I swallowed an inward sigh. Right, Beck said.
In my head, I heard the word he actually meant.
Not “right.” Perfect. “Carter is exactly what I need,” I replied, playing out moves in my head.
“I don’t know why we can’t leave it at that.
” I moved my bishop on a diagonal, a few spaces forward, and then glanced at the door. Where was Carter?
Beck immediately moved his knight. He at least moved it the correct way. He remembered more than I thought. “Because I know you.”
The words made me shiver. Since he’d moved his knight, he left his bishop wide open to be taken by mine. I just needed to clear a pawn first. “You do not know me. Not anymore.”
“I’ve figured it out, though. Why you’re going after him.
Maybe not because you want an in with his dad—or maybe not just that—but because you think it’ll impress your dad.
” Beck stared at the board, green eyes bouncing around the surface as if searching for his next move—or double-checking. “Right?”