42. Cin
Cin
I’m nervous about what he’s going to ask. I have a feeling I know what it’s about, and I’m not sure how much I can explain without Talon going all ape shit.
He strokes the side of my face, pushing the baby hairs that never seem to be tame without gel away from my eyes.
“Tell me why you don’t like to be touched,” he says while staring into my eyes.
“ You’re touching me,” I quip back, and he frowns.
I knew he noticed, with the reassuring comments he’s made since I got here, he’s perceptive. That much I understand, what I didn’t realize was how much he paid attention to it. How much he cataloged and put away.
“I guess I’ve always been avoidant to touch,” I shrug, “my dreams, or rather nightmares, always feel far too real. I feel this pressure, like I can’t move, and someone is screaming. There’s always someone screaming; sometimes it’s me, sometimes it’s not.” I guess I know who the other person is now. My mother was the one screaming while trying to keep me from bleeding to death. Fuck, this sucks to say out loud. I feel like I’m choking.
“And I always die in them at someone else's hands.”
“Cin…”
“I don’t know how to explain it, but I’ll do my best,” and I do. I spill my deepest, darkest fears and truths, which I only recently learned are memories. Talon never says a word; just holds me and listens.
I’m screaming. I can hear it in my dream as if I’m experiencing an out-of-body encounter. My dream repeats, but this time, the faceless man who tried to kill me looks like Cody. The robed figures still chant and murmur, but I’m not a child this time. I’m the age I am now.
There’s a ring on my bloody hand, and my chest hurts like it’s being crushed by an invisible force.
I scream again, and tears start to fall.
I can’t hear anything over the noise I’m making in my sleep. It’s like being underwater and seeing yourself drown from the surface. I’m asleep enough to still be dreaming, yet aware enough to know I’m screaming.
My heart tries to pump in my chest but my ribs squeeze, making it impossible to get in a breath. In my dream, Cody lifts something silver, his hands already coated in red.
Everything hurts, but my head especially so. I feel faint, like I’ve lost a lot of blood. I can’t even find the strength to lift my arm to feel my head for a wound.
Cody’s face starts to change, morphing into a blurry version of someone else.
My father.
He smiles–
“CIN!” Talon’s face hovers above me as I rocket out of the dream. “Cin.” He says again, this time it sounds more like relief.
The tears I thought I was crying in the dream still coat my face, and I panic. Kicking the tangled covers, I try to get up, but Talon holds me still.
“Cin,” his voice is a command, and I stop, closing my eyes and willing this nightmare to end. “Baby, you’re screaming. Cin, look at me.”
The waver in his voice makes me cry harder, but I do as he asks, opening my eyes and looking at him. My heart beats erratically in my chest as he takes deep breaths with me.
“Are you okay?” His eyes search over my body, “you scared the shit out of us.”
It’s then I notice the other guys standing around the bed. I must have been really out of it not to see them.
“Sorry,” I choke and hang my head, “it was nothing.”
“Bullshit,” Talon grips my chin and tilts it up so I have no choice but to look at him, “you were screaming and crying in your sleep. How often does that happen?”
“Tal–” Toby starts but quickly stops at whatever he finds on his twin's face.
I want to cry harder, but I know he won’t stop until he has answers.
“It’s not usually this bad,” I try.
“Try again, Spice.”
I look around at the boys and their states of undress. They must have raced over here without thinking of what they were wearing.
“Are you okay?” Henry asks, and I slump even further into myself.
“I’m sorry,” I say again, “I’m–”
“If you say you’re sorry one more goddamn time…” Talon’s voice is deadly, as if he wants to jump into my dream and obliterate whatever caused me to react this way. I understand why he’s acting like this, but I don’t know why the other guys are here, and the confusion must be plain on my face because Talon says, “they came running as soon as I called; they wouldn’t be here if you weren’t important to them too. Now, tell me what happened.”
“Come on, guys,” Toby says, ushering Banks and Henry over to their side of the room. He shuts the door behind him, and I cry.
While Talon wipes my tears away with his thumbs, I tell him about my dream and how each one is different, but this one felt real.
“I saw Cody this time,” I pull my bottom lip into my mouth, waiting for him to react. When he doesn’t, I continue, “I’ve never seen him in my dreams. It’s always been someone else. But this time, it was Cody, I’m sure of it.”
“I won’t ever leave you alone with him again,” he swears, “and one of us will also be with you at all times.”
“You have lives,” I shake my head, “and I have Griffin.”
“I know, and I know you trust him, but I’d feel better if one of us were with you, too.”
I don’t have to agree because, looking in his eyes now, I know this isn’t a request.
“You scared the shit out of me,” he says, kissing the corner of my lips. I need the contact, the solidity of him.
Twisting my head, I kiss him. Bringing my hands up to run through his hair, I bring him down onto the bed with me. He follows, swiping his tongue through my lips and gripping my hip with one hand while holding himself up with the other by my head.
“Cin,” he says on a puff of air, “I mean it. I don’t know how to be gentle, and I’m scared that one day you’re going to hate me for it.”
I shake my head, and our noses brush, “I don’t think I could ever hate you, Talon Rossi, and believe me, I’ve tried.”
He closes his eyes and leans his forehead down onto mine. We stay that way for a while until he places a kiss on my lips and falls on his side. Scooping his arm between my thighs and pulling me flush with his body.
“Sleep, baby, I’m not going anywhere. You’re safe.”
Falling asleep in his arms shouldn’t be so easy, not after a dream like that one, but it is. I slip back into sleep, only this time no demons follow.